His hands were everywhere. My shoulders. My breasts. My stomach. My hips. My thighs.
It wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough.
Between my knees.
Between my thighs—
Teasing. Flirting. Over and over and over and over.
Slipping beneath me. Wrapping around my hips. Dragging me toward where he knelt. “Do you want to know a secret?” he whispered against my knee, pressing a kiss to my inner thigh.
“Yes.” I wanted to know all his secrets. All his truths. All his lies.
“I’ve fantasized about burying myself between your thighs since the night we met.”
Another kiss. Higher. Harder.
And then he dragged his tongue north.
“Tadhg—”
His mouth. His lips. His tongue.
Stop. Don’t stop.
Tadhg’s shoulders pressed firmly against the underside of my thighs. His fingers dug into the bones at my hips. Vicelike. Insistent. As unforgiving as his tongue.
Yes yes yes I wanted to shout.
But all I could manage was a breathless whimper, clutching his hair as if I would fall away and . . . breathing . . .
I was coming undone. It was all his fault. Whatever he was doing with his—
Oh god
I can’t I can’t I can’t
Stop. Don’t stop.
Firelight danced on his unruly mop of dark brown hair and the slightest point of his ears as he devoured every rational thought and reservation and bit of sense I possessed. No one had ever told me it could be like this.
Chaos building.
A thunderous wave.
Crashing and seizing. Forcing quivering breaths through my lips. I was splintering, breaking apart. I no longer existed.
And I’d never felt so free.
14
There was something hopeful about the moments before one was fully awake, before reality caught you by the collar and dragged you into its dark abyss. Anything was possible at dawn’s first light. By nightfall, you realized all the day had brought was failure. The small specks of hope that remained were like stars scattered across the vast night sky, reminding you that tomorrow could be different. Tomorrow could be the day you succeeded.
I had spent the last four months hopeful for tomorrows while tomorrows came and went, leaving me with the disappointment of yesterdays.
A vicious cycle. Over and over and over.
Tumbling down a never-ending spiral staircase leading nowhere.
Wake up. Fail. Go to sleep.
Repeat.
But not last night.
Last night, I had fallen asleep under a canopy of shimmering hope, wrapped in the strong arms of a devilishly handsome half-fae.
A smile played on my lips as my lashes fluttered open to find my cloak draped over me like a blanket. Sunlight drifted beneath the door. There was a new black dress, shift, stay, and stockings folded over a single chair sitting at a small table that hadn’t been there when I’d fallen asleep.
Tadhg’s magic must’ve returned.
The thought of seeing him again left my stomach tightening with sweet anticipation.
I’d never forget the way he’d made me feel—made me forget. I wanted that bliss again and again and again.
What would it be like if he’d had his magic?
The strange feeling in the pit of my stomach stretched, as if waking from an eternal slumber.
I examined the ring on my finger. The smiling reflection in the green stone caught me off guard. I shouldn’t be smiling. I shouldn’t be happy. Padraig had been brutally murdered.
I should be devastated.
I was devastated.
But the sharp pain had faded to a dull ache.
And for a few precious moments, Tadhg really had made the world go away. But the realities of today were returning with a vengeance, as unforgiving and ruthless as they’d been the day before.
By carriage, we would still have at least nine days of travel. By foot? I hadn’t a clue. All my money was gone. How was I going to pay Tadhg for helping me? Would he accept the ring as payment when we reached Tearmann?
On the table, Tadhg had left a fresh scone and a pot of tea. I could get used to having him around. Not that he’d be around once we reached the castle. After I resurrected Aveen, Tadhg and his magic would be gone. For some reason, the idea made my stomach churn.
After breakfast, I found Tadhg on the riverbank, reading quietly from a green, leatherbound book. His clothes appeared fresh and clean, but his scuffed boots were caked in mud. He glanced at me, offering a hesitant smile. “Good morning.”
