Death's Courtship Page 5

  “Bryn,” he moaned. It was a plea, a protest. He didn’t know how much longer he could last.

  She smiled against his skin and it filled his chest with such pleasure, such satisfaction and happiness he wanted to whisper words of destined love and promises for the future. But he retained enough of his sanity to know it would be a mistake.

  His cock thickened further. “No!” he said, gasping as her hands found him through the material of his pants.

  She stilled. Her mouth left his chest and he wanted to cry out another protest.

  “I’m not going to last,” Atticus said.

  “You don’t have to last. Not after what happened in the kitchen.”

  “Bryn…” He groaned when her hand left the front of his jeans to glide upward and settle on his chest.

  “I think you’re the reason I’m naked. The least I can do is return the favor,” she said, helping him out of his shirt before crawling backward to dispense with shoes and socks.

  Atticus fisted the bedspread as her fingers returned to the top button of his jeans. His stomach quivered and he gasped when she leaned down to press a wet kiss to his abdomen. His breath caught in his throat when her tongue darted out to explore his navel. This time it was him whispering please, arching his hips off the bed, begging for the feel of skin against skin.

  She took his boxers with the jeans, stripped them from his body and left him naked, proud and vulnerable at the same time.

  He grabbed her hands when she would have touched him, measured his length and width, weighed him with her fingers. “If you touch me I’ll come. I want to be inside you the first time.”

  “I’d like that too. Do you have—”

  “In my back pocket. I hoped… It seemed…” He shut up as she retrieved the discarded pants and pulled a condom from the pocket.

  His cock pulsed. In protest. In anticipation.

  Atticus was beyond any ability to differentiate.

  Arousal escaped and beaded on the tip of his penis. And though he hated the idea of having a barrier between them, he found it wildly erotic to watch as she tore the package open.

  He grabbed the base of his cock with one hand while the knuckles of the other turned white in their death grip on the bed clothing. He willed himself to hang on, to not disgrace himself by coming when she touched him.

  “Hurry,” he urged, the word little more than a hoarse pant.

  A spike of white-hot lust shot through him as her fingers brushed against the sides of his penis. Her face was as flushed as his, her lips parted in concentration and aroused need as she slowly worked the condom downward to cover his engorged cock.

  He wondered if extra-large was large enough—he wasn’t human, after all. Never had been. But then it was done and her hand was covering his, guiding him to her opening.

  He’d thought to take her another way. But the sight of her above him, full breasts and taut features, her hot woman’s flesh swallowing his cock, taking him deep inside her an inch at a time…

  Atticus had no strength to muster a protest, no will to do so. His hips arched off the bed as he drove himself the rest of the way in. “Kiss me,” he said, needing to share the breath of life with her in the moment she became his wife.

  Bryn moaned against his lips. Her cunt clenched on his hard cock as their tongues found each other.

  She didn’t know what had come over her. But being with Atticus had somehow destroyed her inhibitions and the self-conscious worry that came with initial intimacy.

  Everything felt so right with him. He just seemed…perfect. Made for her.

  For long moments she lost herself in his kiss, was content to twine her tongue with his as the muscles of her sheath rippled and spasmed and clung to his engorged penis. He was huge, long and thick, a throbbing presence that filled more than her channel.

  With a moan she lifted off him, let him escape until only the very tip of him was inside her. But she couldn’t bear to lose contact completely.

  His fingers took possession of her nipples, squeezed in silent punishment, in carnal command. She lowered herself on him, slowly at first, then faster as his hands moved to her hips and he took control, holding her, guiding her, his back arching as his thrusts took him deeper, harder until they were both panting, moaning, jerking in release.

  La Petite Mort. The little death.

  Atticus understood why the French had named the sweet moment of orgasm such a thing and he approved. If only all death could be so wonderfully sublime. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, then formed completely when Bryn brushed her mouth against his and said, “You’re looking very satisfied with yourself.”

