Amy's Advantage (13 page)

She followed his order and took up a more languid pace that
allowed him to feel every lick, stroke and sucking kiss while still being able
to focus on the open cunt just inches from his face. He rubbed the soft skin of
her labia until her pussy started to heat and swell. The scent of her arousal
wreathed around his head and made him hungry for a taste.

With a deliberate slowness, he tugged the strip of lace
sideways and pushed one finger into her cunt. His cock was deep in Shy’s mouth
when she moaned and the vibrations against his cock had his balls pulling up.
He rubbed the front of her vagina, finding that beautiful spot that drove her
crazy. With another moan, Shy bobbed up and down again, this time twisting her
hips as she creamed around his finger.

Knowing she preferred two fingers, he kept only one inside
her and let her twist above him as she tried to increase the stimulation. She
wanted more, but so did he. Angry at the distance she had kept between them for
the last several weeks, he gained some satisfaction from holding what she
wanted just out of reach. For now.

He tapped her sweet spot twice, making her gasp and sending
cooling tingles over the skin of his cock as she inhaled. Her lips closed
around him almost immediately and the cool was replaced by the wet heat of her
mouth. If she did that again, he’d be coming down her throat before he was done
taunting her.

They both knew she wasn’t taking him back and he refused let
her think he could be at her beck and call. She would leave his room sore and
satisfied and thoroughly fucked as she’d requested, but he would wield the
reins completely tonight. He withdrew his finger and let the lace slide back
into place. Sucking the juices off his finger, he murmured, “You are
delicious.”

At his words, a tremor coursed through Shy’s body and he
felt the primitive pull of possessiveness. In all the times they’d been
together, he’d never been rough or vulgar with her, never allowed even a hint
of that ancient part of his nature to be revealed. That part of him that lived
at the heart of every Kilth male was well chained and hidden just as well as
any secrets she kept from him. It was an act of self-preservation since he
instinctively understood that once he loosed that primal aspect of his
character with this woman, he would be driven by emotion to keep and hold her
forever.

Neither of them was ready for forever. But he
was
ready to let her know there were dark sides to him that she should think twice about
before trying to manipulate him again. He pulled the lace forward until either
side of her labia was swollen around it and her clit was flattened under the
material. With his other hand, he scraped back and forth over her clit with his
thumbnail several times before moving his hands back to her breasts.

Shy was breathing hard as she lifted her head and wrapped
her hand around the base of his cock. Sliding her knees further apart, she
brought her pussy within licking distance. “Kayn. God. Touch me again,” she
begged.

Instead, he turned his head and pressed his mouth against
the smooth skin of her thigh and nipped it hard enough to make her jerk.
“Sweetheart, this is not about you at the moment. Lift that ass back up to
where it was and focus on the reason I let you in here tonight.”

His words sounded harsh in his ears and he wondered if he’d
pushed her too far as she stilled above him. But after a moment, she shifted
back to her original position and tongued down one side of his shaft and up the
other before taking him in down to her throat again.

With a low chuckle, Kayn twisted her nipples. “That’s right,
Shyrana. Just like that. Right now, the only thing that matters is you sucking
me off.”

Like so much of what stood between them now, he knew those
were lying words. No doubt he’d come down her throat fairly soon, but his
attention was elsewhere as he closed his eyes and let the perfection of her
mouth on his cock fuel a favorite fantasy. Having Shyrana. Completely. Forever.

* * * * *

Coming out of the large guest house transformed into
barracks for the soldiers under his command for this mission, Jordyn’s heart
froze in his chest the moment he heard Chloe’s shriek pierce the early morning
air. He ran toward the house, cursing the fresh snow that had fallen last night
slowing him down.

As he rounded the corner of the farmhouse, he saw Chloe
flung backward into the snow, and for a split second, all he could think was
that she had been attacked or shot. His mind was so focused on the fear that
she had been hurt, it took a moment for him to register what he was seeing.

The child was making a snow angel.

Holy fucking blood of the Three Goddesses. His breath rushed
out in new anger as he strode toward Amy, who had initially escaped his notice.
She was lying on the ground close to where Chloe had plopped down, making her
own snow angel.