My lips lifted of their own volition. “Good morning. How did you sleep?” I brought my boots to the edge of the river and eased onto the pebbled shore. Leaf-dappled sunlight sparkled on the burbling surface as I sank my feet into the clear, cold water. The blisters on my heels sighed.
“Quite well considering the woman beside me snored like a drunken pooka.”
Aveen had used to claim I snored, but I’d never believed her. Edward had slept in his own chambers, so he wouldn’t have known.
“Ladies don’t snore,” I told him, focusing on removing stray fluff from my skirt to hide my embarrassment. “And if they did snore, a gentleman wouldn’t mention it.” I wiggled my toes to keep the blood flowing. How had Tadhg bathed in this water last night?
“Ah, but I’m not a gentleman,” he said, his piercing eyes dancing with mirth. With a flick of his wrist, the book vanished. “And after last night, I’m not entirely convinced you’re a lady.”
Dampness seeped into my skirts, and I shifted uncomfortably on the stones. I may not have acted like it, but I was a lady. “Last night was a moment of weakness,” I said, heat creeping along my jaw. Why did I care what he thought? It wasn’t as if his opinion mattered. “It won’t happen again.”
“Right. Of course.” His lips lifted into a crooked grin. “Out of curiosity though, why can’t it happen again?”
Wasn’t it obvious? “For one, we don’t even like each other. And we’re from two different worlds.” Worlds that had been segregated for a reason. He and I couldn’t work, even if I wanted us to. Which I didn’t. The emerald in the ring caught the sunlight when I smoothed a hand down my skirt. My fingers were still stained from the blackberry juice, so I reached into the water and did my best to scrub them clean. “Besides, you just want the ring so you can break your curse.” To Tadhg, I wasn’t a woman, just a means to an end.
He folded his arms over his unbuttoned waistcoat and studied me with an intensity that made my heart rate spike. “The ring doesn’t break curses, it neutralizes them.”
The fact that he finally trusted me enough to divulge information about the ring shouldn’t have mattered. But it did.
I wanted Tadhg to trust me the way I trusted him. And despite every warning I’d heard against it, I did trust him.
No wonder he wanted the ring. Being able to lie in this world could mean the difference between life and death. “If you want it so badly, why haven’t you tried to steal it?”
His gaze dropped to where his hands flexed between his knees. “Enchanted objects cannot be shifted or stolen. They must be freely gifted.”
Would he have stolen the ring the very first day if he could’ve? I had a feeling I didn’t want to know the answer. “I wish you would have told me about the ring.”
He picked up a stone and launched it toward the river to land in the water with a plop. “I didn’t want you to lie to me.”
“Unless it’s to tell you that I love you,” I said with a laugh. What a strange request.
The smile slipped from his face.
“Yes. Well . . .” Tadhg’s teeth scraped over his bottom lip. “Not all of us have the luxury of love. Sometimes we monsters like to pretend we’re wanted for more than an escape or a distraction.” He pushed to standing, dusted off his breeches, and started for the cottage.
Bloody hell. Why had I said that?
�
�Tadhg, wait.” I clambered to my feet and raced after him. “I didn’t mean that the way it came out. I genuinely—”
He whirled, eyes swirling with black. “Genuinely what? Care?” He huffed a humorless chuckle. “You’re such a shit liar, it’s a wonder Fiadh bothered cursing you at all.”
“Tadhg—”
“Let’s not pretend this is more than it is. Like you said, we don’t even like each other. You needed a distraction, and I was more than happy to oblige. That’s it. End of discussion.” His gaze fell to my bare feet, covered in sand and bits of grass. “Get your boots on. We need to be on our way.”
I watched him stalk to the door and rip it open.
You needed a distraction.
I could claim it wasn’t true, but we both knew it was.
The forest ended in a valley, giving way to rolling hills separated by low stone fences and dotted with grazing sheep and cattle. Tadhg barely spoke to me other than to grumble “Hurry up” or “Could you walk any slower?” And he was back to referring to me as Maiden Death.
I hated it. I missed the teasing. I missed the closeness. I even missed the wildly inappropriate comments.
