Page 60 of Wickedly Ever After
She half-turned. “What on earth for?”
“For this,” he said. “For…well, maybe everything. That candor curse was over the top.”
Ida made a noncommittal sound in her throat. “I’m as much to blame as you. I sent you the laughing charm. You retaliated. I ought to have expected it. You always do. In fact, I admit, I did it to get back at you for the pumpkins. Isn’t that stupid?”
“I sent that because of your infernal dandelions.”
She shifted until she was facing him again. “You told me you had them under control!”
“My lawn is probably a carpet of them by now.” He smiled sheepishly.
Ida laughed softly. “You’re horrible.”
“And you’re detestable.” He hesitantly draped an arm over her.
She flinched.
“Shoulder,” Hector explained. “A giant dislocated it a few centuries ago—it gets stiff if I don’t stretch it out.”
“I broke a hip riding four hundred years ago. I don’t like sleeping on my right side. I prefer my left. But I’ll be facing you all night.”
“I don’t mind.”
Her lips brushed his beard—her breath tasted of wintergreen. She pressed her cheek against his shoulder. “I begin to understand the purpose of this spell.”
“Oh?” He was dreadfully afraid he did too. His body did at least.
Ida sighed. “There’s something disarming about sharing a bed with a person. I can almost believe you aren’t half as wicked as I thought you were.”
Oh, Ida, not the half of it. He was feeling very, very wicked indeed. He’d like to plant a kiss on her lips, move himself into position, slide her nightgown up along with his nightshirt and see if she felt wicked too. But he said nothing and lay quietly while Ida relaxed against him. Her chest rose and fell evenly, and to his great surprise, she let out a sudden, ridiculous snore that rivaled Tinbit’s.
Gently, so as not to wake her, Hector tangled his fingers in Ida’s hair.
28
Ida
The Morning After—critical to establishment of a fidelity bond, the couple may engage in an initial pulling away from each other as they grapple with their feelings about what has occurred. It is critical they come together again after this initial “running away from their feelings.”
Instruct hotel staff to deliver breakfast to the room quietly. Include red roses and strawberries for love, cream and honey for home and hearth. Hot tea.
Magic and Mischief—A Thousand Years of Happily-Ever-After: A Memoir
Ida North
On no account should the Morning After ever involve a woman waking up in a man’s arms with his morning breath stinking in her face and feel like she wants to laugh at him, yell at him, and make love to him all at once. But that’s exactly how Ida woke up, and the urge to make love was unpleasantly strong.
Maybe it was because Hector had indeed been “pressed” and what had pressed out was highly respectable. Maybe it was because sleeping tangled up in his arms had caused a series of vivid dreams in which she was waltzing in her castle with themost beautiful man in the world. He had expressive eyes of purest green and long black hair. When he danced, he moved so divinely that roses bloomed, sending their heady fragrance washing over her. Like so many erotic dreams, this one ended with her lying on satin sheets in her own garden, with him naked and easing into her, his kiss burning her lips, the sound of his breath in her ears, and the heartbreak of waking, wet, ready, and empty.
Hector lay curled, one arm draped over her, the other thrown up on the pillow above her head, fingers resting somewhere around the vicinity of her right ear. His eyelashes fluttered, and his mouth moved softly. In a sleepy way, he asked Tinbit for a watering can. In his dreams, the clearly heartless Hector West was working in his garden, oblivious to the intoxicatingly suggestive effects of love magic running wild, the lucky asshole.
Trapped against his chest, legs tangled in his, Ida thought about every Morning After spell she’d concocted for toast and tea to deal with all the angst from baring one’s body to another. How ridiculous. Waking up after sharing a bed with the worst man in the world didn’t make her feel one jot angsty. Instead, she felt oddly comforted and the scent of sweet, dark roses bloomed in her mind.
With a soft sigh, Hector muttered something unintelligible, then sighed, pulling her closer, a smile on his lips.
This happy feeling was magically induced, certainly, but right now she found she didn’t care. He was warm, and she snuggled into his arms, and gazed around the room, feeling less disgusted than before.
To her great surprise, the balky fire had burned down in the fireplace; the salamander’s pot glowed with life but not heat. Hariand Tinbit lay curled up together on the mattress on the floor, with Hari’s blanket thrown over them, their hands in front of their faces, fingers locked together on the single pillow they shared.
