The Fairy Tale Bride

by Kelly McClymer

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  Her bedroom was too hot, even with the curtains billowing in the breeze from the open window. So he thought to teach her a lesson, did he? Well, perhaps it was time for her to teach him one. He thought he knew best. But he didn't always. And not making love to his wife was a mistake. It was time for her to prove it to him.

  He was abed, she knew. She had heard the muffled sounds of undressing near midnight. She longed to put her plan in action tonight, while she was still angry enough not to worry so much over his health. But she did not want to wake him if he slept. He needed his rest.

  Unable to restrain herself, she crept to the door and pressed her ear tight against the cool wood. There was no sound. Thinking that perhaps he was not even in the room, she turned to go downstairs and see if he might still be working in his study, when she heard him call out. Without considering how he might feel at her intrusion, she opened the door a crack and slipped through. Simon was calling out a man's name as he tossed and turned restlessly. His voice was harsh with horror, and she realized he was reliving the man's death, yet again.

  As she listened to the unintelligible words that came in fitful murmurs from the restless figure, she wondered if there was any possibility that his experiences might have contributed to his apathy over his own death. After all, facing death day after day and avoiding it while others didn't might have made him feel that he didn't really deserve to live.

  Perhaps that was why he refused all her attempts to help him find a cure. Valentine might have told her, if only he were here. The murmurs stopped, plunging the room into a silence that felt like the heavy weight of a mantle around her.

  If only he could share his thoughts with her, she knew she could ease his fears. The illness must be a terrible drain on his energy, and yet he refused to talk about it with her. He refused to share the burden with his own wife. But he needed her comfort, and she had every intention of providing it.

  Even though she knew he would disapprove, she slipped into his bed and when he shifted restlessly, she took him into her arms, stroking his arm, his back, his neck, with gentle care.

  He settled against her with a groan of satisfaction and his restlessness faded as his breathing grew even once again. The feeling of closeness and warmth was exquisitely pleasurable.

  Miranda could not bring herself to move away, though she knew he would not be happy to find her here if he awoke. His mouth rested against her neck, his hands were warm on her hips. She lay very still, so that she would not wake him, as she had the first time, when he had sent her so decidedly back to her own bed.

  Having her sisters in the house had somehow intensified her desire to be closer to Simon, for some unexplainable reason. But now, with Simon's warmth and heat surrounding her, she recognized from where her desire stemmed. She had always thought that a husband and family were an unattainable dream. To marry, to give up one shred of her autonomy had filled her with fear. But it was not so hard to lose a battle to Simon now and again.

  If they only had a long enough time together, she was certain that he would cease to question her judgment and learn to trust her. Certainly, she could manage to accomplish that. He was a reasonable man.

  About most things.

  For example, now that she had the husband, she found it impossible not to wish for the family. If only she knew how to accomplish that without risking Simon's life. She was certain that having a son would be enough to make him want to fight to live. How could it not be? Look how tender he was toward Betsy, and he had thought her mother unworthy to be in his home.

  Snuggled against him, she was tempted to kiss him.

  That had always roused his passion before. Asleep, he would not fight her, would not pull away. And when he woke, he would bed her and would have nothing else to fear.

  She wished she had consulted Katherine on exactly what manner of seduction would be the least upsetting to a dying man. Perhaps the shock of waking to find her in his bed would be more than he could bear?

  "Coward," she whispered to herself, deciding she would stay for only a little while, and then quietly go back to her own bed. She would lay as quiet as Briar Rose in her hundred-year sleep. Her anger with him had fled when she had understood what caused his bad dreams. She could wait for a better time to seduce him. But she wanted the feel of him in her arms, and soon the comfortable warmth of his body lulled her to sleep.

  Simon's dream was as always since he married her.

  She was in his arms. She felt right, her curves against his skin as if made to fit only his body ... the warmth of her, the silk of her skin under his fingers. He brushed his lips against the softness and heard a sigh like the spring breeze through budding branches. Under his palm, he could feel the curve of her hip and the warmth spread through him until he felt as if he were dissolving, his flesh melting into her flesh not as men and women joined, but as two beings who become one.

  His fingertips traveled along the curve from her hip to her rib cage and she moved in to him so that they were one from head to toe, their arms entwined so tightly that he knew he would never let her go. Never.

  She was soft and warm and seemed to come alive at his touch. He felt a flare of possession as a rush of quickened breath warmed his cheek and earlobe. He reached for the heat of her and found it, was rewarded with a moan like the low wild sound of the wind just as the storm approaches. He released his own groan to entwine and mingle with the moan until there was nothing left of the sound but a fierce vibration in his very core.

  He bent his head and filled his mouth with softness, roundness, heat. A rough, pleasurable pressure built in him as their one flesh began to undulate in a primitive rhythm and he held to the dream farther than he ever had before, unable to give in to the need to wake and learn that there was no one next to him, no heat, no flesh melded with his.

  And he touched her with his hands, his mouth; there was no part of him that did not touch her, that did not feel her swell with passion and know that passion himself. He did not want the dream to end, even when their body, her body, began to quiver and she whispered his name in his ear. "Simon," she said.

  "Simon," she screamed, softly and their bodies shattered apart as he woke to the feel of her beneath him and knew that he was not dreaming.

  She protested his retreat, wrapping her arms and legs around him. He hesitated, his body not yet his to control. And then he felt the tide of pleasure take her; her arms clutched him tight against her and she murmured against his ear. "I love you, Simon."

  His body went cold in an instant and he raised his head to look into her eyes. They were open. Somehow, her words had given him the strength he needed to halt himself on the edge of a pleasurable abyss. He felt an absurd sense of panic as he pleaded, even as he knew it was futile, even as he mastered himself and his own need, "Tell me you are a dream, Miranda."

  Her hands drifted up his side, deepening the feeling that he was on the verge of going mad. "I'm not a dream. I promise to be still, Simon. As still as you need me to be. I will not be too wild. I promise."

  She tried to pull him back down to her, with gentle pressure on his shoulders. To his distress, he found he had barely enough strength to fight the insistent press of her fingers. A hoarse cry escaped him as he twisted away and left the bed.

  He felt like a fool, standing nude and shivering in the cool breeze, afraid to come any nearer the bed where she lay. Even the distance between them gave him no sense of safety. He knew how easy it would be for him to slip back between the covers and finish what he had started.

  She sat up in the bed. He guessed her expression to be puzzled, although, mercifully, he could not see her face from so far away in the night-shadowed room. "Simon, what's wrong? Are you ill?" He could hear her voice shedding the thickness of her passion, her pleasure. He felt a fierce flow of pride that he had given her release, even if he had achieved none of his own.

  "Go back to your room." He did not trust himself to say more.

  She mad
e a movement, as if she might rise off the bed and come toward him. "But why —?"

  "Now!" He supposed the savagery he felt had been in the tone of his words for she ceased her arguments and rose from the bed.

  He held his breath as the moonlight caught her in the instant it took for the hem of her nightshift to fall to her feet. The shift itself did nothing to hide the outline of her body. And then she was gone through the door. He heard it close gently and wondered what she must think of him.

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