by Billi Jean
“What did he want?” Brennan eyed Stephano.
“Nothing. I had something in my eye,” she lied. She blinked rapidly, not having to fake the moisture that filled her eyes. Her emotions were too high for her to control easily. He wants to talk. That must mean something.
“The Silkies are dangerous, Maeve, you know that. Try to stay close.”
“I know.” She held in the sudden urge to remind him that not only had she survived, but she’d freed a warrior from the Dark Faye and an entire town from a curse. “I’m glad you were safe, Brennan. I was scared for you. How did you break free?”
“It was the Silkie and the Tracker. They pretended to side with the Dark Faye, but spied on them instead.”
She could only stare at him. Who would do such a thing? “But they can read minds, can’t they?”
“I always thought so, but the Silkie seems to have some protections.” They reached the true entrance and he caught up to the others, dismissing her.
Stephano came up behind her and brushed along her arm, winking at her when he did. She felt that mixture of heat and something else…something powerful, almost as if they shared a secret. My strength. She’d heard him boasting over what she’d done, and listening could hear something in his tone, something that belied the way they’d ended things. Does he care about me? She thought he did, but more… She couldn’t imagine him wanting more. He had all the women he wanted—why settle for one?
An hour later she waited in her room, anxious to see if he actually came to her or not. The Silkies had not only provided them with lodging for the night, but they each had their own room. The entire house was carved from white sandstone. Her room had a sunken hot water spring far in the back, and a crevice for a soft bed and another for a table and two chairs. It was far different from her cottage, but still managed to feel…homey. Am I so desperate than anything looks homey?
A scratch at her door, followed by Stephano pushing it open, startled her badly enough she almost screamed. He saw and a smile flashed across his expression, but almost immediately, a serious one fell into place.
Her heart beat too fast all of a sudden. Her breath was shallow too and where he’d entered her body, she clenched, missing the hardness of him filling her to the point of almost pain. Want me. Want me for more than sex, for more than this journey. Want me, me!
The silent desperation of her cry only made her feel worse, not better as he closed the door and stared at her without speaking. His expression gave nothing away while she feared hers revealed every inch of her heart.
Stephano couldn’t seem to find words. All his adult life he’d used honeyed words with women, phrases that had them falling into his arms. But now, facing the one woman he knew was the best thing that had ever happened to him, he had nothing. I fucked this up. There has to be a way to fix this.
He’d paced the confines of his room, unable to come up with a plan for what to say to Maeve once he got her alone. Finally, he’d left and ended up facing her door expecting something to come to him. He’d then paced outside of it for another period of time, until he’d stood, once again staring at the wood separating him from her. Nothing had come to him. Everything he’d ever read had warned him that women didn’t like to be fucked hard and fast, then dropped off without a word.
I should have said something. Anything. It felt like eons since he’d had her to himself and all he could circle around was that all his life he’d never known a woman could feel so right. Essential.
She stood, still appearing distant, even a little afraid of him. He tried to figure out what to do, but with a frustration only slightly less than he’d felt in his room, without her there, he couldn’t stand the distance. He walked over to her and gently pulled her to the chair and onto his lap. She sat stiffly and would have jumped away but he hugged her around the waist and pulled her slim body up against his.
This is what I need. He breathed in deeply, for the first time it felt like since she’d walked away with a sad, broken smile back on that hilltop. The hardness constricting his breathing unknotted. Gradually she also seemed to relax, until with a soft sigh, she stroked his arm, tentative at first, but continued to rub from his wrist to his elbow and back down. He realized with surprise that he’d been caressing hers as well. When the silence grew too much, he cleared his throat.
“I fucked up. I do it. Ajax says a lot. I don’t think. Not when it comes to sex. I forget that my head below my belt isn’t in charge,” he tried to tease.
She tilted her head and stared into his eyes. There wasn’t a smile there, no happiness at all, only a look far too wise for his excuses. He realized with a suddenness that caught his chest in that tight grip again that here was a person who had seen more pain in her short life than he had in his long existence. Maybe not the kind that left her gasping on a battlefield from a mortal sword wound, but still painful all the same. He was lucky to even know her, to even hold her, and have drawn her eye and he’d… And I never considered her that way.
