Once Upon a Fairy tale: A Collection of 11 Fairy Tale Inspired Romances

by Danielle Monsch, Cate Rowan, Jennifer Lewis, Jeannie Lin, Nadia Lee, Dee Carney

  That about summed him up. The shame wouldn’t come, though. “I’m more than that.”

  “You have to be. If Rapunzel loves you.”

  If.

  “Can I see her?”

  “What is it you said you have, that I’d want?” Bovine glared at him. The shoulders previously slumped, squared. The bulge of his massive arms flexed with muscle. “Think. What you say here could get your uppity ass in a prison cell.”

  Uppity ass. He smiled. “That’s where Zel gets it.”

  Bovine tilted his head in question.

  “Never mind.” Langley reached in his pocket and pulled out the braided silk of Zel’s hair. “This is just one strand, folded over and braided. It’s incredible. I thought you might want it back, for research. My valet has the rest.”

  The braid he’d intended for collateral tickled against his skin, and he couldn’t put it into Bovine’s outstretched hand. He stared at the golden braid, heavy in his fingers and replayed moments when he’d had his hands in her hair, in passion, or when gently talking with each other. He slipped it back into his pocket. “I’ll have the rest sent to you.”

  Bovine pushed away from his desk and nodded. “Follow me.”

  Doubt glued him to the chair as he sucked in air before he stumbled up and made his legs function.

  “The absolute only reason I’m not having you arrested is Rapunzel said you had nothing to do with her kidnapping. If I find otherwise, you’ll regret the day you were born. But, I find I trust Rapunzel’s instincts, and you look harmless enough.” Bovine took another moving walk toward the center of the compound.

  “She told you the truth.” Langley concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other and ignored the ‘harmless’ remark.

  “I live back there.” Bovine pointed his thumb over his shoulder to the equipment warehouse. “When Rapunzel was around twelve, when Mother started making noises about moving her from regular training and giving her assignments, I moved us into a condo and made sure Mother had doubts about putting her in the field. What father wants his daughter plunging into danger? She wanted to be an agent, but I couldn’t stand the thought of losing her. Some days I regret the decision and my support of the no bios as agents policy. Some days, I’d do anything to protect her. I can’t lose her.”

  Bovine shook his head and kept walking without looking back at Langley. “When she came of age, I left the condo to her and came back out here. Every young woman needs her own space when she grows into the woman she’ll be for the rest of her life.”

  “She grew up in a warehouse?” Langley couldn’t imagine that kind of intriguing space as a child. He’d never left the mansion until Mère took an interest in his studies in his pre-teens. Even then, she only took him among landers to show him her research.

  “She didn’t want to leave it for the condo. Then when I was ready to come back, she didn’t want to leave the condo for the warehouse. I wasn’t around much, so I tried to give her what I could, when I could.”

  They stopped in front of a free-standing condo. It had to be worth a fortune. A garden plot with a riot of flowers and herbs graced both sides of the front entry. At least ten steps wide and twenty deep, the green space was an unheard of amount for an individual house. And for the house to be freestanding. Nothing to the side. No high-rise. No hovercar access in the air above.

  Bovine slapped Langley on the back. His head thudded once then settled back to a dull throb. Bovine boasted, “You should see the back garden. It’s triple this size, and she has spread her talent there, too. Lovely garden. She’s made a few important discoveries in crosspollination. Made me proud. She’s no agent. She’s a researcher, like me.”

  Bovine’s chest puffed out and he smiled a big, wide grin. Without a knock or announcing himself, the older man opened the front door and walked right in. The place was simple. Smaller than he’d anticipated from the outside. The downstairs was an open area with comfortable seating and a large kitchen. Stairs led to what he assumed was personal living space. Everything about the place exuded Zel’s inner beauty, paintings of cross-sections of plants, softly woven fabrics, and warm tiled surfaces. They moved through the house. Then he saw her.

  Wrapped in a blanket, Zel sat in an armchair in front of a large, wide open window staring into her backyard, a splendid view of colors, but mostly green. An abundance of life and fecundity.

