The Taming Read online

  Liana giggled against his shoulder. “Can it be enjoyed again?” she asked slyly. “Or is that your last ‘enjoyment’?”

  For a moment Rogan considered beating her for her insolence, but then his hand slid down her bare rump. “I believe I can manage a bit more.” He then did something he’d never done before: He lifted her in his arms and carried her to the bed and gently laid her on it.

  As he stood over her and looked down at her, he didn’t want to jump on her, thrust inside her, then go to sleep as he usually did. Perhaps it was because of his earlier “enjoyment,” as she called it, or perhaps he wanted to touch her as she had touched him, but he lay on the bed beside her, propped on one elbow, and reached out his hand to feel the skin of her belly.

  Liana had no idea how new all this was to Rogan, but this was what she had imagined being in bed with a man to be like. He explored her body with his hand as if he’d never seen a woman before. Liana closed her eyes as his hand caressed her legs, running between her thighs, his fingers curling over the smooth, firm roundness of them, then his fingertips entwined in her short woman’s hair. His hand moved up to her belly, his thumb running along the side of her navel, then slowly, ever so very, very slowly, his hand moved up to the underside of her breast. He cupped first one then the other, his thumb just grazing the sensitive, hard little point.

  She opened her eyes to look at him and saw the softness in his eyes and suddenly she knew why she had agreed to marry him. She had sensed that under his toughness, under his hard outer shell, was a softness he had never let anyone see. A shudder passed through her body as she thought of the pain this man must have experienced in his life to make him into the cold, unfeeling man he showed to the world. But somehow she sensed that the Rogan the world saw was not the inner man.

  I love him, she thought. I love him with all my soul and all my being, and so help me God, I am going to make him love me too.

  She put her hand to his jaw, felt the whiskers there, soft now from days without shaving as he seemed to shave only once a week. I’m going to make you need me, she said to herself. And I’m going to make you feel safe enough that I can see the softness in your eyes even when I have clothes on.

  The last made her smile and she rolled her body toward his. He held her to him and she could feel his rising passion as his hands stroked her back, then his mouth took hers and he kissed her deeply. His lips ran down her throat and at last to her breast. Liana arched backward and let out a little cry of pleasure.

  Rogan was aware of her reactions, and because of the episode in the tub, he was able to control his own need for her. The women he’d had had either been frightened virgins or very willing, experienced women, and always they had wanted to please him. Of course none of them had offered to bathe him, nor had any of them left paper and pens in his room. Perhaps it was merely a wish to repay a debt, but he was enjoying feeling this woman squirm beneath his searching hands. Her pleasure was giving him pleasure.

  His lips followed his hands down her body and he found the smell of her and the taste of her sweet and fresh, so unlike the Days, who sometimes smelled so bad he kicked them out of bed. This girl smelled like wood smoke and herbs.

  When his head came back up to her lips, he was amazed at how much he wanted her. Her hands clutched at his shoulders and when he entered her, she rose to meet him with a force and power to match his.

  Never had he spent such a time in bed with a woman! She was lusty beyond all belief, at one point pushing him to his back and climbing on top of him, her hair wrapping around the two of them like a soft yet strong prison.

  Rogan had never considered the woman’s pleasure before, but this woman, with her moans and groans, her movements here, her movements there, sent his own pleasure into a fevered pitch until he thought he might die. When he finished at long last, it was an earth-shattering experience to him, affecting him from his toes to the top of his head.

  He collapsed on the girl and instead of pushing her away, as he usually did to the women he bedded, he clutched her to him as if he were drowning and she were a buoyant log.

  Liana snuggled against him. He seemed to pour over her body as if he were sauce over a pudding. She had never felt so good in her life. “That was wonderful,” she whispered. “That was the best thing that has ever happened to me. I knew marriage to you would be like this.”

  Rogan released his hold on her and moved to the far side of the bed, but Liana moved with him, her head on his shoulder, her arm across his chest, her thigh across his. She was happier than she’d ever been, happier than she’d thought possible.

  She had no idea of the turmoil that was coursing through Rogan. He wanted to get away from her, yet he couldn’t move.

  “What did your brother William look like? Did he have red hair like yours?” she asked.

  “I don’t have red hair,” Rogan said indignantly.

  “In the sunlight your head looks as if it’s on fire,” Liana retorted. “Was William like you?”

  “Our father had red hair, but I inherited my mother’s black hair.”

  “So both of you had red hair, then.”

  “I don’t—” Rogan said, then stopped and he almost smiled. “On fire, eh?” Every other woman he’d had had told him he had black hair without a trace of his father’s red. That was what he’d wanted them to say and therefore they had.

  “What about your other brothers? Were they redheads too?”

  He thought of his now-dead brothers, remembering the youth of them, the strength of them. How well they could fight! He never thought he’d someday be the oldest Peregrine and have the responsibility of it all. “Rowland, Basil, and James had a dark mother, so they all had black hair.”

  “And what of Severn and Zared?”

  “Severn’s mother was a blonde like…” He trailed off. She had taken his hand in hers and now lay there looking at his fingers, entwining hers with his. It was such an odd thing to do, he thought. He should push her out of bed and get some sleep rather than talk to her about painful memories. But remembering his brothers as alive was not painful.

  “Like me,” Liana said, smiling. “And she was Zared’s mother also? But Zared is such a dark young man.”

  Liana did not see Rogan smile in the dim light. “Yes, indeed. Zared is dark because of a dark mother. Severn’s mother died giving birth to him.”

  “So your father had four wives and seven sons?”

  Rogan hesitated before answering. “Yes.”

  “It must have been good to have brothers. I often wished for another child to be born to my mother. Did you often play together, or were you fostered out to other people?” She felt him stiffen beneath her and wondered what she’d said wrong.

  “There was no play in our lives, nor did we foster.” His voice was cold. “We trained for war from the time we could stand. The Howards killed William when he was eighteen, James and Basil at twenty and twenty-one, and they killed Rowland two years ago, before he was thirty. Now I must protect Severn and Zared.” He took her shoulders and lifted her to look into her eyes. “I killed James and Basil. I killed them over a woman, and I’ll die before I let it happen again. Get away from me, and stay away from me.”

  He shoved her back into the feather mattress, then got out of bed and began tugging on his clothes.

  “Rogan, I didn’t mean—” Liana began, but he was already gone. “Damn, damn, damn,” she said, slamming her fist into the pillow, then she turned onto her back and stared at the white-painted ceiling. What had he meant that he killed his brothers? And over a woman? “What woman?” she said aloud. “I’ll have her for breakfast.”

  The thought comforted her and the thought of there being tomorrow night also calmed her. But most of all, she thought of winning her wager. If the peasants turned over the thieves to her, Rogan would be her slave for an entire day. What would she do with him? Have him make love to her all day? Perhaps just to have him stay with her for a day would be enough. Stay with her and answer her q