~~~Valerie~~~
Once Mrs. Rose and Azure were gone, Jackson and I walked with Stephanie back to Jackson’s office where she got into her car and drove away. By that point in the night, I was tired and not paying attention to where Jackson was leading me when he directed me away from his office.
The second the shell of my bookstore came into view, I started to cry. Jackson scooped me into his arms, and I buried my head in his shoulder. I didn’t notice that the building he entered was across the street from the bookstore until he sat me on my feet just inside of an apartment door. From that spot right inside the door, I could see across the studio apartment to the double doors that led out to a balcony in which I was familiar with.
“Why are we in Nick’s apartment,” I asked, turning to watch him bolt the lock and switch on a few lights.
He froze mid-flip of the main room’s light. He didn’t say a word only looked at me with surprise and chagrin.
“Say something,” I ordered, though I understood what he wasn’t saying. With all that had happened that night, I hadn’t paid that much attention to the sound of his voice, and I wanted to hear it again to know for sure.
“Valerie, I…”
“You’re Nick aren’t you? So all of this time you’ve just been pretending that you couldn’t speak to me while we were in public. Why? What kind of game are you playing here? You’re my mate. I’ve seen the mark. I don’t know why it wasn’t there before today, but it’s clearly there,” I said, pointing to his hand and the mark. “Why would you treat me that way? You’re supposed to love me, not humiliate me.”
Tears I didn’t even know I had in me started streaming down my face at the shame.
“Valerie, no, stop crying. I can explain,” he said, scooping me into his arms again and carrying me toward the bedroom and the bathroom attached to it. I didn’t fight him. I was too tired to fight. I was too tired to argue. I was too tired to do anything. I wanted him despite the deception. I knew that once I’d had my cry, I’d forgive him. We could start over from that night and let the last month or so be a blurry memory.
“Please explain,” I said when he sat me on the toilet.
“I’m going to.” He stepped away from me and over to a large, freestanding, oval bathtub. He turned on the faucet, and the tub began to fill with hot water.
“I was under a spell. Around the same time you arrived, Talia put a spell on me to keep me from being able to speak to you. That’s why Rose and Myrtle took her to the holding cells tonight. Before the fire, Rose and Myrtle were at my house trying to see if they could break the spell or find out who had cast it to force them to break it.”
As he spoke, he began pouring different things into the water. I smelled lavender, chamomile, sandalwood, and others I couldn’t identify. I could tell that he didn’t know what he should put in the water, and since I didn’t either, I let him pour. The smell that came from the water was soothing, so it didn’t matter.
“Why would she do that?” I asked.
“Ever since my wife died, Talia’s made it clear that she has feelings for me. She’s never pushy or overly flirty. She’s just made sure I knew she was willing to be there for me and love me, which I told her I appreciated, but since we weren’t mates, I could never have feelings for her. I guess when she found out you were coming, she feared that I would fall for you, and she was right to fear that.”
“But you didn’t fall for me,” I said, drowsily.
“I did. I fell for you the instant Stephanie showed me your picture. I didn’t want to fall for you. I wanted to wallow in my grief for my wife for as long as the rest of my people have to wallow in theirs for their loved ones, but I knew that I couldn’t take the chance you would mate with someone else, so I invited you here.”
“But…”
I couldn’t say anything else. His words brought back memories of when I first saw his photo. The emotions I’d felt for him even then were strong. I took comfort in knowing he’d felt the same upon seeing me.
“I didn’t realize at first that something was off,” he said before I could say more. “It wasn’t until we touched, and I knew I had marked you that I knew something wasn’t right between us. I wanted to say something then but couldn’t. You had just arrived in Greenleaf. I worried that if I mated you so soon, I would traumatize you. After I had marked you, I wanted to explain everything to you. When I realized I couldn’t, I had a witch mask my mark. The deception was just supposed to last long enough for you to get acquainted with this world. I didn’t want to bring you here, mate you, and then explain something was wrong with the mating all in your first week here.”
“You should have come to me,” I said, watching as he stepped back to me while removing his shirt.
“Yes, I should have come to you,” he said, resigning himself to the fact that hiding the mark hadn’t been a good idea. He knelt down in front of me to remove my shoes and socks.