  “Rapunzel.” Bovine put his hands on her shoulders, but she didn’t move. “I’ve spoken with the front office. They’re not pressing charges against anyone but Madame Gothel.” Bovine kissed her smooth head, squeezed her shoulders, and left.

  She didn’t turn to him.

  Langley’s throat hurt. Her chair had a twin, so he pulled it up next to hers, sat with a sigh, and reached for her hand. Her fingers were cold and slack as he intertwined his with hers.

  “Zel.”

  She jerked back against her chair and turned wide eyes to him before she blanked. All expression gone before she looked back out the window.

  “How did you get here?” Her question was unaccommodating, hard, but she didn’t move or pull her hand away. “Go away. I’m almost done grieving for you. I’ll be over you. Tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow.” He’d be gone by then.

  “You can’t have the baby.”

  He flinched and gripped her hand. “You don’t understand. I don’t want to take the baby from you.”

  “Nobody’s ever wanted me. But my child won’t grow up that way. I want him. I’ll never let him forget it.” She still stared ahead, not facing him. He missed the way she used to look at him, with desire and understanding.

  “Bovine wanted you. He wanted you so much he made you. He’ll want his grandson as much as I do.” He didn’t even know if Mère had wanted him, or why she’d decided to have a child.

  “That’s the key, isn’t it? He made me.” She looked at him then. Her expression closed, nothing of Zel anywhere behind her chilled blue eyes.

  “He made you like any father makes a child. With love.” That he didn’t know his own father made the statement a jab to the heart. “Or, a father worthy of the title, anyway.”

  “Maybe.” She cocked her head. “You didn’t think that way before.”

  “No.” He broke eye contact, his shame painful to bear. What she’d done in her garden was amazing to behold. He’d never seen so many vegetables and fruits, many he didn’t recognize, in one place. Even the air above her garden didn’t seem as smog laden as the rest of New Castle. Then he made himself turn back to her, to face her judgment. A small spark of need crossed her face before she became stone again. He had to make her understand. “I was wrong. Dreadfully so.”

  “I’m not who you need to convince.” She placed a hand on her belly. “You and I. We weren’t to be. Too much of what you believe and feel, deep down, will always be between us, and I…I’ll never feel like I should even be here. My mother. Bovine told me about her last night.” She closed her eyes and the paleness of her face sucker punched Langley, but he didn’t move to her as he craved doing. “Bovine made me for his love of her. He couldn’t let her go. It wasn’t so he could have me. I don’t belong. Anywhere. I never should have been. How can you ever believe differently of a creation who shouldn’t exist?”

  “Never say that.” He couldn’t take this anymore. The pain struck him bone deep and he couldn’t breathe through the foreign thickness residing in his chest. He got on his knees in front of her and took her other hand. “You are here. With me. I want you.”

  “For sex.”

  “I’d be liar to say that wasn’t part of it. But only because it’s with you. I want you. Yourself. For what’s inside.”

  Nothing mattered but being with her once more.

  “I want to believe that,” she whispered.

  “Then do. Please.”

  Unable to keep from holding her another second, he slid the blanket aside, slipped his arms around her, and picked her up. If he could love her with his body,
she’d see how he felt. She wouldn’t be able to deny it.

  She nestled into him, her exhalation sliding silky heat on his throat, pushing him past reasoning. Putting her arms one at a time around his neck, he carried her to the stairs and up. The only open door in the short landing exposed a bedroom in soft light, a riot of floral patterns, and a bed. Too small for them to both stretch out, but larger than the pallet they’d shared for twelve weeks.

  “I can’t be with you,” she whispered. “I can’t turn off how I feel. Or how you feel.”

  “How do you feel?”

  She didn’t answer but tightened her arms around him. In his heart, he sensed she was saying goodbye. To her, she’d give him this last time, and they’d be over. Everything he was, he’d give her right now and she’d see into his heart as much as he could see hers, but he couldn’t give her the rest of his life. His life belonged to his duty, to stopping people like Mère. Because once he got the evidence to stop the mistreatment of men and women on Gothel Island, knowing Zel meant he had to give her up, to continue the work to save other people like her.

