His head came up. He looked at her, and he didn't appear lashed. He appeared angry and . . . well, angry, but that wasn't all.

He started toward her. She backed up, heading toward the door. He swerved, herding her into the stall where she'd dressed. Dragging his cloak off the wall, he threw it over the pile of straw-and his eyes glinted with intention.

"You have the gall. Do you really think you're going to . . . to . . . couple with me?" She made a dash around him.

He caught her around the waist. "I have this right. I take this right!" He tossed her on top of his cloak and followed her down.

Straw crackled. Dust flew.

"Don't you even think of it!" As hard as she could, she slapped the side of his head.

He captured her wrist and pressed it over her head, then caught her other wrist and imprisoned them together, controlling her with one hand while he used the other to . . . to grope her. The sensitive skin of her inner elbow and wrist. Her long throat. The swell of her breasts beneath her soft chemise.

With the exaltation of her ride still surging in her veins and her fury to back her up, she struggled against him, flinging herself against his strength, snapping her teeth toward his face . . . yet being careful not to hit his wound.

And why not?

Did he really imagine she would submit to him? To this? Now? After he had made his opinion of her so dreadfully, distressingly clear?

Apparently he did, for he sat up, caught her petticoat, and dragged it up, baring her to the cool air. With his hand on her thigh, he pushed it all the way up. He used his knee to separate her legs, and when she kicked at him, he employed his thumb with wicked intent, sliding it along the crease between her legs, fondling her clitoris, then thrusting his thumb inside her.

Looking into her face, he chuckled. "Why are you fighting? You're damp. Yielding. Ready."

"I hate you!" Stupid, petulant, childish thing to say-and the best she could do right now.

"I love the way you hate."

When he withdrew his thumb, she clenched her teeth to contain her groan of protest.

Somehow he had opened his trousers, for now he wrapped his arm around her hips, lifted her, and positioned them groin to groin.

"Don't you dare do . . . that!" She panted, trying to sound firm, trying to shut him out . . . trying not to want him.

"What? This?" He barely moved, using a small rocking motion that tested her readiness.

She was ready. Blast him. Her body was softening, preparing, wanting.

"Or this?" The head of his penis pressed into her a single, taunting inch, no more, and then slowly withdrew.

She tried to remember why she was so angry at him. "You are the most ungrateful, high- handed, proprietary man I have ever had the bad luck to-"

"Couple with?" He mocked her. "I am the only man, my dear. You were a virgin. That first time, you were a virgin, hot and sweet, young and tight, and I thought I was going to die from the pleasure of having you, and from the pleasure I gave you." He took a long breath. "Furthermore, I'm going to be the only man you're ever going to have."

"You have no right-"

He thrust again.

The words choked in her throat.

In and out, that single inch that opened her to him . . . and to desperate craving.

Her legs stirred restlessly as she tried to contain her response.

She couldn't. Oh, God. She was halfway to orgasm, carried there by his touch, his weight, by his relentless, guttural, visceral claim on her.

"You're mine," he whispered. "That's why I worry about you. That's why I dare tell you what to do. That's why I'll take you until you know with your every breath, your every heartbeat, that I own you."

"And I own you!" She laid claim foolishly, without thinking of the consequences.

"Yes." And he thrust all the way, filling her, heating her, finding, as he had before, that deepest place where her secrets resided. And her secret now was that she loved this.

She loved the powerful motion; she loved the raw violence; she loved that he stretched her until she was full of him and yet needing more. She loved the way he held her in place; she loved his lawless lack of control; she loved her own rebellious submission.

She loved that although she tried to hold off, he wouldn't allow it. He lifted her feet and wrapped them around his back, so she could do nothing but what he forced her to do. Then as he thrust and thrust, he ground his hips in a circle.

She liked being part of the night, swooping along the roads, her costume fluttering, exultant in her freedom.

She liked this better.

She came hard and fast, helpless before the onslaught of love, of lust, of desperate need and glorious release. And as she did, her inner muscles held him captive and massaged him.

He groaned, holding himself rigidly still, letting her use him until she collapsed.

Then he pulled away and thrust again.

And they were moving together, riding wildly, a ferocious hunger driving them.

His cloak twined around them, frustrating them, holding them back.

She kicked it away.

He propelled himself into her blindly, savagely, a man intent on branding himself on his woman.

She came again and again, crying out in ecstasy, filled with him and with satisfaction, yet always wanting more, wanting him.

The rhythm grew faster, the sensation more intense.

She watched his face, saw his eyes glitter with heat, his muscles grow taut with desperation. She was going to die of this pleasure, so much like agony. She was going to kill him, if he didn't kill her. She wanted it to end. She wanted it to go on forever. . . .

And then he convulsed, pouring himself into her, thrusting in a fury and groaning, "Emma. Emma."

The wildness of him poured into her, and she came, too, one final, glorious release that carried her from one peak to the other until she fell, broken and healed, into his arms.

