by Editor
“Raven, I will never force you to do anything you’re not comfortable doing. Ever. I want you to trust me and until you do, we will have fun finding out ways to get around it.”
“Nicely put. And then you as our bodyguard, I don’t know about that either. André showed me the hole in his chest.” She poked her finger into Payton’s chest right where the arrow pierced André. “I thank God we’ve got Serina. We’ve definitely kept her busy since the day we met her.”
Shooting an eyebrow up a few times and flashing a smile, he eased her fears. “Your brother says he will teach me how to shoot a crossbow when he returns. I did hit one of the targets I sought you know,” he added, trying to reclaim his confidence in his own abilities more so than trying to reassure Raven he wasn’t a blundering idiot on the loose with weapons he’d no knowledge of, other than a set of carving knives.
“Payton, what happens if in three weeks…?”
Payton leaned into her and whispered in her ear, “Do not spend the next three weeks worrying over something that neither of us can control. You’ll make your self sick for no reason. Worrying is like paying for something you’ve not yet purchased, and I sense you spend your money wisely.”
Raven threaded her fingers with Payton’s and tugged at him. “Garden, come on. Let’s go get Duncan. I want my family home again under one roof.”
****
Serina took the opportunity to spend some quality time with her husband before he left her. In the playground, Lucian sat curled on a swing, his knees crushed into his chest. The swing scraped the ground from both his weight and height each time he passed the starting point.
Serina took one look at him and laughed heartily. “The swing is built for people the size of fairies in mind, not giants.”
“Give us a shove, luv,” he said with a straight face.
Valiant in her attempts, she stood behind him, trying to push him, her feet buried in the sand.
“Higher, m’lady,” he teased. “I want to experience the wind in my hair.”
She yanked him backwards through the chains to the ground and jumped atop of him.
“Or not. I like your idea better.” Lucian ran his hands up her thighs.
Perched on his stomach, she smiled. “We made it home, luv. Together. I didn’t think we would, but someone was listening to me on that mountain after all.”
“Serina, I failed you up there. I should have been able to kill that monster.”
Quickly, Serina grabbed his cheeks and held his face so he couldn’t turn from her. “We had no idea what evil we were up against, Lucian. There’s no way we could have been prepared for that. You have no reason to feel guilt. I think under the circumstances you and I did all right. You got a bit more than you bartered for, but we’re together and that’s all that matters.” Serina bent over to kiss her husband.
With one swift roll, Serina was on her back looking up at him and the sky’s radiant array of color behind him. This time he bent to her, and placed his lips ever-so-gently on her neck, the epicenter of her sensual awareness and watched a grin working its way onto her lips.
“A quickie here?” she asked eyes wide.
“Oh, how I love your scent woman. You mesmerize my soul, you make me whole and give me faith in myself.” His lips covered hers with a warmth that would never cool. “No, m’lady, not here. We are open for many eyes to see. I will make endless love to you this evening and well into the morrow upon my return then you and I can begin our own family. I’ve heard it said, practice makes perfect. Now that I think about it, tonight sounds awfully far off. Would you care for a quickie before I ride off into the sunset?”
“I thought you’d never ask. Follow me. I’ve the perfect place. No one will find us. Or hear us.” She winked.
Lucian stood, and pulled his wife up. As he brushed the sand from her dress he copped a lustful feel of her lush behind in the process.
“You’re a cheeky bugger.”
Walking back through the gardens, they smiled to everyone and continued straight past each and every person in their family.
“Hey you two, hold up. We should get going soon, Luce,” André insisted as he stood ready to follow on his brother’s heels. “A telegram arrived minutes past that Duncan and Jonah made it safely to a small village a few hours from here. Won’t take long at all to grab them. We’ll be home in time for dinner, Payton.” André turned towards the blushing chef. “Unless, you’ve cooked up other plans for the evening.”
“Dinner tonight, my Lord will be a feast, a celebration for our family.” Payton lifted Raven’s hand to his lips and kissed her, then excused himself.
Lucian yelled back, “Half past noon, Ands. We need to take care of one or two things first.”
“Where are you going?”
Raven jabbed André in his ribs, giving him a look that he was indeed an imbecile, not Lucian this once. “Did you forget he’s on his honeymoon?”
André blushed. “I did. My apologies,” he yelled after them, but they were already out of sight.
****
“Where is it you’re dragging me to?” Although it didn’t matter. As long as he was with Serina, nothing else mattered.
“You’ll see.” Walking back through the church, Serina took Lucian through a back room. She opened a small door to an even smaller staircase. The opening barely allowed Lucian entrance. He squeezed his broad shoulders into the confines not much wider than a ladder grunting and groaning.
Climbing the stairs Lucian stopped a few steps down from his wife and shook his head.
“I see London. I see France. I see my wife’s wearing nothing under that skirt at a glance.” He slipped his hand up her thigh and pinched her bottom.
Serina stopped. Playing it up just a bit, she hiked her skirt well past her hips and finished her climb. The view left her husband doting over her little rump and her bigger sense of self.
“Oh you’re a tease.”
