by T. M. Cromer
“Where else was I supposed to go?”
“Home?”
He grimaced and took another pull of his drink. “I have no home without you, Win.”
She closed her eyes, and a single tear escaped down her cheek. “Oh, Zane. You make this impossible.”
“This, as in us, or this, as in rejecting me?”
“Us.” Winnie focused on him. “I want you to know we’re worth it. Not wonder.”
“You’ve never had doubts, Win?” He pinned her with a stare. “Not once?”
“Of course I did. I wondered if you were in any way the man I thought you were. My misgivings were whether we would work as a couple, and it was only after you kissed another woman.”
“How many times can I apologize for that?”
“I’m not asking you to,” she stressed. “I’m only saying that’s when I had my doubts.”
“If you’re doubt free now, then why insist on this separation?”
“Because I’m not doubt free. Yes, I love you, but I need more time to decide if this constant push and pull is what I want. I’m tired of being at odds with you, Zane.”
“You want to know the funny part? I thought we were finally in-sync with our feelings. I thought the confrontation with Lin put everything in perspective. I guess I was wrong.”
“Then why hide in the bathroom and ask if it’s all worth it?” she stood as she shouted.
He gained his feet and lurched forward to tangle his hands in her thick, dark mane. “Because it killed me to see you that way!” he shouted in return. “Don’t you get it, Win? I’m fucking crazy about you! Crazy being the key word. I’m not that guy.” He forcefully calmed himself and rested his forehead against hers. “I don’t yell. I don’t go off half-cocked to murder people. I’m actually fairly mellow.”
She giggled and triggered Zane’s laughter.
“I am,” he insisted.
“I’ve yet to see it, Counselor. As of right now, it’s all hearsay.”
He snorted and rubbed his nose gently against hers. “As of right now, the evidence is stacked against me to be sure. But I promise to prove my case, Your Honor.”
“Well, you aren’t going to solve anything shouting at each other out here on the porch.” They both started at the sound of Autumn’s voice.
“That’s your cue to take her to bed,” Keaton said over his wife’s shoulder. “Bedding your woman solves everything.” He grunted when Autumn’s elbow found his ribs.
“Hush, you tool. I’m trying to help them.”
“So was I,” Keaton defended as he rubbed his abused middle.
“Ignore him,” Autumn told them. “What I was about to say, before I was so rudely interrupted, was that only time and consideration for one another is going to solve your insecurities.” She smiled when Keaton’s arms drew her back against his chest. “No one had a bumpier road than us. I have faith that the Goddess put you together for a reason.”
Zane met Winnie’s thoughtful gaze. “Okay.”
“Okay?” Winnie asked.
“Okay. I’ll give you the time you need.”
He could swear she looked disappointed at his announcement.
“Does this means you aren’t bedding your woman?” she asked in a hushed voice.
Zane leaned close to whisper, “I so want to bed my woman. But I also want to give her what she truly needs. When you’re ready, babe, I’m going to rock your world and not let you come up for air for days.”
Winnie gripped his biceps and whimpered.
Unable to resist, he closed his mouth over hers and poured all he wanted to say into a single kiss. Her arms curled around his neck, and her fingers dug into his scalp. Her soft moan almost changed his mind about leaving.
As he pulled back, he noticed they were once again alone. “I love you, Winter Rose Thorne. There won’t be a day that goes by that I won’t think it, say it, or feel it down to my very soul.” He dropped a light kiss on her lips. “May I call you tomorrow?”
Winnie nodded, wide-eyed with her fingertips caressing her mouth.
“Go up to bed, babe. I won’t leave until you are safe inside.”
She stopped when she got to the door. “Zane?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you, too.”
“I’m glad, Win. It’ll make my courtship of you that much easier.”
“Courtship?”
“I figure it’s time I did it up right.”
The wide, happy smile that blossomed on her face went a long way in healing Zane’s bruised ego.
“Hey?” he called.
