by Logan Jacobs
“That actually makes me rather more anxious than the prospect of ending up in some trackless wilderness,” Emma confessed. She leaned back into my arm, turned to face me, and smiled, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “I suppose it sounds silly.”
“Hey, everyone’s afraid of something different,” I shrugged.
“I’m used to savage beasts, you see,” Emma explained. “It’s not very difficult to run from something once you’ve gotten the knack, you see. But you and Fela are the only humans--well, people--I’ve ever spoken to besides my kin.”
“You’re worried you’ll be freaked out by all the people?” I asked. “This is a tiny little town. We can take it slow, okay?”
“It’s not really that.” Emma shook her head, then reached out and placed her delicate porcelain hand on top of mine. Her touch was warm and soft and comforting, but it sent a sting of desire through me and made my heart race a little. “You’ve been quite kind to me, but I’m rather afraid I’ll come off as some backwoods bumpkin among civilized society. What if I don’t fit in anywhere?”
“Are you kidding?” I squeezed Emma’s hand. “Emma, you’re nice, you’re really fun to talk to, and you’re super gorgeous, and even though you’re used to living in the woods on your own I still think you’re the fanciest person I’ve ever met. I’m pretty sure you’ll be a hit everywhere I bring you.”
“You really think so?” Emma’s rosebud lips melted into a real smile.
“Yeah, people will love you,” I told her. “If we find a world with masquerade balls and tea parties and all the high society stuff you want, I’m pretty sure you'll fit in better than any of us. I mean, there’s gotta be a universe out there where people still know which fork to use for salad, you know?”
“Oh, Dave,” Emma giggled, and she shook her head fondly. “When you put it that way, I feel rather silly for being so anxious. I suppose between you, me, and Fela, we’ll be able to handle nearly any situation, won’t we?”
“We’ll be fine.” I slid my arm off her shoulders and clasped her small, warm hands in mine. “You’re a survivor, Emma. You don’t need to be scared of getting what you want.”
“I suppose not.” Emma glanced at the hearth, where Fela laid curled up purr-snoring on the rag rug. “Although right now I’m a bit scared of those dogs coming back. I’m not sure if we got all of them.”
“The dogs?” I sat up straight and strained my ears to listen for any hint of growling or zapping. “You don’t hear them or anything, do you? Should we check on Floppy?”
“I suppose we ought to.” Emma pursed her lips, but got up, went to the window, and pushed the quilted curtains aside. “No, he’s sleeping quite soundly.”
“Okay, good.” I stood up and checked to make sure my Glock was still secure in its holster.
“I suppose someone might have taken them early on.” Emma let the curtains fall and turned back to me. “I suppose that Fela will be quite able to guard Floppy, but I must confess that I felt a little insecure last night. I kept thinking there was a dog at my window, just ready to break in and devour me.”
“Why don’t I take the quilts and sleep outside your door?” I suggested. “That way I’ll be able to hear if anything does get into the room.”
“I...” Emma bit her lip, took a deep breath, and clasped her hands behind her back before she spoke. “I think I’d feel rather safer if you were in the room with me. If you don’t feel it’s terribly improper, that is.”
“Okay, okay,” I nodded quickly as my heart raced in my chest and my thoughts raced around my brain. I knew what a girl inviting me to stay in her room usually meant, but we were in a world full of hungry Pikachu creatures. I was pretty sure that Emma had been flirting with me at least a little bit, but I also wasn’t sure whether she’d mentioned the impropriety because she wanted to suggest something, or because she actually didn’t. I had to remember that no matter what she’d hinted at about having a family with more than two people, she’d grown up with some pretty old-fashioned values. I couldn’t assume anything, so I decided to follow her lead and see what she did. “If you think you’ll be more comfortable with me in the room, then I guess it’s not improper.”
“Oh, thank you, Dave!” Emma sighed in relief, then started to pick up the plates and open jars. “I’ll get this all cleared up, shall I? And then we can go to bed.”
