Winter's Tale (12 page)

He pulled her closer, his body heat welcome.
“It’s handy as long as it’s working.”

December rubbed her cheek against his bicep.
His muscle was hard and smooth. “Why does your magic work outside
Dire Woods and not the queen’s?”

“I’m sure she didn’t mean for me to gain an
advantage, but because she banished me to the Overlap, I had
centuries to acclimate to the energy of this realm. I take longer
to recharge here than in Faerie, but I can.”

“You know you can’t do magic in front of
other humans, right?”

She felt him smile as he kissed her hair. “I
know. Your world isn’t a complete blank to me—though my knowledge
of girls boarding schools is disproportionately thorough.”

That spurred a different train of thought.
“What do you suppose will happen when Rackham finds Mrs. Blake’s
body?”

“I rather doubt they will. I expect Queen
Araun will give it to her pack.”

“Eww.”

“There’s more than one reason black dogs are
feared.”

His tone was matter of fact, his arm draping
her waist without tension. Regardless of what those dogs
represented to others, they weren’t bogeymen to him. December had a
feeling he was out of the ordinary even where he came from.

She rubbed his forearm for comfort. “Will
Araun come after you again?”

“She may try, but she won’t find it easy.
Magic has its own laws. I won free of her fair and square.”

December wriggled, enjoying the feel of him
behind her. Though she’d been no innocent when they met, she hadn’t
snuggled with a man like this before. His thighs were as formidable
as his chest—even with their hard muscles relaxing. Hans behaved
like spooning her was the most natural thing in the world. The idea
that he’d probably hold her all night was strange and
appealing.

“What will happen to us?” she asked.

“I don’t know, my love. I’m not a fortune
teller.”

She meant would they stay together forever.
People did in fairytales, but this wasn’t precisely one. She gnawed
her lip, not ready to ask plainly—in case she didn’t like the
answer.

She’d never been in a relationship that
lasted forever.

“Why couldn’t I find your story when I
searched Miss Westin’s books?” she asked instead.

“People don’t write stories about curses that
haven’t broken yet.”

That made sense, she supposed. “Do you think
someone somewhere will write about you now?”

Hans laughed softly above her head. “Beloved,
I’m happy to answer all your questions, but you’re not the only one
who needs sleep tonight.”

She shut her mouth and smiled secretly. She
didn’t mind being told to keep quiet when he called her
Beloved.

“
THE
sun is up,” Hans said.

December didn’t see the sun. She saw the
inside of her eyelids. She’d been slumbering extremely soundly, and
she wanted more of it.

“Mmph,” she said, burrowing into the soft
pillow. Hans wasn’t spooning her anymore. To judge by the direction
of his voice, he was kneeling beside the bed, leaving the narrow
mattress entirely to her. She was unabashedly prepared to wallow
under the cowboy sheets till noon.

Hans wrapped his palm and fingers around her
shoulder. “My battery is charged from sleep. I’m going to heal you
now.”

A dull ache shot through her where she’d been
cut, followed by a heavenly wash of warmth. The sensation was like
melting chocolate swirled with the afterglow of a good climax. The
ache in December’s shoulder shifted between her legs. Her arousal
was so strong she squeezed her thighs together.

Her lover bent to murmur against her neck.
“Do you know what monstrous morning erections fae wake with? Can
you imagine how badly I want to pleasure you?”

She hunched her shoulder and tried not to
giggle. “You’re already pleasuring me.”

Hans wrapped his warm hand behind her neck,
pulling her gently but irresistibly upright. “I want to pleasure
you in the flesh, my love. I’ve barely begun to do that.”

She gave in and hugged him, loving how he
embraced her in return. His big male size was tremendously
satisfying, the strength and the give he managed to combine. She
dragged her sleepy face across his shoulder. “You smell good.”

“
You
smell good,” he replied.

She rubbed his back and sighed happily.
Daylight filtered through the doorway of the room they’d slept in.
They were surrounded by pieces of beds and bureaus in various
stages of repair. Dust floated in the air, but nothing seemed truly
dirty. She guessed the absent shop owners took good care of their
stock.

