Another nightgown she was not aware she possessed had been laid out on the bed. It was white, as sheer as a breath on a winter’s day, and tied in a rather suggestive fashion at the tops of her shoulders with ribbons as fine as spiderweb. The accompanying robe was cobalt velveteen, and the hue made her eyes sparkle like sapphires. As much as she appreciated it, the ensemble deserved to be admired by another party—
“Beatrice.” Arthur called her name from outside her window.
Without hesitation, she threw her legs over the sill and was lifted into his arms. He set her down with care and, taking her hand, drew her toward his woodland sanctuary.
“I was there the night Felicity met the duke, you know.” Beatrice took a deep breath of the fresh night air.
“Were you?” Arthur laced their fingers together. “I heard he carried her away through the Countess of Livingston’s garden.”
“He did. He swept her up in his arms and spirited her off at speed.”
“Is that a dare, Madam?”
Beatrice hesitated one heartbeat too long: he lifted her with as much effort as he would an apple, and off he sped, into his copse, achieving his goal in less time than she had to draw two breaths. He stopped at the entrance, set her down, and gently spun her around to face a bower of cushions and blankets, the velvet curtain from the attics hanging as a backdrop from sturdy branches. Lanterns were scattered about, light playing over the rich colors of the fabrics, and a hamper sat to the side, spilling over with sustenance. The setting was made even more exquisite as it meshed so well within the sumptuousness of nature, the stars and the moon peeking through the canopy of trees.
Beatrice leaned against him, tucked under his chin. “Did you find inspiration in La Belle Assemblée after all?”
“I did not.” Arthur huffed. “It was, in fact, The Lady’s Monthly Museum.”
“It never was!” Beatrice laughed.
He turned her in his arms and took her face in his hands, marveling at her expression. “‘Loose now and then a scattered smile and that I’ll live upon.’”
“Your facility for quotation and this setting,” Beatrice said to his sternum, hiding her face from his besotted look, “betrays a love for the theatrical.”
Arthur nuzzled the top of her head. “My mum loved the theatre, and Arcadia Demesne was known far and wide as a place traveling players could settle and perform before their feet itched for the road. We provided them with room to store their various properties and welcomed them back with open arms upon their return.”
Beatrice led him onto the stage he’d set, kicking off her slippers to curl her toes into the plush rug and smiling at the candles in their holders. Hidden creatures rustled in the underbrush, unafraid, and she looked up as a light breeze ran through the branches above, a bird call sounding overhead.
Beatrice turned to him. “‘The clamorous owl, that nightly hoots and wonders/At our quaint spirits.’”
“Madam…” Arthur fell to his knees. “You take my breath away.”
She held his face in her hands. “I hope I may live up to what the theatre manager intends.”
“I assure you, there is no one better for the role.”
Beatrice cast her costume aside as Arthur leapt back to his feet to toss his clothing around the copse, his shirt dangling from a nearby branch. She laughed as he pulled her to him and dropped them gently to the ground, rolling on his back to sit her almost directly onto his…his manly part. “I believe I mentioned I do not like to ride,” she chided.
“I believe you once did not care for kissing.” Arthur slipped his fingers down her belly and teased her with his thumb. The now-familiar sensation came over her, the paradox of turmoil and languor, and she rolled her hips, his cock hardening against her thigh.
“Oh.” Beatrice moved again, and he moaned, gripping her hips. She wanted to giggle at the way she rubbed along him like a cat but thought he might take her laughter ill. She rose on her knees and felt like one of those goddesses of his; small she may be, but what power she had to make him growl so. She took his hands in hers and stroked her face with them, drew them down over her breasts, settled one on her hip, returned the other to her cunny, laying his fingers in the best place to convey pleasure. She leaned down and braced herself on his chest, and both gusted sighs of contentment and impatience. “I see. This is indeed a class of riding I foresee enjoying, Your Grace.”
“Do not—ah!” He gasped as Beatrice reached down to touch him, to run her fingers over him as he did her. He throbbed in her palm. The strength he called upon to set a leisurely pace was apparent in the sweat gathering on his brow.
Beatrice moved and through a combination of instinct and pure luck brought him to her entrance. She looked at him from beneath her lashes. “Arthur. Show me what to do.”
***
He showed her by doing, rearing up gently and sheathing himself in her heat. She lay her hands on his shoulders and rocked. He braced his feet and lifted his hips in tandem, ran his hands from her shoulders to thighs, up her sides, ran his fingers through her hair, the golden strands luminous in the candlelight. He set one hand at the back of her neck, gripping her nape as her movements settled into a rhythm she deemed best, if her breathing was anything to go by. With his other, he teased her most sensitive place to her approval and her censure when he slipped it away.
As much as he desired the release that awaited them, he did not wish to rush their way to it.
Could he feel pride when he was feeling so much else? How well she took command of their pleasure, having not known it before. How quickly she discovered what was best for her fulfillment and for his and sought to give them both the joy of this act. If he’d had any doubts she was his match they were gone—and on the heels of that thought, his ability to think clearly as she found a movement—Baldr, Sif, Loki, Odin, sweet Valkyries—that made him shudder with deepest arousal as she squeezed around his cock and moved, over and over until his blood sang in his veins. He wrapped his arms around her, his mouth worshipping every inch of skin he could reach, inspiring her to further heights of passion as she writhed in response. The tingling in his balls threatened to draw it all to a close, but not until he made them one in truth.
“I would bond with you now,” he murmured.
“Where shall you bite?” She playfully nipped at his shoulder.