He didn’t stop until he was towering over Amy, blocking the
sun from her face as he glared down at her. “What are you doing?” he demanded.

Spread-eagle on the ground, Amy looked up at him in
surprise, her bubbling laughter stalled in her throat. Her arm and legs had
quit moving at his question but her emerald eyes glinted with an impish
mischief. “Making a snow angel,” she quipped.

“Does anyone know you’re out here?” he asked, the edge of
anger clearly sharpening his words.

She pushed up on her elbows and looked around. “We were
trying to be quiet and not wake anyone. Help me up?”

He took the gloved hand she lifted toward him and pulled her
abruptly to her feet. As she carefully stepped out of her snow angel, he
glanced around, aware of eyes on them. He pinpointed them as the inner
perimeter guards he regularly kept on schedule at all times. That knowledge
calmed the edge of the jagged fear that had sliced its way through him, but not
by much. “You shouldn’t be out here.”

Amy paused from brushing the snow off her butt. “Why? Chloe
has never had the chance to play in snow before and was begging to go outside.”
She gestured toward her daughter, who was busily flapping her arms and legs for
her own snow angel, her eyes tightly scrunched closed against the bright sun.
As bundled up as she was, it was amazing the child could move at all.

“She wanted to play hide-and-seek in the snow, but Chloe
tends to take her hiding very seriously. She likes to crawl inside of things to
hide. More than once, she’s curled up into a ball wherever she’d been hiding
and fallen asleep waiting to be found.” Amy shook her head at the memory.
“Scared the living daylights out of me the first time I couldn’t find her.
Making snow angels was definitely a better option.”

Clumsy in her snow suit, Chloe sat up. When she saw Jordyn,
she gave him a grin that threatened to split her face in two and explode his
heart. Amy reached over and picked her up out of the center of her impression.

“See,” Amy said, shifting Chloe to one hip, “you made an
angel in the snow.” Chloe laughed and then wiggled to be put down. She
immediately made a rough attempt to create a snowball with her mittened hands
and threw it at Jordyn. Thrown from about a foot away, the nearly flat snowball
hit him in his right shin, sliding harmlessly off his nylon snow pants. At her
success, Chloe let out a squeal of glee.

His eyebrows went up and he asked, “Is that a challenge?”

“Snowball fight!” Chloe declared as she scooped up more
snow. This time she threw it before she had packed it together and the wind
caught it and brushed the loose snow back into her face.

A strange, yearning contentment snaked around Jordyn’s heart
as Chloe blinked up at him in surprise, snow caught in her eyelashes and the
curls peeking out from the hood of her snowsuit. Gently, he brushed the snow
off her face and bent down to tell her it was probably time to go inside and
get warmed up.

He never got the chance.

A solidly packed snowball hit him just beneath his ear and
slid under the collar of his coat. Chloe’s eyes got big and her mouth rounded
into a comical “O”. He turned to find Amy packing another snowball just a few
feet from him.

She smiled and said, “Chloe did announce a snowball fight.”
Then she threw the snowball in her hands and it missed his head only because he
ducked. Chloe giggled in delight.

Jordyn turned back to Chloe. “What do you say we work
together to get your mom?” Another snowball hit him in the arm. The woman was quick.
Even as Chloe nodded in agreement, he was packing snowballs. Two more of Amy’s
snowballs hit him before he finished making a quick pile for Chloe to work from
and picking up two for himself.

A snowball hit him in the chest as he straightened. “We accept
your challenge,” he said. Chloe threw a snowball at her mom. It flew several
feet, but was wide of its mark. Jordyn’s, however, hit its mark, slamming into
Amy’s shoulder and breaking apart in a shower of snow that covered her face in
icy crystals. At the first step he took toward her with his second snowball,
she yelped and turned to run.

Without thinking, he took off after her. When he got close,
she threw her last snowball over her shoulder at him, which he easily dodged.
Laughing as she rounded the corner of the house, she was still laughing as she
tripped, going facedown in a snow bank. He reached her as she rolled over, her
entire body covered in a thin layer of snow.