  He slipped off his shoes and tumbled Zel to her side and onto the bed. Slowly, he peeled back the robe she wore and sucked in a breath.

  “Beautiful.” His finger stroked the column of her throat and down, smoothing over her silky skin to circle a tightened nipple. She gasped.

  He wanted to do everything at once. To be inside her. To hold and rock her, to stroke her from her feet to her smooth head. Everywhere. To soak up all she gave him and make him into something better, whole. He tongued her nipple. She tasted divine, like everything she nourished and gave life to. Herbal scents, floral, and oh-so-sweet. Her fingers twined in his hair and he hugged her to him, wrapping around until he palmed her head with one hand, her firm, lovely ass in the other, and engulfed her breast with his hungry lips. He’d smothered himself in her flesh.

  His cock was heavy, aching. Not since the first day they’d fallen to the aphrodisiacs had he lost control so quickly. He needed inside her more than he needed to show her his usual finesse. He yanked down his zipper, ripped off his clothes in seconds flat, and shoved inside her. He hissed and then moaned against her chest. “There’s no place I’d rather be.”

  “I need you.” She moved under him, rubbing her hips deliciously back and forth. He squeezed her, encouraging her movements. Her welcome heat enveloped him.

  “I can’t hold back.” He slid out and pumped back into her, hard, the tension in his back and buttocks made him rigid over her. If he moved, he’d explode. Go up in flames and they’d have to send the autoextinguishers to the house and scrape his ashes off the bed. He ground his teeth to keep the fire racing up his limbs at bay. With a guttural rasp, he commanded, “Tilt your hips for me. Now.”

  She responded to his urgency by fitting herself to him perfectly. The way they joined was too much, it nearly made his heart beat out of his chest. Sliding his hand between them, he thumbed that spot he’d memorized and tore another moan from her. His hips pumped wildly, and she writhed beneath him as he buried his face between her breasts, licking the salt from her skin. Her arms clutched at him as her legs shook. The sign he’d waited for swept through him. Relief he’d held on, pride he’d brought her to climax, went straight to the small of his back and pushed him deep, hard, as far in as he could go as he shuddered. She clung to him and he emptied inside her.

  He stayed like that for long moments, loving being inside her, until he couldn’t hold himself up any longer. He rolled to the side, bringing her with him.

  “I need you,” he whispered in the last moments of wakefulness before the sleepless night, the draining tension, and the sweet release all pushed him toward slumber.

  When something nagged at him, he fought the grogginess but couldn’t make his eyes open. He reached for Zel, but she wasn’t there.

  Chapter Eight

  ‡

  Zel silently fumbled in her clothing cabinet while the morning sun filtered into the room. After their glorious lovemaking, they’d both slept like the dead. The sun had risen, and she wasn’t even sure what day it was, or how long they’d been in bed.

  Since Langley’d told her she carried his baby, she’d been in a daze. The signs had been there, but she hadn’t put it together. She didn’t need a doctor to verify. Absolutely sure, she’d told Bovine, the one person who needed to know. In response to the news, he turned the world upside down and told her the truth: She had a father.

  Straightening to her full height, she took a deep breath. She had to start prenatal care and get her life back on track.

  A life without Langley.

  She carefully kept her gaze from his sleeping form, a simply beautiful, graceful, muscular man warming her bed as her sheets lovingly caressed his backside. She’d woken to him sprawled, his arm across her back. All his limbs exposed, his hair tousled, morning stubble, he made a scrumptious picture that had called to her to join him. Taste him. Everywhere.

  She had to get him from under her skin.

  First things first, she’d call Bovine but she couldn’t talk to him while naked. She slipped her favorite housedress on and silently left the bedroom. She couldn’t face Langley until he had his clothes on.

