Longing filled him. Family. Home. All the things he wanted but couldn't have.
*
"Crap, crap, crap. He can't be here already!"
Teresa raced around her tiny bedroom in search of her best strappy sandals, stubbed her toes in passing on the leg of the bed and erupted into more swearing.
Joanie's voice reading a story in the next room grew louder, a subtle reminder to keep her voice down as little ears heard all and often repeated choice phrases at the most inopportune moments.
Teresa swallowed her cursing and dropped to her knees to search under the bed for her shoes. With a crow of triumph her fingers closed around the familiar straps and she pulled them from their hiding place.
"Okay, mommy's going now," she called out, hopping from one foot to the other as she crammed her feet into the shoes. They'd be killing her within the hour but she couldn't afford to get new ones, not with James needing new school shoes and Molly shooting up like a bean.
"You sure I look okay?" Teresa's face must have mirrored her concern because Joanie's eyebrow hiked upwards in an expression Teresa knew well.
"Honey, you look fantastic. Stop fiddling," she admonished as Teresa fussed with the neckline of the dress. Like her shoes it was a couple of years old, from before her ill-fated marriage, and she'd put on a couple of pounds since then. So it was a little more...snug around the bust than it used to be. Luckily it was a stretch velour so it was forgiving. Maybe...hopefully.
"You look like a princess mommy." Two sets of wide eyes regarded her above duvets in respective pink and blue and Teresa's heart melted.
"Thank you sweetie. You be good for auntie Joan, okay? And go to sleep or Santa won't come." She warned as she swept into the small bedroom and kissed two freshly scrubbed cheeks, collecting hugs which smelt of baby powder, toothpaste and sleepy child.
Joan smiled as she hesitated a moment, unwilling to leave her children even for a date with the hottest man she'd ever seen. Then the doorbell chimed again, somewhat impatiently, as though the man outside knew somehow he was being ignored in favour of two small children. Teresa didn't think that would impress him any. Not looking the way he did, he was probably puffed up on his own looks and not impressed with having to take a middle-aged mother out on a date.
"Go..." Joan mouthed and carried on reading from the book in her hands. It was a book of fairy tales, one Teresa knew by heart, but Joanie was ad-libbing. So far the princess had decided to rescue herself and was hacking her way out of a forest after facing a dragon. For some reason the story also included a rapier wielding hedgehog and a toad with the hiccups, all of which Joan was providing voices for.
Teresa shook her head with a smile as she slipped out the room and headed down the stairs. "All right, all right, I'm coming. Keep your hair on!" she called out as the chimes went again.
*
Keep his hair on. Cy ran his hand over his shorn locks. Most pixies wore their hair at least shoulder length to show off the bright colour. Like peacocks strutting their stuff to attract the ladies. Trouble was, day-glo hair tended to stick out like a sore thumb. No one had any trouble picking them out from a crowd and, with the reputation pixies had as trouble makers, it made them a target for most law enforcement officers. Not to mention warned the ladies, of any species, off.
Cy's natural hair colour was bright blue, the same shade at his eyes. Dyeing it every couple of weeks was a bitch but it stopped the questions about his species.
Leaning against the door frame he waited for his date to get her act together and open it. At least she sounded nice.
Probably short, round and the wrong side of fifty, he thought to himself. The way his luck ran with women she'd be a twenty-pinter. Anyone caught him out with her they'd be calling him 'stumpy' for sure.
He closed his eyes for a second and slipped into the day-dream he'd been entertaining for a few days now. That his 'date' would be the mouth-watering little brunette he'd seen the night of the auction. As soon as he'd seen her he hadn't been able to take his eyes off her, spotting her easily despite the glare of all those lights in his face.
Who could blame him. Why would any guy in his right mind want to take his eyes off a woman like that? Just thinking about her heart-shaped face and those sinfully dark eyes was enough to have him at half mast again.
"Bollocks," he muttered and shoved his hand into his crotch to try and bate down his reaction. Great, the last thing he wanted was Mrs. Average to open the door and think he had a hard-on for her! Then the door swung open and Cy lost the power of speech.
Stood just the other side of the door was the brunette from the auction.
Cy's jaw hit the deck. He shook his head to clear it. Surely he was seeing things but no, it was her. The one he hadn't been able to get out of his head, the one who'd been giving him restless nights and wet dreams ever since. He'd tried to find her but she'd disappeared before he could make his way from backstage.
He'd been pissed off at the time, even more pissed off than he had been at the start of the evening. Pressured into the auction in the first place he'd refused to go the full monty and do the strip routine the guys had wanted. Red satin thong and all.
No way, no how. He wouldn't have put it past one of them to be taking photos from the back of the room and then they'd be plastered all over the walls in the staff room at work. Cy might be a little gullible at times, but he wasn't that stupid.
His irritation had grown deeper when no one at the table seemed to know who she was, giving him blank looks when he'd asked about the gorgeous brunette with the
'take me to bed' eyes and sinful lips.
Her lashes swept over her eyes as she looked down. Right to where his hand cupped his crotch. "Do you need to use the little boys room?" she asked coolly, a flash of amusement in her chocolate-sherry eyes. "I...ugh."
