He had an unpleasant smell that wasn’t the stench of un-washed bodies, but something else. Something that reminded him of the dark. The creature, for he seemed to be more creature than man, shuffled through the halls at a lethargic pace and Dred had the distinct and overwhelming sense that he didn’t want this thing to know where his room was.
That was ridiculous, of course. There was bound to be an organizational chart somewhere so Barista could keep track of her guests. It would be easy for anyone to figure out where they slept, even if he clubbed this thing over the head with a dose of Lethe’s Tears.
Nevertheless, he was going to work some serious warding when they reached their rooms. It was going to be an energy sucking bitch of a night. He’d have to do the entire room because in a castle as old as Snow Manor, there were secret passages that had to be warded as well. It was a veritable bitch to work effective wards when one didn’t know where all of the entrances were located.
The creature turned and bared his teeth in a smile as he stopped in front of an unfamiliar door. Dred had hoped against hope that Barista would have put them in the quarters he’d used when he’d come to visit in summers as a child. He knew every nook and cranny of those rooms.
He couldn’t help wondering if they’d been moved for that very reason.
Dred couldn’t explain why he was seeing monsters in every shadow, but he knew from experience they were real.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Midnight
As soon as they were in their room, with the door secured against unwanted entry, Dred mobilized. He paced around their room, scanning for listening devices, magickal and mortal; he warded the windows, the doors, and even the closets. In fact, she was pretty damn sure he was warding the entire room. She thought that might be a little extreme.
Middy continued to watch him with curiosity as she pulled her Chimerean fur from around her shoulders and dropped it casually on the chair.
“Uh, Dred?”
“Can’t talk, warding.”
“I know. I have an insta-ward pack.” Middy said as she pulled the small sachet out of her purse. “I never travel without it.”
Dred flashed her a lopsided grin and after he activated the pack he asked, “Are you sure you haven’t done this before?”
“I’m just organized.”
Three of the lightbulbs in the chandelier sparked and shot from their sockets, but when they hit the floor, they did not break. Instead, they took on batlike shapes as wings quickly emerged from the white bulb form. Heads popped out with long antennae that were still twitching.
Middy was a gasp away from a scream, but Dred was across the room and had his fingers to her lips. He shook his head, indicating that she shouldn’t make a sound. From the way that the antennae were still moving, the bugs were still transmitting. If any of those things opened their eyes, Middy knew that she would scream like a
bean sidhe
. She could feel a slight bit of hysteria welling up in her.
Dred’s strong arms were more of a comfort than they should have been. She hid her face in his chest, so she didn’t have to look at those Merlin-cursed things. Middy was irritated with herself for being such a . . . such a . . .
pussy
.
There was no other word for it in her book. This doubled her irritation because not only was she embarrassed, but she hated that word.
If she’d been with one of her brothers, she would have poked the damn thing in the eye if it had dared to look at her. She stole another peek at it around Dred’s very large Viking frame.
The thing snapped its eye shut just as it caught her movement. The fuckers were watching them. She could do this. Really. Middy had a grip on her initial hysteria. They were on a secret mission, for Morrigan’s sake. A little bug shouldn’t have—she broke off her thought. It really wasn’t that little. It was just a bug, though. Middy could go over and stomp on it. Not without ruining her shoes, but still, she could do it if she was so motivated.
It was just a bug. Just a creepy, crawly, slimy bit of dark that had been pulled from the Abyss to . . .
She’d been twelve when her mother had let her go to the magick market by herself. Middy had a pocket full of money she’d saved from her summer of flea-dipping familiars and she wanted to buy a cape. A red one. Her idiot brothers told her a red velvet cape would do nothing more for her than attract werewolves, but Middy hadn’t cared.
She’d seen the one she wanted in the
Bell, Book and Candle
.
Middy had been ready to pay for her beloved cape, but could find no one to take her money. She’d wandered to the back of the store, down the stairs, and into a secret room.
The walls had been covered with bugs; they’d swarmed around her, over her skin, tangled in her hair, and they’d all been seeking entry. Her ears, her nose, her mouth, her eyes, and they’d begun to bite her skin to get inside of her that way. She didn’t remember how she’d gotten home, her red cape wrapped in a parcel and all of her money still in her pocket.
