Page 37

Chapter Thirty-One

Oskar

To say that Oskar had never thought about making love to Guinevere again would have been a lie.

After Zadash, there’d been entire stretches of the Amber Road and this forest when it was all he could think about.

He just hadn’t wanted to pressure her, even if he hadn’t been able to resist stealing the odd kiss here and there.

She was technically betrothed, and what had happened at the Song and Supper might have been a fluke.

He had been content to wait for her overture…

until he realized that she was just like him, cranky when she wanted it but wasn’t getting any.

Ah, his sweet Guinevere. So shyly mischievous and tasting of snapdragon nectar, spreading her legs for him and making all those lovely little cries while he plowed into her.

Despite having already climaxed, she was still so tight, and he knew that he wasn’t going to last much longer.

Desperate to make it as good for her as it was for him, he hunched over her, one hand sliding to her chest, the other to the place where they were joined.

“Oh, oh, Oskar,” she sobbed, even as she undulated into his ministrations, “I’m not sure I can bear it.”

“You can.” He bit into the graceful round of her shoulder as he played with her breasts and her bundle of nerves, as his hips stuttered against the burnished cheeks of that perfect derriere.

Her inner walls rippled around his shaft, and he nearly passed out from how incredible it felt, but he had a job to do, damn it to the hells.

“That’s it, sweet girl,” he ground out. “Come again, because you deserve it, taking on the road even though you were afraid, taking me on like you were made for this. With your pretty mouth, with all those stars in your eyes—with the way you fit me like a glove—” The voice was too broken to be his, surely, each word laced with sheer yearning.

Her thighs shook as she rocked back against him, whispering a stream of nonsensical encouragement.

“Come all over me, princess.” He sounded like he was begging. He didn’t care. “Let me feel it.”

And she went off, and she clamped down, and she screamed out, almost hauling him to the peak with her. The thin thread of self-control that was holding back his baser instincts snapped, and he straightened up, his hands on her slender waist, setting a punishing pace.

Guinevere clung to the tree as though for dear life as Oskar knocked the breath out of her lungs with each thrust. Her snug, wet heat; the sight of her with her skirt tossed up; the lingering taste of her on his tongue; the way he was nearly lifting her much smaller body off the ground—it was all too much for him.

His hand slammed into the trunk above hers and everything went tight and the world went blank, and he came with a roar, startling the horses.

It wasn’t until Oskar had slumped over Guinevere, wringing out the last drops of his spend into her, that he became aware of the fluttering of feathers overhead, which indicated that he’d startled a flock of birds out of the trees, too.

He and Guinevere looked around blearily and froze as they made eye contact with Pudding and Vindicator, who had stopped grazing and were giving them baleful stares.

Oskar would never be certain whether it was himself or Guinevere who started laughing first. He thought that it might have been him.

That night, after setting up camp, Oskar reached behind him to scratch an itch in his lower back—and the battered seams of his well-worn tunic’s right sleeve promptly gave way.

Guinevere clapped a hand over her mouth, muffling a giggle into her palm.

It was so charming that Oskar forgot to be embarrassed.

Then she was a whirlwind of activity, rifling through her pack until she pulled out a brown leather case, perching on a mossy stump by the fire, unrolling the case over her lap to reveal a small collection of sewing implements.

He watched her do all of this far too idly for a man whose sleeve was hanging on to his shoulder by a literal thread.

“Take off your shirt,” she chirped.

He raised an eyebrow at her. She blushed but didn’t back down. “So I can mend it. Honestly, Oskar.”

He schooled his features into an exaggerated look of disappointment. What was going on with him? He didn’t tease. Yet here he was, damn near pouting at her.

Her lush lips quirked against another giggle, and she crooked a finger, beckoning him near. He went to her, as he always would, dropping to his knees in front of the stump, helping her peel off his ruined tunic, excitement singing through his veins as he leaned in…

But Guinevere was a woman on a mission. She didn’t even realize that he was angling for a kiss—she was too busy draping the tunic over her lap.

“All right, Oskar, you asked me a while ago to teach you how to sew, so this is how.” She unraveled a length of thread and snipped it loose from its spool.

The scissors in her hand were quickly replaced by a needle.

“First, you push the thread through the eye…Could you budge up, please? You’re blocking my light. ”

Oskar unpuckered his lips and grouchily scooted to the side.

It wasn’t long, though, before he started taking a genuine interest. Guinevere was completely in her element.

Her slim brown fingers were impossibly nimble in the firelight, the needle flashing silver like a comet through a sky of old linen, each stitch smooth and neat.

As she worked, she explained what she was doing in that soft, cultured voice of hers, and everything about this moment wove a spell through Oskar’s heart.

He could have observed and listened to her forever, but the last stitch eventually fell into place, and she packed her sewing kit away. Beaming, she held up the tunic. The sleeve looked as though it had never ripped in the first place. He couldn’t even see the stitches unless he squinted.

“You’re amazing,” he blurted out.

She lowered her lashes bashfully. “It’s the only thing I do well.”

“I wouldn’t bet on that.” He cradled her face in his hands, urging her to meet his gaze. “You light up every room you walk into. With you, hiking through interminable wilderness is actually bearable. You’re very good at making people happy.”

You’re very good at making me happy.

He couldn’t bring himself to say it. There was a permanent goodbye at the end of the road, and there were some things that could never be taken back.

So he pressed his lips to hers instead, closing his eyes as she responded in that sweet, warm way that he couldn’t get enough of.

The newly mended tunic slipped from her grasp, falling to the forest floor in a heap, but neither of them cared overly much.

Maybe he could teach her how to do laundry.