Cléa had proved a great help with the baby, it was true, but the statement sobered them both. Carlijn did not have the support or acknowledgement of Lucan’s family, especially now that Lucan had fled town. She was on her own.
“I’m going out,” she announced, already lacing her boots, her growing stomach barely allowing it.
Hanna frowned. She hoped Carlijn wasn’t going to do anything reckless. “Do you want company? The maid can look after Rosalore while she sleeps.”
“No need. I just want to buy a few new ribbons at the market. The fresh air will be good for me. And maybe afterward I’ll visit my parents.”
Ah. Hannalinde’s heart ached with understanding. Her friend was finally ready to tell her parents the truth, that the engagement to the Meravenna merchant was now impossible. That they would have a half-gargoyle grandchild in just a few months. “Will you be staying with them?”
Carlijn gave her a wan smile. “With all likelihood. Don’t wait up for me.”
When Rikard drew his first breath of the evening, a warmth bloomed at the base of her skull, traveling down her spine and lodging in her chest. Of course, he had to hear complaints at the Nadir’s office first, and she had an appointment with the midwife to check her healing, but then the night would be theirs.
But before he left for work, he doted on Rosalore. He held her in one massive arm and walked the house, singing made-up songs. He changed her swaddling clothes when she soaked them. When she fussed, he sat in the nursery roost with the infant on his chest and purred until she was content, and when Rosalore’s fist closed around his finger, the emotion that flooded through the bond was so vast and so tender that Hannalinde had to sit down.
When Rikard’s parents descended to claim their grandchild for the night, they brought special oil for Rosalore’s tiny emerging nubs, which were barely visible beneath the dark fuzz of her hair. They brought soft cloths for cleaning the baby’s translucent wings, which had emerged from their wing cases but were still hardening, week-by-week, into the leathery membranes they’d become. And they brought far too much keeper-cooked food for everyone, as though they didn’t have a kitchen at Rose House.
Cléa also brought plenty of unsolicited advice about feeding schedules, sleeping positions, and the importance of speaking to the child in the Old Tongue, which Hannalinde nodded along to while trying not to laugh at the faces Rikard pulled behind his mother’s back. She was just grateful Rosalore had such enthusiastic grandparents on Rikard’s side since her own parents were gone.
Then Cléa and Roul whisked the baby away, leaving Rikard a few minutes to dote upon his wife in peace. He brought her tea. He arranged her pillows. He asked about the baby gown she’d started embroidering for Carlijn’s child and about her upcoming appointment with Aalis. He sat on the edge of the bed and told her about what his evening held at the Nadir’s office, the petitions and complaints and the endless absurdity of gargoyle-human relations he’d have to field, and she enjoyed his confidences.
While he was at work, she visited Old Aalis, who pronounced her whole and healed, which was exactly the news she’d been hoping for.
Then she waited impatiently in bed for Rikard to return from the Nadir’s office, her pale hair fanned across the embroidered coverlet. He’d barely touched her since the birth. She hadn’t even touched herself in the six weeks it took for her body to stitch itself back together. The stretch marks on her belly were still raw and vivid, the flesh deflated beneath them. She wondered if Rikard still wanted her now that she was such a different shape and color.
He entered the bedroom quietly and froze when he saw her lying there awake, toying with her swollen, milky breasts through the fabric of her night shift. He never took his eyes from her as she slowly drew her shift up to her waist. A bolt of unfettered lust slammed through the bond, sending a thrill deep into her core. Apparently, she’d had no cause to doubt his desire.
“You don’t have to stay over there,” she said, slicking her fingers through the moisture that had gathered between her legs.
He pounced directly, bounding from the doorway to the bed, curving his body over her. His black hair fell around them in a loose curtain. “I’ve wanted to do this all night,” he grumbled, nosing into the side of her neck until he could lick the scar of her mating bite. “I could feel you playing with yourself on my way home. I very nearlyflew.”
His breath tickled her ear, and she laughed, wrapping her legs around his hips. Fearlessly, she rubbed against him, showing him in the mind bond how she’d say yes to anything he asked. How much she trusted him.
“I want you, too,” she whispered. “Carlijn’s away for the night and Rosalore is still with your parents, so we have the house to ourselves for a few hours.”
“I wish—” he began but cut himself off with a shake of his head, instead capturing her mouth in his in a heated kiss.
Her lips parted under his and she tasted the faint mineral tang of his hide. His tongue, slightly rougher than a human’s, traced the seam of her mouth as his claws dimpled the fabric.
She made a hungry little sound. His hand came up to cradle the back of her head, threading his fingers carefully through her hair as he deepened the kiss. He kissed her urgently, like they might be interrupted at any minute, his breath ragged as his movements grew more and more frantic. He wanted something. Heneededit, and whatever it was, it couldn’t be satisfied by a mere kiss.
She pulled away, curious. “Wish what?”
“Wish I could be inside you.” His eyes fixed on hers, and the bond swelled with his regret that he couldn’t please her in certain ways.
Her chest tightened. He pleased her insomany ways. With fingers and tongue and toys, not to mention with his filthy, heated words. And she could give him so little pleasure in return.
“What about your tail?”
He stilled, his nostrils flaring. His jaw worked as he struggled to respond. The muscles in his neck corded. “Hanna. You don’t mean it.”
“You said you wanted to be inside me. It’s part of you.” Her thumb traced the edge of the scar that twisted his mouth. “Let me feel it.”
He relented, dragging his tail across the sheets and up the inside of her leg. The tapered tip was warm, smoother than the rest of his hide, almost silken where it brushed her ankle, explored the curve of her calf and the sensitive hollow behind her knee.
She hadn’t expected it to feel like this, so agile and confident. The tip traced circles on her inner thigh, and her legs fell open without being told.
“Are you sure?” Rikard’s tail brushed the seam of her sex, lingering. “Are you healed?”
