by Raine Miller
“Help me heal her,” he pleaded without looking at Gaap. “And then we will leave.”
Gaap’s indrawn breath was audible in the suddenly quiet air.
Barbas curled over the inert form of his love. “I will protect her to my dying breath. If you wish to punish me, so be it. But first, let me heal her.”
“Do you think so little of me that you believe that I would banish you?” Gaap paced on the warm sand. Little bursts of dust puffed around his boots as he paced back and forth.
“I am of your enemy,” Barbas said simply.
Gaap rebutted. “Pfft. You are my friend.”
“But....”
“We are your friends.” Gaap waved his arm to encompass the silent group of Demons that surrounded them. He rubbed his hands together in a gleeful motion. “I have no intention of banishing you. In fact, we can use you. You may have insight into the Fae’s ability that you didn’t even realize that you had.”
“What about Aine?”
“The choice is hers. I won’t make anyone stay against their will.” Gaap knelt beside Barbas and placed a gentle hand on her forehead. “But I don’t think that will be a problem.”
Barbas stared at Aine as if the force of his gaze would make her better. “I don’t know what I will do if she dies,” he confessed.
“She is why you’ve been so miserable, I take it,” Gaap said slowly.
“It seems impossible that I could miss her so much when I only knew her for a few days. but it’s as if she’s embedded in my skin, in my psyche. And I don’t want to get her out.” Barbas let out a breath as she began to breathe easier on her own.
“There may be problems with the king.”
“Since his man was willing to kill her, does that not give us the right to keep her?” Barbas whispered.
“Again, you must accede to her will. I will not keep her here if she wishes to return to the Fae Realm,” Gaap said softly. “And not everyone will welcome her with open arms.”
Barbas felt the tension leave his body as Aine began to breathe softly on her own. Only then did exhaustion overwhelm his body. He’d spent his energy, his life force to heal her. “Then I must convince her to stay.”
Depleted, he fell to the sand beside Aine and curled his body around hers. They lay silent in the blood soaked sand, his arms wrapped protectively around her, still intent on sheltering her.
Gaap rose to his feet and gestured to the Fae bodyguard. “Escort the Fir Bolg to the Fae clearing, leave him,” he gestured to Finn, “restrained with a message for the Fae king.”
Gaap spoke to the remaining Fae who had not attacked, only watched. “By attacking the princess he has given us permission to protect the Fae Princess and the Demon/Fae babe that grows in her belly. Any act against the princess is an act against the Demons. Make it known.”
As soon as Gaap made the declaration, his reason for consciousness, to protect Aine, was eliminated. And Barbas tumbled into oblivion.
CHAPTER 18
Barbas awoke slowly. Awareness came in little pricks of sensation as he took stock of his body. He lifted one clean hand, no brown residue lingered in the cracks of his skin. Aine lay cradled in his arms. As he scanned her form, he observed the sick coat of her blood was gone from both their bodies. Although weak from the intensity of healing her, he was whole and hale. More than, if his cock was anything to go by.
The fresh scent of heather and tea tree wafted from Aine’s long, ebony hair. She lay supine in his arms, her back nestled against his front, as he quartered the room with his gaze. In the corner, a giant tub still bore the signs of their cleansing. A pile of damp towels lay jumbled on the floor and drops of water glistened on the ceramic lip of the tub. The Graces must have been tasked with making sure no trace of violence lingered on them.
With trembling fingers, he cupped the delicate curve of Aine’s shoulder. Under his palm her skin was soft and scented with almond oil. Her breath caused the slight rise and fall of her chest. Her breasts were plumped and bared to his view by the drape of the sheet over her waist. Flowers twined in her hair. Another clue that the Graces had been here while they were unconscious.
A huge swell of gratitude nearly knocked him flat on his back. She was alive. Breathing.Barbas forced his hands to steady and slid gently along her tender skin, over her waist, and pushed the soft silk sheet over her hips. His palm settled over the slight bump in her stomach.
