Sebastian

on his first attempt to reach Sebastian.
    If he stayed in the lower circle, the head of the Wizards' Council might not realize he'd returned to Wizard City. Better to endure rough lodgings than see the groundwork for his ambitions crumble again.
    Yes, he thought as they rode through the lower circle, he could endure physical discomfort much easier than failure.
    "So I'm going to be waiting on tables at Philo's a few hours each day," Lynnea said happily. "Philo said if he was going to train Brandon to work at his place, I could help, too."
    "You're going to wait tables?" Sebastian asked, startled by this revelation.
    "I am. In exchange for my meals."
    "You don't have to do that."
    "Of course I do. I heard you when you were talking to the boys, and I agree. Visitors come for the drinking and the gambling and the… other things… and they pay for those things with coin or goods that can be bartered. But those who live in the Den have to earn their keep."
    Wondering if she was aware that she was swinging their linked hands like a happy child, he choked back the denial that she lived in the Den. He didn't want her to settle in and make a place for herself. It would be harder for her to leave and find the landscape where she truly belonged if she started thinking of herself as a resident of the Den.
    And the more she acted like she was settling in, the easier it would be for him to believe she meant to stay, not just in the Den but with him. And the deeper it would slice his heart when she realized she wasn't meant for this ever-night and left.
    "So I'll be serving food and helping with the clearing and washing up, and…" Lynnea paused. "If Philo blushes over serving Phallic Delights, why does he make them?"
    In the fifteen years he'd lived in the Den, he'd never seen Philo blush once, but he didn't think it would help any to tell her it was handing over the basket to his new helper and not the basket's contents that had caused the blush.
    "Then Brandon snickered and said if men were really built like that, women wouldn't want to do anything but have sex."
    "Brandon talks too much," Sebastian growled.
    She laughed.
    Daylight! She was going to be serving Phallic Delights and Stuffed Tits in a courtyard full of erotic statues.
    Once awareness filtered into dreams, she was going to drive him stark raving mad.
    Her mood changed by the time they reached the bordello; she'd become quiet, thoughtful. She didn't say anything when he unlocked the door to their room, just walked in and lit the lamp on the table by the window. Then she took her nightgown, which she neatly folded and tucked under her pillow each morning, and went into the bathroom.
    He blew out a breath, locked the door, and wondered what he was going to do with himself until it was time to try to sleep.

    Then she came out of the bathroom and hesitated a moment before walking up to him.
    "Sebastian."
    Looking at her, hearing the blend of hesitation and determination in her voice, was enough for the power of the incubus to unfurl inside him.
    "Sebastian, I don't know how to say this, don't know how to ask…"
    "Ask what?"
    "I want to be with you. In bed."
    It would change things for you in a way that could never he undone . The thought was there, but he couldn't quite remember why it mattered when he saw nerves and desire mingled in her eyes. No longer a rabbit, not quite a tigress. Woman. His woman.
    He was too hungry, needed the seduction and the feast too much to turn away from what she offered.
    But when his lips brushed hers, something besides the power of the incubus burned inside him, something bright and powerful. As his mouth softly devoured and his hands gently explored, that bright power tempered the incubus hunger into something he'd never felt before, something he craved and couldn't quite name.
    Then he took her to bed, finally to bed. And while he showed her the pleasures of sex, she taught him the mysteries of love.
     

 

     
     

Chapter Sixteen

 

     
     

     
    Lynnea glanced at the closed bathroom door as she laced up her shoes. Sebastian had been amused by her reluctance to get dressed in front of him. After all, he'd pointed out, he'd seen her naked—and shed seen him. But that was a different kind of naked, and getting into her underwear while he lay back in the rumpled bed with the covers barely covering his interesting bits was more than the newfound tigress inside her could handle. So shed grabbed her clothes and scampered into the