None of those bat bugs had been near the size of the ones that now lay on the floor.
“I’m sorry, Dred.” Her voice was still shaky. “I think I’m overtired from the trip,” she said for whoever happened to be listening through the batbug.
“I’ll just get us some refreshment and I think you’ll feel better.” And with one swift movement, he swept the bugs into the fire.
When he was sure they were ash, he asked, “Are you okay?”
Middy nodded. “I’m not usually so . . . that way.”
“You’re made of sterner stuff than you realize, Midnight.
I wonder if that is why we were put in this room?” he said, still thinking about the bugs. “I also wonder if someone knows why we’re here.”
“Maybe. Or maybe someone on Barista’s staff just wants to see what they can find out? With all of the highborns here, there are people who would pay lots of money for the intimate information that’s just there for the plucking.”
“Those bugs were a fuck of a lot of magick for a gossip rag.” Dred’s mouth thinned into a hard line.
“It’s not for the sort of money that some of these warlocks can afford to part with to keep their bastards and scandals in the attic.”
“Very true. Speaking of bastards—” Dred turned to her.
“Have you given any thought to what you’ll do if there are consequences when I fulfill my end of this contract?”
Middy was amazed at how fast he changed subjects.
From batbugs and blackmail to sex. No, not just sex, but il-legitimate offspring. He was so casual about it. She supposed it was a valid concern and she was ashamed to say that she hadn’t given it any thought at all. Good thing she was already on the potion.
“I’m on the potion.”
“Did you know that it’s only ninety-percent effective?” Dred offered casually.
“What are you, a walking prophylactic commercial?”
“I’m just saying. There’s still the possibility that you could conceive. Warlocks have to be super fertile, because we’ve been so hunted by mortals.” Dred shrugged.
Middy colored. What would she do? She knew for a fact that witches could conceive the first time. If she got pregnant, she’d really have to marry Dred. Her mother would petition the council.
Shit.
It was no wonder she was still a virgin! She was never going to get laid at this rate.
“Ah, I can see your wheels turning, Midnight. Be assured, if you do conceive, I’ll take care of my responsibilities.”
“That sounds so romantic,” she snorted.
“Marriage for our kind is rarely romantic, Midnight. I thought you knew that.”
“Lovely. We’re talking marriage and babies, and I haven’t even gotten any of the good stuff yet.”
He laughed. “Middy, you’re supposed to think that those things are the ‘good stuff ’—you’re a witch.”
“I don’t see how. What do I get out of that besides being shackled to a screaming, pooping wad of humanity and a warlock who can’t keep his wand sheathed?”
“Hence the conversation. It’s good to be prepared. Isn’t it better to know what you’re getting into up front?”
“You really are an asshole.” It was more of an observa-tion than an insult.
“I never said I wasn’t, sweetheart,” Dred replied coolly.
“That doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind,” Middy warned.
“You know, you could marry a highborn if you keep your virginity.”
“I don’t want to get married.”
Dred peered at her as if she were some strange little bug that he’d never seen before. “Isn’t it engraved in the witch psyche to want to get married? Don’t they drill that into you with dolls with wedding dresses and stories about charming princes in shining armor who slay dragons?”
“I’ve found dragons to be kind and wise, shining armor rusts like a bitch, marriage is overrated, and charming princes are usually whoremongers. I can buy myself a pretty dress and I don’t have to bind myself to someone to do it.”
“That’s pretty damn cynical, Midnight. I think I might just have to marry you after all.”
“You could ask me right now in front of a cleric and I would say no,” Midnight said as she charmed her clothes out of her bags and instructed them to hang themselves up.
“Right now, you have to say yes.”
“Oh, and why is that? Did you trip and fall in love?” She snorted like a fat piggy with her head in a particularly lush trough.
“No, we just need the tattoos.”
“Oh. Right.” Middy had kind of hoped he was serious. Just so she could say no, of course.
“So, Midnight Cherrywood, would you do me the honor of becoming my lawfully wedded witch?”