“I panicked. I was scared that you would run home if you felt pressured into something you didn’t want. Then there was the whole ‘I couldn’t speak to you’ aspect. This type of mating is new to me, and I handled it poorly.”
“But you were able to talk to me,” I said, as he tossed the items aside and lifted me from the toilet seat.
“The part where as Nick I was able to talk to you, I don’t completely understand. Not being a wizard, I didn’t pay enough attention to spells in school. Myrtle says that our mating found a way around the curse because I was pretending to be someone else, though I wasn’t intentionally pretending. When you didn’t recognize me, I discovered I could talk to you, so I introduced myself as Nick, an abbreviated version of my last name.”
“Oh…” I said, letting him pull my shirt over my head. The steam and smells coming from the tub had me so relaxed that I didn’t immediately realize that he was disrobing us both.
“I had them remove the spell hiding my mark tonight and had planned on coming to you with the truth tomorrow after we broke the ‘not being able to talk to you’ spell. I never meant for you to feel unwanted…unloved. Raise your leg.”
Startled, I focused my gaze on him, only to realize that he was kneeling before my nearly naked body asking me to lift my leg so that he could remove my sweat pants. I immediately began to panic. I was standing in front of him completely nude. All of my rolls, stretch marks, not so perky breasts, unshaved legs were on display for him. I stepped out of the pants while at the same time trying to cover myself.
“Don’t do that,” he said, standing and pushing my arms to the side. “Never be ashamed to show me your body.”
I stammered to say something, but before I could, he touched me. He reached up with one hand and pulled my hair from the clip that held it up. With the other, he cupped my cheek, leaned in, and kissed me lightly on the lips.
The kiss was soft, sweet, and explosive. I leaned into Jackson, hoping that he would deepen it, but he didn’t. He pulled away from me, took my hand and led me over to the tub. He turned off the water and lifted me in his arms. He stepped into the tub and lowered us both into the water. Immediately, the soothing heat and oils washed over me, as we sank nearly to our chins.
“This feels wonderful,” I said, sighing with pleasure. I tried to shift out of Jackson’s grip, fearing that he was uncomfortable with me in his lap, but he held me tight.
“Good. A nice long soak in this should help your body relax and heal,” Jackson said, opening his legs so that he could cradle me better and so that more of my body sank under the water.
I laid my head against his chest and closed my eyes, wanting nothing more than to fall asleep to the feel of him running his hands over my body. He let me lie that way for a long time before shifting me so that I could lie back in the water to wet my hair. I worried about my wounds, but he assured me that they were fine and that the water and shampoo he was going to use wouldn’t bother them.
Never in my adult life had I ever had someone wash my hair for me. Even if I had, I don’t think it would have been as erotic as the way Jackson did it. The way he massaged my scalp, brushed his fingers through my hair, and rinsed every inch clean, had my body aching for him to touch more of me.
The hair washing was nothing, though, compared to the way he washed my body. I was all right with the way he washed my face, neck, and arms to get the remaining dirt and ash off me. The way he washed my breasts was not innocent. He used both hands on them instead of just the one holding the cloth. I arched into him. I all but purred because his touch was soft and sensual.
Once he had my nipples as hard as they’d ever been, the hand holding the washcloth, his right hand, moved to my stomach. His left stayed at my breasts, kneading them, plucking them, circling them. I moaned his name when his cloth hand reached the tuft of hair between my legs.
“You should make me stop,” he said. “You’ve been through too much tonight. I should clean you and get you to bed.”
“Please…” was all I could say as he let go of the washcloth and began playing with my hair.
“Valerie, I…” he started to say.
Knowing he wouldn’t take things any further, I tilted my pleading eyes his way and opened my legs. The bathwater wouldn’t allow for the greatest friction, but it would be enough to give me the release I desperately needed.
I wanted to hold the eye contact we’d made when I turned to him, but when he slid a finger between my folds and found my clit, I gasped, and my eyes closed on their own. As he circled my clit, I felt him grow harder against my back. I wanted to touch him, but I couldn’t reach him.
