Viking Series - My Fair Viking Part 22

"I can," he countered, and moved his hand from her outer thigh to her inner thigh. With just his fingertips,

he lightly caressed her inner thighs in slow circles, from knees almost to her woman's fleece. Up one thigh, down the other, up one thigh, down the other.

Not only was she stiff as a pike now, but she was holding her breath.

"When I caress you here, do your b.r.e.a.s.t.s begin to ache?"

She nodded, to his surprise. He had not-expected such honesty.

"Do you feel a throbbing here... as I do?" He put the heel of his hand against that lowest portion of her belly, just above the pubic bone.

She released her pent-up breath and tried to hold his hand there, through the cloth of her gown, which

still covered her discreetly. But he was already back to finger-brus.h.i.+ng her thighs.

"Adam, I heard about the babe you lost today," Alinor said in the short break between entertainments.

The lutist was done, and now Ras.h.i.+d was preparing to tell one of his long Arab tales... something about a young man and a magic tapestry. "I am so sorry you were unable to save the wee one."

Notnow, Alinor.Oh, please, G.o.d, not now.He hoped his silent nod, accepting her sympathies, would be enough.

But already Tyra was turning in his lap, looking at him over her shoulder. "I forgot to ask you about Dagma. Oh, nay, don't tell me..."

"Dagma will be fine," he was quick to a.s.sure her. "She lost much blood, and is very weak after a full day and a half of labor, but the babe died in the womb."

"Oh, Adam," Tyra and Alinor said at the same time.

"It could not be helped; the cord was wrapped around the infant's neck. It must have been dead for days now."

"Oh, Adam," they repeated.

"Sometimes things, even bad things, happen for a reason," Alinor said then. "She is very young. She can have other children, can't she?"

"Probably."

"I should go see her," Tyra suggested.

"Not now!" He immediately realized how shrill his voice sounded. More calmly, he informed her, "I gave her some healing herbs that will make her sleep deeply through the night."

Icannot believe I am sitting here with my hand up my lady's gown, about to part her most intimate folds, with an arousal that could scorch the hair off a hog, and I am discussing medical affairs. Can this conversation not wait till the morrow? If Drifa overhears and starts asking me which herbs I used, Ithink I might just weep.

"Adam, you look as if you are about to weep," Tykir commented. Adam saw the twinkle in Tykir's eyes. He was looking from him to Tyra and back to him, his head c.o.c.ked in question. He might not know exactly what was going on, but his suspicions had been aroused.

"This is the story of Ala Din and his amazing adventures with a magic tapestry."

Never in all his life had Adam thought he would be relieved to hear Ras.h.i.+d begin one of his never-ending stories. It would probably involve harems in one way or another. The hall went silent as everyone leaned forward and listened intently, not wanting to miss a word of the tale. Vikings ever did love a good story. Adam did, too, but not now. For G.o.d's sake, not now!

Alinor turned forward.

And Adam said a silent prayer of thanks.

"Thank you for staying with Dagma," Tyra whispered over her shoulder at him, then turned to stare at Ras.h.i.+d, who sat on a high stool, surrounded by candles and torches, which gave an eerie cast to his Eastern features. Then, for the first time since he'd pulled her onto his lap, she relaxed and let her head loll back onto his shoulder.

Well, h.e.l.l, if I'd known a little sympathy or a little thankfulness would gain me this result, I could have told her about the old crone with the pus-oozing eyes I helped today. Or the little, boy's broken leg I set. Orthe burnI soothed with ointment on Alrek's palm from picking up hot kindling.

Tyra squirmed on his lap to get more comfortable, and Adam saw stars before him, so intense was the pleasure-pain in his groin. Good thing she could not feel him pressing against her b.u.t.tocks! He did not want to shock her.

"You may resume now," Tyra said.

"Huh? Are you speaking to me?" he asked.Shemust be addressing me, because Alinor is not even looking in our direction, and there has been no break in Ras.h.i.+d's talking. The only thing she could be referring to is...oh, my G.o.d!

"Of course I'm speaking to you, lackwit," she said with as much cordiality as a captain addressing a thick-headed soldier. "You may continue the finger-pleasuring game now."

Game? She views this as a game? So much for her being shocked!

"Have I shocked you?" she asked, apparently having second thoughts.

Nay, no second thoughts permitted. "Yea, you shocked me," he said, "in the nicest possible way."

"Shhhh!" Ingrith, Breanne, and Drifa all hissed at the same time. They were engrossed in Ras.h.i.+d's tale and wanted no chatter to distract their hearing.

And so, while Ras.h.i.+d told his tales of magic in an Eastern land, Adam began to weave his own form of magic.

He teased the hairs of her woman's nest with fluttering fingers, then palmed her, rotating the heel of his hand against her. She arched her back and whimpered softly. He would have liked to touch her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, but that would be too open a demonstration in front of an audience. Instead, he whispered into her ear, "Open more," and when she did, he dipped his fingers into the honey of her arousal and spread it up and down over her slick folds till he came to that bud which was the essence of a woman's pleasure. When he touched her there, she jerked and moaned aloud.

"Is something wrong?" Alinor inquired.

He was strumming Tyrathere now, and at first she was unable to speak.

"Nay, just a little indigestion," Tyra said.

Tykir snorted his disbelief.

"You should chew on mint leaves," Drifa offered. "That is the best thing for cramps in the abdomen."

"I told you the pig's liver in dill sauce was not for you," Ingrith said huffily. She must have come back to the hall to escape Bolthor's sagas in the scullery.

"Shhh!" someone down below protested.

Meanwhile, Adam was doing his best to contribute to her "indigestion." Strumming, and strumming, and strumming, till the bud became bigger and harder, and the folds furled open like the petals of a flower, and the dew was hot and thick.

