Witch Way Out (Witch Detectives #3) by Eve Paludan, Stuart Sharp Page B

I’ll have to deal with that.”
    “Oh, God,” I gasped as he did.
    “It’s not just this one case that has you tense though, is it? It’s all the other ones you have taken on. Why start them, Elle?”
    “The business is still finding its feet,” I said. “I wanted all the business I could get.”
    Niall leaned down to kiss my ear. “We both know there’s more to it than that. Why did you really do it?”
    “To annoy Rebecca, mostly. And then because it looks like these ones are more interesting than they seem. The missing dog didn’t feel like a dog at all when I tried to follow it from its home. The woman who might have a lover…Fergie followed her and she’s just going out into a field at night and staring at the sky with a telescope. The thief—”
    “I understand.” Niall placed another kiss on the side of my neck. “Small, strange things are happening in the city.”
    “Magical things, maybe,” I whispered back, and it was a whisper, because I didn’t trust my voice right then with anything louder.
    “And you feel that they’re your responsibility?” Niall was working his way down my spine now with his lips, teasing me, moving slowly.
    “Yes. There’s too much going on. I feel like some of it has to be fallout from everything that has happened in the last few months, from Victoria—”
    I stopped with a gasp of frustration as Niall stepped away from me, moving into my line of sight as he slowly stripped off his shirt.
    “Victoria is gone, Elle, and this city is not all your responsibility.”
    “But the coven, the treaty—”
    He bent to kiss me, his lips capturing mine as I looked up at him, our tongues dancing together for a moment, our power meeting somewhere between us, mingling.
    “You need to take time for yourself, too. Time to forget about these things, or at least to enjoy different things.”
    “I was planning to, if you ever stop teasing me.”
    Niall stood up straight again. “Oh, so you want to move things along, do you?”
    “I mostly just want you naked.”
    Niall laughed at that. “Oh, you’ve come so far, Elle. So very far. When we first met, would you ever have said something like that?”
    No. No, I wouldn’t, but then, I would never have been naked on my front, looking up at a half-naked Niall when he’d just finished massaging me in a way that made my body sing with need. Context was everything, when it came to what I would and wouldn’t say.
    I watched Niall undress, and he took his time with the rest of his clothes, revealing the slender, toned perfection of his body a little at a time until he stood as naked as I was. I tried to reach out for him, but he caught my hands, turning me onto my back and gently pinning my wrists above me while he kissed me.
    “I was serious about you needing to relax more,” he murmured against my lips. “Let me do this, Elle. Let me do all of it.” He took my hands, pulling them up so that I gripped the edge of the table. “Keep them there, Elle. If they move, I’ll stop, I promise you.”
    As threats went right then, that was about the worst one he could have leveled at me. I didn’t want Niall to stop then. I would have done anything for him to keep going. Not doing anything was even simpler.
    Actually, it proved to be almost impossible, because Niall had decided to make this last. Despite the fact that I was as ready for him as I had ever been, he still took his time, stroking and massaging the front of my body as much as he had the back. His hands slid along the flesh of my stomach, my legs, moving closer and closer to the places I truly wanted his touch, but not quite making it there.
    “Niall…”
    His half smile was almost maddening. “Patience.”
    But I didn’t have any patience left. I sat up and grabbed Niall, pulling him to the table and rolling him beneath me. He opened his mouth to protest and I swallowed the sound with a kiss. I moved down his body, taking the length of him into my mouth while I looked