Page 49 of Tanglewood Legacy (The Three Sisters 3)
And he needed her. He loved her. He’d always love her. No matter what it meant for his future, his position, or his soul. He was hers.
Sliding his hand into hers, he led her back to his room and to the bed. “How is your ankle? Do you need a salve or bandage?”
She shook her head and lifted her skirt. “Rhys treated it with an ointment earlier. It’s almost healed.”
He knelt in front of her, massaging her ankle and calf. The wounds were indeed almost healed, but he couldn’t stop himself from inspecting them anyway. He needed to touch her. Needed to know she was all right. Her eyes settled on the pistol still hanging from his belt, and he removed it, returning it to its box in his wardrobe.
“You were incredibly brave tonight, Pierre. It couldn’t have been easy for you,” Isis said.
He loosened the collar of his shirt and leaned a shoulder against the bedpost. “I should say the same about you.”
“It’s different for me,” she said. “I have magic. I’m harder to kill.”
“But I have a pistol and a woman to love, and God help any man or woman who tries to keep me from her.”
This earned him a look hot enough to singe. She rose to press her lips to his. “You love me?” she asked, as if she’d never considered the possibility, despite their engagement and all the other times he’d told her before.
He ran his hands along her shoulders and then went to work on the strings binding the front of her gown. “When I pursued astronomy, I thought there would never be anything I found as fascinating as the stars, but their light pales in comparison to what I see in your eyes. Botany and horticulture held endless interest, until I tasted the sweet nectar of your lips and experienced the natural beauty of your body.” He finally got the damned garment open and freed her breasts, palming one and flicking his thumb over its tight peak. “And I thought the pleasures of rum a pleasant distraction, until I was intoxicated by the feel of your flesh against mine. You are my greatest discovery, Isis. An endless fascination. My sweet secret of the universe and the deepest respite of my soul. It wasn’t brave what I did today. It was pure instinct to protect my most precious treasure.”
A breathless gasp escaped her lips. “The things you say. I will never tire of the way you love, Pierre, as if your entire being is devoted to the task.” Pulling back, she undressed the rest of the way on her own and tossed her dress aside, before returning to face him completely in the buff. Lightning coursed through him at the sight of her full breasts, narrow waist, and the dark thatch of hair at the juncture of her thighs. His cock threatened to tear through his breeches. He had to have her.
He reached for her, hooking a hand around her waist and pulling her against him. Without her dress, she seemed tiny in his arms, small and exceedingly soft. Her evening primrose scent met his nose and drew him in. He narrowed his eyes on her. “You’ve bewitched me,” he said playfully.
Fisting his linen shirt, she lifted it over his head, then went to work on his breeches. “I assure you, I have not,” she whispered in his ear. “But what is love but its own kind of magic.”
She sank to her knees, removing his breeches and stockings as she went, until he was as naked as she was. His cock jutted toward her, already weeping for her. She tipped her chin up, and those deep blue eyes met his a second before she fisted his length, pumping toward the base, and licked him from base to tip.
“Mon etoile—”
“Where I come from, this is how we worship each other,” she said. Rose-colored lips parted and wrapped around his cock, her tongue swirling around the head. A groan that sounded more animal than human left his throat, and he tangled his fingers in her hair, thrusting to the back of her throat. She didn’t seem to mind the roughness. Humming her pleasure, she hollowed her cheeks and sucked him harder. As she bobbed her head, stroking and swirling her tongue, he thought he’d never known such pleasure. The view of his cock disappearing into her mouth again and again sent his blood pounding in his veins. A tingle started at the base of his spine.
She seemed to sense him getting close and wrapped her hands around his legs, clawing the backs of his thighs. The slight pain was his undoing. One hard suck and he came apart, moaning her name as he braced himself on her shoulders and spilled into her.
Once the room came back into view, he helped her off her knees, knowing the worship she’d shown him must be extended in her direction. She was his goddess after all. His Isis. He backed her knees against the bed and coaxed her to the center of the mattress. Kneeling between her legs, he turned breathless at the sight of her dark hair fanning across the pillows and her pink tongue lightly brushing her bottom lip.
He leaned over to capture that lip between his teeth, then stroked her tongue with his own, tasting himself on her mouth.Mon Dieu, he might combust from the erotic thrill of her. He already felt himself growing hard again. From her mouth, he trailed his kisses to her ear, teasing her earlobe with his teeth before feathering more along her neck and collarbone. She arched, tipping her head back and thrusting her pert breasts toward his face. He obliged her, drawing her nipple into his mouth, sucking hard until she cried out. He gave the other hard peak a nip, noticing the way the pain followed by a lick of pleasure flushed her skin.
He applied himself to learning her, seeking her pleasure like the conquistadors sought gold. He skimmed his knuckle from her navel lower, finding her wet and ready. A man on a mission, he moved down her body, gripped her inner thighs, and spread her wider, glorying in the sight of her. His mouth watered for a taste, and he did not deny himself. He licked up her center, noticing the way she bucked when his tongue reached her cleft. That. More of that. He circled the nub there, lapping and sucking, paying attention to what made her arch and moan. The feel of her against his mouth, her scent, the way she panted with pleasure and fisted the sheets.
She breathed his name, her thighs clenching around his head as she found her release. He didn’t stop until she reached down and pulled his hair. Gripping her hips, he rose onto his knees and pulled her to him, entering her in one hard thrust. She arched again, her body clenching, milking him, her gasps and moans of pleasure driving him on.
Sitting up, she wrapped her arms around his neck and rode his lap, her beautiful breasts pressing into his chest, soft to his hard. So warm, so wet. He cradled her ass and watched the way their bodies connected, the sound of flesh slapping flesh filling the room. Before long, the familiar tingle had begun again, and when she pitched over the golden edge of ecstasy, she took him with her.
Only after every wave of pleasure was squeezed from both their bodies did they flop onto the mattress and crawl under the covers, exhausted. He curled around her and drifted to sleep to the sound of her contented breath.
ChapterTwenty-Five
With Pierre’s arms wrapped around her, Isis drifted to sleep as happy as she’d ever been. When she’d arrived on the shores of la Nouvelle-Orléans, she’d wished to one day find the kind of love that her sisters had experienced. Now, she had, and he had helped her vanquish their rivals. They were safe now. They could rebuild here. Everything was falling into place.
In sleep, though, she was surprised to find things far less settled. Red eyes glowed in the darkness of her dreams, and Isis found herself lying on the stone crag in the underworld again, the ambient red light shining on the city beyond. Asmodeus stood over her, morphing into the form of the blond man in a pale gray suit. He shoved his hands into his pockets and frowned down at her.
Climbing to her feet, she brushed herself off. “What do you want, Asmodeus?”
“You didn’t have to entomb them, Isis. You have no idea how much effort went into creating them. Working with humans is such a chore. It’s like molding the Acropolis out of seaweed.” His lip curled off his fangs contemptuously.
“If you didn’t want me to neutralize them, you should have told them to leave me alone.” She folded her arms, her shadows hugging her sides protectively.
“Believe it or not, my goal in creating them wasn’t to hurt you.”
