The Tiger's Lady Read Online Free Page A

still?”
    Something about that low, rough voice made Barrett shiver. But she stiffened, raising her chin in defiance. “I fear no one! I do not mean to be careless, however.”
    Strong fingers rose to cup her chin, and the giant emerald ring flashed before her eyes. “Why are you followed? Because of an angry husband? A jealous lover.”
    “I have no lovers—jealous or otherwise,” Barrett said flatly.
    “Then why—”
    “I can tell you no more. Thank you for your assistance, but now I must go. Soon he will send others to—” With a smothered gasp, she bit back the rest of her sentence.
    “Who?”
    “Just—others. Men as you have described—jackals who yap at the tiger’s heels.” Her lips quivered slightly as the Indian’s strong fingers brushed the underside of her chin. His thumbs circled the soft swell of her lower lip. “Stop! I can’t think when—when you do that.”
    The man’s mouth curved slightly, his teeth bright against the darkness of his face. “And I cannot think if I do not, meri jaan. Not with such beauty to entrap me.”
    “Meri jaan?” she repeated unsteadily, desperate to think of anything but the fire of his fingers.
    “My soul. My world.” His eyes glittered. “It is no more than you could be, Angrezi. With such a voice. With a body of such fire and sweetness.”
    Barrett’s breath caught. She had no time for weakness, nor for wild flattery. “I must go,” she said, forcing her voice to coldness. “I regret that I have nothing with which to repay you for your assistance.”
    Her captor did not move. “Ah, but there you err, little falcon, for you do have it in your means to repay me. And I fancy I shall collect my price before I let you fly free.”
    Barrett’s fingers opened, shoving furiously against his silk-clad chest. Her struggles wrenched his cloak open, and she gasped as a score of jewels winked back at her, sewn with stiff embroidery to the top of his satin tunic.
    Wild laughter trembled on her lips. Repay him ? Sweet heaven, the man had wealth beyond measuring! One jewel alone would have seen her secure for life. What use would he have for her pathetic few shillings?
    Slowly his hands slid to her shoulders. He pulled her against him, all warm, taut muscle against her softness. Heat leaped between them in the dark cocoon of night.
    “This is my price, Angrezi.”
    His face slanted down. Barrett watched, hypnotized, her heart hammering as his fingers captured her black veil and slowly drew it away from her face.
    Already she felt his heat, knew how he would taste against her. Perhaps that was why she didn’t struggle, but only waited, breathless, to learn if the beauty of their earlier kiss had been simply an imagined thing.
    His large hand splayed open against her neck. His black cloak whirled and danced in the wind. Suddenly the night was warm, alive with sound and sensation.
    Her head fell back, and his followed it down, one hand buried in her hair, tugging the silken strands free of their confining combs. His breath was a raw whisper at her throat as he inhaled her scent, then tongued her neck, pulse point by pulse point.
    And then his lips found hers. He covered her, possessed her, rough with an unspoken urgency.
    Barrett’s breath caught in a gasp as he swept her down smooth, glossy corridors of pleasure.
    Until she wanted more. Much more.
    The ground seemed to shudder beneath her feet, the sky to flash with jagged lightning. Yet all the while the night hung frozen around them, caught in midnight silence.
    Their contact points became the world, the only world, and the pleasure went on forever, born and dissolving in wave after wave of sensation.
    “Who—who are you?” she gasped at last, when some fragment of reason helped her pull free of his drugging touch.
    “Would it help to have a name? Can you trust a word more than what you feel, Angrezi?” His eyes glittered. “Some know me as the faithful hand of the Lord. To others I am the devil’s own