“Yeah?”
“How’s Rafe?”
“Better. Flirting with Aunt GiGi and Spring.”
“And you?”
“No, he knows where my true heart lies.”
“Good, maybe I won’t have to hurt him when he recovers.”
Winnie laughed and opened the door. “Oh, I almost forgot! Alastair left some of Aunt GiGi’s elixir.”
He frowned his confusion.
With a nod toward the whisky bottle on the step, she said, “It’s a hangover remedy.”
“Ah, yes. I’ve heard about that from Keaton. The one that tastes like dirt?”
“That’s the one. Should I get it for you?”
“Nah. I can’t seem to get drunk. Something happened to my metabolism when I got my powers.” He shrugged.
“Not even a buzz?”
“Nope. Believe me, I’ve tried tonight.”
“That’s truly sad,” she smiled.
“You ain’t lyin’, babe.” Zane blew her a kiss. “Good night, my love.”
“Good night.”
After she’d gone inside, Zane dumped his whisky out on the ground and picked up her wine glass to set both items on a nearby table. With one last, long look up at her bedroom window, he teleported to the clearing.
He conjured a flashlight and a pocket knife then found the oak with his and Winnie’s initials. Underneath his initial carving, he etched out the word forever.
“I was going to do the same thing.”
Zane turned to find Winnie with a flashlight in one hand and a pocketknife in the other.
“Great minds,” he stated. “I thought you were supposed to stay within the safety of Thorne Manor so I wouldn’t worry about you.”
“I can’t stay caged up forever, Zane. Besides…” She lifted her hands and twirled in a circle. “This is sacred land. I’m as safe here as I am at home.”
“What am I going to do about you, Win?” He approached her and tugged at the first button of her shirt. When it unfastened, he moved to the second.
“What do you want to do?” she asked huskily.
“I was going to give you the time you wanted. But then you come out here in those short daisy dukes and this low-cut top. What’s a man supposed to do?”
“Hopefully, take advantage of the situation.”
“Well, if that’s what you’re hoping for, who am I to disappoint?”
28
Winnie drank in Zane’s roguish grin. Two seconds after she’d closed the dark mahogany door of Thorne Manor, she knew she’d made a mistake in sending him away. All she wanted was to be in his arms, and it seemed he wanted the same.
As he unbuttoned the third fastening of her shirt, she smiled.
“I need you to listen up to what I have to say.” When she had his full attention, she said, “It doesn’t happen often, but when I’m wrong, I can admit it.”
One of his dark blond brows shot up. “Oh?”
“Yes. I was wrong to say we need time apart.”
Zane pursed his lips and nodded thoughtfully. “I see.”
Another button parted from its matching buttonhole.
“Do you?” she asked, worried she’d prodded the sleeping tiger inside him again. Worried she’d appear like a crazy person with the push and pull of her emotions.
“Mmhmm. If I understand you correctly, and I’m hoping I do, you really came out here so I’d follow up on that offer
to rock your world. That about right?” His lips trailed along her throat.
“Yep! That’s got it.”
One of his long, lean fingers hooked the edge of her top and drew it down her shoulder, exposing her collarbone. He nuzzled the hollow he exposed. When his teeth nipped her skin, she let out a soft yelp.
“Good. Do you want to conjure us a mattress or shall I?”
“A mattress?”
“I feel like sleeping out under the stars tonight, Win. Care to join me?”
“It’s forty degrees!” she protested.
“And yet here you are, flaunting your perfect ass in those short shorts.” He pulled back to gaze down at the pebbled nipple he’d laid bare. “Hmm, maybe you are cold.”
“Nope. Not at all.” And she wasn’t. Between her witchy ability to heat up her cells and the loving Zane was providing, she was toasty as could be.
Zane dipped his head to capture her nipple in his mouth. He suckled as he massaged the fullness of her breast. As he pulled back, he grazed the tip with his teeth. “Conjure the bed, Win,” he growled.
