With those few words, Calder came in sharp, grasping pulls and the scent of her cream caused his nose to flare. He drew in a deep breath and continued thrusting. He moved in her with deep, forceful strokes. He seemed to know exactly how to move to keep her in one long, continuous orgasm. Her inner contractions continued until she could no longer keep track. Her heart hammered and her body throbbed.
He rubbed his hair-covered chest against her breasts, teasing the sensitive points of her nipples with every brush. She felt the vibration of his mindless murmurings against her glistening flesh. Finally, the pulsing tapered off while his strokes continued rough and quick.
“My mate, my Liaria, my Calder, come for me again. Please, love, let me feel it. Fuckin’ perfection…” He breathed the words against her sweat-damp hair then pulled his hips back and fucked her without restraint or practiced moves.
With no thought, only instinct guiding her, Calder met her mate stroke for stroke right into another world-bending orgasm. Her body exploded down to her molecules before reforming under his desperate thrusts. A high wail escaped her mouth as she felt the head of his cock stroking a spot deep, deep inside her that she never knew existed until Roark. For that alone she’d be grateful for the rest of her very long life.
A rough animal growl of triumph filled the air as hot, wet streams of his semen jetted into her still spasming depths.
Chapter Six
Roark looked down at the woman in his arms and marveled at the wisdom of fate. Two days ago he’d known nothing of the female or the impact her existence would have on his life. Now he couldn’t imagine a day without listening to her opinions on… Well, everything. She’d fallen asleep in his arms as a lover and remained in the same female form all night. Feeling very pleased with himself, he placed a brief affectionate kiss on her temple.
Her cat trusted him so there’d be no leaving him for some faceless loser. They’d belong only to each other for the rest of their long lives. Two days ago the thought would have him reaching for itching cream. Now the thought of touching or tasting another woman had his stomach churning with bile.
He loved her zest for life, her ability to laugh at herself and to be honest, he liked that she could laugh at him as well. Too many people had allowed Roark to take himself too seriously the last century or so.
Now everything would change if it hadn’t already. Sure they still needed to get out of the magical time-out Nob had put them in, but other than that their lives were indeed on the right track.
He ignored the nagging feeling at the back of his neck, not wanting anything to interrupt or intrude on the start of his new guilt-free life. Calder wouldn’t stand for it he somehow knew and grinned.
Calder, his mate. His mate, Calder. The lioness Calder was his mate. His mate was a shifter named Calder.
Damn, he had it bad. Good thing there were no pencils or notebooks around or else he’d be writing their initials in trees and all over schoolbooks. But honestly he didn’t care.
Amazing how much things can change during one brief leap from reality. The voice had been right. He wasn’t his parents. Their mistakes didn’t have to be his own. He really did deserve more credit than he’d been giving himself. So he’d make sure to pat himself and Calder, his mate, on their backs quite often to remind them what incredible people they both were.
“Shhh,” Calder mumbled from where her head rested so naturally on his shoulder. He smiled until her hand came up and with shifter strength slapped that hand over his mouth. “Trying to sleep, Charms. Shhhh.”
He wanted to cry out, to magic a mirror because he knew there would be blood. No one could get hit that hard and not have some sort of scar left over. Carefully as he could, he slipped his lover’s hand off his mouth and breathed a sigh of relief when she seemed to settle down back into a peaceful sleep.
The next instant his entire body bowed in pain, mind-numbing, ball-shrinking pain. Roark wept, cried and whimpered, careful to keep the noise at a minimum lest he wake and face the full wrath of his shifter mate and her paws of mass destruction.
One arm thrown up to protect his once perfect face, Roark sacrificed his other hand to protect what was left of his family’s royal jewels. After she’d finished smashing them with her iron knee of agony. A small, pitiful moan left his tightly clasped lips as he brushed against the sensitive skin. She’d unmanned him, left a bleedin’ eunuch, never to be able to pleasure another woman for as long as he lived. Might as well drink the poison now as he was no use to the world without his legendary and mighty bed skills.