“I give up!” she said, wiping the snow off her face and
eyeing the snowball he held. Her cheeks bright pink from the cold and her green
eyes shining as gems held against the sunlight, she smiled up at him and
tripped his heart into a slow roll inside his chest. “What’s the Ilyrian word
for uncle?” she asked, holding her hands up for a lift out of the deep patch of
snow.

He dropped the snowball and reached down to take her hand
for the second time that morning. “We don’t have one, because we never
surrender.”

Amy grabbed hold of his hands and then, quick as lightning,
shifted her weight and twisted, easily overbalancing him thanks to the position
he’d taken to help her up. Her sudden unexpected tactic brought him tumbling
into the snow. Instinctively he maneuvered to keep from falling on top of her
and hurting her and ended up rolling in the snow next to her. Since she was
still holding on to him, she rolled with him, landing on top of him. When they
came to a halt, she was laughing again and they were both covered in snow.

Her face just a few inches from his, she grinned down at
him. “I guess I really am Ilyrian, huh?”

His eyebrows lifted and the left corner of his mouth tilted
up. “Yes, you are.”

Instantly the distance he’d held between them seemed to
evaporate. Her gaze opened and he read her feelings for him as clearly as if
she had them written on her forehead in permanent marker. The air around them
charged with an energy that hurtled past sexual and for a moment he knew
nothing in the world except a desire for this woman that went beyond anything
he’d ever experienced.

“Oh my god,” she whispered. Her eyes moved down to his
mouth. “I so want to kiss you right now.”

Need, sharp and hot sliced through him. “Amy…”

Her eyes jerked back up to his. She read both the need and
the denial and let out a frustrated sigh. “Crap.” She pushed up with her arms.
“Great. Whatever. Sorry. Again.”

“Amy, it’s not—”

A shower of snow flew over them. “I win!” Chloe announced,
obviously pleased with herself. While they’d been rolling around, she’d
followed them and taken the chance to ambush them.

Amy sat up, momentarily shocking his system with the fact
that she was straddling his waist. Then she was pushing on his shoulders and
stepping away from him.

“Yes, you did,” Amy said, picking up Chloe and heading into
the house. “Time for some hot chocolate.”

“And cookies!”

Amy shook her head. “It’s too early for cookies. How about
some oatmeal?”

Chloe twisted in her mother’s arms and pointed at Jordyn.
“Come!”

“She’s a little bossy,” Amy said.

“Comes by it honestly,” Jordyn said as he fell into step
behind them.

Amy tilted her nose in the air. “I know. Just like her
father.”

Jordyn just grunted in response and stomped on the porch to
knock the snow off his boots. After all their outerwear had been shed, Amy
coolly asked Jordyn to take Chloe into the kitchen while she changed her jeans.
Chloe’s snowsuit had kept her dry and warm, but Amy was soaked to the skin.
Without waiting for an actual answer, Amy told Chloe she’d be right back and
headed up the stairs, her socked feet padding softly on the treads.

He watched her disappear as the weight on his heart
increased. For all his efforts at staying away from her, he’d managed to hurt
her again. And they hadn’t even gotten to the difficult part of the day.

Chapter Eight

Jordyn hung the assorted jackets, hats and gloves on the
hooks by the front door before scooping Chloe up and heading for the kitchen.

It was still early, but the house held a quiet that came
with fewer people there to move around. With Wyc, Rordyc, Connyn, Myrra and all
their mates already back in Ilyria, the large house had taken on the feeling of
an empty shell rather than a temporary home, until Chloe and Amy arrived.
Chloe’s laughter and energy rolled into every corner, tossing any crouching
gloom out into the winter landscape.

Chloe was jabbering nonstop about the snow when Amdyn passed
them in the hall on their way to the kitchen, a mug of coffee in his hand.
Jordyn had planned to do a perimeter sweep after getting Chloe settled with
Kirry for breakfast, but his commander asked him to stop by the library first.

