Interesting. Avalon continued to surprise her. Morgan wasn’t evil incarnate as the stories had led her to believe.
“Listen, before you get the wrong idea—”
“Oh, hey.” Artemis held up her hands. “My lips are sealed. Your soft and chewy center, at least where this guy is concerned, is still secret.”
Morgan eyed her carefully. “I’m going to trust you. Don’t dick me down.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” No, Artemis definitely didn’t want to be on the wrong side of the legendary Morgan Le Fey.
“Good. Because I’m your future mother-in-law. Wouldn’t want to start out on the wrong foot.”
“Not at all.” And in the name of not starting out on the wrong foot, Artemis decided not to correct her assumption. She’d wondered why the other women would be so quick to set up a one night stand for her son. If she’d been mortal and used to mortal morality, it might have squicked her out just a tiny bit.
But no. The conniving woman was plotting for evil-imp grandbabies. That motivation she’d seen a million times before, and since becoming goddessmother and aunt to little Ephie, she could understand it.
Morgan led her through the rest of the upstairs living area and then out a backdoor onto a deck where she could see Mordred’s “beach house.”
It was a sleek, ultra modern monster, with walls of windows, a swimming pool on the roof, and a private beach.
“I’m never leaving,” she murmured.
“There’s an apple tree on the other side of the house, but it’s enchanted. If you’re missing home and want figs or pomegranates, it’ll be happy to supply you. All you have to do is ask. Same with the house. If you can’t find something, ask and it shall appear. After all, it’s not a vacation if you can’t find the toilet paper, right?”
Artemis laughed. She found herself liking Morgan more and more. “Yeah, that would be awkward.”
“The door’s unlocked. I have to get back inside to my customers.”
To Lance was what she meant, but Artemis kept that to herself. She thanked Morgan and followed the small path to the house.
The inside was just as magnificent. It was a large, open floor plan with lots of white marble and large, overstuffed furniture. What she liked especially was that the inside of the house smelled of the sea and lemons. It was crisp and fresh.
She wandered into the single bedroom and the whole far wall was a window that looked out across the azure water. What a view. Artemis sighed aloud. Even without the whole seduction angle, this was going to be a nice vacation. She hadn’t had one in a century.
Artemis peered into the bathroom and almost had a showergasm. Not to be confused with self-love from the shower nozzle, but an actual showergasm. The white marble theme continued into what could only be called a wet room. Continuous waterfalls poured from the ceiling on three sides and soft lights twinkled around the space.
Dear gods! She wasted no time stripping and immersing herself in the decadent shower. She moaned aloud when the hot water tumbled over her.
Invisible hands startled her when they soaped up her hair, but the feeling of firm fingers massaging her scalp quickly squelched any reservations. Tension slipped away with the water that sluiced down her body. Why didn’t Olympus have these enchantments?
Artemis moaned again. She couldn’t help it. Nothing had ever felt so decadent.
“I can honestly say that this is a first for me.” A velvet baritone voice startled her, but she didn’t make any move to cover herself. She might be a virgin, but she wasn’t body shy.
She pushed her wet hair out of her face and opened her eyes to see a man that could only be Mordred Le Fey. He had the same dark amethyst eyes as his mother. Fucking Tartarus, no man should have eyes like those. They made her wonder if she could be impregnated just from his regard.
By the gods, he was beautiful. His skin was like the white marble that surrounded them, perfect and hard. The lines of his muscles were so wondrously sculpted, she wondered if he was a Greek statue come to life. The black hair that hung down to his shoulders wasn’t raven like his mother’s, but more like a blackbird’s—iridescent with hints of blue and green threaded through the black.
Her eyes were drawn down to his waist where only a towel hung secured with a loose knot.
Artemis tried not to lick her lips. Only the worry that she’d look like a slavering hound kept her tongue in her mouth.
“What’s a first for you?” she asked. Artemis was proud of herself. Words accomplished.