Though, he reminded himself, while the throbbing between his legs continued, he was quite brilliant at finance. So maybe offing himself wasn’t the best answer to the cock problem.
Plus his good looks alone were more than enough to turn any woman’s head. He could still be useful as an escort, for charity events and publicity shots. Yes, Roark still had value as a man even if he’d never be able to pass all his extraordinary traits on to offspring he never knew he wanted until he couldn’t have the precious disasters.
Curled up in a small ball, whimpering like a child, Roark did his best to roll away from the disaster that was his Liaria. The woman would be the death of him.
“Where are you going?” his woman dared to mumble while trying to cuddle up with him.
“To try and save what’s left of my manhood.” He unrolled from her clasping claws and naked limbs. “Leave me go, woman. You’ve already killed our possibly having children.” The last words came out in panting gasps as the pain continued to rack him.
“Huh?” Feminine ire in a low, husky, sleep-heavy tone grumbled behind him. “Is all the moving really necessary?”
“Yes, it is.” Moving not a good idea, boyo, Roark reminded himself even as lightning forks of pain shot through his veins.
Her paw of pain, otherwise known to the unaware as Calder’s right hand, landed lightly on his shoulder. “What’s the matter?” She leaned around his still twitching form to look at his face.
“Are those tears in your eyes?” An even closer look. “You have snot bubbles! What the hell is the matter with you? Where’s your big badass persona you’re always dragging around?”
“You managed to…” pant, pant, “to kill off any Y chromosome left in my…body.” Oh the agony, it was hell, it was torture, it was…wearing off.
The crazy female huffed out an irritated breath. “You don’t have to snap my head off. Geez.” She moved away quickly. “You should have just told me you weren’t a morning person. For cripes sake, grow a pair, cher, and suck it up.”
Oh how badly he wanted to rail at her. Tell her without her lethal knee there would be no snot bubbles, not that he believed Calder on that one. However taking his temper and now fading pain out on his Liaria was pointless.
“I’m attempting to suck it up, but first my lungs have to learn how to breathe,” he responded as evenly as possible.
“There’s a tray of coffee plus some muffins and other stuff if you’re interested.”
What the hell? Ignoring the remaining pain, Roark sat up and looked around. They were still in the wooded glen, the large ash tree sheltering them from the mild heat of the sun.
“Where did all that,” he waved a hand, “come from?”
Calder shrugged the large shirt she wore hanging from her curvy frame. “Where did you get that?”
She shrugged, more concerned with the food than his clothing. “It was here folded up next to the food. Ya know while you were curled up like a bed-wetter at a sleepover. Here,” she tossed a pair of jeans in his direction. “I’m guessing these are for you ’cause there’s no way my hips are fitting in those twiglike dimensions.”
“Twiglike?” he objected, holding the soft material up for a closer examination. “What the bleedin’ hell are you blathering on about now?”
“Men. You are so clueless as a species it truly amazes me you manage to figure sex out.” Stalking over to where he innocently stood, Calder took the pants ou
t of his hands and held them to her own luscious frame. “See, there’s no way my fluffy parts will fit.”
Handing the blue jeans back, Calder turned from him and went to where she’d been in the process of spreading the food out on a thick red blanket. Delicious smells of buttery scones, sweet jam and hot coffee filled the air and had his stomach rumbling.
“I’m not a dainty eater so if you want any food then get over here.” Calder plopped down on the blanket, spreading a blue linen napkin across her lap. “And I might as well warn you now, I’m a coffee whore. I’ll pretty much sell whatever or whoever I need to get my fix.”
“Fine, I’ll remember not to stand between you and your bean addiction. I’ll trust you to have the same courtesy with myself and tea.” Feeling as though he were walking across a minefield, Roark hesitantly set his foot down as if it might be his last step.
“Your tea bags are your own, promise. I promise you won’t ever have to worry about me touching them.”
