Thief of Hearts Read online

  He scratched his chin as he looked at her. “I wish I knew.”

  It was getting warm in front of the fire. She slid her jacket off her shoulders and reached into her shirt to pull off the ruined remnants of her breast wrappers.

  She looked at the strips of linen ruefully. They were cut through all the way – utterly ruined in her haste to prove herself. Not a single piece was long enough to be worth salvaging. She would have to get more.

  She tossed them into the fire and watched them hiss and splutter on the flames.

  He waved away the acrid smoke that rose from them as they smoldered in the flames. “What are you burning?”

  She turned to face him. “My wrappers.”

  He blinked. “Are you going to give up being a Musketeer? Return to being a woman once more?”

  He did not know what he was asking of her. She shook her head. “I have no way of earning my living as a woman. As a woman I would starve.”

  “I offered to marry you once.”

  “You did not know me then. Besides,” she looked around at the chamber he occupied, “you cannot afford to keep a wife were you to get one. The two of you would starve together.” The thought saddened her, though she knew it was true. She could never marry him and drag him down into the poverty she had only just escaped herself.

  He came and stood behind her, his hands on her shoulders. “No wife of mine would ever starve while I was alive to care for her.”

  She looked up at him, his green eyes shining in the firelight. A marriage between them was impossible. If she had not known it before, she knew it now. “You do not even like me. I am a thief, do not forget. You have fought me nigh on every time we have met.”

  “That was before I knew you were a woman.”

  “Does me being a woman make it all right again? Just like that?”

  He creased his forehead as if in pain. “Damn it, I do not know. All I can think of now is the sight of your red lips, and the way they would feel against mine were I to brave that friend of yours you have hidden in your boot and try to kiss you.”

  Slowly she removed the dagger from her boot and tossed it on the floor. The blade skittered over the bare boards and came to rest in the corner. A marriage between them might be impossible, but there was nothing to stop her from becoming his mistress – even if only for the one night. She wanted him so badly she would take whatever she could get and try not to pine for what was beyond her reach. “I will take the gamble that you will not hurt me.”

  He fixed her with his gaze. “Stand up next to me.” The force of his will was almost tangible in the air.

  It was an order she could not refuse, that she did not want to refuse. Slowly she got to her feet and turned to stand in front of him.

  He held on to her arms as if he was fighting for his sanity. “You are a liar and a thief and a soldier. I should not desire you still, but I do. God help me, but I do.”

  He was taller than she was – a whole half-head taller. She tipped her head back to look at him. “It was not all lies. I wore a gown the first time only for Sophie’s wedding, but the other times I wore it just for you. It took more courage than I knew I had. I have been a boy for so long – for most of my life. I have not worn a gown since I was little more than a child.”

  He looked puzzled. “I do not understand. Wearing a gown takes courage?”

  If he once knew about Rebecca, he would know her innermost soul. He would have all her secrets. She was not yet ready to tell him. “I cannot tell you now. One day I might explain to you why, if you care to know.”

  “Even when you talk in riddles, I want you all the more.” He nuzzled his face in her hair, breathing in the scent of her. “The first day I saw you sitting in the church, I thought you looked like an exotic Madonna. You looked so pure and sweet, with those rosebuds in your hair. I thought I had never seen anything so beautiful.”

  His foolishness made her smile even as her skin warmed with his words. “Not even Francine?”

  “You were different. Francine is like a rose in full bloom – her charms are so obvious, and will soon be overblown. But you, you were as sweet and unripe as a rosebud, promising delights that no one else had shared.” He raised his head and looked sorrowfully at her. “Is that, too, a lie?”

  “I have never---”

  He cut her off with a hand over her mouth. “Hush, do not speak. I could not bear it if you told me more lies.”

  She tossed her head to remove his hand from her mouth. “I will not---”

  He silenced her with a shake of his head. “If I cannot stop you from talking any other way, I will stop you like this.”

  Slowly he bent his head towards her and she lost the will to speak. A lock of golden hair fell over his eyes and she reached up her hand to smooth it back again.

  His hair was as fine and silky as it looked. She ran her hands through it, absorbed in the feel of him beneath her fingers.

  She was almost taken by surprise when his mouth reached hers. He kissed her closed lips, then her cheeks, her chin, and then, at last, her lips again, with soft touches that sent a shiver of pleasure skittering down her spine, to land quivering in the pit of her belly. She turned her mouth wordlessly towards his, shuddering with need, wanting his kisses with a desire she had never felt so strongly before.

  Her hand settled instinctively at the nape of his neck, and she pressed his mouth more firmly against his. She wanted only to feel his body against hers, from the breadth of his shoulders all the way to the floor. She wound her other hand around him, stroking the planes of his back with the tips of her fingers. She hardly believed she was here, in his chamber, touching him and being touched in her turn. He was so strong and yet so tender, everything she could have desired in a lover.

  She pressed her breasts, covered only with the thin linen of her shirt, against his chest. Her nipples, happy to be freed from their confining wraps, peaked and hardened at the touch. They had been ignored for too long, hidden away in the dark, their very existence denied. They showed their delight in their new-found freedom with a sensitivity that made her nearly faint with pleasure as they rubbed against the roughness of his jacket.

