by Lena Loneson
It hurt. Their kiss scraped against her lips, if not drawing blood then at least drawing pain. Nora whimpered. He didn’t pull back. She leaned in farther, spreading her lips, flicking at his warm, soft tongue with her own. Heat sizzled at each point where their bodies touched—their mouths, his hand on her neck, her bare knee against his denim-encased leg and his other hand moving up her leg, past her knee, touching her thigh. She shifted her legs to give him better access, daring him to venture farther. Her nipples pebbled beneath her blouse, straining against the cups of her silk bra.
Someone stumbled against the sofa, knocking Nora forward, breaking the kiss.
She turned, seeking the interloper. Braidie, daughter of one of her mother’s friend’s, Nora’s enemy since childhood, was the instigator. Her blonde braid hung limply. “Selkie witch,” the girl hissed. Nora drew back, hunching away from the name. Had Eamon heard?
“Excuse me.” Eamon’s voice was quiet but deeper than normal, closer to bass than baritone, pressing out above the noise of the bar. “Can you move aside, miss? We’re occupied.” The word “miss” was filled with derision. Braidie’s eyes widened and her nose flared. If taking delight in her embarrassment was wrong, Nora had no desire to be right. She leaned forward and placed a possessive kiss on Eamon’s jawline. Mine.
If she were a dog, she’d have peed on him. But her love of water aside, Nora had never had a craving for golden showers. She giggled into his stubble.
He twisted to look at her better, smiling. “What are you laughing at?”
“Just…everything.” How could she express the sheer joy she felt?
“I was exploring this place earlier. How long is your break? There’s somewhere I’m planning to take you.” His fingers danced along her skin, tracing her cheek, then her earlobe. Everywhere he touched her, it felt like being branded without the pain.
“Here, within The Cave?” Did he mean the old dungeon around the corner? It was filled with instruments of capture and soft pillows, in an odd sort of contrast. Though the hotel didn’t advertise it as a place for sex, she’d seen couples slip away during songs before. Sometimes, during the quiet pieces, she heard them moaning. The remaining pairs dancing pulled closer, danced a little slower, hypnotized. Nora had imagined herself on the moaning end of the situation more than once.
He nodded. “How much time do we have?”
A microphone squealed onstage. Shit. They didn’t have the luck of the Irish tonight. “None, but I’ll see how short I can make this set.”
She rose to head for the stage but didn’t get far. He’d clasped her hand firmly in his.
“You go, I come with you. I’m not letting you run out on me again.”
“Works for me.” They walked hand in hand to join the Grainne O’Mailles. When they reached a low set of stairs at the far edge of the stage, Nora gestured for Molly to come and join them. Messing with Eamon’s confidence was too tempting. “So since we’re stuck together, what do you play?”
“Play?” His hand on hers loosened suddenly. Nora gripped harder.
“Yep.” Nora pulled him up the stairs with her, onto the stage. “Can’t just stand on the stage like a bloody fool, can you?”
Eamon looked mildly panicked. Should she relieve him? Not just yet.
Molly had caught on. “Thinking of starting the céilí early, are you?” She turned to Zoe. The two women pulled extra wooden stools forward from the side of the stage.
Zoe turned back to the microphone. “Lads and lasses, we’ve a special treat for you all this evening! We’re getting a grand céilí going. Anyone who’d like to can join us up here. Don’t have an instrument? Ask around! Nora’s friend here is looking for…what is it you need, then, lad?”
Nora whispered in his ear, “You can just hum along if you don’t play.” Oh, now she felt bad. She’d intended just to spook him a little. She had no idea whether he could actually handle an instrument.
“Guitar,” Eamon said into the mic. “If anyone has one I can borrow, I’d be right grateful.”
Zoe clapped and whooped. One of the older men—Nora thought his name might be Pat—walked slowly to the stage with a guitar. Eamon took it from him with a respectful nod and Pat slapped him on the back. Had they met before? She supposed Eamon made friends easily.