The rapid bump-bump of the babe’s heartbeat reassured him. With his healing senses, he assessed his child. Healthy. The trauma to Aine’s body seemed to have bypassed the fetus.
Barbas couldn’t seem to stop petting her. He pressed a gentle kiss to her shoulder even as his fingers traced the curve of her hipbone and the gentle slope of her thighs. Resolutely, he ignored the puckered red slash at her breast and concentrated on the smoothness of her supple skin and the steady, beautiful sound of her breath.
Barbas continued to assess her health as she stretched sinuously under his strokes. She was alive!
Aine shifted on the slippery satin sheets, and as her senses returned, she became aware of the hot, heavy weight over her waist. The press of a hard chest against her back. The snuggled curve of strong thighs behind her own, and the disturbing awareness that she was nearly naked and had no idea how this came to be. And finally the hard pulse of an erect cock against her buttocks.
As she slowly opened her eyes, other clues alerted her to her whereabouts. The crash of waves against the sand. The sweet and tart scent of heather and lemons in the early morning breeze. A peat fire burned in a heavy limestone fireplace. Velvet curtains hung on the posts of a massive oak bed. She held still. Unsure how long she’d been asleep or how she had come to be in this bedroom.
Panic fluttered in her stomach as she acknowledged she really had no idea where she was.
“You are awake?” The deep rumble of Barbas’s voice vibrated against her back. Goddess, she must be dreaming. Tears pricked her eyes and she pressed her lids closed against the wish that he was here.
“I’m holding on to you. I know you are awake.”
Not a dream. She was in a bed with him.
How odd. Through a thick fuzzy fog she tried to remember how she arrived in this bed but her mind could dredge no memory of it.
“Where,” she cleared her parched throat, and attempted to swallow the tight ball. “Where am I?”
“Welcome to my home,” he said softly.
Disbelief flooded through her as her memories returned in a rush. Gaap, the confrontation, the fight, Finn’s betrayal, and his final act. “So this is my prison?”
Barbas shifted and tried to roll her towards him. But she held stiff against his efforts. When she refused to turn around and face him, he pressed a gentle kiss to the curve of her neck.
“I would hope that my home is more hospitable than your former dungeon.” He placed a large rough palm against the bulge in her tummy that protected their baby.
“You promise me that you will care,” she stumbled over her words. “For the baby. Love her,” she said fiercely.
“You are not dying.” He stroked his palm over her arm, his rough callused fingers tingled against her bare skin. “Not anymore.”
She ignored him. “And you must promise to speak well of me to the child.” She bared her soul. “I love her.”
“Why are you so sure it’s a her?”
“No Fae males have been born in a very long time. Only female progeny for the last thousand years.”
“Interesting.”
Why were they discussing these mundane procreation facts? Aine squashed the hope that blossomed in her heart. With his arm around her waist, even with her increased ability, she knew it was possible that he could deceive her. After all, he’d hidden his Demon side successfully while in both the Human and Fae Realms. Her truthsayer abilities would be near useless with him.
Barbas asked. “Why did you come to me?”
Aine’s heart thudded. Dare she answer truthfully? She
had no choice. “I knew how much your mother’s abandonment hurt you,” she said haltingly. “I could not keep my condition from you. Nor could I keep the baby from you. It was not right. Fair.”
She clenched her fingers against the need to stroke his skin. Her body trembled with fatigue. And her chest ached. However she didn’t know if the ache was caused by her wound or by her cracked and broken heart.
“And I knew my father would never allow a babe with Demon blood to be born in the Fae Realm. My only thought was to protect the baby.”
Aine closed her eyes and searched inward. With her whole heart she sent love and affection to the life growing within her.
Barbas savored the heated feel of her bare backside against his front. But it was nothing compared to the warmth in his heart. She understood him. He had never actually discussed the pain of his mother’s betrayal but she knew. “Any other reason?”
She hesitated. “I am a truthsayer.”
“And?” He couldn’t figure out how that would matter to their child.
