He watched, fascinated, as she took on the unmistakable bearing of a temptress. She might claim to be unsophisticated, but she looked quite worldly standing before him at this moment.
“Well, then.” She reached for the laces holding the lapels of her nightgown together. “It will be my pleasure to give you that visual.” Slowly she pulled on both ends of the ties until the bow came undone. Loosening the laces, she gradually pulled the nightgown over her shoulders.
Holding his breath, he waited for the garment to fall and expose the breasts he had fondled, kissed, and never seen. The silk moved with glacial slowness as it descended, revealing creamy mounds that made his mouth water. Then the nightgown caught briefly on her nipples, leaving two rosy half crescents of areola visible.
He moaned. She gave a shimmy, and the nightgown fell to the floor.
As a Frenchman, he prided himself on never being at a loss for words. Yet when confronted with her generous breasts, her small waist, and the downy patch marking the entrance to all things feminine and wonderful—he was speechless. The pendant glowed against her skin and made her look like a regal goddess who had descended from Mount Olympus to grace mere mortals with her presence.
“Am I acceptable?” There was laughter in her voice. Apparently she could see the thunderstruck expression on his face and knew full well that she had achieved her goal of seducing him senseless.
His brain still refused to produce coherent speech, and his tongue felt thick and unwieldy in his mouth. That had never happened in his adult life. He had always been ready with the right comment. Gwen had reduced him to the level of a witless fool who could only nod and continue to stare at her. His dick, however, spoke volumes.
“Then it’s bath time.” She held out a hand.
How he managed to climb in without stumbling, he would never know. Instead of watching what he was doing, he was consumed with watching her. She climbed in with him and began to wash his pheromone-charged body.
He told himself to snap out of it, to take control of the situation and act like the proud Frenchman he was. Instead he let her caress him with the soft wash-cloth until he thought he would go out of his mind. He missed the moment when she reached back and pulled the plug. Some of the time he had his eyes closed and was sure he was whimpering with pleasure.
But as the water gurgled down the drain, she leaned forward until her pendant dangled against his rock-hard penis. Then she caught the stone in one hand and rubbed it along the sides of his jutting cock. She continued that sweet torture as he lay propped against the tub in a state of orgasmic lust, hypnotized by the sway of her breasts each time she moved.
He was amazed that he had not come yet, but she seemed to know how far to push him before letting up. At last she rose to her knees and kissed him on the mouth. “Sit on the edge of the tub with your back against the wall,” she murmured.
Because he guessed her intention, he found the energy to move. That request could mean only one thing. He struggled to his knees and levered himself into the position she had described.
And then—dear heaven, did life get any better than this?—she took his penis into her mouth. Time stopped. It seemed for a second that his heart stopped. But it started up again, racing at breakneck speed as she caressed him with her lips and tongue. She gave him the full treatment, massaging his balls as she tended to a climax that loomed ever closer.
When he came, his bellow of gratitude rang in the tiny bathroom. Fiercely he gripped the edge of the tub, determined not to topple over and crush her. That would not be a gentlemanly thing to do.
“You . . . are wonderful,” he was able to choke out.
Smiling, she helped him out of the tub and clumsily they dried each other off. At last they tumbled naked into her bed.
“You truly are amazing,” he said again as they cuddled under the covers.
She snuggled next to him. “You know, I’m beginning to think I am.”
Chapter 11
While Ambrose was out shoveling the walk at dawn the following morning, Dorcas tracked down Sabrina to her hidey-hole under the stairs and took off the diamond-studded collar. Ambrose was shoveling, rather than waiting for darkness so he could spell the snow away, because he wanted Dorcas to take pity on him and let him out of the doghouse. He’d headed out there before breakfast, even before coffee.
He was playing the martyr role. She knew it, and she suspected he knew it, too. They’d been married long enough to read each other pretty well.
