All the Sweet Tomorrows

belle, you mustn't hate yourself. Yield to me, cherie, and I will give us such pleasure.'

'N-never!'

With a sigh of regret the young King moved from her lovely breasts and began caressing her long torso with his hungry lips. Slowly, tortuously, his mouth moved downward, firmly parting her resisting thighs, to stare admiringly at her hidden treasure, to kiss it softly. His curious tongue began to explore her, inhaling her haunting woman's fragrance, slipping along the folds of sensitive flesh, pushing gently into her to rouse her passions until she was no longer able to deny them.

Skye clenched her bound hands into fists, her rounded nails digging cruelly into her palms. She bit her lip so hard that it bled, but she could not prevent the sob that was torn from her reluctant throat. He lifted his head to stare at her, his eyes passion-drugged. Slowly he pulled himself up and atop her. Then with a quick thrust he was inside her warm body, moving smoothly, rhythmically. After what seemed like an eternity to Skye, the King demanded, 'Does it please you, cherie? Will you admit now that I am the best lover you have ever known?'

'This is not love, monseigneur,' Skye whispered. “This is rape! Do you not know the difference?'

'How stubborn you are, ma belle,' he groaned, 'but I will not give up. I have been known to stay hard and potent within a woman an entire night before spilling my seed.'

From the city there was the faint sound of the two o'clock tocsin, and Henri of Navarre buried his face into the perfumed tangle of Skye's hair, inhaling the taunting fragrance of her damask rose scent. He had been modest, if anything, when he numbered the women he had possessed in his young life; but this woman! Never had he enjoyed a female as he was now enjoying Madame Burke. Had she been willing instead of reluctant, she would, he suspected, have unmanned him half a dozen times already.

Skye lay beneath him wondering if he would ever cease. She had been gone from the ballroom an hour now, and Adam might begin to seek her. How was she going to explain a longer absence? God only knew what Anjou would say to set Adam on the wrong track. The passion Navarre had managed to arouse in her died away with her concern. She had to force him to release his seed, and Skye knew just how to do it. Closing her eyes so he could not see she was deceiving him, Skye moaned convincingly, and began to move her body in time with his. Using the old trick she had learned in the harem she tightened her internal muscles about his manhood.

Navarre groaned with total pleasure. 'Ah, cherie,' he halfsobbed into her ear, 'what delicious torture you abuse me with. Don't stop, I beg of you!'

He was not an easy man to break, she found, and she almost grew too tired to continue when, with a loud shout of triumph, he flooded her with his creamy tribute. Skye cried out herself, but it was with relief. Now perhaps he would be content, and she could go back to Adam before he learned of her shame. For several long moments the King lay on her breasts catching his breath. 'Mon Dieu, cherie,' he finally exclaimed, 'you are magnificent, but then I will wager you have been told that, too.'

Skye let a deep sigh escape her. 'Now, monseigneur, now that you have satisfied yourself, may I please go?'

'Cherie, we have only just begun to love. I have no intention of releasing you until the dawn.' Still lying atop her, he bent and kissed her softly. 'Come, ma belle, did I not please you the tiniest bit? You most assuredly pleased me.' He smiled winningly at her, and although Skye felt she should hate this arrogant young man, to her surprise she found that she did not.

'Monseigneur, if you hold me until the dawn what will I tell my betrothed husband? I will have to tell him the truth. That the Duc of Anjou kidnaped me from the ballroom under a false pretense, and prepared me for your rape. My husband's mother was with me when Anjou came to me. She will swear to my story. Think of the scandal, M'sieur de Navarre. You are married less than a week to a princess of the blood royal of France, and you are already philandering with another woman, and an unwilling woman at that. Release me now, and I can return to the ballroom with no one the wiser.'

'You reason well, ma belle, but the fact I am already chasing other women will cause no scandal. It is my nature, and it is expected of me, bridegroom or no. My dear wife has already betrayed me with her lover, de Guise, allowing him into her bed in the afternoons when I have been with my brother-in-law Alencon. Now that, madame, is a scandal, but because I am a Huguenot and Margot a good Catholic, it is not considered a sin by the good people of France. Margot considers it her royal duty to cuckold me. Therefore my making love to you, madame, will be no scandal.'

'M'sieur, be reasonable! Where is your pride? Do you truly find deep satisfaction and pleasure for your ego in forcing a bound woman who does not want you? For shame, M'sieur de Navarre!'

'You are really most adorable, cherie, when you are angry,' he teased her, but before Skye could spit out her angry reply, the door to the study burst open, and the Prince of Conde rushed in frantically calling to his cousin.

'Henri! Thank God you are safe! Get up! Get dressed! We are about to be murdered, and we must