Move Me (12 page)

“They have me,” he murmured. His breath came
out on a shaky sigh. The knowledge that he loved her didn’t help
him in any way.

Because
he loved her, he knew the
other reason he couldn’t stay.

He didn’t move when he heard her march up the
stairs. Though he sensed her anger, every moment he had left with
her was precious.

“Who
are
you?” she demanded from the
door.

“I am called Duvall,” he said, the closest
pronunciation she’d understand. For a second, she appeared startled
that he was answering. Then her anger returned.

“You’re called Duvall,” she huffed, fists
planted on her hips.

“I didn’t lie to you. You assumed I was John
Feeney.”

“Oh I
assumed
. I guess it’s all right
then.” Her voice shook with fury as her eyes glittered with bright
tears. Ironically, Dubhghall thought he’d never seen her so
beautiful.

“Why?” she said. “I felt sorry for you. Why
would you trick me?”

“I needed something only you could grant
me.”

She stared at him. He watched the memory of
everyone who’d disappointed her scroll across her face. Her
parents, her uncle, her ex ... maybe even her brother. Dubhghall
was very sorry to be added to that list.

And then comprehension dawned. “The note,”
she said. “The one you hid in the drawer.”

He pulled it open, his dread that she would
hate him no match for his need to play straight with her. A partial
truth wasn’t good enough. She deserved the whole. He retrieved the
folded paper and handed it to her.

She opened it warily. “
I, Belle Hobart,
having been bequeathed my uncle’s worldly possessions, do grant the
faerie known as Dubhghall all the names of Isaiah Luckes
.”

She looked up from her reading, her brows
drawn together in perplexity. “What is this?”

“The truth.”

“I’m supposed to believe you’re a
faerie
? And that you want my uncle’s names?”

“I have your uncle’s names. You already ceded
them to me.”

“That’s crazy!” she spluttered. “There’s no
such thing as faeries.”

“You saw me use my faerie speed when you
tried to open the drawer before. And that first night, after your
shower, I dream-walked you. You wanted me to be a sheik. We were in
a tent. I tied you up with magical leather straps. I can tell you
everything we did, if you like. I promise you, I’ll always remember
it.”

Belle had gone paper white. Fearing she might
faint, he rose and caught her elbows. “You stroked my wings,” he
said huskily. “They don’t manifest in the mundane world, but you
knew exactly where they were.”

~

Belle remembered that dream distinctly,
including his tall and sparkly wings. She shook her head, trying to
twist free of his hold on her arms. This insane story couldn’t be
true. Maybe she’d talked in her sleep and he’d overheard. Okay,
strictly speaking, they hadn’t
slept
together, but maybe
he’d planted a bug in her room. He might have had any sort of
equipment in his toolbox.

“Belle,” he said, one hand rising to stroke
the side of her face.

Belle gazed helplessly into his eyes. He was
so beautiful, so dark and mysterious. She could demand he show her
his faerie magic. That would debunk this nonsense once and for
all.

Unless it wouldn’t
, a contrary part of
her suggested.

“Why do you need Uncle Lucky’s names?” she
asked him instead.

“An enemy unearthed my truename. Faeries hide
them, as a rule. With the right spell, truenames can be used to
compel my people against their will. Once mine was known, I was
vulnerable to being forced to do terrible things. Because I’m a
powerful mage, this was no small danger. I had to flee or Mor, my
enemy, would have blackmailed my father into handing over his
country.”

“His
country
.”

“My father is the king of Talfryn. I am his
youngest son.”

He said this with a perfectly straight face,
a feat Belle couldn’t have matched to save her life. “So you’re a
faerie prince?”

“I am. Though unlikely to inherit. My parents
keep Talfryn in better order than most fae lands, thus making it a
prize. If my father surrendered it to Mor to save me, all our
citizens would suffer.”

“You do realize how ludicrous this
sounds.”

“I have an inkling,” he said dryly. He
brought his hands to her shoulders, his thumbs rubbing them gently.
The gesture disconcerted her, as did the fact that he remained
naked.

Keeping her eyes on his, Belle drew a
steadying breath. “You could show me your faerie magic, prove you
are what you say.”

