Читать книгу Ruling Passions - Laura Wright, Laura Wright - Страница 9

Llandaron

Four months later

Fog surrounded the sloop like a perilous curtain, while the influx of seawater slithered into the hull in a snake-like stream.

As she stuffed wet couch cushions into the cavity, Sophia Dunhill cursed herself for forgetting to plot her estimated position.

How could she have been so stupid? So scattered?

Maybe because with her grandfather’s beautiful homeland in her sights, all thoughts of navigation had simply drifted from her mind.

She’d been sitting on the deck with the late-afternoon sun warming her shoulders, staring out at the small island nation just off the coast of Cornwall. She’d felt mesmerized by Llandaron. Her mountains and her beautiful landscape of trees, purple heather and rocks itching with beach grass.

The weather had been absolutely perfect. Blue sky, calm seas. Then everything had changed. Out of nowhere thick fog had rolled in like a milky carpet so fast she’d barely had time to think. And in seconds the Daydream had collided with the rocky coastline.

How was it possible? A sailor for a good ten years and she hadn’t seen this one coming.

Panic surged in her blood as she bolted up the companionway steps to the deck and straight into the thick fog. She couldn’t lose this vessel to her own stupidity and a pile of rock. It was all she had left of her grandfather. The beautiful sloop was his legacy, his dream—and the one thing that only they’d shared. It had to remain afloat. After all, she still had one leg of this voyage, her grandfather’s voyage, to complete. She had to dock the Daydream in the small fishing village of Baratin where her grandfather was born before she could return home to San Diego, to her empty apartment and to the writer’s block that had plagued her since his death.

Baratin wasn’t far, just on the other side of Llandaron, and come hell or rough water she would make it.

With steady hands she hauled a spare sail across the deck and draped it over the gaping hole. But the water was too powerful. The padding wasn’t going to hold for long. Especially bumping against the rocks the way they were.

A fleeting thought born out of panic, shot into her mind and she quickly shoved it away.

Abandon ship.

But to a sailor, abandoning ship was akin to abandoning a child. It wasn’t done.

At that moment seawater burst through a deck plank like a geyser. The boat shifted, groaned in pain.

Abandoning her child.

Sophia’s heart squeezed. She had no choice.

Grabbing the chart and ditch bag she’d packed, Sophia eased her way to the bow of the boat. Was she a coward to take the easy road? she couldn’t help but wonder. For a moment she was reminded of her parents’ funeral, of the decision she’d made that day to defy their will and go and live with her grandfather instead of her stern aunt Helen. After years of living with two domineering spirits, Sophia had felt desperate for freedom. She’d gone on instinct, and finding her grandfather had been one of the best decisions of her life.

Instinct was all she had to cling to now, and it was screaming at her to jump.

Sophia gave one last glance at the chart to make sure she knew which way to swim. Then, with her eyes closed, her breath a little too tight in her lungs, she listened for the sound of the waves just as her grandfather had taught her.

And after snugging up the straps on her life jacket, she slipped into the water.

He’d hoped to keep the world out.

At least for a while.

From the deck of his beach house, Alex Thorne leaned back in his chair, took a pull on his beer and reveled in the shroud of fog that enveloped him. Granted the mystical fog only lasted one hour in Llandaron. But it was an hour of no questions, no answers and it was pure ecstasy.

After returning home from London five days ago, there had been nothing but questions and the demand for answers. As always he’d dealt with each as succinctly and as nonemotionally as possible. His family didn’t need details of his failed marriage, just the facts: he was divorced and back home to resume his duties, face his people.

Given his brusque nature, Alex had thought the news would flow easily from his lips. But it hadn’t. Deep in his gut, shame had paved the road.

His brother, Maxim, and sister, Catherine, had offered their support and their love, while his father had listened with a tight expression, giving off only sighs and an occasional nod.

Alex didn’t scorn the man’s pragmatic reaction. In fact, he understood it. He, too, was worried about Llandaron and how its citizens would take the news of his failure when it was soberly announced at the annual Llandaron Picnic on Saturday. He couldn’t forget how year after year his people waited patiently for news of a child. News that would never come.

Could his people forgive him this, too? Or would they ask him to step down in favor of Maxim?

