“Whatever you need, just ring that bell,” the redhead pointed to a flower shaped bell beside the door. “My name is Klippe.”
“Is there a bathroom?” When Klippe frowned his confusion, Wolf gestured at Loti’s limp form. “For her.”
“Ahh, of course. Forgive me.” He walked over to a side door and opened it to reveal a full bath. Wolf eyes were perpetually narrowed.
“Is there anything else you need?” Klippe’s tone was hesitant.
“No.”
Klippe couldn’t seem to shake his confusion, but bowed gracefully. “Then I will leave you.”
As he shut the cottage door, Loti moaned in her sleep. Wolf sat down beside her and settled her head in his lap. He ran his thumbs over her furrowed brow. What could she be so worried about in her sleep? Spider’s webs?
Is that how she was spirited off? He brushed her golden brown hair from her eyes and let out the breath he had been holding. His chest ached from how tight he’d held it for the past two days, but she was with him, now. He wouldn’t let the same thing happen again. Ever.
“Loti,” he whispered and she groaned. “Loti, you need to drink.”
Her eyes fluttered. He maneuvered her to her side and adjusted the down quilt so he could slide her naked body underneath. Then he worked his engineer boots off and slid in beside her, curling around her, sighing as he pressed the front of his body tight against hers.
“Wolf?” She mumbled. He kissed her temple as he slid his arm under her neck.
He bit his wrist and tucked it between her lips. As soon as his blood touched her lips, she stiffened, then brought her hands to his forearm, pressing the wound to her mouth. She sucked and swallowed softly at first, then more urgently as she woke up. Wolf groaned as his whole body vibrated with need.
Chapter Nineteen
He pressed against her and she arched her back. As she drank, she woke up to a pulsing between her thighs. Metallic, sweet warmth ran down her throat and she groaned. Her skin tightened with want, hardening her nipples almost to the point of pain.
Wolf’s warm hand stoked her hip and she fumbled for it, dragging it over her stomach to her breast where she squeezed his hand over it. He gripped and kneaded as they moved against each other without thoughts—a deep sense of privation animating them. When the wrist wound healed, Loti rolled quickly over, wrapping Wolf in urgent arms.
“Oh my god, I never want to feel that empty again,” she moaned into his mouth.
He growled low in his throat as he kissed her back, each of them trying to absorb the other with starving kisses and wild touches. Wolf disentangled himself with a shuddering exhale and dragged Loti to her feet. Whimpering, she buried her face in his neck, not wanting to let go. She inhaled the virile scent of his skin as she leaned heavily against him, unbuckling his belt with shaking fingers.
His leather jacket flew across the room as both of their hands hurried to bare the broad muscles of his chest. She pressed swollen and sensitive lips to the ripple of his stomach, then knelt to peel his jeans down over his hips. Her fingertips brushed over the hot skin of his powerful thighs and his breath juddered as he snatched her up.
Without conscious thought she wrapped her legs around his waist as he lifted her. He pinned her against the nearest wall, his mouth devouring her flushed face and throat. She gasped as he cupped her backside, lifting her higher so her bare flesh pressed against his thick hardness. He trailed his tongue along her jaw, down her throat to her collarbone.
Sucking a hard nipple into his mouth, he rolled it around his tongue. She moaned at the exquisite torture, arching her back and he leveraged his big body to hold her against the forgiving plaster-covered straw bale. The thick walls cushioned their moans, sighs and gasps so that they didn’t echo, but stayed close, the tiniest sigh clear and distinct, and gentle.
Wolf ran fierce hands over her ribcage, lifting her arms over her head where he pinned her hands. She yelped as he plunged inside her with a deep possessiveness. She clung to him tighter, her legs around his waist her only purchase. Her body thrummed with a prickle of fear and a warm gush of elation as he laid a wet mouth over her hammering pulse. The gentle touch was a sharp contrast to his aggressive thoughts: Mine, Mine, Mine. He held her impaled to the wall, so still except for a thready tremor in his chest.
