Chapter 36 A Nice Afternoon
A Nice Afternoon
He smiled hopefully at her, looking nothing like the guy who’d moped nonstop on the way there.
“I thought you hated my driving,” she said.
“Only the terrifying parts.”
“You’re immortal.”
“And yet, not impervious to pain or fear of losing body parts.”
“Ha ha. Yeah, of course you can ride along. I’d be glad of the company.” Maybe a little too glad, but she was only human, as the fae loved to mention on a constant basis. “Should I ask why you’re going back when you were so het up to get back into the fae realms?”
“I needed to get back to Moonstone, specifically to this place.” He waved a long-fingered hand at the palace.
“To regain your power.”
“Yes.” He held her gaze. “Now I go back and finish what Lenorae’s family started.”
She really wanted to ask more, but figured both that he likely still couldn’t say much and that she probably didn’t want to know.
The last thing she wanted to hear about was the perfect Lenorae who somehow got herself affianced to the Prince of Amethyst. Knowing that Azul’s father was king at least explained the family pressure to wed as they decreed.
Though the information changed her assessment of who Lenorae and her family were.
They had to be Cinnabar or Ruby fae, or affiliated with those realms, to have put the geas on Azul.
She tried one more question. “Why was the wedding in a human realm?”
He considered, seeming to be trying out different answers to see what would come out of his mouth intact. “It was a politically tricky situation,” he finally said, then shrugged to indicate the vast array of things he couldn’t say.
Yeah. She figured. “All right then. No more questions. How long till nightfall?”
He glanced at the sky beyond the lavishly gilded ceiling. “About six hours.”
“That long? I thought I was stuck in that Moonstone jail a lot longer than that. They picked me up right before dawn.”
“You were jailed for several days. That’s in part why you were so weak.”
“Several…” She couldn’t finish, rubbing a hand over her face. Anything could’ve happened to Dy in that time. “This is really bad.”
“Not as bad as you dying there and not getting back at all,” he replied gently, no longer restraining her, but rubbing her back lightly.
It felt really good. Too good. “And remember that time in the fae realms moves differently than in the human realms. I wondered before if you factored that into your calculations for returning with your cargo on time.”
“No,” she admitted. “No one seems to have worked out the math on it.”
“There is no math—at least, not of the kind humans use. The oscillations of time and space that set the fae realms apart from the human ones aren’t based on the same laws of physics. It changes all the time, depending on various factors that don’t follow a pattern.”
“Oh, that explains everything,” she commented sourly. “Otto said the timing would work and he was invested—literally—in us bringing back his cargo on time. What is the astra anyway?”
“You don’t know?” he asked cagily, his expression shuttered, and Cha was put in mind of how he’d reacted to the Moonstone fae speaking about the thing.
“I said I didn’t know what it was, didn’t I?”
“Yes, but you are capable of lying, Arantxa darling.”
“Hey, I haven’t lied to you.” Much. She tried to think of any outstanding lies she’d committed with him.
“Uh huh.” He chucked her on the chin. “Let’s finish the healing. Why don’t you bathe first, then you can have a nap until it’s time to go.”
“Hey, not all of us naturally smell like berries.”
“No, you don’t smell like berries.” He leaned in, inhaled deeply, and hummed. “You smell like Arantxa Evermore, the most interesting and enticing woman I’ve ever met.”
She drew back to squint at him. “What is this about?”
“I’d think a woman who’s had as many lovers as you would recognize a seduction. Are my techniques so lacking?”
Okay, that she really hadn’t expected. She had to work to keep her jaw from falling open. “You want to seduce me?” she nearly squeaked.
He frowned. “You had made your intentions clear. Have you changed your mind?”
“What about the whole bad omen, bad timing thing?”
“It was bad timing,” he answered with implacable logic, “as the subsequent attack by Cinnabar imps unequivocally proved.”
Well, he had a point there. “And the timing is good now?”
“We have hours to kill,” he answered on a purr.
Who was she kidding? She was totally up for this. One upside of stewing in your regrets in a fae jail cell is you emerged with your priorities rearranged and crystal clear.
“I have not changed my mind.” She grinned. “You might recall that I really wanted to find out about the wing thing.”