  Her mouth opened to give a tiny exhalation of delight, and he took advantage of it to enter her mouth with his tongue, tasting her very soul.

  Kissing with open mouths? It did not take her long to learn that such kisses were sinfully delicious. Tentatively she moved her tongue against his, exploring the sensations that burst in on her as she explored his mouth with her own.

  She felt him hardening against her belly and she rubbed herself shamelessly against him. Virgin she may yet be, but she was not a complete innocent. She had grown up on the streets, and was on friendly terms with a good half dozen whores. She knew that a man showed his passion for a woman by the hardness of his prick when he touched her.

  She laughed deep in her throat as he kissed her. Judging by the rod of iron he was holding against her, he must want her very much indeed. Her legs turned boneless, barely keeping her upright, as she gloried in his need for her. She may be a liar and a thief and a soldier, but she could make Jean-Paul desire her all the same.

  He groaned as she pressed herself up against him, tantalizing herself on his hardness. “You are a witch to enslave me like this.”

  She was not a witch. Churchmen burnt witches at the stake. She did not need to be tied to a stake in the marketplace with a pile of faggots around her feet to feel almost dead with fiery heat. She did not need flames licking her toes and ankles and up her thighs to feel hotter than she could bear. She was sure if she got any hotter she would burst into flames all by herself, without the need for a priest to hold a lighted torch up to her.

  She did not protest when his hands moved to touch her breasts under the linen of her shirt. She arched her back, thrusting them into his hands. She would die if he did not touch her, if he did not take her breasts into his hands, and smooth his callused palms over her too, too sensitive nipples.


  It was as if he read her mind and knew every desire that she felt but could not put into words. His hands moved exactly where she wanted them to go. They touched her just where she ached to be touched.

  His hands moved down to the waistband of her breeches, and paused. For one heartbreaking moment, she thought he would stop there, but he did not. “I cannot think of you as a wench when you are garbed as a man,” he growled into her ear. “You will have to take those breeches off, or I shall do it for you.”

  Never had she been happier to oblige him. She shuffled backwards a few steps until she felt the end of the bed bang against the backs of her knees. She slipped out of his grasp, sliding her body against the length of his, sat down on the bed and held out one leg. “My boots first. I cannot take my breeches off while my boots are still on.”

  He knelt down in front of her and pulled off first one boot, and then the other, tossing them into the corner of the room without hesitation. With a sigh, he ran his hands along her shins and up over her knees.

  Her feet and legs felt so naked without her boots. She shivered. This was real. She was in his chamber and he was undressing her, inch by inch. She bit her lip, feeling suddenly vulnerable.

  He nudged her knees apart and moved in closer between her thighs. “Now for your breeches,” he said, as he bent his head to begin work on the laces.

  His fingers fumbled with the knots, unable to work the stiff leather. With a curse of frustration he grabbed his dagger. She flinched away from the blade as, with one quick tug, he slit through the leather ties.

  Slowly he drew them over her buttocks and legs, discarding them into the corner on top of the boots.

  His teeth grazed her thigh, and she whimpered part in pleasure, part in apprehension, and clenched her thighs together. Surely he was not going to hurt her now? Surely he would not hurt her as Rebecca had been hurt? He could not be that sort of man. Surely he could not be.

  The thought of Rebecca was like being doused with cold water. What was she doing, opening herself to this man? To a man she barely knew? She sat up again with a whimper and pushed him away, clutching her shirt to her breast and waiting for the explosion of anger that was sure to follow.

  The explosion she feared never came. “You are scared?” His voice was gentle.

  She nodded, unable to find her voice, looking at his knife.

  He followed her gaze, understanding on his face. He held it up by the tip of its blade and offered it to her handle first. “Take it from me.”

  She took it, feeling the comforting weight in her hand. Slowly her fears started to ebb away. He would never have given her his knife if he intended to hurt her.

  “You have my knife.” He held his arms open, baring his chest. “I am in your power. You can stop me whenever you want to, and I shall not dare protest.”

  She had no need to be afraid. Jean-Paul was not like Andre. He would not hurt her. She tossed the knife away in the corner. “Don’t stop,” she whispered. “Not yet.”

  “Your wish is my command.” He gave her a wicked grin before bending down to untie the faded ribbons holding up her stockings - with his teeth. The ribbons once gone, he drew them down over her ankles, and off into the corner they were thrown as well.

  He sat back on his heels, looking at her with new appreciation. “I like you better like this. You look all woman to me now.”

  She crossed her arms over her breasts, feeling suddenly chilled despite the heat of the fire in the grate and the smoldering furnace blazing inside her own body. She felt so exposed, sitting in front of him naked but for her linen shirt and breeks. “I have always been all woman.”

  “Your breeches concealed that small detail from me for some weeks,” he said with a grin. “You cannot blame me for holding a grudge against them.”

  “You should be thankful to them. They have kept me safe for years.”

