The Black Sheep and the Princess (31 page)

He was going to object, going to pull her up on top of him, slide inside of her, and make love to her as slowly, as sweetly, as he was capable of, but then he was groaning, and arching off the bed as she took him into the delightfully warm and soft interior of her mouth. Her hands pushed at his chest, kept him in place, as she slid her leg over his, making her intentions clear. And far be it from him to not give her what she wanted. Especially when—

“Sweet Jesus,” he said, followed by a long, slow growl as she began moving her mouth and hand on him. “Kate, that's—” But there were no words. So he groped for a pillow, pulled it under his head, and watched, and felt, and pumped, as she brought him screamingly close to the edge.

And she would have taken him over, but not this time, not tonight. He nudged her away, grinning when she pouted up at him. “Come here,” he murmured, helping her slide her weight over him, then slowly easing her down onto him. Their sighs of pleasure matched. “You're so damn perfect for me.” He didn't think he'd said that out loud, until she agreed.

Her hair fell forward as he brought her mouth to his. “Roll me over, Donovan,” she whispered. “I want to feel your weight on me.”

It caught at his heart, every time she said it. The way she said it. He was Donovan only to her. And it felt so damn good to know that. He shifted them both to their sides, paused there for a moment, kissed her, then moved the rest of the way, sinking deeply into her as she lifted up and wrapped her legs around his hips.

And he held her gaze, in between long, slow kisses, moving inside of her, feeling her match his steady rhythm as easily as if they'd done this for centuries. He finally slid his arm beneath her, tilted her hips up that extra bit, so he could sink a tiny bit deeper, reach that spot he already knew was there, the one that made her gasp and tighten around him almost convulsively. The one he knew would take them both over the edge. But he held her there, for that one moment out of time, and looked into her eyes. “Kate…”

And her eyes grew glassy then, at that one hoarsely uttered whisper. And it didn't scare him so much as hurt him. Because she was his, dammit, and he'd never do anything to hurt her, and the look in her eyes spoke of much the same, even as they both knew the reality of what they were doing to each other. And where it would leave them.

“With me,” he said, pushing the rest of the way in.

“Always,” he thought he heard her whisper, as she took him there, and they both went over.

“I
'
ll be fucked.”

Kate stretched, smiled. “Highly possible. Probable even.” She blinked her eyes open and found Donovan standing by the bedroom window. Bare-ass naked. Her eyesight was a bit blurred from sleep, but, even blurry, he was the best thing she'd ever seen.

“Sorry,” he said, “I didn't know you were awake.”

“What's going on? Uh oh.” She pushed up on her elbows and shoved her hair out of her face. “Did something else happen?”

He turned, and the hard set of his jaw instantly softened. “Actually, nothing is going to be happening for a while.”

She sat all the way up, only to have him flatten her right back to the bed. She'd never get tired of that. She smiled into his sleepy face and bumped her hips up. “Really? All tuckered out, are you? Because I thought—”

He rolled to his back and pulled her, squealing, on top of him. “I think we achieved that somewhere around three this morning. I can't remember ever being this worn out.” He wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and tugged her mouth to his. “And yet, strangely energized, all at the same time.”

She laughed against his lips, kissed him back. “Funny, I seem to be having the same predicament.”

He started to shift up on the bed so she could straddle him, but she pushed his hands away, still laughing. “If we're going for some kind of marathon record, I need sustenance first.”

His grin was as wicked as it was wide. “I thought last night when you had your mouth full of—”

“Men,” she retorted, but snickered. “That was more like a dessert topping. I need real sustenance if I'm going to keep up with you.”

“A dessert topping? Did you just call my—”

She rolled off of him. “You have a problem with that? I happen to really love my dessert toppings.”

And with that she found herself on her back again, a grinning Donovan in her face. “I've been reduced to a sex condiment and you think I should be flattered, do you?”

“Trust me, nothing about you is reduced.”

He laughed, then winced as he shifted his weight.

“You okay?”

“Cop knees.”

She rolled him to his back, gently this time. “Sounds serious. Perhaps I should investigate.” She slid down along his body.

“I thought you were starving?” He groaned a little as she slipped between his legs. “And, last I looked, that wasn't my knee.”

“Hunger first, injury later. Besides, this will take your mind off of the pain, for a little while anyway.”

“True.” He let his head drop back against the bed. “Very true.”

