Page 25 of The Claiming of the Shrew
Leah bit him, but it was a delicate nibble, not hard enough to hurt. She squeaked again.
Fawkes opened the purse, tilted his hand, and let her slide off into what he guessed was her shrew pocket. It was padded on the inside, and there was a small porthole covered with plastic so she could look out.
Feeling slightly self-consciously, he slung the purse over his shoulder with the shrew pocket on the outside.
“Is that all right?”
A muffled squeak came from the purse. Fawkes hastily opened the top to make sure she could breathe. Two shiny black eyes looked up at him. She squeaked and nestled down in her shrew pocket, then stood up again to extract something from one corner. Fawkes choked on a laugh when he realized that the shrew pocket had an even smaller built-in pocket for snacks. She held a piece of granola bar in her tiny pink front paws.
Leah began to nibble on her snack, squeaked at him, and pressed her nose to the porthole.
“Right,” he muttered. Closing the top of the purse, he picked up her clothes and her crutches, and started off down the hill.
Walking straight down the hill was challenging. He nearly twisted an ankle several times, caught the crutches on brush, and had to hold the purse securely against his side to avoid knocking Leah around too much. But it was fast. He reached the theater group’s encampment no more than ten or fifteen minutes later, slightly out of breath, with leaves in his hair and a rip in his jeans.
In spite of most of the troupe having gone in for dinner, there were still quite a few people around, walking between trailers or sitting outside. It was evident that a number of them planned to eat in their trailers. Ignoring Leah’s urgent squeaking, Fawkes walked casually through the camp. The fact that he was carrying crutches and a large purse earned him a couple of curious glances, but no more than that. Theater people were used to weirder things, he supposed. He went in the hotel’s side entrance.
“Look,” he said quietly to the frantically squeaking purse. “I know you want to look around, but there are just too many people. It’s never gonna work, all right? We’d get caught in a hotminute and have to answer awkward questions. Let’s go on up to my room so you can get dressed and make a plan B.”
From the noises Leah was making, she might bite him seriously this time. As soon as he set the purse on the carpet in his room and opened the flap, Leah poofed out to full size, standing with one bare foot in the purse. “You hadone job?—”
She toppled, having badly misjudged how stable she was going to be. Fawkes lunged and caught her. He now found himself with a very pleasant, if upset, armful of naked Leah.
“We had a plan!” Leah said, muffled, into his chest.
“There were too many people around. I told you that.”
Leah heaved a sigh and stretched her arms up to wrap them around his neck. Now her entire naked front was plastered to him. There was nowhere to put his hands that wasn’t naked Leah, not that she seemed to mind. With her usual mercurial nature, she was now grinning up at him.
“Next time,” she said, stretching up to nip at his chin, “talk the plan over with me before changing it.”
“Fair,” Fawkes said breathlessly.
“Could you pick me up? I’m not really equipped for tiptoe.”
“Right,” he breathed, and swept her off her feet, picking her up in a bridal carry. “Where do you want—er?—”
“There’s a bed right there,” Leah said, and nipped his ear—not hard, a gentle nibble, like the way she’d mouthed at his hand in her shrew form. “If we’re not going to be snooping, there are a few other things I can think of to?—”
Fawkes covered her mouth in a kiss, and went on kissing her frantically as he stumbled toward the bed, tripped on her purse, then nearly fell over the crutches.
“Fawkes,” Leah said, breaking the kiss for the second or third time to clutch at his neck. “Do not drop me. You now have onedifferentjob, which is getting me to the bed without falling over on top of me.”
“I can’t see my feet!” he protested. “You’re in the way!”
And very, very distractingly so. Every time he tried to look down, all he saw was Leah’s breasts and the rising and falling curve of her stomach leading down to the soft brown tuft between her legs.
“Bed!” she declared, pointing.
They were both laughing by the time they toppled on the bed, kissing again, rolling over and scattering all the decorative pillows that Fawkes had pushed over to the unused side of the bed. He was worried about accidentally hurting her, but Leah was lithe and strong, and there was nothing at all hesitant about the way she used any part of her body. She was already trying to unbutton his shirt.
“Wait, wait, pants,” he gasped. “Shoes!”
He rolled off her to try to get his shoes off, while Leah flopped languidly on the pillows. “Youhavehad sex before, right?”
“Of course I have,” Fawkes muttered. He kicked off his shoes, one of which narrowly missed a lamp. “Hang on?—”
Leah giggled and wriggled higher on the pillows. “I’ll help you with that, if you need any—ow!” She pushed herself up on her elbow, wincing. “What the heck do you have in your pillow?”