The pressure from his mouth mounted in small increments, harder and harder until the tips of his fangs punctured the taut skin of her neck. Her breath slowed until she wasn’t breathing anymore; the air simply wandered in and out of her lungs. His fangs penetrated bit by bit with a burning sting, her belly spasming with a primal fear. When they were all the way in, he sucked with a slow tenderness, swallowing down her blood as if it were a rare and precious thing to be savored, not mindlessly gulped.
His tongue worked her neck in languid sucks as pleasure shivered through her—more intense for having followed the pain. Then he rocked in slow thrusts harmonized with the reverent movements of his mouth. Loti shivered as they merged not only in body, but in soul and his ferocious thoughts claimed her. The slow-building pressure of pleasure not only in her lowest belly, but also in her heart and mind, stole her breath away.
A white and sapphire light surged low inside of Loti until it overtook her entire being— burning brightly, hotly, pulsing in time with her release. With a harsh groan of pure masculine satisfaction, Wolf poured himself into her in jarring pulses, feeding in needy gulps. Loti collapsed against him like a bag of bones: no muscles, no ligaments, no cartilage holding her together. They slid down the wall as one, collapsing into each other, their breath coming in hard gasps. Loti’s hands spasmed with excruciating prickles as the blood rushed back into them.
Dropping her head to his shoulder, she murmured, “Something happened,” and tried to swallow with a dry mouth.
“I know. We’ve changed, again,” he said to her neck, and laved at it in lazy licks. “We can’t catch a break, can we?”
She chuckled the weak, happy whimper of a sated lover. After a moment, Loti lifted her head and the nauseating dizziness surprised her. Wolf worked his fingers through her hair at the base of her skull, cupping her head.
“You need more blood,” he whispered.
With eyes closed, she mouthed, “Okay.” Her stomach gurgled and she half-laughed. Wolf smiled, kissing her nose.
He cradled her close as he stood up and tucked them both back into bed. He let her drink a long time, opening his wrist twice before reluctantly retracting his arm. She snuggled her backside into him and sighed. They pulsed in color and hormones for a long time, no words between them. They didn’t need them.
Their bodies and souls throbbed with a rightness— the urgent and not-so-sweet craving now satisfied. Loti drifted in and out of consciousness with Wolf’s breath on her neck. She slept for an hour, while he watched her face soften into peacefulness. When she woke, they were in the same position. She rolled over and Wolf moved with her, tucking her into the nook of his arm.
“I’m hungry,” she mumbled.
He grunted and slid out of bed. She sat up with a woozy rush, stuffing the pillows behind her and under her arms so she could lean against them. “Why do I feel so tired? What happened to me? Why did this…what was it?”
Wolf set the tray of food on the bed and went back for the carafes of wine and water. He grunted as he sniffed the wine. “It’s a recent Merlot.” Loti tore a piece of bread from a round loaf he held out to her and munched.
“Light walking.” Wolf said.
Loti stopped chewing and stared at Wolf. “What?”
“You asked what it was. I assume you meant what you did over the past two days.” Wolf pulled the comforter up over his chest as he nestled in beside her, rubbing her thigh under the covers.
She slowly began chewing again and helped herself to a handful of almonds. Tilting her head she considered the nuts in her hand. “Light walking? This…traveling I did is light walking?”
“One of the ways you light walk, but this ti
me you took your physical body along. That is probably why you’re so drained. I imagine it takes a lot of prana to transport the physical versus the subtle.” He slid his hand to the soft inside of her thigh, his thumb brushing close to sensitive places. She wriggled and he grinned. “You are a Light Walker and light walking is what you do. If you trust yourself.”
Wolf watched the incredulity play with her lips, eyes, and brow. She shook her head and grabbed the water carafe, chugging straight from it, not bothering with the water goblets. Wolf chuckled and sat up. He squeezed her knee and she jumped, splashing water on herself. “Damn it, Wolf.” He grinned as he poured them both a glass of wine. She set the water on the floor and accepted the glass he held out to her.
“So how do you know all these tidbits about me?” She sipped the wine, closing her eyes.
