I felt my eyes get wide and my heart swell.
“You’re not going?” I whispered.
“Gods, no,” he answered instantly.
He wasn’t going!
And he wasn’t going because he wanted to stay with me.
Woo hoo!
I grinned before I admitted, “Uh… that’s good since I actually was into all this Gales business mostly because I have a fabulous dress.”
That was when Frey’s grin became a fantastic smile.
Then, thinking about what he did on his ships, I tipped my head to the side and asked, “Isn’t your business important?”
“It was,” he stated, “it isn’t anymore.” My heart swelled so big, it felt like it was going to burst, his head dipped and his mouth touched mine before he pulled slightly away and muttered, “Ruben can deal with it.”
I nodded, agreeing eagerly. “He can. I don’t know him very well but he seems really competent to me.” And this, actually, was no lie.
His eyes held mine and I felt his body move the entire bed as it rocked with his laughter then he fell to his back, taking me with him so I was again on top. I lifted my head to look down at him and his hand held back my hair as his other one drifted down my spine.
Then he told me, “I’m afraid, my wee Finnie, your dressmakers are in for a long wait.”
Oh yes.
Hell yes.
“Maybe they’ll come back tomorrow,” I suggested.
His hand drifted over my ass, my eyes instantly glazed over as I felt his touch cause a spasm between my legs and he muttered, “I don’t think there’s any ‘maybe’ about that, wee one.”
I forced myself to focus on his face to see his focus was entirely on me.
Hmm. I liked that too. Seriously.
His fingers gripped my ass and his voice growled, “Kiss me, wife.”
I’d gone dazed again but that didn’t mean I didn’t whisper, “Okay,” and then, immediately, I did what I was told.
* * * * *
I stood between the door and the doorjamb, hiding the room from view but in no way hiding the fact I was wearing nothing but Frey’s huge sweater from Alyssa who standing out in the hall and looking at me with her eyes dancing.
“Uh…” I muttered, fighting the heat that was in my cheeks, “could you do me a favor and bring up some food?”
“Of course, my princess,” she said enthusiastically.
“Thanks,” I whispered, she winked, smiled brilliantly and hurried away.
Eek!
I closed the door and turned to the room.
It was hours (and hours) later. Frey was asleep in bed. After I’d carefully left his arms to pull the bell to order some much needed sustenance, he’d rolled to his side, commandeered a pillow and his arms were wrapped around it. His hair had fallen on his forehead and the covers were down to his waist.
He looked very hot. Hotter than ever. It was a wonder the bed didn’t spontaneously combust, he was that hot.
I kept watching him as I walked across the room and only pulled my eyes from all the glory that was my husband when I made it to my armchair. I scooped up Penelope who gave me a, “Mrrrr, Mummy, I was mrrrr sleeping.”
“Hush, baby,” I muttered.
Penelope hushed but only after I started scratching her ruff.
Cradling her close, I walked to the window and slowly and silently pulled the curtain open. The rush of the cold draft hit my bare legs and crawled upwards but, although I felt it, I didn’t really feel it.
I had other things on my mind.
I took in Fyngaard. Night had fallen. Torches were lit. People were out.
Life was going on in this world as it undoubtedly was in mine.
And I had finally become wife to my other world husband. There was no mistaking it now. I had five orgasms as proof (the first, two more with Frey inside me, one from his fingers (fabulous) and one from his mouth (so freaking good, I thought it might be supernatural and this was possibly not be wrong, considering his command of elves and dragons)).
And now that he was asleep, the lamps shining a glow on the room, the huge fire roaring in the grate banishing the cold but not quite holding back the chill, it came to me that I was screwed and not just in one way, in all ways.
In our love fest, birth control had not only not been mentioned, I didn’t even think about it.
And that was not smart.
In fact, I was wondering if any of this was smart.
It could not be denied it was good, the best by a long freaking shot. I couldn’t get enough of Frey, the more I had the more I wanted and, what was almost better, he definitely couldn’t get enough of me. He really liked my body and didn’t hide it and he also really liked my touch (however that came about) and he didn’t hide that either. Not even a little, either of them. And knowing both felt freaking great.
All the rumors were beyond correct. His skills were varied, they were vigorous and the man had stamina.
And it was worth it, yes, even worth the risk of pregnancy. Not only because it was fan-freaking-tastic but because it was with Frey.
And, by the by, right then, I wasn’t going to go there. Not then. Not until later.
Probably much later. Definitely stupid later.
But as I stared out the window unseeing at Fyngaard I thought that my parents had taught me to throw caution to the wind. Life was meant to be lived, every breath was a gift, every risk was worth taking.
But I had a feeling they weren’t thinking of something like this.
“Finnie,” I heard and, coming out of my reverie, my body gave a small start and I turned to see Frey was awake, he’d rolled toward me, his dark hair still on his forehead, his massive chest on display, his green-brown eyes were sexy-drowsy and he was up on a forearm in bed. “Come here,” he ordered.
My feet moved even before my mind made the decision to go and this was no surprise. A man looked like that, he was looking at you like Frey was right then looking at me and he told you to come there, you went there.