She’s a Siren. She could have her choice of men. Even if she feared her powers, she would grow into them. ‘I’m powerful.’ She’d said it with amazement, as if the idea had never occurred to her, as if she had no clue of her own worth. But some man, some day would, and he’d catch her eye, then her.
And it won’t be me if I don’t get my head on straight. He brushed her long thick hair back over her shoulder, marveling at how silky soft it was, like mink. He could remember the way it had felt, tickling along his arms as he held her and took her with such abandon. I fucked this up. I should have held her tenderly and made slow love to her. She killed for me. And I fucked her on a mountain top then let her walk away before the sweat had even dried.
With a ball of lead in his stomach he knew he couldn’t sweet talk his way out of this. She deserved more than that. Truth was, she deserved more than him. He had no clue how to be with a woman, actually be with one day in and day out, but for the first time in his immortal life, he wanted that—if it could be with her. It wouldn’t be hard. It wouldn’t be tiresome or boring or too much work. He feared, suddenly, that waking each day without her would be.
He closed his eyes and tried to think of not turning and seeing her right there, of not waking to the warm press of her body at night, or not having her looking at him with such confidence that he had the answers to whatever it was she wanted to know… Or kiss me as if she gets as lost as I do from such a simple act.
The pit in his stomach grew. I fucked up. But I can fix this. Every article ever written says to communicate. Talk to her.
“I lost my head. I know you aren’t sure if I’m being honest, but I am.” He took her hand and gently threaded their fingers. Hers were so pale and slim, so small and fragile. “I can be, honest.”
He met her eyes. She was frowning, that adorable expression he knew meant she was considering what he said, but found it lacking.
“I’ve gone a long time, for me, a long time, since I had a woman.” Her gaze became frosty but he forged on. “But I won’t make this mistake again,” Even if I want to again, right now by taking her until every inch of that frost melts for me. “I… You can trust that.” I’ll make such slow love to her she’ll beg me to go faster.
She studied him with an inscrutable expression. The Sphinx could have taken lessons from her. “Mistake?”
Good, at least she’s speaking. He had a sense he was lucky that she was. “Yes. I rushed this, I can see that now. I…I don’t have to have sex.” He swallowed, not sure where those words had come from. Surely not from me.
“You don’t?” She appeared so mystified, he immediately needed to prove he didn’t need sex.
“No,” he growled. “I didn’t for months before I met you and didn’t for weeks with you.” Weeks that had nearly killed him. He smoothed her hair back from her face, even though he’d been the one to snap at her. “I want you. I want to show you more than what we had. There is more. That was wild.” It was addictive. She’d been so wet
for him. No woman had ever been so wet for him. He hadn’t even taken the time to prepare her. She’d been so ready, but tight and damn it, scorching hot silkiness around his cock, he’d lost his mind, taken her as if he’d been her lover for years, not the first time! “I…” Lost my mind? Lost my ability to think once you kissed me? Sank into paradise and wanted to ensure you always fit only me?
“I wanted you, too…”
He heard the but, he knew it was there, so he covered her mouth. “I can be slow and sweet, too. Don’t judge me for earlier.”
“I don’t judge you.” She pulled his hand away, then surprised him by threading their fingers together again. He felt immensely better. He still doubted she was being honest.
“Liar.”
She blinked and the misery she’d been hiding was there, a shadow of it in her eyes.
“You think all I want is sex, and nothing more,” he accused her.
“You said yourself you can’t have more. You like variety.” Why does it seem ages ago that I thought that way? How could I ever think this person was anything but essential to me? “You’re a warrior, they don’t have homes and wives and children.” She mocked his deeper voice and would have gotten up.
He was man enough to know that there was no possibly way of letting her get up. He did what he had to. He held on to her, refusing to let her go and tried to remind himself that women were known for throwing a man’s mistakes back in his face. “I wasn’t thinking of you, or me. I was…hell, just talking. I do that with you. I’ve never talked to a woman before. I guess I need to think before I speak.”
