by G. A. Aiken
Bastards. Every last one of those damn dragons . . . bastards.
Well . . . was she just going to stand there and stare at him? What was he supposed to make of all that staring? Especially when she kept frowning at him like that. Or maybe it was a glare. Hard to tell really.
“Are you saying you want to kiss me now?” she asked, and he had no idea what to make of that tone.
So Éibhear shrugged. “Figured why not?”
Her head tilted to the side. “Figured why not?”
“Yeah.”
And that’s when a book flew at him, slamming into his forehead. The power of it had him stumbling back against the table and he placed his hand where the book had met flesh and bone. He glanced down at the book and asked, “You threw The Ancient Philosophies of Seòras at me? Do you have any idea how old this book is? And why the hell are you throwing books at me anyway? What did I do?”
“You exist! I think you exist just to torment me.”
“You started this, Iseabail.”
“I started nothing. I asked you a simple question and you went all Éibhear the Terrified on me. As usual.” She stalked toward him. “And that’s when I decided, ‘Fine. I’m done with this.’ And in typical Éibhear fashion, that’s when you decide, ‘Eh. I might as well kiss her. Couldn’t ’urt.”
“First off, that’s not how I sound.” Gods! She made him sound like a bloody halfwit. “And second—”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
“What?”
“I don’t want to hear it. That’s all you bloody do. Talk!”
Seething now because he had no idea what he’d done, Éibhear growled out between clenched teeth, “You, of all beings in this universe, have the nerve of accusing me of talking too much?”
“At least I have something to say.”
“No, you don’t! You babble. Constantly! Until my bloody ears bleed!”
That’s when she swung on him. But this time, he was kind of expecting that move, so he caught her arm and flipped her back on the table. She kicked him in the jaw, and gods! The woman’s legs were damn powerful. If he were truly human, his head would have been separated from his neck from that blow.
Éibhear stepped back, black smoke swirling from his nostrils, a low growl rolling past his lips as he gripped his jaw and popped it back into place. By the time he was done, Izzy had placed her hands behind her and flipped her body backward so that she landed on the other side of the table.
“Running?” he couldn’t help but taunt. “The great general of Queen Annwyl’s armies?”
“You should know by now, Éibhear the Ridiculous, I don’t run.”
Then a wooden chair came flying at his head. Éibhear leaned back and the chair careened past him and into the far wall, breaking into pieces on contact.
“You’ll have to explain that bloody chair to Bram,” he told her.
“I’ll tell him it was your fault. He’ll believe me.” She grinned. “They all do.”
Their gazes locked and they watched each other, for how long, Éibhear didn’t know. But then he saw her eyes briefly stray to where they’d placed their weapons while they ate. At the same moment, they were both running, heading for those piles of weapons. Izzy was fast, her long legs getting her to the pile quickly. But he was fast, too, leaping over the table and slamming into her just as she reached out for an axe. His axe!
Éibhear lifted her off her feet and swung her around. He had her arms pinned, but her legs were free and the damn woman kicked like a psychotic mule. She brought her head back, ramming it into his chin, almost dislodging his jaw again.
Fed up, Éibhear spun Izzy around and slammed her into the wall, pinning her there with his body.
Panting, the pair stared at each other until Izzy asked, “Ready to kiss me now?”
The dragon’s silver eyes narrowed on her. “I see how you’ve come so far in the human armies, Iseabail. Because you’re completely insane.”
She laughed, her tongue reaching out and swiping up blood that leaked from her split lip. “I may have heard that accusation before, but I refuse to accept or acknowledge it. Now kiss me . . . or get the battle-fuck off me, Éibhear the Blue.”
His gaze lowered to her mouth and she saw his brain turning while he, as always, agonized over his decision. She imagined he couldn’t be like this in battle or even with other women. She just didn’t know why he insisted on being so obsessively concerned for her.
“Waiting,” she pushed, the one word no more than a snarl.
That’s when he released her, Izzy’s drop to the floor a little unsettling since he hadn’t even lifted her up all the way to eye level.
“And you can keep waiting,” he shot back seconds before he turned away from her and headed toward the stairs.
Smirking, Izzy watched him.
“Éibhear?”
Fed up, Éibhear spun around to face the unhinged female that he was trapped in this bloody castle with for the night.
“What is—” he just managed to get out before a piece of the broken chair rammed into his leg bone. The pain of it shocked him and he automatically dropped to one knee. Then Izzy was there, her strong hand gripping him by his jaw.
“Let’s just get this over with, shall we?” she said.
Then she kissed him.
Not a silly, girlish kiss or even an angry, biting kiss. But a demanding, passionate kiss that tore the breath from his lungs and did to him exactly what he’d always feared. Tore any control or rational thought he’d believed himself to possess completely away from him.
Damn her!
She pulled away first, stepping back, a triumphant smile on her face. “There. That wasn’t so hard now, was it?”
Her tone was unbelievably condescending and superior, which only made him want her even more. Why? Because he was pathetic! He didn’t deserve to be a dragon. The mightiest of higher beings!