“Finding a woman in my house making those sounds without me.” His gaze centered in on her breasts and her nipples tightened, making something tug low in her belly.
He was definitely Mr. Right Now. She wanted to know exactly what kinds of sounds he could elicit from her.
“Your house? Oh, sorry. Morgan assured me the house was empty. I’ll be done in a second.” She tilted her head back under the stream for another rinse.
He laughed and Artemis was sure he violated some cosmic law. A man couldn’t be that hot and have a laugh that did those kinds of things to her body. It was just wrong.
“Not shy, are you?”
“Should I be?”
“No, but this is another first. A naked woman who didn’t come on to me.”
He knew he was hot. Well, if the man had a mirror, of course he knew he was hot. Plus he was charismatic and a bad boy. They all knew their own appeal. She knew better than to show him he affected her at all.
“It seems I’m getting a lot of your firsts, which I would guess is highly unusual?” She twisted her hair to wring it out and tossed it over her other shoulder, exposing the huntress tattoo on her bicep.
Artemis rationalized it was only fair she would get to be first at something with him. It would be a fair trade.
“Highly. I’m Mordred.”
“I gathered.”
“Did you now?” His eyes roved over her and she returned the perusal and saw the thick, hard evidence of his interest outlined against his towel.
Artemis bit her lip so she wouldn’t gasp aloud. Even as clichéd as it sounded in her head, she couldn’t help but think she needed to pick someone else because that beast of a thing would never, ever fit.
It was just as she’d thought before; there was no need to send a wrecking ball through the party place.
“The eyes gave it away. I’m Artemis. And do you have a towel?”
“All I’ve got is this one, but you can have it.” His fingers went to the knot at his hip.
“No, that’s fine.” She held out her hand and a towel appeared. “Seems the house found one for me.”
“That was kind of it.”
“Yes, it was.” She wound it around herself.
“But such a shame.”
He was such a charmer. She’d have her hands full, in more ways than one. “Mordred Le Fey, as handsome as you are, all the gilded tongue in the world won’t work on me. I’m the eternal virgin, if you know your mythology.”
“That’s a theory I think we shall have to test, lovely Artemis.” His voice held a promise that made her squirm.
“In your dreams, faerie boy. But thanks for letting me have the bedroom while I’m here.” From the look on his face, it appeared both Aphrodite and Morgan were right. All she had to do was act unaffected. He obviously couldn’t resist a challenge.
“You’re welcome to stay as long as you like. You can even sleep in the bed. I’d never ask a lady to sleep on the floor.” He grinned. “But seeing as it’s my bed, I plan to be in it.”
7
GWEN
Gwen wandered around the house, unsure of what to do with herself. It was as if her life, even her skin, didn’t belong to her.
She tried sitting on the chaise, but she kept seeing Lance sitting across from her, kept hearing him shatter their life together. It hadn’t been a good life these last hundred years or so, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t worth saving.
The house was so empty. Even though
Lance’s things were still here, he’d taken something vital with him when he’d walked out the door. The quiet, rather than comforting her, was a heavy weight. She’d never felt so alone.
So utterly lost.
Not even when she’d first left Lyonesse to marry Arthur.
Part of her wanted to cry, but there were no tears. There was nothing but the emptiness. Loneliness. A dark, gaping hole that nothing could fill.
Except chocolate.
What Gwen really wanted was someone to give her the orgasm of her life, feed her chocolate, and hold her all night. That wasn’t too much to ask, was it? And she wanted it to be Lancelot, but like she told him, not the man he’d become. The man he used to be. The gallant knight in his shining armor.
The man who’d loved her.
This Lance, she didn’t know him very well, but what she did know, she didn’t like.
Gwen had to face facts. The man she’d loved was gone. More importantly, the man who loved her was gone. What they’d had together had been dead for a long time. Lance moving out was simply burying the corpse.
If that realization didn’t deserve a trough of Belgian chocolate gelato, she didn’t know what did.
