Page 70 of Forbidden

“If you touch me,” Duncan whispered, savoring Amber’s unbridled response to him, “I shall be much less certain of my own control.”

Beneath the words was Duncan’s own growing doubt that his restraint was equal to Amber’s sweet and abandoned response. He had never known a woman could want him so much, so deeply, without coyness or calculation.

“Dark warrior,” Amber said, “you would never break your vow to me.”

The certainty in Amber’s voice was repeated in the clarity of her eyes watching him. Duncan saw himself reflected darkly in her luminous depths and at the same time he saw her absolute trust in him.

“You humble me,” Duncan said.

“Then don’t raise me so high,” she whispered, smiling.

“Shall I free your arms?”

Though Amber knew she could free herself if she had the patience, she wanted it to be Duncan who released her. She wanted him to understand the completeness of her trust, as she understood the intensity of his promise not to take her.

He was a man of honor. Honor was the very core of his pride and strength. Honor was what had made him the man he was.

“Yes,” Amber whispered. “Free me.”

Yet still Duncan hesitated.

“I promise I won’t be too forward,” Amber said, trying and failing to hide her smile.

The smile Duncan gave Amber then was the one that called meadowlarks from a midnight sky.

“That would be very disappointing, sweet witch.”

Slowly Duncan lowered his head to Amber’s breasts, tantalizing her with the warmth of his breath while he teased her with silky touches of his mustache and tongue. His reward was a series of broken sighs and tiny sounds as she twisted against the cloth binding her elbows.

“You tempt me,” Duncan said.

“And you torment me.”

“A sweet torment?”

He cupped his hand around one of Amber’s breasts, lifting and caressing, testing the tight peak.

“Aye,” she said. “Very sweet.”

“Not as sweet as these pink buds.”

Amber drew her breath in swiftly. She could feel the passion sweeping through Duncan in hot pulses as he looked at his fingers on her breasts.

“Nor as sweet as making you moan beneath my mouth,” Duncan added, bending down to Amber once more.

“My arms,” she said.

And it was all Amber could say, for Duncan’s powerful forearm was beneath her shoulder blades, arching her back, and his mouth was on her naked breasts. With a ragged sound of pleasure, she gave herself to his caresses, hiding nothing of her own response.

It wasn’t until Duncan lifted his head that Amber realized he had unfastened her clothes completely. He sat up and pulled the long sleeves down over her wrists one at a time. Then he eased her clothing farther down her body, revealing more creamy skin and the long, inward curving lines of her torso.

Though Duncan wanted to keep undressing Amber more than he wanted air itself, he forced his hands to stop at her waist. He kneaded her resilient flesh lightly, hungrily.

It wasn’t enough for either of them. With a quick, graceful movement, Amber sat up. The rush of cool air made her shiver. Instinctively she shrugged the folds of her mantle forward, covering her shoulders even as she reached for the laces at the front of Duncan’s shirt.

“Be as I am,” Amber said, pulling laces free. “Naked but for the mantle.”

“And if I take chill?” he asked, smiling slightly.