Fascinated

satisfaction but they did. 'It is said to be the size and shape of an unshelled nut. They call it the third almond.'

'I want to please you, Muhamed. I want to give you the same pleasure you have given me.'

He pulled away from the comfort of Megan's arms. 'It is not the same,' he said harshly.

'You are afraid.'

Yes, he was afraid.

He was afraid that the climax she had given him would never be repeated.

He was afraid of losing what little masculinity he retained.

'It is unnatural,' he grated.

Why didn't she see that it was unnatural?

'Muhamed, satisfaction is not unnatural. What they did to you is unnatural. Men loving women only so they can bear their children is unnatural. But not this, Muhamed. You said you receive satisfaction through my pleasure. Let me share yours. Let me know that I can please you, as you've pleased me.'

'They laughed,' he said harshly.

'I would never laugh at you.'

No, Megan wouldn't laugh at him.

Gently, he withdrew from her and stood up, bones creaking, knees aching.

Megan grabbed a pillow. Dropping it to the floor, she kneeled in front of him.

He stared down at the top of her head; her braid hung down her back. She looked like a schoolgirl.

Her hands that wrapped around him did not belong to a schoolgirl; they belonged to a woman.

Fire danced along his verge, the caress of her fingers.

Glancing up, she caught his gaze. 'This is for me, too, Muhamed. I've never had the opportunity to touch a man's body. I will always treasure the fact that you trust me enough to let me do this.'

Head lowering, she circumvented his response by the simple expedient of taking him into her mouth.

He wished he could see her face.

He wished he could hold her body.

His groin tightened.

He blindly grabbed-a woman had such a vulnerable neck-and felt the laving of her tongue deep inside, as if his member did not stop at his pubis, but wound up inside him.

She suckled him.

He slid his thumbs up, simultaneously feeling the hot suction of her mouth and the muscles in her jaws rhythmically contract, expand, contract, expand.

There was pleasure in having a woman suckle a man's member, but there was also uncertainty. In a woman's mouth, he was entirely at her mercy.

She could hurt him, and there was nothing he could do to prevent it.

Had she felt this same sense of vulnerability when he had taken her into his mouth and suckled her? he briefly wondered.

Did all women feel this sense of vulnerability when a man took them-whether with fingers or verge-and they were entirely at his mercy?

Had Megan felt this vulnerability?

Lungs sucking in air, he threw his head back, his whole world reduced to Megan's lips, Megan's tongue, and the sharp threat of Megan's teeth.

He was melting, yet he had never felt more hard.

A gentle pressure nudged his thighs. His heart jumped-in anticipation, in dread.

He did not want what she offered.

He wanted to be like other men, to take his release as other men took theirs.

Trust her, she had said.

He had never trusted anyone, not since he was thirteen.

How could he trust this woman?

How could he not trust her?

He parted his legs.

She found him, prodded him. Her finger was slippery wet- from her own body?

He squeezed his eyelids together, emotions roiling, muscles clenching. Denying her access. Denying the unbidden thrill of pleasure her touch engendered, probing for entry.

She would not be denied.

He gasped, feeling her become a part of him. And gasped again when she found the gland he had spoken of.

A bolt of lightning shot down his spine and out of his verge. Light flashed behind his eyelids; voices echoed inside his ears.

The son of his heart: I will kill you….

The woman he had loved: Have you never, ever wanted to find love in a woman's body?

Megan, the woman who through her selflessness was demonstrating that he knew nothing of love, and never had: / do not understand what it is that you want from me.

He gritted his teeth to hold back the pressure that squeezed his chest and overflowed into his throat.

This was what he had wanted.

This was all he had ever wanted.

A woman who would not cringe at his body, as he cringed from it.

A woman who would take what he could give her, and not belittle him for what he could not give her.

A woman who cared about the needs of a eunuch.

The flickering lights behind his eyelids coalesced into one blinding white light. His world shattered, the past that had been forced upon him, the present that now brought fulfillment to a eunuch, the bleak future that yawned before him.

A hoarse cry splintered the light, and once again he was a man.

Not a eunuch.

A man.

Megan's gift to him.

Suddenly they were two people instead of one.

A splash of water sounded in the silence; it was followed by the clink of stoneware on wood-more splashes, silence again.

He strained to hear her next move, to feel her nearness. Trembling in the aftermath of the pleasure she had given him.

Soft hands cupped his face, lowered his head.

He opened his eyes. Megan's eyes were bright with unshed tears.

'I was a part of you, Muhamed. I've never felt anything so powerful, or so beautiful. Thank you for your trust.'

His heart double beat.

She deserved the truth.

'Muhamed is the name that was given me by the Arabs. My English name is Connor. Connor Treffry.'

She recognized the name.

The Treffrys were the most prosperous fishermen in West Cornwall. Perhaps in the entirety of Cornwall.

Megan withdrew: hands, emotions.

'How?' she asked.

How had he come to be a eunuch?

How could he have deceived her, he who had accused her of deception?

'I loved the sea,' he said raggedly, needing her warmth and her closeness but unable to express emotions he had held in abeyance for forty years. 'I wanted nothing more than to be a fisherman, like my father. Like my brothers before me. I convinced my father to let me go out with some of his men one day. There was a squall. We