The heavy snowstorm had been a blessing, though, and she’d already taken a pre-dawn walk to ascertain that Marc’s rental car sat in the same spot where he’d parked it the night before. But if Ambrose hadn’t remembered at the last minute to turn on the exit sign, Marc might not be in Big Knob at all.
The combination of the exit sign incident and the lost section of Ambrose’s staff had ticked her off sufficiently that she wasn’t in a particularly loving mood. So she would let him shovel, which wasn’t a bad idea, because they needed to keep the neighbors calm. A walk that was snow-covered one day and clean the next, with no evidence of shoveling, could stir up the locals. They wouldn’t take kindly to discovering they had a witch and wizard in their midst.
Carrying the collar down to the cellar, she used a butane lighter to ignite her ceremonial candles. Then she tucked the collar in her pocket while she filled the cauldron with water.
Sabrina followed, of course, complaining in high-pitched meows about the loss of her cherished adornment. Sabrina’s attachment to the collar only solidified Dorcas’s belief that it contained an entitlement charm.
“If you want your collar back, you have to come into the circle and help me.” Dorcas dumped the last bucket of water in the cauldron and turned on the gas logs underneath. Then she added a few select herbs and one of Sabrina’s whiskers. Whenever Sabrina lost one, Dorcas scooped it up and saved it in a Ziploc bag for future magical use.
Sabrina jumped up on the CD player sitting on a table next to the wall and nudged it with her nose.
Dorcas noticed but continued stirring the brew with a forked stick. “So sorry. We’re not playing the Frankie Avalon CD. That’s Ambrose’s thing, not mine.”
Sabrina gave a little rrrtt of protest.
“No. This is a discovery charm, not a matchmaking charm. We don’t need to hear ‘Venus.’ In fact, I don’t care if I ever hear it again.”
Sabrina looked at her with wide eyes, as if Dorcas had committed heresy.
“You’re only sticking up for Ambrose because he bought you this collar.” She took it from her pocket and motioned Sabrina over. “If you’re getting in the circle with me, any time would be good.”
Keeping her attention on the sparkling collar, Sabrina pranced over and sat next to the cauldron.
“Let’s do it.” Dorcas walked clockwise around the cauldron with Sabrina mincing along behind her, looking generally pissed. Dorcas didn’t have time to coddle the cat. Eliminating the entitlement charm on Sabrina’s collar was only the first item on her to-do list, and she needed to handle it quickly so she could turn to more pressing matters, like the match between Gwen and Marc and the troubling presence of Leo in the forest.
Muttering the discovery charm, she used the forked stick to lower the collar into the cauldron. Leaning the stick against the pot, she resumed her circular walk while she waited the required number of minutes for the potion to work. If her neighbors could only see her now . . .
Somehow she and Ambrose had been able to keep secret their magical status and the presence of a dragon in the forest. Then there was the lake monster named Dee-Dee who’d surfaced the previous summer in Deep Lake, which was visible from the Lowells’ kitchen window.
As the resident witch and wizard, Dorcas and Ambrose had been expected to handle Dee-Dee, too. They’d done so by transporting a mate to the lake. Dorcas broke out in a cold sweat remembering the dangers inherent in that maneuver.
They’d succeeded, though, with the help of the town
’s founder, Isadora Mather. If the townspeople would freak over having a witch and wizard living in their midst, they’d go postal if they ever learned that their beloved town was founded back in the early 1800s by a certified witch who currently resided in San Francisco.
Isadora had made an incognito visit last summer and had helped transport Dee-Dee’s true love, Nor-ton, from North Lake. Dee-Dee had been absolutely no problem since. Next spring Dorcas wouldn’t be surprised to see a pair of baby lake monsters swimming in the moonlight.
Yes, there were gratifying moments. And then there was George. Sometimes Dorcas felt as if she were juggling punch bowls filled with that awful sherbet-and-fruit-drink concoction that was served at most events here in Big Knob. One false step and she’d be covered in broken glass and icky slop.
