Finally, he takes me fully into his mouth and suckles. Pleasure spikes between my thighs. “Oh, yes.”
Lincoln gives my areola another expert swirl with his tongue. A low moan escapes my lips. “I want you, Lincoln. Now.”
“As you command, my—”
A frantic pounding sounds at our bedroom door, interrupting us.
Fuck-fuck-fuckity-FUCK-fuck. Right when he reached my nipple, too.
“Are you expecting anyone?” asks Lincoln.
“Nuh-uh, are you?”
“Nope, my schedule’s clear until lunch.”
We share a frown. No one gets past the royal guard unless they have proper credentials and a damn good reason.
“Open up!” A woman’s voice booms through the closed door. “I have important news for you.” She speaks in an operatic sing-song that’s hard to forget.
“Is that Maxon’s new night nanny?” I ask.
“Yeah, that’s Rowena. And if I were a betting man, I’d say she’s here to quit.”
“But you only hired her yesterday.”
“True enough. But you know our Maxon.”
“That I do.”
Our young son inherited my power to move souls to Heaven and Hell, which makes him the Scala Heir. When I was three, even my Mom couldn’t tell that I had supernatural skills. That’s not the case with our Maxon. He’s got all sorts of unusual powers, including an incredibly low need for sleep. That said, Lincoln and I do require our rest, so we hire someone to watch our little guy until morning. The infamous night nanny.
“How many night nannies does that make this week?” asks Lincoln.
“Four,” I reply.
We had the same night nanny for ages but she left to start her own family. Now, we’re in an awkward in-between period. And by awkward, I mean angry-nannies-quitting-daily-type-awkward.
“Ah, well,” says Lincoln. “We’ll get it right eventually. I’ll hire the next one. It’s the least I can do for leaving you all hot and bothered.” He kisses the tip of my nose and then rolls out of bed. I watch Lincoln’s naked backside as he saunters down the hallway and into the nearest bathroom. Mmm-mmmmm, my guy has a sweet butt. What a shame that royal playtime was cut short this morning.
The pounding resumes, only louder this time. “Will you please open this door? It’s urgent.”
“One minute.” Scooping my Scala robes off a nearby chair, I pull them on over my head. “Is Maxon okay?”
“He’s fine,” calls Rowena. “However, his behavior is nothing less than monstrous, in my opinion.”
“Monstrous?” That’s way too harsh. I speed across the room, whip open the door, and freeze. It’s a stupendous effort not to laugh my ass off.
Okay, Maxon might have been a little monstrous this time around.
Rowena stands in the outer hallway, a short, plump muffin of a woman in a simple black Rixa gown. But that’s not what has me almost cracking up. Yesterday, Rowena had a massive beehive of gray hair that added at least six inches to her overall height. This morning, that hair-do is a burnt-out mess. She looks like Mrs. Santa Claus with a char-broiled Mohawk.
Yup. That’s Maxon’s handiwork, all right.
I scan the hallway, but my boy’s nowhere to be seen. Most likely, he’s hiding around a corner or behind one of the larger pieces of gold-inlaid furniture.
Rowena folds her ample arms over her even-more-ample chest. “I have something to say to both of Your Highnesses.”
Lincoln steps up beside me wearing jeans and a black T-shirt. “What seems to be the problem?”
“I came here to discuss your son, the High Prince. You can throw me in the dungeons if you wish, but his behavior is unacceptable.”
Lincoln and I exchange a long, knowing look. Don’t worry, honey. If we chucked every night nanny who bitched about Maxon into the dungeons, we’d run out of dungeon pretty quickly.
“Maxon,” says Lincoln in his best paternal-authority voice. “Come out here, please.”
Our little guy sidles into view, a black-haired moppet wearing blue and white striped pajamas. He has mismatched eyes, a slender frame, and a shit-eating grin on his face. “Yeeeeeeah?”
Technically, our boy is only three-years old, but since he’s also supernatural, he has the size and strength of a child of five. In terms of thinking power, his cranial capacity flip-flops between that of a silly preschooler and an adult criminal mastermind. What can I say? He’s beyond awesome.
“Do you know why nanny Rowena is upset?” asks Lincoln.
“No.” Maxon lets out a puff of breath while extending his lower lip forward, a move that makes his bangs shimmy. That’s his ‘thinking up a lie’ face.
I set my fist on my hip. “You can do better than that, baby.”
“And tell us the truth,” adds Lincoln.
“Well, nanny Rowena had a lot of rules.” Maxon grips the arrowhead-end of his own long black tail, twisting it in an odd rhythm. “It was hard.”
“What kind of rules?” asks Lincoln.
Rowena straightens her rounded shoulders. “I follow the same thrax traditions that any nanny would—”