Page 48 of Raven in Midwinter

“No, sir,” he assured me. “You may have me anytime, anywhere that you please. I am yours. You bring out a new and possessive side of me I had no idea was there, and things that I would be embarrassed to do with anyone else, you say saddle up.”

I was quiet a moment, and he snickered.

“I’m sorry, did you say saddle up?”

His laughter was such a good sound, so much joy there, but I was startled when I heard a loud ping.

“What was that?” I asked him.

“I have no idea.”

“Did it come from in here? Maybe the bathroom?”

“I’ll go look.”

“Not without me you’re not.”

“Listen, I used you hard, harder than I probably should have and⁠—”

“No, you don’t apologize for great sex and giving me what I was begging for.”

He tipped his head as though in thought. “There was, in fact, an awful lot of please, Lorne, and faster, Lorne, and⁠—”

“Can we go check the bathroom, please?” I muttered, trying to push out of his arms that I was wrapped in like a vise.

“It’s always my pleasure to do everything you want. You get that, right?”

I was going to continue to banter with him, but his voice cracked a bit, like he needed tender words from me, from my heart, not my brain.

“As it is mine,” I promised him, pressing my face into the hollow of his throat. “I want you all the time, anytime, but just holding your hand and kissing you, bringing you lunch, and when it rained, that first week in November…when we went to Albany with Amanda and Eddie and the kids. Do you remember?”

“Of course I remember,” he said gruffly, clearly pleased, as he brushed at his eyes. “You wore your canvas sneakers, even though I told you not to, and I had to carry you on my back for three blocks.”

I was smiling, and I couldn’t stop. “That was terrible for you.”

“Yes, it was. Absolutely awful. All that hugging and kissing and breathing down the side of my neck, putting goose bumps over every square inch of my⁠—”

There were more noises then, above us, below us, and it sounded, which was creepy, like something was running through the walls. But it couldn’t have been rats or squirrels or any kind of rodent because it sounded like whatever was moving around was wearing work boots.

“Come on.” Lorne helped me out of bed, wrapped me back up in his robe, and was surprised there was a second one hanging in the closet when he went to pull on a shirt and underwear so he wouldn’t be walking around naked.

It was nice, normal, that he was holding my hand as he led me to the bathroom.

Once we stepped through the door, we could only stare, wide-eyed, then decided to turn on the water to see if the shower from our bathroom in the cottage would work in a bathroom that until recently would have felt right at home in Versailles. The water pressure, in a shower that should not exist in 1799, was pretty good.

“Huh,” Lorne said, shutting it off. “Is it actually our shower?”

“It does look like ours, and also, there was one robe before, and now there’s two. This seems to me like a fairly observant home. A home that listens and provides, shelters and protects.”

“It certainly does,” Lorne said, smiling. “You wanna take a shower with me?”

As though he even had to ask.

EIGHT

The following morning, when we opened the bedroom door, I was surprised there was no one there. From the shadows and movement the night before, I was expecting people set on interrogating us. There should have been questions, especially from Giles. Where was he? Didn’t he want to murder me on sight? Frankly, I was confused.

“Interesting…” Lorne commented, glancing around. “Giles is usually out here first thing, asking me what my plan is for the day.”