Page 17

AMbrOSE

P iper’s quiet on the ride home back to the chateau and all the way up the stairs to our bedrooms. We’re standing in the hallway and she’s just about to go into her room, but I don’t want her to disappear in there for the night. We’ve been together for hours and yet it’s still not enough.

“How are you feeling?”

Piper freezes with her hand on the doorknob. Her head slowly turns until she stares at me with wide eyes. “What do you mean?”

“It was a big day. We’ve got new council buddies. You were introduced to the consequences of my curse.” I keep my tone light, but I study her. Rebecca’s reaction to me has dulled over time, but it’s still intense.

Piper sags against the door. She looks paler than usual tonight, her blue eyes somehow more vivid and larger as she blinks slowly at me.

“It was definitely an eventful evening. I don’t understand how Tucker and Francesca are qualified to be on the council, but I guess we’ll find out.”

Piper turns back to her door, her shoulders tense as she hovers in between the hallway and her room. She surprises me by asking a question, her head is tipped down, but her eyes look up at me. “How many women have you kissed?”

I take a step toward her. Her eyes scan up and down my body.

“It took me a little while to figure out what my curse was.”

Just because the firstborns of all of the most powerful magical families in Mystic Hollows are cursed doesn’t mean the curse stays the same from one generation to the next.

Many of us don’t even know exactly what our parents' curses were, because they never told us. They were dirty little secrets that we’re never supposed to talk about. My friends and I said fuck that.

Most of our curses kick in when we turn sixteen. I was a horny teenage boy. I kissed a few girls. It didn't take me long to figure out that something was very wrong, but the damage was done. One girl had to be hospitalized. Another family moved out of town.

“So you kissed a lot of girls,” she whispers.

“Not that many. And none who meant anything,” I murmur.

She’s not judging me and I have no obligation to tell her any details about my past, but I want her to know I’m not some horrible person who went around bewitching people with my kiss.

As soon as I figured out what was happening, I never kissed another woman.

Piper stares at my mouth. I brush a finger over my lip as I close the space between us. She reaches up and mimics the move with her finger. A lick of pleasure radiates from the touch.

I cup her face and mimic the move, brushing my thumb over her bottom lip. “I bet you taste so sweet.”

Piper swallows. Her hand is still on my face, and her fingers are cold.

“Were you jealous tonight?” I take another step forward until Piper’s back is pressed against the door frame. I lean down and run my nose up the column of her neck. She shivers, and a soft gasp escapes her mouth.

“I don’t have the right to be jealous.” She exhales as I drag my lips under her jaw. As she tips her head back obligingly, I scrape my teeth over her skin.

“You’re my wife, Piper.”

“Just on paper,” she whispers, all the while her hands are sliding down my chest.

I glide my hands over her hips to grab a hold of her luscious ass. I pull her tight to my body so she can feel how fucking hard I am.

“What are you doing to me?” I growl. Whenever I touch her, the world flips upside down and I lose my fucking head.

“I’m not doing anything," she responds, but her hands have worked their way under my sweater. Her fingers dig into the muscles of my lower back.

With a groan, I suck on the lobe of her ear and then nip at the flesh below it. Our bodies rock together in a primal conversation as old as time.

“We have an agreement,” Piper says shakily, but she’s raking her nails down my back, pulling me to her. The only way I could be closer is if I were inside her.

“I said I wouldn’t fuck you or anyone else for three months. There are other things we can do, Piper.”

I suck on the skin of her throat, and her groan reverberates through my body. She’s trembling.

“I won’t do anything unless you say it’s okay.” I slide a hand up her side and cup her full breast. Damn, I want to bury my face in between her tits.

“Okay. Yes,” she pants, and that’s all the permission I need.

I pull her into her room since it’s closest and over to the bed. I practically tear her shirt in my desperation to see her. To touch and taste her. Her breasts are perfectly displayed in a lace bra, and I groan.

“Fuck, you’re beautiful.”

I bury my face in her tits. Piper moans as I tug down her bra and suck her nipple into my mouth.

Dropping to my knees, I unbutton her pants, and she lifts one leg, then the other, so I can toss them away.

I stare up at her, her eyes soft and a little dazed as she looks at me.

Her hands rest on my shoulders, like she needs help balancing. I grin up at her. She’d better hold on.

Giving her enough time to protest, I slowly slide her panties down, pressing kisses to her stomach, her hip. I drag my hand up her leg, hooking it behind the knee and settling it on my shoulder. Piper does a little hop, but I grasp her ass and hold her in place.

