I shoved forward into his arms and ground my forehead into his chest. I knew that he was right, but the thought of my mother alive was too persuasive to ignore. “I miss her.”
“You’re supposed to miss her, baby. She’s gone. But when you’re alive, you’re the only one left hurting. She’s where she was meant to be.” He reached for me, pressing my palm to his lips before settling our linked hands between us.
I considered his words about life and death on the way back to the cottage. He drove in silence, both of us lost in our own thoughts.
I existed because of a prophecy, as did Logan, West, and Troy.
What did that mean? Had there been no prophecy, no eternal souls, would I never have been born? How was it that Logan and I were so close, and yet he was predestined to be my enemy?
He grabbed a pizza from a local shop for dinner, taking it back to the cottage. We moved around the kitchen silently, putting all the groceries and supplies away. He set out paper plates and bottled water, and I pulled two paper towels from the roll for our pizza. We moved in sync, neither of us speaking.
Ravenous, I finished two wide slices, and West consumed almost four. After we finished, I stood up, cleaning both of our places.
“Thank you, Roam.”
I paused over the trashcan, lifting my eyes to his. “For throwing away your plate? You bought everything. All of this. It’s the least I can do.”
He answered me with silence, and I walked to his chair.
“West, you’re not responsible for me, okay? Prophecy or no prophecy. Like you said. I’m where I’m supposed to be.”
He moved me to step between his long legs, wrapping his arms around my waist. The tiny kitchen was intimate, and shadows played off his handsome features as he looked up at me.
“I have to save you, Roam.”
His mouth moved against my stomach, and I threaded my hands through his hair, watching the blond strands move between my fingers.
“I’m going to shower, is that okay?”
He slid the chair back, standing in front of me. “Of course. Take your time.”
We stared at each other in the dim kitchen lights. The clock on the microwave changed to nine-thirty. The waves crashing against the shore outside the open window created a constant white noise in the cottage, the saltwater air filling the atmosphere. I took a deep breath, linking my fingers together. “What I said by the ocean… West, I…” I cringed, remembering my shameless invitation for West to take me to bed. “I don’t think…”
He shook his head firmly. “Nothing is going to happen tonight, Roam. Take a shower and go to bed. I’ll come in and check on you before-”
“No! No, I want you to sleep with me. Just… beside me, I mean. Don’t leave me in the bedroom alone. I’m afraid. I’m so afraid of the nightmares.”
He nodded, turning to gather the pizza box. “I’ll come in then, in a little while.” He ran his fingers through his hair, resting them at the back of his neck. “Just to sleep, okay? Next to you.”
“Okay, thank you.” I started to turn, but he caught me gently, and I lifted my eyes to his.
“I just want you to know, Roam, that they don’t compare to you,” he said quickly, under his breath, and I leaned closer to hear him. “No one compares to you.”
Satisfaction made me smile, his flattering words striking up the capricious teenager inside of me. I blushed, looking up at him shyly. “Thank you,” I managed.
He smirked and rolled his eyes. “Now get to bed. This isn’t a vacation. I’m teaching you how to fight tomorrow. More than just self-defense. You need to get some sleep.”
I clasped my hands behind my back, rising to my tiptoes for a second. “Yes, Mr. Perry.”
He shook his head, still grinning as I turned for the bedroom.
Chapter Twenty
The dank cellar is dripping at the corners, the stone walls streaked with sludge. I am suspended from shackles in the ceiling. As I register that I am dreaming, I realize that I am in a prison.
I am alone.
I take in my surroundings; no light except for an open fire pit in the wall, several empty cells with iron bars, and a long, wooden table with wheel-like devices attached.
A rack, I realize in horror. The long, iron rods propped against the fire pit fill me with dread. They are thick at the bottom…
In the shape of a cross.
Frantically I wish for whatever is going to happen to end. I can’t bear the thought of torture or death again. The watery mirror claims one wall across from me. The garment that I wear is white but filthy; something meant to be worn under fine gowns. The material brushes my bare body as I yank against the shackles. My hair is red-gold with long, heavy waves.
Footsteps approach. I see a man with another man slung over his shoulder. He throws the iron-barred door open and drops the slack prisoner to the stone.
I recognize West immediately.
Vomit erupts in my throat, and I have no choice but to turn my head and gag, choking as the vile substance splashes to the grimy floor. My jailer turns to face me.
It is Troy.
“He shall watch,” he says, gesturing to West as he wrestles with consciousness.
Another man enters, brushing his hands against his hips. Relief floods my body so quickly that I drop, the manacles catching my weight cruelly. “Logan!” I cry, pleading. “Logan, please help me!”
Logan looks confused, turning from me to Troy. “Does she suffer visions?”
“She is a witch. All witches communicate with the devil,” Troy responds, reaching for an iron rod. He holds the bar into the fire, heating the cross at the end.
I know what is coming. I think of the birthmark on my shoulder, and West’s story.
“I am not a witch, I am just a girl, and you’re a good person, you don’t want to do this,” I say to Logan, tears tumbling down my cheeks. “Please…”
“Quiet, witch,” Troy snarls, and before I have time to register his movement, he stabs the branding iron to my shoulder.
