Midnight Soul (Fantasyland #5) Read online

  He opened the door and I saw through to acres of gleaming wood floors, a brick fireplace with a beautifully carved wood mantelpiece that was freestanding in a room that went on the length of the house. Sitting room first, fireplace delineating it from a dining room and then the this-world kitchen was entirely visible at the back.

  As was the back door.

  “Shotgun,” Noc said, drawing me in, “means you could stand at the front door and shoot a shotgun straight through the house right out the back door.”

  I looked up at him as he stopped us to close and latch the door behind him.

  “Why would one do that?”

  He took my hand and drew me deeper into the space, grinning and answering, “They wouldn’t. That’s just a nickname for these kinds of homes. Places like this were built because it gets hot. When it does, you open the doors, a breeze can get through when you do, cooling the space.”

  It could, indeed.

  Clever.

  “Also,” he went on, “they’re narrow so you can fit a bunch of them on a street. This one was a double-barrel. That means it was two houses once that shared a wall. Someone renovated it, pulling them together. The length that’s now communal space was once all there was to the house, but now I also have three bedrooms and two baths.”

  He stopped us in the kitchen, which was long, but narrow, and had a number of quite impressive cupboards, which included a kind of cupboard-esque/counter-esque seating area in the middle.

  He let me go and turned to a cabinet door, opening it.

  “Will whiskey work for your digestif?” he asked, putting odd emphasis on digestif, like that word amused him.

  “Yes, darling,” I murmured, taking in his furnishings and décor.

  Not surprisingly, it was all very masculine. Somewhat like a high-born member of a House would decorate a hunting lodge, but with this-world differences, obviously.

  I felt Noc touch my waist and turned from my perusal of his abode to him to see him offering me a glass of amber liquid.

  I took it and barely did so before he moved into me, maneuvering my position then pinning me with my back against the counter.

  I felt my lips curl up.

  “Like it?” he asked quietly.

  “Very much,” I answered. “It’s very attractive. Very masculine. Very inviting. Thus very you.”

  He shook his head slightly, his eyes lighting, his chin dipping, saying, “My Frannie has a way with a compliment.”

  “I share this trait with you,” I replied.

  He bent closer, his movement taking his nose a whisper away along the side of mine, his lips right there, before he lifted away and took a sip of his drink.

  I drew in breath, delighting in his tease and taking a sip from my own glass to calm my reaction.

  Marvelous, this world had excellent whiskey and Noc had the taste to procure it.

  “Frey,” he said suddenly.

  “I beg your pardon?” I asked, confused at this and thinking our next activities would be quite different and have not a thing to do with my cousin in the other world.

  Noc focused on me. “Frey and Finnie. They’re together. Having babies. But the Finnie of this world, Valentine says, is a lesbian so she’s not gonna be finding her Frey.”

  “A lesbian?” I asked.

  “She likes only women.”

  “Ah,” I whispered, feeling my lips curl again, for the rumors had been rampant, with most refusing to believe it, but I just knew the deposed Winter Princess was a guenipe. “A guenipe,” I stated.

  “Say what?”

  I focused on him. “We call them guenipes in my world. Most usual, for women and men to prefer the same sex, or both sexes, as a matter of fact. Most undesirable when the woman happens to be the Winter Princess and responsible for carrying on the royal line.”

  He nodded. “I can see that.”

  I took another sip of his excellent whiskey and noted, “This does not offer balance of the worlds for she would not be likely to carry on any line here either.”

  Noc shook his head. “Nope.”

  “Perhaps I’ll look into my crystal ball tomorrow, find the Frey of this world. Not,” I added swiftly, “to spy on him or meddle. Simply to assuage my curiosity and, I’m guessing, yours.”

  He grinned. “Crystal ball.”

  I understood his amusement and returned his grin. “I know. It seems absurd, this being precisely what I thought at first, but it’s most useful.”

  Noc had no comment to that.

  He had something else on his mind.

