He opened his eyes fully. The sun had dipped toward the western horizon. Maybe three hours of daylight left. He stared. He didn’t blink. He felt a part of himself open to that dare, man against nature against beast. At his best moments, he was all three.

The beastly little bastard inside him wanted what it always did. Food. Fighting. Fucking. The order didn’t matter.

What did Tallis want?

I want to go home.

“Do you want to think about something else instead?” Kavya spoke directly against his throat.

“I thought you were sleeping.”

“No.”

“Lying here being bored?”

“Just resting.”

“Wait, think of something else,” he said. “What did you mean by that?”

Her gaze fixed on his. Wide. Unblinking. Did she see a fool? A killer? A lunatic?

What Tallis wanted, apparently, was for her to see someone else entirely, because he wanted her to see him as a good man. With his hand moving up and down her arm, then slipping lower to caress the span of her ribs, he wasn’t a good man at all. The beast’s dark thoughts spilled into his rational consciousness, twining sex and violence and tenderness with the image of Kavya—her splendor while nude and aroused. To see that would be a blessing unlike any he’d known because, unlike his visions of the Sun, Kavya would be real.

“Don’t worry. I wasn’t poking around in your mind. But like I said before, sometimes you feel things so strongly. Just now, you thought something sad and shocking. That’s all I know. So . . . I’m hoping it had nothing to do with waking here with me.”

Tallis exhaled. She phrased it in such a way as to leave the door open. He could explain, or he could move on. He wasn’t ready to explain. The raw impulse of wanting to return to Scotland wasn’t new, but he hadn’t felt its visceral punch so strongly before.

“Nothing at all. What about you? If you didn’t sleep, how did you occupy your time?”

She stretched. Was she purposefully pressing her high, firm breasts against his side? “I’ve been remembering what you did to me. I don’t want to wait until we get to a hotel. You need what I had. It would work some of the tension out of your body. You’re strung so tightly.”

“If I said I feel stiff, I’d have to admit to the shame of making an unbearably bad pun.”

She was beautiful when she frowned. Not serious. Not scolding, even. Just more inquisitive than usual. “Pun?”

“I’m stiff, Kavya. My prick. I woke up with you lying curled into me and I got ideas. Very quickly.”

“About us, no matter the sadness I felt.”

“Forget that. I’ve been honest about my desires from the moment I knew them myself. What I gave you was a prelude. You’re curious about me and even more curious about sex.” He tapped his temple. “I’ve got no psychic weapons up here to mess with your mind.”

“I know. I want to reciprocate. Here.”

Tallis grinned as if she’d made another teasing jest, but her expression revealed that same frowning inquisitiveness. “Wait,” he said. “You’re serious.”

“I am.”

Speaking bluntly, he wanted to test her resolve. “With your mouth or your hand?”

She inhaled, eyes so wide that he could see a ring of white around her amber irises. “My hand. Easier for you to guide me.”

He couldn’t help a groan, which banished her hesitancy and made her smile. It also made her bold. She fumbled with the button and zipper of his cargo pants until she’d made room enough to slip her fingers inside. “Fuck,” he said roughly.

“That’s the idea.”

“You have no idea.”

With her free hand, she guided his beneath the waistband of his briefs. He made a fist around hers. The pressure, the heat—Tallis arched his neck, greedy for air. How long had it been? He couldn’t remember. And he knew that no matter how much time passed, he’d never forget Kavya’s tentative pace becoming more assured.

She clutched him tighter. Her fingers were caught between his and the swelling ache of his hard-on. But Tallis was the one caught. He couldn’t focus. It was either close his eyes to savor the pleasure ripping up from the base of his spine, or watch Kavya. Watch her eyes as they darted from his face to where she’d bared his cock. Watch her parted lips as she began to softly pant. Watch as she learned the rhythm of his desire.

She propped on one elbow. Although awkward, she managed to yank open his shirt. Her awed sigh made Tallis feel powerful, that his body aroused this mind-blowing woman.

Smiling with age-old female trickery, she began to experiment. She pushed his fist away, changed the rhythm, teasing him, increasing the pressure, gripping his swollen head, pumping his long shaft.

“The old-fashioned way, Tallis,” she said, her voice breathy. “You can’t give me your thoughts. Give me your words.”

“You think I can speak now, lonayíp woman?”

“Yes.”

His head was spinning in circles that kept time with her strokes. “Don’t let up.”

“You made me feel amazing. Is this as good?”

“If you felt half of this, I did bloody well.”

She licked the fevered skin of his upper pectorals, then blew across the damp trail. “Beautiful.”

“I’m not.”

“Yes, you are. There. Like that—arching against me, your hips off the ground.” Kavya sounded overwhelmed. “I’ve never seen anything so powerful. I’ve never felt so powerful.”

“Faster.” He was thrusting up to meet every downward clench of her tight fist. So close, burning, he moved to enclose her hand in his once again.

“No,” she said sharply. “Mine.”

Leaning down, she found where his neck met his shoulder and sucked, licked, scraped her teeth across his heated flesh. It was her teeth, and the appreciative moan she hummed against his taut muscles—primal. Urgent. Earthy and strong. The combination sent him rocketing over the edge.

He cried out a hard curse and snapped rigid. The sky closed to black along with his eyelids. He didn’t see colors or stars; he only felt. Kavya pumped twice more before he came, streaking his abdomen with the hot proof of his release.

“Oh! Oh my.” The first was shock. The second was satisfaction. “That was . . .”

“Bloody fantastic,” Tallis scratched out. He tried to swallow but couldn’t. He needed water. He needed a steady breath. Later. “Are you sure you haven’t done this before?”

“Never.” She licked up to his earlobe, then caught his lips in a kiss that balanced between sweet and savage. “But I liked it.”

“Not more than I did.”

A blush—her blushes were always a surprise—turned the apples of her cheeks golden pink. “That was all right?”

“Very all right.” He pulled her close for another kiss, this one sweet enough to make him think, if only for a moment, that they were the forever sort of people. That wasn’t the case and never would be.

After a cursory cleanup, he forced a smile. “We’ll definitely need another bath,” he said blithely. “Not that I’m complaining.”

“And there you go again.” Her eyes were hazy and distant, when she met his gaze at all. “Tallis gone. The Heretic returned.”

He stood sharply, which meant shoving her off and away. Not his favorite chore. He set about reassembling his armaments and looked down at Kavya, who’d brought her knees to her chest. Obviously she wasn’t in the mood to explain herself, and he wasn’t in the mood to listen. The orgasm that had held back his worries wasn’t strong enough to keep them at bay forever.

Still sitting, Kavya aligned her knuckles in that odd, fastidious way.

He couldn’t resist. Not again. “Why do you do that?”

Her brown eyes were lightened by the sun, which made them look more like caramel. She narrowed them, but beneath her outward aggression was a different timbre—as if she’d been caught doing something wrong. “What are you talking about?”

Tallis nodded toward her knotted hands. “Your fingers interwoven, clasped so exactly.”