Wolf didn’t answer. She opened her eyes and an overwhelming surge of love and gratitude stilled her heart. He was watching her with the devoted, smitten eyes of a lover. “I have looked for you for hundreds of years, Loti Dupree. I’ve read everything ever written on the Light Walker legends. I’ve talked to whoever knew anything about you and your kind.”
Loti took a long draught of her wine and wrinkled her forehead. “You mean whoever knew anything about Light Walkers.” She emptied the glass and held it up.
Wolf replenished her glass, still sipping his first. “And about you specifically.”
Loti shook her head, waving the wine glass haphazardly over the white comforter. “You didn’t know who or what I was until that night at Rachel’s place. How could you have known to ask anything about me?”
Wolf eyed her over his glass as he emptied it. She topped it off. “You’re still not accepting this past-life thing, are you?” He drank.
She tugged her top lip under and scrapped the wine stains with her bottom teeth—an old habit. Slouching back against the pile of pillows, she sighed. “Okay, so say this reincarnation thing is real.”
“Oh, it’s real.” Wolf drank, contemplating the rim of his glass. “David would have been able to tell you that.”
Loti closed her eyes. “And Roger, huh?” She cradled her wine glass in both hands.
“Loti, you saw the file.” His jaw flexed as he closed his eyes with a sigh. When he opened them, his face pinched into a plea. “I’m afraid I might have contributed to their intelligence data.”
A knock sounded at the door. Loti sat up, splashing a little wine on her bare chest. She grabbed a cloth napkin on the tray and dabbed at her chest as Wolf went to answer the door, buck naked. His muscles rippled under taut skin and her belly clenched at the sight.
“Asparas,” Wolf greeted the pretty fae and held the door open. Loti thought his demeanor had softened towards her. She smiled at his mental shrug. He had what he wanted, his Loti and control of the situation—at least as in control as he could be in a fae colony. The word made Loti think of busy bees and honey. Wolf smirked at the image she conjured of a yellow cartoon beehive.
“Mr. Arrighi,” Asparas beamed at him.
He rolled his eyes. “Please, call me Wolf.” He insisted as he sauntered back to the bed and climbed in.
Loti was intrigued by the fact that neither of them seemed to register that they were naked. She had pulled the airy down duvet up over her chest when Wolf had answered the door. Now she felt odd being the only one not hanging out, but it would be even weirder pulling the blanket off, now. She sighed and tried not to think too much about it. It hurt to think. Wolf reached for her thigh under the blanket and she settled into him. Better. It was always so much better when he touched her.
“What brings you here, Asparas?” Wolf asked, stroking the soft inside of Loti’s thigh.
Loti leaned forward to snag a piece of orange Mimolette and some sort of crispy flat bread. She let the covers pool around her waist as she shifted back and nibbled the cheese. The flat bread was infused with roasted garlic and pepper.
“There is someone here who would like to speak with Loti.” Asparas gestured towards the door.
Wolf sat up, his eyes tightening. “Who?” He shot a dark look at the door. “Are they out there, now?”
Loti sipped her wine, looking from Asparas to Wolf and back to Asparas. For whatever reason, she didn’t feel as apprehensive as Wolf did. The fae’s aura pulsed with hope and trepidation, but no malevolence. However, she was perfectly willing to let Wolf dictate the visitor’s fate. She wasn’t eager for more company.
She wanted to be alone with Wolf. She needed to be alone with Wolf in a way she didn’t understand all the time. It felt like something more than her needed it. The universe, maybe?
“He is someone close to Loti.” She smiled and was that a nervous twitch? “At least he was at one time.” Her eyes widened with that same hope.
Wolf and Loti looked at each other. Finally, Loti spoke. “Who is he?”
Asparas shook her head emphatically. “You need to see him.” She twisted her hands together in a plea. “He really wants to see you.” She glanced at the door and back to Loti. “Please?”
Wolf sat up and flopped his hands in his lap, looking over his shoulder at Loti. “Give us a minute.” Asparas gave him a curt nod and disappeared out the door.
Loti gulped her wine arching her eyebrows. “I have no clue,” she said to Wolf’s mental query. “I don’t have any friends or family in Vermont.” She frowned, glancing around as if looking for something. “That’s where we are, right? The only fae commune I’m aware of on the East Coast is in Vermont.”