“Get up here, and we’ll see what else I am.” In the short amount of time it took Lucian to scale the remaining ten stairs, his little tease of a wife was stripped of every stitch of clothing she wore.
Ducking into the bell tower for lack of standing room, Lucian looked over the small space. A catwalk roughly three feet wide encompassed the bells. Splinters would be a worthy adversary, as the floorboards were made from rough unfinished pine.
“That was fast. What did you do? Wiggle your nose and wish yourself naked?”
“Lucian, if I could do that, you’d be in the same predicament. How long have we got till noon?”
“Why?” he asked both amused and aroused. With a quick glance at his timepiece, he answered, “Three minutes.”
“Quick, lose your trousers and then put that finely chiseled tool of yours to work right here.” Serina lay atop her clothing, pointing to a destination south of her belly button. She began to move her body in a suggestive manner, caressing her private lips as she waited, her impatience for some company testing her will.
Lucian was so taken at the images in front of him that he couldn’t move. All blood flow on his body diverted south, and the levee was getting ready to break.
“Pushy, aren’t we?”
“Time’s a ticking away, toots. You know I have patience problems.” She giggled. “Come on. I want us joined when the bells chime. It’s been a fantasy I’ve had for years.”
“Some say a person can go blind from too much sex. Not us. We’ll end up deaf. But who am I to deny you ecstasy?”
She shook her curls out. “There’s that vampire vanity I’ve heard tell of. Now...let’s see if you’re all talk or all action.”
Lucian accommodated his wife’s needs and fulfilled her fantasy, delivering a heated passion that rang louder than the bells.
On the twelfth chime and his twelfth pass through her thighs the deafening bells filled the air as Lucian’s hips stilled, the vibration of both the bells and their lovemaking lingered sweetly between them.
“That, St. Jame
s was a record,” Serina hollered.
Lucian yelled, too. “You said you wanted a quickie. Next time be careful for what you wish.”
She looked appalled.
He looked amused.
Lucian nudged his lips to the small crook of her neck and kissed her lightly. Without warning, he sent his new shiny fangs into her neck, and drank her in.
Serina’s orgasm started where Lucian’s left off. She wiggled her hips and pressed into him, trying to get a response from him.
Slowly breaking away from her, he licked his lips behind closed eyes. “M’lady, I love you more than life itself, but the whole quickie thing, the bells, you with nothing on under that dress…well, let’s just say I’m all chimed out. Are you upset?”
“No. It was fun. We can try it again tonight. When you return, we can fulfill one of your fantasies if you’d like.”
“M’lady, you are my fantasy, my wildest dream, my life, my love and my reality. Sadly, speaking of reality…”
Lucian escorted his blushing bride back through the church and passed her hand to Father Butler. “Take care of our girl while I’m away, Father.”
“I always have, Lucian. Go now and bring home your Duncan. We’ll all be here when you return.”
“What?” Lucian glanced to Serina seeing if she’d heard him.
Father repeated himself, watching both Lucian and Serina rub their ears and scratch their heads. “You two’ve been in the bell tower, haven’t you? There isn’t a sacred spot on this land you two haven’t covered.”
“What?” Serina asked.
Father Butler walked away making the sign of the cross over his chest.
With a cat-like crawl, Lucian snatched her body and whisked her to his.
“I love you, Serina St. James.” A breath away from kissing her, he told her, “Remember what I said in another lifetime? Death cannot separate us. Only time and circumstance. And since I’ve already covered the death part, now it’s just the time and circumstances.” Lucian covered his wife’s lips gently, loving every sensual cell of her that he came in contact with.
“Lucian, I—”
“I know, m’lady. Until tonight, my love.” He set her down and walked out of the church with André by his side.
A word about the author...
Jaclyn Tracey’s life began in merry old England on an American Air Force Base, giving her dual citizenship to both beautiful countries. Although she grew up as an only child, she is blessed with an amazing family she cherishes.
She grew up in Saratoga Springs, NY, where she met and married Steven, her best friend. They have been married twenty-four years. He is employed as an engineer, developing and manufacturing digital mammography detectors that are improving women’s health care. They have two beautiful children, Caitlyn and Christopher, who are now in college. Caitlyn and her pitbulls, Damon and Dalton, live in Delaware and Christopher goes to college locally.
Jaclyn graduated from Ellis School of Nursing as a Registered Nurse. She works for Living Resources, a community of dedicated people caring for the mentally disabled. Her hobbies include hiking, skiing the bunny hill, four-wheeling in the winter with their jeep, traveling with her family and reading. Black-and-white photography was and still is one of her passions.
January 1, 2005, Jaclyn sat down and began writing Eden’s Black Rose, after the Boston Red Socks won the World Series. She figured if they could win the series, she could write a book. She’s grateful it didn’t take 86 years to get published! (Thank you, dear editor, Callie Lynn Wolfe, and The Wild Rose Press!) Oh, and for the record, she’s a loyal Yankees fan. Jaclyn belongs to a local chapter of the Romance Writers of America, the CR-RWA, and the RWA.
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