  For a moment, she stood outside the bedroom, hand on the closed door, and bit back the sorrow. Crying wouldn’t help. She had a child to consider. The man on the other side was her first, only, and last lover. As a creation, she’d never felt quite right in the world and had never been comfortable around men, except Bovine. She would miss Langley. Their sex had been incredible and she’d mourn him, but she’d lived passionless before. She would again.

  She put her back to the door and went downstairs.

  “Good morning, my child.” Bovine rose from the kitchen table and strode toward her.

  Startled, she calmed her racing heart, fought back the panic his unexpected presence brought, and hated the blush heating her cheeks. She ran a hand down her dress. “Morning.”

  He hugged her tight, and she hoped like hell she didn’t smell like sex.

  “You had a long night.” He chuckled and let her go. The blush spread down her chest. “Sit and have some coffee.”

  “How long have you been here?” Guilt riddled her nervous question. Nothing like an embarrassed daughter to let a father know exactly how she’d spent her night.

  The aroma of coffee settled her as he took down two cups and lifted his ever present thermos filled with specially imported, rare, and expensive blend. “Just got here. Came to take you to the lab for an exam.”

  “An exam?” For the first time ever, she doubted Bovine. She stepped back.

  Crash.

  Bovine jerked his head to the side, splashing coffee on the counter.

  Zel spun toward the sound and went cold at the sight greeting her. Holding a mechgun aimed with lethal sureness, Madame Gothel strode through Zel’s smashed front door, which showed a pair of Gothel’s guards on each side of the entry. They stayed outside while their employer walked in.

  Though she wanted to throttle the woman, Zel didn’t move a muscle. She had to remember her actions weren’t just for her, but for her baby as well.

  “Madame Gothel.” Zel accompanied her toneless greeting with a nod and per her never-used operative training, tilted her chin down and lowered her gaze. This was the woman who’d made such a mess of Zel’s life. The hatred curdling in her stomach shocked her. She couldn’t maintain the cowed posture. “What are you doing in my home?”

  The woman raised her perfectly manicured brows. “Such a way to welcome a guest.”

  “Get out.” Zel pointed to the door. She could care less about the gun. Madame Gothel had purposely planned to get her pregnant. Cold-hearted scientist that she was, she wouldn’t endanger her so-called experiment. The anger poured through Zel. “You are not welcome here. You made me quite un-welcome in your mansion. You will not bring your toxic presence into my home.”

  “Rapunzel.” Bovine used his stern, f
atherly voice that never failed. “Calm yourself. Sit.”

  Though she nearly obeyed, she locked her knees and crossed her arms. “I won’t sit with that woman.”

  Madame Gothel smiled, a small quirk of her lips. “This creation is a determined thing. That’s why I used the aphrodisiacs with them. Rapunzel showed too much resistance from the start. The first few weeks I had her, I couldn’t get her to even sit at the exam table without the guards holding her down.”

  Aphrodisiacs. It all made sense. She didn’t know why she’d succumbed to lust for the first time in her life. She’d never even felt attraction before, much less lust.

  “You tricked me?” Zel clutched her arms. It’d been worse than she thought. Her body had never been her own, nor the passion. Even the gun pointed at her robbed her of her body. She could do nothing to resist its lethal force.

  “Calm down. Everyone, take it easy.” Bovine turned his frown from Madam Gothel to Rapunzel.

  “You’re not taking my baby.” She palmed her stomach. “Nobody is. Not Mother. Not Bovine.”

  “Never. Why would you say such a thing?” Bovine paled and slid a hand over his face. “I know I’ve been a negligent father, but I do love you. I want to make sure you’re well. And the baby.”

  “It’s fine, unless whatever drugs she used on me have harmed the baby.”

  Behind her, a movement of air brushed the back of her dress.

  “She only used the aphrodisiacs the first day.” Langley strode in, confident and bare-chested. She jerked her gaze away from so much bronzed skin. It amazed her how he could distract her even with his mother’s gun to her head.

  “True. I wouldn’t want the drugs to harm the issue. And, the nudge seemed to take. You two couldn’t keep your hands off each other.” Madame Gothel cackled, and Zel struggled not to hate her more even while her confession knocked free some of the ice forming inside her.