Thank you for your kind words. I also want to say thank you for your continued interest and support.
I do not own Merlin or the characters and I especially do not own Wicked In Your Arms.
"I want to hear everything. How was the dowager's house party?" Gwen's half sister Matilda asked, as she leaned close and whispered over the lilting notes of the soprano who sang at the front of the room. "Do you have any prospects? Any handsome men who swept you off your feet?"
Gwen ignored the sudden pinch in her chest at the thought of one handsome man in particular and slid her gaze from the Italian opera singer the dowager had acquired for the evening.
The singer's generous bosom swelled from her gown and she feared that she might spill free with her next note.
She looked to her half sister...
"The viscount has made himself amenable," she said.
Matilda looked around, several rows of chairs lined the ballroom occupied by gentlemen and ladies, all listening raptly to the soprano performing on a small dais at the head of the room.
Then she looked at the gentleman sitting one row behind them in the dowager's ballroom.
Smiling, she whispered,
"I'm sure the viscount has been more than amenable. His imposing grandmamma would see to that, I imagine."
Gwen nodded, her stomach cramping a bit because her single marriage prospect was due to one intimidating old lady. Far from romantic.
At that thought, her gaze swept the room, searching for the familiar blonde hair of her prince.
A weakness to be certain, that she should still search for him after she had ended their affair. But in the last week since her return to town she found herself searching for him everywhere she went.
She took a bracing breath... Sooner or later they would bump into each other and she must be strong when that moment arrived.
She had to be as stalwart as she'd been at the inn, severing their relationship with nary a tear. At least in his presence.
"Are you looking for someone?" Matilda asked.
"No." She forced a bright smile. "Thank you for accompanying me tonight. We've had so little opportunity to visit."
"I'm thrilled you invited me. With my husband out of town on business, I'm happy for the distraction. I'm only sorry Elizabeth isn't feeling well."
"She's been spending a good deal of time with Lord Hornsby," Gwen said.
"Lord Hornsby? That ancient old man who practically accosted us when we arrived, demanding to know where she was?"
"The same." Gwen readjusted herself on the hard-backed chair and sighed, not understanding why her sister Elizabeth encouraged the old man's suit. "I think she wanted a reprieve from his attentions."
"That I can understand."
Matilda shuddered and Gwen couldn't help teasing,
"Not everyone can be married to an Adonis."
Matilda smiled pertly and whispered back,
"True. There is no one his match."
Gwen snorted.
"Braggart!"
"Although, that gentleman who just entered the room with his gaze fixated on you would be a close second."
At that, Gwen's gaze jerked up to land on Arthur, standing tall and handsome in his black jacket. Only he wasn't alone...
Other than his ever-present cousin, a pair of ladies accompanied them. One was older...the mother, Gwen guessed from her resemblance to the young, fair-haired woman that the prince gallantly led into a seat.
Her eyes burned. He wasted no time moving on.
"Gwen are you all right?" Matilda asked.
She nodded, staring her aching eyes hard at the back of Arthur's head two rows in front of her.
So much for remaining stalwart. Her hands shook in her lap.
Suddenly, the room broke into applause as the soprano's final note faded to an end.
Shaking, she rose to her feet and said,
"Excuse me, Matilda. I need some air."
"Would you like me to come with..."
"No. I'll be but a moment."
If she should succumb to tears, she didn't want her sister to witness her display of weakness. They were only just beginning to know each other.
And she would rather her sister not know that she had fallen in love with a man so above her station, that she was guaranteed nothing but heartache.
She glimpsed her father as she fled, standing near the back with other gentlemen less inclined to appreciate the evening's musical performance.
She ignored his scowl as she dashed off. Even ignored meeting anyone's eyes directly...most specifically a handsome, blonde-haired, blue-eyed prince she'd shut out from her life.
She blinked burning eyes, her steps eating up the parquet floor as she hurried from the ballroom. She wondered if she could beg off for the night and go home.
She'd tell everyone she was ill with whatever allegedly ailed her sister Elizabeth.
"Gwen!"
A small squeak escaped her at the sight of Arthur striding towards her.
Whirling back around, she increased her pace, hoping he would get the hint that she didn't want to see him...especially with her eyes burning with tears that threatened to fall at any moment.
"Guinevere!"
He said her name louder, a barked command. And a quick glance revealed he was running now, his face set in hard, determined lines.
Lifting her skirts, Gwen gave in to a full run, not caring how absurd she was being, running from the prince as if he was a crazed murderer.