I gasp, contorting in pain. My screams tear through the stone dungeon, echoing in unseen caverns. The burn of the numbers does not even compare to what he’s doing to me. I want to slip into unconsciousness.
I want to die.
“No!” West is on his feet, slamming his weight into the bars.
Troy turns to shout at Logan. “Take her now. A virgin witch will rise again.” Troy’s hissing voice is behind me. I lift my head, the fiery pain in my shoulder blurring my vision. Logan is in front of me, his fingers gripping my chin, and I meet his dark eyes. They are empty, void of the compassion and love that I have known since we were children.
I am pressed against the stone wall. He lifts my garment, spreading my legs apart.
“I will kill you! So help me God I will kill you!” West is roaring.
“Please don’t,” I beg weakly. Logan’s face is so close to mine that our mouths are touching.
“Roam,” he whispers against my lips. In one movement he tears through me. I am screaming…
I can’t stop screaming…
. . .
Kicking with all my lower body weight, I managed to knee him in the side as hard as I could. I heard the air hiss from his body as my fingernails dug into his shoulders, and I scraped them down, gathering his skin beneath them.
“Fuck… Roam stop… Roam!”
I felt myself being lifted into the air as I finally opened my eyes. He held me in his arms, pinning my hands to my sides. Confusion stole the first moments of consciousness away from me as I searched moonlit room.
A bed, a window... West… the beach cottage.
Am I in another dream?
“West?”
“You’re okay, baby, I’m here… it’s 2012,” he consoled, his warm lips on my forehead. His arms wrapped around me, and I gripped his shoulders, clinging to his chest.
“Logan,” I moaned as he lowered me back to the pillows. I could see in the moonlight streaming over the oc
ean and through the window that he wore only boxer shorts, and as he turned to pull the sheet back onto the bed, I gasped.
Deep, red ravines marred his back, along his shoulder blades.
Did I do that to him?
“Logan’s not here,” he answered, sighing.
“No… Logan, he…” Don’t cry. You just cry and cry and you know it’s not real! I took a deep breath, trying to steady my voice. “He… raped… me.”
“What?” West growled, adrenaline forcing his grip to tighten on my upper arms. “When?” he demanded.
“I’m not sure… the fifteen-hundreds? Right after Troy gave me this,” I whispered, sliding the thin strap of my white, lace cami off my shoulder.
My birthmark was darker than normal, the cross suddenly deep and painful. I had fallen asleep in my just my underwear and cami, the warm air stifling in the bedroom even after opening the windows. The waves lapped at the shore, sounding close enough to the window to touch.
“Roam,” he responded, his distant gaze falling on my shoulder. I watched his expression change from enraged to cold as he remembered. “I was there.”
“It was horrible. My heart broke for you, West, just trapped and unable to help me… her,” I corrected, my fingertips pressing my birthmark.
“Logan had you first, and then Troy.”
“Her,” I insisted, tears burning my eyes.
“I spent three days sitting in that cell. You hung from those shackles dying. Alone.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, sitting up to kneel on the bed next to him. The moonlight bathed his face in silvery shadows, and I stared at the cuts in his back. They were long and serrated, and I reached for his skin, tracing each one tenderly.
His broad shoulders stiffened, and he caught my wrist in his hand, forcing my eyes to his.
“Roam.”
He only said my name, but I knew that it was a warning.
And I knew that it would be my only one.
Something possessed me, some ageless craving deep within, to press my lips against his back, over the wound that I had caused. He released his hold on my wrist, and his muscles tensed, tightening the skin beneath my mouth.
I kissed his back the way that he had taught me kiss his lips. I let my breasts press against his back, my tongue tracing the line that my fingernails had broken into his skin. I realized that he had already healed.
He groaned, turning suddenly to press me back against the pillow. His eyes searched mine, ravenous, and I struggled to pace my frantic breaths.
“I’m going to make love to you, Roam.” His voice rumbled in his chest, and I held my breath, unable to speak.
His hand cupped the underside of my knee, and I moaned softly as he slid up to my thigh. His eyes raked over me as though he couldn’t decide where he wanted to start.
“I’m scared,” I burst in a tearful whisper, my mouth only moments from his as he moved over me. He stilled his hand, gripping my thigh as his thumb pressed against the string band of my panties.
“There are other things to be afraid of. This isn’t one of them,” he hushed, his mouth finally claiming mine as he pulled my panties away.
Torrents of desire assaulted me all at once. His kiss was drugging, and I forgot my fear as his tongue took over. He coaxed my response, beginning slowly, stoking the fire that was already raging inside of me.
He lifted my hips, urging me to rock against his hand. I gasped, widening my eyes as he pushed, sliding his finger so deeply inside of me that I broke from his kiss in shock.
“West… oh God…”
“Do what feels right,” he murmured, trailing kisses down my neck. I gripped his broad shoulders, unable to resist bucking beneath his expert touch. He was doing something inside of me, something that forced a cry to my throat. As his mouth found my breast, I moaned, dizzying sensations pleasing my senses. “That’s it,” he murmured, his lips trailing back up my neck.