“Stay still.” I chuckle and then lean down and circle her clit with my tongue.

Piper’s breath hitches and her hand lands on the back of my head.

I swirl my tongue, pulling her against my face and holding her tight while she moans loudly.

I groan into her pussy, my dick straining against my fly.

I’m so fucking hard I could probably come with one pump of my fist, but this is about Piper.

I want her to dissolve into a puddle of pleasure.

When her hips move against my face, I increase the pressure of my tongue, sucking and flicking until her body is shaking and she’s making the hottest noises I’ve ever heard.

“Ambrose,” she cries out, her body folding over me as she falls apart on my mouth.

I press one more kiss on her hip and lift her body onto the bed.

Piper is twitching as I kiss my way across her stomach and up to her full breasts. Her hand falls away from my hair and she makes a low moan that sounds off. The hair on the back of my neck rises, and I drag my mouth away from her skin. Her tremors have turned into full body shakes.

“Piper?” I shift up her body to look at her face. Her head is thrown back and her eyes are squeezed tight. All the color has leached out of her skin. Panic sears through me. She looks like a corpse. I cup her cheek and her skin is clammy.

“Piper?” When she opens her eyes, they’re glazed. There’s one second of relief until I realize it’s as though she can’t see me, despite the fact that I’m only inches from her face.

“My curse,” she breathes out, shuddering. Even that seems to hurt her.

“The one from your dad?” Did I command her to do something? Is she fighting to throw off something I told her to do?

“No. The Briar Witch curse.”

Her family curse. That’s what this is.

Piper curls up onto her side. She looks so vulnerable, naked in the big bed. I stand up and head to the closet to find her some clothes. I grab a t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants and rush back out into the room. “What do you need? What can I do?”

Piper’s teeth are chattering now. She clenches them together so she can speak. “Nothing.”

“Here, let me help.” I lift her up to pull on her sweatshirt and manage to do something I’ve never done before, which is to put a pair of pants on a woman instead of taking them off.

I grab the comforter and pull it up to Piper's chin and then stand there, like an idiot.

“What is this?”

“It’s like the worst case of the flu you’ve ever had.” Piper gasps as tremors wreck her body. I drag my hand through my hair watching helplessly.

“I’ll be right back.” I dart out of the room, pulling my phone out as I head downstairs. Where am I going? Why is this house so fucking big?

I don’t care how late it is. I call Bram. His phone rings and rings. Bastard probably doesn’t even have it on. Or he’s passed out. Fuck. Why don’t I have any of Piper’s friend’s phone numbers? I try Roman next, and he answers after a fucking eternity.

“What? I’m sleeping.”

“I need to talk to Josephine.” I’m breathless as I run down to the kitchen.

“Why do you need to talk to my bonded?” Roman sounds like a territorial animal.

“Dammit, Roman, it’s about Piper.”

There’s some shuffling, and then Josephine says hello in a raspy voice.

“What is Piper’s curse? How can I help her?” I’m in the middle of the kitchen spinning in a circle. What the hell should I get from here?

Josephine is quiet for a moment. “Is she sick?”

“Yes,” I bite out, trying to keep my voice even. Josephine doesn’t need me to yell at her because I’m panicking.

“It usually lasts a few days, longer lately. So maybe four or five days. She’ll spike a horrible fever and won’t be able to keep down any food. She doesn’t really like people being around when she’s sick.”

Tough shit. I’m not going to leave her to suffer alone. How many times was I sick as a kid and there was no one here to check on me? The nannies would pop in to throw some medicine my way, and take my temperature, but it was out of obligation, not because they cared for me.

“What can I do?”

“Keep her warm. Try to get her to drink fluids.” Josephine sounds apologetic.

“There must be something else.” I drag my hand through my hair, pacing in the kitchen.

“It’s her curse, Ambrose. There’s nothing to be done but to wait for it to pass.”

I hang up and then run around the house like a madman, gathering up a collection of drinks, a hot water bottle, extra blankets. When I get back to Piper’s room, she’s moaning as though pain is splitting her body apart.

I set the drinks on the table and hand her a hot water bottle. She hugs it to her stomach, but I don’t know if it’s doing anything.

“Stop staring,” Piper pleads, turning her head into the pillow as she writhes beneath the blankets.

She might want me to go away, but I can’t. What if something happens when I’m not here? What if she needs me and I’m in another room? I drag a chair over to the side of the bed and hold vigil.

“I’m here. If you need anything.”