He located his intended victim sleeping in her bed. Her tiny hand curled around a doll. He’d found his own sister this way many times.
What had he become? The blood of honorable warriors flowed through his veins. He was one with the bear…and he was about to cowardly cut the neck of a small girl. He’d stuck his dagger into the wooden chest next to her bed as a warning to her family, grabbed his brothers and fled into the night.
He prayed to the spirits of the bears that they might let his family enter their sacred grounds, and he vowed to protect those lands with his life, even to kill any trespasser who dared to enter the domain of the bear.
And here she was. The person who dared to defy the warnings staked on the outskirts of this isolated land and intrude where she had no right to be.
Osborn looked down at the woman stretched naked beneath him. Her very presence mocked his vow and his rule—to never kill a woman—and yet he must kill. She brought menace, blood magic, the worst kind, here.
Her breasts rose and fell as she took one ragged breath after another. The tight dusky tips invited his touch and his tongue and he was distracted for a moment. Her hair splayed all around the ground, like it did when he dreamed of her. She wore only an odd timepiece around her neck. Her soft lips were parted and a pulse hammered at the base of her throat.
He was distracted longer than a moment because she slammed her knee into his side. His breath came out in a grunt, but he didn’t budge. It would take more than a small woman’s shove to overpower him. He gripped her wrists and tugged them high above her head to prove his point.
“Are you daring me to kill you, Breena?”
“Let me go!” She bucked her hips, trying to shake him off, but only managed to shift her legs so that she cradled him. He felt the slick heat of her woman’s body, and his cock stiffened. How long had it been since he’d touched a woman? Since bringing his brothers here, he’d driven every emotion, pounded every desire and drove every wish he’d once had for himself into creating something on this land. Raising his brothers, keeping them alive, making sure they had a life so that when he left to seek revenge on those who’d brought down the destruction of his family, his brothers could and would carry on without him.
In an attempt to dislodge him, Breena jerked against his cock, and his breath came out in a hiss. Years. It had been years since he’d sunk himself into a woman’s inviting warmth. But the female beneath him wasn’t just any female; she was the woman of his dreams.
No. She was the woman who’d invaded his dreams and made him dream of her.
“You cannot best me.”
“I can try,” she told him, meeting his gaze. Defiance and something like desperation mingled in the green depths.
He knew those sentiments.
Felt them.
Lived them.
She shouldn’t have to feel that.
Why he should even care, he couldn’t fathom. But for some reason, Osborn cared. It had been a long time since he’d really given a damn about anything.
Her bottom lip trembled for a moment, and he couldn’t look away from the tempting softness of her mouth. Then he felt her spine stiffen. “If you’re going to kill me, do it now, otherwise—” Her otherwise was punctuated with the top of her head meeting his chin. His teeth snapped together, and his head reared back, but the shock of her action didn’t loosen his grip. Instead, he shifted both her wrists to just one of his hands and gripped her chin to make her meet his eyes. Just to prove that he could.
“A moment ago I was thinking I wouldn’t kill you. I’m back to thinking I will.”
“I…” But her sentence trailed. Had he expected her to apologize for wanting to live?
Her one word drew his glance back to her lips. The tempting seductress of his dreams, or the sleepy enchantress come to life. Now Breena was a woman. Naked. And under him.
Osborn lowered his head, and took from her what he’d wanted. And she gave it to him. Her lips met his, her mouth opening to welcome in his tongue.
She tasted like promise and better than his dream.
He wanted to taste all of her.
“Please,” she said, her voice broken and needy.
Please what? Please don’t kill her? Please make her feel something other than fear for a moment? Fear he’d caused?
He slumped against her, burying his face in her drying hair. The drive to explore her body died, and was replaced with something less primal. Guilt? Regret?
He didn’t need more of that in his life. He had enough for a dozen lifetimes.
“I won’t kill you.”
He felt her sag beneath him, the fight draining from her limbs. He released her hands, and balanced above her, Breena’s sweet, soft curves still cradling him. “But I need answers.” He eyed the sky, noting the position of the sun. “It will be dark soon. You can stay tonight, but you leave tomorrow after I’m satisfied I know all I need to about this threat. And, Breena…”
“Yes?”
“Don’t come back.”
She nodded, and a smile almost tugged at his lips at the quickness of her agreement. “Don’t worry.”
With one more hard glare, he gently pushed himself off and away from her.
Don’t look.
With a new determination, he began to examine the wounds on his arm. Already a dark bruise had formed, mimicking the shape of the creature’s snakelike body. The bleeding had stopped, though. The poison’s ache had been reduced to a throb, and the burns would fade. He’d had worse. Osborn heard her rolling to her knees.
Don’t look.
He felt the gash on his forehead, and wasn’t surprised when he pulled back his hand to find it red with blood. That bang to the head might require his brother to take a needle to it.
Leaves crunched beneath Breena’s feet as she raced quickly toward her clothes.
Don’t look.
He looked. And groaned. Breena’s slight frame was perfection. Made for a man’s touch. His touch. Her backside was made to cup a man as he entered her from behind. His favorite position. His cock stiffened again.
“One more thing.”
She turned, shielding her body from his eyes with her clothes. But she’d never be able to block the image of her soft curves from his memory.
“Until you go in the morning…don’t let yourself be alone with me.”
BREENA DRESSED AS QUICKLY as she could with shaking fingers. Shaking everything. Even her knees felt weak. Her nipples ached when she pulled the shirt Osborn’s brothers had loaned her over her head. The fabric felt rough and abrasive against her sensitized skin. Sensitized from his hands.
Don’t let yourself be alone with me.
She closed her eyes and steeled herself against the hot wave of desire that coursed through her. The pleasure and the thirst for his touch narrowed her focus to only him. Her warrior. Osborn.
She licked her lips, finding them swollen. Breena lifted her fingers to touch where he’d touched. To trace along her bottom lip the spot he’d nipped.
Don’t let yourself be alone with me.
A powerful warning. An order. And Breena had been raised to be an obedient girl. She’d never broken a rule or voiced a disagreement. Looking over her shoulder, she stole a glance at that man who’d issued what basically amounted to a threat—to her body. She began to shiver.
Osborn stood watching her. More like stood guard. His arms were crossed against his chest, the muscles coiled and ready for combat. His wide-legged stance instantly instilled caution to any observer.
I’ll chase.
Run you down.
Render you defenseless.
He didn’t care that he still stood naked. A flutter tickled her stomach. She’d never seen what made a man a man before, and she couldn’t help but look. That part of him stood out and seemed to rise higher and bigger under her inspection.