Heart of Darkness (38 page)

“Of course, you are,” he told her with a
frown.

“Then why have things grown awkward between
us.”

“Awkward?” he scoffed. “We've only been
rejoined for an hour or so.”

“Don't lie, Wolfe. Something is wrong. Why
not tell me what it is?” she said and swept over to the drinks
table to pour herself another brandy. Isabeau took it back then
swiftly bowed her head to prevent the bout of coughing that always
assailed her after she drank brandy.

“I failed you, Isabeau. What is to say that
it won't happen again?”

At first, she thought he was playing. Or
trying to distract her, but then she realized that that wasn't the
case. His face had grown ashen and his jaw tensed.

“What is to say that it will? You shall
try your best, Wolfe. There is no need to have fear. What is life
if we live it with fear? No life at all! For four years, I have
lived that way and thought never to escape it. Perhaps we shall not
be able to outrun the Milesians but we shall have attempted to do
so
and
together. Tis not much,
but it is enough for me. More than enough. To know that I'm bound
to you fills with me happiness, more than I can even dare to
admit.”

“But why? Tis not as though we face a smooth
future,” he protested.

“No, but we shall be together. And we shall
face it together. That, after far too many years of being alone, is
quite quite sufficient. Indeed, more than sufficient. I told you,
Wolfe, I love you. From my background, I know, that that is all
that counts. And that you possibly don't love me, makes me more
happy than words can express.” Her lower jaw popped out to the side
as she tried to hold in her emotions and knowing that she could
not, she spun away from him and hid her face.

“You don't understand what a mate is, do you
Isabeau? Truly?”

“Theoretically, I do. Tis the same as a soul
mate.”

“In the world of the Sidhe, theory does not
exist. Only fact. A mate is the other half of one's soul, as you
say. But not in the way of humans. We are forged from the same
fire. We are twins of the heart. When one has found their mate, it
is as though the body cannot function. You remember I told you of
my Grandfather? His talent was for numbers and he gambled
heavily?

“After my Grandmother died, his mate, he lost
his talent and died a year or so later. A mate is the most integral
part of a Sidhe and many are unlucky and do not find theirs, but I
have found mine and you, yours. Love...is far too...” He paused and
considered his words for a moment, leaving her waiting with bated
breath. “Love is so inadequate for what I feel for you. You are my
past, present and future. To say that I love you is not enough. It
cannot fully express how I feel for you. When you say you love me,
that is because you know not of the Sidhe ways. Only of human. The
length of our marriage will change and deepen your feelings for me,
until what you now consider love is a mere smidgen of what you will
feel.”

His words were heartfelt and came from the
soul. They were enough to have her stomach clenching and her
swallowing convulsively with relief.

“You're rather full of yourself, aren't you,
Wolfe?” she retorted with a faint smile and was pleased when he
chuckled.

Before he spoke, he winked at her and
murmured, “Confidence is a blessing, my dear. Not a fault.”

She nodded wryly and eyed him as a knock
sounded at the door and a barrage of staff entered. His gaze was
filled with promise, both for the night ahead and the future and
for the first time, in a very, very long time, Isabeau felt
secure.

Epilogue

With a long, slow groan, Isabeau's hands
clawed into the bedding beneath her. She felt exhilaration rush
through her as Wolfe's fingers dug into her hips and then ran down
along the curve of her overlarge stomach. His tongue ran along the
length of her quim and a shudder quaked through her, as the tip of
the muscle swirled around her clitoris and ignited a rush of
pleasure to flood with liquid fire through her entire being. When
it flickered back and forth, back and forth, every single part of
her tensed and then released. Her muscles burned with unquenched
need.

“Wolfe! Please,” she grunted as he began to
nibble it between his teeth. “Why do you torture me so?”

“Say it.”

“No.”

Her words incited him to suckle her nubbin
and a piercing cry escaped her. “Please!”

“Isabeau, just say it. Three little words.
That is all you have to do!”

“It isn't becoming for a Duchess to say the
like!” she gasped.

Wolfe snorted and suckled at her a little
more. “Since when has that counted for aught with you?”

“Since we knew I was pregnant!” she retorted
and pressed her forehead against the bedding. The muscles in her
stomach clenched as his fingers ran down the length of her thighs
and then slid inside her quim. He curled his fingers inside her
channel, rubbing that delicious spot within her that only he could
find.

“You're my woman first, Isabeau. Then a
mother, then a Duchess.”

Even though he was torturing her, his words
made her smile. For she knew of no other man, who would have said
the like. Duchess first and above all else. That was always the
rule.

“Tis rude!” she gasped again, this time as
his fingers slipped in and out in a parody of what she wanted most
in the world! His cock thrusting into her and possessing her until
she didn't know where he began and she ended.

“Nothing is rude between these four
walls...”

She felt the cheeks of her buttocks separated
by rough fingers and then the flicker of his tongue against the
rosette that rested there. A quiver rushed through her and she
rushed, “Please, fuck me.”

“That wasn't so difficult, was it?” he
murmured and then, she felt him move up behind her backside and
finally, he did what she so needed.

Grasping her hips from behind, his thick cock
slid through the lips of her quim and when it brushed against her
nubbin, she cried out, “Please! Fuck me. Fuck me!”

He chuckled, satisfied at her submission.

When he complied, she thought that she may
have died and gone to heaven. His hips pistoned into her and the
movement pushed him so deep that she began to cry. Her fingers
ripped at the bedding and she screamed as he began to move into her
faster and faster. Her elbows shook from supporting her body,
feeling like jelly. Tension built within her, making her rock back
against him.

