Page 31 of Falling for the Knight

8

Christ.

Tristan had never backed down from a challenge, and he sure as hell was not going to start tonight.

As Tristan reached for her, Hannah leaned in toward him. He had only a brief glimpse at her face, the lips he so desperately wanted to feel against his own, and then he was clasping her cheeks in his hands.

He touched his lips to hers, and she immediately opened to him.

Her kiss was no innocent virgin’s touch; nor was it the measured caress of a courtesan. As her tongue reached out to meet his own, Tristan took advantage. He tried to be gentle, but her response wouldn’t allow it. She hungrily took what he offered and gave the same in return. His rough hands moved from her face to the back of her head, grabbing her silky hair with both fists.

When she groaned, he pressed harder, moved faster, desperate to taste her. No kiss had inflamed him so quickly, and when she pulled back, he silently thanked every saint at once.

That would not have ended well. It would already be difficult to let her go—no need to make it harder.

“I take it back.”

Tristan could not help but smile. She looked exactly as she should, a woman properly kissed. He wouldn’t be surprised if he looked much the same. That kiss had taken him more by surprise than the day King Richard had turned an armorer’s apprentice into a lord with one deft stroke.

“Our times are not so different.” Hannah licked her lips one last time before stepping away from him.

Aye, Hannah, they are. No woman here has made me feel that way before.

Apparently they were going to act as if the kiss had not happened.

Very well.

He leaned down to grab a log from the pile. Either they had been lucky to find dry wood in the cave, or they’d unknowingly commandeered someone else’s lodging. It was getting late, but he did not discount that the reivers may return.

“Are they not so different?” he finally asked. With an adequate fire, he turned his attention to the bedrolls.

“That was . . .”

He paused, looking up at his beautiful traveler, waiting for her response.

“Like a regular kiss.”

It had been anything but.

She must have read the look on his face, because she hastened to say, “I mean . . . not regular. Actually, not at all. But maybe I thought it would be different somehow.”

Once he’d prepared the makeshift beds, Tristan sat on his. Having changed his position, he could no longer see the valley below them, but he’d exchanged it for a much more pleasant view. She stood in the exact spot where they’d kissed.

“Do you know what I mean?”

“No,” he said. “I do not.”

Though he should be insulted by her casual declaration that his kiss was quite ordinary, Tristan found himself amused instead.

“Perhaps you should explain.” He had a feeling she could not, but he looked forward to her attempt.

“It was regular,” she said, “in that it was the same kind of kiss a man would . . .”

His eyes narrowed.

“Never mind.”

She lifted her gown, moved toward the bags, and pulled something out.