Wolf scowled at her. “Yes. Vermont. Close to the New York border.”
Loti nodded without looking at him and picked at the pile of grapes on the tray. “I think it’s okay if we meet whoever it is.” She rolled a grape around her mouth and bit into it. Cold sweetness burst in her mouth. She chewed and swallowed.
Wolf shook his head, but threw up his hands. “Okay, but I get to chase them out when I want to.”
Loti grinned around a grape. “Okay.” She play-slapped his shoulder and he grabbed her hand, tugged her palm to his mouth and kissed it.
“You need to learn caution.”
“I think you’re suspicious enough for the both of us.” They stared at each other for a few seconds, Loti’s eyes bright with repressed laughter and Wolf’s eye twitching.
“Okay, Asparas,” Wolf said to the door. “Bring him in.”
The door eased open and both Wolf and Loti sat up as a thirty-something, maybe even forty-ish man walked in, followed by the trembling fae. Loti yanked the duvet up to her chin, rattling the tray. Wolf tensed as the fear and shock followed by great, steamy clouds of anger rolled off Loti. He leaned forward, putting his broad shoulders between the man and Loti, since she hadn’t revealed to him how she knew the wide-eyed, frightened looking man.
She sobbed into the covers, and Wolf swallowed the wad of ache in his throat. Images of Loti as a child flickered through his mind and he jumped up as he saw the man in Loti’s memories.
Chapter Twenty
“Wolf. Don’t.” Loti’s voice shook as she gathered more of the covers around her neck. “Please get me the robe.”
She pointed at the pile of cloth on a tray on the windowsill. Wolf sorted through the items until he pulled out a long, drapey robe. He deliberately turned his back to the contrite man, kneeling down to help Loti slip it on. He blocked the view to give her some privacy, but he needn’t have. The gentleman averted his gaze, turning his back and clasping his hands in front of him. Loti’s hands shook as she cinched the belt.
Wolf bent down to whisper in her ear, “You don’t have to.”
But I want to.
He kissed her eyelid and brushed the hair from her eyes with both hands, cupping her face. She stood up and faced the man with golden-brown hair and electric blue eyes.
“Daddy,” Loti’s bottom lip quivered, “is this where you went?”
John Duvall blinked rapidly. He glanced at Asparas who gestured for him to go on. Looking back at th
e daughter he had abandoned all those years ago, he swallowed hard. “Asparas brought me here.”
Uncomprehending, Loti nodded and blinked fast. “She brought you here.” But her voice was empty.
John’s eyes skittered from Wolf, who stood close behind Loti with his hands on her shoulders, to his confused daughter. Wolf’s eyes were hard and wary and John opened his mouth, then closed it several times before Loti shook herself and came to life.
“She brought you here? Why?” Twisting the belt ends in her hands she wondered what she was supposed to be feeling.
What did one say to the father who had disappeared without so much as a phone call to let them know he was alive? His car had been found off the road and over the bank into the woods on the highway between his work and their home. The keys were still in the ignition and his wallet and briefcase were on the passenger seat. The engine was running when the police officer discovered it. The cops only found it because someone had called reporting a bright light coming from the woods: the headlights were still on.
Asparas took John’s hand in hers, a nervous smile tugging at her lips. “John was hurt in the accident.”
That was what everyone had told her, that he was probably hurt and wandered away from the accident. The officer had said the side window was cracked and blood was found on the glass and on the door interior.
“He was almost dead, Loti. I spelled him into a stasis sleep and brought him here, to my family. We took care of him and healed him.” She gave John a fond smile. “And he’s been with us ever since.”
“Loti, I…” his voice faltered and his breath hitched.
She realized he was on the verge of tears and she saw red. How dare he cry; how dare he act like he had missed her; how dare he feel anything? Her head exploded with red rage and before she knew what she was about to do, she lurched across the room and punched him square in the nose. There was an audible crunch as John howled in pain, flying backward and into the wall. He crumpled to the floor covering his face with his hands, blood splatting in loud drips on the cement.
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