Rounding a corner, she seized the latch on a door, fumbling with it, hoping to dive inside and hide.
But just as she got the door opened, he was there.
Every hard imposing inch of him pressed at her back.
Instantly, she was enveloped in him. He was no longer a memory, but a live, real, flesh and blood man pressed hotly against her.
Her heart spiked against her throat. And panic warred with the inexplicable fury in her heart.
Suddenly, she whipped around and brought her palm crashing against his face with a loud crack.
But he grabbed her wrist before she could strike him again and pushed her back into the room. And darkness engulfed them, thick and pervasive as a cocoon.
Inside the room, they wrestled, with him trying to grab one of her flailing hands desperate to hit him...to punish him again...to hurt him for all the pain in her heart.
Sobs choked her throat. But he hauled her against him, her arms trapped between their bodies.
Next, he grasped her face with his one free hand, forcing her to be still, immobilizing her. Then his mouth claimed hers in a fierce stamp of his desire.
Heat seared Gwen at the contact and she was helpless to resist. She kissed him back with equal fervor, their lips brutal and thorough, teeth clashing in their feverish need for each other.
And the throbbing darkness enhanced everything.
With her arms still trapped, she found herself moving, until the backs of her knees hit something... A chair or a bed, she guessed, but somehow didn't care.
Still, they remained kissing, their lips locked in a fierce battle.
But he eased up, freeing her hands. And it was as though they were reading each other's minds, because her fingers flew to his trousers and freed him even as his dove beneath her skirts.
Fabric ripped. Her drawers, she supposed, but she didn't care.
And the barest hint of air caressed that exposed part of her before he was there, plunging himself deep.
She arched, crying out beneath him as he worked himself over her, taking her as if his life depended on it.
Their bodies made savage sounds as they came together again and again in a fierce coupling.
His hands gripped her bottom, lifting her up for his penetration. And she went willingly, moving with his every motion.
She took everything he had to give and found herself reveling, exulting and then exploding into a million particles.
The air itself seemed to shudder around her as she convulsed, trembling in his arms. And still, it wasn't over...
He flipped them so that she could ride him. And after a moment's awkwardness, she found her rhythm, encouraged by his deep, guttural sounds of satisfaction.
He cupped her breasts through her dress, abraded her nipples through the sheer muslin until she moaned and rode him harder, finding that spot and hitting it as hard as she could manage.
At that, he grabbed her hips anchoring her onto his rigid member as he began to thrust in a punishing rhythm.
"Mine," he whispered ever so softly Gwen wondered if she had heard him correctly through all their sounds and noises.
Ripples of sensation burst through her again, spreading from the core of her to each and every nerve ending. And just as the prince groaned out his release, she gave an exultant shout and collapsed breathlessly on top of him.
Draped over Arthur, it was some moments before Gwen could even move.
But his light touch at the back of her head spiked her to awareness.
She lurched upright and scrambled off him, rearranging her skirts over her.
"What have we done? In the midst of the dowager's musicale, no less? You've gone mad and you've dragged me with you!" she angrily said.
"It was bound to happen." His disembodied voice stroked the air, infuriatingly even. "And it will happen again if we try to ignore each other."
She rose unsteadily to her feet.
"What do you recommend? We schedule regular trysts?" She thought of the fair-haired lady waiting for him in the dowager's ballroom and her anger returned. "That might impede your courtship."
She thought she caught the gleam of his blue eyes in the dark.
"You're jealous."
"Why would I be jealous?" she snapped. "I broke it off with you. It's you who needs to stop hounding me."
Gwen moved to put some distance between her and Arthur, her hands quickly assessing her hair. There was hardly a strand properly in place.
One look at her and anyone would surmise she had been engaging in relations of an illicit nature.
"How could I have been so stupid?" she said as she furiously attacked her hair, readjusting the pins without a hope.
"Guinevere..." Suddenly his warm hand was on her arm. "We can't go on ignoring each other. I'm going to keep hounding you, as you put it."
"Don't touch me!" Her voice quivered as she tried to pull free.
The last time he touched her, which was moments ago, they ended up rutting like a pair of wild animals. Her face burned and she arched away.
But instead of releasing her, he took her by both arms and held her close as though trying to comfort her. Or calm her. Perhaps both.
And that was how they were discovered, locked in each other's arms, her hair tumbling wildly around her, the smell of their desire ripe on the air.
Light bathed them as the door to the room opened wide...
Stay safe!