Shit. Cy snatched his hand away from his crotch as bright colour flared across his cheeks. He ignored it as his natural confidence surged back. His eyes dared her to keep looking and, if she did, to comment on the semi-erection starting to tent his jeans. Far from being embarrassed now he wanted her to notice it, wanted her to comment.
Her eyes widened, darted away, flicked back for a second, then settled on his face. Cy's lips quirked in amusement. If the sight of a semi like that got her flustered, he'd love to see what would happen if he whispered the wicked things he wanted to do to her in her ear. Starting with stripping that tight little dress from her luscious tits right here on the porch and suckling her n**ples until she was moaning in pleasure.
"No, I'm fine, thank you. I believe we have a date this evening?"
Cy straightened up and flashed her his best smile. The one which normally had the ladies panting and ready to do anything he wanted. To his surprise, it had totally the opposite effect. Her lovely eyes shuttered over and she smiled a small, brittle smile.
“We do indeed. Let me just get my coat."
When she reappeared she was wrapped shoulders to mid-calf in a voluminous trench-coat Cy took an immediate dislike to. Not only was it hideous but it hid her wonderful figure. A figure Cy wanted to see more of...much more of. Preferably without that red dress, lovely was it was, on.
She'd be all satin skin over those glorious curves. Curves he intended to take his time exploring and finding all the spots that made her squirm in pleasure. The fun he'd have finding things out about her. Did she prefer her n**ples licked or sucked? Would she be a moaner or a screamer as he made her come with his lips and tongue? Would she gasp as he filled her with his c*ck over and over again?
"My lady, if you'll allow me?"
Cy locked his thoughts away in a corner of his mind and offered her his arm, trying his best to be gallant. Not easy when she was looking at him as though he'd just crawled out from under a rock. That wasn't something he was used to. For a pixie Cy was considered good looking. Pretending to be human with dyed hair and the whole pixie/fae sexual edge going on, he was devastating. Something he accepted without question or vanity, but something he was more than happy to use to his advantage, especially with a woman like this.
For a moment he allowed a fantasy of what would have happened if she'd been a pixie to fill his mind. They'd have met at a clan gather—perhaps to celebrate a wedding or truce—and he'd have moved heaven and earth to possess her. Even to the point of starting a war so he could claim her as his own.
Might made right. The Pixie code. If you could take it and hold onto it, you could keep it. "Of course."
She placed a delicately boned hand on his arm. A shiver shot through Cy. The heat that had been banking up, fuelled by his thoughts, broke free of its constraints and flared into a full blown inferno at her touch.
The gasp which left his lips was as unexpected as it was unintentional. Play boy extraordinare Cy usually had better control than that. Even more surprising was her echoing intake of breath.
A buzz of awareness arched between them.
Cy turned his head and caught her eye. Again her eyes widened and, this time, anger filled them as she pulled her hand away.
"Let's get on with it, shall we?" she asked, breaking away from him to stride down the short path to his car.
What the fuck? She'd felt that too, he'd seen it in her eyes. Cy followed her like a puppy on a leash—all the while trying not to imagine what her ass looked like under all that material.
He failed. Miserably.
"Flashy. Guess you don't have a family."
The comment dripped acid. Cy frowned. Where had that come from? And the anger? Had he done something to upset her? Impossible, he'd only arrived a few minutes ago and even he couldn't piss off a woman that quick. Had he met her before and pissed her off somehow?
"No," he said, his voice clipped. "I don't have a family."
*
The drive to the restaurant was painfully silent. Cy kept stealing glances at his passenger. She sat in silence, no attempt to engage him in conversation. She just looked out of the window.
Cy's confusion grew. She was acting like she didn't want to be here. If she didn't then why the hell had she bid on the date with him?
His annoyance grew by the minute, swelling and filling him. Cy was a hot-head, always had been. He couldn't keep things bottled up for long and, sure enough, within minutes he cracked.
"Okay. Time out," Cy announced as he swung the sleek sports car out of the flow of traffic. He pulled up, yanked the handbrake on and looked at her. As he did he tried to school his expression to cool, calm and collected. So what if he thought she was the sexiest thing on the planet? If she wasn't into him, she wasn't into him.
"So do you want to carry on? Or should I turn the car around and take you home now?"
Finally she turned her head and the darkness in her eyes took his breath away.
Then she shook her head and smiled. Well, she attempted a smile. Cy wasn't fooled.
Someone, somewhere had hurt this woman and hurt her badly.
"Of course I want to carry on. Why else do you think I paid for the date?"
Chapter Three
Oh my god, he was gorgeous. More so than he had been the other night on stage, if that was possible. His hair was dark and cropped so close to the scalp it was hard to tell exactly what colour it was. Teresa curled her hands into her lap and fought the urge she'd been having since she'd first seen him at her door. The urge to reach out and run her hands over his head was overwhelming. An image of his dark head against the pale skin of her breast filled her mind. She could almost imagine the warmth of his mouth as his lips closed around her nipple. Teresa bit back a moan.