The little market at the end of Roundtable Lane delivered, but only on the off season. The owners had refused to pay Morgan to license a materialization spell and didn’t have enough delivery faeries.
So it meant if she really wanted that gelato, Gwen would be hoofing it to the market. Maybe the fresh air would do her some good.
She shimmied into a pair of yoga pants, a t-shirt, and shoved her hair into a messy bun and jogged to the market. Not that five minutes of jogging would undo the damage she was about to inflict on her hind parts with the million calories of gelato, but it made her feel better about drowning her misery in chocolate.
That thought fell right out of her head like a brick when she arrived at the market and saw Arthur with a woman on each arm perusing the wine section. She could turn around and go home. She wouldn’t have to acknowledge him; he wouldn’t have to see her… Not that it was hard on him after all these years. She knew how he filled his time. He was a notorious manwhore. So notorious, in fact, he was half of Avalon’s economy.
She knew she had no reason to feel jealous. She’d left him of her own free will, but that didn’t mean she wanted to know he’d banged the backside out of half the supernatural population.
The question remained: Would she really let her ex and his double trouble flavor of the day keep her from her precious gelato? The answer was no. Hell, no. If she slunk away, it would be as good as admitting she was wrong, or regretted her decisions, or a whole host of other crap that she’d never cop to in a million years.
One thing she would admit—because there was no denying it—whoredom looked good on him. Just the thought… even her own phrasing pissed her off. She’d been painted with the whore brush for leaving him for one man and her name was a big smear of crap in the history books while Arthur was praised and admired for shagging anything that moved. It was completely unfair.
Especially since it looked so good on him. It had been a while since she’d seen him, maybe fifty years? A sad fact, that. They lived on a bloody island and she’d managed to avoid him for fifty years.
He laughed at something Bimbo Number One said and the faint lines around his eyes crinkled, giving him just a bit of an edgy appeal. He had streaks of gray at his temples, but it blended into the rest of his fawn colored hair. Although he was tanned, his skin didn’t have that same sunshine hue that Lance’s did—his was harder won. Lance’s was genetics, Arthur’s had been earned on the battlefield with long campaigns under the sun. Where Lance’s fingers were elegant, a gift of his magical lineage, Arthur’s were broad and rough. Even so, he still carried himself like a king.
Why hadn’t she noticed how good forty looked on him when she’d been married to him? She shook her head, rattling those ideas out of her head. Gwen knew it was simply a case of “the grass is greener” because she was newly jilted and seeing him with other women had always irritated her. Nothing more serious than that. She wasn’t actually jealous.
Onward, little soldier, gelato relief is in sight. Maybe she’d even ask if they had any of that wine ice cream and get some of that, too.
“What soft light through yonder window breaks? It is the east and Guinevere the sun,” Arthur recited when he saw her, giving her a courtly bow.
Yeah, she was the sun all right. A bright shining light of humiliation in her too tight yoga pants that had never seen a yoga workout. She hated him a little bit in that moment because she knew he wasn’t being ungallant. He always said kind things to her when he saw her.
Compliments she knew she didn’t deserve. The sun, she thought again. Hardly. Why couldn’t he be mean and spiteful? She’d deal with it better if he’d been outright cruel to her.
“Hello, Arthur. You’re looking well.”
Damn. Why had she said anything about how he looked? Now he’d feel honor bound to return the nicety and she knew she looked like refried hell. She made it a point not to look at Bimbo Number One or Bimbo Number Two. As far as she was concerned, they weren’t there.
He gave her a lopsided grin. “Ladies, this is Guinevere.”
Double damn. She smiled at them, even though it hurt and she’d rather have knocked out her own teeth with a claw hammer.
“And Guinevere, these are… the ladies.” From his phrasing, she knew he’d forgotten their names.
“She’s the reason you’re single?” Bimbo Number Two asked. “No, really. Her?”
“Forever and always.” But his words seemed meant for Gwen alone.