“No one touches me,” she finally whispered. “But you touched me without worry. Without fear. Do you know what a precious gift that was?”
Barbas caressed the side of her face and skimmed his palm over her curly hair. “I like touching you. Preferably like this and not like my healing touch on the beach.”
“You healed me?”
“Of course,” he said arrogantly. “I am the Demon of Healing.”
She jerked in his light grasp. “So then....”
“I would heal all of you, not just your corporeal form.” If you will let me. “Stay,” he demanded softly.
As if they both feared the commitment inherent in that one word, Barbas distracted her with a pluck of his fingers on her sweet buds. Her nipples puckered and he smiled. A truly wicked smile. She was so damned responsive. “You like that, sweetness?”
“Perhaps.” She wiggled against his erection. “It’s clear that you do.”
He nipped at the sensitive skin where her shoulder and neck met, then in a slick move he squeezed her breasts together and plucked at the tips again. With a low moan she arched against him and pressed her buttocks into his cock. Blood and arousal shot to his already hard erection as she rubbed against him with a breathy exhale.
“You are a temptation.”
“Goddess, I missed you,” she whispered.
“Your breasts are fuller.” He squeezed even harder.
“Mmm, and more sensitive.”
He plucked the hard tips, playing a sensual melody as her body flushed and responded to his music. Her hips began to rock back against his body. He’d been unable to bed another woman since he left the Fae world. His dick had been limp and unresponsive for any other woman. Now pre-cum pearled on his cock, and her crack rubbed against him, sensation flooded him with blood until he was painfully engorged.
Barbas palmed her fuller breast in his hand and swelled with pleasure at the way her body flushed and her nipple stabbed into his palm.
He tried again to roll her over.
“Not yet.” She growled and pushed his palms from her body. He wanted to look into her eyes when he took her in his world for the first time but apparently his princess was in charge.
So Barbas shifted onto his back. “Do with me what you will.” He grinned at her. He trusted her. That knowledge brought a singular peace to him.
Aine set back on her heels and studied Barbas. He’d said he wanted her to stay. Joy overwhelmed her and all she could think about was how to show him how much she wanted to stay. How thrilled she was with his request.
His erection jutted proudly from the nest of black curls at his root. The fact that he trusted her sent warmth spiraling through her.
She slid slowly up his naked body, savored his lean muscular sleekness beneath her. Feared this was some sort of dream. And before she continued she needed his assurance. “What is going to happen to the babe?”
“The babe will stay in the Demon Castle. But you also have been offered a place here for as long as you wish.” His lips tightened.
What did that mean? Did he want her to leave once the babe was born? She stifled the urge to brush her fingers over her slightly rounded stomach and clenched her fingers in a fist. Barbas captured her fist in his large palm and lift her hand to his mouth. He feathered a light kiss over her the tight ball of her fingers.
“We can discuss the particulars with Gaap later.” Barbas pried open her fingers and kissed each tip slowly. “You will be expected to contribute to our knowledge base. But you will also be safe.”
Aine decided now was not the time to discuss her fate. Instead she would grasp this time in his bed. To touch and be touched. To snatch affection where she could. For once the babe was born she couldn’t be sure they wouldn’t cast her out. She’d be alone again. As she pushed up on her arms, her lower body brushed his rigid cock. Aine caught her breath at his smooth hardness. The movement brought her breast in line with his mouth. Barbas took full advantage, and curled his tongue around her hardening nipple. Goddess, she was unbelievably sensitive. He released her nipple with a pop and blew a hot breath against the wet tip.
Tingles fizzed through her body and shot down to her pussy. Arousal tumbled through her and centered in her core. The slick wetness coated her curls as she slid along his swollen member and teased them both.
Barbas bucked his hips and pushed against her aroused center.
Aine moaned at the sensual contact.
“Sweetness, are you going to do more than hover there?” He bucked again but this time she was ready and ground down on his erection. “That would be much better if you put my cock inside that sweet pussy of yours.”