I dropped Penelope in the chair as I went and she instantly collapsed irately onto a haunch and started licking her foot.
I didn’t pay attention. My attention was elsewhere. When I got close, I watched Frey push up, twist and reach out to me. He caught my hips and guided me into the bed. When I climbed in on my knees, he pulled me to straddling him and dropped to his back. Then his big hands went under his sweater and up, gliding light and gentle over my hips then around to cup my ass.
My lids lowered and I licked my lips.
“My wife likes my hands on her arse,” Frey muttered, his fingertips stroking and I did, you bet I did, I liked it a lot.
“Mm,” was all I could mumble.
Frey grinned and his hands moved up. “Come here, love.”
I bent toward him and got close, resting my arms on his chest as he pulled the sweater up with his hands then they drifted lazily along the skin of my back.
“What takes you from our bed?” he asked quietly.
“I ordered us some food,” I answered quietly, staring into his somnolent green-brown eyes.
“This is good,” he muttered, his full lips curved slightly and I liked that so much I lifted my hand and held it against his face as my thumb moved out to touch his lower lip.
I barely touched it before he rolled me to my back then he shifted both of his arms so the backs of my knees were hooked in the crooks of his elbows, my legs spread wide, his hands in the bed. He loomed over me and I sucked in breath as my eyes took in all the power and beauty of him between my legs as I felt my exposed sex quiver.
His eyes held mine and kept hold as my breath started coming faster and my legs tensed against his arms in anticipation. Then his eyes dropped to look at me and I held my breath in reaction to the beauty I saw as hunger consumed his face, he shifted his hips and then he was inside me.
Oh God.
“Frey,” I breathed, his head lifted and I had the burn of his gaze as he moved s
low, God, so slow and gentle, unbelievably gentle and deep, so, fucking deep.
I tensed my legs and clenched my sex tight around his cock and he growled low in his throat, his face growing dark, then he rumbled, “And I like my wife’s caress.”
I lifted both hands to trail my fingers on his chest. “Good,” I whispered then urged, “Faster, honey.”
He kept thrusting slow and sweet and whispered back, “No, wee one.”
“Please.”
In then out, taking his sweet time then, “No.”
He held my eyes and moved inside me as my fingers drifted wherever they could reach across his massive chest and tight abs and I did this awhile, his eyes locked with mine as he slowly filled me then glided away and back and back and it started building, unhurried, soft, then more and more until I couldn’t take it. It felt so good, he looked so good, I needed more and not having it was like torture. My fingers drifted down his abs, separating to curl around his sides to hold on as he kept driving slow, gentle and sweet.
God, he felt great. So freaking great.
“Please, Frey, faster,” I breathed, my legs beginning to clutch his arms, my sex clenching around his cock.
“No, Finnie.”
Pleasure rolled leisurely through me, burning a path so deep, my neck and back arched with it.
With effort, I righted myself, caught his now hungrier eyes and whispered, “You’re killing me, baby.”
“No, I’m not, wee one,” he whispered back. “Just feel me.”
“I feel you,” I promised and I did, oh yeah, I did.
“Watch me take you,” he ordered quietly, still going slow, deep, so, so sweet.
“I’m watching, Frey,” I breathed and I was and it was spectacular.
His eyes moved from my face down my body to our connection then slowly up again and by the time they made it back to my face my back arched, my legs hooked tight around his arms and my sex started spasming.
God, I was going to come. Just with this. I was going to come.
Oh God, so close.
“You’re beautiful, Finnie, but by the gods you have never been more beautiful than you are right now, spread before me, wrapped in my wool and filled with me,” he murmured and that was it, my hips jerked violently, my neck arched back and a slow, low, sweet whimper escaped me as a slow, deep, unbelievably sweet orgasm swept through me.
I hadn’t finished before he moved his arms, unhooking my legs and he dropped to a forearm on one side of me, his other arm wrapping around my back and he drove me down as he drove up, finally faster, harder, shifting his hips back and forth as he memorized every inch of the heart of me and he did this while I watched in deep fascination, holding him tight to me with all four limbs until his jaw clenched and a low, slow, sweet rumble tore out of his chest as he poured into me.
I loved it, every second of it from start to finish.
See? Totally screwed.
Again. Sex. Again. No birth control.
Okay, no. Again, fantastic sex. But, again. No birth control!
He stayed inside me and took my mouth in a kiss as slow, sweet, deep and wet as how he just made love to me then he released my mouth but stayed close and slid his nose along mine.
God, I’d missed that too.
Then his head moved back an inch, he caught my eyes and his were languid but they were also serious.
Hmm. Taking in that look, I was thinking it was uh-oh time.
“I’m best pleased to have you back, my Finnie,” he said gently. “Best pleased,” he repeated and my limbs got tighter then even tighter when he whispered, “I missed you too, wee one.”
“Frey –” I whispered but he cut me off.
“But mark this, I’ll not tolerate you going away again. It’s important you understand me. We are new, you and I, you needed time to come to terms with all you had learned, time, I will add, that I gave you and time that you took but I will tell you that you took too much of it.” Hmm. I couldn’t say he was wrong about that. Then he finished with, “But I won’t allow it again. Is this understood?”
