“What?” Paul blinked.
“I’m an animal, Paul. An educated animal, sure, but some things are simpler for me. You’re my mate, and while it’s unusual for a fox to have only one mate, my foxside is fine with it, and the wordside will catch up. You’re a human, plus you’re a witch, plus you’re a witch from a famous witch clan and maybe a little snobby because of it. You’re getting lost in words and definitions, and it’s complicating things in your head. You’ve got shit to work out before you can accept you’re mine and I’m yours. It’s early October. I’ll give you to Yule to work it out on your own. Otherwise I’m coming for you, and I’ll make you work it out.”
He grabbed Paul and pulled him into a short, fierce kiss that involved biting, drew blood. Then he dropped a business card on the table and walked out.
Only after he was not only out of sight but out of the hotel and on his way to the airport did Tag allow himself the luxury of a few tears.
Chapter Fifteen
Every day, Paul took out the card with Tag’s number and email on it.
Every day, he remembered the feel of Tag’s skin, Tag’s cock, Tag’s laugh, Tag’s clear russet aura, Tag’s last fierce kiss. The memories left him hard with need and aching with loss. But he also remembered the empty look on Tag’s face as he’d texted his lovers in Tennessee, setting up a time to say good-bye.
Every day, he put the card back on his desk without calling or writing.
No one but Portia knew anything had happened in Las Vegas other than shutting down an incubus, and Portia didn’t ask questions. She didn’t need to. He was locking away his pain as best he could, hiding it from the many psychically sensitive residents of Donovan’s Cove, but no shields he was capable of creating—no shields that any witch who’d lived less than a century was capable of creating—could shut out his twin if she wanted in. Still, the fact she didn’t ask about Tag was a blessing.
Not knowing exactly what was afoot, though, didn’t keep anyone from worrying, from asking questions as he became more and more withdrawn, more and more focused on reading ancient grimoires focusing on the ethics of red magic, less and less eager to join the families for their periodic, huge communal meals or even to speak.
When, a few days before Winter Solstice, he bowed out of going with the family to pick out the Yule trees for the various Donovan’s Cove residences and ritual circles, and declined a tree for his own apartment, Portia took action. She didn’t bother with telepathy, either, just barged into his apartment in the main house without knocking. Her long, dark hair stood out in a static cloud around her head, which meant she was picking up way too much on Paul’s emotions, despite his efforts to shield.
“If you didn’t want me to come in,” she said, not waiting for him to speak, “you should have locked the door. Great Aunt Roslyn is getting worried, Paul. You don’t want her getting worried. She’s already turned all of Uncle Declan’s mead to disgustingly sweet vinegar and ruined some lovely smoked salmon. Don’t want her spoiling the Yule feast completely.”
Paul cranked his shields even higher and forced a smile. “Or turning a patient into a zombie.” No one knew which one of Great Aunt Roz’s powers occasionally backfired and started spoiling food, but since she was primarily a healer, the involuntary rotting was scary. So far it had affected only food and the occasional garden plant, but no one wanted to know what would happen if she got really upset.
“That.” Portia crossed the room in three long-legged steps to loom over Paul, who was curled up in his favorite chair under a ratty blanket, playing again with Tag’s card. “Now, are you going to stop sulking and get in touch with that lovely boy, or do I have to do it for you?”
Paul handed her the business card, now grungy and wrinkled with his constant petting. “What kind of guy has ‘business’ cards that don’t list any business information, just his name, phone and email? A guy who hooks up with a lot of people, that’s who. A guy who plans to keep playing the field long enough to hand out… How many business cards come in a box anyway? Five hundred? Two hundred? A lot, anyway.”
She examined the card. “Perforated edges. He printed out a few of them at home. Get as far as the late 20th century, bro, even if you can’t bear to make it to the 21st. And maybe he was a bit of a man-ho. So what? You’ve had your share of flings—and besides, if he’s a fox dual, he’s supposed to be a man-ho.”
