by Marian Tee
Outside, the clashing of swords continued to ring in the air. Briefly, Misty wondered where Lysander was and whether he was okay. “You shouldn’t have hurt Lysander like that,” she heard herself saying. “I was really worried about him.” Misty almost winced after. How the mighty had fallen! Was she truly trying to make Domenico feel…what? Jealous over a gay man?
She waited for Domenico to laugh at her, but if anything his eyes flashed, a sure sign of his temper.
That made her angry, and she lashed out without thinking, “Can’t you leave me alone? Don’t you know I don’t want you here?” Misty couldn’t believe what she was saying. It was like a she-devil had taken over her body.
But still Domenico didn’t answer. Instead, he was calmly pulling his shirt off, and she bit back a cry when she saw how bad his wound was. She stood up and immediately fell back on the bench with another little cry, shocked at how the world whirled around her.
Domenico was back at her side in a flash, kneeling in front of her as he stroked her back. “Easy, cara.”
Her eyes stung. It had been a very long time since Misty had heard him call her that. It meant Italian for ‘darling’, and she used to think it was terribly sweet of him to call her that.
“You’re still too weak. Don’t move. Just rest for a minute and wait for the food.”
She pointed towards the cabinets above the unused armor. “The first aid kit.”
A little smile touched his lips, softening the harsh lines of Domenico’s beautiful face. “Was that why you tried to stand up?”
Realizing how she had given herself away, she clamped her lips shut and didn’t answer.
He laughed. “Concerned for me, are you?” He straightened in one graceful move, and Misty couldn’t help gawking when he turned his back, allowing her to feast on the beauty of his muscled back. God, he was so much sexier now. How was that possible?
“Of course not,” she finally remembered to protest even as she continued looking at Domenico. He still had his back to her, now rummaging through the contents of the cabinets. She licked her lips – at the same time Domenico turned back with a first aid kit in his hands.
The air around them immediately changed, the sexual tension between her and Domenico so thick it was impossible to breathe.
He strolled towards her slowly, as if giving her a chance to savor the sight of him bare-chested. Oh dear Lord, but she couldn’t help it. Misty savored.
He took a seat next to her on the bench, close but not close enough for them to touch. He gave her the first aid kit. “Could you help me bandage it?”
Bandage? Could she be his bandage instead so that she could wrap herself around him?
His eyes widened.
Shick. Had she just said those words out loud?
Domenico opened his mouth.
“Shut up.” It was her first time to say that to him. In fact, it was probably his first time to hear someone have the audacity to say that to him.
But Domenico didn’t even blink. He snapped his mouth shut obediently, not saying a thing.
That made Misty suspicious and after washing his wound clean, she peered at his face, unable to help it.
Domenico smiled, and everything in it told her how he was just waiting for her – how he wanted her to act on her desires, to take his cock into her mouth, squeeze it between her breasts, pull it inside her sex---
She turned red.
When Domenico laughed, she couldn’t help it, slapping the gauze hard against his wound.
“Oww!” Domenico didn’t know if he wanted to scowl or laugh at how petty her mode of revenge was.
“Serves you right,” she mumbled.
After a few seconds, Domenico’s lips twitched. “You weren’t like this in the past.” He then added softly, “I like it. I’m glad you’ve become even stronger.”
She busied herself with keeping the gauze in place. “You mean I was such a wimp before.”
“No.” Domenico surprised her with the swiftness, the hardness, of his denial. “You were never that, Misty. Your strength was unique – a quiet but undefeatable one – but this time you have become more confident. And I’m glad for it.”
He paused, and Misty could sense him debating with himself about what he wanted to say next.
“Domenico---”
“I’m just fucking sorry you had to learn it without me by your side.”
Her fingers fell from his wound. The sincerity in his voice was impossible to deny, and her throat felt a little scratchy as she answered, “It’s not your fault.”
“It is.”
She shook her head and forced herself to look back at him. “It’s not, really. Besides, it’s all water under the bridge now.” She stood up, taking her time now so that she wouldn’t feel dizzy again. “We’re both better off apart.” Unable to stop babbling, she walked towards the gates, saying, “You have your life and I have mine here with---”
One moment she was about to reach for the gates, and then the next she found herself pushed against the gates, her breasts hitting the arm that Domenico had wrapped around her from behind.
“You have your life here with Allard? Is that what you were about to say?” Domenico growled, his control snapping when he realized that Misty was actually admitting to planning a life with another man.
Her mouth opened and closed several times. All Misty had wanted to say was that she was going to rebuild her life with the Faeries. Lysander hadn’t even entered her mind…but he didn’t have to know that.