The sound of her bottom smacking his hips
sounded loud in her ears.

He covered her with his body and pressed his
hands to either side of her own. The sensation of him touching her
along the entire length of her body was wonderfully satisfying and
had his thrusts penetrating her even deeper. She gloried in the
rough haired feel of him against her back.

His fingers delved underneath her body and
began to flicker at her nubbin again. The strumming sensation had
her quivering and as he pumped harder into her, touching every part
of her and overpowering her with a welter of feelings, she
channeled her over-brimming magick into her ring. Letting it
blossom inside her, she forced it to spread to him and with two
more strokes, she felt the blistering heat as he climaxed and it
triggered her own pleasure.

She felt so light, so free that her heart
flew as well as her mind. Pleasure beyond pleasure rushed through
her until she thought that she would collapse with it and when
finally, it waned and her heart returned to its normal, steady beat
and her lungs collected sufficient air to breathe as usual, Isabeau
felt a deep contentment rumble through her.

Wolfe's hands cupped the heavy weight of her
belly and she felt herself be almost lifted and then rolled on to
her back. He pressed a kiss to her forehead and then sunk down
beside her.

They both lay supine on the bed, almost as
though they had been through a war and had lived to tell the tale.
But the effects of climaxing through the ring were so explosive,
that every time she did it, they ended up like limp moppets on the
bed!

The sun shined brightly through the curtains,
for it was early afternoon and while her pregnancy had not been the
total cure that Wolfe had aspired to, since their joining and the
fruits of their loins had taken seed in her belly, Wolfe no longer
had to sleep entirely through the day. He could awaken in the early
afternoon, when the sun was at its zenith but the earth's power was
not so strong.

“Are you ready to meet with him?” she asked,
her words piercing the quiet like a dagger.

“No,” he admitted gruffly.

“It's encouraging that he made the first
move,” she replied and curled on to her side to nuzzle against him
comfortingly. Two days ago, Jaegar had written them a missive
stating that he wished to make reparations for his behavior and
that he would be traveling to meet them on this day.

Wolfe felt certain that they were on the edge
of experiencing Jaegar's malevolence, whilst she hoped that it was
the signs of a truce being declared.

“Encouraging, perhaps. Although it depends
upon his motives.”

“Why must you think so bad of him?” she asked
with a sigh.

“You ask me that?” he retorted.

“Well, it's not necessarily a question,
Wolfe. More rhetorical.”

She didn't have to see him, to know that he
rolled his eyes. “About five years ago, he tried to bankrupt me,
you know.”

Isabeau gasped and rolled upwards. When she
said roll, she meant staggered upwards and relied upon Wolfe to
push her the last few feet upwards. At seven months pregnant, she
was hardly as mobile as she'd once been.

“He didn't! Did he?”

He nodded. “The majority of father's wealth
is in the entail of the estate, but Jaegar only discovered that
when he took me to court. A very humiliating experience on both our
parts. Not only did it drag our family history and reputation
through the newspapers, but it was just another spiteful act on his
part. So forgive me, Beau, if I can't forgive and forget. It takes
a lot more than one missive to make things right or to make me
believe in him!”

With a sympathetic frown on her face, she
reached over and cupped his cheek. “I love you, Wolfe.”

As soon as she murmured the words, Isabeau
watched as he started to grin. When she had first declared them and
expected him to reply in kind, it had hurt her greatly when he
hadn't. But now, she used it to stir him out of the dark moods that
sometimes overtook him.

She believed that it worked as a reminder.
Both that she was there for him and that whilst what they had
together was deeper than love, it was just a reminder that she
indeed felt that way about him.

“Why must you tease me out of moods that are
well deserved?” he replied mockingly and then sat upwards and
pressed a kiss to her belly.

She ignored his comment and looked on as he
jumped to his feet and tugged at the bell pull.

Whether or not Jaegar had come in peace or
with a desire to do more harm, Isabeau truly did not know. But a
part of her, a rather large part, believed that Jaegar had had time
to come to terms with his past, present and future and that he no
longer bore ill will towards her or Wolfe.

When hours later, the sun had set and a
carriage rocked into the driveway, Isabeau looked out of the window
and down at the travelers. It did not surprise her to see a woman
exit the carriage with Jaegar, nor hours later as they dined, did
it surprise her to learn that this woman was his mate.

While both men would forever be haunted
by what had happened to them. Both at the hands of their
father
and
the Milesians, she
was certain that the Fates' generosity in handing them both
mates--women who loved them more than life itself--was their way of
repairing the atrocities that had befallen from them. And while she
could make no promises for Jessamy, Jaegar's mate, on her own part,
Isabeau knew that she would do whatever she could to ensure Wolfe's
happiness. For his and her own were entwined and it would be that
way forevermore.

The End

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Ransom had been in the house dozens of times
since he had returned, so many times now that it had begun to seem
as familiar to him as it had when he was a boy and had torn up and
down its hallowed corridors and through its echoing chambers in
pursuit of his brother, or being chased by his brother. For a
moment he allowed his mind to conjure the ghosts of the past,
allowed himself the luxury of reliving snatches of those halcyon
days, but only for a moment. The memories were bitter sweet,
because he could not summon them without also resurrecting the pain
and he had taken to avoiding that because the grief begat anger and
fury begat carelessness.