Page 31 of Taming the Beast (Fairy Tales of New York)

He leaned forwards, pulled her down and covered her with his body. “Quiero follarte hasta el fin del mundo,” he murmured into her ear.

“Really?” she said softly. “Until the end of time?”

He tensed for a moment, his blood thundering in his ears. Yes. No. Shit. Definitely no. “Just an expression I picked up,” he murmured, forcing himself to relax. “How do you say ‘all night long’?”

“Toda la noche.”

Better. Much better. Because ‘forever’ this certainly was not. “Quiero follarte toda la noche.”

“Well, then,” said Mercy with a smile as she wound her arms around his neck and pulled him down, “what are you waiting for?”

*

When Seb had said he wanted to have sex with her until the end of time, Mercy had known he hadn’t really meant it. But that hadn’t stopped her wondering over the last couple of days how long she wanted what they had to last, and it hadn’t stopped her from suspecting, worryingly, that the answer might indeed be until the end of time.

That couldn’t be so. Although they hadn’t put a time limit on their arrangement she knew perfectly well that it wasn’t permanent. And that was OK because she didn’t want permanent. Nevertheless, what with the whole conversation aspect – which meant she and Seb now talked lightly about all manner of general interest things and which had led to a sort of well, camaraderie, she supposed – she could feel herself possibly becoming a bit…entangled.

Take today for example. Thanksgiving. Here she was, setting the long wide table in Sully’s – which was closed for the day – in preparation for an early dinner. The weather was abysmal but the fire was blazing and music was playing, and it promised to be an evening of warmth and love and laughter as well as excellent food and, seeing as it was being provided by her, even more excellent wine. Everyone except Zel, who was in Russia, would be in attendance: JP, Faith, Ty, Dawn and Finn and finally, Casey and Ronan, also the Sullivan brothers, these two twins.

But not Seb.

And it shouldn’t have mattered. In fact, she should have been pleased that Zel wasn’t around to invite him because that would have been beyond awkward. But somehow it did matter, and his absence bothered her.

What was he doing today? she couldn’t help wondering. The idea of him hosting a dinner for eight was unimaginable, and he didn’t exactly have a whole slew of friends, so was he going to be on his own? It seemed the most likely scenario, and that made her heart wrench because no one should be alone on Thanksgiving. But she could hardly invite him over, and anyway even if she had, she had no doubt he’d have said no because from what she’d gathered he rarely went out.

Nevertheless, she had the horribly disturbing feeling that she wanted him to be here and that was just absurd. She and Seb didn’t have a relationship like Dawn and Finn or Zel and Ty. She didn’t know what they had. All she knew was that she couldn’t stop thinking about him and she wished he was here, which meant she was very possibly en route to heartbreak.

So it was probably a good thing she wasn’t seeing him this weekend, she thought, frowning at the wineglass she was holding up to the light, then wiping it with a cloth and setting it on the table. On Saturday night she was going out with her course colleagues. They were celebrating Christmas early with drinks that started at six, and the plan was to finish late. It had been with regret that she’d told Seb she wouldn’t be able to hook up with him this weekend, and many times she’d thought about cancelling, but now she was thinking that perhaps it was a blessing. Her and Seb’s arrangement, by its very nature, had become pretty intense so some space, some perspective, would be good. She’d use the ten days she had before she saw him again to remind herself what they were about and to prove to herself that she could survive perfectly well without seeing him. And then, she was sure, everything would go back to normal.

*

By eight pm on Thanksgiving evening Seb was ready to climb the walls of his apartment. As the staff had had the day off, he’d had the whole house to himself. All day. With no plans. So he’d prowled a bit, then worked a bit. Prowled a bit more and worked a bit more. In between he’d thrown together a ham and cheese omelette. Now he was sitting restlessly in front of the TV, mindlessly channel hopping and driving himself even more demented.

What the bloody hell was wrong with him? He’d never been bothered by his own company before – on the contrary, he was usually perfectly fine with it – so what was it about today that had him wanting to crawl out of his skin? So it was Thanksgiving, a day of celebration and friendship. Who cared? He certainly didn’t. He never had before.

But why couldn’t he stop thinking about what Mercy was doing? Why did he keep wondering whether she was having fun with her friends and without him? Of course she was having fun, he thought darkly, stabbing at the remote control and wishing for the hundredth time the weather wasn’t quite so awful because then at least he could have spent the day hammering the hell out of something. She was fun. That was why she had friends while he didn’t. One of the reasons, at least. She didn’t close herself off from the world. She had a social life that she embraced.

And she’d have more friends after her bloody Christmas party on Saturday night. Her classmates couldn’t fail to warm to her, and he didn’t have any problem with that at all, although, Christmas? Really? What was up with that? It wouldn’t even be December.

Tossing aside the re mote control with a sigh of frustration Seb jumped to his feet, stalked into his study and flung himself into the chair at his desk. Just because this would be the first weekend for months that he and Mercy hadn’t spent together, it was no big deal. He’d survive. It wasn’t as if he needed to see her. He didn’t need anything. The thought of gatecrashing the party hadn’t crossed his mind once. He had way more control than that. And as for popping in to the wine awards dinner to say congratulations, well, as that would smack of weakness it was obviously totally out of the question too.

Really, there was no problem, he told himself as he fired up his computer in the bordering-on-desperate hope he’d be able to focus. He could wait ten days before he saw her again. Of course he could.

*

Wednesday night, the night of the wine awards presentation dinner, was going to be a good night for Hernandez wines and Mercy, who’d left her coat in the cloakroom and was heading towards the Palm Court where champagne and canapés were being served, was fully intending to enjoy herself.

In an hour or so the five hundred guests would be sitting down in the Grand Ballroom of this stunning Art Deco hotel to a sumptuous four-course dinner. During coffee, she’d be going up on stage to accept the framed certificate that announced their win in the best white for under twenty-five dollars category, and after that, hopefully, she’d be fielding requests for information, samples and tastings, which would lead to a dramatic upsurge in sales.

In the meantime, though, she had a team to celebrate with, news to catch up on and wine to pour.

Scanning the crowd, Mercy spotted the stand that bore the Hernandez Estate livery in front of which stood Maria, their Sales and Marketing Director, and Antonio, their Production Manager, and made her way over.

“Hello,” she said in Spanish, smiling widely as she kissed them each in turn on both cheeks. “It’s so good to see you. How was the trip?”

“Surprisingly fine,” said Maria with a grin of relief which was entirely justified since back home there’d been talk of a national airline strike for weeks now and everyone knew it was only a matter of time before it went ahead.

“And how are things going?”

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