Alex took another pull on his beer and stared out into the fog-shrouded sea he bowed to whenever he needed some semblance of comfort. There was no getting past the fact that he loved his people more than his own life. And he was ready to do as they wished. Whatever they wished—

Suddenly, Alex stopped short, all thoughts spent, and leaped to his feet. Brow furrowed, he cocked his head to the side and listened.

A sound. A cry—coming from the water, faint, but desperate—echoed over the beach. A sound that made his blood run cold.

Gut in his throat, Alex bolted off the deck, dropped down onto the cool sand and raced to the water’s edge. The fog was thick as butter, but the visual impasse didn’t make him cautious. He could have run that stretch of beach blindfolded, he’d combed it so many times.

There it was again. A woman’s cry. Louder now.

Without pausing to think, Alex thrashed into the surf, then dove beneath the waves. He swam like a demon toward a cry muffled by the swirl of the sea.

When he surfaced, he fought for his bearings. He looked right then left, then behind himself as his legs worked like twin engines in the water.

It took all of five seconds for him to locate the source of that cry. Red hair, wide eyes, pale complexion. A woman thrashing about in the water, the strings of her life vest caught on rock.

Her shouts for help grew hoarse, weak. She was obviously tiring. The erratic tumble of Alex’s heartbeat thumped in his ears as he swam like a sea snake straight for her. Once he reached her side, he wasted no time with words. He ripped the vest from the rock, then eased his arm around her waist and scooped her up.

But in his haste for shore, his leg caught, gripped by a colony of seaweed. The slimy mess wrapped his ankle like a hungry Octopus, dragging him down, dragging him under.

Cursing, he lost hold on the girl, for a moment lost his breath as he struggled under the whirling sea. Panic knocked him senseless as his pulse raced wildly in his chest. Floating below the surface of the green sea, he saw fleeting images of death, his death.

Then suddenly he felt a rush of water loop his legs, saw the red-haired woman down by his ankle, cutting him away from the slimy green god.

Up he sailed, practically flew to the surface of the water like a helium balloon to the blue sky. Air smashed into his lungs. Coughing and sputtering, he fought to stay above the lurching sea.

Then, just when he thought fatigue might claim him, an arm eased across his chest, hooked him like a sad fish and he felt himself move.

The waves rose and fell around him like the footfall of a giant as they inched toward shore. The woman took her time, swimming slowly, taking the waves with gentle insistence, allowing them both a chance to get their bearings.

Though Alex’s lungs ached, his breathing soon regulated and his pulse eased toward normal as he floated on the surface of the water.

By the time his feet hit wet sand, he could walk. But he didn’t stay upright for long. When he felt the comfort of dry sand, he dropped down and stretched out. He heard the woman ease down beside him.

“You better be all right, Lancelot,” she said breathlessly.

It took Alex a good thirty seconds to respond to the thoroughly American quip. “Lancelot?”

“The knight? The one who rushed in to save the damsel in distress?”

“Right,” he mumbled, rubbing a hand over his wet face. “The one who rushed in to save the damsel in distress, then got his foot caught in the seaweed.”

“Seaweed, stirrups…same difference.” The woman put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re okay, right?”

“I’ll live.” Alex forced his heavy eyelids open. “So, if I’m Lancelot that must make you…”

The words died on his lips. Framed in a halo of milky-white fog, just inches from his face, was a woman of such heavenly beauty he nearly thought he’d succumbed to the pull of the ocean depths. Eyes the color of the sea—pale green with tinges of blue—and miles of red hair, wet and in gentle waves.

His body tightened. It was her. He felt it in his bones—that same need, that same connection. How was this possible? The mermaid from four months ago, here. Washed up on his stretch of beach.

“I think that makes me an idiot,” she said with dry humor. “Actually I’d say we’re both idiots.”

“How do you figure?”

“Me getting caught on that rock.” She dragged her tongue across her lower lip thoughtfully. “You getting caught in the weeds.”

If he snaked a hand around the back of her neck, pulled her down to him, would she part her lips for him, kiss him the same hungry way he wanted so desperately to kiss her? “That doesn’t sound like idiotic behavior to me.”

“No? What does it sound like, then?”

“Divine intervention. Perhaps we’re both looking to get caught.”

The fog seemed to suffuse Alex all at once. He had no idea what had made him say such an insane thing, but it was too late to retract the statement.

The woman stared intently at him, as though she could see right through his skin. “I’m not looking to get caught, I’m looking to find freedom.”

“God knows why, but right now they seem to be one and the same.” He said the words as much to himself as to her.