Arthur struggled to keep his voice discernible above a growl. “It is often in a private place known only to the bonded pair.”
Beatrice gripped him with her knees, holy Freya, the better to glare down at him. “I want it to be seen. I want all to know you are mine.”
He sat up, keeping her tight to him, huffing at her little giggle at the sudden change in position. They kissed, and he scented her beneath her jaw, trailed his tongue around her earlobe. She tilted her head to his chest and moved her hair away from the side of her neck. He licked it and nudged it with his teeth, and she nodded. As their passion mounted, his fangs lowered, and with as much care as he could muster, he bit.
Their ecstasy exploded, and Beatrice shook in his arms, tightening around him as she found her release, goading his own. As naturally as if he had done it an infinite number of times, as easily as he called Her name every day, when he came he invoked Freya; he said please and thank you and let him give his wife, his beloved, the child she yearned for. He gently laid his mate down on the soft layers of their bower. Arthur embraced his duchess, his lover, and ran a hand over her belly, imagined, and believed.
***
Beatrice wrapped herself in a silken coverlet as Arthur took care to fold the gossamer nightdress before he set it aside. “Have you had Lady Coleman make me a new wardrobe?”
He looked at her, slightly abashed. “This is from the players’ store.”
“A costume?”
“Desdemona, I fear.” He grimaced and offered her a sugared plum in consolation.
“Your beloved dramatist’s heroines do not enjoy pleasant fates.” She took a bite of the treat and started. “Did you know him?”
“Who? Shakespeare?”
How she adored making him scowl. “I know you lot do not age as we humans do.”
“Madam, I object.” He shook out a cloth and laid out a selection of victuals. “I am not two hundred years old. In Shifter years that would make me…” The math appeared to be beyond him. “Very, very old. As old as Conlon, for Odin’s sake.”
“There is much I do not know.” Beatrice stroked the bite at the back of her neck and shivered.
“Now that we are bonded, you will no longer age at the rate of the rest of humanity, and as a consequence, I have sacrificed my years to match your own.”
“That is generous of you, to lose those years.”
He sat and pulled her into his lap, his fingers finding her mark. “Those years are wasted if I do not have you to give them to.”
“Even if they are given to Lady Frost?”
“A glorious challenge, that lady. I find I would miss her did she go.”
“Oh.” Arthur played with the ring on her finger, and she held out her hand. “Charlotte made one of her faces when she saw this and would not tell me what it signified.”
He cleared his throat and said, “It is the gem of office for those whose task it is to resolve all dilemmas and right all quandaries, and I will say no more about it at the moment.”
Beatrice had another question at any rate. “I was surprised to see it set in silver. Is that not anathema to versipelles?”
“Bloody wolves.” Arthur scrubbed his hands over his head in agitation, with the delightful result she needs must comb her fingers through it to put it in order. “Their lore states they become powerless when silver is applied to their person, as in jewelry or when used as a weapon. This is a ruse, for it is gold that harms all Shifters and confines them in their essential forms, catskin or bearskin or duck feathers. As little as an ounce of gold is able to trap versipelles until they are free of it.”
“Then what of Lowell’s curse?”
“In fairness, that is not an exaggeration,” he allowed. “If the Alpha of any species does not bring forth young, then the pack or the sleuth or the herd disbands. It is something of a curse as it means the rest, the followers of that Alpha, will not reproduce.”
Oh, dear. “Arthur, I fear you have been unfortunate in your spouse.”
He cupped her face in his hands, his massive, warm, loving hands. “Beatrice, that creature did not take you successfully to wive, and I swear on my true essence and by Frigga and Odin and Freya and Thor, you will have as many cubs as your heart can love.”
“I anticipate prodigious diligence on your part.”
“And I on yours. As my brother and his wife decided together, so shall we, when you wish.”
Beatrice had wished for it from the start of their bed play, for what it was worth. “I am rather disappointed there will be no dancing under the crescent moon in the nip.”
“I did not say that, did I?” he teased. “I look forward to introducing you to our ways. We have a number of ceremonies and observances to be undertaken as a sleuth.”
“Disting,” she recalled. “In the spring.”
“And in the summer, Lammas to celebrate the first fruits, and Haustblot in the autumn, and of course Vetrnaetur.”
“Oh, of course. Let us not forget Vetrnaetur.” Beatrice stumbled over the pronunciation. “Will we… Must we let everyone know the bite has taken, or is it enough it will be seen?”
“There are one or two things that require we gather, and the sooner the better. We will meet the sleuth at dawn.”
“Will the bite help us call in the children?”
“It cannot hurt. But are you? Hurt?”
“No.” Her eyes sparkled. “But I am doomed to high-necked gowns for the rest of my days. Much like Viscountess Wallace.”
“Oh ho, you are a gossip when it suits you, I see.” Arthur’s eyes shone with delight.
Beatrice wrapped her arms around his neck. “You suit me.”
“And you, me.” And kissing suited them both very well.
***
Beatrice found herself bundled back into strong arms and deposited on her windowsill well before the moon set. She stole another kiss to add to her store, an infinite space larger even than Arcadia’s attics.
“So,” Arthur said once his breath had returned. He laid his forehead on hers, and she played with the lock of hair she claimed for her own.
“So?” Beatrice prodded. “Are we to cavort around a fire at dawn?”
“Not as such. But we are to meet at dawn, and there will be a fire. You need your rest.”
“Will you not stay?”
“I cannot.” He took her hand in his and stroked his thumb over the topaz in her ring. “For I have a request to put to you and would leave you to think on it.”