“Yeah, I’ll, uh...” My mouth went dry and I wiped my clammy hands off on my jeans. I was prepared to sit on the wooden floor next to Emma’s bed with one hand on my Glock and the other on my spear if I had to, but I desperately hoped that Emma wanted more, otherwise my balls were going to be as blue as her eyes by the morning. “I’ll get my spear and stuff.”
“Do feel free to make yourself comfortable.” Emma’s cheeks pinked as she stacked the dishes on top of each other, and she shot me a low-lidded glance over her shoulder before she bustled off into the kitchen.
I grabbed a few of the quilts off the wicker sofa and took one last look at Fela’s curled form on the rag rug. I knew the fire would probably die down pretty soon, and I didn’t want the cat-woman to be cold, so I unfolded one of the quilts and spread it gently over Fela’s slumbering body.
“Mmm, warm.” One of Fela’s brilliant yellow eyes slitted open. “Mate well, Dave Meyer. Make powerful cubs.”
“Uh, I don’t even know if we’re going to do that tonight, but thanks.” I felt a hot blush spread across my nose and cheeks, but I leaned forward and bumped my nose against Fela’s anyway. “You’re really okay with me and Emma?”
“I told you, I think she is a good choice for the pack,” Fela yawned. She brushed her lips against mine, then settled her head back down on her arms and closed her eyes. “We will make good mothers together. Go make cubs with Emma.”
“If you insist.” I pressed a kiss to Fela’s hair, grabbed my spear and the quilts, and headed to Emma’s bedroom.
Tonight I was going to fulfill my duties as male of the pack, one way or the other.
Chapter 16
“Hey, Emma?” I leaned my spear against the wall, shifted the quilts I’d been carrying under my left arm, and knocked on the wooden door that Emma had pointed out as leading to her bedroom. “It’s me, Dave. Are you decent?”
“Come in, Dave.” Emma called out.
I grabbed my spear in my quilt-carrying hand and opened the door.
The bedroom was whitewashed just like the living room had been, but a few small framed portraits of men and women in very fancy hats hung on the walls. There was one tall rectangular window in the middle of the wall facing the door, but it was covered with a quilt, and the only light in the room came from a yellow candle set into an old-fashioned silver candlestick that sat on top of the wooden trunk under the window. A double bed covered with a blue and white quilt stood against the wall to the left of the trunk. Another trunk sat pushed against the middle of the right wall. Its flat surface was scattered with old-fashioned cosmetics. One more trunk sat in the far corner of the room with a small pile of neatly folded laundry on top and Emma’s black boots next to it.
Emma had changed into a long white nightgown. Her lacy collar dipped just beneath her throat to expose her pale collarbones, and it was tied with a white ribbon in the middle. Her loose sleeves ended just above the tips of her fingers, and the lacy hem hit right above the delicate curve of her ankle. Her pale bare feet were buried in the colorful rag rug that laid next to the bed.
“Do make yourself comfortable.” Emma reached up to the bun of black hair at the back of her head, pulled a long black ribbon from her coiffure, and shook her raven locks out in what looked like cinematic slo-mo to my enraptured eyes. Her glossy locks unfurled and cascaded down her back in a waterfall of ebony waves.
I had to physically keep my jaw from dropping open as I watched Emma run her fingers through her hair, and it took me a second to remember why I’d agreed to spend the night in her room in the first place. I closed the door behind me, leaned the spear
against the wall, and bent down to set the quilts on the floor. Somehow I felt like more of a voyeur looking at Emma in her long, ankle-revealing nightgown than I did looking at Fela in the nude.
“It’s awfully kind of you to spend the night in here.” Emma went over to the bed and pulled the quilt down to the foot of the bed to reveal two huge, fluffy pillows and a crisp white bed sheet.
“Hey, if it makes you feel safer, I’m happy to.” I picked up two of the quilts, spread them out on the floor next to the rag rug for a base, then folded up another quilt for a pillow. “I’ll warn you that I’m not really used to fending off wild animals, though.”
“Well, you’ve done an excellent job so far.” Emma sat on the edge of her bed. “Do you think you’’ll be quite comfortable down there?”
