“Do you want me to try to wake Lin?”
Fei froze, her tunic in her hand. “No.”
Another hiccup.
Shit.
“I will be all right.”
He knew that lie. How easily people believed it. How easy it was to let people believe it.
I want the real you.
The hell with that. He’d rather give her the man she saw when she looked at him. Reaching out, he cupped her shoulder in his hand. She stiffened beneath his touch.
“Fei?”
She didn’t turn.
He didn’t know what to say. They sat for a minute, connected yet distant. Her next sob vibrated down his arm. To hell with it. With a tug, he tumbled her back to his side. Her hair snagged over his shoulder, tangling with his. She lay there gripping her tunic as he propped himself over her, staring past his shoulder, her composure as fragile as their connection.
He didn’t know what to say any more now than he had a minute before. Drawing the backs of his fingers down her cheek, he wiped away the tears. “I’m sorry.”
She took a quavery breath and closed her eyes. “It is not your fault.”
“Maybe, maybe not, but I’m still sorry.”
“For what are you sorry?”
She opened her eyes. The pain in their tear-drenched depths made him want to go out and kill something. Taking her hand in his, he worked her fingers free of the tunic and brought them to his shoulder. “For whatever’s making you hurt.”
“Damn you.” Yanking her hand free of his, she thumped him on the chest, saying something in Chinese he’d bet his last dollar was a curse. “I was in control—”
Catching her fist in his, he tucked it against his chest while pulling her close. “That kind of control you don’t need around me.”
She sniffed and shook her head against his chest. “The bargain was just for this night.”
She felt so small in his arms, so delicate. So right.
The next sob shook her from head to toe. Her palm opened against his chest. Pressed. His senses flared, absorbing the heat of her touch “Do not let me do this, Shadow.”
“Do what?”
Her hands crept up around his neck, clung. “Be weak with you.”
“You’re not weak, Fei, you’re just hurting.”
“He was my father.” Another sob, less contained, punctuated the sentence.
Brushing the hair away from her face, Shadow caught the next tear on the edge of his index finger. “And you loved him.”
“Yes, even at the end.”
He kissed her then. Softly, gently, the way he hadn’t been able to earlier. “Then cry for him.”
“It is not fair to you.”
Cupping the back of her skull in his hand he pulled her closer, wanting to pull her so close nothing could ever touch her again. “Let me decide what’s fair.”
She shook her head. “You wanted passion.”
“Maybe I lied.”
Her nails dug into his neck and her entire body went still. “I lied, too.”
Whatever she’d lied about it was tearing her up. “How?”
“I told my father the emperor had found him. That his soldiers were hunting him. If I had simply locked him in he might have tried to escape, but in his mind he was so afraid of the emperor’s soldiers he stayed where I put him.”
“Fei…”
“It is my fault.”
“No.” Fisting his hand in her hair, Shadow pulled her head back. “Look at me.”
He had to wait, but she did. Finally. And the pain in her face was like a punch in the gut. So was the hope. She wanted pretty words to make it right. He didn’t have anything except the brutal truth.
“Life isn’t fair, Fei. Sometimes no matter how carefully you plan, no matter how hard you pray, shit just goes bad. You rage against that all you want, but you don’t blame yourself. None of this was your fault.”
She shook her head. “You cannot know—”
He cut her off. “I know and so do you. Underneath that guilt trying to eat you alive, you know it, too.”
Her eyes searched his, seeing more than he wanted. “You know this guilt?” she whispered.
Shit, she saw too much. Brought up too many memories he didn’t want to recall. He kept his answer short. “Yeah.”
“How did you deal with it?”
He’d buried it so deep he couldn’t feel it anymore. “The way that felt right.”
Her cheek rubbed against his chest. “I want to cry and scream and rage.”
He cupped her head in his hand and cradled her against him. “Then do it.”
Her cheek slid against his chest as she looked up. “Where will you be?”
He brushed his lips across her hair. “Right here.”
Holding her, and keeping her safe the way she needed. He might not be able to give her forever, but he could give her that.
CHAPTER EIGHT
DAWN BROKE THE SKY with little fanfare. Shadow watched through the leaves of the trees as the pale rays of pink and orange spread across the horizon. Beside him, Fei slept, her head pillowed on his shoulder. That in itself was a novelty. He’d never slept with a woman. When the pleasure was done, he was gone. He didn’t like the trapped feeling that came with the morning after, but this time he didn’t mind. He was looking forward to waking Fei and watching awareness steal the sleep from her eyes.
Carefully sliding a strand of hair off her face, he touched a finger to the creaminess of her complexion. Nothing marked the differences between them more than the differences in their skin. His skin was darker than hers, rougher than hers. Scarred, whereas hers was smooth. She was a princess, whereas he was the dragon she called him. A glorified lizard, ready to breathe fire. For her.
He wasn’t going to leave her. Not yet, at least. Not until he got her safe. And there was only one place he knew where she’d be protected. He kissed the top of her head. “Fei, it’s time to get up.”
With a mewl of protest, she nestled closer. Her hand slid down to his groin. He’d been semihard all night, but he got harder as her soft palm cupped him.