Since he’d already eaten with a group of soldiers in the
barracks, he waved off Kirry’s offer to make him something as he put Chloe in
her booster chair at the table. The child was animatedly describing the
snowball fight to Kirry when he left the room.

The library door stood open and through it he could see
Amdyn at the computer workstation and Siriyn sprawled out in a club chair
nearby, his fingers tapping the armrests repeatedly. Whatever they’d been
discussing had brought a frown to Siriyn’s normally sanguine face and Jordyn
shut the door behind him. Amdyn closed out the windows he’d been navigating
through on the computer and came to sit in the same seating arrangement as
Siriyn. Jordyn joined them.

After a few minutes of discussion regarding house and
grounds security, Amdyn said, “There’s a portal opening tomorrow and I want Amy
and Chloe through it.” He looked at Siriyn. “You too.”

Siriyn frowned. “How can another be opening so quickly? I
thought the next one wasn’t for several weeks.”

“The Council is forcing an opening.”

“Who knows about this?” Jordyn asked.

Amdyn grimaced. “Too many, in my opinion. Anyone involved in
the Council and anyone they’ve told. On this side, Shy, since she’s involved in
the communication and now you two.”

“I don’t like it. With that many people involved, the
traitor will know,” Jordyn said.

Shaking his head, Amdyn said, “We won’t have the time or
coordinates until an hour before, ensuring as much safety as possible. But
since Myra left, we don’t have a Keeper on this side to open an emergency
portal anymore and the Prophets and Elders are all in agreement that the final
daughters need to be returned as soon as possible. They are starting to worry
that the prophecy may not be fulfilled.”

“They’ve waited for over twenty-five years. A few more weeks
won’t hurt them and two of the daughters have already returned,” Jordyn said.

“I understand,” Amdyn replied. “But they believe that all
the daughters must return and we’ve been gone a long time. The people are
starting to doubt.”

“
Starting
to doubt?” Siriyn asked, a surprising
sharpness in his tone. “There’s been doubt since the Brothers split the
Kyltar
at the beginning of the Five’s war,” he said, referring to the black
mythological beast that looked like a cross between a panther and a lion that
stood, claws extended and ready to strike, at the center of the Seal of Ilyria.

The Kyltar, the symbol for their homeworld, had been carved
from the ancient black stone mined from the depths of Ilyria and embedded in
the floor of the Hall of Council in their capital city. It had remained
unscathed for hundreds of years before The Original Five brought their royal
staffs down together upon it, declaring war on each other’s Houses. The staffs
had shattered and the seal had cracked into five sections along with their
world. According to legend, not until the prophecy was fulfilled and their
world healed would The Kyltar be whole again.

Siriyn glared at his older cousin. “Why are you worried
about the people doubting now? Do you think they doubt the prophecy? Or the
ability of the Kilth to rule? Maybe you’re worried that people are starting to
doubt your ability to reign as Heir to the First House?”

Amdyn leveled a cold stare at Siriyn. “Careful, cousin.
You’re walking right up to the line of treason.”

Siriyn leaned forward, his face as granite hard as Amdyn’s.
“I know this is hard for you to believe, since you all think I’m irresponsible,
unreliable and just too damn young to understand what the weight of our rule
requires, but I was the last one to leave Ilyria. I’ve been the one who’s made
the most trips between worlds and I’m telling you, there’s more than just a
single traitor we need to be worried about. Groundwork is being laid for a
rebellion, but it hit a major wall when Bethany was found and the people
realized that the prophecy might have a chance after all.”

“Which is why we need to get all of them back as soon as
possible,” Amdyn said, the heat holding steady in his voice. “The Council is
planning a big celebration for the returned daughters. They want them to be
presented at the next Gathering.”

“It doesn’t feel right,” Siriyn said. “If this is a trap and
Amy or Ellen were killed or taken during the dimension leap, it would give the
traitors the leverage they need to pull in more of the Council. Have you even
thought about what the political ambitions of some of the Elders or Prophets
might be? It’s no secret that some of them are afraid of losing their positions
of influence once the Heirs regain their full power. If the Council set this
portal up, how can you be sure it isn’t a trap?”