She stilled her wiggles and tilted her head again, in that way he knew meant she was listening. “You don’t speak to women? How do you bed them, then?”
He laughed. He could tell it was the wrong thing to do, but he couldn’t help it. She was so serious, as if she could believe he had some secret sign language with woman that got them into his arms.
“Oh! You! Why do I bother with you?” She made a bid for freedom again but he caged her in.
“Sorry, sorry, I talk but only to get them into bed, not…to listen to them, or have them listen to me. With you I talk.”
“Now. Before you talked to get me into bed, so I could see what I’d been missing.”
Men really do say stupid things. “Mae, tossing a man’s words back at him constantly isn’t wise.”
Her brow wrinkled. “Why?”
He shot his hands up in frustration. “Because sometimes I say the wrong thing and it’s your job to figure out when I’m meaning something else.”
Her eyes flew wide. “What? How can I—?”
“Listen. I’m used to a certain way. I’m…” Settled? Boring? “I don’t want…” To screw this up?
“Don’t want me. I know. I know that. This was sex, nothing more.” She sprang out of his arms, throwing him for a loop with her words. “I understand.”
“You don’t want more?” He felt as if she’d punched him.
“No, of course not. You made it perfectly clear you didn’t. Why would I?”
The pain in his heart grew worse, but his temper soared. The little witch! Here he was all in knots because he worried over her and she only wanted… Wait. He studied her averted gaze, the grip she had on her hair, the tension in her shoulders. The little… “You little liar. You want more.”
She dropped her hands to her hips and glared at him. “I do not want more! And stop calling me that!” she shouted.
“Then stop lying,” he thundered. “You damn well do want more!”
She gasped and stepped back, hand at her throat. Too late he realized shouting at her might not be the best decision on his part. She does want me. She wants more, the home, the meals, the talks, the…me. Immediately doubts assaulted him. Why? Why would she want more? No one ever has. No one—
“I did. I mean, I do. I mean, I think I do.” She sealed her lips into a tight line, then burst out, “But you…you…make it so hard!” She paced away from him, but he didn’t care. Such a rush of happiness hit that he took several seconds to savor it. She wants me. The entire time she paced back and forth railing at him for being arrogant and pushy and always, she said, trying to bed her without regard for anything else, but she wanted him. She wants me. Only me.
“You’re always trying to have sex with me! Even when you’re being the protector, I worry you’re doing so to bed me! Then what? I know what! You’ll leave and go to your realm and I’ll…I’ll never see you again!”
He corralled her by the bed so the last frustrated explosion he had hold of her slender shoulders. Never see him again? He’d be damned if they’d ever part. But first she had to admit more. Me. She wants me.
“Who touched who? Who kissed who? Who jumped in whose arms—?”
“Stephano! I did not jump into your arms!”
At her breathy little eruption, he brushed his fingers over her lying lips. “You little liar, when will you trust me and speak the truth?” He guessed by her mulish expression it would take time. I did try to bed her every chance I got, but still…that was then. Now is now. She wants me. She wants me, that means…she loves me.
“It’s hard to be truthful with you,” she admitted in a whisper. “You never are!”
He held in the grin at that, but accepted maybe she was partially right. Her gaze was on his again and in her pretty eyes he saw the pain, the hurt and the hope. She wants more from me. He tucked her hair behind her tiny ears. The gesture soothed him. Meeting her eyes again, he knew now was the time for him to give more.
“I once thought I would never trust another woman, or want to trust one either, but with you that’s all changed.” He ran his hand along her hair and gathered it behind her head in a mass of heavenly silk.
“You loved a woman? Once?”
He snorted. “No, I’ve never loved anyone.” Until now.