  “You done with your digestif?” he asked, tipping his head to my glass.

  I was not.

  And yet I very much was.

  But in response to his question, reading the look in his eyes, thus what was on his mind, I lifted my glass slowly, took a sip just as slowly, and removed the glass from my lips at my leisure, all this staring into his eyes and watching them heat as I did so.

  When the glass was away, Noc dropped his head again, his nose coming close enough it almost touched mine. Dipping it under and around, his lips so very close, his heated eyes unceasingly peering into my own.

  “You like to tease, baby?” he whispered.

  “Perhaps,” I whispered back.

  It seemed he was moving in to take my mouth, and I held my breath, but just as he got near enough to capture my lips, he retreated, again only a whisper away.

  I tipped my head back, wishing to erase that whisper, but Noc changed course, lazily running a phantom trail with his lips along my jaw, my cheekbone and back to my lips, right there, but not there enough.

  My heart was beating a swift tattoo, the area between my legs tingling, growing moist, and I swayed slightly into him, wanting to remove even the limited distance we had.

  But Noc put his drink down on the counter behind me, his hand spanning my hip and holding me steady.

  And away.

  I felt his lower lip brush mine but the touch was so light, it was like a dream.

  Thus I felt my nipples strain the material confining them, a pleasurable discomfort.

  “You tease too,” I accused softly.

  “Mm…”

  This he murmured as his face got even closer.

  But not close enough.

  Gods, he was better at this even than me!

  And it was marvelous.

  I put a hand to his stomach and drifted it up.

  “I would very much like you to kiss me, darling,” I requested.

  “Yeah,” was all he said as a reply.

  “Now,” I demanded, swaying closer, and he allowed the touch of our bodies but didn’t give me his mouth.

  “Now?” he asked.

  “Now,” I repeated.

  He ran the tip of his nose along the flare of my nostril and then adjusted so I could feel the hairs of his brow brush mine.

  My breath started to get heavy.

  “How much you want my mouth, Frannie?” he asked.

  “Quite a bit,” I answered, trailing my hand around his side to his back and up to his shoulder blade, pressing in.

  He resisted.

  I felt my panties dampen.

  “Noc,” I breathed.

  “Say please,” he ordered.

  My eyes narrowed even as my womb convulsed.

  “You’re very bad,” I admonished.

  “You think you ask pretty you won’t get your reward?” he inquired.

  That was an excellent point.

  “Say please,” he urged, giving me the barest trace of his mouth. I sought more, but he denied me. “Say it, baby.”

  There was nothing for it.

  “Please, Noc,” I pressed my breasts into his chest, “may I have your mouth?” I whispered, and I got my reward from the burn in his eyes even before he gave me my real reward.

  “Absolutely,” he growled and then he gave me what I asked for.

  I was so attuned to him, I nearly dropped my glass in an effort to clutch him to me th
e instant I tasted his tongue, forgetting I even held it.

  Fortunately, Noc had more presence of mind and before the kiss heated, my glass joined his on the counter.

  My arse also joined the glasses on the counter when Noc suddenly yanked up my skirt, lifted me and planted me there, pushing in, forcing my legs open, rounding me tightly in his arms so my intimate parts were pressed to his hardening ones and his mouth devoured mine.

  When I was grasping his hair, whimpering down his throat and grinding my hips into his, he lifted his head and looked down at me with eyes ablaze.

  “Ready for bed?” he asked.

  “Absolutely,” I breathed.

  Noc grinned.

  Then he lifted me off the counter, put me on my feet, yanked down my skirt, took possession of my hand and pulled me out of the kitchen.

  * * * * *

  “No, please,” I begged.

  I was close. So very close.

  As I had been, time and again, repeatedly, while Noc spent what felt like ages taking me in a heady variety of positions, some of them I didn’t know existed.

  And as he took me, touching me, kissing me, nibbling, biting, licking, suckling, thrusting inside me, he brought me to the precipice of climax.

  And then he’d pull out, whip my body into a new position and start all over again.