“You’re sure?” she asked. Guitar was a good sign. She liked a man who knew how to use his hands. And the scrape of a callus or two against her clit didn’t hurt. Oh shit, there she went again. Now it was the still-unshaven stubble on his jaw she was thinking of. It had felt harsh and raw against her lips. She’d like to feel it against her other lips.
“I’d never let you down, little one,” he said. His voice was confident but the whites of his eyes were a little bigger than usual. Here was hoping she didn’t kill the poor man with stage fright before she’d had a chance to fuck him.
“We’ll start with a jig, key of G,” she said. “Give you a chance to tune up and get into the groove.” Nora signaled to the other women and two more came to join them from the audience—another female fiddler and a young man with a mandolin, both tourists she didn’t recognize. As Zoe began with her drum, fast and furious, Nora started a jig on her whistle.
The Cave was immediately filled with hooting and foot-stamping. Nothing like a good jig to get the crowd going. They had the energy of a mob with pitchforks chasing after a dreaded beast, but channeled it into dancing and spilling beer instead. The second fiddler started a harmony with Molly, which evolved into a competition, the notes falling faster and faster. A spot for a dance floor was quickly cleared. This wasn’t a couples’ dance any longer—villagers and hotel guests danced in circles, outdoing each other with silliness. Highland and square dancing dominated, with one brave soul attempting to bring back the Running Man. He had to be a tourist.
Despite the raucous cheering, the first strum of Eamon’s guitar sailed straight to Nora’s ears. She’d been straining, listening for it without even realizing. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his fingers speed up as he grew more confident. Soon he was fingerpicking on a level with the others. She let out a surprised sigh of relief, nearly missing a note of her own. She could have slept with a poor musician—she’d done it before—but it was never as much fun. She preferred a good sense of rhythm.
Nora turned to share a smile with him. His face was alight and pink with pleasure, his eyes heavy-lidded as he concentrated hard. His lips were pressed together. Mmm…often a man’s playing face was the same he’d make later, when he came. She committed this look to memory.
When the jig ended, Zoe turned to Eamon and the two other guest musicians, offering them the microphone. Eamon accepted. He lowered it, sitting back on the stool and grasping his borrowed guitar. “I’d like to play you a small tune that’s popular in my adopted homeland of Canada, specifically from the island of Newfoundland.”
There was a whistle from the audience. Someone from the island was there, no doubt.
Eamon looked toward Nora for approval. “It’s called She’s Like the Swallow.”
Nora was familiar with the ballad. She nodded. He couldn’t have picked a song more after her own heart, and she suspected that he knew it. She was a total sucker for sad ballads. Lost love? Bring it on. Nora moved to the side of the stage and sat on a stool there out of the way. She’d like to hear this one without performing herself.
His voice was amateur but pleasant, if she were to evaluate it critically. It was the delivery that raised goose bumps on her arms. His tone changed from light to rough on the chorus, making her think of his stubble on her neck, moving downward to her collarbone, kissing her between her breasts. Ordinarily, if she saw a man she wanted, she took him right away, before he heard too much about her past or thought too hard about the webbing on her hands and feet. It was rare that Nora let an attraction simmer like this. She hadn’t even seen him naked. Hadn’t sucked one of his nipples into her mouth. Hadn’t felt his fingers inside her or touched her tongue to his cock. She di
dn’t know what noises he would make when he came, or whether he would make noise at all.
The audience quieted, one by one and in pairs. The dancing stopped and a few people began to hum. As Nora joined in so did Zoe and Molly, and the rest of the bar-goers picked up the tune. When it ended, there was respectful silence, then applause—for a few seconds, anyway, before more musicians started trading instruments and people yelled out the names of favorite tunes. The céilí was off at full tilt.
Nora watched Eamon as he moved, jumping off the stage to return Pat’s guitar to the older man. Eamon’s body was powerful and athletic. No wonder he’d managed to pull her out of the sea when even her swimmer’s arms were exhausted. She let her gaze drift downward until Molly’s fluttering hand flew in front of her face.
“Nora, you’re going to be useless to us staring at his arse, you know?” Molly couldn’t have yelled it louder if she’d tried. “We’ll take over for a bit, aye?”
