Maggie Shayne - An Enchanted Season

“Can’t breathe down there, my love?” she asked her lover, amused.

“No, I can’t,” came his half-muffled reply. “A little help with the air, please?”

“And let myself freeze from the cold draft?” she joked, shifting the bedding so that it formed what she hoped was an adequate tunnel.

“I’ll make sure you’re kept nice and warm,” Steve murmured, returning to his task. A moment later, he paused in his savoring to add, “Mm, tasty.”

That made her laugh. It was what he’d first said about her recipe for cider, and for the first meal she had made for him…and the first time they had made love. No, she didn’t mind the cold, after all; not when he resumed flicking his tongue between her nether lips, sending a flush of pleasure out across her body.

He knew her very well. In fact, Steve could usually make her climax within minutes once he began tasting her down there. This time, he took his time, using his knowledge to tease, not just to please. A flick here, a suckle there, a bit of lapping, a swirling lick. Gentle stroking from his fingers, counterpoint to the nibbling of his lips. One of those fingers slipped inside, carefully twisted around, and pressed upward in a fluttering movement. Stars exploded silently behind her eyes, making her cry out.

When he added an equally rapid flicking of his tongue to the peak of flesh overlooking his finger, Rachel shattered deliciously, arching her neck and twisting her body, before relaxing gradually under the easing of his touch.

Steve couldn’t breathe; her brief writhe had been just enough to collapse the tunnel of the bedcovers that had been providing him with fresh, cool air. Squirming carefully up the length of her body, he poked his head out with a gasp of relief, flushed from the heat the two of them had generated under the thickly layered quilts. He grinned as he gulped in the crisp, cool air. In fact, he was surprised he still fit in the bed, given the dreamy, dazed look on his fiancée’s face.

What a way to make a man feel ten feet tall! Damn, I’ve missed totally scattering her wits like that. What a fool I was, letting the grind of daily life drive our love down into something ordinary…

Rachel came back to herself with a double blink, finally realizing her fiancé was beaming at her like a lit-up Christmas tree. She thought briefly about twitting him for being so smug, but conceded that it was well-deserved smugness. That, and it was much easier to whisper a simple “Wow.”

“Mm-hmm,” Steve agreed smugly, cupping her damp mound under the layers of bedding. His groin twitched with desire, feeling how slick he had made her, but he told that part of himself to hush. Tonight was for his future wife to enjoy. If she wanted more, she’d let him know. If not, it was enough to have pleased her so thoroughly. She deserved being pleased.

Thankfully, his loins agreed with that decision; Rachel was worth far more to him than the proverbial quick roll in the hay.

His quietude puzzled Rachel. Arching a brow, she asked, “Is that it? No pouncing on me?”

The curve of his mouth deepened from a smirk to a leer. “If you want more of the same, I’d love to do it all over again.”

Oh. She blinked at him, thought about him suckling her again, and of him not being that eager to release himself. Since she could feel his erection prodding her hip, she knew he was eager physically, but he hadn’t even hinted at his own need. “Why? I mean, why pamper me, and not take any pleasure for yourself?”

“Who said I don’t enjoy that?” Steve countered, propping his head up on his hand. The air was cold against his arm, but he was still a bit heated from being buried under the covers. “It pleases me a lot to pleasure you. Tonight is your night. Anything you want,” he promised impulsively, almost rashly, “and if it’s within my power, I’ll give it to you.”

And I thought he’d melted my body into warm goo with that mouth of his, she thought distractedly. Who knew he could melt my heart, too, after all these years together? Thoughts whirling, she settled on what she really wanted, and slid a hand onto his shoulder, pushing him over. “What I want, right now…is to please you as thoroughly as you have just pleased me. So kindly make an air tunnel for me.”

Grinning at the ceiling, Steve complied, first making sure the quilts and sheet stayed high on his chest while she squirmed underneath, then rumpling them just so to ensure that she could breathe as she kissed her way down his chest. He didn’t want his fiancée to suffocate, after all. Especially with her mouth full.

THE ALARM CLOCK RANG ALL TOO EARLY, AS IT USUALLY DID,but both Rachel and Steve woke with that wonderful, must-stretch-under-the-covers sensation of having had a truly good and relaxing night’s sleep. Rachel winced as Steve turned on the lamp by the bed, smirked as he slapped off the alarm, and kissed him with closed lips when he leaned over her. Morning breath was always a worry, but a peck on the lips was a very nice way to start the morning in a good frame of mind.

Good enough that the chill in the air only made both of them gasp and hurry to dress for the morning’s chores. Even with Pete out in the barn, ready to help shift the cows from their stalls to the attached dairy annex and give them their morning feed, it would still be a chore. Since he could still hear the wind whisking the snow around the house, Steve crossed to one of the heavily draped windows and peeked between the velveteen curtains. He frowned, trying to make sense of what he saw.

With his and Rachel’s bedroom being on the ground floor, with the understanding that the “ground floor” technically started two feet above the actual level of the ground, it took him a few moments to process what he was looking at in the sliver of light that shone through the windowpanes: snow that had piled up to the bottom edge of the window.

Six feet of snow.

There had been about eight to ten inches of snow left over from previous storms, compacted by time, wind, and almost-thawing before freezing again. It usually didn’t snow more than a few inches, half a foot at most per snowstorm, but it rarely thawed in Iowa long enough for all of the snow to melt away, just compact down. By the time spring rolled around, it would be a couple feet thick, but that was at the end of winter. This much snow in a single fall was almost surreal.

“Six feet…”

Rachel, tugging her head through the sweater she was pulling on over a long-sleeved knit shirt, padded over to join him. “What did you say?”

“Six feet!” He held the curtain back so that she could see for herself. It was somewhat dark outside, though still lit by a faint, almost sourceless, orange-peach glow that undoubtedly came from the lights over by the barn, and the streetlamp glow from the nearby town. “Assuming it hasn’t drifted up on this side of things, that’s six feet of snow out there! This is one of those storms that only comes along once every half-century!”

“Wow,” she breathed, staring at the still-falling flakes, which didn’t have quite so far to fall anymore.

“You’re only allowed to say that after I give you mindless pleasure,” Steve teased her, drawing her into his arms as he let the curtain fall back into place. They shared a loving but brief kiss before he set her free with a sigh. “I’m going to have to crawl through the snow to get to the barn, then shovel my way back again. I told Pete the milking starts at five o’clock sharp; I hope he has the sense to start without me, or the girls will get off their schedule and stop producing as much milk.”

“You’ll need a hearty meal when you’re done. I’ll start making sausage…um…chicken gravy and buttermilk biscuits for breakfast,” Rachel amended, thinking of the two guests who wouldn’t be able to eat pork.