Free One Thousand Kisses by Jody Wallace Page B

her, but his throat was dry. Where was he? The last thing he remembered was drowsiness. Had to get up. Wake up. His limbs failed to respond. Prickles dotted his extremities.
    But it didn’t matter. She was finally here.
    “Anisette.”
    “Shhhh.” She advanced through the darkness. A breeze pinned him to the mattress.
    Mattress. He was in bed. Something sweet and flowery tickled his nose. She reached for him, two slender hands cool against his naked chest.
    Her hands lingered at his throat, paused, covered his face. Her body brushed against him, blocking the glow of the doorway.
    Small, firm breasts. A blanket of hair.
    Anisette. Yes.
    The crisp curls of her groin brushed his cock, and her fingers pressed his eyes shut. Summer flared inside him, and heat. When he tried to embrace her, his arms were too heavy.
    “Shhh,” she said again.
    Her satiny skin caressed him, but she was winter and snow. His heat flowed into her. He could feel it amass inside her like a beating heart. Yet with each beat it faded, chill and small and smaller still. He strained to reach it before it was too late.
    He’d waited so long for this. Why wasn’t it working?
    Her finger slipped between his lips, bitter and salty. Inside her. Inside him. Wake up. She’d taken his heat but she was too cold.
    “Anisette?”
    “Shhh,” she said a third time. Her body began to move. Rime crusted her skin, chafing him. He should roll atop her and into her, heat her up. Why couldn’t he move?
    She squeezed two icy thighs around his cock and blew frost into his ear. Pain shuddered through him instead of ecstasy. He hadn’t told her about the prophesy. If he told her, she’d melt. Then she’d make the pain go away.
    Wake up. Her body sizzled with icy fire, searing him. She was freezing without him inside her. She needed him, and he hurt so much.
    Suddenly she was wrenched away, crying his name. White light flared, trapping her in solid ice. This wouldn’t be happening if he’d taken her, and now the ice would kill her.
    He leapt forward, but wires cut his wrists. Fetid air entered his nose. He couldn’t breathe, he’d suffocate, he’d die before he could tell her—
    No!
    This wasn’t happening. Another nightmare. He couldn’t stop watching her die, watching them kill her. He couldn’t wake up. Break the cycle. Wake up!
    Help me.
     
    The cry roused Ani from hot, restive slumber.
    She nipped up like a jack in the box. Heart racing, she stared into the darkness. Earth magic sharpened her hearing, her vision. Yet no matter how far she extended, the only sounds were the ordinary noises of the night.
    She’d been dreaming. Good or bad? Fairies only had bad dreams if their psyche was imbalanced. The type of imbalance that could cause a woman to experience graphic, sexual dreams about the Primary of the Elder Court. That could cause panic attacks and instinctive agony spells.
    What a mess. Ani collapsed onto the pillows and scrubbed her face. She had to regain control. Erotic nighttime fantasies like the one she’d been enjoying weren’t bad exactly. What made hers bad was that she’d been interrupted before the grand conclusion.
    It had been so close to grand. His skin. His hands. His tongue. Whether or not it was a nightmare, it felt bad now. Her puss ached with frustration, but she had no urge to rub it. All the lust had been shocked out of her by the sudden fright.
    Imbalanced indeed. Without Talista by her side, she’d grown too feeble to handle Court. She’d limped along for five years, but evidently she’d reached her limit.
    She suspected her limit had something to do with Warran Torval. Or was it her mortifying desire to offer Elder Embor a proposition card—or proposition him outright?
    While cowardice explained the first issue, lack of balance was the only explanation for the second. She’d lost her center and her sense. While Embor’s threat to report her had likely been a bluff, it didn’t erase the fact she’d throttled