  “Do you feel in danger now that they are gone?”

  She looked at the predatory gleam in his eyes. He wanted her, and was not afraid to show it. Yes, she was in danger, but not as Rebecca had been. Never that. “Never more so.”

  “You know I would not hurt you.”

  “Maybe not now,” she teased. “Now that you know I am a woman and have stopped trying to kill me in your spare time.”

  “I would not hurt any woman, if I could help it. Not even you, you minx, though Heaven knows you have done your best to torment me.” He reached out and touched her breasts with his hands. “Just as you are tormenting me now.”

  She shivered at his touch. “I am not teasing you now.”

  He pulled the shirt over her head. “I am glad of it. I could not bear it if you were to mock me now.”

  Her breasts were on the small side for a woman – certainly she could not compare them to the lush breasts that spilled lavishly out of the bodices of the gowns of the whores she knew. They had mountainous breasts. She had barely a couple of molehills. She was shy under his scrutiny, feeling suddenly inadequate as a woman, but he seemed to find no fault in her.

  He moved his hands over her breasts and then bent his head to taste them. She gasped at the shock of his mouth on her nipples, gently pulling and tugging them, suckling on them, licking around the hard, pink center until she could hardly bear the rush of sensation in her body.

  He took away his head, and she felt the breeze of his movement on her wet nipples.

  With his back to her, he pulled off his own boots, tossing them in the pile on top of hers, flung his jacket off his shoulders, pulled his shirt over his head, then unlaced his breeches and kicked them off as well.

  He paused for a moment, clad only in his linen breeks, and then they, too, were discarded to lie on top of the pile.

  She watched with wide eyes as he freed his body from its coverings. His back was smooth and brown in the flickering firelight, the muscles rounded and well-defined. His thighs looked as strong and beautiful as if they had been carved out of marble by a master craftsman. She wanted to reach forward and touch them to make sure that he was indeed made of living flesh.

  Slowly he turned around to face her and she gasped with shock.

  His chest sported a long raised scar, puckered and red and raw in its newness. The scar that had nearly taken away his life. She had known that he must be scarred of course, but knowing it was different from seeing it.

  She raised a forefinger to touch it. “Does it still hurt?”

  He made a wry face. “Not nearly as much as this does right now,” he said, indicating his erection.

  She traced the outline of his scar and then slowly moved her hand down his belly to his jutting cock. There would be time enough to weep over his scar later. She had other things on her mind for now. “Will it hurt more if I touch it?”

  He grimaced. “Undoubtedly.” But when she went to take her hand away, his own hand moved over hers, holding it where it was. Slowly he lifted her hand and brought it down again, teaching her how to touch him to give him pleasure.

  She relished the lesson, glorying in the feel of her power over him, delighting in the groans of pleasure that she drew from him as she stroked along the thick, hard length of his proud cock.

  He lay back on the bed and drew her down beside him. “You are still wearing too many clothes,” he murmured into her ear. “Take them off for me. Please.”

  She wriggled her hips and slipped out of her linen breeks. “Is this better?”

  He murmured his agreement and pulled her body close to his. Her breasts pressed into his chest and their bellies were joined together as they kissed with a growing ardor.

  His cock pressed into her belly with a delicious hardness and she wriggled against him to feel it all over her, as much of it as she could reach. He gave a moan of pleasure at her movements, and moved one hard thigh in between her legs, rocking it gently against her.

  Then his fingers crept down to touch her in the place that she ached for him. She arched her back to give him room to touch her there. He did not need to be inv
ited twice.

  His fingers slid easily over her, moistened with her liquid heat, and then into her. She gasped at the invasion of her most private space, but his hot breath in her ear made her want only more. “You are wet and ready for me, Miriame, aren’t you.”

  She could only gasp as he slid a second finger in to join the first. She thought she would die with the wonderful fullness of it.

  “You want me to take you now, don’t you. You want me to put my cock inside you, to stroke you as far and as high as I can reach, to fuck you until you scream yourself hoarse with pleasure for me.”

  She did not answer. She could not. She hardly had enough air to breathe with, let alone to talk.

  He took his hand away, leaving her bereft. “Tell me you want me, Miriame. Tell me.”

  “I want you. God, I want you.” She had never wanted anything more than she wanted him to take possession of her body.

  His fingers crept back again, stroking her until she was mindless with wanting him. “You are not lying to me now, are you.” His voice was thick with satisfaction as she dripped with wetness for him.

  She could hardly get the words out, but she knew he would stop if she did not speak. More than anything she wanted him not to stop. “No, I’m not lying to you.”

  He nudged her over until she was lying on her back, and spread her legs wide apart. “No second thoughts?” he asked, as he straddled her, his cock poised at the very entrance to her body.

  She shook her head and lifted her hips off the bed to meet him. He already possessed her heart, and she longed for him to take possession of her body as well.

  He thrust into her a little way, then a little more, slowly but surely sinking deep into her body until he was inside her up to the very hilt. He rested there for a moment, his weight on his elbows, and looked into her eyes. “By God, Miriame, you test my self-control.”