Arousal gushed through her. But she wasn’t going to give in quickly. She had three months of longing to make up for and she planned to take her time.
Aine rubbed her breasts in Barbas’s face. “Suck me.”
He arched a wicked black brow and smirked. “Are we back to this then?”
She slid sinuously against him like a cat in heat. The slight stubble of his beard scraped against her sensitized tips. Goddess she didn’t even need his participation. However she wanted it. Badly. “Suck me.” But the command came out breathy and not at all forceful.
“Say please,” he demanded.
She wouldn’t beg. He blew another breath over the wet bud and jiggled the very tip of his tongue against the hard button. The unexpected contact arrowed straight to her pussy. Her channel contracted, begging for the invasion of his cock. But Barbas kept up the sensual pressure, even as he arched his hips against her spread thighs. Her body betrayed her as she caved. “Please.”
He smirked. “Well, since you asked so nicely.” And he opened his mouth over her areola and sucked. Hard.
Aine hovered above him, her pussy slick against his aching cock. He tongued her nipple as he pulled hard on the beautiful globe of her breast. She seemed fuller. And Gods damn it but she was sensitive. She began to rock against him, her head thrown back, eyes closed, lashes lush and full against her cheekbones. A rosy flush covered her brown skin as her full lips parted. The delicate arch of her neck was in full relief against the morning sun. Her clenched fists were planted beside his head, her body fully engaged as she rode him. Until she gasped and pressed hard against him, her body in the throes of a magnificent orgasm. He could feel the pulse of her pussy against his straining cock. With a little nip he let her breast go.
“Hot damn, sweetness. I didn’t even get inside you.” A feeling of complete satisfaction thrilled him. Her pregnancy was going to be a lot of fun if he could get her off just by sucking her breasts.
“Oh dear Goddess,” Aine murmured as she continued to rock against him. His cock was coated with her pussy juice.
“I can’t fucking wait to get inside you.”
She tilted her head down, her long curly black tresses shielding her body from his gaze. “All in good time.”
He’d created a monster. But even as he thou
ght that, he smiled. A fucking great monster. “Put me inside you, sweetness. It will be worth your while.”
“In a bit.” She tilted her head to the side, and her hair slid over her sleek bronze skin, and exposed the still angry slash of her wound. His thoughts darkened at how close he’d come to losing her. Barbas lifted his head and brushed a tender kiss over the healing scar. “I almost lost you.” Eventually they needed to have a serious discussion. She’d been unconscious when Gaap made his proclamation. She needed to have a choice in what was happening to her. Her reaction a few minutes ago was not one of joy but of resignation. She didn’t really believe the Demons would welcome her.
She teasingly pressed away from him. But she either didn’t know or had forgotten that Demons had the ability to extend their tongues. With a sensual swipe, he lengthened his tongue and trailed a path up the center of her chest before he curled the elongated member around her nipple and tugged.
“Oh my Goddess,” she breathed and sank back toward him.
He released her nipple again. “Let me inside you, Princess.”
Aine slid her soaked pussy up the length of his cock and rubbed her clit over the engorged head, so wet she slipped against him. With one sharp thrust, he was in.
And she started coming again. He hadn’t even begun to move.
Barbas curled his tongue around both breasts, and squeezed. Aine bent closer and he sucked both nipples into his mouth at once. He puckered his lips and tongued the hard points together with a desperate twist, suckling in time with the thrust of his hips, hungry to feed her fierce arousal. He devoured her breasts like he was a starving man and she was an orgy of food. Her nails scored his flesh and her knees squeezed his hips as her entire body clenched with the force of her orgasm.
Her pussy pulsed around his cock in heavy, thick waves. Barbas could not hold back. He began to pump, shoving his cock deep inside her. With every grunt and thrust, her plump pussy slammed down against his pubic bone. His balls slapped against her and her breasts began to bounce. Aine’s fingers dug into his shoulders as she hung on for the ride. He knew he should slow down, take it easy but easy would have to wait for the next time.
