“It’s good to be honest,” she said coolly. “You’ve got a case of lust and it’s inconvenient.”
“Lust is rarely inconvenient, and if only that, I’d have had you in bed every night since you returned to Talamh.”
“That assumes I’d want to be there.”
“Aye, it does. It’s not lust alone, though there’s plenty of it to go around. I’m weary of telling myself it’s best if I don’t touch you. You distract, you crowd my thoughts. If that’s the way of it, why shouldn’t I have you, as that’s not changing, is it?”
Clearly, she thought—nearly amused—he was talking himself into sleeping with her.
“Is this your idea of a seduction?”
“It’s not, no. I can do much better than this in that area. It’s truth I’m giving you, because we both value it.”
He reached out to touch her hair, just the tips of his fingers. “And the bloody, buggering truth is I need sleep, but sleep won’t come if I don’t have you. So you could give yourself to the taoiseach for the good of the world.”
And there was just enough humor in his eyes now that she crossed the line fully into amused. “I could.” She waited a beat. “Or?”
“You could lie with me, Breen, because I’m a man who wants you, and I see the want mirrored in your eyes.”
Now she smiled at him, held out a hand. “Why not both?”
He took her hand, then, as he’d done the first time, in another world, swept her up.
“You dressed in stars,” he said again as he carried her to his bed. “And I was lost in them.”
“I missed you,” she told him. Truth, she decided, deserved truth. “When I was away, and when I came back. I missed you.”
He laid her on the bed, put a hand on her cheek as he covered her. “I’m here. Stay with me.”
When he lowered his mouth to hers, he let go of all the worries. She brought him peace, and he no longer questioned why. The feel of her under him, soft and yielding, and still stronger than she knew, brought him hope. And he could hold on to that as he held on to her.
Her arms came around him, her hands sliding up his back, into his hair as her lips heated against his. So the slow, quiet kiss grew more avid, more needy with quick bites, seeking tongues, with bodies shifting to find more.
The line of her neck, the curve of her jaw, the pulse in her throat that beat like hummingbird wings—all those flavors enveloped him, enticed him.
Why it should be her, why it had to be her, he would think on later. But now, it could only be her.
His lips sought the curve of her breasts above the starry fog of her dress, then his hands slid up the filmy layers of it and whisked it away with a wish.
Naked, she shivered once, sighed once, then arched to him. With hands and mouth he took her breasts, feasted, and his hunger only grew.
She’d wanted this, had tried to close those wants away, and had sometimes succeeded. Or nearly. Now the craving to be touched by him, to taste him, to have the weight and shape of him pressed against her were met at last, so the joy, the pleasure, the passion braided together like a rope of fine silk.
As the light began to shimmer awake with night fading off for the coming sun, she ran her hands down him to spin his clothes away as he had hers.
She felt his laugh against her skin. “You missed a boot.”
His hands roamed; his mouth ravaged. She shifted, turning over him so hers could do the same.
“It’s hard to focus.”
“Aye.” He brought his mouth back to hers. “But I’ve got it.” Shifting back, he gripped her hands, then drew her arms up over her head.
In the first strikes of sun she saw his eyes, amber flecks swimming over green. “Next time we’ll take time, but I need you now. Take me in now.”
“Yes.” She linked her fingers tight with his.
When he drove inside her, deep, strong, and held, just held, her body bowed, her heart leaped, and everything in her burst into wild bloom.
He thrust again, held again, with his eyes locked on hers. “I want to watch what I do to you. Once more.”
On the next thrust she cried out in shock and release, quivering, quaking as the orgasm tore through her. In her vision, lights flashed and danced, bright as pixies.
“Breen Siobhan.” He covered her mouth with his to taste those hot, helpless cries as he drove her, drove them both hard and fast.
The soft light from the new day spread over them, and birdsong lifted in the air. She let herself fly, just fly, a dragon rider into the whirl of wind. And when the wind swept over her, when she fell into it, through it, she fell with him.
She couldn’t catch her breath, and decided it wasn’t worth chasing. She’d just lie there gasping until it found her. He still held her arms over her head, but loosely now as he lay, limp as a dead man, on top of her.
Slowly, her heart still banging, her ears still ringing, she focused on the ceiling.
The hills and valleys of Talamh rose and fell, browns and gold and so many shades of green. Seas rolled toward beaches of silver shale or golden sand. From the seas Mers leaped. Others sat on rocks. On the high cliffs stood trolls with their clubs or axes or picks. In the fields farmers plowed, and over the forests and meadows faeries flew. Elves and Weres walked among the trees, horses carried riders or carts along the road. A coven of the Wise cast a circle.
And in the sky blue as the seas, dragons flew.
“It’s beautiful. The ceiling.”
He made some sound, then rolled to lie on his back beside her. “It was painted long ago, and reminds the taoiseach that when he sleeps, Talamh should be his last thought, when he wakes, his first.”
“Well, that’s a lot.”
“The first night I spent here, I studied it.”
“You were just a boy.”
“I was taoiseach. And a boy, so I thought: How am I to do this? There’s so much, there are so many. I wanted the farm and the valley, and I’ll confess it, I wanted my ma. But I slept, and slept with Talamh over me. In the morning, I went, as is written, to the council. I was terrified.”
He turned, narrowed his eyes at her. “I’ll deny that for a vicious lie if you should speak that out loud to any.”
“I’m a vault.”
“And keep it locked. So before all had come in and settled, one of the council came to me. He told me to stand tall, ignore the sickness in my stomach. To remember I chose and was chosen. And if any tried to intimidate me, well, bugger them. It was Shana’s father who said that to me, and stiffened my spine that day.”
She turned, laid a hand on his heart. “He knew you chose, and though it must hurt him more than anything I can imagine, he knows she chose. And I think, when she was here with you, she didn’t look up and see Talamh as you do.”
“I never brought her to this bed. Or anyone before you.” He sat up, scooping a hand through his hair and wondering if lack of sleep had loosened his tongue. Before he worked out what to say next, Bollocks walked to the side of the bed, sent out an imploring look.
“Oh, right! He hasn’t been out in hours. Sorry, sorry, what a good boy.” Breen crooned it as she started to roll out of bed. “Where’s my dress?”
“Somewhere.” Keegan looked around, gestured. “There.”
“Looks like I’m taking the walk of shame,” she said as she went to get it.
“You’re ashamed? Of this?”
“What? No, no. It’s an expression. When a woman—and it’s always a woman—comes home in the morning in the same thing she was wearing the night before, it’s called the walk of shame. Stupid, but since it’s my first time, sort of satisfying in a weird way.”
“I’ll take him. I’ve things to check on, and he can go with me.”