His Lady Bride (Brothers in Arms) Read Online Free PDF

not.”
    “Then you would not have me at all.”
    “Wrong,” he whispered, reaching out to capture her arms and bring her flush against the heated, rigid length of his body.
    As Gwenyth gasped with both fear and shock, Aric closed his mouth over her own.
    A thousand sensations assailed her at once—the feel of him close to her, his solid, strong hands as they slid around her shoulders and down her back. The rasp of stubble on his cheeks as he dipped his head to place another hard kiss across her tingling mouth. The smells of rich earth, midnight rain, and aroused male blended to an intoxicating elixir that blotted out all thought.
    The taste of him clung to her lips as he parted them and found his way inside without haste, swirling, dipping, tasting, until Gwenyth could not find her next breath, until honeyed fire flowed within her. Then his groan reached her, vibrated inside her, echoed in the pit of her stomach and lower.
    He lifted his head and spoke. “Stay here long at all, and we will share that bed.”
    Gwenyth raised a trembling hand to her lips. Why did she feel so alive? Why did pulses and tingles skip and hum inside her? That sensation he roused by looking at her had multiplied tenfold. She actually wanted the recluse to kiss her again. And again. Had he worked sorcery upon her?
    Taking a deep, steadying breath, she vowed she would not remain here to find out.
    “Then I shall depart this moment, for I’ve no intent to share your bed.”
    Aric said nothing to stop her as she walked out of the shanty and emerged into the noonday sun. Not a single word of farewell! She walked briskly across the clay-soiled hills, listening to the chirping of birds, determined to put her temporary husband from her mind.
    ’Twasn’t as if she truly cared that he did not speak to her, but could he simply dismiss her after such a kiss? Forget such oddly pleasurable sensations? The roguish sheep-biting buffoon! She had not given the lewdster permission to touch her, nor had she wished to feel any pleasure at his kiss. Certain she could not get away from him quickly enough, Gwenyth made haste through the forest.
    She reached Penhurst so soon, she was near startled. The swaying leaves parted, some dropping to the ground in a green cascade, as the castle came into view and stole her breath.
    The round turret and the battlement were as familiar to her as her own heartbeat. This was home, the place of her memories of a laughing papa and a tender mama. She had missed being here in the past days, even if Penhurst’s current inhabitants had not missed her.
    The portcullis was lowered against intruders. Against her.
    Inside, she heard the bustle of the castlefolk, the blacksmith, the apothecary, the soldiers training. Animals bleated and lowed as the sun rose to its zenith. Gwenyth so longed to be a part of it all again that she ached.
    Gazing into the turret, she motioned to the lookout, a scrawny lad named Hamlin, to let her inside.
    The boy shook his head. “Lady Gwenyth, milord said ye ain’t to come in.”
    Mortification blazed through her entire body. Hamlin had spoken loudly enough for the whole of the castle to hear she was not wanted. ’Twas likely he had yelled loudly enough for Aric to hear. Heaven forbid!
    Drawing in a deep breath, Gwenyth calmed. Uncle Bardrick could not be so cruel as to cast her out of his life completely, without a single word in the doing. Mayhap Hamlin was to open the portcullis to no one.
    No matter, she decided. The ancestor who had built Penhurst had also built tunnels beneath, in case of a siege. She had played in the tunnels as a child and knew they would take her near enough to the solar.
    She made her way around the outer curtain of walls surrounding the castle. Just within a cluster of brambles and bluebells lay the opening to the tunnel, covered now by twigs and rocks and leaves.
    Sweeping the impediments aside, Gwenyth lowered her feet into the opening and slid down into the narrow red-brown