Dream Lover (16 page)

He kept his eyes locked on mine even as the blush rose to my cheeks. He lifted his wrists and started to unbutton his shirt. Underneath, his skin was the alabaster-smooth, taut pallor that I remembered, like a polished sculpture. A drift of freckles was strewn over his shoulders, and his nipples were as pale as rose quartz.

“Without adornment.” He walked to me, close enough that I could smell the milk and wool of his sweat. He lifted my hair and laid it behind my shoulders. Such a small gesture, but I felt so exposed. Between us, the locket lay heavy on my collarbone.

“Let history be left behind,” he said softly. “Trust me, Amy.”

I wet my lips. Scott was asking me to let go of everything I’d carried with me for all these years.

To be free of it, to lay down all the enchantments and the regret and the hidden weaponry and meet him as just a woman again, oh, how the thought of it made my bones ache with weary longing. Up above us a violet sunset seeped into the clouds, and somewhere in the forest a woodpigeon sang.

Without speaking, I pulled down the zip on my dress. I didn’t turn away from him as I removed my clothes. This was only half a striptease and half a promise. A way to show him that I was willing to lay myself bare for him. Fear rose in me along with desire—between my stuttering pulse and my shaking hands I couldn’t tell what was driving me anymore, I just knew that if I could hold my nerve I would be in his arms.

I dropped my underwear on the grass and stood there wearing only the red marks on my skin where clothes had been. The air was summer-evening sweet, but the breeze was cool enough to prickle my skin into goose bumps.

Scott was still. Only a muscle in his jaw twitched.

“Everything,” he said.

I threw a prayer into the ether and hoped the goddess would hear it. I undid the clasp of the locket, letting the warm weight of it slide down the valley between my breasts and fall to the ground. The spells unwound, with a sound like the wind moaning, and I felt the world free and loose and dangerous against my skin. Scott stepped forward and I let him hold me, his arms warm and strong and the crook of his neck smelling of sweet hay.

“This is dangerous,” I said.

“Kiss me.”

And so I did. With open mouth, breathing hard.

For the first time in fifteen years I was vulnerable, and
although I was scared it was exhilarating, too, to let go of the fight. I could not protect us, if Tommy came here. The vigil had been abandoned. There was nothing between us and the sky, the rest of the world, all the cruelty and the bloodlust and the hungry snarls of angry men. When Scott bit my neck, his teeth left marks that reminded me just how fragile, how human I was. When his hands dragged over my body his fingertips tugged at my skin, leaving it tender. I felt the pulse in my throat, the boom of his heart, the puff of his breath tickle my ear.

We were like two teenagers discovering each other for the first time. And though my flesh was older now and had known many others, it still leaped under his touch. When he pressed his hard prick against me and the long yearning of it dug into my belly, I laid my forehead on his chest. This was my altar to worship, for now.

I held his smooth cock and kissed it tenderly. A single tear wept from his slit and I licked it away, tasted the salt of him. He was whispering my name and falling to his knees. Was it because we were so aware of the danger that every touch seemed magnified? Scott dipped his fingers between my legs and stroked the wetness he found blooming there. I wanted to swallow him whole.

“Stop, stop, stop,” he said, “I’m too close.”

I sucked in my breath and pulled away, smiling like I was drunk. He lowered me to the ground, his hand at the small of my back as he entered me. That was my Scott, so gentle even when the desire darkened his face and made him sweat. I noticed that, his kindness, and then I was overtaken by the hard, beautiful feel of him inside me. Rocking back and forth on our bed of meadowsweet and nettles, we clung to each other. It was more than fucking, that act. ’Twas a banishing of the darkness, a promise to each other and a memento of the time we’d lost.

Scott wrapped my hair around his fists and bore down on me, his hips swooping over and over, his body singing against mine. We were beasts again, simple beasts chanting each others’ names into the gathering night.

“God, how I missed you,” he said.

“Show me,” I said through gritted teeth.

Our movements slowed. He fucked me emphatically, punctuating every thrust with a kiss that was as deep as the river behind us. He ran his hands once more over my face, as if memorizing it or reawakening an old memory, and then he reached down and plucked at my nipple. His hands were rough and impatient.

“I know you,” he whispered. “I know you, Amy.”