  “Umm,” he murmured, tangling his fingers in her silky hair and relishing the feel of her breasts against his chest as she lay on top of him. “That’s because I am.”

  He grinned when he felt his cock start to stiffen where it was still lodged inside her. His lips captured hers, sucking and teasing as one hand stroked down her spine. He knew he should be grateful things had gone so smoothly, but as the kiss deepened and heat built between them, he craved more, wanted there to be no barriers between them the next time they made love. He ached to slide his cock into her, to feel her slick, heated core against his unprotected penis.

  “Bryn…” Words eluded him. The sudden sound of the doorbell broke and scattered the sentences that had formed in his thoughts as a tangled knot.

  She tensed but didn’t roll off him until the bell sounded again, more insistently this time. It was followed by a man’s voice yelling, “Bryn, it’s me. Mark.”

  Chapter Five

  Jealously assaulted Atticus, a mugger’s attack he hadn’t expected. Primitive instinct shouted, No! and had him ready to jump out of bed and stride to the front door. Now that he’d claimed Bryn as a wife he could end his vacation with a thought. One touch and Bryn’s suitor would be on his way—permanently. Or—

  Bryn distracted him with a kiss, reminded him without knowing she’d done it that she still thought him human. “I’ll be right back,” she said, starting to pull away from him.

  “Who is he?” Atticus asked, grabbing her hands.

  Her wrinkled nose and deep sigh went a long way toward calming the unexpected churn of emotions assaulting him. “Someone who thought I’d be the perfect wife for him since I can see his dead mother. I’ll tell you about it after I’ve told him to leave.”

  Atticus released her hands—reluctantly.

  “Coming,” Bryn yelled, her sense of humor kicking in with the realization she probably would have been doing just that with Atticus if Mark hadn’t interrupted.

  Since her dresser was closer than the pile of discarded clothing on the kitchen floor, she pulled on a pair of shorts and thin sweatshirt before slipping into the office. She left the doorway to her living quarters open, partly because it made her a little nervous having Mark show up unexpectedly and partly because she didn’t want Atticus to wonder if she’d told him the truth about Mark.

  For the second time in one night she was greeted with a bouquet of flowers. Only this one brought her a mix of sadness and exasperation instead of happiness.

  Bryn crossed her arms over her chest not only to minimize the impact of not wearing a bra but to make it clear she wasn’t going to take the offered flowers. “Mark, what are you doing here?”

  “I thought we could talk.”

  “We’ve already talked. I told you I won’t go out with you again. I’ve asked you to stop sending flowers and calling.”

  “I brought you a box of chocolates, too,” he said, completely ignoring what she said and lifting his arm away from his side to reveal the white and gold box.

  She shook her head. “Please leave, Mark.” For the first time she wondered if she should threaten to contact a lawyer. But what would she say? Mark sends me flowers every Sunday even though I’ve asked him not to. He calls, or at least I think some of the hang-ups are him but I can’t prove it. And when I do answer, if he’s on the line, he’s alw
ays polite.

  “Please stop this, Mark. There’s someone out there for you but it’s not me.” She felt a twinge of guilt as she added, “Last week’s temp met her fiancé on eHarmony.com. They have an amazing way of determining compatibility. I bet—”

  “Is that where you met him?” Mark’s face appeared strained as he looked past her.

  Bryn turned slightly. She couldn’t see Atticus through the doorway separating the work and living quarters, but the Aston Martin parked in front of the building was probably enough of a clue that she wasn’t alone. Even during the workweek the spaces in front of her office usually held only her car and sometimes one belonging to the temp Marietta sent over.

  It bothered Bryn to do it, but it suddenly bothered her more that he’d shown up now when for months he’d seemed content with no “in-person” contact. “You need to leave, Mark. You need to stop calling and sending flowers. I’m serious. I know you don’t consider yourself a stalker but it’s starting to feel that way to me. I’m not going to go out with you again—ever. And if you don’t stop, then you’re going to force me to ask for a restraining order.”