Confusion swept her face. “Yes, they do. Why is that?”

She didn’t give him a chance to answer, though he really had none to offer. This mood, this moment, was unreal, surreal. She lowered herself on top of him. Her arms snaked around his neck, her needful gaze melted into his own and she kissed his mouth. Just once, one soft, small touch.

Alex cursed the delicious weight of her, the fullness of her breasts pressing against his chest, the pouty lips just inches from his own.

With the fog as her refuge, she was doing something terrible and highly erotic to him, something he’d never felt before—or wanted to feel. Her eyes, the way she looked at him…she had him bound, deep in a trance—a mysterious, sensuous trance. And he needed to get lost there.

Mouth to mouth, body to body, fog blanketing them from the world. Pure paradise.

The freedom to be caught.

His pulse slammed her rhythm in his blood. This had to be a dream. Or maybe it was a nightmare, he reasoned as pure heat came over him, dark and unstoppable. A nightmare where all the control he prided himself on was lost. Where his mind went, his reason, too.

Animal instinct took him. He shifted, had her on her back in seconds. He watched as she smiled tentatively, then lifted her chin, parted her lips. Was he insane? he wondered as her eyes drugged him, drew him in. Did he care?

The surge of need that rippled through him was completely foreign. Or maybe it had just been tucked away, waiting…

A deep, aching groan erupted from his throat as he lowered his head, brushed his lips over hers, just to test, to tease. And as he’d hoped, prayed, she met him.

Hot mouth, sweet tongue. Her fingers fisted in his hair, pulling him closer.

Alex couldn’t think—didn’t want to think. He whispered against her mouth, “What are we doing?”

With an erotic nibble on his lower lip, she uttered, “I have no idea. But it feels so good.”

“Too good.”

His mind went blank once again as she kissed him, deeply, urging him to follow, to play, to plunder. Total madness took him, and his kiss turned ravenous. She angled her head over and over, her hips pressing up, up against the steel in his jeans.

A need for control rapped at his mind. He pulled away, just an inch, his eyes burrowing into hers. Sea-green hunger stared up at him, willed him to close his eyes and take—only take. And when a bleating cry of distress escaped her throat, he silenced her in the only way he knew how.

Around them, the ocean pounded the shore.

Around them, the fog swirled.

With a wildness he was just beginning to understand, she pulled at his T-shirt, fumbled with the button on his jeans. Then before he could think, she rolled them both over until she was straddling his waist, fog lacing her face.

Pulse pounding, Alex eased down her bathing suit top, cupped her full breasts in his palms, rolled the swollen buds between his thumbs and forefingers. A hot gasp rushed out of her, and he felt her quiver over and over against his erection. He knew she was on the brink of release, totally free to take what she wanted.

He tugged at her nipples as she moved her hips against him in a rhythm as timeless as the ocean waves. Beneath them, sand flicked and flew. Alex moved with her, taking her to the edge as against his fingers, those rosy peaks turned crimson.

Suddenly she cried out, a deep aching sound from low in her throat.

Painfully hard, Alex rolled her on her back. He had her suit off, her thighs splayed before the next ocean wave crashed against the beach behind them. Breath heavy, eyes hungry, she wrapped her long, glorious legs around him, then slammed her hips upward.

Alex stared down at her. “Do you want this?”

“Yes,” she whispered, panting.

Without another word, another thought, Alex rose up and plunged inside of her. He gasped as she stretched around him, wet and hot. “You feel like heaven.”

A moan escaped and the words, “I’m no angel.” She lifted and lowered her hips, moving him in and out of her body with wild, wicked strokes.

Complete madness took him. But he knew the madness couldn’t last long, and that made him sick with anger. He wanted to be lost in this, in her, in this hallucination forever. But his body was weak from years of denial.

Sweat beaded on his brow as he drove into her, burrowing them both deeper into the sand.

She was so tight. So was he.

Her hands were everywhere at once; his back, his buttocks, gripping his shoulders. Until she stiffened, her legs releasing their hold on him and opening wide.

He could feel her climax coming, rumbling through her body like thunder, grasping him with her muscles. The feeling was so sweet he thought he’d lose his mind.

But instead he lost his control.

And as she convulsed around him, tightening, squeezing, Alex gave in, fell over the edge and exploded along with her.

