Page 149 of Under Arthur’s Protection

“I’ll buy you a new one,” he said, without breaking rhythm.

“Shut up and keep going.”

Every nerve ending was keener without the condom between us.

“Gwen.” His voice cracked.

“Arthur! Fuck!” I tightened around him and his rhythm stuttered. I slid two fingers between us and clamped them around his shaft. “Yes! Yes!”

While the climax rolled through me, he drove deeper and deeper, until he finally held steady. He gripped the back of my head and brought my face to his, holding my gaze as he finished inside me for the first time. It was warm and real and close in a way nothing else had ever been.

His arms shook under his sexy gray sweater. We stayed close, breathing each other’s air. His forehead found mine, and for long minutes, neither of us moved. He stayed inside me, wrapped his arms around me, and kissed me.

Eventually, he said, “I interrupted your research.”

“You did.”

“You seemed very focused.”

“I was.” I kissed the tip of his nose. “You ambushed me.”

“You were in your bathrobe.” He tugged the open collar. “So it’s your fault.”

“Everything is my fault, apparently.”

He kissed the corner of my mouth. “Sorry.”

“No, you’re not.”

“No, I’m not.” He pulled out of me and grabbed a tissue from the fallen box on the floor. After cleaning me, he asked, “If Germany’s out, what’s left?”

“Spain, France, Italy, Norway, and Wales.” I stood and smoothed the map out, while he threaded an arm around my waist. “I don’t know what I’ll do if I actually find it.”

“Stay quiet?” He pulled his jeans up, but left the button undone.

“The agreement covers publicizing the truth about the sword, the inscription, and the cave. But this is independent research.” I tapped Spain on the map. “If I find the Seat, is that covered by the agreement or not?”

“You don’t even know if it’s a place,” Arthur said. “But either way, they’ll expect you to stay quiet about it.”

“Yeah.” I had deleted the timer on the email I’d threatened them with. But I hadn’t deleted the email itself. No, I kept it in my draft folder and added everything I’d learned from their Charter, in case I ever needed to deploy it. “I like having a puzzle to keep my brain busy, though.”

“Working with Sam isn’t keeping your brain busy enough?”

“I love working there.” I’d handed over my report to her two weeks after we’d returned from Cornwall. Most of the cuts and bruises had faded by the time I saw her, and I’d kept out of sight while they healed. She’d accepted what I’d written, but her questions made it clear she suspected a deeper story. Somehow, that suspicion had led to a job offer. “She’s talking about a trip to Brazil next month. There’s a collection she wants to evaluate in person.”

“Brazil? I haven’t been to South America in a while. Need a bodyguard?”

“Hopefully not.” I ran my fingers along the scar on his forearm. The thin white line from the archive knife wound. I traced it down toward his wrist. “But the Seat is different. It’s mine. Nobody asked me to look for it, nobody’s funding it, nobody’s going to publish it. It’s my own little puzzle.”

He watched my fingers on his scar. “Will you be happy with that?”

I looked up at him. Two months ago, I’d been grabbed from a cave on the Cornish coast. Two months earlier, I’d been lamenting my career choices and my piss-poor choices in men. Now I was working at my desk in our house in Brenton, Michigan. I had a great job with a woman who believed in me, amazing research to work on, and I was in love with the best man in the world. “I’m not sure happy’s a strong enough word.”

He turned me toward him and cupped my face. “My offer to fly you back to Europe for your research stands.”

“I have a job. I can’t drop everything and leave.”

His eyes searched mine. “And so does the offer to buy the Marlcombe Collection or the Walmere Sword and fix⁠—”