“Not bags, you barbaric American. Leaves, real tea leaves to make real tea.”
“Okay, I won’t touch your leaves. Now will you sit your whiny ass down? Geez, the shit I have to put up with in order to get laid is unbelievable.” She cut a scone in half, put one half on a plate then handed it to him.
“Thank you,” he warily replied, not sure what the hell had happened to his passionate, confident mate of last night, but he wanted her back. This woman made every hair on his body stand up, and not in a good, sexy way.
“Look, I’m sorry if we got started on the wrong foot. We’re here together and likely stuck together until Nob chooses to let us go. Aside from you hearing strange voices, I think we’ll be okay.”
“You’re crazy.”
One blonde brow arched. “It’s taken you this long to figure that one out, cher? Then we’re both in trouble for more reasons than I thought.”
Too many things were hitting him all at once. Instead of replying off the top of his head like his female seemed to do, Roark sat down, ate the food on his plate and thought through everything Calder had said since they woke up.
“Why have you changed? Has someone said or done something to offend you?”
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
“Last night I fell asleep with an incredible and generous lover I couldn’t wait to fuck. This morning I wake up to every male’s nightmare. A pissed-off female pretending everything is okay. Everything is not okay, so please stop pretending it is. Talk to me.” Ack. Dear goddess of the moon, had he really asked a woman to talk to him, to share her feelings? This emotional crap had better come with more benefits than sharing thoughts. He was a man. He didn’t do feelings.
Talk to him? Roark actually spoke those words out loud? Never one to keep her thoughts or concerns to herself, Calder obliged him. “Fine, here it is.” She took a last sip of delicious coffee, set down the fragile cup and turned to face her leery mate. “We had incredible sex last night. I mean knock-me-off-my-feet, mush-for-brains fucking.”
A smug smile spread across his beautiful lips. “Aye, that we did.”
“Imagine my surprise when I wake up this morning to find a crying, whining snot factory in place of my passionate mate.” Goddess, even the thought of what he’d looked like made her cringe. Was this how all couples reacted? Surely not or the two-footed race would have died out long ago.
“You—” He stopped, sputtered nonsense for a moment before regrouping himself by closing his eyes and taking long, slow breaths. Finally those glorious emerald orbs opened and fixed on her. “Calder, my love, what we have here is a failure to communicate.”
Startled by the pop reference, she could only nod. Who knew leprechauns liked modern media so much? Weren’t they supposed to spend all their time fixing shoes and hiding pots of gold underneath rainbows?
“Focus, darling, before we find something else to fight about.” He tapped the end of her nose playfully with the tip of his index finger.
“Right, I’m paying attention.”
“So here it is. I wake up to my amazing mate in human form cuddled in my arms. You can’t imagine how grand I felt knowing you trusted me enough to keep you safe.” He touched his chest, right above his heart. “Never thought to actually feel a pain in my chest not caused by my family’s fighting, but there it was. And while I was busy ruminating on all the joy I’ve found, you sucker-punched me in the face. Then, if that wasn’t enough of an insult, you went after both our favorite body parts!”
Huh, she’d wondered about the slight discoloration she’d seen in his face, but didn’t say anything. Mainly because she didn’t notice it yesterday before she jumped him. Sex had a way of wrecking her already notoriously short attention span. Then the last part of his words sunk into her head.
“I beat your cock?”
His too handsome face flushed red. “Nay, of course ya didn’t beat my cock. Ya slammed your mighty paw into my impressive manhood.”
Isn’t that exactly what she’d said, without the mighty paw part? Men, she mentally grumbled, can’t live with them and can’t beat them within an inch of their lives. Well, you could, but holy goddess of catnip, the whining. No one could live with the whining and stay sane.
“Well, is it broken?” she asked, since it seemed to her the most important question of the day.
Again he looked offended. “Of course it’s not broken! It would take something far more massive and lethal to destroy something so big and hard.”