Then his hand slipped between us and he found my clit and rubbed it, pinched it with an expert’s fingers, summoning my orgasm as surely as he called my name. I dug my nails into his back and kicked at him with my heels, trying to gather him inside me for good, trying to keep him there welded to me with sweat and lust. We cried out like jackdaws.

It was something beautiful, that orgasm—as pure and sweet a flowering as I’d ever known. Scott must have felt the same, because tears sprang to his eyes as our gazes locked. His lips parted, but he said nothing. His shoulders shook and his body jerked, so that his cock plunged into me hilt deep. Yes, it was as good as a handfast, coming together like that: pure alchemy.

“Good ride, that girl. Almost worth losing everything for, isn’t she?”

The voice cut into our world like a hard, blunt knife. Tommy. He’d found us. Everything in me recoiled in revolt, and I struggled to get to my feet. Where was the locket? I searched the grass before me, desperate, breathless.

Tommy stood just a few feet from the patch of flattened grass where Scott and I had made our bed. Everything in him was
menace. His fists were clamped to his side, and I kept my eyes on them, knowing just what power he could unleash given the slightest provocation. The damn locket!

“Lost something, witch?” Tommy gave me that filthy smirk of his. My nakedness didn’t bother me, though I knew Tommy’s eyes were raking over my body as though he possessed it. I was more conscious of Scott, his skin as white as paper, a pale smear on the night. How could I have let him disarm me? What a fool, to risk a good man’s life just for a few minutes of stolen pleasure!

Tommy lifted his hand and a stripe of energy tore across my flank, scorching my skin like a whip. I cried out before I could stop myself.

“Tommy. Don’t do this.”

“Don’t? I’ve waited fifteen miserable years to catch you bare of protection. You think I’ll walk away now?”

“So take your revenge. Take it on me. Let him go,” I said, trying to keep the steel in my voice.

“Scott? Dear Scott? But we have the biggest score to settle,” Tommy said quietly. His tongue flickered like the blade of a flick-knife. I saw his hands twitch, the magic gathering between his fingers. I readied myself to cover Scott, to try and deflect the blows. Even if it was just my mortal body, just a flesh and blood barrier, it might be enough to save him.

Witches, we have to keep the magic contained within our own kind. It’s only right.
Protect the mortals
; that was one of my first vows.

And then the light came, the bolt of power that ripped the sky open and half blinded me. I screamed, but the sound was swallowed up, and for a moment everything was pure, blank, white.

I drifted or fell through space.

Then the smoke filled my mouth and the landscape remade itself around me. I doubled over, coughing, feeling the static from the discharge of energy playing in my hair. I reeled, and lifted my head and looked for Scott.

He was not where I thought he was. Under the hazel tree, where Tommy had been, Scott now stood, still naked. His head was bowed and his shoulders rose and fell in a fast rhythm. The ground at his feet was dark and churned. At that moment, a crow rose, flapping and squawking, from the undergrowth. It took off and wheeled around once before flying off to the east. Scott cursed once, under his breath, and spat on the ground.

Only then did I understand why I had not been able to read Scott and how he had moved so fast to meet me at Black Hill.

“Scott?”

He turned to me. “You’re okay?”

“Aye. Have you taken the vows?”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t tell me. You don’t wear the mark.”

Scott shook his head. ‘I’m a farmer, Amy, not a witch. But after you—” He stopped and closed his eyes. “After you left, I had to make sure I was safe.”

“Tommy was bound,” I said. “The charm forbade him from harming you.”

“Aye. And Tommy never broke a promise? He was powerful, he’d have found a way. He always got what he wanted.”

The sorrow squeezed my chest. I couldn’t apologize now, not after so long. I’d broken Scott’s heart when he was young enough for it to shape his whole life. Nothing I could do now could make up for it. He rubbed the back of his head.

Just as quickly as we’d fallen on each other, suddenly the years and the mistakes yawned between us. I reached for my dress, though it was far too late for false modesty.

“Getting cold,” I said, to cover my shame. And if I didn’t leave now I would likely cry, and I couldn’t let him see that, not when it was my fault that this whole mess had come about. “Time to go.”