Other times she realized she’d fallen in love with the quirky little town and its even quirkier inhabitants. George gave them a convenient excuse to stay on.
In the time they’d lived here, she’d made two converts to magic—Maggie Madigan was their assistant and would return to work soon with little Daisy in tow. Annie Dunstan was working as a correspondent for Wizardry World magazine, which was why she was currently in Scotland instead of at home helping Gwen through this soul mate business.
Other than Maggie and Annie, no one else in Big Knob had a clue as to the magical events going on under their collective noses. Dorcas planned to keep it that way. Nonmagical people tended to get nervous in the presence of spells and potions.
She checked her watch. “Ready for the bad news, Sabrina?”
Sabrina sat down, tail twitching, and stared up at the steam rising from the cauldron.
Using the forked stick, Dorcas lifted the collar out of the water. “See? I knew it!” The collar glowed red, a sure sign of an entitlement spell. It was a powerful spell, too. A light pink would have been something she could undo in a few minutes, but this deep red would take hours to counter. She didn’t have hours.
Sabrina gazed at the collar and let out a plaintive yowl.
“You can’t have it, kitty cat.” Ignoring Sabrina’s meows of protest, Dorcas balanced the collar on the stick as it gradually cooled. Finally she was able to slip it back into her pocket.
Then she turned to Sabrina. “Once life settles down, I’ll see what I can do. It’s a pretty collar, but I can’t let you wear it like this. You’ll become insufferable.”
Sabrina glared at her without blinking. She was obviously not happy. But maybe she wouldn’t be expecting to have her pillow fluffed during happy hour, either. At least Dorcas had accomplished that much.
Closing the circle, she walked over to the valve and turned off the flame under the cauldron. If Ambrose had finished shoveling the walk, she might relent and allow him a little before-breakfast treat. They hadn’t used their sex bench in a while. After Maggie’s husband, Sean, had built them such a sturdy one, she hated to see it go to waste.
Gwen didn’t have much experience with morning-afters, but Marc seemed to have enough experience for both of them. The phrase charmed the pants off her could have been invented to describe Marc. He’d smiled at her upon waking and assured her he’d had the best night of his life.
She doubted that, but he was sweet to say so, especially when she woke up with bed head. After her makeover she’d felt more glamorous than ever in her life, but she wasn’t exactly holding the glamour card this morning. One look in the mirror told her—even without her glasses—that she’d morphed back into the old Gwen, with the exception of the gold streaks.
But to hear Marc talk, she was his angel of the morning. He combed his fingers through her tangled hair and pronounced her beautiful. The sun was just rimming the hills on the far side of town, and they had to sneak out to the Whispering Forest before anyone was around who might question them. She couldn’t even let him go across the square to his car to get his suitcase for a change of clothes.
Although she figured he could do without sex and clean clothes temporarily, she couldn’t expect him to go without a decent breakfast. He’d suffered through many long hours without food, so he readily agreed with the plan. He also helped her make omelets without being intrusive, which was a miracle in itself.
By adhering to a hands-off policy so they wouldn’t get distracted, they made it out her back door in less than thirty minutes. A cold blue sky and mounds of snow greeted them. The sun barely made a dent in the frigid temperature, and their breath fogged the air.
Because of the fogging issue, she’d tucked her glasses into the pocket of her coat. Or maybe it wasn’t only the fogging issue. His praise of her beauty had made her reconsider getting contacts, or at least glasses that suited her better than these.
She realized now that she’d never thought enough of her attractiveness to buy a nicer pair. The pendant she continued to wear seemed to demand that she think about how to look good instead of dismissing that as a lost cause. When she’d had to pick an outfit out of her closet this morning, she’d concluded that her wardrobe needed a major overhaul.
The quality of Marc’s clothes underlined that thought, although he wasn’t nearly the fashion statement now that he’d been yesterday. He was, however, better prepared to face an Indiana winter day.