  It was hard, especially when his eyes grew moist and she saw the abject loneliness in them, but she closed the door quietly and firmly, hoping the gesture was harsh enough to get the message across though she felt guilty for doing it. She hated deliberately hurting someone even when she knew they brought it on themselves.

  With a sigh she closed her eyes and rested her forehead on the cool wood. A long minute passed, and then a second. She tensed, expected to hear him knock or ring the bell again.

  Receding footsteps finally sounded, followed by the blissful start of an engine and then a car driving away. Bryn startled when Atticus’ hands settled on her shoulders. She moaned softly when he kneaded the knotted muscles he found there.

  “Sorry you had to be here for that,” she said.

  His lips pressed soft kisses to her neck. “I’m not. If he shows up again, I’ll deal with him.”

  Her heart did a swan dive in her chest, leaping in joy only to sink into uncertainty when she reminded herself to take this one day at a time. Atticus was probably talking about the immediate future, as in, if Mark turned up again while he was still on vacation and staying with her.

  She turned and wrapped her arms around his waist, hoped her emotions didn’t show on her face. Her parent’s conditional love had left its mark on her, making her needy and yet cautious at the same time. Physical intimacy was always tricky for her. It opened emotional doors she usually kept guarded.

  It was too easy to make more of it than there really was. And yet…something about Atticus made her willing to risk the pain that would come if what seemed so perfect turned out to be nothing more than a vacation fling for him.

  He’d put his jeans on but his chest remained bare. Bryn pressed a kiss to the hard muscle above a tiny male nipple. “Where were we?” she asked, wanting to recapture their earlier closeness.

  Atticus rubbed his cheek against her hair and tightened his arms around her in a possessive hug. He didn’t like to see her in distress. He liked it even less that another man had come calling on her with flowers and chocolate.

  “I brought ice cream,” he found himself saying, remembering as he did so that the Cherry Garcia was on the counter where it’d been forgotten as soon as she kissed him. “It’s probably soft.”

  His cock, on the other hand, was hard and got harder when she licked over his nipple and rubbed against his erection. He felt her smile against his chest and his heart melted.

  “Some things are better soft,” she said. “Ice cream is one of them.”

  Atticus didn’t have the strength to release her completely. It should have felt foolish to hold hands with her as they traveled the short distance to the kitchen, but it didn’t. Even when she pointed at a cabinet and said, “Spoons in the top drawer. There’s an ice cream scoop in the one below,” he found it difficult to let her go. Thoughts of tugging her back over to the bed were held at bay only by the desire to learn more about Mark and to find a way to avoid wearing a condom again.

  Reluctantly Atticus freed Bryn so she could retrieve bowls and open the carton of ice cream. “Tell me about him,” he said.

  As if on cue the phone rang in both the office and the kitchen. Bryn said, “Let the machine pick it up.”

  A moment later there was a click, followed by Mark’s voice. “I left the flowers and the candy for you. I know you and Mom didn’t hit it off, but it’ll get better. You can’t really blame her, she thought… Well, it’s all my fault, not telling her about you before I brought you home. If you’ll give her another chance… We can make this work, Bryn.”

  There was a long silence, then finally a dial tone.

  Atticus moved to Bryn’s side. “You were about to say?”

  She took the scoop from him and began filling the bowls. “I met Mark when I went out on a call. Later I figured out he’d set the whole thing up to check me out, but at the time he was introduced as ‘a friend from the office interested in ghosts.’ There wasn’t a ghost, but the woman who’d asked me to come out insisted on fixing dinner for me since I don’t charge if there’s no ghost to deal with. Mark stayed.”

  Bryn pushed a bowl along the counter until it was in front of Atticus then took a spoon from his hand. “When it comes to people who don’t spend most of their time writing software and troubleshooting computer programs, Mark’s kind of shy and awkward. I found it…endearing, non-threatening. We went out.” She sighed, stirring and mashing her ice cream until it was smooth and formless except for the tiny squares of chocolate. “I liked him. That’s what makes this harder.”

