‘I want you…’
She wasn’t sure which one of them said the words first. The truth was that the declaration was torn from both of them in almost the same moment so that the rough-voiced assertion sounded as if there hadn’t been two single people speaking it but one of them as a whole, both male and female proclaiming the overwhelming primal need that had them in its grip.
‘I want you…’ Penny managed again, her low, shaken voice sounding like an echo that had fallen from the very first pronouncement and was now fading away into a broken whisper, almost drowned out by the crash of the waves against the cliffs beyond the open door. ‘I want you.’
‘And you shall have me,’ was Zarek’s ardent response as he lifted her from the floor, swinging her up into his arms and carrying her swiftly from the room.
The hallway and stairs were still in almost total darkness but Zarek seemed to have eyes like a cat so that he didn’t hesitate for a moment but strode swiftly up the stairs, even taking them two at a time at one point, in his haste to reach their bedroom. Kicking open the door, he hurried her across to the bed where he tumbled her down on the covers, coming down beside her in an instant.
‘Ise panemorfi…Ise panemorfi.’
He was muttering the phrase over and over again, punctuating each word with a kiss on a different part of her exposed body. Her face, her shoulders, her arms, down the slopes of her breasts. And then, at last, at long, long last, his mouth closed, hot and hungry, over one tight nipple. Sharp teeth scraped it so gently for a moment, before he suckled hard to relieve the tiny pain, making her arch against him with a low, wordless cry of pleasure.
‘Z-Zarek…’
His name was all she could manage as any thought and the ability to find coherent words were obliterated by the sheer force of the sensual storm that took her. Acting blind, she had managed to pull open his shirt, tug it part way off his shoulders, so that at least her hands could explore the warm, tight contours of his chest, tangle in the rough haze of black body hair that tickled her palms, curled around her fingertips.
Zarek’s hands were dealing with her dress, taking it down further at the front, tugging it up at the skirt to expose her legs, the plain white knickers that were now her only covering apart from the band of bunched material at her waist. And they didn’t last for long under the determined assault of those powerful hands that tore them apart as if they had been made of nothing more substantial than tissue paper.
She had barely time to gasp in shocked excitement when those wicked fingers, gentler now, were stroking through the dark curls he had exposed, finding the moist cleft between her legs, the tiny bud that pulsed with hungry need.
She was so aroused that the first intimate touch of his hand on her had her crying out and throwing her head back against the pillows, her eyes closed so that she could focus on the shock waves of pleasure that rocked her world.
‘I missed this…’ Zarek’s rough mutter close to her ear echoed her own private thoughts and all the time that knowing hand teased and tormented her, building the desire to the point where it almost broke her, then easing back to take her away from the edge just for a moment. ‘And I know you did too. Missed what we had together…’
Penny had no idea where the sudden change of mood came from. The abrupt and totally unexpected switch from blind and greedy passion to a new and very different frame of mind, one that shocked her out of the heated sense of oblivion into which she had fallen. It was as if someone had suddenly opened a window, letting in an icy rush of cold night air that feathered over her exposed skin, cooling her blood and making her shiver in shocked response. As if a cold, cruel voice had spoken out of the blue, and the words she heard inside her head had the force of a slap in the face, jolting her back to bitter reality with a rush.
Missed what we had…
Missed what we had…
And what had they had? Blazing passion, true—a burning physical desire that had blinded her to everything else. But nothing more. There had been nothing between them but sex. At least on Zarek’s part.
And was she going to let him just walk back into her life—and into her bed again—without so much as an argument? When Zarek had left for the Troy she had known that she had never meant her wild and hurting threats that she would not wait for him. She’d told herself that if she stayed, then when he returned she had to stand up to him. That there had to be more to make this marriage work, her love alone wasn’t enough to sustain it, and something was going to have to change.
Two years was a much, much longer wait than the few days she had been expecting, but her resolve needed to still be so much the same. More so if she was to be able to survive as Zarek’s wife ever again.
Nothing would change if she gave in at the first kiss, the first caress.
‘Zarek…’ She tried to speak but it seemed that all strength had drained from her voice and nothing audible came out.
‘Gineka mou…’
Zarek had no such trouble and as he pressed his mouth against her breast again his words were perfectly audible. As was the darkly possessive note in them.
Gineka mou…My wife.
He was staking his claim on her once more, using sex to do so. That was how he’d won her, how he’d held her blind and deceived for the first six months of their marriage. But then she’d learned the truth…
‘No!’
This time she had no trouble in making herself heard. The cry of rejection was loud and clear, echoing round the empty house. In the same moment she tried to push at Zarek, push him away from her. Free herself from his possessive and dangerously enticing hold. His hands still caressed, his mouth pursed to press another kiss against her breast and she could feel the hot, moist touch of his tongue against her skin. Another moment and she would be lost again. Already she could feel the tidal waves of dark desire sweeping over her, threatening to drown out the frantic voice of sanity and self-preservation.
‘I said no!’
With urgent, desperate hands, she pushed at him but he was too big, his powerful body too heavy for her attempts to move him. So throwing caution to the wind she resorted to desperate measures. Reaching out, she grabbed a handful of his black hair—two—twisted her fingers in it, refusing to let herself think about the silky slide of it in her grip, and tugged. Hard.
‘Gamoto!’
She didn’t have to know much Greek to understand that Zarek’s violent explosion of sound was definitely a swear word. She only had to see the way his head came up, his eyes flaring sharply.
‘What the…?’
‘I said no!’
Surprise gave her an advantage she hadn’t expected and with a frantic wriggle, another push, she was free of his confining weight, out of the bed and thudding onto the floor. Panic carried her halfway across the room, almost falling as she struggled to keep her balance and get as far away from him as possible so that he couldn’t reach out and grab her, use his superior strength to hold her, keep her prisoner.
‘What the hell…?’
If Zarek’s eyes had been sparking irritation before, now they were positively incandescent. They burned with fury, turning a look on her that she felt really should have shrivelled her into a pile of dust where she stood, silhouetted against the window, the moonlight lighting her from behind.
‘You…’
Zarek stopped abruptly, clearly fighting to bring himself under control. With an effort