The prince greeted the newcomers, and Will felt his momentary relief at the interruption fade. ’Sblood. The arrival of these two men-Sir Louis Krench and Lord Ralf Stannoch-only made the situation worse, for they were two of John’s long-time confidants and companions. Will had appreciated their absence, for while they were gone, John was left to his own devices-which were not quite as extreme as what the three of them dreamed up together.
At the least, no one had died while Krench and Stannoch were gone.
“So you have at last returned,” said John. “I’d begun to fear you’d joined my brother’s camp.” He laughed heartily at what he obviously intended as a jest.
He invited his friends into the chamber, and Will was slightly mollified to see that they weren’t alone: three tittering women accompanied them. Whores, serfs, or freewomen, Will didn’t know, and he didn’t care who they were except for the fact that they were additional quims and breasts.
He moved now and pulled Marian firmly onto his lap as he settled into an armless chair in a shadowy corner. She settled there stiffly, warm and lush. As far as he was concerned, the chess game was over. To ensure this eventuality, as John was inspecting the new female arrivals, who were already being coaxed out of their clothing, Will swept his hand over the chess table and knocked the remaining pieces askew. Then he curled his arm around Marian’s belly to keep her in place, folding his fingers into a fist.
Marian stiffened even more in his lap, and hissed, “Now he shall blame Hilde for that and punish her further.” Her mouth was near enough for him to smell the wine on her breath, but she was not close enough to kiss.
Foolish woman. Will looked away from the soft, sweet-smelling body and tightened his fist as he struggled to keep from uncurling those fingers and touching her. “John will know ’twas I. ’Tis yourself for whom you ought worry,” he murmured into her ear. “Krench and Stannoch are no weak weasels. But at the least they’ve brought their own playthings.”
“Then let us leave.” She turned and her hair spilled differently over his arm, tickling him and raising fine bumps there.
Aye. They must leave.
But Will did not move. His body was frozen, and he feared if he allowed it to thaw, all would be lost.
“Nottingham.” The sound of John’s voice cut through Will’s haze of indecision, and Will looked over to find John looking at him. “You must join us.”
It was not a request.
CHAPTER 8
Marian had nowhere to look, so she closed her
eyes. But the sounds pervaded, the sounds and scents of coupling. Of cries and gasps and desperate begging, the sharp slap of braided leather on skin, the groan of satiation, the smells of spent seed and sweat and spilled wine.
She didn’t want to think about the fact that she was naked, bare but for the cloak she’d grabbed up at the knock at the door.
Will stood slightly behind her, leaning against the tall bedpost, arms crossed over his bare chest. He’d said naught to her, nothing to ease her fears or worries except the warning that she should have a care for herself. Even when John ordered them to join his other companions, Will had done nothing but acquiesce.
Now, acutely aware of the tableau before her, her nipples were drawn tight and the little hooded knot in her quim had begun to come alive, and she knew that she’d leave the chamber much less innocent this night than she had been before. She dared not open her eyes and look at Will for fear of what he might see in her eyes, and she was relieved to no longer be sitting bare-bottomed on his lap, held in place by a steely arm.
During the chess game, when he’d crawled out of the bed leaving two women in the shadows behind him, Marian’s tentative relief had been washed away by the sight of his half-clothed self. Though that strong body had trapped her against a wall, and been poised over her earlier today, she’d never seen the powerful slabs of muscle and the square angles of his shoulders. Harold’s pale, hair-covered torso and belly had looked nothing like the tanned, rippling one that emerged from the bed-curtains.
At first, as he’d crawled forth, he had reminded Marian of a lean cat, dark and sleek with rich black hair rumpled from whatever he’d been doing behind the curtains. Shadows gathered in the hollows of his collarbones and along the sweep of his muscled shoulders. His face was dusky and dark with stubble, his eyes heavy-lidded, his mouth set. Black hair grew in a wide patch over the upper part of his chest, but as he came into view, she saw that it narrowed into a slender line that ran down the center of his flat, ridged belly. . and then disappeared into the shadow of his loose braies. Braies that hung low on lean hips, exposing their bones and a thick dark thatch of hair. . and looked as though they might slip down with the slightest tug.
All this had been impressed upon Marian in an instant. . and now she could not erase the image from her mind. She’d had no idea. . no idea a man could look like that. Beautiful. . and yet frightening, dark and smooth and lean. . the beauty marred by white battle scars.
“Why so shy, my lady?” came a velvety voice in her ear. “Open your eyes.”
She didn’t. She kept them closed and though they did not touch, she felt the tension from Will, who stood like a powerful, impersonal tree trunk next to her chair.
The prince spoke again. “You’ll watch, my lady, or you’ll join them.”
Marian’s eyes flew open and John’s mellow chuckle fell heavily into her ears. “Very good. Now tell me which of these. . arrangements. . suits you the most.”
He settled in an armless seat next to hers, close enough to brush against her. She drew her cloak closer about her shoulders, but he noticed. . and with a flick of his wrist whisked it away, sending it crumpling to the floor. “Do you not recall that you lost your cloak by fair play, my lady?”
Marian could do naught but huddle beneath her hair, grateful that it was so thick and heavy.
“My lady,” that mellow voice purred again, “which is it? Which scene has captured your attention?” John had leaned very close to her and she felt the warmth of his skin brush against her. He’d removed his tunic and now, like Will, wore only braies tied at the waist.
And yet the proximity of his bare chest and arms, darkly haired torso and belly, prompted a very different response from Marian. One closer to distaste than desire.
“Is it the woman there?” John persisted. “See how she takes them both at once?”
Marian could not help but see the woman, arranged on her hands and knees, naked, of course. One of John’s friends, the shorter one with sharp, weasel features, had loosened and dropped his hose so that it bunched around his ankles. He slammed into the woman from behind, his fingers grasping her hips so hard the skin was white where he gripped.
And in front of her stood the other late arrival, a man with pale skin and pale hair, and colorless gray eyes that had scanned Marian with bald lust. Dressed in only a tunic, he’d dispensed with his hose completely and his pale, spindly legs bowed slightly as he worked his erection in and out of the woman’s mouth.
“Would you enjoy that, my lady?” John murmured in her ear. “Two sleek cocks sliding in and out, one at each end?”
As before, once she began to look, she found herself unable to turn away. . to block out the sounds and images. The long, shiny lengths pumping the woman from either side. . her cheeks hollow and her eyes wide as one man held her face steady, lifting her chin to make her throat a long, easy curve, her breasts hanging free, jolting with every movement. . and at the rear, the slip and slide of another red cock, in and out in a smooth, sticky rhythm, faster and faster. .
Marian swallowed, her breath rising faster as the pounding became harder and the two men lost their synchronized rhythm, slamming into the woman haphazardly so that she could barely keep her balance, breasts bouncing and swaying. Marian felt it as if it were inside her, the rise, the tension, the urgency. . The hot tingling in her stomach swirled lower, almost painful in its intensity, tightening at the center of her quim.