“You’re not even on one knee! And where is my ring?” Middy put a hand on her hip.
“You’re getting tattoos—why do you need a ring?” Dred asked with disgust.
“It’s a good thing that you’re not doing this for real. Any witch worth her salt would tell you exactly what you are free to do with your tattoos and your proposal.”
He was still standing. There was no knee dropping in sight. Midnight decided that if she kicked him in the knee, he’d have to bend down on the other one. Now, did she want him on the right or the left? She wasn’t going to say yes until he did it the right way.
Suddenly, she found herself in his arms on the receiving end of a panty-shredding kiss. With one hand tangled in her hair and the other at the base of her spine, he bent her backwards, bracing her with his forearm. He was so focused on her mouth, it felt as if time had stopped and her whole world swirled with colors like a Monet canvas.
Middy was aware of nothing but the heat between them, the way she fit against his large body, his expert touch causing a symphony of sensation that drowned out anything that wasn’t Dred. Even her breath was his and the beating of her heart was like a stampede in her ears.
He wrapped up the kiss gently as if the lack of contact would break her. She clung to him, unwilling for the moment to end.
“Marry me, Midnight.” Dred’s whisper was harsh and ragged in her ear. The warmth of his breath sent shivers down her spine and curled in her belly before reaching the core of her.
“Yes.” The words tumbled out of her mouth unbidden and she tilted her head up to meet his lips again.
She realized there was something soft beneath her now, the bed. Dred kissed her again and Middy cried out. Even the mindless desire he ignited with his kiss couldn’t drown out the pain of what felt like a sewing needle jamming into the skin of her wrist.
They both watched as the mark that branded her as his slowly bloomed to life there. Tangled vines and blooms erupted on the canvas of her flesh and curled around the Shadowins crest that became visible on the sensitive side of her wrist. Middy had to admit that even though it burned like hell, it was beautiful.
Dred’s wrist was dark with larger vines and foliage, but no blooms. They twined around the scrolling letters of her name which encircled his wrist. Blood welled in places and smeared before disappearing as if it had never been.
“This is completely unfair,” Middy muttered as soon as the pain ebbed.
“Oh, how is that?” Dred asked, still inspecting his wrist as if it belonged to some aberration from the Abyss rather than himself.
“I get pricked twice. Once by the needle and once by you.”
“It will be more than twice, Midnight, I promise you,” he said as he ghosted his fingers over her cheek and down to the hollow of her throat. “And it will be well worth it.”
“Don’t make promises that you can’t keep, Shadowins,” Middy challenged him.
“I never break my promises, Midnight.” Dred continued to stroke her flushed skin and trailed down to the valley between her breasts.
“Well, you certainly won’t be putting out right now, will you?”
“Alas, no.” He didn’t sound as if he meant it. “There are many . . . pressing matters.”
Midnight shifted and arched into his touch, the heat from his hand burning awareness into the sensitive flesh of her breast.
“You could tempt an angel to sin,” he said as he edged her blouse open.
“You’re no angel, Mordred Shadowins.”
“No, I’m certainly not,” he said, the pad of his finger tracing farther down toward her belly, but then back up again to her lips. “You’re making it awfully hard to not be a bastard.”
“How’s that?” Middy looked up at him.
“It’s the way you look at me, your eyes soft and wanting.
The way you arch your body to my touch, the way your lips part when you think about our kisses and”—he leaned in next to her, the weight of him pushing her down into the mattress—“the way you flush that shade of pink when you think about fucking me.”
He brushed his lips against hers before he continued. “All I can think about is what it would be like to feel your heat around me, how tight you’ll be, and the rapture on your face when you come for me.” Dred touched his lips to hers again, hard this time, but it still wasn’t a kiss. It wasn’t enough. “I could be inside you right now, but there’s not enough time to make it good. Not enough time to push you to the edge so that when I take you, it will be a pleasure-pain instead of only the tearing of your flesh.”
Middy felt the evidence of his words pressing hard into her thigh and she wanted more of it. His words, titillating though they were, made sense. She confessed to knowing nothing of sex except what she’d heard from Tally and the perversions she’d inflicted on a centerfold.