“Where will you go next?” Scott asked, his voice low. I looked west, to where the sun was drowning behind the lake. Out there was the whole wide world, everything I’d run from and everything I’d worked for. Scott picked a stem of grass and started tearing the seeds from it. I wasn’t used to seeing him angry. He’d always been the most gentle man I’d known.

Here there was nothing but Margaret’s empty house, and a small village full of people who would never fully understand me. I’d always be the witch. I’d always be the outsider. I looked at the grass seed scattered on the earth where we’d lain. With luck each seed would sink into the black earth.

“I’m not sure,” I started to say. And then I stopped. I looked back down the hill. Brambles and honeysuckle tumbled down the path, a glorious tangle of creeping vines and sweet-smelling flowers. I knew every step of this path. I looked at Scott, at the dappled, freckled skin and his hair like copper wire.

“I think I want to go home.” There. It spilled out of me like a cloudburst. “If you’ll take me.”

His eyes were steady when he looked at me. They were the old violet blue of spring skies. We used to lie under skies like that and dream of the future.

When he smiled, it was like the sun coming up.

“Scott,” I said, just so that I could have his name in my mouth.

I’d have said it again, but by then he was kissing me.

 

 

 

 

O
nce upon a time, a wolf came out of the dark while she searched an abandoned campground for leftovers and stuck his nose right up her backside. She swung away, tucking her tail, and tried to get around him. The wolf chuffed, mouth open, and absorbed her scent through his tongue. He was erect. She was scared; it was against nature this way since she didn’t want to mate with a wolf. The wolf grabbed her.

She struggled, snarling, trying to get away, and the sound the wolf made was like a chuckle, and so she stared. What was he?

An animal with black fur and dark eyes.

Without hesitation, she twisted away and ran.

She ran into the winter night, cobalt sky and starlight, a twotone moon above her. She ran from the campground toward town. She ran until her sides hurt, until she felt her tongue lagging from her mouth. She was weak from scavenging. She’d been alone too long. Time folded; memories overlapped. Not long ago, although she wasn’t sure when, she’d ducked into a
library and read about Eve, the first woman on earth, or maybe it had been Lilith, the Devil’s wife, but who’d been the first one like her? Children’s stories were full of wolves. Myths included shape shifters. Where was her book of Genesis? She couldn’t find anything like that.

The wolf had followed her out of the woods. They’d entered another kind of forest, one of newspaper like animal skins stuck to the concrete and wheels of cars. She heard the wolf chuckle again and stopped. Crouched against a wall, she regarded him. The wolf was sleek and muscled, obviously not hungry like her. He was full. The beast was beautiful. He lowered his head and growled. She ducked around a corner and ran again. He followed. At the door to her motel room she shifted. Fast as she could, she tried the door. It was unlocked: good. Inside the room, she slammed the door then secured the lock. She held still. The woman heard him coming. Her skin reacted. The ripples were like electrical zaps that lifted the hair on her arms then crowded into her stomach.

The woman felt a pelt of fur rising along the bumps of her spine.

She held her human form.

On the other side of the door, the wolf’s claws clicked on the pavement then stopped. She heard him panting and imagined his breath fogging the doorknob. The woman rushed across the room. She was light on her feet, quiet. She dropped to her hands and knees behind the bed. Meanwhile, the wolf sniffed her remains on the sidewalk: fur, teeth and skin. She heard him eating her, chewing her up, cleaning up after her.

The wolf scratched the door.

She held her hand to her mouth and didn’t move. After a while, the woman went to a window across the room. There,
near the glass, the air was cold. She shivered. Finally, she opened the curtain. The wolf waited on the other side of the glass. He pulled his jowls back and showed her the lovely canines. His dark eyes took in her human form, and then the wolf shed his fur in piles; his canines fell to the sidewalk before his head shrank and his ears retracted and went soft at the side of his head. For a moment, he stood bent over like a monkey, and the sight of an animal transforming into a man was ugly, so frightening she couldn’t watch anymore. The woman cringed from the window and then hugged herself. She closed her eyes, waiting. After a while, she couldn’t resist. When she looked again, the wolf man stood upright; he was built like an athlete and tall, but his skin appeared so pale she imagined a vampire before an endless myriad of monsters paraded through her head, the impossible all in existence now.