Gossamer in the Darkness (Fantasyland)

She smiled at him timidly.

Fuck, she was.

She was perfect.

And his.

All his.

His arms around her grew tighter.

“Were you all right taking that much?” he queried.

“It was hot,” she answered. “You kept coming and it made me feel….”

“Powerful?” he finished for her.

She scrunched her nose in an adorable affirmative.

“It’s been a while,” he told her.

“Right, of course. Pent up, I’m sure.”

“Indeed, of a sort, since I’ve been taking care of myself thinking of you every night and some mornings besides since the day I met you.”

Her eyes widened.

He grinned at her. “The reality is so far better, it’s rather astonishing.”

“Awesome,” she whispered.

“Obviously, it was watching me thrust into your face, alternating paying attention to your very beautiful arse.”

“Hmm…”

“That said, it was mostly that you’re flawless at sucking cock.”

Her legs started shifting.

Which meant she responded to verbal stimuli.

He already knew she did the same to physical.

Loren smoothed a hand over her arse.

She trembled.

And there it was.

“I was otherwise engaged, my darling. I didn’t get to watch,” he said quietly.

“Oh my gods,” she breathed, squirming on him even more.

The grin he gave her this time was different.

“Stay low but straddle my hips,” he ordered.

“Loren, your side.”

He shifted his hand around…and in.

Her eyes went half mast, her head tilted back, and her lips parted.

“Straddle my hips, my love, trust me, I’ll be fine.”

She straddled his hips, careful to keep her right knee from grazing his side.

Loren moved his fingers.

And this time, watched.

Chapter Seventeen

Sharing

Loren

She sat across from him at his breakfast table in the conservatory, the beams of the sun gilding her hair, her face aimed to the windows, watching the birds at their bath.

He was dressed, but she was wrapped in his dressing gown. It was too big for her. But it was all they had for the now as he refused to button her into a gown she’d worn just the day before. He’d sent word to Corliss to have her maid, her apparel and her toilette directed to his townhome so she could face the day fresh, preparing to do so there.

More importantly, this also meant he got to keep her longer.

“Stop watching me,” she told the window. “It’s ridiculously romantic. I’m melting in a puddle over here.”

He grinned at his coffee cup, his attention remaining on her over the rim as he took a sip.

She turned in the midst of this, watched his actions, and her gaze heated yet again.

“You’re a walking, talking, eating, drinking-coffee, sex-god hero from a romance novel,” she groused.

“I love you think that, though I’m perplexed as to why this seems to put you in a foul mood,” he noted, returning his cup to its saucer.

“I can’t jump you over the table due to your injury, that’s why,” she explained.

He raised a brow. “Did I not prove my creativity this morning?”

“The bit where you were on your knees could have torn your stitches.”

The tone of her response communicated she was now being very serious.

“Again, darling, I’m fine,” he said in the same tone.

“How worried should I be about this bordello woman you’ve angered?” she asked.

And there it was.

“You shouldn’t worry at all.”

“Loren—”

He went about picking up his fork in order to go about consuming his eggs, saying, “I’m now aware that she holds ill will with the intent to do something about it and will thus be prepared in the future.”

“What actually happened?”

His head was slightly bent to his plate, and he kept it that way as he lifted his gaze to her.

“Oh boy,” she said when she caught his eyes. “That bad?”

He took a bite of some eggs, chewed, swallowed, and answered, “We’ll just say I made a statement, though, apparently, not a big enough one.”

“Mom told me what you did to the baddie who was guarding her.”

Loren grew motionless.

“It’s okay, honey,” she assured. “That guy was rough with Mom, and he was gearing up to…well…”

Loren kept her pegged with his eyes.

If they were sharing—and this had finally begun between them with depth and honesty, and as far as Loren was concerned, there was no stopping now—thus, she would too.

“Violate Maxine,” she whispered. Then quickly, likely seeing and maybe even feeling his reaction to those words, she reminded him, “He’s very dead. You yourself made him that way.”

“I should have perhaps taken more time in that endeavor,” he murmured, cutting into his sausage.

She released a surprised giggle, and he returned his attention to her.

She waved a hand in front of her face, shifted fully to her plate, reached for her coffee (a surprise she drank that with her breakfast, as he did, an unusual thing for a lady, they customarily drank tea), and said, “I know, I know. I shouldn’t think it’s funny that you murdered someone. But I can’t call up any remorse for a man who would stand guard over captive women, not allowing them to bathe, eat properly, and, it needn’t be said, all the rest.”