“Believe me, honey, drop-dead gorgeous is good.”
He chuckled and held out his hand invitingly. Ruby stepped into his arms and wrapped her arms loosely around his neck, arching her neck slightly to accommodate the height difference.
“Will you explain step two of your master plan how?” she asked sweetly, nuzzling the warm skin of his collarbone.
“Nay, I will show you, instead,” he laughed. “Will you divulge the next step of your master plan, as well?”
“Never. The advantage is in your being surprised by my next move.” Ruby jiggled her eyebrows suggestively.
“Hah! You have astonished me at every step since first we met. And what benefits have you reaped—exile by Sigtrygg, face slaps from Dar, threat of execution? In truth, you have fared poorly in our society, sweetling.”
“Despite all those things, I am where I want to be at the moment, though I must admit I got here through no part of my master plan. My blurting out that stuff in the hall about you shaving my legs was totally unplanned.”
A thoughtul smile played at the edges of his mouth. “Did your husband truly shave your legs?”
Ruby nodded her head, still having trouble reconciling the fact that Thork and Jack might not be the same person. She couldn’t be doing these things with Thork if she didn’t think he was, in some way, her husband. “What I didn’t say was that by the time he was done I had lots of nicks on my upper thighs from his shaky hands.”
Thork hooted with laughter and swung her around in his arms. “Since you’ve been so truthful with me, I will give you fair exchange. The next step of my master plan is to play the Kevin Costner for you—to kiss you till you are mindless with the wanting of me, till your toes curl, till you moan for me to stop, till you drip with nectar, till…”
And he did all those things and more.
Later, during a brief respite, Ruby lay on her side in his arms on the bed, his erection pressing against her leg. Ruby touched his kiss-swollen lips lovingly with her fingertips. He caressed her body gently with callused hands, waiting for her to regroup before his next assault. His heavy breathing told her it wouldn’t be long.
“Are we on schedule with your master plan?” she teased, rubbing her breasts across the soft blond hair that covered his chest, then doing the same with a leg thrown over the curly blond hairs on his thighs.
“Yea, minx, that we are! By my accounts, you have come three times to my one thus far, and we have not yet really begun.”
“Oh ho! Now you keep score. What is your final goal?”
“You know well and good what my final goal is,” Thork whispered as he examined the interior channels of her ear with the tip of his tongue and placed a warm hand between her legs.
There was no more talking then, except for his sensuous whispers of what he liked, answered by her soft moans and writhing body.
“Enough!” she finally begged. “Please… now.”
Thork slowly inserted a finger inside her to further test her readiness and groaned, “For the love of Freya! You are tighter than an untried virgin.”
“Hardly that.” But Ruby was glad she pleased him and could wait no more. She opened her legs wider and pulled Thork up and over her body.
“Now,” she demanded, unable to stand the delicious assault any longer.
He bent her knees and placed himself at her portal. Then he raised himself on his elbows and arched his back, perspiration beading his forehead and upper lips at the control he exerted to hold back. With eyes locked with hers, Thork slowly began his sweet entry. Ruby felt herself relax and stretch to accommodate his size. Then he stopped.
He stopped.
Thork’s eyes widened, then blinked unbelievingly, before he withdrew and rolled over on his side away from her, cursing her with coarse words.
“What? What is it? Did I do something wrong?” she asked, putting her hand on his shoulder.
“Do not touch me!” Thork snarled and shrugged away from her, sitting on the edge of the bed. His shoulders trembled as he tried to bring his aroused body under control. Finally he walked stonily over to the water pitcher and dumped its entire contents on his engorged staff. He pulled on his pants angrily before walking to the edge of the bed.