She gasped, instantly torn. This was much more than she expected but with it, she wouldn’t have to fear winter. As long as there was food to be bought, she could afford it. Did she take it? Did she give some back? Did he even know the value of what he just handed to her? Was it spare pocket change to him? Or was it all that he had?
When she considered the condition of Ginger Wine’s, it might be all that he had.
“Do you accept?” he asked breathlessly.
Did she? Her breath caught as she realized that she was on that verge of no return. Like when she went to her mother and told her that she’d marry Troy. When she walked down the aisle of the Zion church to where Troy waited with his other wives. When she looked at the pregnancy test that she’d bought at the drug store with hoarded cash and realized that she needed to flee Kansas or doom her baby to a life at the ranch.
And that had worked out so well.
Was she about to make another horrible mistake?
But really, could she truly continue to run all the risks of being a streetwalker through a Pittsburgh winter as she got bigger and bigger with child?
Work or starve her unborn child along with her or this.
She closed her fingers on the gold coins. “Yes. I accept.”
He crushed her to him, and with desperate whimpers, seemed to feed on her. He lifted her off her feet, laid her back on the low table with the tiny china teacups and little platters of cookies. The child mannequins all grinned silently as they watched him move over her, weeping and whimpering.
When he pulled away from her, she thought it was to pull down his pants. Instead he fumbled out a leather bag and produced a thick pencil.
“No, no, no. Must be careful. Must be sure or they’ll use their swords to put things right.”
He held her still with one hand pinning her hard by the shoulder. With the fat greasy point of the pencil, he drew something on her stomach.
“What are you doing?”
“Shhhh.” He pressed the pencil to her lips, his one eye bright. He drew another line and said something in Elvish that she didn’t recognize. The drawn lines gleamed momentarily and fluttered. He whispered another word and the light faded. He pressed his free hand to her belly, smearing the lines. “Perfect! Perfect!” He glanced around at the watching mannequins. “But not here. They’ll be back and they will not want to stand around and wait for me to have my fill.”
He meant the Wyverns. No, she’d rather not have them watching. She wasn’t that brave.
She guessed the location of the freight elevator and that the newly arrived elves wouldn’t know enough about department stores to cover it. She took Forest Moss down to the delivery docks and out onto the street.
Where could she take him? Ginger Wine’s was nothing but rubble. She wanted bank rate of exchange on the bullion, not whatever a hotel would give her because she didn’t have enough American dollars to pay for a room. Which left her house.
Feeling like she had just stolen an elf lord, she guided him to her home.
The only highlight of the worst summer of her life been finding the Victorian house on Mount Washington to squat in. Yes, it was too big for her but the kitchen had a wood-burning stove, a sitting area big enough for a bed, tall windows that faced south, and high ceilings that made the room seem even bigger. She would be safe and warm all winter in the one room. If the war hadn’t broken out, it would have been perfect.
She hadn’t realized that she’d be bringing Forest Moss home with her. She nervously scanned the room after she’d pulled him inside and bolted the door behind him. Luckily she’d washed her breakfast dishes and left them drying in the rack. Her bed was a twin-sized futon on the floor. She’d washed her sheets and air-dried them just the day before. The half-finished quilt she was sewing by hand out of fabric remnants even managed to make the futon look like a real bed instead of sheets spread out on the floor. She had black-eyed Susans in a Coke bottle by her bed and herbs growing on the windowsills. Her place wasn’t pretty as Aiofe’s place but it felt cozy to her.
She had had sex with all of her other johns in their cars and back alleys. She’d never brought any of them home. What did he think? She nervously put her keys on the counter and turned to Forest Moss.
He was still staring at her as if she was the only thing in the universe.
Her purse was heavy with the elf bullion. It thumped when she put it down on her battered table. He’d given her more than enough money to survive.
It was time for her to keep her part of the deal.
She turned off the light and stepped into his arms.
Peanut was right.
Elves were damn good at sex.
After six months of marriage and weeks of turning tricks, Olivia thought she knew everything about sex. The orgasm took her by surprise. She felt the familiar flutter of pleasure that she normally felt but then it grew and grew and then went stomach-flexing, bolt-of-lightning good with all sorts of little aftershocks and jolts.
Not to say that she didn’t know what she’d just experienced. She’d watched every man that had ever been with her ride through the whole show. To finally know how good they’d felt every time made her feel used and cast aside like a condom. The injustice of it filled her with rage at the entire gender and she smacked Forest Moss.
“Is something wrong?”
“Yes.” She didn’t want to explain how screwed she’d been to have been born a human female. “If my johns are feeling that great, I don’t charge enough.”
“I don’t understand.” The shadows hid his ruined eye. In the dim light, he was as beautiful as any other elf. There was a glimmer on his cheek. When she touched his face, she realized he was crying.
“You did nothing wrong,” she reassured him.
He whimpered like a puppy as he slept, curled around her. In the morning, he wanted to stay naked, stay in bed, stay skin to skin. Since the baby books said that getting up slowly helped prevent morning sickness, she lay with him, embarrassed by the sunlight pouring through the windows, leaving her no place to hide.
At least Forest Moss was gentle with her. Troy had been all impatience and hardness, leaving bruises as he took his pleasure. Everyone from her older sister-wives to her mother all told her to be silent and endure it. A man’s right to his wife. The men in the alleys and the cars had been no different.
Forest Moss seemed content to just lie in the warm sunlight, wrapped around her, so close they seemed to share the same breath. She had never experienced so much intimacy. Troy had six wives before her. He came to her Friday nights, took his pleasure and hogged most of the bed, stealing the blankets. It was so much rutting in the dark.
Forest Moss seemed to want to see every little part of her. He held her hands, one at a time, up to the light.
“So small,” he murmured. “Like Wolf’s child bride.”
She blushed. “I’m much taller than her.”
He considered her, smiling gently. “Yes, you are right. You are older?”
Her blush deepened. “I need to eat.”
Another key thing that the baby books said would prevent morning sickness was to eat many small protein-rich meals.
With Forest Moss hovering nearly close enough to touch, she scrambled up her last eggs. He frowned at the nearly empty fridge and then opened the cabinets that she had nothing to put into. When she tried to share the food with him, he refused it.
“I’ve been living fat on the Wind Clan coin.” He pushed the plate toward her. “A week’s worth of missed meals would not hurt me.”