Barely able to resist rolling her eyes at his drama, Calder cut to the chase, her body already warming with need. She could fuck him still, but again the whining. Who needed it? “So you’re not broken, maimed or irreparably harmed?”
“No, I don’t think so.” He looked down at his lap as if expecting his penis to speak a list of grievances. “Yes, I think everything will recover nicely.”
That did not sound good or at least not quick. And she did need her mate to make a quick recovery from his imaginary injuries. “When do you think you’ll be recovered by?”
Green eyes narrowed at her in suspicion. “Why? Are you planning on mauling me again?”
“Oh jeez.” This time she couldn’t stop the urge to roll her eyes. “I did not maul you. I may have given you a playful love tap that any other male in the universe could deal with, but that’s it.”
“Love tap, my rock-hard ass.” He jumped to his feet and she quickly followed his actions. “You have no idea what those mighty paws of pain are capable of.”
“Stop calling them that.”
“Stop using them to try and unman me.”
“Unman you? I touched you once. I don’t think it counts as a habit.”
“Just so you don’t go getting ideas in your head.”
She lost it. Later she would look back and marvel on the sheer stupidity of them both, but hindsight and all that. “Roark, I get it now. I really do.” She allowed the defeat she felt to show in her voice and the slump of her shoulders. “You don’t want this mating and you’ll pretty much do and say anything to get rid of me. Fine, I don’t want to be with someone who only sees me as a convenient fuck.”
He jerked as if slapped, then moved to close the distance between them.
“No,” she said as firmly as she could with tears threatening. “Don’t touch me. We both know what will happen and as good as the sex is, it isn’t enough to keep us together once the afterglow wears off.” She turned away from him to rub furiously at her traitorous, watery eyes. “I always thought mating would be easier, more natural. Goes to show you what I get for thinking.”
“Calder, please.”
“I really can’t do this anymore, Roark. I’m up and down then up again and that’s just in the past two days. I can’t imagine living the next hundred years like this. I’d be as nuts as you are.” Taking a deep breath, wiping her eyes again, she turned around to face him one last time. “Let’s just say we tried and it didn’t work out. It’s not like the Fae believe in forever and true love,
right?”
He didn’t respond. Then again she really hadn’t expected him to. She was the one with the breaking heart and a soul torn in two thanks to the loss of her mate. “Have a good life, Roark.”
She wanted to give him a last kiss, but knew she couldn’t get that close without begging him to change his mind, to love her. What few tendrils of pride she had left, Calder was determined to keep. “Nob, I know you’re listening, you sneaky brownie. You know it’s over so I ask that you please send me home. I need my—”
Right before the world went black, Calder thought she heard Roark scream her name, but knew she’d been mistaken. Roark never screamed out for anyone, much less with tears in his bright leprechaun-green eyes while he did.
“Calder!”
He was too late and Nob’s magic had already whisked away his Liaria. “Damn you to the bottom of the bog of eternal flames, Nob. Bring her back!”
Nothing happened. No matter the threats he used or the promises he made, his little house brownie refused to bring Calder back or transport Roark to where his Liaria was.
“Still feel in charge of the situation? Still feel like a male of worth?”
The damn and blast voice was back and just as useless as ever.
“Now what?” Roark demanded of the unseen man. “You come to rip out your pound of flesh as well? Have at then, mate, because you can’t hurt me.” Not any worse than Calder’s leaving already damaged him. Even breathing felt like a useless chore now. Not to mention the absolute agony in his heart.
His Liaria, his life, had left him and no pep talk, no full-length mirror in the world would make him feel better about being alone. Damn it, she’d woken in his arms as a woman not a cat. Didn’t that mean anything to her at all?
Absently he rubbed the throbbing ache over his heart and wondered how he would get through the rest of the day, much less the now endless years of his life.
“For a man not willing to give of himself you seem slightly disturbed by the woman’s leaving. She gave you what you wanted, didn’t she? A few good tumbles, some laughs and then she got the hell out of your life. What more does a Fae male want out of life?”
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