He sank down atop her. They breathed together, heavily, recovering and returning, becoming two people again, Michael and Emma, complete and whole in themselves.

She remembered-he had insulted her. He had forbidden her. He had taken her.

And he would pay.

"Did you tear open your wound?" She pushed at him.

"What?" He lifted himself onto his elbows and looked down at her.

She was pleased-no, delighted-to see that he looked dazed. "Did you tear open your wound?" More forcefully, she shoved at him.

He let her, rolling onto his back and taking her with him. "I don't think so."

She slid his shirt off his shoulder and looked. No crimson stained the white bandage. "You're sure you didn't hurt anything?"

"I'm fine!"

Taking both sides of his shirt in her hands, she ripped it apart. "Stay absolutely still and I won't hurt you now." Putting her mouth to his, she kissed him hotly, deeply, and when he groaned, she knew she was going to win this time.

They were both going to win this time.

As they dressed, she couldn't meet his gaze. She had been wild with him, taking charge, riding him hard, riding him fast, making him carry her where she wanted to go.

She needed to remember more than those moments. She needed to remember what had come before, in all the days of their acquaintance, and what he'd done to her-seduced her with a lie, laughed at her behind her back.

But this didn't feel like a lie, like seduction, or like laughter. It felt like . . . union. It felt like a meeting of souls.

"Emma?"

His deep voice made her want to hide. "Yes?"

He put one hand on her shoulder, used the other to tilt her chin until she had to look at him. "Marry me."

"What?" She looked at him now, all right. Looked to see if he was serious.

Her shock must have been all too apparent, for he laughed reluctantly, and repeated, "Marry me. Please."

He looked serious. And she couldn't figure out why he would propose as a joke. After all, he'd already done with her what he wanted . . . what they both wanted. A little curl of panic started in her belly, so she took a moment to hide her face, and pulled her dress on over her head.

He moved behind her and started fastening her buttons.

Briskly and sensibly, she said, "I'm a paid companion. A rector's daughter. I can't marry the heir to the dukedom of Nevitt."

"What a snob you are." Using his fingers, he combed the hay out of her hair.

"A snob!" His casual dismissal of her background took her breath away. She twisted around to face him. "I assume that someday you want to return to England?"

"Someday very soon." She heard the hitch of homesickness in his voice.

Homesickness was catching, apparently, for she felt it, too. But that made his proposal even more ludicrous. "I remember England if you don't. I'd be shunned. You'd be embarrassed!"

He drew himself up, and for the first time she saw the visage of the nobleman that lay at his core. "I would not be embarrassed, and you would not be shunned. You would be a Durant."

His arrogance took her breath away. But when she got it back, she retorted, "Not for long. Your father would have the marriage annulled."

"My father would joyously click his heels to know I was marrying at last."

She laughed reluctantly.

But he looked more and more earnest. "More important, when he got to know you, he would slap me on the shoulder and tell me you were too good for a wastrel like me."

"You're not a wastrel," she said automatically.

"Not any longer. But I was. I was a lot of things. A spoiled brat, a wastrel, and an adventurer. Then a prisoner." His eyes grew dark. "Nothing more. Even after I was released, my soul still cowered behind bars and in the dark. Until you came, Emma, and rescued Elixabete. Then I saw kindness still existed in the world, and it was the start of healing."

"No one can stand by while a child screams in pain!"

"Actually, most people can. Then you saved me from Prince Sandre and his thugs. Well"-he waved a dismissive hand-"not me, really, but the Reaper."

"You saved me first!"

He viewed her as if he saw something in her she couldn't imagine. "You repay your debts, even to a crazy man in a costume, and you kiss him in gratitude. Both parts of me-Michael Durant and the Reaper-fell in love with you."

Love.

No, not really. He was still suffering from prison-induced delusions.

She didn't believe him. Or rather, she didn't dare believe him. "You're insane."

He laughed a little. "Possibly. But what I want to know is, who are you, Emma Chegwidden? What will you do with your life? Become the princess of Moricadia?"

"No!" She shuddered in revulsion. "No."

"You could do a lot of good here, use your influence on Sandre to soften his policies. Sacrifice yourself for the good of others."

"No. I won't!"

"Or you could be the Duchess of Nevitt."

"You taunt me."

"Do I look like I'm taunting you?"

She turned her head away, because the idea of being his wife, at his side for his whole life . . . It pulled at her with all the power of the North Star to a magnet. How she wanted him!

"Or you could do whatever you want."

She looked back at him. "What do you mean?"

"You're not the same timid little companion who came to Moricadia and got lost in the woods. You've had a rebirth, Emma Chegwidden, and now you're an Amazon, doing what you believe is right no matter the opposition."

Was that how Michael saw her? As an Amazon? Right now, she didn't feel like an Amazon. Her legs felt like noodles from riding as the Reaper, and from riding Michael, and from orgasms so intense she cried with joy.

"Think about it. You are afraid of nothing, and you can be whatever you want. So be mine." He kissed her lightly on the forehead, on the cheek, on the lips. "Marry me."