Blinking didn’t help to clear her head. Maybe Molly had the right idea. Would it be fair to leave the women for a while?
Her friend leaned down and whisper-yelled in Nora’s ear, “Take him to the dungeon, why don’t you?”
Yeah, she could leave the other two O’Mailles to run the céilí for a bit.
Now, she just had to find an out-of-the-way spot for her pennywhistle—best not lose another—and empty beer glass. She bent over and stashed them behind an amp.
A strong hand moved up her arm, pulling her back up. She could liquefy at his touch, just melt onto the stage and trickle off the sides. He tugged her close, leaned in so she could hear. Her left arm pressed into his chest and it rumbled as he spoke. “That was unbelievable fun. I haven’t sung for a crowd since…I guess since my niece’s birthday, and that was a bunch of nine-year-olds. You caught me off guard, there. I didn’t expect to sing in exchange for a date tonight.”
“Who said you were getting a date?” she asked. Her lips kept quirking, ruining her attempt at a poker face.
He grinned. “I did.”
“All right, then.” His confidence was infectious. She let her smile turn conspiratorial. “You enjoyed yourself though.” It wasn’t a question.
“So bloody much, Nora. My fingers feel like they’re near torn off, but I loved it.” His voice bounced here and there, a ping-pong ball of excitement. “You do this every Saturday?”
She nodded. “Each and every, with some special functions in between. You know—weddings, birthdays, days the fishermen brought in a good catch, the anniversary of the last werewolf attack—anything we can think of.”
“Werewolf attack?” He looked interested.
“Absolutely.” There we go, now the poker face was working. Sort of.
“I’ll have to write a piece about that. But for now…” He clasped her hand in his and tugged her toward the dungeon.
His hand was hot on hers, the calluses on his fingers standing out more than she’d felt before because of his short jaunt playing tonight. His fingers were firm and strong. He’d be a right fine fingerpicker if he chose to keep at it. Perhaps she’d have Molly, who played guitar in addition to fiddle, teach him a thing or two.
Or not. The two redheads would look gorgeous together, a matched pair. Jealousy roiled in her stomach at the mental image of Molly and Eamon playing together. Ridiculous. Nora was the one he was pulling toward the dungeon.
Ah, yes. And that was what her brain, flopping around from music to jealousy, was trying to avoid.
Nora was no innocent. She’d had her share of men in her share of naughty places—the backseat of a car, her bedroom, not knowing when her mother might come home, a backstage dressing room while on tour with the O’Mailles.
And she knew what went on in the dungeon. Everyone knew what went on in the dungeon. Besides the moans that had drifted out from the dungeon during past gigs, she’d also once heard a scream, like something out of a horror movie, but with the opposite of horror beneath it.
She’d been in there herself many a time, on a giggling dare with Molly and Zoe. Just never with a man. So she knew about the shackles and chains, the racks and cells left over from the castle’s medieval past. After half a dozen pints the woman had once gotten brave and taken photos of each other being “tortured”. The new, luxurious plush rugs and pillows scattered throughout the old dungeon room gave it a strange air of decadence mixed with danger.
Seeing the room while half-crazed with horniness, a muscular man pulling her inside, however, was a mite different. The room was dark, everything inside mere shadows. Laughter came from the blackness, emerging into shapes as her vision got used to the room. There was a young couple necking in the corner. Teenagers, barely of drinking age. Their sounds brought a flush to Nora’s cheeks. Her palms heated. Could Eamon feel it? Could he see how much this place affected her, turned her on?
If so, good. She was finished being embarrassed by her desire for this man.
The walls beside the couple were festooned with the medieval devices she’d seen before with her friends. Beside Nora, the wall was bare. She reached out a hand to touch it. It was cold, hard stone. She shivered.
“Stay here,” Eamon whispered into her ear, his voice low and breathy. His face was shrouded in shadow. She nodded, accepting the order. As he offered the couple beer money to vacate the room, Nora combed her hair back with her fingers and straightened her skirt.
She never wore tights on gig nights. Too hot. She was glad. She wanted his hands on her bare legs again.
He moved back to her, looming above her. Damn, the man was tall.