I stared up at him.
He said he’d not tolerate me going away again.
He’d not tolerate me going away.
And, in about ten months, I was definitely going to go away.
Shit, I had to tell him.
Shit. Somehow, someway, I had to figure out how to explain what this was, who I was, where I was from and get him to believe me. Then explain to him we could have all of this and we could enjoy it, we had time, a lot of it.
But then that time would end and I would go home.
I held his eyes as fear started to rise inside me, panic, anxiety and something else, something far more painful, something I refused, at that point when I was hanging onto bliss, to understand.
Then I started, “Frey –”
“Don’t,” he growled harshly and I blinked at his sudden fierce tone.
Then I had to so I whispered, “But you have to know something about –”
“I know, Finnie.”
I blinked again as my heart skipped a beat.
Frey kept talking. “I know how you’ve come to me.”
I felt my lips part in shock, his eyes dropped to them then they came back to mine, warm and sweet.
“I know who you are, my love. I know how you’ve come to me. I know you are Finnie.”
Oh. My. God!
He knew I was Finnie!
“How –?”
“That doesn’t matter, just know I know and we don’t need to speak of it. We never need to speak of it. This is the now and you have no choice but to live in the now. You never have a choice but to live in the now. And this, my wee Finnie, this is where we will live. We will always live in our now.”
I felt my eyes start to fill with tears (yes! again!) because he knew and he understood and it felt like a weight had lifted from me. He knew about me, who I was and how I came to him and he apparently understood the way it was between us and that it would end and therefore we had to live in the now.
But even as that weight lifted and I started to feel light, immediately something else started to drag me down and I whispered, “Frey –”
He interrupted me by touching his mouth to mine.
When he lifted his head, his eyes held mine and he whispered, “You are not in the now, Finnie.”
I wasn’t. I was thinking about the future and leaving him.
Shit.
“Come to the now, wee one,” he urged and I nodded.
The now. That sounded like something Dad would say. Live in the now.
And I would live in the now with Frey. And I’d enjoy every second of it while I had it.
Then a knock came at the door.
I held his eyes.
Then, forcing myself into the now, I joked, “The now, apparently, means food.”
He grinned. Then he said, “This is good since I’m starved. My wife worked all my energy out of me.”
“Don’t pretend you didn’t like it,” I teased.
“I am not,” he stated with all seriousness and the weight of those three words made me go still under him as he continued, “It was beyond anything I could have wished it to be. You are, my wee Finnie, beyond my wildest dreams.”
Oh my God. Did he just say that?
I stared at him and it hit me not only did he just say that, he meant it.
Then my eyes flooded with tears and I whispered, “Oh shit,” lifted my face and shoved it in his throat as I burst into tears and I did this loudly.
Another knock came at the door.
Frey gently pulled out of me, rolled to his back, settled me into his side, hauled up the covers and held me close as he shouted, “Enter!” and I tensed but that didn’t keep me from continuing to sob into his skin.
The door opened, I shoved closer to Frey and held on tighter.
As did he.
Then I heard him order, “Leave it and us. Quickly.”
I smelled food and heard cl
inking and clunking then, shortly after that stopped, a door closed.
Frey held me tightly long after the door closed and I kept sobbing not realizing how badly I needed to do it but I’d apparently bottled a lot in because there was a lot coming out and in the safety of his strong arms, I let it go.
Once the sobs started to subside, one of Frey’s hands moved under his sweater and up to stroke the skin of my back as I snuffled and lifted a hand to wipe my face.
“All right, wee one?” he asked softly.
“Mm hmm,” I mumbled, nodding my head, resting my cheek on his shoulder and wrapping my arm around him again.
Frey kept stroking my back.
It felt really nice.
And it was then I thought of when we were riding to Fyngaard and Frey telling me about the villages, their names and their gods and what the rivers and forests were called.
He knew then. He knew.
It all came to me in a rush, his gentle explanations, his patience, those weird times when I’d watch him come to some understanding, times that were now not so weird.
He knew. And he’d known for awhile.
“When did you know?” I whispered to his chest.
“Finnie –”
I gave him a squeeze and repeated, “Tell me, when did you know?”
Frey was quiet a second. Then he sighed.
Then he said, “In my gut, when you kissed me back when I kissed you in the Dwelling of the Gods after we were wed. And every second I spent with you after I returned to the cabin, I knew you were not who you appeared to be. You are not a thing like her yet you look exactly the same. I knew something was not right with you. The elves verified it and shared with me that you are not of this world.”
I pulled in a quiet breath.
“Their message,” I guessed.
“Yes,” Frey confirmed.
I nodded and thought that was kind of cool that they knew. And hopefully, the next time Frey spoke to them, he would take me with him and I could ask them how they knew.
Then I got back to the now.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked softly.
His hand stilled at my back for a second then started stroking again when he answered, “Partly, it was because there was much you were taking in and I was concerned about you. But I will admit, my wee one, mostly it was because I enjoyed your response to my world, your blunders, your cover ups. They amused me.” I lifted my head and he looked right in my eyes. “Greatly.” He stressed then grinned before he said, “It was very endearing.”