Page 21 of Any Duke in a Storm

He parried a brutal but elegant sequences of strikes, ones he recognized as if they’d been imparted by a European fencing master. When she performed a slight jump backward, Raphael knew the move because he’d learned the same. His suspicions were correct: Bonnie Bess had spent time in an aristocratic court or at least a family with enough wealth to spend on fencing lessons. He would bet his entire fleet upon it. “You fence well,” he told her. “Pierre Prévost?”

“Yes,” she said, eyes narrowing. “Do you know his style?”

He gave an exhilarated laugh. “I do. My father enjoyedfencing and I essentially memorizedTheorie pratique de l’escrime.”

Without warning, she sprang forward, nearly catching him in his arm before he spun away in the opposite direction, narrowly missing the edge of her blade. “Where did you learn?”

“Paris,” he said. “You?”

“London.”

Dimly, Raphael became aware of their audience, the whistles and cheers nearly deafening, especially when the captain continued her flashy moves. He’d been so caught up in her that he’d forgotten the crew that surrounded them. However stunning and capable she was, or whether they had fencing styles in common, Raphael still had a wager to win. He had no intention of losing, though the odds of winning lessened as time passed. Clearly, they’d honed the same skills.

Time to change up the game.

Watching her hips—as shapely as they were in those formfitting trousers, which gave away her movements—Raphael sucked in a tense breath. When she shunted left, he ducked and swiped out with his legs, taking hers out from under her. His adversary slammed to her back on the deck with a gasp, her sword flying from her hands a handful of feet away. As expected, she was not one for defeat and vaulted to her feet, fists at the ready.

“That was disgraceful,” she snarled. “But then I shouldn’t be surprised.”

Raphael couldn’t help the taunt that rose to his lips.“Will you use your talons to source first blood, Viking, or should I expect more of that caustic tongue of yours?”

She bared her teeth at him. “Are you going to fight like a gentleman or keep scampering around like a rabid squirrel?”

“I do not scamper,” he said, grinning.

“And I do not require a blade to make you bleed, Pirate.”

Without warning, she shuttled in, one fist punching out to catch him in the jaw and a second jab into his ribs. A spinning kick caught him in the side while a second neatly clipped the sword from his grip. He wheezed as he fought for air to fill his lungs and staggered back out of her reach. “That was sneaky,” he panted, putting some distance between them.

“All is fair in love and war.”

He feinted right as she launched an attack to his left, barely evading the kick that came toward his thigh. “And here I was thinking we could only ever be war and war. There is hope for this poor, lovesick soul after all! Thank you, oh divine Goddess of the Sea!”

Bess stared at him, her lips twitching at his over-the-top dramatics. “You are the most absurd man I have ever met.”

“Flirt!” he shot back and snatched up his fallen weapon.

“Trust me, Pirate, you’d know if I were flirting with you. Right now, I only mean to right a grievous wrong.” With that, she closed the distance between them, crouching to the deck and ducking below the end of the blade that whistled past her head. A tuft of blond hair flutteredto the deck, but she paid it no mind and crashed into his belly with the full force of her shoulder.

The air blasted from him as they both toppled back. Without thinking, Raphael moved to cradle her from harm, releasing his weapon and taking the brunt of the fall on himself. They tumbled down in a tangle of limbs and crashed into the mast pole. Blinking the stars out of his vision, he reached up to his sore temple, his fingers coming away stained red.

Dieu, was he bleeding?

The virago of a captain straddled his waist with an impish grin that made those sea-green eyes light up with victory. “I win.”

Raphael would forfeit the match a thousand times over if the decadent weight of her body and the heat of her thighs upon him was the penalty for the loss. The roar of her crew’s cheers filled the air. “I call foul,” he protested.

A full-blown smile formed, nearly made him dizzy as she leaned forward, the heat of her center pressing intimately down on his abdomen. “Are you being a sore loser?”

She propped her elbows on his sweaty chest, like the very eagle inked onto his skin, sent by Zeus himself to torture the Titan who’d stolen from him. The irony wasn’t lost, the symbolism almost poetic in its beauty. Oblivious to their onlookers, a fingernail traced the top of one feathered wing. Raphael shuttled back a sharp exhale, the slight touch almost too exquisite to bear. He couldn’t help noticing her gaze flick to his piercing. Would she dare to touch him there?

“Ride him good, Bess!” someone shouted, and the crew broke out into raucous laughter, breaking the charged silence between them. She snatched her hand away, a look of mortification brewing on her face as if she’d been caught doing something she hadn’t intended to.

“I did not lose,” he said. “You did not inflict first blood, theSyrendid.”

“Good thing she and I are one and the same.” She sat up straight and scooted back, eyes ablaze.

Raphael couldn’t help it, his body reacted at the precipitous jerk of her hips upon him…his cock swelling beneath the titillating press of her plump arse as his brain conjured images of fantasies he did not need with such an eager audience. Of his beautiful Valkyrie with her head thrown back in ecstasy, hands on her naked breasts, and riding him to her pleasure without mercy.

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