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bring home.”
    He stood up and got close to her. “I’m not mad at you now, Audrey.” He tugged on the hem of her blouse which had been pulled free during their little tussle against the cake display. “Why don’t I go with you? It’s been a long time since I saw the sky and breathed fresh air.”
    Her heart turned over, even though he was still being maddeningly flirtatious. She supposed it was to be expected. He’d gone without everything for ages, poor man. She leaned into him and tipped her head back, but instead of kissing her on the mouth, he dipped his head lower and nuzzled her throat.
    She knew it was the complete unreality of the situation that made her act so wanton and rash. She’d never once kissed a man she only knew a half an hour, let alone seriously entertained the idea of falling into bed with him. But for some strange reason, it seemed like he was hers, to do with as she pleased.
    She pulled away with a gasp. That sort of thinking wasn’t like her at all, either. Erik was a human being, whether he’d been trapped in a painting by a crazed witch and freed by her or not, it made no difference. Just because, by some insane glitch in his curse, she had control over him, didn’t mean she could take advantage of him.
    “I can’t take advantage of you,” she said, pushing on his chest with all her might.
    He backed her into the wall, folding her arms against her chest as if all her strength was of no consequence to him. He laughed, a low rumble that went straight between her thighs, and pulled her hands away, wrapping them around his middle.
    “I don’t mind,” he said, working down the side of her neck with soft gentle breaths.
    She would count to ten, and then command him to stop, but in the meantime, she got her hands under his vest and rough shirt, sighing not only at the exquisite feel of his hot, smooth skin against her palms, but at his lips trailing down her neck and along the opening of her top. It wasn’t technically kissing so she guessed he was strictly following her rules. Either way, it made her lose her tenuous grip on her self-control.
    Pop the buttons, she mentally pleaded, exhaling to further strain the fabric. Just don’t stop. She wanted him to make it lower than he did, and considered counting to twenty, but at fourteen, she dug her fingernails into his back and sadly told him to stop.
    “I thought you were hungry,” she said, feeling as bereft as he looked when he immediately stepped away from her.
    “I am,” he said, stubbornly not taking his eyes off her.
    “Just stay in the house. I’ll be back soon.”
    “Take me with you,” he said.
    She almost agreed. There was little harm he could cause, not when he had to do everything she told him to. She wanted to tell him to take off his clothes so she could touch him some more, and shook her head. His clothes. He couldn’t go out in his bearskin and tatty, skin tight breeches.
    “Not until I get you something more appropriate to wear. What’s your size? Oh, you probably didn’t even have sizes back in your day did you? Somebody just made your clothes to fit?”
    “My grandmother made my clothes,” he said, and she had to put her hand over her mouth to keep from making a yearning noise.
    He looked, acted, and sounded so fierce, but when those words came out of his mouth, her heartstrings very definitely felt a tug. No, it was bad enough she couldn’t stop thinking about rolling around naked with him, she absolutely couldn’t develop feelings for him. But most of the lusty glimmer had drained from his eyes and she could see he thought about the past. All the people he loved had been taken from him when he’d been locked up and cursed to live silently and helplessly all those years.
    “Stay put,” she said, rushing to her room. She found a tape measure in one of the dozen emergency sewing kits her mother constantly put in her Christmas stocking, and returned to find him standing in the same spot.
    “Sorry,”