  This time, I was on my back, Noc between my legs.

  But he’d pulled out and was hooking me behind my knee. He lifted that leg across the front of his body, forcing it to the other side. He found the back of my other knee and bent that in line so both legs were angled the same, inner thighs pressed together, the outside of one leg pushed to the bed, but my hips were twisted to the side, my arse and pussy offered to him.

  I caught his gaze as I tried to catch my breath.

  He imprisoned my gaze while his other hand wrapped around his cock, he found me and drove inside.

  My lips parted, my eyes closed and my neck arched.

  “Look at me,” he grunted, thrusting deep.

  I forced my eyes to open and again found his.

  “Twist at the waist, Frannie, hands over your head, press them against the headboard. I wanna watch you move with me.”

  I didn’t hesitate even a moment to adhere to this command.

  His eyes dropped to my breasts that were surging with each plunge.

  “Fuck yeah,” he groaned, putting a hand in the bed at the small of my back, arm straight, giving him leverage, as he removed his other arm from the backs of my knees and shoved his hand between my legs, finding my sensitive nub.

  I lifted my top knee higher to give him better access and my entire body spasmed.

  “Noc,” I gasped, my back arcing, the pleasure rippling over me, driving me down into his thrusts.

  “Whose cock are you taking?” he asked.

  “Yours,” I forced out.

  He drove home and ground inside.

  I whimpered.

  “Whose?” he demanded to know.

  I stared into his striking face, which was now harsh with pleasure, and knew the answer.

  “Mine,” I whispered, beginning to tremble not only with what he was doing to me but the force of his meaning.

  He started thrusting again.

  “Whose pussy is this?” he bit out.

  “Yours, darling. It’s yours,” I gasped, my trembling turning to tremors.

  “Fuck yeah, it’s mine.”

  “My love, I need to climax,” I begged and only vaguely watched something fierce, frightening and exquisite brand itself into his features.

  “Say that again,” he ordered.

  “I need to climax,” I repeated.

  He bent at the elbow so he was closer to me, not interrupting his thrusts but adding pressure with his fingers between my legs.

  “All of it,” he growled. “Repeat all of it, Franka.”

  “My love, I need to—”

  “That’s it,” he grunted, driving deep, circling hard, the pleasure overtook me, lifting my back from the bed, forcing my head into the pillows, his name a pant of bliss through my lips. “Yeah,” I heard him groan. “Yeah, Frannie.” He sank in fully and whispered, “Yeah,” as I felt his body strain into me and the deep, intoxicating sigh of his release.

  After the sensations chased themselves away, I relaxed into the bed, opening my eyes and watching Noc as he lifted his head, which had fallen after his orgasm, and he gazed at me as he stroked inside, tender and sweet before he pulled out.

  And then I watched as he moved down.

  He bent to my hip, touching his lips to it. Along my outer thigh, halfway to my knee, another lip touch, and onward, to the side of my knee for another one.

  He shifted and I continued to watch as he gently pulled his hand from between my legs where he’d been cupping my sex in an intimate touch since my climax. He rested it on my knees, keeping me twisted sideways in the bed, but he brushed his lips along the side of my torso. Up, to my ribcage. Around, to between my breasts.

  Then his weight was pressing into my hips as he looked into my eyes, his somnolent, sated—such beauty—and he said quietly, “Do not move an inch, Frannie.”

  “Your wish is my command, darling.”

  A blaze of something I couldn’t quite decipher flared in his eyes before he gave me a tender grin, dropped his head again to kiss me between my breasts and he retraced his path along my body before he left the bed to go to the privy attached to his bedchamber.

  I would know why he didn’t wish me to move when he returned, extinguished the light on the nightstand behind me and then entered the bed, fitting himself at a curve to my length at the back. Pressing into me to reach a long arm to the light in front of me, he put that out, then pulled the covers up over us and settled in, an arm around my belly, snuggling me closer.

  But he said nothing.

