“It’s Cressi,” she announced, expecting me to react to the announcement. I remained in the exact same position, my hands spread apart, waiting for her to retake her rightful place inside of them and blinked a few times in confusion. She huffed at me, then turned her attention to the ringing and touched something to make it stop. At the same time, she arranged her dishevelled hair.
“Hey girl,” Anwen spoke to the device, taking a seat further from me on the sofa, trying to keep her rugged breathing in place.
“Hey sexy,” the device responded and I inched closer, curious about what she saw. I discovered a blonde woman on the screen, but before I could spot any more details, a hand pushed my head back and Anwen got closer to the screen, making the device reflect her like a mirror. Apparently, I was not allowed to be part of that mirror towards the blonde woman.
“Are you okay, do you have some kind of allergy or something?” the woman asked, stopping her action to approach the screen and check Anwen’s reflection.
“No, no, everything is fine,” she replied, wiping her lips with the back of her hand, trying to make the redness of my biting them go away. Unsuccessfully.
“Anwen,” the woman paused and sent a penetrating stare through the device that had the power to make Anwen blush. I had to learn how to do one of those too, they might come in handy in the future and they seemed to have an effect on the receiver. “Tell me what is happening, now!” she demanded and pierced her gaze through the device. Even I backed up a bit, it was almost as scary as one of Mother’s. Must be something females can control better. Anwen sighed defeatedly and grabbed the device in her hands, shifting towards me, so close that she almost sat on my lap. It made me become mirrored in the device and the woman’s attention immediately shifted towards me.
“This is Ansgar,” Anwen introduced me, caught in the act and forced to do something she wasn’t planning to.
“Ansgar,” the woman exclaimed, excitement in her tone and wide eyes studying me, or the parts of me that she could see. “It’s very nice to meet you, Ansgar. I’ve heard many great things about you.”
I nodded, not knowing what to say to this woman, to which she continued, “I see that you are keeping my girl company. And if she moved over just a bit more, I could see your abs better. Very, very sculpted.” She actually licked her lips when she said it, causing Anwen to find a pillow and cover most of me with it.
“We were just having a chat,” she replied quickly. I shifted towards her in surprise.
“Clearly. Your lips are red, your pulse is at a hundred and sixty, your hair is a mess and he’s shirtless. If only all my conversations were like the one you two are having,” she sustained her face with her knuckles and looked at us like we were something cute, causing us to smile awkwardly at the same time.
“Okay, I’ll leave you to it. Anwen, your dad wants to do a new campaign with me, he’ll email you tomorrow. You two have fun,” she wiggled her eyebrows before disappearing from the screen and leaving the device to reflect the girl talking about fae gods once again.
Anwen placed the tap over it, folding it in half and disappearing into a cover of plastic. She took a seat next to me.
“She is very different from you,” I stated the obvious.
With a smile, Anwen told me about her friend, Cressida Thompson. They knew each other since they could remember and had always been best friends. They grew up together and visited each other every week on holidays. Cressida’s job was a complicated mess I did not understand, but it made her bold and direct, Anwen explained. She had to take care of herself ever since her parents died in a helicopter accident.
“She is my best friend; I am sorry if that was awkward.”
“Not as awkward as last time,” I chuckled, making her relax into me. Anwen rested her head on my shoulder, adopting a cuddling position at my side. “She is right though, we were supposed to talk, not…” she stopped.
“Not fondle each other?” I completed, making her laugh.
“That is one way to put it.” She turned to me, her stare locking in with mine. “This is all very new to me. I never felt like this, all the shivers and the want, the need to touch you. I just need…” she stopped to think for a second, “I need a bit more time to get used to it all,” she gazed at me apologetically.
“Is this you asking me to stop visiting again?” Desperation inundated my voice. I expected her to ask me anything but this, not now, when I finally held her in my arms, not because I made her feel uncomfortable.
“No, of course not,” she protested and lifted my sorrow. “Absolutely not, you cannot do that to me again, I went crazy that month without you,” she exclaimed and gripped my arm for emphasis.
I smiled proudly and snatched her back in my arms, placing her shape onto mine, holding her across my torso. “No sex,” I uttered her thoughts, the message she wanted to deliver but was afraid to, the request she did not dare say. “Until we are both ready.”
“Is that okay with you?” she asked cautiously.
“As long as I get to kiss you all night long,” I replied and planted my lips on hers yet again.
None of us could remember how we stopped, it was probably when our lips became so swollen from their continuous frolic onto one another that they shifted crimson and pulsated in pain. We'd talked about the fae, about customs, but most importantly, I answered every single question she could think of about her brother.
She showed me documents and maps, tracing his journeys across the world. I was stunned to discover how much he knew, how he’d travelled near the location of the four burial places, but I still could not help as much as I wanted to. I did not know what he wanted Anwen to find, though it was obvious it had a connection to the fae. Unless it was… I stopped my thoughts, no human in existence could possibly know aboutthat. It was a secret that costed one’s last breath.
I woke up in the middle of the night with Anwen’s body resting over me, both of us crammed onto the sofa with moonlight shining upon our skin. When I tried to position myself differently, she groaned at the disturbance and pulled my neck closer to make the movement stop. I immediately did and let her rest onto me while I remained awake and listened to her heartbeat so close to mine, her relaxed breathing tickling my skin. I caressed her hair, illuminated by the moonlight and seeded small kisses onto her head, gentle and steady to make her relax and fall back into deep sleep.
About an hour later, a small snore creeped out from her nose and I had to bite my tongue to avoid a laughter attack. Small noises, similar to a hedgehog's, resounded from in and out of her nostrils. I started to shift sluggishly, moving my figure inch by inch from underneath her, until I made myself fall onto the floor with only my hand attached to her. Standing up, I clasped her, leaving the one hand underneath her head and shoulders and the other gripping her legs, then rested her against me and climbed the stairs towards her bedroom.
It proved more difficult than I remembered since I had no light in the upper floor and many doors remained closed with a seal, but I found the unlocked door at the end of the hallway with an enormous bed attached to the wall, where I let my woman slide into her comfortable sheets. As soon as she touched the pillow, her body recognized her lodgings and spread widely onto the mattress, grabbing the pillow and turning onto her side.
I wrapped her in a blanket and left a trail of kisses along her face and neck, then headed towards the window to check on the time. By the way the moon shone, sunrise would arrive in two to three hours. I stood there, walking over the land illuminated by silver light, debating whether to sneak into bed with her or return home. The first choice looked wrong without an invitation, I did not want to claim more territory than she was ready to allow and inviting myself into her sheets seemed one of the most intimate gestures a new couple could have.
