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It washer so close With a sound that was not quite a groan, he reached out and pulled her tightly to hi afresh as he embraced her At last he took her firmly by the shoulders and held her back fro?" There was pain in his voice and his body was taut

"I can because Ihi else Or at least it seeone, there will be others, won’t there?" He htened on her shoulders

"Yes There will" She looked directly at hi in the face of his accusation "As you will have your wife, and those women you seek out for… didn’t you call it necessity and amusement?"

He released his hold on her and looked away "You are right, Madelaine; I have no basis for complaint I, after all, made the"conditions of our liaison: how ill-mannered ofyourself," she said in discomfiture "If you "

"I a dehter "Fine pair we are," he told her at last "It would serve us both right if we lost the whole night in bickering"

"If that wouldeasier, then--" she offered, only to be cut off by his lips opening hers

He seemed determined to press the limits of their passion, for he went at her body as if it were territory to be won He lavished attention on her face and mouth, on the curve of her neck and the swell of her breasts, using every nuance of excitation he knew to evoke a desire in her as intense as his own, all the while reveling hi her tantalizing ht of his relentless fervor; it was an act of flagrant, erotic idolatry "Now Let me have All of you," he whispered to her as he drew her onto his lap, guiding her legs around hi in anticipation as she sheathed hi and profound as his flesh was frenzied; while she nuzzled his throat, he clasped her as if to brand her body with his iether for so to make the firsthow he held her "My foot’s falling asleep," he apologized

"Does it hurt?" Madelaine asked, loom her bedroom looked more like a sketch in charcoal than a real place; no birds yet announced the co of the October sun, but Madelaine saw it heralded by les," he said, wrapping his arm around her shoulder As he pulled her close, he said, as he flipped his foot to restore circulation, "What a prosaic thing to happen"

"Itcramp," said Madelaine as levelly as she could; she was still filled with the glory of their consummation

"That would be a different matter, wouldn’t it?" He chuckled once

She turned her head and kissed the lobe of his ear "Oh, entirely"

He ran his hand down her neck to her breast, cupping it and brushing her nipple with his thumb "I hope you won’t have bruises"

"No," she said "I won’t"

"Another of the things those of your blood don’t do?" he asked deliberately lightly "As you do not eat or weep?"

"Yes," she said quietly, and kissed the angle of his jahere it met his neck

"Is it difficult, not to eat or weep?" he asked, still holding on to her

"Occasionally," she admitted, aware that she would have welco She was about toher back close to hiive you up Ifrom him, a cry of such utter despair that she was rendered still by its intensity

"I know," she said, ht to find so

His eyes were frenzied as he pulled her around to face him "I will not let this end If I took you with ht be anywhere in the world in a month"

"If that is what you want, Tecumseh, then I will do it," she said, amazed at how deeply she meant what she said

"It is, it is," he insisted "It would be the joy of ht go, and all the time ould have" He tried to s his lips over his teeth

"That e you assu over her that surprised her row old and I would not You ht not mind this year, or next year, but in ti as to what your children would think"

He stared at her "My children?"

"Well, you would not leave the what his ansould be

"No," he admitted after a moment "I could not do that"

Madelaine kept on "They would see what you would see: they would grow older and I would not"