She lifted her chin. “It’s my life---” Misty couldn’t say anything else, finding herself gasping instead as Domenico’s claws flashed out just before he completely ripped her dress apart with one slice.
She screamed. “What the---no!” Domenico had ripped her bra and panties away. Before she could struggle and scream again, he had turned her around and taken her lips for a hard, passionate kiss that inflamed her senses even as she tried to break free.
“You’re just making me want to fuck you harder, sweetheart,” he rasped against her throat, and she knew it was true when he pushed his hips towards her and Misty felt his cock actually swelling in size against her sex.
The feel of it was too much, and instead of screaming she heard herself moaning instead. “You bastard!”
“Scream as much as you want, Misty,” Domenico growled just before he sank his teeth into her shoulder and bit her hard enough to make her cry out. “No one will hear you.” He lifted her arms above her head, pinning it to the gates. “I’m going to fuck you so hard just so you’ll know no other man can please you this way.”
“You’re so full---” Misty forgot what else she had to say when Domenico lowered his head and took one nipple into his mouth and started to suck. She screamed instead, and she screamed again when it made him suck harder.
When she tried to keep her screams silent, he pulled away, his pants-covered cock teasing her bare sex while one hand kept her arms pinned over her head. “I won’t kiss you again if you won’t scream, darling.”
She glared at him. “Over my dead---” Misty tried not to moan as he pushed his hips harder towards her, her pussy becoming soaking wet at the feel of his cock.
Domenico released her all of a sudden that she could only stand there, her body shaking with desire. When Misty recovered enough of her senses, it was too late. Domenico was undressing himself, stepping out of his pants and kicking his shoes away. When he had taken off his briefs, revealing his straining cock, Misty bit her lip hard to keep herself from moaning again.
“This is all yours, Misty. Only yours.”
She squeezed her thighs close, not wanting Domenico to guess how he had aroused her even more with his words.
“Are you sure you don’t want to take it?”
They stared at each other, Domenico waiting, his eyes burning bright, while Misty’s body was as tense as a bow about to snap.
Domenico started to stroke himself.
Her control broke.
&
nbsp; “Damn you,” she sobbed, the sheer strength of her desire engulfing her. “Take me, Domenico, take---” She cried out in utter ecstasy as Domenico was suddenly next to her, slamming her against the gates, his mouth taking her other nipple in the same time his cock slid home.
“I love you.” He said the words when he released her breast and moved to its twin, his hips never stopping its hard, deep movements, his cock sliding so far into her it brushed against her womb.
“Domenico.”
He gripped her ass tight, shifting her for a better fit as his cock pummeled into her depths faster and more furiously, making Misty cry out his name again and again. It was the sweetest music, and he could listen to it all day.
“I love you.” He had to say the words even though he knew she didn’t believe him and wouldn’t return them.
He had to say it because that was what he felt, what he would always feel.
Her head had fallen back, her lips slowly parting open, and Domenico knew Misty was close. Keeping his gaze on her beautiful face, he withdrew almost all of the way out, knowing it would make her look at him.
She did.
He shoved his cock back inside her in full force, and Domenico was rewarded with the loveliest sight, Misty falling apart in ecstasy as she came, her body shuddering. Weakly, she held on to him as he sought his own release, his hips wild in its movements, his cock hungry for more of her depths because it had been so fucking long.
“Misty!” He threw his head back as he came, and he shuddered anew when Misty’s arms locked around him, as if wanting to be close to him. That had been so fucking long, too---the feeling of Misty wanting to be next to him.
“Misty,” he whispered against her hair even as he pulled her closer, urging her silently to wrap her legs around his waist more tightly.
“Misty, I love you so fucking much.”
She still didn’t answer but he could feel her tears leaving a hot wet trail on his cheeks and down his neck. His own eyes burned. “All those months, I gave you time to heal, but now it’s my turn. I want you back, Misty.” He touched her hair with his lips, and his words were both a promise and a threat.
“I won’t stop until I have you back and you understand that you’re meant to be mine.”
Chapter Seven
Something had happened between Misty and Domenico.
Lysander knew it right away the moment he met with Misty the next day. “Hello, my pretty.” He kept his voice light and casual as he came to her.
She tiptoed to kiss him on the cheek, and again the gesture surprised him. There was nothing sexual about it, but even so it made his cock harden. Why did she appear so irresistible to him?
“I’m sorry I didn’t get to check up on you yesterday,” she said guiltily. After what happened in the armory, Misty had allowed Domenico to take her back to her cottage. How could she not when she didn’t have anything to wear but his shirt? Just remembering her walk of shame, with her in the arms of a bare-chested Domenico, made Misty want to knock her head against the wall as many time as it took to get some sense back into her.