“I know. That’s the issue. I can’t ask him to be something he’s not, can’t ask him to change his ways for me. If he chooses to do that, he has to choose it when I’m not near him, not influencing him with red magic. I couldn’t live with myself if I realized too late I’d pushed him.”
Portia laughed. It wasn’t an entirely kind laugh. “You’re scared. You’re scared, and you’re being a self-righteous ass and hurting the guy you love by pretending you know what’s best for him instead of admitting you’re scared you’ll be hurt and even more scared that you’ll hurt him. But isn’t that a little arrogant? He’s a grown man, and he thinks he can handle monogamy. If you love him, you have to trust him.”
Paul opened and shut his mouth. He wanted to argue with Portia. He really did. He’d been trying to do the right thing by Tag, trying to protect him from making a decision that would change him forever.
Maybe it was too late to worry about that. Paul knew he’d been changed forever. Who was to say Tag wasn’t too? “But with all that red magic flying around, neither of us could think clearly,” he finally stumbled out, knowing that Portia’s clear sight would see if there was a lie in there he could no longer recognize.
“You were probably wise to give yourself both some space away from incubi and red magic. But it’s been months. You still want him. Still need him. Still love him. Magic still dances on your skin, and he’s not even here. I can see it.” She picked up the phone and put it in his hand. “Call him, or I swear by the Lord and Lady I’ll do it for you. And you won’t want that. Trust me.”
Paul stared at the phone she’d forced into his hand, half expecting it to bite him.
Could it really be that simple? Just…call him?
“Do it. I’m sick of you languishing around in my head like a broken-hearted lady in a Victorian novel. Do it before I count to ten, or I’ll do it for you, and I’ll tell him just what a hopeless twit you are.”
“I love Tag, but I hardly know him.” He wasn’t sure where the words came from, but he thought it might be a more honest place than he’d been able to reach before. “I’m scared of this whole destiny thing. I don’t even know what he does for a living.”
“I’m a teacher. Middle school social studies.”
The phone slipped from Paul’s suddenly nerveless fingers and hit the floor hard as he sprang up to enfold the exhausted-looking redhead who was leaning against the doorframe.
Tag smelled wild, and his aura was the color of autumn and sunset, and he felt solid and hot in Paul’s arms, but Paul couldn’t believe the evidence of his senses, even his witch-sight. “Are you real?” he breathed. “Or am I having a particularly vivid dream?”
“Told you’d I’d be here before Yule. Now shut up and kiss me.”
Portia slipped quietly away.
Chapter Sixteen
Later—much later—Paul lay with his head on Tag’s furred chest. “I wasn’t sure you’d really come,” he said, “and I was afraid to call, afraid to pressure you and even more afraid that you’d come to your senses and would blow me off.”
“There’s only one kind of blowing I’ll ever do where you’re concerned, and it’s the fun kind.” Tag chuckled deep in his throat, a sexy animal sound, as he stroked Paul’s skin. “And as for coming to my senses, I’m a fox, remember? Knowing what we want and going for it, even if it seems crazy, is as close to sane as we get. I wouldn’t have held out as long as I did,” he confessed, his voice dropping to a lower, smokier pitch, “if I hadn’t stormed out without getting your number or address, and you’d had me delete that email from Portia as soon as you
’d memorized the spell.” He looked almost sheepish, but the moment passed quickly and he reverted to his usual cockiness. “For semi-famous people, your family is really off the grid. I tried everything I could think of to find you except just looking at a map of Oregon. Once I did that, I figured the town called Donovan’s Cove was a good place to start.”
Paul chuckled. “Glad I’m not the only idiot in this relationship.” He snuggled close. “I was worried you might not want someone as dorky as I can be, but as long as we’re both occasionally dumb as a box of rocks, I guess it’s okay.”
“Love makes you stupid, but it’s better to be in love and stupid together than wise and alone. Ancient fox proverb.”
