by Lauren Dane
She would be setting a good example by moving into an enclave. She would be safer and, damn it, she would be with him and that made her happier than she ever expected to be.
She pulled out a big suitcase and he gave her a look. “What? You win. Happy?”
In two steps he was on her, pulling her close, crushing his mouth against hers. Her spine loosened as she held on. His taste thundered like her pulse. He took over, the scent of his skin, the feel of his muscles as they bunched and shifted like the predator he was, she greedily took him in. Even as she knew somewhere in the back of her head that he was being a bossypants.
When he finished and she struggled to regain her composure, he set her back. “I am happy, but this is not a game where you lose and I win. I want you with me in my den. It’s my nature to want my woman in my home where I can keep her safest. I want to be with you because I like to be with you and it makes having lots of sex with you easier if you’re within reach whenever the mood strikes.”
She rolled her eyes.
“You’re grumpy because your world is falling apart and you’re doing your best to build a new future.”
“I’m grumpy because you are pushy and bossy and you take over when you should back off.”
He grinned for a moment. “Alamah, you knew I was bossy and pushy when you let me get you naked.”
He was so right she should be embarrassed. “You have other attributes that seem to blind me temporarily to your overbearing nature.”
He laughed. “Thank goodness then. Come on. Pack up. Shall I grab the books on your shelves so you can study them at my house?”
“Fine.”
She moved into the bathroom to gather her toiletries. And to get some space. He clouded her judgment with his . . . well, his gorgeousness and his ability to be really good at everything and the way he just let her be bitchy and kissed it out of her when he got a mind to.
Lord, she was in such trouble.
She tried to be annoyed that she’d have to drive so far to get to the office, but when she licked her lips she tasted him again and it fled.
Her clothes went into a garment bag. She only wore a few different pairs of shoes to work, but she brought many others to his place because one never knew when she might want to wear some pretty heels after all.
If he claimed to want to be with her, he needed to understand she had a lot of clothes. And shoes. And bags. And books too.
He’d clearly run some boxes down to the car while she had pulled her stuff together in the other room because her shelves were a lot more bare when she came out.
“I took the liberty of grabbing the teas and your teapot and some of the stuff in your fridge so it won’t spoil. Will you allow me to drive home? I know all the back ways and you can make calls if you need to.”
“See? How hard is it to ask instead of giving an imperious now and frowning at me?”
“We both have to adjust, no?” He kissed her again and took her suitcase and garment bag when she was hormone addled.
“You can drive if you’ll point the car through the In-N-Out drive-through on the way.”
“I can do that.”
He walked out, wearing a smile and when he wasn’t looking, she gave one too.
• • •
“THERE are two full closets. I’ll give you the one here in the master and take the one in the other bedroom.” He brought her suitcases into the house.
She shoved a few more fries into her face. “I can take the other closet. There’s no sense in you moving everything.”
“I want you to feel at home here. A safe place.”
He was so sweet she couldn’t resist moving to him and kissing him. “Sorry about the salt.”
He licked his lips. “Somehow you can make salt sexy.”
She moved into the room she’d slept in just a week before. A week. Jeez. So much had happened in that time.
The closet was gigantic with racks for shoes and bags and lots of space to hang things. Even without the utterly beautiful male standing a few feet away looking adorably uncertain, she’d live there for this dream of a closet.
“This is a fabulous closet. I’ll take it.”
He smiled and it warmed her. Man, she was in big trouble.
“Why don’t you look at the one in our bedroom first? Then you can decide.”
“I’m going to eat this Double-Double with cheese and suck down my milkshake first. Then I’ll look.”
He put the box he’d been holding down on the bed and followed her out. “I’ll get plates. Sit.”
“Okay then. Thanks.”
He brought plates and she put all the food out and they sat in companionable silence for some time as they ate.
Once they’d finished and cleaned up—he dried and she washed—they’d brought the rest of her things into the house.
She busied herself getting the layout of the closet and the built-in drawers. It was a weird thing she knew. But organizing stuff made her relax, enabled her to let go of all the insanity of the last months and focus on some problem solving. Not just where her socks would go, but how to organize the new teams going out into the field.
She turned to see him pocket a silver box. One she’d noticed on a side table earlier.
“What’s that?”
“An old silver piece. It doesn’t really go in here.” He looked her over with that face of his and she forgot why she had that little frisson of uncertainty.
“This is your home too. I want you to . . . feel that. Put things where you like them. Tell me what color you want walls to be and I’ll take care of it. Don’t like the bedding? I can change that.”
“You’re such a prince.” She grinned as she watched him as he stalked her way. “I have no doubt you can snap your fingers and make all sorts of things happen.”
“I am what I am, alamah, and you’ll need to get used to that too. I want you to be happy. I’ll do what it takes to make that happen.” He shrugged as if most people were that way when they weren’t. Despite how fast things had jumped from hot chemistry to ohmigod you’re it for me, it moved her that he was so focused on her well-being. No one had ever been that for her. It was overwhelming but in a good way.
