“If you dislike me so much, then why bother with me?”
“I havetriednot to,” he retorted in snarling frustration.“That’s why I told her that you were no one and nothing but a ride where you could hear.So that you would believe that and go about your mortal life without me.”
“I had no choice but to believe it since the fae can’t lie!I’d be stupid to not believe the truth,” she snapped back, all the hurt she’d felt over those words boiling out like pus from an abscess.“So, fuck you for treating me like you cared about me when all the time you saw me as no one and nothing but a ride.Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, Azul!”She wrenched her hand from his grip and turned fully away, her back to him.It was a symbolic gesture, largely meaningless since every line of her body was still pressed against his, but she was perilously close to tears and she’d gouge her eyes out before she let him see her cry.
Even if he see and hear her anyway.It was the principle of the thing.
~30~
Horses and Promises
“The horse Irode in on,” he finally repeated.“I’ve never ridden a horse, but it hardly seems fair to blame the poor creature for my bad behavior.”
She sniffed, somewhat mollified that he’d acknowledged that his behavior had been bad.“It’s an expression.”One she hadn’t thought of since her childhood.“I was angry.”
“Was?”He turned on his side, running a hand down the length of her body and draping one wing over her to cover her like a blanket.
“Am,” she corrected stiffly, trying to pretend he wasn’t melting her.How could she continue to be so vulnerable to him when he’d admitted she meant nothing to him?
“You deserve to be angry,” he said on a sigh.“I’ve treated you very badly.Something I tried not to do, but in this I also failed.I should never have succumbed to the temptation to touch you.The first time.Every time.”His hand continued to travel over her, eliciting an almost painful arousal, intensified by her turbulent emotions.“Don’t cry, Arantxa.”
Fuck her life.“I’m not.I never cry over men.None of you are worth it.”
He tsked.“Even though you can lie freely, that doesn’t mean you should.”He brushed the short curls from the back of her neck and pressed his lips under her ear, making her shiver.She had to bite back the traitorous moan of need.“Don’t cry over fae either, Arantxa darling.”
That only made her chest tighten with grief, strange and potent combination with the desire she was trying to stifle.“Don’t call me that,” she choked out.
“Why not?”
She sighed and it came out as a kind of sob.“Because it’s not true.”
“But you believe I can’t lie.”
Stilling, she contemplated that.Then scrubbed away her tears—how the mighty had fallen; she put it down to hunger—and turned to face him.She could see a little more in the dark than she’d thought.Or his eyes were like a cat’s, collecting and reflecting light, luminous as a summer twilight sky.“Youcanlie.”
“Give the human a cookie.”
“How?”she demanded.“I thought all fae were incapable of lying.”
“Because humans know everything about fae?”
“Well, no,” she admitted.“But there are certainironclad rules that are common knowledge.”She paused, waiting for a response.“See what I did there?”
“Oh yes, but you’re not in the least funny.”
She tapped his lips with a forefinger.“Another lie.This is an amazing discovery.”
Before she could withdraw her finger, he caught it again, more gently this time, and held her hand while he drew her finger into his mouth.The sensual suction took her arousal up several notches and simultaneously soothed her ragged emotions.“Azul…” she breathed, feeling helpless to say more, to express anything at all.
“Arantxa darling,” he answered and folded her hand inside his, giving her lips the kiss instead.
She sank into the kiss.She couldn’t help herself.Never had been able to where he was concerned, not since that first time she spotted him on the side of the road, wearing that ridiculous wedding outfit and still managing to look like sex on a stick.“Are you trying to seduce me?”she asked between kisses.
“Do I have to?”he sounded amused.“Perhaps you’re taking advantage of me.After all, I am your captive at the moment.”
“I’m the one wearing your collar.”
He slipped a finger under the collar and tugged, sending lightning through her veins and her heart thrumming with following thunder.“It does seem to have a remarkable effect on you.Perhaps I’ve discovered a method for tamin the wild beast.”