“Eyes open yet?” Hans asked.

“Maybe.” She pushed back and smiled at
him.

He smiled back at her. “I want you,” he said.
“No kidding.”

He was shirtless, which explained why hugging
him felt incredible. He’d left on his buckskin trousers. The bulge
that pushed out their front was X-rated.

Not done exploring him just yet, December
sifted her fingertips through his dark gold chest hair. “When I
touch you, my skin tingles.”

“When I touch you, mine does.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“But I’m not magic.”

“The combination of human and fae tends to be
. . . combustible. It’s one of the reasons someone always sneaks
between the realms, no matter how tense relations between our races
sometimes become.”

Fae and humans had relations? She made a note
to ask about that later. In the meantime, she dragged her nails in
firm circles over his straining hump. When she reached the head of
his penis, Hans sucked a sharp breath of reaction. “Relations are
looking tense right now,” she teased.

Despite the state of his arousal, he leaned
to kiss her light as a feather on her mouth. Her lips tingled like
her fingers had. “Take pity on me,” he whispered. “I want my cock
inside you.”

“Will you always ask my permission?”

“Always. Just as I’ll always use my powers of
persuasion to coax you to give in.”

“Do I, er, need protection?”

He shook his head. “For you and I to have
children would require a ritual.”

His beautiful eyes gazed deeply into hers.
She felt as if he were silently saying he wanted kids with her.
Maybe the two of them were special faerie soulmates, but having
children was a serious grown-up thing. Panic gripped her for a
second but relaxed soon after. He said he’d always ask permission.
He must mean about things like that as well.

“We have time,” he said softly. “We have so
much to learn about each other.”

Tears burned across her eyes. “I want to know
everything
about you,” she declared impassionedly.

He laughed. “Not right this second, I
hope.”

She bit her lip and shook her head. “Not
this
second. I have more urgent issues I’d like you to see
to.”

He liked that answer. A salacious glint
entered his expression. Though her shoulder was healed, he helped
her peel off the borrowed cable knit sweater. As gently as if she
were a child, he shifted her tumbled curls behind her
shoulders.

“So beautiful,” he said, his fingers
smoothing her breasts’ lush curves. “Like a healthy peasant girl on
a farm.”

She smiled. Worths weren’t generally
considered peasants, but she guessed to him this was a compliment.
He was engrossed in drawing circles around her areola when she
unbuttoned and unzipped the corduroys she wore.

“I can help with that,” he said.

She propped her hands beside her hips to
brace, perfectly willing to let him. He stood, moving to the end of
the little bed to pull the pants down her legs. Once they were off,
his strong and sensitive hands rubbed pleasure back up her naked
limbs. He stroked and kneaded her calves, her thighs, the slightly
ticklish bend behind her knees. She expected him to rush toward the
main event, but he’d told the truth about enjoying touching her. He
kissed every scratch on her legs from their dash through Dire
Woods, healing each one in turn. She could tell from the in and out
of his ripped stomach that his breathing had deepened.

In the mood to tease, she nudged his thigh
with her toes. “You going to stand there dilly-dallying
forever?”

He caught her ankle and worked his thumbs
into the arch of her foot. “You can’t be trying to hurry me. I have
centuries of unfulfilled fantasies to make up for.”

He was teasing too. The twinkle in his eyes
said so. Despite this, December’s neck arched with sudden,
uncontrollable pleasure. The nerves his thumbs were pressing tugged
unexpectedly on her clit.

“Oh my God,” she gasped as moisture welled
from her.

Hans pressed the sole of her foot over his
huge erection.

She wouldn’t have guessed that would be a
thrill, but his shape and hardness sent electric currents up the
same rewarding path. For him too, apparently. His hips rolled
against her foot, both his hands pressing it to him as he groaned.
She curled her toes, and he writhed harder. Then, as if he couldn’t
wait a second longer, he released her leg and ripped the ties of
his trousers loose.