Amdyn stood abruptly and moved to the wide set of windows.
“You don’t know who these traitors are or if they are even really on the
Council. It could be any number of people and we can’t start doubting all the
Elders and Prophets and questioning every move they make simply because we’re
sure that there is a traitor among us. They’ve supported and guided our
ancestors for decades. They helped bring our world and, yes, our own Royal
Houses, back from the brink of disaster that the War of the Original Five
brought us all to.”

“That doesn’t mean they want things returned to the old
ways,” Siriyn stated.

“What do you know about the old ways? You’ve never bothered
to concern yourself with the old
or
new ways of our rule. You’re here to
find your mate, pushed into it because of your birth order, but you’ve never
taken any of it seriously.”

“By the time I came along, the search for our supposedly
mystic mates had been going on for decades with nothing to show for it. Can you
blame me for not wanting to leave a world full of real women falling at my feet
to go search for a myth?”

Amdyn turned from the window, his blue eyes as cold as the
winter sky behind him. “Our mates are not a myth. They are real and essential to
the prophecy.”

“What do we have that proves that this prophecy is real?”
Siriyn’s question wasn’t heated but honest. It brought the rising tide of anger
between the two cousins to a dead halt as Amdyn stared at his younger cousin.

Drawing in a deep breath, Amdyn set his shoulders back,
strong and sure. “I have Ellyna.” He crossed his arms over his chest and his
tone turned chastising. “Wyc has Bethany, Connyn has Aurora and Rordyc has
Bethany. Four of five. And now you have Amy. Can you still doubt the prophecy?”

Siriyn didn’t answer, but anger crept back into his
expression and the muscles along his jaw tensed. Jordyn watched Siriyn closely
as he asked, “Are you saying that you don’t believe you’ve found your mate?”

Immediately, Jordyn saw the anger in the young man’s face
reveal a much deeper struggle. There was definitely more going on with the
youngest Kilth heir than his cousins guessed.

For a long moment, Siriyn’s amber eyes reflected a fierce
inner battle and then just as suddenly, they cleared. “No,” he said, conviction
strong in his voice, “I’m not saying that. I know I’ve found her.”

Though he expected the answer, physically hearing it turned
Jordyn’s blood to lead. He nodded at the younger man. “Then we need to continue
with the best course of action to return you and your mate to the safety of our
world.”

Jordyn looked at Amdyn. “Chloe should be done with
breakfast. Would you like to speak with her now?” Amy had agreed to let Amdyn
search Chloe’s mind last night, but Chloe had already fallen asleep in
Shyrana’s lap by the time they had finished their meeting and so they had
agreed to this morning.

“Yes,” Amdyn said.

“I’ll go get them,” Siriyn said, his eagerness to leave
evident.

Jordyn stood to leave as well, but Amdyn stopped him. “I’d
like you to stay. Chloe is comfortable with you and Amy is a little tense about
this. I think it would be good for both of them to have you in the room. They
trust you.”

Without comment, Jordyn nodded and settled back into the
chair. Amy and Chloe entered with Siriyn trailing behind.

“Is Shyrana coming?” Amy asked after glancing around. “I
thought she was the main mind person here.”

“She is,” Amdyn said, “for certain things. But not for
this.”

Amy was holding Chloe’s hand, standing nervously in the
middle of the room. “So, what do we do?” Though studiously avoiding Jordyn, her
gaze nervously hopped from one spot to another, a skittish bird flitting from
branch to branch, unsure of where to land.

“Just take a seat,” Amdyn said. “You can hold Chloe on your
lap if you’d like.”

Chloe was squeezing two of her mother’s fingers with one
hand and had the thumb of the other firmly stuck in her mouth, looking as
nervous as her mother. Jordyn caught her eye. “Amdyn wants to talk to you,
Chloe. Is that okay?” Chloe nodded, her eyes round and serious above her
tightly fisted hand.

“Good. He’s just going to ask you some questions and I’ll be
right here with you and your mom.”

Siriyn took a seat angled close to the couch where Amy chose
to sit. While Amy slid Chloe onto her lap, Amdyn sat down across from them,
leaning forward, elbows on his knees.