  “What happened?” Atticus managed, finding it disconcerting to wrestle with the primitive, caveman-like emotions her admission stirred in him. He’d always considered himself a rational man, a just being, a person who brought order to chaos and dignity to the job. But when it came to Bryn—he was a mass of conflicting needs and desires.

  “He took me home to meet his mother.”

  “Who’s dead.”

  “Very much so. But not gone. She thought I’d come to send her away and she does not want to go. Even worse, Mark doesn’t want her to go. She threw a fit. He acted like a complete mama’s boy.” Bryn shrugged. “Let’s just say it wasn’t pretty. And once you’ve seen someone in that light, there’s no going back. I liked him. He was sensitive and smart and easy to be with. I’m not saying we would have ended up together long-term. But…I liked him. Now I feel sorry for him and at the same time I’m mad at him for not being stronger…for wasting his life and not being who I thought he was when I was going out with him.”

  Troubled eyes lifted to meet Atticus’. “Does that make sense at all?”

  Atticus set his empty bowl down then took hers and placed it on the counter as well. “It makes perfect sense,” he said, pulling her into his arms and nuzzling her neck, inhaling her scent and kissing the soft skin he had access to.

  Words joined, forming sentences only to break apart and realign as he tried to find the right way to express his feelings. Finally he said, “I don’t like seeing you suffer, but I can’t stop myself from being glad you’re with me and not him.”

  His hand slid up her back, over to cup her breast through the soft fabric of her thin sweatshirt. His mouth sought hers, claimed it in a chocolate-cherry kiss.

  “In case you’re wondering, I never slept with him,” she whispered when they parted, his lips a breath away from hers.

  The warm press of her palms over his hardened nipples was exquisite torture. “I want you again,” Atticus murmured.

  “I want you again too.”

  “Bed?” He swung her up in his arms and smiled when she laughed. Now that they’d consummated their union, the only ghostway to open for her was the one leading to his home. He could imagine cozy evenings by the fire, the two of them leisurely making love on his side of the house.

  The chaos to be found on the
other side of the house damped his smile somewhat. He glanced around suspiciously, though in his current human state he was at a disadvantage and wouldn’t know he was in the presence of one of his brothers unless they wanted him to.

  Plague take them! If he found out any of them were voyeurs on his wedding night he’d banish them to Hades. He’d assign them the unpleasant task of auditing those souls trapped on the banks of the river Styx and seeing which ones could be released.

  Let them commune with Phlegyas the ferryman and Cerberus the three-headed dog instead of their Xboxes for a change! he thought, ire building until he resolutely pushed thoughts of his brothers from his mind.

  Thoughts of Bryn’s suitor were not so easy to dismiss.

  He placed Bryn on the bed but resisted the urge to immediately strip them both of clothing and cover her body with his. “Be…right…back,” he said between kisses.

  It required a supreme effort of will to leave her. His cock protested with each step he took.

  It couldn’t be helped. Curiosity, male instinct, primal need—any one or all of them carried him to the front door and had him opening it, assuring himself Mark was gone.

  The flowers and box of chocolate were like a red flag to a bull. Muscles rippled. Nostrils flared.

  “We can take care of him for you,” a male voice said. Knuckles popped and cracked. “You’re family and nobody messes with family.”

  Atticus turned his head slightly to see the brother born after Sammael leaning against the wall, cloaked in darkness. It was shades of The Godfather or, given Azrael’s lack of appreciation for the classics, an interpretation of The Sopranos.

  “What are you doing here?” Atticus managed through clenched jaws.

  “Keeping an eye on things. So what’d you think of the whole Suriel the Trumpeter routine? Cool, huh? We collaborated on it.”

  Atticus opened his mouth with the intention of telling his brother to go away but stopped himself in time. Obviously this was a situation requiring the application of some psychology. For all their boisterous assertions that they could attend to the business of Death better than he could, apparently, his brothers needed reassurance and perhaps a bit of guidance.