Terri Brisbin Read Online Free Page A

said, offering her his hand. “I would speak to
you.”
    She stepped back, opening a path into her chamber. “We can
speak inside, Connor.”
    “We can but will not,” he explained, shaking his head to refuse
her offer. “I will be neither interrupted nor disturbed while this matter is
settled between us.”
    She swallowed once and then again, took a deep breath and then
accepted his proffered hand, walking at his side toward the stairs to their
chambers. He waited, hoping she would just admit the truth to him on her own,
but the words never came. He guided her up the stairs to their rooms and gave
orders to the guard at the bottom there that no one be allowed up.
    With the wedding feast still continuing, they could not remain
away for long, but Connor had two separate plans to persuade her to explain
herself and her actions to him. If the first did not work, the second surely
would.
    He knew everything about this woman at his side, every inch of
her body, every facet of her soul, and he would use that knowledge to show her
she could confide in him over this troubling matter. If not as her husband, then
as her laird.
    They stepped into their chambers and he released her hand,
turning to drop the bar across the door. Another way to ensure there would be no
interruptions. He waited for her to face him, which she did from several paces
away, but when she would have spoken, or looked as though she would, Connor
shook his head at her.
    “I think, wife, you have forgotten the danger in rousing the
Beast of the Highlands.” He smiled at her and she blinked rapidly as though
trying to figure out his meaning. Connor did not let her wait for long. Striding
across the distance between them, he pulled her into his arms and lifted her
face to his.
    “Now you will find out what happens when you do such a
dangerous thing.” And with that little warning, he paused only to inhale her
enticing scent and then he pounced on his prey.

Chapter Five
    In spite of his fearsome reputation when they met,
Connor had never raised a hand to her. Now, as he made his threat, she wondered
in that momentary pause what his path would be and should have suspected this
one. He knew her body was his and now he would seek her soul by using his
knowledge against her, much as she had last night. She meant only to distract
him, but he meant to claim her and to show her that she was his.
    It took him only seconds and one devastating kiss to gain her
body’s surrender.
    His mouth grew insistent and hot as he touched his tongue to
her lips and pressed forward to taste her. One followed and another and another
until she lost her breath. Pulling her mouth from his did not help, for he
followed and captured her with another kiss. Her breasts swelled and she felt
him pull her closer, sliding his leg between hers until she nearly straddled it.
Allowing no space between them, he pulled her closer and she slid up along his
thigh, the friction of the layers of clothing between them a delicious thrill.
She felt him half carry her back a few paces, and then the hard surface of the
wall was at her back.
    His mouth released her for a scant moment as he positioned her
higher in his arms and used the wall to support her. Then as she rode his thigh,
Jocelyn felt his hand seek a path under her skirts to the naked skin of her
thigh. Damn her body, for it responded by arching against him, almost begging
him to seek the heated, wet core of her being. He kissed her again and she
moaned into his mouth and his fingers did find her skin and then inched their
way closer and closer and…
    Her head fell back against the wall and she panted, her body
aching for more than he gave her. His mouth traced kisses down her face and neck
and he reached his hands up and pulled the neckline of her gown until the laces
snapped. Drawing the edge of her gown and chemise loose and low, Connor kissed
and licked his way down from her shoulders and across the swell of her breasts
and lavished those