As the heat of Sophia’s body ebbed, so did the fog around them. For one full minute she silently prayed that it would take her with it, up into the sky where it was safe from reality and awkwardness. But as she’d learned early in life, the elements kept their own counsel.

The man beside her shifted, his hot skin grazing her own.

Unbidden, her body stirred in response. She stifled a groan. No, she was no angel. Burying her face in her lover’s neck, she wondered how in the world had she allowed such a thing to happen. Granted, she wasn’t someone who shied away from life—but making love to a total stranger was completely over the top.

And, yet, she wanted more.

More lying naked beside the most achingly handsome man she’d ever seen. More time where loneliness and uncertainty subsided and wonderfulness abounded.

More feeling like a woman, desired and consumed.

Reaching twenty-six years old with one pale love affair to her credit, she’d often fantasized about moments like this. She just never imagined one becoming reality. And now that it had, waking up wasn’t as easy as opening her eyes to the morning sunshine and safety of her nautical bedroom back home in San Diego.

Sophia’s thoughts faded as the man beside her disentangled himself from her grasp and sat up. His jaw was as tight as a lobster trap, his heather-colored eyes filled with dismay as he looked down at her. Her heart lurched and fell, and she felt very naked. Despite his gloriously handsome features, his expression was one of consternation.

But for his own actions or for hers, she wasn’t sure.

With her cheeks turning pinker by the second, she snatched up her bathing suit and hurriedly slipped it on as she tried for a casual tone. “I suppose you won’t believe me if I say that I’ve never done anything like this before?”

His eyes were blank now, no banter, no smile. “I must apologize.”

His husky brogue washed over her, heating her skin once again under her wet suit. “There’s no reason for an apol—”

“Of course there is.” He cursed, drove a hand through his thick, black hair. “You were practically drowning out there—”

“So were you.”

“—and I—”

“And we,” she corrected.

He paused for a moment, his gaze moving over her. “Who are you?”

A fool? she felt an impulse to exclaim. A shameless woman with absolutely no hindsight. A woman so desperate to live a little, she’d lost her mind…for a moment. “Maybe it’s better that we don’t know each other’s names.”

He released a haughty snort. “Impossible.”

“Not really. Don’t ask. Don’t tell.” Just give me five minutes to disappear, she thought dryly.

“I’m afraid that rule doesn’t apply here.”

“Why not?”

He stood up then, slipped on his jeans, all broad shoulders and lean muscle. Lord, the man could’ve been carved in bronze he was so well put together. Wavy black hair licked the back of his neck, razor-sharp features showed off his imperious nature to perfection, and then there were those amethyst eyes—needful, yet proud as a lion.

“Let’s just say I’m old-fashioned,” he said dryly.

“Well, I’m not,” she countered. It was a lie, but emotional anxiety always brought out the worst in her. She wasn’t about to spill her guts to this man. Not when he was making it crystal clear that their lovemaking was a huge mistake. She wasn’t going to tell him her name, where she was from, that she was sailing the isles for her grandfather as she tried to come up with a decent idea for her next children’s book.

No. She just wanted to run.

“I don’t want to resort to commands,” he began, crossing his arms over his thickly muscled chest. “But I will.”

Sophia’s brows shot together; she wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. “Excuse me?”

“I’m afraid I will have to command you to tell me who you are.”

“Command me?”

“That’s correct.”

She grinned, let out a throaty laugh and shook her head, the tension inside her easing considerably. “That’s very funny. You’re funny. So that must make you what? The king of Llandaron or something?”

He shook his head brusquely. “Not yet.”

Her stomach pinged with nerves, but she shoved the feeling away, forced out another easy laugh. “Well then, I suppose you can call me the queen of the sea.”

“This isn’t a time for humor, Miss…”

“I agree.” She stood up, straightened her shoulders. This was getting ridiculous. They’d acted without thinking, made a horrible mistake. But it was over. She needed to get out of here. Now. Before this charade went any further. Before she made an even bigger fool out of herself. “Any more commands before I go find a boatworks, sire?”

His severe gaze fairly wilted her resolve. “Just one.”

She swallowed, feeling the heat in her belly fire to life—and hating herself for such a reaction. “Knock yourself out.”

“I was careless. For that I apologize.”

“Please, no more apolo—”

“You may be carrying my child, miss… The heir to the throne of Llandaron.” He raised a fierce brow at her. “I’m afraid you’ll have to remain with me, in my kingdom, until I know for certain.”