The Maid's Lover. Amanda McCabe

me,” he murmured.

      “Of course I do,” she managed to whisper. “Now, if you please.”

      “So imperious,” he said with a tight laugh. “I should make you wait, make you beg, but I fear I cannot wait. Not another moment.”

      “Then do not. Please.” Anne wrapped her arms around his shoulders, whispering in his ear, “You see? If you want me to beg, I will.”

      “Next time, my love, I vow that you will.” He spread her aching folds wide, pushing himself deep inside of her with a twist of his lean hips.

      She bit her lip to keep from screaming aloud. She tightened her legs around him, pressing her hands to his rear as he drew away and lunged forward again, deeper and deeper. She closed her eyes tightly, falling into the hot whirlpool of wild delight. The scent and heat of him surrounded her, and their bodies moved together, arching and striving.

      The sparkling pressure built deep inside of her, expanding, growing, until it exploded like a bonfire. “Robert!” she cried, holding onto him as if to keep herself from drowning.

      He threw his head back, shouting her name as he found his own release. His back was taut as a bowstring, his backside tightly clenched under her touch. He collapsed to his side next to her, and she lay there listening to his harsh breath in the silence of the woods as she tried to catch her own.

      “Anne,” he murmured, resting his head on her abdomen. They said nothing more, just lay together in the heavy, heady, drowsy quiet.

      She caressed his tangled hair and spread it over her bare skin, a silken web that bound him to her. Or perhaps she was bound to him, for she never wanted to leave this place. When they were alone like this, the rest of the world felt so very far away. Nothing there could touch her when he held her in his arms, and it had been thus ever since she first saw him. When he came to a banquet at her grandmother’s house, back at his family’s home after years at Court and abroad, and she glimpsed him across the great hall, it was as if she was hit by sizzling, blue-white lightning. And when he took her hand and asked her to dance…

      Robert had a rare magic in him, and she craved him as she never had anything else. And, miracle of miracles, he seemed to feel the same about her. Every time they came together in their secret trysts was like the very first time; full of passion, desperation and wonder.

      But now—now it was time to move forward. To see what happened to them next. That morning she had listened as her grandmother gossiped with her ladies, and they said Robert would soon return to Court. “To make a fine, rich match no doubt. His parents grow anxious about that, I hear,” her grandmother said, with a questioning glance at Anne. As if she knew what was going on, and was sure a poor orphan like Anne Percy could hold no allure for Lord Langley.

      That was Anne’s great fear, too, one she kept hidden away even from herself. No matter how much he lusted for her, perhaps she was just a pastime for Robert. A dalliance until he returned to his real life at Court.

      She did not want that, not at all. She wanted more. She wanted everything. And she had to cease being too frightened to reach for it.

      “Oh, Anne,” he murmured. “You are truly like no one I have ever known.”

      Her hand grew still against his hair. “Am I? Even your lady at Court?”

      He sat up slowly, frowning down at her. “What are you talking about?”

      “I heard that you are intent on making a fine match at Court,” Anne answered. She, too, sat up, drawing her rumpled bodice over her bare bosom. The breeze felt suddenly cold on her skin. “A wealthy lady. One of the Queen’s own attendants, perhaps?”

      “I did not think you were the sort to listen to idle gossip,” he said tightly. He reached for his shirt, and shook the leaves and dirt from its wrinkled folds before pulling it over his head.

      “Is it idle? Are your parents not eager for you to marry, then?”

      “Of course they are. I am their heir.”

      Their heir—and she was nothing. She had nothing to offer him and his family but her love and ardor, and whatever meager portion her stingy uncle would give her. Yet her love was as strong and fine as any Spanish steel. As she looked at him now, his dark green eyes, the frown on his handsome face, those feelings burned and made her reckless.

      “And you?” she demanded. “Do you have a lady in your sights? Someone well-dowered and well-connected…”

      He seized her around the waist, dragging her to him. She braced her hands on his shoulders. “I have you in my sights, Anne Percy.”

      Did he mean—could he mean what she thought? Hope flowed in her heart, as bright and forceful as the passion. “I have no dowry.”

      “You have more than riches. You have yourself. Your beautiful, stubborn, changeable self. Truly I have never known anyone like you, Anne.” He lowered his head to kiss her neck, softly licking at that one spot he knew made her wild.