He was feeling rather hot and thick himself.

Sensing that she was about to reach her peak, he eased a long middle finger up inside of her, and was rewarded by the rhythmic spasm of her inner muscles welcoming him to her world. Her hands grasped his forearms in an iron grip, trying to fight the overwhelming ripples that pa.s.sed through her. He would have bruises tomorrow, for a certainty... bruises that he would relish as a reminder of her sweet surrender. In the end, just before she crashed through that barrier that separates a woman from ecstasy, her knees gripped his and she put a fist to her mouth, trying to stifle her cries, but he heard, "Oh... oh... oh... for the love of Freyja!... oh!"

Then she sank into a relaxed heap of satiety.

Adam got great satisfaction out of Tyra's pleasure... not as much as if he'd climaxed himself, but close. Her open sensuality was a delight. He never knew what to expect next from her... as was proven in the following seconds.

When her soft panting died down and she was able to speak, Tyra turned slightly to face him and asked, "When can I finger-pleasure you?"

Chapter Thirteen.

"So, exactly how many kinds of pleasuring are there?" Tyra was asking Adam a short time later.

He groaned and put his forehead on the table. "What kind of monster have I created?" he murmured, but

he was smiling as he spoke; Tyra was fairly certain he did not consider her a monster at all. In fact, the hot looks he kept giving her would indicate just the opposite.

Ras.h.i.+d had finished his tale, none of which Tyra could remember, and several village boys did some acrobatics, none of which Tyra could remember, and most everyone had left the dais to engage in other pursuits, including dancing, which was taking place at the other end of the hall to the accompaniment of several fiddle players. But Tyra could not think of that. The only thing on her mind was the incredible experience Adam had just introduced her to.

"I mean, you have shown me mouth-pleasuring and tongue-pleasuring and now finger-pleasuring... none of which I would have expected. So exactly how many types of pleasuring are there?"

"Tyra, must you a.n.a.lyze everything?" Adam asked, raising his head to look at her. Almost immediately, he added, "If you do not raise that bodice, I very well might jump intoyour lap."

She hitched her neckline upward. "Yea, I do a.n.a.lyze everything. How else can I understand things?"

"This is not a battle where each and every strategy and method of fighting must be studied. The best kind of lovemaking is spontaneous."

She tapped a forefinger against her lips. "Nay, I think you are wrong. Not that I have engaged in actual love-making, precisely. This did not count as lovemaking, did it?"

"Not precisely," he said, mimicking her playfully.

"But methinks there must be delights in all kinds of lovemaking... planned or unplanned."

Adam shook his head hopelessly at her. "No doubt you are right."

"So what other kinds are there?"

"Kinds of what?"

"Aaarrgh! Pleasuring, you lackwit. Do you deliberately misread me?"

He grinned. Then he put up his hands in surrender when she made a growling sound. "There is mouth-pleasuring and tongue-pleasuring and finger-pleasuring, as you have said. Then there is eye-pleasuring, and talk-pleasuring, and swive-pleasuring. But best of all is a combination of these."

She frowned in confusion. "Give me an example of talk-pleasuring".

He laughed. "Why don't you come to my bed furs and I can demonstrate all of these things?"

"Not now," she said. "Not yet."

"Well, then, if I were going to talk-pleasure you, I might tell you some of the things I intend to do to you

once I get you naked and alone. I might tell you of my desire to thrust and thrust and thrust myself into your tight sheath till you scream with pleasure. Or I might tell you of my fantasy of licking my way up one side of you and down the other, then licking where you are hottest and wettest with want of me."

"Oh, you wicked, wicked man. That is such a lie! People do not dothat ." He threw his hands in the air as if to say,You asked . "Well, what of eye-pleasuring?" she asked, figuring that was safer territory to explore. "I would see you adorned in the sheer veils of a desert houri with bells that tinkled with every sway of your hips and bracelets on your ankles. Or I could arrange you on the bed furs and ask you to watch as I undress slowly for you. Very slowly."

"I like that latter one," she said. In truth, she liked it all.

He smiled, as if he knew.

"Would you like to know something particularly scandalous?"

"I do not know," she said, but almost immediately changed her mind and said, "Yea, I do." He laughed. "I would like you to wear a special adornment I saw one time in Baghdad. It is a thin gold chain that hangs low on the waist, but there is another chain attached to it that runs from the center in back, through the b.u.t.tocks crease up through the woman-cleft, over the belly, to attach at the waist. This adornment is to be worn under clothing during the day... when riding a horse, or walking to the garderobe, or eating a meal, or... whatever. Always it is a reminder of the man who placed it there."

Tyra was at last speechless. He had been right. It was a scandalous fantasy.

He reached over and took her hand in his. "I am half teasing you, Tyra. Not that all these things can't be done, or that we won't do them, if you want." "I do," she put in quickly. He laughed. "Keep surprising me like that and you will land in the bed furs afore you can blink. Just know this: If Bolthor or Tykir or Alinor tell you I was wild at one time, they would be telling the truth. I used to be a connoisseur of all things dangerous or s.e.xual or adventuresome. But now I have come to believe that the best s.e.xplay comes from the simple acts of two people involved, not in practiced arts."

A wanton thought came to her unbidden. "I just thought of another kind of pleasuring. I overheard Lady Alinor mention it to the cook." "Well?" he prodded when she just smiled secretly at him. He raised a goblet of ale to his lips, waiting.

"Feather-pleasuring," she announced gleefully.

For several long moments, he choked on his ale... till she slapped him on the back, so hard he began

choking all over again.

"I went too far, didn't I? Men like to lead, whether it be in battle or loveplay. I was too aggressive."