I tried to close my legs and fight him as the stirring inside of me turned into something beyond my control. Pressing my thighs together against his skilled hand, I exploded, the world falling away as I cried his name.
“West?” I begged, opening my eyes to meet his through the moonlight.
“This is what we are,” he whispered against my ear as I struggled with consciousness. “If I take this from you, Roam, I will never let you go. Do you understand?” he urged, lifting himself over me, poised just outside my entrance. He brought my hand down between us, and I wrapped my fingers around his unbelievable size, holding my breath. “Don’t tense up. I’m sorry that I have to hurt you. Do you want me?”
Tearfully, I nodded. I would have begged him at that point.
His fingers encircled my wrists and pinned my hands to my pillow, and I turned my head, watching the numbers on both of our arms catch the moonlight in the window.
He thrust forward. My scream was involuntary as I clung to him. He took me over, my every thought, my every breath. The burning pain was not over-exaggerated from what I’d imagined but wasn’t nearly as bad as my nightmares. He released my arms, still inside of me, and held me completely still.
I was his now. I was magic.
We were magic.
We were lost in a history that neither of us understood, yet had suffered for almost a thousand years.
“It will pass,” he eased, his voice rough with a need that only I could understand.
It did pass. The sting came and went faster than the numbers. I was unsure of what was supposed to be happening as he remained perfectly still.
“Can I touch you?” I asked, unaware that I’d even spoken. My emotions directed my words on their own accord.
“Touch me, Roam,” he commanded, and I wrapped my arms around his neck. “Don’t let go of me,” he whispered.
And then he moved.
Oh, God, he moved, and I arched my hips to meet his thrusts. In moments I was sure of nothing except for him, for West, and his determination to build the fire again within me.
I realized why he’d waited for me to adjust to the pain. He was strong, so strong, and I knew he was holding back and he drove so deeply inside of me. I whimpered, throwing my head back as his mouth crashed to mine.
“God, Roam, you are… it’s never been like this. Fuck,” he growled, sliding his arm around my back to lift me against him.
I couldn’t form words. I had no understanding of my life anymore.
Everything was West.
I rocked against him, our bodies falling into a steady rhythm as the waves crashed to the shore outside. “West… my God West, please,” I cried, vaguely aware that I was begging him. I screamed at the intensity of the explosion he’d created, and this time my breathless world burst into a million intricate pieces around me.
West groaned, tensing over me.
“Roam,” he cried out roughly, his lips meeting mine again. I knew the moment that he came inside of me, and I was overwrought with unexpected satisfaction.
I did this to him.
After a few moments, he found my gaze. He kissed me slowly, a kiss meant for the calm after the storm. “Are you okay?” he asked tenderly against my ear, threading his fingers through mine as his breathing evened.
“I will be,” I answered, turning to gaze out the window of the cottage. It was nearly morning, and the first hint of sunrise touched the horizon.
“Did I hurt you?” he asked, his lips trailing over my neck as he gathered my heavy hair into his hand.
“No. The pain went away, I mean,” I managed.
I fought away the inevitable with all my inner strength.
He pulled away, continuing the kiss me. As though he could sense my impending breakdown, he met my eyes.
I was lost in what had just happened. He had taken the innocence that had kept me naïve for so very long. He had seized the promise of what my future once held, melding our future into one.
As though he could hear my thoughts, his voice rumbled low against my body. “No one else matt
ers now, Roam. Only you and me.”
I nodded, pinching my lips together to fight back the tears. He sighed, reaching for the towel I’d left by the bed after my shower. I was too lost in the aftermath of emotions to pay attention as he cleaned us up. He tucked me into his arms, and I realized that I fit there perfectly.
As though I was made for him.
“Sleep,” he whispered.
I nodded. As much as I struggled to barricade the part of my mind that sought out thoughts of Logan, I could no longer keep them at bay. Logan’s words taunted me, weighing my heart with shame.
I’ll never hurt you Roam. And I’ll never let anyone hurt you. I promise you.
Who was Logan now? Did the person that he was in another life even matter? I could only guess how many times he’d participated in my torture or death throughout all the lifetimes that I’d had with him. But just as I was not responsible for my own past lives, he could not be held responsible for his. He’d done nothing but love me my entire life, and I repaid him by giving myself to another man.
West has been part of me forever.
Logan had it within himself to kill me, and West did not. Because of that, though I’d always love Logan, I could never fully trust him again.
Could I?
The numbers on my arm were silhouetted in the early morning light. I fought back the tears that threatened again. West would know if I was crying. Logan was alone and dealing with the nightmares all by himself. I needed to get to him, to help him through all of this.
I was made for West.
The thought circled repeatedly in my mind. We were incredible together, and I knew it. He knew it. My body ignited with his, and I would never feel that way with anyone else.
I’ve never felt like this with Logan.
I never will.
“Don’t be afraid to sleep.”
West’s voice startled me. I turned, thinking that he’d been sleeping.
Roam (Roam Series, Book One) Page 17