How could she have let herself make love with Domenico again? Hadn’t she learned anything? He was not to be trusted – no matter how much he seemed to care for her!
Lysander sighed. “I admit to feeling hurt.”
She felt even guiltier. “Tell me how to make up for it?”
He grinned. “I was just teasing you. It wasn’t even your prince’s fault.”
“He’s not my prince,” she said automatically but this time she paused afterwards, as if troubled by the words.
That pause troubled Lysander, too, alerting him to the fact that he had to move faster if he wanted Misty in his bed. He wasn’t stupid. He knew his worth, but not even the most impressive skills in bed would be able to seduce Misty away from the Moretti heir if she fell in love with him again.
“Of course he’s your prince,” he teased. “If the rumors are true, you worshipped him so much that everyone in the entire realm heard you screaming his name.”
Misty choked. “Lysander!”
It was the first time she had called him by his name, and the pleasure it caused disturbed him. She was beginning to matter to him too much, and that wasn’t something he had counted on. It was not a good thing.
Misty was gnawing on her lip. “What else did people say?”
Lysander’s lips tightened. Was he supposed to tell her that the women who did hear her screaming had all thought Domenico Moretti was so good in bed to make her sound delirious with pleasure? He did not want to think about that, not when he wanted to be the one to make Misty’s body go soft and tight with pleasure, to see her pussy filled to bursting with his cum.
His cock strained against his pants at the thought.
“Lysander?”
He answered slowly, “I don’t think you want to know.”
“I want to!” Did they think she was a slut? Did they---
“They were talking about how your prince was such a stud because after what happened, they saw him taking Ivory to dinner.”
She involuntarily took a step back. That was not what she had expected to hear at all.
Lysander’s conscience stirred at the way Misty had paled at his words, but he did not retract them. It was not his fault if women made fools of themselves – even if the woman was as kind as Misty.
“Stop looking so glum, Misty.”
She mustered a smile. “I’m not.” But her heart was heavy. Could it be true? After what had happened between them, could Domenico have taken another woman to his bed?
“Tell you what, why don’t we have a picnic and forget about all our problems and responsibilities for now?”
Misty hesitated. There were still terms of the agreement that they hadn’t yet ironed out, and the longer that took, the more danger they were in. Many of the other races would not be willing to offer the Faeries a helping hand without the Alliance agreement formally signed.
Lysander sighed. “Misty, stop being a martyr. It’s just one day – surely you deserve that much?”
She flinched at the term he used. A martyr. Had she been doing that all this time? Could it be the reason why Domenico never thought her fit to be his true mate?
Squaring her shoulders, she smiled brightly at Lysander. “Okay, a picnic it is. Let’s walk to my home first so I can grab some stuff and then we can go.”
While waiting outside Misty’s cottage, Lysander caught sight of Sir Belmont walking up the lane. Snapping his fan open for the sole purpose of antagonizing the old man, he called out in his soft languid drawl, “Sir Belmont, what a pleasant surprise!”
“Seeing you is a surprise but it is not pleasant,” the old man grumbled. “And stop it with that fan. We all know you are as homosexual as I am.”
He snapped the fan closed, grim-faced. If Misty had heard what the old man said, he would not be accountable for his actions. “What’s your angle, old man? Why are you being so nice to her?”
“Shouldn’t I be the one asking you that, Lysander Allard?” The old man gave him the evil eye. “It’s a disgrace, how you turned out.”
He scowled. “You just said you didn’t think I’m gay.”
Sir Belmont threw him a disgusted glance. “I wasn’t talking about that, you stupid boy. I’m talking about you – as a person. The Allards were once the gentlest of the noble families, the one with the heart of courage and generosity. It is a pity that as the last of your line you have become completely cold.”
“How can you say that,” Lysander hissed, “when I’m willing to give up my own life for our race?”
The old man remained unimpressed. “If that is all you can say for yourself then---”
The front door flew open, Misty coming out in a shirt and jumper, looking like a fresh-faced high school student with her face scrubbed clean of makeup. She brightened when she saw Sir Belmont. “Welcome back, Sir Belly.”
Lysander’s jaw dropped, momentarily forgetting his anger up
on hearing what Misty called the other man. Even though he was known nowadays as their race’s own Grinch, everyone was also well aware that he had been one of the greatest swordsmen of his time.
Sir “Belly” ignored his slack-jawed look, his face creasing with a rare smile as he gave Misty a bag of fruits. “Ripe for eating,” he told her warmly.
Misty grinned. “Thank you! Let’s have tea sometime this week?”
“If you can spare this poor old man some time.”