Her eyes grew sad. “That’s why you want variety. You don’t know—”
“The only variety,” he spoke over her, “I want is which position we’ll try from the Karma Sutra.” He dropped her hair for the pleasure of smoothing his hands down her slender back to her curvy bottom. The knowledge he’d come inside her, that even now she could be pregnant was messing with him. He wanted her round with babe. His babe. She’d never think to leave him then. “With you, I want a home. I want babies,” he growled, pulling her hips tightly to his so she could feel how ready he was to start on that. “I want you ripe with my child, and you cooking for me, and you kissing me, and you sleeping with me, and you babying me, only me. Barefoot and pregnant sounds perfect.” It also sounded Neanderthal, but there it was. He grinned and shrugged, adding, “If that’s what you want…I mean.”
Her eyes had widened the more he spoke, but at his teasing, the misery melted from her eyes, replaced by that sultry heat he wanted.
“I want to make love to you, Mae. Slowly, until you’re begging me to fill you. Then you know what I want?” He kissed the softness of her warm cheek. She smelled delicious. He wanted her scent all over him, and his all over her.
She shook her head, shivering against him.
“I want to make you come until you’re so hot and wet for me I can fill you with one hard thrust. You want that, don’t you? My cock again, filling you? For me to stay there, all night long, riding you until you can feel me there tomorrow, until I can fill you again?” His erection pulsed harder than his heartbeat, but with each throb, he felt an answering shiver from Mae. He didn’t think she even knew she was curling her fingers in his shirt, little kitten claws, digging into his flesh, too, to hold him tighter. He wanted those nails marking his back again, her teeth biting into his shoulder from the fierceness of her passion.
“Stephano,” she breathed and he shuddered roughly at the need in her tone. Had any woman ever sounded so perfect to him? She released his shirt, but only to cling to his shoulders and press her full breasts to him. Gods, he could feel the tight buds of her aroused nipples. He hooked his arm around her
slim waist and kissed her. So beautiful. Flushed cheeks, wild eyes, dark hair. She was utterly captivating. He couldn’t imagine not having her in his life. She drew her hands up to frame his face and the move made soft pillows of her bosom.
“Mae. Gods, woman you’re killing me.” He ducked down and kissed the softest flesh ever created, loving it with his mouth and tongue until she moaned heavily. Only then did he unlace the back of her gown and allow the material to slide down and give him a view of her rosy nipples under the thin layer of her chemise. Has anything looked so delicious? He sucked one pink areola in his mouth, tightening his grip on her as the nipple budded hard against his tongue. His cock thickened to a heavy weight that dragged at his abdomen, more than ready to plunge between her gorgeous globes. Slow. Slow down. She was still too new for that kind of ride. Instead, he gave her open-mouth kisses from the bottom of her heavy breast to the tips, then on to the sides and tops.
She cried out his name with such passion he could hear her inhibitions vanishing even before she fisted his hair and gyrated her hips against him so his cock was treated to the softest rub down of his life. He groaned. It was so loud it hurt his throat. She seemed to like the sound because she built a rhythm with her hips that hit the underside of his cock perfectly.
“Angel,” he panted, lifting his head to kiss her jaw, feeling as desperate for her as he had back on that hilltop. “You’re gonna end this before I can begin.”
“I am?” She sounded delighted.
I missed this, her excitement, rushing things. Slow, I gotta go slow. He caught her hand as she sneaked it down to his breeches. “I owe you a few more orgasms before you’re giving me that again.”
“Why? You liked it. I know you did,” she added with a confidence he wanted more of. He got a sweet kiss instead then a sparkling smile. Gods, she’s so beautiful. Don’t let me screw this up. “I think you really liked it.”
“Really liked it? Angel,” he growled into the plush pillows of her bosom. How can they be so big when she’s so small? She laughed, which made them quiver. He was a breast man. Oh, he loved her little ass and the rounded pert curves were deadly, but her breasts were lethal. She laughed again and they bounced. The groan he made came from deep, deep down. Reluctant as hell, he lifted his head, and only because she tugged his hair. She took his breath away. Her eyes were bright with happiness. Go slow, show her, tell her the truth. “You can do that anytime you want to and I’ll be one happy man. But…” He pulled her in closer until their lips were inches apart. “I’m the man, I’m going to make you come first, then you can do whatever you want with me.”