“Welcome back,” she said, giddy. She reached up, running her fingers along the stubble of his chin, his cheek. His face was as hot as her hands. He turned his head to kiss her palm, grasping her wrist in his strong fingers. He placed a kiss on the inside of her wrist, sucking at it.
“You’re not going to run from me this time, are you?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No. And I think you deserve an apology for last time.”
His smile blossomed. There was a bit of a predatory touch to that smile. “What do you have in mind?”
She rose on her toes to kiss him lightly, pressing her lips to his. She liked the small, pleased noise he made in response. She parted her lips, ready to taste him with her seeking tongue.
He pulled back. Nora sighed, leaning in closer. Her breasts rubbed against his chest, the nipples growing harder.
“Not yet,” he said.
“What are you waiting for?”
Wordlessly he placed a hand on her shoulder, turning her so she faced away from the interior of the dungeon. He moved the hand to her chest, into the hollow between her breasts. His fingers slipped beneath the left sleeve of her blouse. He pushed her backward slowly. “Just move,” he said.
She did. Nora took her time, one foot behind the other, placing them carefully. Her clogs made smacking noises on the dungeon floor until her feet came to one of the plush rugs. Its decadent fibers enveloped her clogs, tickling between her toes. Without the slapping of her clogs on the stone floor, all she heard was her breathing and his. The dungeon seemed to exist in a bubble outside the world. She was distantly aware of laughter and music back in the main Cave area, and she knew the céilí was going on without them, but it seemed to be an entirely different world—one they could avoid for now.
His hand clutched the fabric of her blouse just above her breasts, pulling her to a stop. “Be careful,” he said. “Lean back slowly.”
She pressed her back against the dungeon wall. The cold stone against her bare shoulders and the thin fabric of her shirt made her shiver. “Brrr.”
“I’m always having to warm you up, aren’t I?” Eamon ran his hands down her arms, rubbing them to warmth. He grasped her wrists, pulling her arms until they stretched out on either side of her. The points of heat from his hands were the only places he touched her, but she could feel his body heat radiating into her. His skin was only inches from hers…until it wasn’t. Hi
s legs, hips and chest settled in to her. She was pressed against the back wall of the dungeon by his body, her arms outstretched, held tight, and his cock rigid against her stomach.
Ugh, if only she were taller. She stood on tiptoes, trying to rub herself against him.
“Not yet, little one. Stand still.” His tone held a touch of laughter and his eyes shimmered quietly in the near-dark. “You still owe me for running off.”
What did he mean by that? She was eager to find out.
He moved her hands again and she let them go limp, allowing him to mold her in whatever direction he wanted. When they brushed against hard, cold metal, her excitement grew. He closed the shackles around her wrists.
Nora tested them gingerly. They were tight enough to hold her in place. Her heart raced. Being tied up with a scarf was nothing compared to this. Were they the original dungeon shackles?
“They didn’t torture people in these for real, did they?” Ah, wonderful, way to break the mood.
But he laughed. “No. I’m pretty sure these are replicas. And don’t worry—I’m an excellent lock picker. Learned it in my early years as a journalist—never know where you might want to write about without permission of the ownership.”
“You’re the one who wrote about Tullamore, originally, aren’t you? Áiné has spoken of you.” Nora didn’t need to mention that she’d been a newborn when the article that had made Tullamore famous as a hotel had come out. Why draw attention to the age difference?
“Yes,” he said, his voice quiet.
“What else is hidden in here?” she asked.
“Spread your legs.”
She did so willingly.
“There,” he said. “Not so far.” He ran fingers along her bare arms, then down the fabric of her dress to her waist, rubbing at her hips with his thumbs. The blood had already begun moving out of her arms as they stretched out on either side of her. Her fingers felt light, airy, as if maybe she could fly.
Eamon crouched down in front of her, trailing his hands down her thighs, over the fabric of her skirt. At the hem, he continued on her bare legs, moving to her ankles. His fingers tickled as he undid the clasps on her clogs. She lightly kicked off the shoes and buried her toes in the plush rug beneath. Ah, it was warm compared to the cold stone at her back.