Duvall or whoever he was let out a rasping
laugh. “Sadly, I cannot spare the power for that display. I have
just enough to get myself home again. My ... batteries don’t
recharge in the mundane world as they do in Faerie. I probably
shouldn’t have spent as much magic here as I did.”

Belle’s eyebrows expressed her response to
this.

“Yes,” he said. “I realize that’s a
convenient excuse.”

She didn’t move when he smoothed her hair
behind her shoulders. She should have, but the intensity of his
gaze, the emotion it conveyed, was too arresting to tear her
attention from. He gazed at her like he cared - more than cared,
actually. He might be crazy, but she couldn’t remember anyone
looking at her this lovingly before.

“Do you
have
to leave?” she asked
plaintively. The words slipped from her unplanned, causing her
cheeks to sting the instant they were out.

Duvall cupped her face, his dark eyes gone
luminous. “Belle, if my happiness were the only issue, I’d stay
with you forever. You are the shining star that reigns over my
yearning heart.”

Belle’s mouth fell open. This had to be the
most ridiculous statement he’d made yet. “Duvall ...” She trailed
off, having very little idea how to continue. Did she want to warn
him not to be so crazy? Or to confess that her heart yearned
too?

“Belle, my kind find it highly uncomfortable
to lie. You may trust what I say.”

She wanted to - too much, she was
certain.

“Everything okay up here?” Susi asked from
the door in her best mom tone.

They both turned toward her. In Dubhghall’s
case, this presented Susi with quite the eyeful. She inhaled like
she’d been slapped. “Oh. I didn’t - Holy smokes.” Susi’s marital
status didn’t keep her from gawking ... or gulping audibly. “Wow,
you
do
look handy.”

“Susi,” Belle said, amused in spite of
herself. “This is -” She hesitated a beat too long.

“Duvall,” her companion said, offering his
hand as casually as if he were dressed. No modesty problems there,
she guessed. “My apologies for worrying you for your friend’s
safety.”

“Sure.” Dazed, Susi let him shake her arm up
and down. “I take it the, um, confusion concerning your identity
has been cleared up.”

“As much as it can be. Would you be kind
enough to hand me those work trousers?”

His pants were crumpled at Susi’s feet. With
understandable reluctance, she bent and passed them to him. The
sight of John ...
Duvall
dressing drove a lump up into
Belle’s throat.

“Duvall,” she said. “Maybe you rushing off
isn’t a good idea.”

“I fear I must.” He retrieved his flannel
shirt from where it had landed on the footboard, pulling that on as
well. “Much time has passed already. I cannot predict how narrow my
window of opportunity is.”

He was talking funnier by the second, and she
didn’t like that at all. He sat on the bed to pull on his socks.
His work boots followed in short order. Belle’s hands curled into
fists by her sides. Fully dressed then, he rose and came to
her.

“I make no promises,” he said. “Only that my
heart is yours forever.”

She knew she pulled a face. In her
experience,
forever
was right up there with Santa Claus.

As if he knew what she was thinking, he
smiled, slid both arms behind her, and kissed her on the mouth.
This was no polite peck. She had half a second to feel embarrassed
about him Frenching her in front of Susi. After that, his seductive
powers kicked in.

He’d tugged her right up against his warm
hard front, the tightness of his arms pulling her to her toes. He
was erect within those dark green trousers, the thick ridge beneath
his zipper as firm as steel. That was distracting, but - truth be
told - his lips were all he needed to conquer her.

His kiss denied her the chance to hide her
reactions. Skilled though he was, he barely had to expend an effort
to make her moan, to make her cling to him with all her strength
and drive her tongue against his.

In too many ways that mattered, he was her
dream man.

He turned his head to take her mouth from
another angle, vanquishing hers anew. He tasted as good as he
smelled, and greed swallowed her good sense. She wanted to make him
come from her belly rubbing his cock, wanted to hear him gasp and
feel the hot rush of seed. She caressed the outside of his leg with
the inside of hers, a natural prelude to hooking her calf around
his hip. When she did that, Duvall’s hands engulfed her bottom,
clamping snugly and pulling up.

The rock-hard length of his erection notched
her labia through her sweats. His tongue pushed into her mouth -
strong, sleek, slow - lingering for tantalizing seconds before it
retreated.

