Besieged (7 page)

“You’re all mine now, Peggy,” Geirwolf said
between pants as he collapsed on top of her. His breathing was labored, his
voice hoarse and firm. “Forever mine.”

She bit her lip and looked away, nervously
wondering how long it would take before her reticence had been completely
chipped away.

Swaddled in polar bear furs, Peggy sucked
in the cool air of the above-ground courtyard, basking in the feel of fresh air
and snowflakes hitting her squarely in the face. She knew Geirwolf wasn’t
supposed to bring her here yet, at least not until she was an impregnated,
fully-fledged member of their people. And yet he’d snuck her out into the
courtyard anyway without Ivara knowing—yet another token of affection from him.

“This is what we call a zaba root,”
Geirwolf murmured as he plucked a vine-like plant from the ground. He snapped
it into halves and showed her the sap that leaked from it. “It’s used by our
women to make sweets with. Taste it.” He smiled as he handed the root to her.
“It’s much like sugar.”

Peggy slowly held out her hand, then
tentatively reached for the plant. Her aqua gaze clashed with Geirwolf’s as
their fingers brushed against the other’s. She bit her lip and glanced away, then
nervously raised the root to her lips and sucked the sweet sap from it.

His eyes tracked the suckling movement her
lips made. She blushed, wondering if he was imagining his cock in place of the
plant.

It had been a little over a week since
she’d been married and already the man was getting to her in a big way. His
persistence at wooing her was practically extraordinary, for she had been far
from agreeable from the get-go. Peggy didn’t want her husband to befriend her,
nor did she want to love him, so she’d behaved as petulantly as possible toward
him and his overtures of kindness ever since their wedding night.

Clearly, her grand plan wasn’t working.

Geirwolf had met each of her acts of
defiance—which ranged from simply ignoring him to screaming when he tried to
touch her—with patience and understanding. He had stayed all but glued to her
side the entire past week regardless to how she behaved, allowing her to vent
her frustration and anger without becoming angry in turn.

Clearly, his grand plan was working far
better than hers.

Peggy wasn’t the type to easily form close
emotional connections with other people, and especially not with men. She
didn’t trust males much and never had with the singular exception of her—may
the lord rest his soul—father.

It had been Peggy’s experience in
relationships that when the going gets tough, men get going. She had expected
that Geirwolf would be no different, so she had been more than a little
surprised when she’d come to realize that no matter what she did and no matter
how badly she behaved, he would never give her up. She didn’t know whether to
be further frustrated or downright flattered by this realization. Her mind said
the former, but her heart said the latter.

“Why are you doing this?” Peggy whispered.
Her head came up as she lowered the root from her mouth. “Why?”

His eyes crinkled uncomprehendingly at the
corners. “I’m not sure I follow—”

“—Why are you keeping me?” she interrupted.
She sighed and glanced away. “No matter what I do you still want to keep me. So
let’s lay our cards on the proverbial table, okay?” She took a deep breath and
met his gaze. If she didn’t leave this man soon she’d never want to leave him,
she thought in a panic. “What will it take to get you to let me go?”

He stared at her for a long moment, but
said nothing. He blinked, then glanced away, his gaze staring absently at the
moon overhead. “There is nothing you can do, nothing you can say, no defiant
act you can make, that will get me to release you,” he said softly.

“But why?” she asked pleadingly. “Make me
understand. Make me understand why you can’t let me leave and take a native
woman as a wife—a woman who can better deal with being taken from everything
and everyone she’s ever known.”

Geirwolf sighed. “Peggy…”

“Yes?”

He looked at her again, his grim features
uncharacteristically vulnerable. “Would you believe me if I said I was sorry
for what’s happened?”

“I don’t know,” she said honestly.

She was surprised by how much it hurt to
hear Geirwolf admit that he felt as though he’d made a mistake when he captured
her. But then she could hardly blame him. She’d been far from kind or accepting
of him since the very beginning. But then she could hardly blame herself.
Because she hadn’t wanted to be captured in the first place. Her emotions, it seemed,
were growing more and more confusing and uncertain.

“Well I am,” he murmured. “I’m very sorry.”

Her spine straightened. She suppressed the
sorrow she felt at knowing he considered her to be a mistake, telling herself
it was ridiculous to feel that way. “I see,” she said a bit stiffly.