“So,” she said conversationally as she teased him with a string of kisses along the velvety smooth length of him. “What were you looking at outside?”

“My eyes are rolling back in my head and you want to chat?”

She kissed the tip, making his hips buck, smiling at how easily they'd come to know each other's bodies so well. “I was just curious.” And she didn't want the fire marshal rolling in and interrupting anything either. “Why won't anything happen today? Anything else, I mean.” She looked up at him, wiggling her eyebrows.

But his head was back, his eyes shut. He was all hers.

She wished.

“Freak snowstorm last night,” he murmured absently, his hips moving with the rhythm of her hand. “About a foot, if that's not all drifting.”

Kate stopped what she was doing and sat up. “It snowed?”

Donovan opened his eyes. “A lot. Which means no one from Ralston is coming here. And we're not going anywhere. Now, about that pain management program you were beginning there—”

But she'd already scrambled off the bed. It said enormous things about the nature of their relationship that she didn't even think to cover herself up. Not that he hadn't seen her naked, but morning light was not always flattering. And yet she knew it wouldn't matter in the slightest with him.

Why can't I just keep him?

Then she looked out the window at the winter wonderland blanketing the camp property for as far as she could see, and she couldn't help but grin. Snow day. Looked like she was going to get her wish. For a little while longer, anyway. Normally, she'd be upset at yet another delay in getting things up and running for her camp, but she could hardly fight Mother Nature now, could she?

“It's still snowing,” she said, squinting at the tiny flakes spitting from the leaden sky.

“Yep.”

He didn't sound all that upset by the prospect either. She turned to find him still spread eagle on the bed, in all his quite estimable glory, hands propped behind his head, shit-eating grin plastered all over his face. Well, at least it appeared they were on the same page, anyway.

Lucky her.

She sent a silent thank-you to Mother Nature and strolled back toward the bed. “So, then, the agenda for today would be—”

At that moment, Bagel pitched a very loud, very long, very mournful howl from the other room.

“What, does he have radar or something?” Kate said, crossing the room to the bedroom door instead. Peeking out, she found her dog sitting by the front door, looking quite plaintive. “It's cold out there,” she informed him. “And the snow is deeper than you are.” This did not seem to make much, if any, of an impression on him. She supposed when nature of a different sort called, it called.

She jumped a little when she felt Donovan's warm skin brush against hers as he came up behind her. He nibbled his way along her shoulder, and had her knees wobbly by the time he reached the side of her neck.

“Wrestle you for who takes Wondermutt out.”

“I'm not sure we have that long.” But her body was already in absolute agreement on his voting method. It took enormous willpower not to turn into his arms, push him right back to the bed.

“Well, then the problem takes care of itself.”

“Ew,” she said, laughing. “Not in my cabin, which means I guess we're going to have to figure out what to do about it at some point.”

“It's not that hard.”

She bumped her hips back against his. “I beg to differ.”

He chuckled, and the warm sound sent tingles through her that reached places even the feel of his naked body could not. Which was saying something.

He nipped the edge of her ear. “Quite the voracious animal, you are.”

She looked over her shoulder. “I'm just trying to keep up.”

He grinned, not looking the least bit abashed. She liked that about him. Even more, she liked that about them.

Bagel continued to whimper and look longingly at the front door.

“Yeah, yeah, we're coming,” Donovan told him.

“We?”

“Sure. It'll be good for us. A little fresh air.”

“A lot of snow.”

“Come on.” He tugged her back into the room, leaving the bedroom door open, and began scrounging for his clothes. “We'll just shovel a path to the nearest tree, make a nice clearing around the base of it for him, and voilà. Porta-potty.”

When she didn't say anything for a few seconds, he looked up from pulling on his jeans. “What's wrong?”

“Well, I hadn't exactly gotten around to buying a snow shovel. I wasn't going to need one for a while, or so I thought.”

“That's okay, any shovel will do.”

“I'm sure there are shovels around here somewhere.”

Donovan paused, his shirt bunched in his hands. “Somewhere?”

“Down in the service sheds. And the stables.” Which were hundreds of yards away, through very deep snow. She smiled. “Hey, you wanted the snow adventure.” She looked around the room. “I don't even have proper boots. Just my regular work boots and they're crusted with mud and smell like burnt cabin. I haven't had the rest of my stuff shipped out here yet.”

Donovan pulled on his shirt and walked up to her and slipped his arms around her waist. “How about you make some breakfast and I'll see that the dog gets his business done? Deal?”