“Really?” Paul was starting to figure out when Tag was teasing, but this time he couldn’t be sure. The fox’s expression was both tender and mischievous, but that was pretty standard for Tag. There’d been laughter in his voice, but given fox dual culture, ancient wisdom probably included the ability to laugh at their own foibles.
Tag laughed out loud and kissed the top of Paul’s head with an exaggerated smack. “Okay, I just made it up, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. And there’s no one I’d rather live stupidly in love with than you.” Tag paused. “Paul, you just said something about bein’ married to you. Was that what you call a proposal? Because the answer’s gonna be yes, but I’m not actually sayin’ it until you propose better than that.”
A thrill went through Paul’s body and right into his soul.
Tag paused again. “Except I just said yes. Oops.”
It was time. Paul had no real plan about how or when he’d propose. He’d daydreamed about it, in between daydreaming about sex with Tag, laughing with Tag, fighting with Tag, watching his back, and growing into an eccentric family elder with Tag by his side. He’d even researched all the proper forms and all the magical and mundane details of the Donovan betrothal and marriage rituals. But that was when he wasn’t convinced he’d ever see Tag again, and the daydreams and the research were a way of occupying his mind until he could decide whether he had any right to go after the man for whom he yearned.
Now a tingling of the magic told him the time to propose, to set the rituals in motion, was right.
He didn’t remember his heart pounding this way or this anxious roiling in his stomach when they faced down the incubus. When he’d imagined proposing, there had been candlelight involved, or a full moon on the beach, and he’d rehearsed everything. And Tag, in his flights of fancy, hadn’t looked impatient or smug—though if Paul had been realistic, he should have included Tag being cocky about the whole thing, laughing even though he took it seriously or maybe because he did.
“I love you, Tag, and I’ve been an idiot.” It wasn’t at all what he’d intended it say. He was blathering, but he was so nervous he couldn’t stop himself. “And I want to spend the rest of this lifetime making it up to you.”
“If it involves breakfast in bed sometimes, I’m all for it. Now shut up and propose already!”
Paul slipped off the bed. He knelt on the worn Oriental runner next to the bed and took Tag’s left hand, the one closer to the heart, between both of his.
His heart was racing, his palms suddenly sweaty, even though he already knew what Tag’s answer would be. The rituals around a witch marriage were magic in their own right, leading up to the final moments of the ceremony when their souls would literally be connected by an etheric silver cord. Because Tag wasn’t human, let alone a witch, some parts of the ancient rituals would have to be altered and improvised to make the magic work in a way that wouldn’t interfere with his dual form or his beautiful, wild soul. That, to Paul, made the bits that could follow tradition all the more important. “Taggart Ross,” he said, his voice shaking, “will you marry me and journey by my side through this world?”
Tag’s grin threatened to split his face, but his eyes were just a little misty, and his aura softened and expanded, wrapping around Paul. “Guess it’s true about love makin’ you dumb, because a fox should at least pretend to play hard to get. But I like saying yes to you. Every chance I get. For the rest of my life.”
Tag leaned forward to kiss him, but Paul held up a warning hand. “A witch marriage is a pledge to bind our lives and very souls together from this day forth, in this world and in the Otherworld. Taggart Ross, will you so bind yourself to me as I will to you?”
Tag blinked a couple of times, then said, “Of course I will. Now can I…”
“Do you accept that silver cords of matrimony, unbreakable save by the Powers, will bind us, even if our lives and hearts change, and we must part?”
“Shit, sweetie, how many times do I have to tell you yes before you shut up and kiss me?” Tag pulled him bodily onto the bed—not that Paul was fighting or anything. “Yes, I’ll marry you, you silly witch. I’ll go through all your rituals, which will probably take three hours…”
“Three days, actually. Not three solid days,” Paul added quickly at Tag’s grimace, “but a couple of hours a day over three days. You’ll hate that part. But in between the boring parts, there’s a hell of a party. We do know how to play, believe it or not.”
