Page 27

We’ve just finished. She’s been screaming for a while. A long while. I’m not even sure all the sounds were words. And my knot’s finally gone down, and she’s curled up in the nest, breathing hard, and I’m on my way to get her some water when the pounding starts.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Hattie lifts her head. Her eyes go huge.

“Who the fuck,” she croaks, “is knocking on my door in the middle of the night?”

I walk over and open it.

There’s a man standing on the step with a lantern held up high. Short and skinny, gray whiskers, a heavy coat, and a big iron ring of keys on his belt. A night watchman. Every village has one. This one looks like he’s been awake since before he was born.

He lifts the lantern and looks at me.

Then he looks down.

I’m completely naked. Seven feet of naked. Covered in sweat and her slick and teeth marks, with my cock still half hard and shining wet in the lantern light.

The lantern starts shaking.

His eyes come back up to my face, very slowly.

“Is…” He clears his throat. “Is someone being murdered in there?”

I look at him for a long moment.

“Not yet,” I say.

And I shut the door in his face.

Behind me, there’s a sound like somebody being strangled. I turn around, and Hattie is face down in the nest, shaking so hard the bed’s moving, with both hands over her mouth. Tears are running down her cheeks.

“Not yet,” she wheezes. “Rowan. You told the night watchman not yet.”

“He asked.”

She howls into the pillow. And then, right in the middle of laughing, she stops. Goes still. Sucks in a breath.

And her scent explodes through the whole cottage.

The next wave.

She lifts her head and looks back at me over her shoulder, and her eyes are already glazing over, her pupils huge and black. She’s on her hands and knees in the middle of the nest. And as I watch, she lowers her chest down into the blankets, slowly, arches her back, and lifts her hips.

Presenting.

For me.

Her pussy is swollen and red and dripping, wet all the way down her thighs. She’s trembling. And she reaches back with one hand, grabs her own ass, and spreads herself open for me.

“Rowan,” she begs. “Again. I need you again.”

I forget about the water. I forget about the night watchman. I forget my name, and I only got it a week and a half ago.

* * *

I take her slow this time.

She doesn’t want slow. She tells me so, a few times, in some very specific language. But I’m in no hurry, and her heat is going to last for days, and I’ve decided I’m going to learn every single thing her body does.