Children of the Sea 03 - Sea Lord

shoulders, the soil damp beneath her buttocks, and then— yesss —his erection, hot and hard against her thighs, against her entrance. He had yanked his pants open. Her jeans and panties were down around her knees. She strained upward, her body taut and ready as a bow. He reached between their bodies to the place where she was slick and wet and aching for him. Now. He pushed, and she sucked in her breath at the sudden invasion, the startling fullness.
    It was too much. It was not enough.
    His weight pinned her, trapping her firmly in her body, fully in the moment. She was swimming in sensation, swept away by desire. He hunched into her, working her with long, firm strokes, thrusting into her again. And again. The musk of earth, sweat, and sex rose around them, the slap of flesh on flesh, wet and raw. He pounded into her, deep, deeper. She clenched around him.
    His hand gripped her jaw.
    Startled, she opened her eyes. His face was dark and intent above her, haloed by the blue, blue sky.
    “Come with me,” he commanded. “Come.”
    She was helpless to resist. The tide rose in her body, drowning will, swamping thought. The ground rolled under her like a wave as her crest took her. Above her, within her, Conn’s body plunged. Shuddered.
    And the dark carried her away.
    Conn levered himself from the girl’s long body, lying among the green vines and dry husks. Her palm lay curled half-open like a flower. Her scent—sun-warmed skin, soap-washed hair—mingled with the smell Page 25
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    of crushed stalks and turned soil.
    Gazing down at her pale face and thick, fair lashes, he allowed himself a moment’s regret. He would have preferred her cognizant.
    And walking, he acknowledged ruefully.
    But he had already been gone too long from Sanctuary. He needed her to propagate her mother’s line and secure his people’s fate. He did not choose to become mired in days of delay and endless explanations, with the risk of her family’s interference and perhaps her own refusal at the end.
    So.
    He had bound her to him by the simplest, strongest means at his disposal. She had not been unwilling. He had experience enough to achieve her seduction, skill enough to compel her response. Magic enough to throw her brothers off the scent should they feel obliged to follow.
    Everything had gone according to plan.
    Except his own reaction.
    Conn frowned. She had moved him. He did not know why. He had enjoyed other partners who were more beautiful and certainly more inventive. Eager partners. Selkie partners.
    Not recently, though. He adjusted his clothing, tucking himself away. Perhaps the girl’s charm lay in her novelty. Perhaps what he was experiencing was merely relief after a long abstinence.
    And yet . . . He glanced down at her quiet face, her fair hair rioting over the ground. When he was in her, when her body rose to meet his, he had felt a power, a control, a hunger to match his own.
    Absurd, of course. She was only human, no matter who her mother was.
    He slipped off her shoes; reached under her to remove her jeans. Beneath her garments, she was lovely, clean-limbed and strong, pale and smooth as willow with the bark peeled away.
    He laid her back down among the pumpkins, his hands skimming her ribs as he tugged her skimpy top to cover her pink-tipped breasts. Unexpected hunger tightened his belly. Stiffened his cock.
    Grimly, he returned his gaze to her face. The children of the sea lived in the moment, following their whims and desires like the pull of the tides. But Conn had ruled for nine hundred years in human form from the tower of Caer Subai. He had learned—painfully—to control his nature, to weigh and calculate and decide. He would not be distracted from his purpose.
    He slid his knife from the sheath at his knee.
    Corn stood around them in patches, skeletons of summer among the stakes and twine. Conn gathered a sheaf in one arm and, bending, sliced it through in a single stroke close to the ground. He bound the dried stalks together with twine, tying them to form a waist, a neck, legs. The shock at the top he left loose like long, stiff hair.
    He laid the corn maiden on the ground beside Lucy, measuring its length with his eyes. They were almost the same size. He dressed the sheaf in the girl’s clothing, forcing the jeans over the stalks of its legs, bundling its body into the shirt. He was sweating when he finished. Bits of dust and