“No.” Geirwolf’s gaze bore into hers. “You
don’t.” He clasped her hands in his. “My English is not always so good. What I
mean is, I’m sorry that I didn’t realize how difficult of a transition this
would be for you.” He smiled. “My people have been capturing brides for a
thousand years. And so I thought, in all my arrogance, that my way was the
better way.”

He snorted at that, then released her
hands. “For this I am sorry because had I really considered your feelings I probably
would have forced the lust I felt for you at bay and made myself take a bride
from the women here. But I didn’t and that truth cannot be changed. I can’t be
sorry you are mine, Peggy Valkraad, so please don’t ask me to be, but I am
sorry that you are unhappy that it is so.”

Peggy nodded, his words making her feel
more content than they perhaps should have. “And now?”

One of Geirwolf’s eyebrows shot up. “Now
that you are here how can I possibly regret the fact that you are mine? I could
never send you away, Peggy. Never.”

She gave him a half-smile. “Despite all my
screaming?”

His smile came slowly, the twinkle in his
eyes restored. “Yes, despite the screaming,” he murmured.

They studied each other without speaking
for a prolonged moment. Eventually Peggy glanced away, her sigh somewhat
mournful. “Wolf…”

“Yes?”

“It does make me feel better to know that
you’re sorry I’m unhappy, but I just don’t know that I can ever really be happy
here. Because a part of me will always long to be free.” She sighed again. “And
resent you for not giving me that freedom back.”

Geirwolf closed his eyes and took a deep
breath. He opened them again and waited for her to make eye contact before
responding. “I will not lie and say I would free you if I could because if
faced with that choice I’m not certain I could be so selfless, but Peggy, you
must understand that this choice is no longer mine. It never really was mine.
Though I admit I planned to steal you all along.”

She squinted her eyes at that. “I don’t
understand…”

“From the moment you clapped eyes on the
men from the Hallfreor clan your choices had been taken from you.” Geirwolf’s
eyes narrowed in a serious fashion. “The clans of New Norway have thrived for
as long as they have for the simple reason that nobody knows of our existence.
Whether I had desired you for my own bride or not, the warriors who accompanied
me that day I stole you from the Hallfreors would never have let you go back
from whence you’d come for fear you’d tell outsiders about our people.”

Peggy chewed that over for a long moment,
her thoughts and emotions in turmoil.

“I’m sorry you are unhappy, Peggy,”
Geirwolf murmured, “but there is no way my people will ever let you leave.”

She took a deep breath and expelled it. For
some reason or another, knowing that Geirwolf didn’t have the power to let her
go, that he’d never held that power, made it easier to let the anger toward him
as a person go. She wasn’t quite ready to let her anger with the people of New
Norway in general go, but it wasn’t the people of New Norway in general that
she was married to. “So what you’re saying is that we’re stuck with each other
and need to make the most of it?”

Geirwolf frowned. “You gave my words the
grimmest possible connotation, but yes, I suppose this is what I am saying.”

She chuckled softly at that, the twinkle
back in her own eyes. “I didn’t mean that quite like it came out but thank you
for understanding.”

Geirwolf took her hands in his again, his
expression serious. “Please, Peggy,” he murmured. “Let us begin again. Give me
and our marriage a chance and I promise you I will never let you down.”

Peggy bit her lip, her gaze locked with
his.

“You won’t regret it,” he said softly, his
lips coming down to kiss her forehead. “I vow it.”

She closed her eyes for a threadbare moment,
trying to sort out her emotions. When she opened them again she saw that
Geirwolf was looking at her expectantly, waiting for her decision.

Her thoughts were in such chaos that Peggy
ended up answering him without words. She couldn’t seem to voice her feelings
aloud so she told him what he needed to hear with her body.

Without giving it any more thought, Peggy
gave into her instincts and let go. Turning around, she hoisted the furs up to
her waist and, trembling from the cold, clutched onto a nearby wall while
exposing her naked pussy to him. Arousal shot through her at the sound of her
husband sucking in his breath.

“Peggy,” Geirwolf said thickly. He came up
behind her and roughly palmed her ass, kneading the two globes until they were
warm and toasty. She could feel his eyes devouring her cunt, devouring her ass.
“I’m glad you are mine.”

She closed her eyes as he lowered his
braies to his knees, her nipples hardening. The feel of the frigid air hitting
her pussy coupled with the possessive way she could feel his gaze boring into
her exposed cunt made her soaking wet and ready to take him in.