He leaned in, brushed her ear with his lips, then bit gently—sending lightning straight to her groin.
Apparently at least that part of her hadn’t suffered lasting damage and still felt great and ready to party.
“I do vividly recall,” he murmured into her ear.
“And I fully intend to wrap you up in my wings, just the two of us in a sensual cocoon of naked fun.”
Her pussy sparkle rocketed right up to Ruby level. “I think I should take that bath.”
“Let me help you,” he practically purred. Sweeping her up into his arms, he stood at the same time with effortless strength.
“I’m pretty sure I can walk now,” she said, a little embarrassed.
“You don’t like me carrying you?”
She nearly gave a flip answer, to deflect the intensity of the moment, then remembered the whole honesty thing. With a sigh, she admitted, “I like it too much.”
Though she’d rather expected him to tease her, he instead gave her a long, fulminating look. “I know what you mean.”
She decided not to question that as he carried her into a bathing chamber as elaborate as the bedroom had been.
He set her on her feet next to a sunken pool of amethyst-dark water.
“Why is everything purple?” she asked. “Like, is it a branding requirement, that you must uphold the realm theme in everything around you?”
He regarded her with some amusement. “It’s the magic. Our realm generates a vibration of magic that you perceive as shades of purple. It doesn’t look that way to us.”
“Oh.” Well now she felt like a stupid human, like a dog capable of seeing only a few colors compared to her more sophisticated superiors. Human pet. She narrowed her gaze at Azul, who watched her intently. “It’s a wonder you can put up with us at all.”
A slow smile spread over his face, his wings expanding in an eye-catching way. She supposed he had to have big rooms just to flex them, and she absolutely supported him flexing those wings as much as possible. “You have your appealing qualities,” he replied, nimbly unbuttoning her jacket.
“Uh, you’re undressing me?” she asked, since she hadn’t been exhibiting her denseness enough already.
“Demonstrably,” he answered smoothly. “I’ve been wanting to do this almost since we met.”
“Why are you being so nice to me now?”
He paused on the jacket, raising his cobalt-blue gaze to hers, then settled his hands on her hips. “This might be all we have, Arantxa. You have to know that, right?”
Well, she did, but that hadn’t been something she’d wanted to contemplate too closely. “You won’t be my first one-night stand,” she answered glibly, “and I doubt you’ll be the last,” she added, just to make herself feel better.
“Then we understand one another. My situation is …complicated. After this one-afternoon stand,” he said with a sly smile, “we might never have another opportunity.”
“Will you still marry Lenorae,” she asked with intense curiosity and an annoying stab of jealousy, “after all that happened?”
“That remains to be seen. There are …things to sort out. But the reasons I agreed to the marriage in the first place remain. I am not the master of my own fate, in this regard. The most I can do is seize this time with you. I would like it to be ‘nice.’” His smile turned almost shy. “If that’s all right with you.”
“I can do nice,” she said, feeling a bit silly about the insistent way she said it. “I mean, I like nice. I can be nice.”
“Don’t strain yourself. I find I’m perversely attracted to your mean streak.”
“I don’t have a—” His lips cut off her words, hot and silky, fanning the excitement racing through her body like high-test pixie dust on a perfectly inclined race course.
Oh yeah. This worked. He busied himself with her jacket, sliding it off her shoulders and letting it fall.
Rather than immediately proceeding further with the undressing, he smoothed his hands over her shirt, tracing the curves with what seemed like reverence.
“Mean and sweet,” he whispered against her mouth. “The perfect combination.”
Oh wow, she hadn’t expected to feel like this.
She wasn’t a woman who indulged in the softer emotions.
Sex was sex and they were better keeping it that way.
Levering him away from her, she smiled into his concerned frown.
“My turn,” she informed him. “I want to see these wings without a shirt in the way.”
“You’re kinky for wings,” he accused, but amusement quirked his lips and lightened the frown.
“Put it down to one of my human failings. How does it come off?”
“I’ll do it.” He stepped back a bit more, clearly enjoying giving her a good view, judging by his smug expression, wound long fingers into his shirt and pulled, ripping it clean off.