A snap of her fingers provided a soft mattress perfectly suited to their needs.
He guided her backwards until they tumbled onto the bed.
Winnie laughed as she clung to him. “So much finesse!”
“Shut it and get naked.”
“Like this?” With a simple snap of her fingers, her clothes were no more.
“That works,” he murmured approvingly. He paused and raked her body with his hot gaze. “I was such an idiot to think—”
Winnie placed two fingers over his mouth to cut off his self-recriminations. “The past is no more, Zane. We are moving forward. We’ll both try to be better people.”
“You make me better, Win.”
“Stop spoiling the moment with sentiment and do me,” she ordered and offered up a wicked grin.
“Your sexual wishes are my command.”
Zane trailed his fingertips across the curved plane of her midriff. Her muscles tightened and danced in reaction. His lips followed the path of his fingers, and the sensitive skin along her abdomen quivered in response.
As his tongue teased and swirled across her opening, she gasped her delight. And when he joined his body with hers, she cried out his name. Instead of the wild, fast-paced sex Winnie had been expecting, Zane took his time. Each stroke slow and steady, each caress worshiping her. Every kiss tender and packed full of promise. In return, she poured her feelings into every touch of his skin. When their eyes met, he could be in no doubt of her love.
When she climaxed, he refused to let her look away, insisting on seeing into her soul. And when he came, she saw his heart reflected in his warm, chocolaty eyes.
In that moment, she was truly loved and surrendered her soul to him in return.
* * *
As they cuddled under the open sky of the clearing, Zane sighed his contentment.
“What was that for?” Winnie asked as she twisted to see his expression.
He met her inquiring eyes and spoke his truth, “I don’t know if I’ve ever been happier than in this moment.”
Her eyes glowed with her emotion. “Me either.”
Zane tightened his arms around her. “I don’t want to spend another day apart, Win. Move in with me.”
“I have a better idea,” she said. “Move in with me.”
“Won’t it be crowded?”
“No more than your home.” She shifted and rested her head in her elbow to look down at him. “Summer lives in North Carolina now. Autumn is living with Keaton and Chloe at Carlyle House. Dad is gone most days. That leaves only Spring and me. With my workshop on the Thorne estate, it makes it easier all around.”
“Is this what you truly want? I’m not rushing you? It’s okay to tell me if I am.”
Her beatific smile filled the cracked holes in his heart that he hadn’t been aware existed.
“I’m sure, Zane.”
“I know we’ve had our ups and downs, Win. But I’m never happier than when I’m with you. I need you to know that.”
“I feel the exact same way about you. Please tell me we are past the anger and jealousy, and any stupid games of revenge. I couldn’t take it if tomorrow you walk away and it’s all been another way to get even for what I did.”
“We are well past it all. I can’t say I won’t get jealous when men try to capture your attention in the future—I’m human—but I promise to try to curtail any pettiness or anger on my part.”
“There will never be any reason for jealousy on your part. I promise not to kiss any more men while we’re together.”
Zane went still. “Kiss any more men while we’re together? Who did you kiss since we’ve been dating?”
She sat up and grimaced at her slip. Apprehension was written all over Winnie’s face. “I…”
He jackknifed into a sitting position and faced her. With one fingertip, he tilted her head up. “Tell me, Win. Who did you kiss?”
“Technically, you and I weren’t together,” she hedged.
“Rafe,” Zane stated flatly. “Just as I was starting to like the guy. Now I have to kill him.”
“Zane! It’s not like that. It was the morning after you kissed that chick in the bar. I was hurt and angry. He kissed me, and I let him. It meant nothing.”
He let the silence drag out as he turned over the fairness of his anger. Her breathing kicked up with her nervousness. If he were to be honest with himself, he had no right to be upset, and yet, the territorial side he’d never been aware of before becoming lovers with Winnie kicked in with a vengeance.
“Come here,” he ordered.