“We’re going to play a game,” Amdyn said. “First, I’m going
to think of something and I want you to try to guess what it is. And then
you’ll think of something and I’ll try to guess. Can you do that for me?”

“Yeath.” Her word came out smudged around her thumb and Amy
gently tugged it from her mouth and brushed a kiss across the soft hair at her
temple.

Amdyn waited until Amy looked back up. “Go ahead,” she said.

“Okay, Chloe, what do you think I’m thinking about?” Amdyn
asked.

“Moon,” Chloe said without hesitation.

Amdyn smiled encouragingly. “No. Try again.”

“Bunny.”

Amdyn shook his head.

“Mouse?” she asked.

“Chloe,” Amy said, “I doubt Uncle Amdyn is thinking about
your favorite bedtime story book.”

Chloe looked up at her mom and plunked her thumb back inside
her mouth.

“Try looking at what he’s seeing behind his eyes,” Amy said.
“Tell me what pictures are playing inside his mind. Like when you close your
eyes and still see things you’re thinking about. Remember how sometimes you’ve
thought the same thought as Mommy? Try thinking the same thing as Amdyn. It’s
okay this time.”

Chloe nodded seriously and looked back at Amdyn. Suddenly
her wet thumb came out with a pop. She smiled up at Amy. “Aunt Ellen. Like a
princess.” Chloe patted the top of her head. “She has a crown. And a purple
dress.”

Amdyn’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s right.”

Chloe placed her hand on Amy’s cheek to turn her mother’s
face to her and whispered, “He’s worried, Mommy. She doesn’t like her crown.”

His eyes narrowing slightly at Chloe’s comment, Amdyn sat
back and looked at Amy. “I kept the image static and recognizable, but unique.
But she’s reading emotions layers underneath even if she doesn’t realize what
she’s doing or understand it all.”

He refocused on Chloe. “Okay, see if you can guess what I’m
thinking this time.”

Jordyn studied Chloe’s face as she watched Amdyn. Her facial
expressions flowed from concentration to surprise to delight. She clapped her
hands together and said, “It was you!” Pride beamed out of her little face as
Amdyn nodded.

“I was showing her a memory. A little girl finding flowers
that were left for her.”

“It was a secret,” Chloe interjected importantly.

“Yes, it was. Very good. Do you know how old I was in that
memory?” Amdyn asked.

“Bigger than me.”

Amdyn nodded in approval, pleased with her response. “What
else did you see?”

Chloe thought for a moment. “The singing trees.”

Amdyn glanced over at Jordyn and then back at Chloe. “How do
you know about the singing trees?”

Suddenly Chloe looked as if she’d gotten caught with her
hand in the cookie jar. Instead of answering, she leaned back against her
mother and stuck her thumb back into her mouth. Amy shifted Chloe in her lap to
look down at her face. “It’s okay. You can tell him.” Chloe turned her face
away, pressing her nose into Amy’s sweater.

Amdyn watched Chloe for a minute, but didn’t push her.
Instead, he spoke to Amy. “You’ve never noticed that your daughter is
telepathic?”

“There’ve been times I thought something was going on. We’ve
had a couple of incidents in the past where she’s seen what another person is
thinking and blurted it out loud as if she’d seen it really happen. I had to
take her out of a preschool because when one of the fathers came to pick up his
son, Chloe announced that he was kissing the boy’s teacher in a bed.”

She glanced at Jordyn, who was watching her carefully. “That
turned into a big mess. Since then, we’ve worked on not talking about imaginary
pictures with anyone but me and not imagining what other people might be
thinking.”

“You’ve known she could do this?” Amdyn asked.

“No, I didn’t
know
. I thought at first the boy had
seen something and told Chloe and she made up the story from there. And she’s
not quite three. She hasn’t been talking for all that long, and even so, we
haven’t had deep conversations about how her mind works. Besides, most people
don’t go around thinking their child is telepathic. There are a dozen reasons
that could explain how Chloe has done similar things in the past
without
assuming
some weird paranormal activity.”