“I’m really hard to live with.” She shrugged. And then she remembered the box. Funny thing about having such a sharp memory. There was a stylized L on the lid. Lydia perhaps?
He barked a laugh. “You can organize your books by color and spine size. I’ll make an effort to comply.”
“Oh that. Well, that’s why it’s a good thing I can have my own closet. I like things in their place. It makes me feel better to know exactly where stuff will be. But I’m sort of temperamental.”
Again he laughed. “I haven’t noticed.” And then he kept laughing.
“Har. Look, Mister, I’m just trying to be up front, as you seem to want to try this living together thing. I’m not all purple scarves and glitter like my sister.” Or flirting behind fans and elbow-length gloves and stuff.
“You bring that up as if I don’t know. You’re not anyone else but you, thank gods. I crave you, not anyone else. I admit it, I’m sort of strangely turned on in anticipation of seeing what your closet will look like once you’ve finished.”
She shook her head at him, unable to hold back a smile.
“I’m particular. I get up very early and I’m often bitchy about it. I am intolerant of generic ice cream. I only like Kraft macaroni and cheese or homemade. I am religious about my coffee. My mother will make you eat tofu and mung beans. You need to accept that. She’s a total hippie. Her name is Rain after all. She will talk to you at length about how awesome veganism is and how cake with no eggs or butter is just as good as cake with, and you have to nod and pretend such a thing could ever be true. I’ll need a workspace here where you will not lay your crap or borrow my pens.”
“Are you trying to scare me? Because you’re not. There are four bedrooms here. You can have any of the other three to use as an office. I won’t
borrow your pens.” He snorted and she sent him a raised brow. “I promise. Or lay my crap on your work things. Though, alamah, I don’t lay my crap anywhere. I don’t even have crap. I have belongings.”
“I told you I was difficult.”
“But you’re worth it, so stop trying to scare me off.”
“I’m not nice. Or easy to be around.”
He paused, leaning over to take her hand. “What’s this about? Hm?”
She squirmed, uncomfortable that he knew her so well. “I don’t know what you mean. I just think it should be clear what you’re getting into.” She wasn’t a high-born fancypants Regency lady–type person. His wife probably had been gentle and had soft hands and never said boo. Helena didn’t have gentle manners, though, if she did say so herself, she’d wager her fashion sense was as good as, if not better than, Lydia’s had been.
He merely looked at her carefully. “Your scent changes. Just a small, nearly imperceptible bit when you’re being evasive. Did you know that?”
“No. I’ve never dated a Lycian before.”
“Of course you haven’t. Also, we’re not dating. You’re my woman. What aren’t you saying? You’re standing here in our home talking about how I should know what I’m getting into. And believe me, beautiful, beautiful witch, I do. You’re troublesome. You have a special talent for attracting the sort of people who seem to want to blow you up or shoot you.”
He kissed each eyelid with such gentleness she found her eyes stinging with unshed tears.
“You make me vulnerable.” She didn’t know how to be. Not emotionally vulnerable anyway. She could deal with physical vulnerability. It came with her job. She could work on being less of that. But emotional stuff?
He tipped her chin so he could look in her eyes. Alarm raced over his features when he saw the tears. “Of course I do. If there weren’t this enormity of feeling and connection between us, you’d easily evade feeling deeply for me. I would never hurt you. Not on purpose. Your heart is safe with me. Don’t you know that?”
She swallowed back the panic and the sob that wanted to escape. Oh gods, she was jealous of a woman who’d died more than two centuries before. What was wrong with her?
“What is it? How can I make it better?”
“The box. The one you just put in your pocket. It was hers, wasn’t it?”
She didn’t need to use a name and he was too grown up to evade or deny.
“Yes. I’m sorry. It’s been part of my home for so long I didn’t think. Are you bothered by it? She’s long gone, Helena.”
“I’ve never really been jealous before. Especially not of a centuries-dead woman. I’m sorry. I’m embarrassed to be so petty. I know you loved her. I don’t expect you to have been a monk before I was even born. I’m just . . .”
He drew the pad of his thumb down her cheek. “Shh. It’s not petty. It’s all right to feel that way. I loved her. She meant something to me and she always will. I can’t deny that or it would shame not only what I had with her, but myself as well. And what I have with you.”
“I don’t expect you to. Honestly, it’s not that you loved her. I understand that. I accept that. I’m just . . .”
“Just what?”
“Not that. Not gentle born. I have weapons calluses. I say bad words and I often come home covered in bruises, cuts and sometimes in a sling. I don’t know how to keep a genteel home for my husband and, well, that’s not me. I can’t be her. I can’t be like her. I’ve never ridden a horse!”
He smiled and kissed her quickly. “You’re you. My amazing female. Brave and strong. Smart. Angry and righteous. Full of love and passion. Protective. I love that. All of it. Lydia was part of my life then. But you’re my life now and forever. The difference is vast. I’d never want you to be anyone or anything but what you are. Because that’s what I love about you. And you don’t need to ride horses. We don’t have the time anyway.”