“Bunch of serious, witchy humans think they know how to party. My family will cover the damage charges at the venue. There will be some.”
Paul snorted. “Venue? We have all our big parties on the estate because everything’s bespelled to contain fire, flood, earthquake and other problems caused by witch party games. Imagine a bunch of young fire witches and an open bar.”
Tag let out an exaggerated sigh of relief. “I think I’ll fit in after all. Now, about kissing me.” He rolled Paul so Paul was straddling his hips, acutely aware of the way their cocks rubbed against each other. “You talk way too much, pretty boy. Why don’t you have something better to do with that gorgeous mouth?”
Paul did indeed. First he gave the kiss Tag had nagged for. Tag tasted of sunlight. Paul couldn’t begin to explain it, but he tasted as if he’d stored the sun in his cells to share with Paul in the cloudy Pacific Northwest. He marveled at that, then got down to the serious business of marveling at Tag’s mouth under his, Tag’s tongue dancing with his, Tag’s body hot and solid underneath him, instead of a shadow in a fantasy.
Tag wanted him to put his mouth to good use? Paul could do that.
He began the line of kisses on Tag’s jaw. “I like the goatee,” he paused to say, then continued kissing out to Tag’s ear and from there down his neck to the clean, muscled line of his shoulder. Paul tasted sweat and an acrid hint of something that suggested Tag, for all his insouciance, had been just as nervous as he was. But under the sweat he tasted desire, tasted the man who’d just said he’d spend eternity together with him. His man. His future husband.
He moved to the nipples, not neglecting any of the territory in between, enjoying the silken texture of Tag’s hair. He’d forgotten how soft it was, how different from the texture he’d expect from hair that looked so crisp. “I love this, Tag,” he breathed. “It feels like I’m petting something with soft fur at the same time I’m making love to you.”
“That’s freaky. Humans never want to think about that.” Tag spoke slowly as if he had to choose his words with care. “Even if they know my other side has fur.”
“I love the fur. It’s part of you. I’d love to pet your fox form sometimes if you’d let me. Just…not naked.” Tag laughed at that, but the laugh turned into something more like a moan as Paul flicked one puckered brown nipple.
In the frenzy of their time in Las Vegas, he hadn’t really explored how sensitive Tag’s nipples were. Very sensitive, as it turned out. Before long, Tag was sucking his breath between his teeth when he wasn’t letting loose with a litany of profanities that, in his wild, honeyed voice, sounded more like a prayer. His cock burned against Paul’s belly, a steel bar heated red-hot.
Paul had to close his eyes to defend himself against the multicolored energy swirling through the room, swirling through his being. He w
as already drunk on the stuff. If he let himself see more, his witch-sight would limn everything in russet and green and red and blue, and they’d look to be floating above the floor because he’d no longer be able to see the bed.
Using Braille, he stroked and kissed and licked his way down Tag’s torso, lingering on the abs that twitched with sexual tension.
Then he shifted off Tag’s hips, moved just so, and took Tag deep into his mouth.
“Shit,” Tag exclaimed. And then, “No you don’t. Not alone.” Strong hands guided Paul over Tag’s face so he could suck as he was being sucked.
This position had always felt awkward to Paul in the past. Someone was bound to get distracted and lose track of what he was doing. Someone was bound to get a neck cramp or something. Even if you were both red witches, chances were someone would come faster than the other.
He wasn’t going to worry about any of that now. Couldn’t worry. Could only experience the ravenous need to take Tag over the edge again and let Tag take him there. With one hand, he fondled Tag’s balls, already tight with approaching ecstasy. He used the other to steady himself as he sucked Tag’s cock as deep as he could in this less than optimal position.
And oh Lord, Tag was licking and sucking his balls, alternating with Hoovering his cock, taking him in deep and sucking hard, then backing off to tantalize his balls some more.
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