Gwen had loaned him her father’s navy goose-down jacket, thermal gloves, and an old pair of fur-lined boots, items Andre Dubois had left for his rare winter trips back to Big Knob. The boots fit, but the jacket was a little small. Marc didn’t complain, but Gwen wondered if his fashion sense was insulted by the loaner clothes.
She thought he’d look yummy no matter what he wore. Or didn’t wear. That train of thought had to be derailed tout suite. They had things to do before they could consider doing each other.
Nevertheless, she’d have to be made of ice not to anticipate their next sexual encounter, whenever it might be. As she started down the narrow path leading into the woods, she glanced back over her shoulder. “You know that question I asked that made you nick your chin?” She’d noticed this morning that he had a tiny scab at the edge of his dimple to commemorate that moment.
“I remember it well.”
“You didn’t answer me.”
“I was too busy bleeding.”
She hoped she wasn’t being too forward, but the subject needed to be broached. “We can buy condoms in town today.”
“I told you that I would protect your reputation.”
“Forget my reputation. Protect me from getting pregnant and I’m good.”
“I am serious, Gwen.” His footsteps crunched through the snow as he followed her. “You have lived here all your life. I am not willing to suddenly appear and ruin the good name you have worked years to build.”
“What makes you think I have a good name?”
“Everyone in the bar hovered around you, trying to help when you had your coughing fit. You are obviously beloved in this town.”
She’d never thought about it that way. “They’d treat anybody like that.”
“I do not believe so. That Madame Loudermilk would not have people hovering over her.”
Gwen smiled. “Clara would never put herself in a position that required hovering, but I understand what you’re saying.”
“I need to stay in Evansville for the next two nights.”
“What?” She stopped and turned around. “You must be joking.”
“No.” He cupped her face in his gloved hands, and his gaze was endearingly earnest. “There will be enough talk when everyone learns that I spent the night at your house, but the snowstorm will excuse it. If I stay the rest of the time, they will know something is going on between us.”
“First of all, you’re supposed to be my cousin—”
“Which I am sure nobody believes.”
“And second of all, what’s wrong with me having a man stay in my house all night if I want to? It’s not like I’m some vestal virgin. I’m an adult woman, and if I want to have sex, that’s my—” She would have continued the rant if
he hadn’t called a halt by kissing her.
As a conversation stopper, it was a beaut. No woman in her right mind would continue talking when she could be kissing Marc Chevalier. As he thrust his tongue into her mouth, she could swear the temperature surrounding them rose by a good ten degrees.
Her hood fell back, and he tunneled his fingers through her hair to hold her absolutely still for his kiss, which was turning into quite a production. She would give it five stars, easy.
The longer he kissed her, the less she cared about the opinion of her friends and neighbors. If he wanted her to agree that abstinence was the way to go, he had a funny way of shoring up his argument. She was beginning to wonder if it was true that snow was a good insulator, and if so, how fast they could build themselves a makeshift igloo.
When he came up for air, they were both breathing hard enough to create a little cloud layer right where they stood.
She gulped for air. “And your point is?”
“I care about you, cherie.”
The cold must have been making her eyes water. Surely she wasn’t tearing up because he’d told her he cared. Well, yes, she was. She’d never imagined that a guy who looked, acted, and kissed like Marc would say that to her.
He brushed at her cheeks with his gloved thumbs. “I did not mean to make you cry.”
“You didn’t.” She sniffed. “It’s the cold.”
“Oh.” He smiled as if he didn’t believe a word of it. “If I did not know better, I would think you are not used to hearing a man say that.”
“Sure I am. I hear it so much it’s old hat now.”
He studied her face. “You do not know how beautiful you are, do you?”
“Of course I do.” She sniffed again. “Red nose and chapped lips. What could be lovelier?”
He shook her gently. “Stop that.”
“Stop what?”
“Denying your own beauty. I am French. I know beauty when I see it.”
“We’re talking inner beauty, right? Because I’m all over that. I have the most gorgeous insides you ever saw.”
Casual Hex Page 11