She was imagining things. Had to be.
“Oh, Arthur. You could still turn any damsel’s head,” Gwen said, the sentiment bittersweet.
“Turn your head all you want, but he’s busy tonight,” Bimbo Number One supplied as they each tucked themselves against him.
Gwen wasn’t about to get into some kind of contest with Arthur’s Slag du Jour. So she simply smiled. “I can see that.”
While Arthur had the look of a man supremely satisfied with himself, he said, “I’ll be free tomorrow, Gwen. If you’d like to come to the castle for lunch and catch up. It’s been what, fifty years?”
She swallowed. “Yeah. A long time.”
“You can bring Lance, if he’d like to come.”
Daggers shot through her heart and tore upwards, shredding the stupid thing. Of course he’d invite Lance. Arthur still cared for both of them. Even after what they’d done. Gwen felt lower than a dried out dragon turd.
“Tomorrow? No, you’ll still be busy,” Bimbo Number Two interjected.
“Ah, we shall see about that, my pet. We shall see.” Gwen watched with horrible fascination as Arthur slid his hands over each woman’s hip and guided them toward the checkout.
She sagged and exhaled heavily. Would she go? Gwen looked up to study Arthur’s retreating form, but he watched her over one of the bimbo’s heads. “Noon?” he mouthed.
Gwen found herself smiling and she nodded.
Stupid head. She hadn’t given it permission to nod. Gwen couldn’t go to the castle. Panic set in. There was a reason she hadn’t seen him for fifty years. They couldn’t do this just friends thing.
No. No. No. And more no.
The place probably smelled like a cannery with all the pussy that had been in and out of there.
Gwen didn’t really want to be seen making the trek to the castle either. Everyone on Roundtable Lane would be talking about it, especially since Lance had just moved out.
How did she get herself into these things?
She scanned the freezer case for the gelato and of the horrors that had been inflicted on her today, this one was the one that made her scream.
They were completely out of gelato.
8
MORGAN
She was determined not to be that creepy chick that perched over a man and watched him sleep.
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But it took every ounce of her formidable will. Morgan rarely had such a chance to study him at her leisure, but she reminded herself if she woke up and found someone she’d declared untrustworthy staring at her while she slept, she’d smite them with the dirtiest, nastiest curse she could fathom.
Just to be on the safe side.
Of course, the same rules didn’t apply because Morgan knew better than to trust anyone.
So instead of eye-humping Lance, she curled up on the sofa in the TV room to catch up on Game of Thrones. She’d started watching because the actor that played Jaime Lannister looked a little bit like Lance. The hair, for sure, the jaw if she squinted. She’d kept watching though because she couldn’t stop. It was crack.
She loved that the good guys didn’t always win.
Morgan had a whole season to watch, so she was sure that would keep her out of trouble. At least until Lance slept off his Johnny Walker induced coma and left.
She managed to get lost in the intrigue until Lance wandered out from the bedroom and peered into the TV room. He seemed a little lost, so she waved him inside.
“Come on in. I’m just catching up on some brain candy.”
He sat down on the couch next to her, his weight depressing the overstuffed leather cushion. “I love this show.”
“Watch it with me then, if you don’t mind waiting for me to catch up.”
“I’ve seen this episode, but that’s as far as I’ve gotten.”
She snapped her fingers and two tall, frosty glasses of rich, dark beer appeared along with an array of hot wings, loaded potato skins, and mozzarella sticks. He accepted the beer and a plate with a smile and they watched in silence.
Morgan couldn’t pay attention to a damn thing that happened on the screen. She was sitting next to Lancelot du Lac watching television. It was as banal a thing as could happen and yet, every cell in her body was singing the Hallelujah Chorus in Latin. His leg brushed up against hers and the warmth of him though his jeans seared her.
The best part was, he didn’t pull away, didn’t seem to be afraid that he was going to get infected with witch cooties.
Ambrosia Lane 1-3: Saranna DeWylde Page 31