“I was fine last night.” I grabbed my spear and set it next to the quilt mattress, set my Glock and holster on the trunk by the window, then laid down on the quilt mattress and pulled the last quilt over my body. I wriggled out of my jeans and kicked them to the foot of my makeshift bed, turned to face Emma, and propped myself up on my elbow so I could see the black-haired girl. “Okay, I’m here right under the window in case the dogs come in. I have my gun right there so I can grab it, and my spear is right next to me. All good, or did I forget anything?”
“Hmm.” Emma laid down on her side and gazed at me, but she didn’t pull the quilt over her body yet. “It’s nice to be able to see you, I must admit. I woke up in the middle of the night last night, and for a moment I thought I’d woken up from a lovely dream. I was afraid I’d imagined you and Fela coming to save me.”
“I know it feels pretty crazy,” I said. “I keep wondering whether I imagined all of this, too. But then I eat a piece of wild turkey or a dog zaps me or something, and it’s like, yeah. This is definitely real.”
“I’m glad you feel that way, too!” Emma exclaimed. “I suppose I would be more concerned if you said you’d never questioned it. And are you sure you’re comfortable on the floor? This may be the last night either of us gets to spend in a real bed for quite some time.”
Something about the breathy, hopeful way Emma said “either of us” made a spark of desire and hope flare up in my chest, and I decided to take her up on her offer.
“Since you put it that way, sure.” I pushed the quilt off my body, stood, and went over to the bed.
“Oh!” Emma rolled over to the far side of the bed, ended up on her back, and folded her arms under her head. “Now there’s room.”
“I think there’s just enough bed for both of us.” I could feel my cock starting to twitch at the prospect of spending the night in the same bed as Emma, so I laid down on my stomach next to the black-haired girl and turned my head on the pillow to face her. My chest prickled with warmth and my pulse thudded butterflies in my stomach as I contemplated the mere inches of white linen that laid between us. I couldn’t help but imagine the acres of perfect white skin that I knew laid under Emma’s nightgown and wonder what it might be like to run my fingers across her slender curves. “There we go. Nice soft bed for both of us.”
“Thank you.” Emma tilted her head to gaze at me. “I feel a little better having you closer to me, to be honest. I can hear you breathing, I can feel the mattress bending under you, and I can even smell you a bit--not that you smell bad, it’s a very nice warm smell. Like you’ve been out in the sun all day. Which I suppose you have, of course.”
“I’m glad my sweaty funk is making you feel better,” I teased. “If you weren’t such a proper lady, I’d think you were just finding excuses to get me into bed.”
“Oh!” Emma flopped over and buried her face into her pillow.
“”No, no, no, it was just a joke!” I sat straight up as a pang went through my chest. “I was just trying to flirt, I thought it was cute. I really don’t mind--”
“You must think I’m awfully artless,” Emma sighed as she raised her head from the pillow. Her cheeks were flushed bright red, and her eyes were glistening as though she was about to cry. “I don’t know how to be as forward as Fela, but I don’t think I know how to court, either. Especially not when you’ve got such a gorgeous and frankly terrifying mate by your side already!”
“Is this about Fela?” I asked. I couldn’t believe that Emma thought she was bad at flirting, especially since she’d been giving me those tantalizing little looks almost since we’d met. I glanced toward the living room and realized that Fela and I had been making out just inches away from where Emma had been sleeping, so unless Emma had dropped off to sleep immediately she’d probably heard everything. “You heard her talk about her pack, right? She and I had a whole discussion about inviting you into the pack before we asked you--that’s even how she put it. She told me to go make some cubs with you. Trust me, Fela isn’t the jealous type.”
“Make some cubs!” Emma clapped her hand over her mouth, but the corners of her eyes crinkled up, so I was pretty sure that she was trying not to laugh. “My, she does put things very plainly.”
“Yeah, she does,” I grinned. “Not that we need to go that far right away. But if you want us to court, we can court. Fela will probably be cheering us on.”
“Courting takes time, you know.” Emma propped herself up on her elbow and gazed at me. “There is a process to it. You must call upon your intended’s family, and appear at parties together, and purchase all sorts of little gifts that show how wealthy you are.”
