Page 43 of Her Irish Treasures
But we aren’t all together, I couldn’t help but think as I stepped back out into the room clad only in the basic hotel terry cloth robe. Warwick wasn’t here. They hadn’t wanted me to go to his homeland in Faerie, though surely it would have been more comfortable. Certainly more spacious. Not to mention free.
“It’s decided,” Doran said as I paused at the foot of the bed. “We have a plan.”
Ivarr lay beside him on the bed, bare chested but still in dark boxers. Evidently he’d won the right to join us. Good. I hadn’t had a lot of interaction with him yet. Of the four treasures, I knew the least about him. His black skin contrasted with beautiful amber eyes that glowed with his brilliant light when he smiled.
Taller than the other three men with a lanky, lean frame, Ivarr was the Sword of Light, from which no one could escape. When he’d helped Aidan with the giant kelpie in the lake, a golden beam had shot out of his chest. He’d flown toward the battle on nothing but light.
Beside him, Doran seemed to take up two-thirds of the bed. A big man, both wide and tall and thick. Giant platter-sized hands and feet. Crooked hooked nose. Hulking shoulders. Very much the gargoyle from my dreams even in human form.
I glanced over at the other bed, and Keane sent a smoldering look at me. He had the sheet pulled up over his lap, so I guessed he didn’t have a stitch of clothing on. Also, no gloves. Gulp. Though I couldn’t blame him in the slightest for not wanting to sleep with tight leather on his hands.
That put the grumpiest man of the lot on the couch. Despite the comfortable temperature in the room, Aidan had retrieved his leather jacket that I’d “borrowed.” Rather than pull the bed out and take up all the space in the room, he’d chosen to simply kick back on the couch with his head on the armrest and his still-booted feet propped up on the opposite end. His eyes were closed, his face shadowed by one arm over his forehead, but I didn’t buy that he was asleep.
“After a few hours’ rest,” Doran continued in his deep, floor-rattling rumble. “We’ll sort out our resources so we may secure permanent living quarters that are both safe and comfortable.”
Sort out resources? I couldn’t help but frown. “Does that mean you’ll have to sell some of your weapons and stuff?”
“Aye,” Aidan replied in a flat, bored tone.
I really didn’t know any of them too well yet, but Aidan was never bored. Never not sarcastic with a bite to his voice. It sounded to me like Doran was making him sell off some of his equipment to fund a place to live. For me. “I’m sorry. Vivi was helping me list some of my paintings to sell too.”
One icy baby blue eye cracked open in the shadowed recesses beneath his arm. “Why the fuck would you be sorry? I don’t give a rat’s ass about mortal weaponry. We have a conduit now. We shouldn’t need an extensive human arsenal to push out the demon horde.”
“Oh. You sounded… not mad. I took that to mean you’re upset.”
He huffed out a laugh and slammed his eye back shut. “Only that I am denied the pleasure of tucking that glorious ass back against my dick while you sleep.”
Now it was my turn to let out a laugh, though it came out more like a strangled groan.
“That’s my pleasure tonight,” Ivarr drawled, sitting up to offer me his hand.
It was both an“oh, shit,”and“fuck yeah”moment. Did I take the robe off? Or keep it on? We’d already fucked. Well, Doran had been inside me after treasuring me on the bar, which meant he’d driven me insane with his tongue. All of us had climaxed thanks to Keane’s wicked talent.
But it was one thing to have sex, and another to actually sleep in their arms. Like looking into their eyes, breathing the same air, relaxing enough to sleep, safe and secure. I did trust them. Obviously. Or I wouldn’t be here. I’d almost died to free Doran. I had no doubts whatsoever that they’d always take care of me, if for no other reason than to keep their magic intact.
I was their conduit. I was the hub at the center of the wheel, four spokes spinning around me, casting out powerful magic to drive back the forces of darkness. They wouldn’t risk that, especially after losing the treasurekeeper before when Doran was cursed.
Deciding to keep the robe on just for my own peace of mind, I took Ivarr’s hand and let him help me crawl up into the middle of the bed. Both he and Doran turned on their sides, giving me a little more room, but it was still wall-to-wall muscle. Heat. Rock-hard temptation all around me.
I ended up facing Ivarr, so it was Doran against my back. His gigantic hand splayed across my abdomen, snugging me back against his heat. With his arm around me, I was almost completely encased in muscle. He was just that big. It made me feel like a baby bird tucked under her mother’s wing.
No safer place in the world than under Doran Stoneheart’s mighty arm.
Curling our clasped hands against his chest, Ivarr just looked at me with those beautiful golden eyes. “Such a treasure. We are truly blessed, Doran.”
“Aye.”
That single word rumbled through me, vibrating me from head to toe. How could he say that—when he’d been trapped for hundreds of years, a giant gargoyle statue forgotten in a root cellar near a church?
He rubbed his mouth against my ear. “I’d suffer the curse another thousand years just to hold you again,mo stór.”
Blinking back tears, I curled my other hand around his wrist, holding them both. “No more curses, please.”
“What was your life like before you heard Doran’s call?” Ivarr asked. “If you’re not too tired.”
I was feeling less like a zombie after the shower, though I didn’t think the alert brain would last long after the week I’d had. “I lived with Vivi. She took me in after I filed for divorce.”
His eyes flared and he glanced up at Doran. “You were wed before?”
