He pulled up her skirts, ran his hands up her muscled leg, along the sweet jut of her hipbone.
Millicent fumbled at the buttons of his shirt, managed to open it enough to smooth her hands along his chest. Her touch set Gareth on fire. Alas, how she managed to heighten his senses, to bring his body to a level of excitement he had never experienced before.
He must have her. He would do anything to win her. Gareth pressed closer, claimed her tongue with his in a dance that mimicked his intent. Millicent clutched his shoulders in a possessive grip. He touched her. Touched her wet heat, her silky folds, and she arched against his hand.
He delved deeper. Deeper, until she squirmed beneath him. Until she growled with need.
In one smooth motion, Gareth slid his body over hers and kissed her entrance with his swollen flesh. Then gently, slowly, filled her with his need, with his desire. With his love.
Millicent arched back her head, breaking their kiss, exposing the smooth white curve of her throat. Her harsh gasps sounded loud in the tiny room. He ran his tongue over the creamy skin, relishing the salty-sweet taste of her.
Gareth ground his pelvis against hers.
You are mine. Whether you choose to acknowledge it or not, you are mine. But I will have more than your body. I will have your heart. The whole of it. Not just the damaged bits and pieces.
Millicent began to shake. The tremor ran from her center and spread through her limbs as her release overtook her. And Gareth’s body responded to her pleasure, but his own release did not spread like a wave. It imploded inside of him, shattering his senses in a burst of ecstasy, making spots of light dance before his eyes.
He stilled, gathered his wits about him, and pulled away from her. Then sat for a moment with his head bowed in his hands.
She mewed. Some soft, sad noise that made him want to return to her. It would be so easy to stay. To tell her she had freed him, that her love had been strong enough after all. She would believe his words with her head… but he could not be sure if she would believe it in her heart. And he had a chance to make Millicent whole. He could tell her about his plans, about his hopes to bring Nell back. But if it did not work… no. He could not risk it. The disappointment might destroy her.
Gareth rose, dressed, and left as quietly as he had entered.
He did not look back at Millicent, nor did she make another sound to try to make him stay.
Perhaps she too understood that words were meaningless between them now.
He ran into the guard Bran had placed at the door during the tavern keeper’s absence. The man half shifted to jackal before he recognized Gareth, then moved aside. Gareth strode through the city like a blind man, his hand in his pocket around the bag of Nell’s ashes. He got lost several times on his way out of the tunnels, his mind distracted with thoughts of Millicent.
And ran into Bran at the top of Lady Roseus’s stairway. They stared at each other in silence for a few moments.
“You should marry her,” said Gareth.
Bran grinned. “I plan to… if she’ll have me.” He shuffled his feet, stuck his hands deep in his pockets. “And what about my Millie?”
“If she’ll have me.”
“We are a fine pair, old chap.”
Gareth grinned back at him. He suddenly felt lighter, as if his task wasn’t as impossible as he thought it might be. If a gruff bear could somehow manage to make a timid flamingo fall in love with him…
“Well, then.” Bran stepped to the side and they passed each other on the stairway.
Gareth did not see Lady Roseus as he strode through her house. Just the footman, who called for the carriage Gareth had left waiting. It had come with Hobover House. Indeed, he had several conveyances provided with his new estate. This coach had been kept up particularly well, with a coat of fresh varnish and smoothly oiled wheels. He ducked through the door and made himself comfortable, for he had a lengthy journey ahead of him to return to Ipswitch… and only Nell’s ashes, and memories of his encounter with Millicent, to keep him company.
Twenty
Millicent had closed her eyes for what she thought had been just a moment, a delicious feeling of lassitude overwhelming her. And then she heard the door to her little room snick shut. She sat up with a start, blinking in the gloom. He had left her. After making love to her until she was so exhausted she’d fallen asleep, he’d just walked out without a word.
She glanced around the room in confusion. Perhaps she had only dreamed of him?
But she now felt fully awake. She could smell sour ale, could feel her hard pallet beneath her. She was still in the Swill and Seelie, where she had wallowed in misery for weeks. Her surroundings were too painfully real.
As real as the gentle ache from Gareth’s lovemaking.
Millicent hugged her shoulders. No, it had not been a dream. He had come to her. Had made love to her like a man starved for affection. Yet he had asked her to give him the relic…
She had thought it had been his way of saying good-bye.
For the last few weeks she had resumed her old life once again, determined to forget him. But she couldn’t. A head of blond hair would set her heart racing, and then plummeting to earth when she realized it wasn’t him. She would dream of him night after night… of his goodness, his courage, his gentle touch.
Millicent eavesdropped on every conversation she could, trying to find out what had happened to him after that fateful day. Talk flowed about the battle between Queen Victoria and the Duke of Ghoulston. The patrons of the pub relished the tales of Ghoulston’s blindness and eventual madness. But no one mentioned her enchanted knight.
Millicent dropped her arms. She knew the queen had taken him to Buckingham, but after that, Gareth seemed to have disappeared from aboveground. She feared the Master had taken the relic to the Hall, and trapped Gareth inside it forever.
But her knight had come to her. Somehow. Someway. And he still needed her. She had felt it in his kiss, with his every touch.
And she had promised she would never forsake him again.
Millicent surged to her feet. How dare that piece of metal try to tell her she wasn’t good enough for him? That her love wasn’t strong enough? So—so she couldn’t break the spell… who knew what sort of torture Merlin had intended with his curse? Perhaps he wanted to deny Gareth any happiness at all, and despite their different natures, she knew she could make him happy.
Her anger at having someone—or something— other than herself determine her fate, did what no persuasion could have. It made Millicent look at herself in a new light.
She had changed since she had first met Gareth. He had tamed her beast, had taught her about the value of charity and honor. She had been raised in the Underground, had learned to be selfish in all her concerns… and yet, she had still loved Nell. Millicent had taken care of her and risked her life for her.
Nell had died to help queen and Country.
And Millicent knew if she could ask Nell, the firebird would answer that she did not regret it.
So, what made a person good or bad? She’d always known the answer, but now embraced it fully within her heart: their actions. Not the cost of the clothing they wore, or the size of their home, or where they lived, whether in the grandest part of West London, or deep within the Underground. Even if they shape-shifted to a beast, their animal natures did not define them.
Millicent yanked open her door, strode into the pub and over to the bar. When she discovered Bran had left his room, she spun and poked a finger at the messenger sprite snoring on the counter. “Where is he?”
One translucent wing fluttered. “Eh, what?”
“Bran. Where did he go?”