“I have a few million in a bank account in the next universe over, but if you want I can go into town and loot the jewelry store for you,” I joked.
“What I mean is that it’s an awfully long process, and I don’t want to wait.” Emma sat up, and her smile smoothed out into a more serious expression. “The forest is full of wild animals, and the next world might be even more fearsome than this one. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow, but I want you to--to hold me tonight, Dave Meyer. Is that alright?”
“Yeah, I can hold you.” I propped myself up on my elbow and held my arms out. “C’mere. Want me to be the big spoon?”
Emma nodded, and my pulse began to race again as the black-haired girl inched her way over the sheets toward me. She nestled her glossy black head against my chest, laid her palms on my shoulders, and slid her linen-clad legs against my jeans as she settled her warm, slender body against mine. She smelled herbal and a little fruity, like lavender and the berries from the preserves we’d been eating, and I could feel her heart beating in her chest as she pressed her small, pert breasts against my torso.
“Comfortable?” I asked as I slid my arms around Emma.
“Very,” the black-haired girl murmured, and I could feel her body relax slowly as I stroked gentle patterns over her back. Her breathing had slowed, and I thought she might have fallen asleep when she tilted her head up and brushed her rosebud lips against mine.
“Dave?” Emma breathed against my mouth.
Instead of answering, I leaned forward and kissed Emma properly. I started with a chaste and close-mouthed kiss, but Emma’s soft lips parted under mine, and I couldn’t help slipping my tongue between those sweet silken pillows.
Emma sighed softly as I explored her tender mouth. She ran her tongue over my lips so that I could taste a faint hint of mint that hadn’t come from anything we’d eaten that night, and I wondered if she’d popped a few leaves into her mouth to chew in preparation for inviting me to bed. She kissed far more ardently than I’d imagined she would, and soon her tongue plundered the depths of my mouth, her teeth scraped along my tender bottom lip, and her hips pressed insistently against mine.
“You’re driving me crazy, Emma,” I gasped into her rosebud mouth when I pulled away for air.
“Oh, Dave...” Emma slid her arms around my side, rolled over onto her back, and pulled me on top of her.
I propped myself up on my forearms over Emma’s chest, swung my legs over to straddle her, and slid one knee forward into the vee between her parted thighs. I could feel the heat of E
mma’s body through the white linen of her nightgown as she pressed her crotch against my leg in response.
“Kiss me, darling,” Emma breathed. She twined her arms around my neck and pulled me down to meet her lips. Her mouth was as sweet and slick as honey, and her tongue traced electric patterns of desire over the roof of my mouth. When her sharp little teeth bit down into my lip, sparks of pleasure coruscated down through my chin and into my throat.
I drank from the mint-flavored cup of Emma’s rosebud lips as the slender girl rocked back and forth against me. When I had to pull away for breath again, I turned my head, opened my eyes, and brushed my lips over the soft skin of her jawline.
A brilliant blue spark crackled over my mouth and sent a hot jolt of sensation through my lips. It wasn’t the lingering pain of the spark from a fire or the heat from a jalapeno pepper, but more like the dizzying sensation of swallowing a chunk of wasabi. The heat zapped through me for a sudden and painful moment and left only a buzzing, tingling aftershock in its wake.
“Oh, don’t stop,” Emma moaned. Her long black hair spread out like a halo on the pillow, her bright blue eyes fluttered closed, and she arched her swan-like neck in pleasure. “I’m coming quite undone.”
“You want to come undone?” I propped myself up on one arm, tugged gently on the end of the ribbon that held Emma’s lacy collar together, and bent my head down to brush my lips across the black-haired girl’s porcelain skin as the bow unraveled. I could feel more little sparks tingle along my lips, but the hot prickle of their sting melted into sparks of pleasure as the sensation raced along my nerves. The tips of my fingers prickled as I coaxed the lace of Emma’s collar down her pale throat to expose her collarbones and the tops of her creamy breasts, and my tongue tingled as I licked a trail of kisses down her swan-like neck.