She was more than ready for that, grateful to
see him shove the pants to his hips and let his trapped cock spring
free. God, it was hard, its skin flushed with excitement, its pulse
beating visibly. She could hardly drag her gaze from it to him as
he descended over her on the little bed.

His knees hit the mattress, and his hands
reached for the headboard. His fingers squeezed and released the
wood like his muscles needed more to do than he was giving
them.

“Open your legs,” he rasped.

She spread them so that her calves hung over
the sides.

The position exposed her more than she would
have wanted if she weren’t so aroused. Hans looked at her sex, then
her belly, and her breasts again. That he admired everything he saw
was obvious.

“Touch me,” he said when his ogling reached
her face.

She laid her hands on his pounding chest,
smoothing them around his ribcage and down his sides. He shuddered
and closed his eyes.

“God, I want you so much,” he said.

Saying that simply made her bolder. She
trailed her touch to his rigid cock, gathering her hands together
and pulling up the hot pole. The hungry sounds he made were
delicious, the beads of wetness that welled from the slit. She
spread the silky drops around his corona, delighting in every gasp
and quiver she drew from him. With the pads of her thumbs, she
rubbed the hot spot beneath, lubricating it as well. His breath
rushed out with pleasure. She wanted to suck him, but that would
mean dragging her gaze from his exalted expression.

No one could doubt how passionately he
desired her.

“Take me,” she said. “Make up for your lost
time.”

His eyes opened. The gleam in them was
unfocused, like he’d come back from a very dirty and pleasant dream
starring her. He lowered his hips with her hands still on his cock,
letting her guide the head into the best home for it. She let go
when he was there, smoothing her touch up his sides again.

The moment felt monumental, as if her life
was finally beginning. He came down onto his elbows, his eyes
blazing into hers. His tip pulsed rapidly against her.

“You have my heart forever,” he said.

He pushed in before she could answer,
startling a gasp from her. Holy hell, he felt good: thick, hot,
smooth. The tingling magic of his skin radiated even more strongly
from his penis. Her hands tightened on his muscled back as he
forged slowly into her tight passage.

“My God,” she gasped, her spine arching as he
stretched her walls.

He wedged one hand beneath her bottom,
pulling her to him as he pushed harder.

He moaned long and low when he reached the
end of her.

Being filled by him was almost too good. Her
pussy throbbed like a drum around him—or maybe
he
was the
source of that lovely thick percussion. Probably it was both of
them. Not that it mattered. When she wriggled to get closer, the
throbbing increased deliriously.

He gasped, his hips grinding closer. “I have
to move. Tell me you’re ready.”

“Yes,” she urged. “Please.”

He drew back, drew breath, and then he pumped
his cock into her.

She loved that better than she’d ever loved
anything, digging in her heels, clutching at his waist to help him
go at her harder. He seemed to feel every stroke, seemed to
appreciate every burst of sensation from the quick slick friction.
He pushed one of her legs higher on his back. Very much a fan of
this, she used its strength to push her pelvis over him.

“Hans,” she groaned, unable to keep his name
inside. She swelled with so many feelings: pleasure, love, hope so
sharp it was frightening. The barricades around her heart were
cracking, letting his fully into it.

He caught her urgency. His thrusts came
faster, his grunts of need and pleasure rising in pitch. The joints
on the little bed creaked like mad, but thankfully didn’t break.
Maybe to help support it, he put one foot on the floor. That gave
him even more leverage, which he couldn’t seem to resist taking
advantage of. He braced one palm on the headboard, so as not to
crack her skull against it.

Oh it was all so good, but she had to have
more. She changed the angle of her hips, and he went deeper. She
cried out hoarsely at that pleasure. The hammer of his cock was
concussing some previously hidden nerve. Her pussy tightened, her
anticipation of what was coming mixed up with an unbearable
tenderness.

Her heart longed for him as much as her
body.

He knew. He found her clit with two fingers
and the tenderness exploded. She came in hot streaks of feeling.
They shot up her clit where he pressed and rubbed, through her
pussy, pleasure zinging out through every toe and fingertip. Hans
let out a strangled sound and swelled inside her.