  He just held me and he did it close.

  I felt his warmth. His strength. His affection for me. All of this simply lying on our sides, his arm around me.

  “Thank you for a lovely first day in your world, Noc,” I said.

  “My pleasure, sweetheart,” he replied.

  “Dinner was delicious,” I shared.

  “Yeah, I got that, seein’ as you didn’t say shit to me until you cleaned your plate. Thought, when you got done, you were gonna pick it up and lick it.”

  I did, actually, have that urge. Fortunately, I was able to quell it.

  I didn’t respond to his commentary as it was slightly vexing and I was in no mood to be vexed.

  Instead, I said, “Thank you for being so kind and patient with Josette.”

  “Not hard,” he told me. “She’s sweet and funny and you mean the world to her.”

  I had a feeling it was the last part that caused Noc to show her his generosity of kindness and patience.

  On this thought, I wondered how I had lived the life I had and in the end it led me to Noc.

  I desired an answer to that question at the same time I thought it best not to question it.

  No.

  I should, just to experience it. Nurture it.

  Revel in it.

  Noc pressed closer. “What’s on your mind?”

  “What makes you think something’s on my mind?” I asked.

  “’Cause we had four hours of sleep last night, a busy day today, I just came hard, gave it to you harder, and you said you were tired before we even hit my house. And now you don’t sound it, don’t act it and you don’t feel it,” he said his last with a squeeze of my middle.

  “Cora told me police in this world were quite intuitive,” I mumbled, wondering if that boded well or ill for me and thinking, in most instances, it would be the latter.

  “We are,” he confirmed. “Though I’m not a cop anymore, but in ways I’ll never shake, once a cop, always a cop.”

  I stared into the dark a moment before turning in his hold.

  He shifted his position to allow me to do this but he did it keeping me in the curve
of his arm.

  “You told me Valentine was going to get you a position with this city’s guard,” I said.

  “She was.”

  I was shocked at what I read this to mean.

  “And you’ve decided, with the treasure bestowed on you in my world, to be a man of leisure?”

  I was shocked at this idea because the Noctorno Hawthornes of both worlds were no men of leisure. So much not, I couldn’t credit it, wondered at it and was troubled by it, the last in regards to it possibly having something to do with me.

  “No,” Noc replied. “With that I paid my way eating and drinking through four countries in your world, bought twelve cases of wine in Fleuridia, my new Suburban and this house, which, with the reno on it and the neighborhood it’s in, wasn’t cheap. But I put the bulk of it away because I’ve learned in life shit can happen and it does, without fail, so you gotta be prepared. A good way to be prepared is have more than a million dollars’ worth of gold illegally converted into cash, which is then illegally invested in foreign investments that, if I take any out, I’ll get back in cash so the IRS won’t cotton on I took a trip to a parallel universe that made me a millionaire, an explanation they won’t buy. This means I gotta keep that windfall on the down low in order to avoid a prison sentence, because no matter how smart you think you are, the IRS will catch you. And I actually did earn that treasure in a parallel universe, but they won’t believe that and since I don’t have an explanation they will believe, I gotta break the law.”

  I had opened my mouth to ask but I didn’t need to bother, Noc answered me.

  “And the IRS is the department in the government you pay taxes to, sugarlips. They frown on anyone not doing that and they get pretty nasty when that happens.”

  “Tax collectors in my world are much the same,” I shared.

  “I bet,” he muttered.

  “Although I will take this opportunity to note I’m delighted to hear that you acquired so much Fleuridian wine, your explanation does not negate my question.”

  “Sorry, Frannie, what I’m sayin’ is, that money is not gonna be used so I can be a man of leisure.” I could hear he found something about that amusing but he didn’t explain what that was as he continued talking. “I decided not to take a job with the ‘city guard,’ but instead work for a private firm that pays more, is more flexible with hours and will hopefully offer an interesting caseload that’s not like I’m used to so I’ll be doing something different, all of this giving me a needed change of pace.”