The pompous brat stepped away from him, tossing aside the piece of chair she’d used to temporarily incapacitate him.
“Night!” She gave him a little wave that made him hate her a bit and that’s when something in Éibhear snapped. Like the last piece of rope he was hanging on to.
Éibhear stood to his full height and reached out, catching hold of Izzy by her chain-mail shirt and swinging her around until she was in front of him.
“Really?” he asked.
As usual with this insane female, Iseabail the Dangerous showed no fear, no concern, nothing but humor at his expense.
“Really?” she shot back, her arms extending from her body. “Really . . . what are you going to do? The great, pious, beloved Éibhear the Blue. What are you going to do?”
Éibhear’s grip on her shirt tightened, the little metal rings that made up the protective garment digging into his fingers. And he realized in that moment that he’d have to show Izzy the Dangerous that the “great, pious, beloved Éibhear the Blue” had been dead and gone for a very long time....
Chapter 18
Izzy would be the first to admit that over the years, it was this sort of thing that often got her into the worst sort of trouble. Well . . . her and Brannie. Poor thing. That dragoness had pulled Izzy out of more scrapes that Izzy’s mouth had gotten them into than either would ever care to admit. But Brannie wasn’t here right now and Izzy wasn’t exactly in a situation she didn’t want to be in.
More fool her.
What exactly was wrong with her anyway? Was she still harboring the desires of her sixteen-year-old self? The same girl who had gone from having only three soldiers protecting her as they lived their lives on the road to having an entire family to call her own, including a mother, father, uncles, aunts, cousins, grandparents . . . and Éibhear. Handsome, chivalrous, impatient, terse Éibhear.
Well, with her he’d been impatient and terse. With everyone else, he was the wonderful, sweet, adorable Éibhear. The blue dragon everyone loved. But Izzy would be the first to admit, she’d seamlessly moved from loving him to hating
him. He’d driven her absolutely insane for years. Hot one second, cold the next.
Of course, at the moment . . . she seemed to have him decidedly hot.
Using his grip on her shirt, he pulled her closer, his gaze locked on her mouth. To be honest, Izzy expected him to do what he always did to her any time they got too close to anything that even hinted at sex. But Izzy wouldn’t pull away first. She wouldn’t let him off the hook. If he was going to walk away, he could walk away. She wouldn’t help him by—
Yanking her up until she was on her toes, Éibhear leaned down and took her mouth with his. Her thoughts tumbled away as his hands released her shirt and moved to her shoulders, shoving her back against the wall, his lips still against hers.
Sure, Izzy could have fought him off. He was a tough challenger, but so was she. But the truth was, Izzy didn’t want to fight him off. All these years, all her long days on patrol thinking about him and what he might be up to and those long nights in her bunk dreaming about him, this was what she’d always wanted.
Well, this and one other thing . . .
And deciding not to wait any longer for that, Izzy did what she’d dreamed of since the very moment she met Éibhear the Blue all those years ago.
She dug her hands into his blue hair and held on.
Gods, his hair. Not his hair!
All these years he’d never willingly let Izzy near his hair because . . . well, because he was afraid of this. Of what was happening right here.
When his mother, or Talaith, stroked his hair, he felt a great sense of comfort and, very often, quite sleepy. But from the first time Iseabail had dug her hands into his mane and demanded he take her flying, his feelings were far from comfortable or sleepy.
And he blamed the damn woman who, at the moment, had her fingers gripping his hair.
His hair!
Éibhear tried to pull her hands away, but Izzy only tightened her grip and kissed him harder. Her tongue slid inside his mouth and Éibhear used his body to pin her against the wall.
There were many things he should be doing. Either pushing her away or seducing her. He did neither. Like some out of control hatchling, he reached for her leggings, gripping them and pushing them down her hips.
He’d have been appalled by his lack of finesse, too, if Izzy hadn’t already beaten him to it, his leggings nearly around his knees.
By the time he got hers down to her knees, she’d already gotten off her boots. Seconds later she’d managed to get out of her leggings completely. One indescribably long leg wrapped around his waist—flexible!—and the other around his calf.
Then, with no thought or even a modicum of self-control, he lifted her just a bit and drove home with one brutal thrust, burying himself inside Izzy and making his cock the happiest thing on the planet!
Izzy barely managed to bite back a scream of pure pleasure and instead buried her mouth against the flesh between Éibhear’s neck and shoulder. She bit down hard and held on, her arms wrapped around his shoulders, while she tried to stop herself from saying or doing something—anything!—that might destroy whatever self-respect she’d built up for herself over the years.
Because, gods of thunder and suffering, this sudden, rather rude, entertainingly brutal fuck was turning out to be the best one she’d ever had. Without foreplay, without a kind word said between them, without a gods-damn bed!
But Izzy didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything at the moment. Especially once Éibhear started moving, his thrusts hard and merciless, his thick cock buried deep inside her.
She tightened her arms around him and unwrapped her leg from his calf so she could raise it and open herself more to him. She felt him growl against her neck where he’d buried his face. He braced his legs farther apart and his strokes became stronger, harder, his cock powering inside her.