I started to shift positions, but before I could, his left hand left my breasts and rose to my cheek. He tilted my head a bit more and lowered his so that he could kiss me. The kiss started out light, but I wanted more, so I opened to him. He slid his tongue in my mouth at the same time that he dipped a finger inside me. He pumped the finger in and out of me a few times before going back to my clit.
The kisses, the feel of his body wrapped around me, the movement of his finger over the swollen bud between my legs was all too much, and he knew it because just as a low rumble started to build in his chest, I came hard and fast. I dug my fingers into his arms for leverage and rode his finger until my limbs felt like jelly.
He didn’t stop kissing me, though, and when I found my strength, I turned in his lap so that I was straddling him. We were kissing fiercely by then, and I was rubbing myself against him.
When I moved to touch him, to place him at my entrance, he grabbed my hand to stop me.
“But it’s your turn,” I said, pulling from him.
“Valerie, baby, you’ve been through too much tonight. It’s late. If we do this, I won’t be able to stop. I’ve wanted you for weeks now so this won’t be slow, it won’t be soft, and it won’t be just once. It’ll be all night and most of tomorrow. I’ll probably be inside you all weekend. Maybe by then, I’ll be able to stay out of you long enough to feed and bathe you again. We shouldn’t start this tonight. We should wait until you’ve healed.”
“Jackson, please,” I begged, pressing myself to him and kissing his neck. “I need you badly. I ache so much. Please, make love to me.”
He growled loudly, but I didn’t stop kissing his neck, nibbling his ear, or whispering to him how wet I was for him, how I wanted to come around his cock, how I wanted to watch him come in me.
In one swift movement, we were out of the tub.
“Hold onto me,” he said.
I wrapped my arms and legs around him, while he held tightly to me with one arm and reached for a towel with the other. He wrapped us in a towel and stalked toward the bed.
Jerking back the thick comforter and sheet, he gently laid me down. He tried to pull away from me, but I tightened my arms and legs around him. I had him and wasn’t going to let go.
Jackson chuckled and brought his lips to mine. We kissed while he tried to dry us with the towel. I left him to it and took advantage of the situation to reach between us and cup his cock. Simply touching the swollen length made my insides clench in want. He insisted on taking things slowly, trying to convince me to stop for the night, but that wasn’t going to happen.
The second I gripped him, he stopped what he was doing and held himself over me, looking into my eyes but not seeing me through the fog of pleasure my touch brought on. I moved my hand slowly on him, feeling the tension rise and his lust fill the air.
“If you keep doing that, I’m going to come all over you,” he said, leaning his forehead on mine, but not stopping me.
“On me or in me is your decision to make. I know which I prefer, but you…” I ceased talking to bite his lower lip and pump him harder.
“Fuck,” he moaned and crashed his body onto mine, his lips onto mine. I reached around him, grabbed his ass, and shifted my body so that my clit ground into his shaft.
“You’re wet. Are you sure you’re ready for me? You were so very tight around my finger. Can you take me? I don’t want to hurt you.”
“As long as you love me and don’t ever deny me again, you could never hurt me. Now please make me come again. I can’t go any longer without you inside me.”
He lifted his hips slightly, adjusted himself so that he was at my entrance, swore again at how wet and ready I was, and he eased his head into me. I cried out from the pleasure and begged for more of him. He slid a little further and buried his face in my neck. When he wouldn’t move any deeper, I began to tilt my hips, which caused him to slip a little further.
“Yes, you need to take over. I’m afraid I’m going to hurt you. My instincts are telling me to pound into you. They are telling me to slam all the way inside you and ride you hard. I…”
“Please, oh my God, please do that,” I said, cutting him off and pushing hard on his ass so that he nearly did what he was afraid to do.
“Valerie, baby, I…”
Again, I cut him off. I reached up and grabbed the back of his neck, looked him straight in the eyes, and said, “Make love to me now, hard, and exactly how your wolf is telling you to. I’m so close to coming. If you would just… I w…”
That time it was his turn to cut me off. He reached up, grabbed the headboard with one hand, and reached down to grab my hip with the other. I arched to the angle he needed me to be in, then he slammed into me with bone clattering force. I screamed his name. He slowly withdrew, then moved quickly back into me, and I shattered. He swore at the way my body spasmed around him. After that, he began moving rapidly in and out of me, chasing his release, which came seconds after mine.