She knew he meant to remind her how it felt
to be fucked by him.

Perhaps he’d reminded himself as well. He let
out a sound of longing as his mouth released hers. Belle’s well
kissed lips tingled crazily.

“Belle Hobart,” he said, his hypnotizing eyes
holding hers prisoner. “Do not follow me. What I do now is best for
both of us.”

His arms dropped from her, and he stepped
back. She started to say his name.

“Sh.” He lifted two fingers before his mouth.
For a confusing instant, glitter made of light seemed to twinkle at
their tips. “You are loved,” he said. “Never forget that.”

She watched him go with her heart pounding
anxiously in her chest. Down the stairs his footsteps went, through
the kitchen, out the creaking back screen door. Aluminum banged
wood as it bounced shut behind him, a sound heard a thousand times
that tonight rang with ominous finality.

That was wrong, wasn’t it? Belle loved
Duvall. She should be running after him. They could work out their
differences. There were worse things than spending your life with a
crazy man.

Spending it without him struck her as the
biggest one.

She knew who he was at the core. Smart.
Compassionate. Enough of a child to curl up with a storybook.
Enough of an adult to finish any job he took on. And he
loved
her. No matter what his quirks, that was
important.

She couldn’t seem to make her legs do what
she wanted. She sat back down on the bed and stared at the plain
white wall.

Susi sat beside her and squeezed her hand.
“It’s okay, Belle. You aren’t the only woman who’d let a man like
that lie to you.”

He doesn’t lie
, Belle thought, sure of
it. Duvall just danced around the truth sometimes.

“The pies are warm,” Susi volunteered. “I
turned off the oven before I came up.”

“Pie sounds good,” Belle agreed, but neither
of them moved for a while.

~

The clearing behind Belle’s house was quiet.
The trees rustled in the wind, and somewhere nearby a squirrel
scrabbled up the bark of a trunk. Here in Belle’s world, the
monsters weren’t those he was used to. Mundanes worried about
mortgages and the price of gas, about keeping their children safe
and countries that couldn’t be magicked out of making war. These
were no less serious hazards than goblins or evil spells, but if
the human spirit could flourish among them, so could a fae’s.
Dubhghall dreaded facing life without Belle more than any of those
perils.

He glanced back at the house’s glowing
windows, aware he needed to make haste before the spell he’d placed
on Belle wore off. He closed his eyes and centered himself.

“Isaiah Bennington-Luckes,” he murmured, “I
summon you to me.”

Because the name belonged to both of them for
now, he felt an odd tug inside his core. The ghost came without a
struggle, fully apparated by the time Dubhghall opened his eyes.
The shade looked different from before, displaying more radiance
and less individual personality. The barest outline of Isaiah’s
clothes and limbs remained.

“You’ve earned my help crossing over,”
Dubhghall said, “if that is what you wish.”

The shade had enough humanity to scratch its
temple. “I’m not sure your aid is necessary. I feel as if my
business here might be done. I think my niece will be happy
now.”

Dubhghall wasn’t going to contradict him, not
if keeping his mouth shut meant Belle wouldn’t be haunted
anymore.

“I’m going after the boy,” he said.

“That’s good,” the ghost responded. “I can’t
see him from where I am, but if anyone can find Danny, I know it’s
you.”

If the former Isaiah couldn’t see Danny, its
reassurance was polite rather than factual. But there were worse
things than politeness. Dubhghall appreciated the ghost’s good
will.

“Do you wish me to light the path for you?”
he asked. “Once you see the way, you’ll have no trouble traveling
it on your own.”

“That would be kind of you,” the ghost
agreed.

Belle’s uncle was indeed close to crossing
over. Illuminating his way didn’t take much power. Dubhghall
focused, and a soft new star appeared in the western sky. The
shimmering arch that led to it began at Isaiah’s feet.

“Oh,” said the ghost, gaze turned upward,
hands pressed over its heart. “
Thank
you.”

This was all the goodbye he got. The specter
disconnected from the earthly plane as easily as a plug from a
loose socket. One moment he was there, and the next the night
itself seemed to have forgotten him. Dubhghall’s new truename
settled more strongly inside of him, shared no longer but only his.
Since that name originated here in the mundane world, the chance
that any fae would discover it was doubtful.