A few hours later, we found ourselves between two fields separated by a stretch of gnarled brambles. A tall hawthorn tree with wide branches grew in the center.
Hunger clawed at my stomach, and exhaustion weighed down my limbs. Tadhg had shifted some dried venison and smoky yellow cheese an hour ago, but it hadn’t been enough to fill the void growing inside of me.
I had accepted, because if I hadn’t, I would’ve collapsed. But I vowed to pay him back for everything he’d done, even if it meant returning to Graystones and giving him every coin in my coffers.
“Where are you going?” Tadhg called.
I glanced over my shoulder to find he had fallen behind. “I assume the village is that way,” I said, gesturing at the puffs of smoke rising toward the low-lying gray clouds.
“My friends don’t live in town.” He nodded past the hawthorn. “They live over here.”
There was no house or cottage or any manner of dwelling in view. When he’d mentioned his friends, for some reason I’d assumed they’d be human. What if they were terrifying beings living in a hovel or a cave or a crypt or somewhere far worse? Not that I could think of anything worse than living underground among skeletons.
“I need you to listen carefully.” He waited for me to nod before continuing. “You cannot tell anyone the truth about why we are together. Do you understand?”
The Gancanagh was a prince in his world. To confess that I needed to kill him could only end in disaster. “What should I tell them instead?” I twisted the ring around my finger. I’d been telling the truth for so many days, it still felt strange to be able to lie.
“I don’t care. Just say we met at a pub and I’m bringing you to Gaul.”
It was partly true. We needed to go through Gaul to get to Tearmann, and technically, we had met at a pub.
Tadhg pressed an ear against a knot in the tree and knocked three times. Paused. And knocked twice more.
Black spots appeared on the trunk.
Not spots.
Doors.
The doors blew open and light burst forth, surrounding Tadhg and knocking him to the ground. Palm-sized women with iridescent wings tugged on his clothes and his hair, pressed kisses to his cheeks. One tucked herself into his waistcoat pocket; two more tried wiggling their way into his breeches.
All of them had hair that reached to their knees and tight-fitting dresses resembling feathers, leaves, or fish scales. Intricate knots and ancient symbols had been tattooed onto their golden skin.
“Enough, enough,” Tadhg laughed, pulling the two at his waist out by their dainty feet. “Out of there, you two. We’re in the presence of a lady.”
Every tiny head turned toward me. In a blink, I was surrounded by light, currents of air, and sharp, stinging pain. I cried out as they pinched and poked and prodded and—dammit! A blue faerie with a vicious gash of a mouth bit me, leaving a round red mark on my wrist.
“Enough!” Tadhg’s command set their beautiful faces into looks of pinched irritation. They retreated to the tree’s branches—all except a faerie with flowing white hair, who came to rest on Tadgh’s shoulder.
Rubbing the sore spot on my wrist, I dared a step forward, too fascinated to let my wariness keep me from taking a closer look.
“I take it you’ve never met a faerie.” Tadhg’s voice was full of warmth. The faerie rubbed her head against his cheek, a serene smile on her glowing face. Her freckles sparkled like sunshine on water.
I shook my head. I’d dreamed of this moment when I was little, but I never believed it would really happen. “She’s so beautiful.” The most beautiful creature I’d ever seen. The faerie lifted her hand to her face and whispered something in Tadhg’s ear that made him chuckle.
“What’d she say?”
“Áine thinks you look like a toad.”
Wretched little mite. “Tell her I take it back.”
“There’s no need. She understands you perfectly well.” The faerie whispered again. “She says you’re the ignorant one.”
Ignorant indeed. I had never met a bloody faerie, but I knew all about the ancient race of magical beings. They stole human babies from their Moses baskets and replaced them with hideous changelings and sent bad luck to anyone who disturbed their homes. They were vindictive, jealous, and despised humans.
It was close-minded to think it was true of all of them, but from the way they glared at me, I had a feeling it was more true than not.