Izzy began to shake, her grip on him becoming even tighter. So tight, she was grateful he wasn’t human. Grateful she wouldn’t have to revive him from strangulation or take him to a healer for broken bones.
The trembling began in her toes and raced up her legs and spine, spreading out through her body until an orgasm like she’d never felt before exploded from her, her screams lost against Éibhear’s neck.
When her entire body clenched around him and she screamed into his neck, Éibhear’s knees almost buckled and his eyes rolled to the back of his head.
Then he came. Hard. Harder than he ever had before. So hard, he almost blasted the wall behind them with flame, and he had to fight hard to control the urge, not wanting to burn Izzy while in the throes of passion. That just seemed rude.
When he got the feeling back in his legs, Éibhear realized he had his leggings down around his ankles and his still-hard cock inside a half-naked and panting Iseabail.
A situation many might consider . . . awkward.
Chapter 19
Éibhear started to place her down on the table but seemed to reconsider that and pulled a large cloth from his travel bag, put it on the table, then carefully placed her naked ass on his uncle’s furniture. Once he had her there, he slowly backed up—and out—until he could sit down beside her.
And that’s what they did. They sat there, staring off at the wall across from them. In silence, they went on like that until Izzy couldn’t stand it anymore.
“Well . . . we got that out of our system.”
“Aye. That we did.”
“And now we can move forward.”
“Right.”
“Great.” Without looking at him, she reached over and patted his shoulder. “Glad we took care of that.”
From the corner of her eye, she could see him nod, but he still didn’t say anything. She was grateful. The last thing she needed at the moment was talk. Real talk anyway. She didn’t want to analyze what had just happened between them. She didn’t want to look for anything deeper and she definitely didn’t want to start talking regrets. Instead, she wanted the glow from that orgasm to last as long as it could and that meant no deep conversation with Éibhear and his deep thoughts.
Deciding escape was her best plan at the moment—as a general, she always knew when to retreat—Izzy slid off the table. “I’m off then. Dinner was great.”
She crouched down—she was not about to bend over—and picked up the rest of her clothes and walked toward those damn stairs again. The stairs she couldn’t quite manage to actually get up. Even now!
“You know . . .”
Izzy stopped at the sound of Éibhear’s voice, her eyes closing in frustration, her hand gripping the banister. Her escape . . . so close! “Aye?” And she tried hard to keep the dread out of her voice.
“Look, I’m thinking—”
Oh, no. Please don’t think.
“—since we’re not going back tonight—”
Gods, please. I don’t want to spend all night talking about this one gods-damn fuck.
“—maybe we should really be sure—”
I always get trapped with the emotional ones. And this time it’s all my fault!
“—we’ve really gotten it out of our system.”
See? I knew he would do . . . wait. What?
Izzy faced him. “What?”
Don’t look down. Don’t look down.
Éibhear knew if he started staring at her pussy, his eyes would stay locked and then his mouth would be right there. So it was best to stare at her face. Although the look of astonishment she had at the moment made it hard not to laugh.
“What do you mean,” she pushed, “see if we’ve gotten it out of our system?”
He shrugged, trying to look as casual as possible. The worst thing he could do with Iseabail was show her how desperate he felt at the moment. And gods, he was desperate. Desperate to be back inside her. The need was crawling up his spine and beginning to eat at his brain.
His poor beleaguered brain that was working hard at the moment to focus on her face.
“Well, once is usually a good idea. Yet sometimes one starts wondering
if perhaps there should have been more and then it becomes this obsession again, but by then it’s just too awkward.”
“And you want to—”
“Since we have all night . . .” Éibhear shrugged and slid off the table. He kicked off his boots and leggings—thankfully before he’d tripped over them and made a complete fool of himself—and walked over to Izzy. “It makes sense, don’t you think? A few more times. Just to be sure, of course.”
She eyed him and he didn’t know what to make of that look. So he kept his mouth shut. He was glad of it, too, when she asked, “Will we have to talk?”
“Not if you don’t want to.”
“And it’s just to get this out of our system, yeah? Nothing else?”
“Nothing else.”
All right, that last bit might have been a huge lie, but he could see that Izzy could go either way at the moment. She could wrap her legs around his head or make a run for it.
“Couldn’t hurt,” he suggested, keeping his voice as casual as he could manage even while his cock pointed at the bloody ceiling.
When she gazed off, her mouth one tight line—she was clearly debating with herself—Éibhear decided to help her out. He slipped one arm around her waist and with his free hand took the clothes from her, tossing them onto his travel bag.
“It’s not like we have anything better to do tonight.”
Her smile was small but there. Even better, when he pulled off her shirt, her nipples were hard and she’d begun to pant.
Izzy swallowed and asked, “Just to get this out of our system. We won’t have to discuss this tomorrow or anything, will we?”
For Éibhear, there was nothing to discuss.
“No. We won’t have to discuss it tomorrow.”
“Yeah, well . . . all right . . . uh . . .” Éibhear leaned down and sucked Izzy’s nipple into his mouth. “Gods,” he heard her sigh out as her fingers slid into his hair again and held on.