As she shifted toward him, he dragged her the rest of the way to straddle his lap. “You get this one pass because I was an idiot. But if you ever kiss another man for the rest of your life, I’ll rip his tongue from his head. Are we clear?”
“Is this like a wedding ceremony where I repeat the vow?” she teased.
“That works for me.” He smoothed back the long hair from her face with the backs of his fingers and draped it behind her shoulder. “I, Zane Carlyle, take thee, Winter Thorne, to be my forever love. I promise to annihilate any man who touches you and rip out the tongue of any man looking to get overly familiar with your tonsils.”
She laughed and kissed him. “I, Winter Thorne, take thee, Zane Carlyle, to be my forever love. I promise to rip out the hair of any woman who touches you and turn any female looking to get overly familiar with any part of your anatomy into a wart on a donkey’s behind.”
Zane grinned and kissed her in return. “I think this is the perfect commitment ceremony, don’t you?”
“I do.”
He snorted at her play on words. “Now tell me how sucky Rafe kisses, and we can get back to our lovely evening together.”
Winnie’s giggle cheered him.
“He had sweaty palms, didn’t he? And he slobbered?”
“I swear, he doesn’t kiss half as good as you,” she said as she drew an X over her heart.
“I’ll have to settle for that, I suppose. I can afford to feel magnanimous toward the poor guy. He lost.”
“More importantly, you and I won.”
With a slow, tender kiss, Zane confirmed her words. “We did indeed. I love you, Win. More than words can say.”
“I love you, too.” She buried her face against his throat and placed a light kiss on the skin there. After a wide yawn, she said, “Can we take a nap before we make love again? It’s been a long day.”
“Sleep, babe.”
Within minutes, she gave over to the dream state that beckoned to her.
Zane held her to his chest and eased back into a supine position, careful not to jostle her. Soon enough, his eyes drifted shut and he joined Winnie in slumber.
29
Four mornings later, Zane jogged downstairs to find Winnie rolling out the dough for another batch of her incredible cinnamon rolls. “How come you don’t conjure them?” he asked.
“I enjoy making them from scratch. It helps me center myself and make a mental schedule of all I need to accomplish for the day.”
“Do you have extra I can bring to Penny? I don’t think she eats enough.”
Winnie frowned and glanced up. “Why do you say that?”
“Just a feeling. She’s never said, but based on some digging I’ve done, I don’t think she and her little brother have had a happy life so far.”
“Oh, Zane. Yet, she’s so bubbly all the time. How does she do it?”
“I don’t know. But she’s kept my office running during all this mess with searching for the amulet. I’m going to give her a raise and hire her on permanently.”
“I think you should. How old is her brother?”
“Sixteen.”
“I could hire him after school to help with deliveries if you think it might be something he wants to do.”
Zane wondered at her purity of heart. Never had he met anyone as generous in spirit as Winnie. “That’s an awesome idea, babe.”
“Why don’t you tell her today when you get to the office? Have her brother stop by later this afternoon or tomorrow if he’s interested.”
Zane wrapped his arms around her and nuzzled into her thick, upswept hair before he dropped a kiss on the nape of her neck.
“I saw Rafe was up and around last night. How’s the healing process coming along?”
“I checked on him this morning. His color is back to normal. Another day or two, and he should be good as new. He seems to have hit it off with Aunt GiGi.”
“Think your uncle will be upset?”
“Uncle Ryker?” At his nod, she continued. “I don’t know. They’ve been separated a long time.”
“But as a Thorne, doesn’t your aunt fall under the family legend of only one soulmate?”
“Yeah. I don’t know that she’d get over her love for Uncle Ryker, but I think she’s lonely. She should be able to find comfort if she can.”
A knock on the front door startled them both. Zane glanced at his watch. “Who the hell is here at seven-thirty a.m.?”
Winnie rinsed her hands and followed Zane to the foyer, where he opened the door. On the other side, stood a petite blonde woman with a manila envelope in hand.