Tadhg spoke in soft tones to the faerie. She listened intently, nodding every so often and darting looks of thinly veiled hatred toward me.
“It’s settled.” Tadhg stood and dusted grass and leaves from his breeches. “We’ll stay here for the night and head off first thing in the morning.”
The faerie clutching his neck snuggled closer.
I imagined how satisfying it’d be to crush her bones beneath the heel of my boot. There was no sane reason for me to be jealous of the tiny woman. Moving forward, my relationship with Tadhg was going to be strictly professional. Still, that didn’t mean I wanted to watch some floozie faerie rubbing herself all over him.
Tadhg brought us across the field to an outcropping of tall trees with ivy climbing the trunks. Ferns and long grass fluttered on either side of a dirt path. The other faeries flew above us like iridescent starlings before disappearing into the treetops.
The path led to a collection of white stones set in a circle around a wide bonfire. Beyond the stones loomed the ruins of an old tower house with vines invading the empty arched windows.
“There are cots in the tower,” Tadhg told me. Áine smirked from her perch. “You can sleep there tonight.”
“Where are you sleeping?”
Áine flew and landed on the ground beside his boot. A sharp white light flashed, and when my sight cleared, Áine was still there, only she was no longer palm sized. Her white hair swayed in the breeze, and her legs seemed to go on forever beneath the scandalously short white whatever she was wearing. It was hardly enough cloth to be a dress.
Tadhg made no secret of his perusal from Áine’s ethereal face to her high, firm breasts down to the curves of her waist and hips to her dainty, toeless feet. “I will be staying elsewhere.”
My stomach twisted.
I didn’t care.
I did not care.
“Come with me. I have a surprise for you,” Áine said in a high, sing-song voice, holding out a hand toward him.
His gaze fell to her hand before returning to me. “I’ll join you in a moment.”
The way Tadhg emphasized the word “join” left a hole in my chest.
Perhaps I did care. But only a little. Not that it mattered. He wanted the ring, not me. Last night had been a mistake. A terrible, beautiful mistake.
Áine’s smile broadened before she went to the crackling bonfire. Sparks flic
kered in the darkening sky. More lights flashed, revealing six more human-sized faeries.
“They can choose one day a month to walk the island as humans do,” Tadhg explained, rubbing the back of his neck with a drawn-out sigh.
Some of the faeries sank onto the stones; others fell onto their stomachs in the grass.
“Isn’t that convenient.”
His lips flattened and he hummed. “As I was saying before, choose any room you want, but be sure to lock the door once you’ve gone in.”
As if a locked door would keep me safe from any of these faeries. “Am I not allowed to stay out here?”
His eyebrows came together. “Do you want to stay out here?”
I shrugged. I didn’t want to hide away for the night with only my dark thoughts for company.
Worrying his lower lip with his teeth, he darted a glance toward the gathering. “I’m not sure it would be safe. Things can get out of control, and there’s no telling what you’d see.”
“I will be fine.”
Huffing a breath, he raked a hand through his hair. Again, he glanced over his shoulder to where more faeries had joined their friends. What was he so worried about? None of the women seemed to be paying me any attention.
“All right. You can stay, but only if you promise to avoid the wine,” he said with a resigned sigh. “It’s stronger than what you’re used to, and I’ve seen the way you handle your stout.”
Avoid the wine. I could do that.
A picnic had been laid on top of one of the stones. I filled a chipped porcelain plate with boiled potatoes dripping with butter, carrots, and a skewer of some type of charred meat that smelled savory and delicious.
Tadhg passed all of it to collect a bowl of blackberries topped with fresh cream. Instead of sitting next to me on a stone, he went to where Áine waited by the fire with a basket hanging from her elbow. When she handed it to him, he peeked beneath the cloth on top and kissed her cheek.
The crestfallen looks on the other faeries’ faces would’ve been comical if I hadn’t been wearing the same expression.
A Cursed Kiss (Myths of Airren Book 1) Page 15