He brushed the hair back from her face and slid his palm around to cup the back of her neck. It was dominant and tender all at once.
“From the moment I first met you I knew you’d be important to me. We have so much time to build a future. A long, beautiful future. You are brilliant. Magnificent. My match in every way. Do you know what it means to a male like me that you have weapons calluses?” His grin told her all sorts of things and made her tingly.
“I feel like a baby next to you.”
“In some ways I suppose you are. I’m four centuries old. But you’re no naïve baby. You’ve learned powerful and painful lessons. You’re struggling to protect people in a time that most people, even those my age, haven’t had to deal with. You have, to be clichéd for a moment, an old soul.
“It’s not about high-born manners or horses or keeping a house, and I’m sorry if anything I’ve ever done has led you to that conclusion. You stand up for what is just and you do it at great threat and danger. But you do it because it’s who you are. That’s . . . it’s irresistible.”
“You’re so sure of yourself.”
“Not always. But I came up hard. Yes, I am a prince, but all my brothers and I had to serve in battles. Had to come up on our own through the ranks and find our way. Simon came here to escape that destiny. I suppose when I volunteered to come here to help Owen, it was to forge a new path for myself, and there you were. It was meant to be. You and I were meant to be. I can be absolutely sure about that, even as I am just as confused and sent reeling by many other things that happen daily in this new reality Others face.”
“I hate it when things are out of my control.”
“I know. We can get through it together.”
“I’m still difficult and you still can’t borrow my pens, even though you’re exemplary in bed.”
“All right. I can live with that.” He kissed her long and slow until the stress melted away and she felt a lot better. He was way better than her mother’s tea.
“And, by the way, I picked up DVDs of the movies you mentioned. Thunderdome and Mad Max.”
“Really?”
He nodded. “Really. Want to watch them in bed?”
“I’ll make popcorn.”
Chapter 18
“YOU need to get out. It’s one night. A few hours. Helena, it’s been how long since you’ve done something that didn’t involve shooting, getting shot at or blown up?” Marian, one of Helena’s right-hand people and a good friend, poked at her.
Helena couldn’t help smiling as she thought about some of her recent recreational activities with Faine. “I do okay.”
“Okay, but you can do that when you get home. You’ll be sweaty and relaxed. Plus, well, it’s good for the Others community to see us out and about. We get to have a damned life too.”
Wild Darkness was a fun club. Or it used to be. Helena hadn’t gone in at least a year and a half. Part of it been that she and the ex had gone out there on a regular basis. The rest had been her life getting so busy that going out and shaking her ass had fallen to the bottom of her to-do list.
“Hell, ask Faine to come along.”
“Ask me to come along where?” Faine wandered into the room looking good enough to lick. She figured having more access to him now that they lived together would ease her need of him at least a little. But that wasn’t the case. The more time she spent with him, the more she wanted.
“I was just trying to talk Helena into coming out tonight with me and some of the others from the Hunter squad. There’s a dance club, it’s run by Others.” Marian shrugged. “It would be a good sign if people saw her out.”
Faine searched her face for a signal, but she could tell, given his posture change, that he thought it was a good idea. It probably was.
She smiled at him and he nodded. “I’m in. I mean, if I don’t have to manage some new crisis between now and tonight.”
Marian beamed his way. “I’ll see you both in a few hours. Don’t let her wear something frumpy. She’s got great legs.”
Faine raised a brow. “Oh, I’m
very aware of Helena’s legs.”
“I don’t own anything frumpy!”
“Okay, so don’t wear anything elegant but so long I can’t even see your knees.”
“I’ve been dressing myself appropriately in social situations for a little while now. I think I can manage.”
Marian just laughed as she left Helena’s office.
Once they were alone she sighed. “Good gods. We don’t have to go for a long time or anything.”
He crowded her and she secretly loved it. “Oh, beautiful witch, I’m going to watch you move all night long. And then I’m going to strip you naked and show you how much it makes me want to love every inch of you.”
He was so good at that. All that sexy talk that turned her knees rubbery.
“You do have really great legs. I’m undecided, though, if I want anyone else to see that. Maybe you can go dancing in a long dress instead.”
She laughed. “I’d get caught up in all the material around my legs. I need to move. Plus, well, she threw down the gauntlet with that frumpy comment. I have to wear something totally fabulous.” Which, knowing Marian, was what she intended from the start.
Because they were alone, he dipped down, brushing his mouth over hers. “If you dance like you fuck, I’m going to be hard all night long.”
“I don’t know if I do or not. You’ll have to tell me afterward.”
“I like this side of you.”
“Which side is that?”
He tipped her chin up with his fingertip. “The playful Helena only a few people get to see. My beast presses against my skin, wanting to come out to play too.”
She swallowed hard. Her magick rose and she let it for long moments before she got herself back under control.
“Stop that. I’m totally okay with playing. Later.”
He smiled, kissing her again quickly before stepping back. “Count on that. Find me when you’re ready to go home. I’m working in the conference room next door.”