But Geirwolf didn’t mount her. He stared at
her pussy for a long time while his callused fingers kneaded her buttocks, as
if memorizing the way her cunt looked. And then he sighed, a sound she wasn’t
certain what to make of.

Geirwolf let her buttocks go, then pulled
the polar bear furs back down to cover her. “I’m a sentimental fool perhaps,
but I can’t take you like this. Not now.” He patted her gently on the buttocks.
“Not until I’m certain you truly want me.”

Peggy closed her eyes briefly, stunned at
the physical and emotional disappointment she felt at his words. Nevertheless,
she made no protest when he took her by the hand and quietly walked her back to
the breeding stalls. She supposed she should have felt embarrassed by the
quasi-rejection, but oddly enough, she respected him more for it.

Life was getting very confusing, she
thought on a shiver. Very confusing indeed.

Two evenings later, Peggy came in from a
day of watching other women be trained and opened the door to her private
chamber. She found Geirwolf asleep on the bed, his big body sprawled out across
it as he lounged on his back. Apparently he had come to her early tonight and
had fallen asleep while waiting on her return.

She bit her lip. He looked so damn sexy
just now, maybe even sexier than he looked when awake.

Her eyes flicked down to his groin. He was
erect. Even in his sleep he still wanted her.

Peggy closed her eyes briefly, her emotions
at war within her mind and heart. The tough-as-nails side of her, that side of
her that had gotten her through her father’s death and then again through
college and graduate school, wanted to keep Geirwolf at bay forever just to
prove that…well, she wasn’t precisely certain what she was trying to prove.
That she was strong perhaps? She sighed. Geirwolf had already told her at least
ten times how much he admired her strength of spirit. So who was she trying to
prove herself too? Herself perhaps, she admitted.

But the other side of Peggy, the nurturing
side that wanted to love and to be loved, yearned to reach out to this man, to
her captor…to her husband.

He was always so strong, she thought with
admiration, her gaze flicking over the chiseled lines of his face. So strong
and so kind…

Naked, her feet freshly painted and her
pubic hair freshly trimmed, Peggy lowered her body to the bed and pulled
Geirwolf’s braies down to his knees. His erection instantly sprang free, the
thick piece of flesh pulsing as she palmed it.

“Peggy?” Geirwolf said softly, his tone
confused. He blinked, trying to wake up. “What are you—” He sucked in his
breath when she wrapped her lips around the head of his cock, whatever he’d
been about to say long forgotten. “Peggy,” he murmured, the fingers of one
callused hand sifting through her hair. “That feels wonderful, my love.”

His love.

Peggy closed her eyes and gave herself up
to her feelings, to her desires. She took his cock all the way in,
deep-throating it until it touched her tonsils.

“Ja,” he breathed out, his muscles
clenching as he twined tendrils of her coppery hair around his hand.
“Yes.”

She sucked him feverishly, her mouth and
lips working up and down the length of his steel-hard cock in fast, suctioning
strokes. The sound of saliva meeting flesh competed with the sound of her
husband’s breath catching.

“Ja,” he gritted out, his voice sounding
half-delirious as he possessively tightened his hold on her hair. “Sug kuken
min,” he said hoarsely, too far gone to speak in English.
Suck my cock
.

Peggy sucked him like a hungry animal, her
face working furiously up and down the head and shaft. She brought her fingers
into play as she sucked him off, massaging the sacs that lay tightly against
his groin.

His moans grew louder as she took him in
faster—deeper—harder—faster—deeper—harder…

“Peggy,”
he
groaned, his muscles tensing and his eyes closing.
“My Peggy…”

Geirwolf came on a loud groan, his jaw
clenching and his teeth gritting. He spurted hot cum into her mouth as his
entire body shuddered and convulsed, moaning as she drank it all up.

Peggy made a suctioning movement with her
lips one final time, depleting the head of any remaining droplets. She
swallowed it, then glanced up at him, her expression vulnerable.

Would he act smugly because she’d caved in
this much? Would he behave arrogantly, knowing as he did the power he wielded
over her?

“Thank you,” he murmured, his voice humble.
His wolf-blue eyes looked anything but smug and arrogant. They looked grateful.
And at peace. “That was a precious gift you gave to me.”

Peggy blinked, tears welling up in her
eyes. “I—I’m scared,” she breathed out. “I’m so very scared.”

Geirwolf’s eyes softened. “I know, baby.”
He held out his hands and pulled her down so she was laying on top of his
chest. He kissed the top of her head, his hands gently stroking her back. “I
know.”