Captivated

'You were limping last night.'

'Because I fell on it when the bloody horse threw me. Continue with your studies.'

Abigail obligingly studied the swollen shaft that sprang out from a bed of black, curly hair. It seemed impossible that he had fit inside her. 'Have you ever measured yourself?'

'You're putting me to blush.'

'The head is purple.' She ignored his sally. 'It is very large, like a small fist. It has an eye.' She captured the single drop of moisture that glistened on the tip and smeared it over the swollen glans. 'And it weeps. Is it sad, Colonel Coally?'

'Very, Miss Abigail.' Robert's voice was strained. 'Why don't you kiss it and make it better?'

Abigail leaned down and touched her tongue to the purple-hued bulb. 'You tastesalty, sir.'

'You cannot judge the flavor by a single taste. Take it between your lips.'

Robert knew exactly what he tasted likejust as Abigail did. Yet he was as entranced by this play between a man and a woman as was she.

Grasping the stalk of his penis in both hands, she pulled it taut so that she could take the crown of him fully in her mouth. And re-tasted him for flavor.

'You still taste salty, sir.'

Robert's breathing quickened. 'Perhaps you are mistaken you should try again. Taste made in haste is not a good method by which to judge.'

'Perhaps. But only if you tell me if you have ever measured yourself.'

'Never.'

'Then I shall do so.' She spanned the length of his manhood with her fingers. They fell short of the purple-hued crown. 'My fingers spread six incheshere. If I take my other hand and spread it out, so, then I spannine inches, Colonel Coally. When next you go into battle, you can not only astound your enemy with your chameleon properties, but you can also intimidate him with the size of your great lance.'

The mattress shook with Robert's laughter.

'But you have yet to determine whether it does indeed change color, Miss Abigail.'

'How do you suggest I test that, Colonel Coally?'

His laughter stopped.

'By suckling me, Abigail. As hard and as deep as you can take me.'

Abigail cradled him between her handsthe purple-hued crown throbbed. 'But I did that last night, Colonel Coally. Today I want to do something else.'

A half-smile formed on his lips. 'Your fantasies, Miss Abigail.'

She gently rubbed the thick shaft between her palmsand imagined him all alone on the eve of battle. 'Do you ever touch yourself?'

'Do you?'

The rain echoed softly inside the cabin.

Abigail swallowed her fear and uncertainty at confessing what no respectable person did, let alone admit. 'Yes.'

'I think we all do. The only problem in the field is finding privacybut sometimes even that doesn't matter.'

'Show me how you touch yourself.'

It could have been a blush on Robert's cheeksthe light was too dim and his skin too dark to be certain. The thought that he could still be rendered as vulnerable as she warmed herand fired her determination. 'You said everything, Robert.'

Closing those dark eyelashes, he reached down and cupped his hands over hers. 'Rub me between your handslike this.'

Abigail's hands were sandwiched between heat and friction. She quickly learned the motion, varied the motion, until he took his hands away and he was all hers.

She could feel his readiness through his body, drawn as tautly as a pulley. See it in the stomach that corded and strained for release.

Suddenly the bulbous head grew a deep burgundy. Even as she watched, marveling at the change that was occurring, it throbbed and shot up a geyser of white fluid. At the same time, a groan worked its way past Robert's throat.

The sound drew Abigail's attention. Robert's eyelids were squeezed shut and his lips pulled back from his teeth as if he were in the throes of agony. Slowly his features relaxed into an expression of utter peace.

His black lashes lifted.

Abigail stared into the depths of those stark gray eyes that had seen too much death and pain and wanted to give this man…everything.

Reaching out a finger toward his stomach, she touched the mound of warm, white fluid there.

His essence.

Last night it had shot up inside her.

'So, do I change color, Miss Abigail?'

Abigail thought of him, inside her, doing all of the wonderful things she had just witnessed. And felt tears clog her sinuses.

'Oh, yes, Colonel Coally.'

His gray eyes were too intense. Just when she thought she would laugh or cry or do something else entirely uncalled for if he continued to stare at her so, the skin around his eyes crinkled.

'Lance, Abigail?'

'Do you prefer a different name, Robert?'

'Prick.'

Hot color flooded Abigail's face at the explicit word that she had only ever been exposed to in print. 'Battering ram.'

'Cock.'

'Jacob staff.'

Robert threw his head back and laughed in that purely masculine, uninhibited way of his. 'Wherever did you learn such phrases? Never mind. Your erotica. You were quite enraptured when I peeked through the window last night. What were you reading about?'

Before Abigail could reply, Robert crawled over her and stood up on the floor.

She watched the sway of his testicles with interest as he leaned over the foot of the bed. They were rather hairyand oddly touching; man at his most vulnerable. And exposed.

He was all too aware of her interesthis gray eyes, when he turned around, glinted. He held up a copy ofThePearl.

'Is this the one you were reading?'

'What number is it?'

'Twelve. Do you have them all?'

She flipped the quilt over her naked body. 'Yes.'

He flipped the quilt away from her. 'Come over to the window.'

She gazed at the front of him. He had gone from limp to hard. 'Why?'

'I want you to read to me.'

Abigail's mouth dropped open. 'Absolutely not.'

'Ashamed, Abigail?'

She closed her eyes against the truth. Shewas ashamed. That she had desires. And pursued those desires.

She opened her eyes. 'No, I am not ashamed. Merely feeling very vulnerable. It's not every day that a woman shares her secret life.'

Robert's dark face hardenedshe could imagine that look on his face before he killed. Without warning, he reached down and grasped her hand in his, his skin hard where hers was soft, calloused where hers was smooth.

For a second she felt trapped. And knew that he, too, was trapped by the desires that, for however long the storm lasted, were neither his nor hers, but theirs.