She hated sticking him with the cold, wet, doggy detail, but the offer was simply too good to pass up. Her stomach chose that moment to send up a particularly distinct grumble.

Donovan smiled. “I'll take that as a yes.”

“I owe you,” she said, never so sincere.

“Make mine scrambled eggs, and if there is hot coffee, we're even.” He kissed her soundly on the mouth, groaned a little, and pushed her back against the wall to take the kiss a little deeper, before finally wrenching himself away. “Probably good it's cold out there,” he said, then went to get his coat and boots on.

“I can't imagine why,” she said, a bit breathless. She was still leaning against the door to her bedroom when he and Bagel took off out into the snow.

She smiled when she heard Bagel's barks of joy. “Men,” she said, shaking her head and heading to the kitchen.

 

A half hour later, she was just getting muffins out of the oven when the door opened and a soggy, snow-encrusted dog came trotting in. She looked up, but a soggy, snow-encrusted Donovan didn't follow.

“He needs a rubdown, but you're out of rag towels on the porch. I—I'll be back in a few minutes. Don't hold breakfast.”

Kate plopped the muffin pan on the stove and hurried to the front door. It was so blinding white, it took a moment for her eyes to adjust, but they did, in time for her to see Donovan wading through knee-deep snow, heading down the driveway to the road. “Wait! Where are you going?” She stepped on the porch and shouted the same question again, only louder. It wasn't snowing hard, but the wind made it difficult for sound to carry.

He turned. “I just need to check on something. Go ahead and eat. I'll warm mine up. Save me some coffee.”

She could hardly understand him, but then he turned back, head down against the elements, and kept on trudging. It was either race out there after him, or wait for him to get back and grill him then. She looked down at Bagel, who was sitting, still soggy but looking quite contented with himself, next to her feet. “What is it with you guys and the call of the wild, anyway?”

She looked once again to the trail Donovan was leaving in the snow and debated with herself for all of two seconds. “I can wait.” But she didn't head right back in. She watched him to see what direction he took. She thought maybe he was going to see what, if any, further damage the heavy snow had done to the cabin-slash-crime scene, but instead, he turned and headed down the path leading to the next set of cabins. He was quickly gone from sight.

She looked down at Bagel again. “What's going on?”

All she got was a tail thump and a short whine.

She sighed and stepped back inside the cabin, closing the door against the howl of the wind. After feeding Bagel, she went back to preparing breakfast, but decided to hold off scrambling the eggs until Donovan came back. She popped the muffins into a basket, keeping one out for herself, then covered the rest with a towel. Then, after slipping her coat on and jamming her feet into her fuzzy slippers, she went out on the porch again and nursed her cup of coffee while picking at her muffin. She squinted through the screen and the steady fall of tiny snowflakes, looking for any sign of Donovan's return. By the time she drained her mug, she knew standing around was not going to be an option.

“So much for a fun snow day.” He'd said they'd go looking for evidence this morning, but with the storm, Roger wasn't likely to show, so surely he could have had breakfast first. And they were supposed to look together, although she hadn't exactly shown a lot of excitement for going out in the snow, so she couldn't really get mad at him for taking off without her. But still. She was getting tired of being left behind to wait.

She brightened when she remembered stashing a pair of tall rubber barn boots in the far corner of the porch after a day spent investigating the stables a few weeks back. She dug them out, then went back inside to put on another layer of socks and another pair of sweats, before heading out.

She kept to the trail Donovan had made through the snow, which was already getting blown in, wincing as the deep snow tipped into the sides of the wide rubber boot tops and slid down to soak her feet. She stopped and pulled one pair of sweats up and out, then tugged the elastic band down over the boots. Now her hands were numb, but at least her feet wouldn't get any wetter. She continued down to the road toward the lower cabins closer to the lake. “What on earth are you doing down here?” she murmured.

She got to the first cabin, and even with the wind and drifting, she could still see where he'd been around the outside, and inside as well, it appeared, as the snow on the front stoop was disturbed where the door had been dragged open. But there were more tracks leading down to the next cabin, so she just kept on going. It wasn't until she passed the third cabin that she realized that even with the drifting and fresh snowfall, the snow looked a lot more churned up down here than it had when she'd first left the cabin. She stopped for a second and looked back, then at the cabin in front of her. Donovan's self-made trail leading down the driveway had been pretty narrow, but down here…