His penis pulsed inside her as if punctuating his request, and she gasped a little bit but then nodded. He was gone and back quickly, and he pulled her back into his embrace as if he’d missed her in even that short time.
“Okay. Let’s get some sleep,” she said, snuggling close, reluctant to spoil the moment with talk of curses or futures. She’d never, ever, felt anything like the incredible magic of Sean’s lovemaking and—just this once—she wanted to forget her problems. She wanted to simply bask in the afterglow.
Serious, independent, responsible Brynn could wait until later. Sensual, decadent, feminine Brynn owned the now. As she lay there with her body tucked against his, she realized that he hadn’t only filled her body, but her heart and soul, too, and she waited for the wave of terror to wash over her at the realization.
It didn’t.
Instead, a sense of complete peace and contentment swept through her, a feeling of belonging. A feeling of home. She wanted this man, and she was beginning to wonder how far she would go to keep him.
ELEVEN
Sean woke to the noon sun slanting through the window shades, turning Brynn’s auburn hair to a glowing coppery red. She slept in his arms, and he stayed quiet and still, not wanting to wake her, content simply to watch her sleep.
She’d turned his life upside down, this magical woman. He, the eternal loner, suddenly wanted to find a way to make room for her in his life. She’d already stolen a place in his heart. Her delicate lashes fluttered as she slowly woke, and she blushed when she glanced down and noticed that his cock was hard.
“I won’t apologize,” he told her. “I’m always going to be hard when I wake up next to you.”
“Always? Sean, we have to talk about this.”
He hated to see worry in those winter-blue eyes of hers, so he decided to do his best to replace it with passion.
“We could talk about it,” he said, rolling onto his back and pulling her on top of him. “Or we could do this.”
With that, he gently rocked his hips up and down, rubbing against her sensitive clit, and he enjoyed it far too much when her eyes glazed over and she gasped.
“Oh! That feels so good,” she said, almost moaning.
Then she flashed a grin and encircled his cock with one slender hand.
“But if we’re going to distract each other from serious conversation, I think it’s my turn,” she said, gently but firmly stroking the length of his erection up and down, until he was shaking from the effort it took not to come in her hand.
After that, they spent quite a long time distracting each other, both in bed and in her shower, where Sean discovered that a wet, soapy, and slippery Brynn was very distracting indeed.
Brynn made sandwiches in her cheerful blue-and-white kitchen, casting glances from beneath her lashes at the large, utterly male person who’d made himself at home, in both her house and her life, in the space of only a few days.
“I’ve told you about the curse, at least the short version. Let me give you more than the headlines,” she said, handing him the largest sandwich she’d ever made in her life.
He glanced at it and grinned. “You must think I really worked up an appetite.”
“I sure did,” she blurted out, and then she felt her face go scarlet. “Stop it. Eat your sandwich.”
He laughed, but he picked up his sandwich. After a few bites, he glanced across the tiny kitchen table at her. “Maybe give me the full version?”
So she did, neatly folding her napkin and placing it next to her plate, and then telling him about the peasant girl, and the king, and the moon’s bargain. When she finished, she waited for him to show his disappointment or, worse, his revulsion at the thought of becoming involved with a woman who was destined to doom her own daughter to the curse of the black swan.
His face was cast in hard lines, and he crumpled his own napkin into a ball in his fist. “What a bitch,” he said grimly.
She blinked, utterly confused. “What? Who?”
“The moon. Or the moon goddess, depending on your beliefs. Whoever or whatever made that bargain was not playing fair. One saved life in exchange for a thousand years of servitude? I don’t think so.” He slammed his fist on the table, rattling the salt and pepper shakers. “We have to find a way to break the curse.”
She sat back in her chair, nonplussed. Of all the reactions she’d expected, this wasn’t even on the very bottom of the list. Break the curse? Nobody had even considered that, as far as she knew, in the entire history of her family.
“It’s the moon,” she said, enunciating carefully. “How do you break a curse cast by the moon?”
He shrugged. “You find a witch who’s bound to the moon goddess and ask him or her. This is Bordertown. I’m sure we can figure it out.”
She was already shaking her head. “I don’t want you to have false hope. The moon is too powerful. I plan never to have children, because I don’t want to do this to my daughter. The curse will stop with me.”
“Okay,” he said blandly, and then he picked up his sandwich and took a huge bite.
“Okay? What do you mean ‘okay’?”
After he swallowed and took a drink of water, he grinned at her. “Okay. We’ll find a way to break the curse, or we won’t. Either way, I’m not planning to let you out of my life, so just deal with it.”
“Deal with it?” Her voice came out sounding unnatural, and she realized she was echoing him like a stupid parrot.
“You forget, we have something that your ancestors didn’t have all those years ago,” he said, his rich brown eyes sparkling with humor.
“What is that?”
“Birth control.”
Her mouth fell open. “I know we have birth control, you idiot. But I couldn’t ask you to be content with a woman who can never give you children.”
“I want you, Brynn Carroll,” he told her, shoving his chair back and rounding the table to pull her up and into his arms. “We’ll figure out the curse and the children later, and in the meantime we can adopt a dog or three. They’ll be the cleanest, best-groomed dogs in Bordertown.”
“But—”
Sean stopped her by the simple means of kissing her until she gave up and kissed him back, but his conscience prodded him with its sharp blade until he reluctantly pulled away from her.
“There’s something else, though,” he said, steeling himself to tell her the truth about his fire demon heritage, hoping that she could understand and accept him.
Hoping she wouldn’t run screaming or throw him out of her house.
Before he could figure out a way to begin, the antique rotary phone on her counter rang, and they both looked at it as if it were an alien artifact.
“I should answer it,” she said apologetically. “It’s the number I give out for customer emergencies.”
“Like wolverines in the pickle vat?” He grinned at her. “Skunk encounters?”
“Exactly.” She picked up the phone and had a quick conversation about, from what he could decipher, a garage mechanic’s dog who’d rolled around in automotive oil. The owner couldn’t get it out and was worried.
“Yes, I’ll be glad to come in early. I’ll meet you at my shop in twenty minutes,” she said, ending the call.
“You have to go,” Sean said, resigned and more than a little relieved. A reprieve, then, until he had to admit that half of his DNA came from the most hated and feared species of creature in Bordertown.
“I have to go,” she confirmed, already cleaning up and getting ready to leave.