Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 147649 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 738(@200wpm)___ 591(@250wpm)___ 492(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 147649 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 738(@200wpm)___ 591(@250wpm)___ 492(@300wpm)
“You’re changing the subject, Pell.”
My smile is big. “You’re so smart, Pie.”
“If I recall, you used to think I was slow.”
“Slow to love me, that’s all.”
This answer makes Pie huff out a laugh. “Well, you certainly didn’t love me those first few days.”
“I would beg to differ. I was insanely jealous when you went on that date with Russ Roth.”
“You were?”
“In-sane with jealousy. I was playing it cool though, so…” I stop talking because her blue eyes are twinkling with delight and I just want to get lost in them for a moment.
“You played it so cool. But about this plot.”
I lean down and touch my mouth to hers. Her lips are soft and she tastes like honey from the lip balm she made last week in the apothecary. I shiver a little when her fingertips make contact with my back. They dance their way up my spine as we kiss, our tongues slowly twisting together.
And as we kiss, our short history begins flashing through my mind. Scenes flicker. That first day when she arrived and I scared her. The moment when she realized she was trapped here with me and could only pay off her debt by making me happy. Her long, sad face after her date with Russ Roth. And then the happier one after she called her friend, Jacqueline, and realized she was still real.
She was vulnerable back then. And even though she’s so much stronger now—her spelling is quite impressive, even Tarq thought so—she’s still vulnerable.
There’s a part of me that wants to take her away now. A part that wants to leave this place. But there’s that other part of me that wants us to stay here forever. Just… get rid of these monsters and go back to the way it was those first few days.
Everything was so exciting when Pie showed up. And even though I complained about it, it was the thrilling sort of exciting. The kind that comes with confusion, and opportunities, and all kinds of feelings.
Then everything got complicated. And now Pie thinks that the curse is protecting us. And we’re both questioning the goal.
Should we even try to break the curse?
Because if we do, then we open ourselves up to all the bad shit that hasn’t been able to touch me over the centuries.
But if we stay here, we’re just… master and caretaker. That’s all we’ll ever be.
There is a part of me that wants to let the monsters have it. Let Tomas hatch baby dragons in the dungeon. Let Batty and the rest of them terrorize humanity in whatever way they want. Maybe even free the prisoners in the Bottoms.
Just… let it all decay the way it should’ve a thousand years ago.
But I’m afraid that this is taking it too far.
Because I am a monster out of time.
I don’t belong here in this age any more than Saint Mark’s does.
And if it goes, maybe I go with it?
Pie pulls out of our kiss, her breath a little bit heavy and those sparkling blue eyes of hers half-closed. “What are you thinking about?”
“You.”
“Liar.”
I chuckle. “Later, Pie.” And when I kiss her again, her hand slides between us and grabs my growing hard-on.
She whispers into my mouth, “You were much easier to seduce when you didn’t wear pants.”
More flashes of memories come with this statement. Her demands that I cover myself up. Her blushing face whenever she accidentally saw my ‘package.’ That whole conversation in the Pleasure Cave when she thought she had accidentally put a love spell on herself.
There is no way to stop my smile.
And that’s how I kiss her as I spread her legs open wider, pull my pants down out of the way, slip her panties aside, and push myself inside her.
I kiss and love her—smiling.
She gasps when I go a little too fast and I always slow down when she does this. I want to ask her if she’s OK. I want to make sure I’m not hurting her. But she always reassures me before I can get the questions out.
This time is no different. She places her hands on my face and just keeps kissing me, urging me to continue.
But I keep the pace slow and easy after that. We’re not in a rush. We have all the time in the world for this. And she just makes me feel so good, I want to prolong the experience.
But eventually, she does something that just turns me on so bad, I can’t hold back. She leans in to my shoulder, tipping her mouth up to my ear, and she says, “‘I love you more than you can know. I see us now, and as we grow. I’ll be there for you ‘till the end—your wife, your lover, and your friend.’”
It’s an offer, a proposal, and the ultimate promise all wrapped up in one Pie spelling.