A few feet away, Lin slept, just as oblivious as Fei to the potential danger all around. Only the innocent slept so deeply. Shadow tried to remember when he’d ever slept like that. He couldn’t, but then again, he couldn’t ever remember being innocent.
Fei rubbed her cheek against his chest. The hand on his cock measured his length from base to tip, his thickness in intermittent squeezes. His breath hissed out from between his teeth. When he looked down, Fei was watching him with an age-old question in her eyes, and a temptress’s smile on her lips.
“Good morning.”
“Morning.” With an arch of his brow he indicated her hand. “Feeling brave this morning?”
“Maybe.” She snuggled closer to him. The trust displayed in the gesture soothed his raw nerves. “You did not have pleasure last night.”
“The hell I didn’t. Watching you come was very pleasurable.”
“That is not the same.” She shifted her grip on his cock, encompassing as much as she could through his pants. “It is not a good wife who does not give pleasure to her husband. I very much desire to be a good wife.”
Shit. A decent man would remove Fei’s hand, give it a kiss and tell her it wasn’t the time. He’d just finished establishing that he wasn’t innocent and apparently he wasn’t decent, either, because not only did he not remove her hand, but when she reached for the ties on his trousers, he beat her to them, ripping them open. There was a lot he couldn’t have in this world, but her hand wasn’t one of those things.
She hesitated. “Is there a certain way that pleases you more?”
“However you want.”
She didn’t touch him immediately. Instead, she ducked under the blanket.
“What are you doing?”
“I would see you.”
A shiver went through him. She popped out from beneath the blanket.
“It is too dark
,” she informed him in a soft whisper.
He put his hand over hers. “Then you’ll have to feel me.”
She smiled and squeezed. “That I will enjoy.”
The honesty of her desire shot through him like a lightning bolt. His cock jerked. She chuckled. “You like that.”
“I like you.”
For some reason it mattered to him that she know that it was different with her. That she was unique. He groaned under his breath as she fondled him. Even her touch was unique. She held him as if he were breakable. Caressed him as if he were fragile and milked him as if he were precious. Usually he preferred a rougher touch, but instead of telling her that, he lay still, biting back a moan, and savored the uniqueness of what she gave him. Everything was different with Fei. More intimate. More personal.
“Fei?”
At the whisper of her name, she glanced up. Her lips were parted and moist. Her hand soft and loving. He wanted those lips wrapped around his cock, to slide his length along that hot little tongue, to watch his shaft pump between her lips. Goddamn, he wanted her mouth.
Cupping her head in his hand he dragged her mouth to his, mating his lips to hers, kissing her passionately as she gripped him harder, pumped faster, catching the rhythm of his breathing, dragging his orgasm from him with long, firm strokes. He came in hard spurts, moaning under his breath as the pleasure stole his control.
“Oh, shit, honey.”
“You liked?”
He stole the smile from her lips, taking it as his own, growling. She nipped his lip. “You know damn well that I did.”
She took a handkerchief out of the pocket of her clothes and delicately wiped up the remnants of his passion. When she was done, she propped herself up against his chest and grinned down at him. “I am a good wife, then?”
“The best I ever had.”
“How many have you had?”
“Just one.”
“You are funny in the morning.”
“Hmm.” Closing his eyes he stretched and yawned. “Is that what you think?”
“Yes, and I think I am the reason.”
He cracked a lid. “You look pretty damn pleased with yourself.”
“I am.” Leaning forward, she whispered in his ear, “Did you really wish that it was my mouth on you?”
Had he said that out loud? Pushing her hair out of her face, he checked her expression. No fear there, just, God help him, interest. “Yeah.”
“Maybe we can try this next time.”
“You’ve got nothing to prove to me, Fei.”
Her face fell. “I disappoint?”
Shadow didn’t let her pull away. “Not a goddamn bit.”
“You prefer a woman with more…” Cupping her hand in front of her chest, she made her point.
How the hell had she gotten there? “I prefer you.” He kissed her hard and fast. “And me.” Another kiss. “Going at a speed we both can enjoy.”
Her voice rose. “You do not think I would enjoy this?”
He cut a glance at her cousin through the bushes. She stirred but then settled down. “I hope so, but there’s a lot of pleasure between here and there that I’d like to explore first.”
“It is because I have not known a man?”
“Yes.”
“You think I cannot enjoy you because of this?” He wasn’t going there. With a smack on her ass, he slid her to the side.
“I think you could burn me up, but as much as I’d like to find out how much, it’s time to get up and get moving.”
“To where?”
“To a place you’ll be safe.”
“Where is this?”
“Unless I come up with something better, home.” He was going home. “To Hell’s Eight.”
“YOU SHOULD NOT PROVOKE HIM,” Lin said a half hour later as they foraged for firewood.
Fei shrugged off the criticism. Lin didn’t believe in questioning any man at all. “And what else would you have me do? Be the rug upon which he wipes his feet?”
“I think you should have respect for your husband.”
The stick she grabbed was stuck. She gave it a yank. It broke in two. “Even if he doesn’t intend to stay my husband?”
Lin grabbed a stick out of a thicket and added it to the stack in her left arm. “He is your husband now. He fights for you and—”
Fei cut her off. “You mentioned that before, but it doesn’t make any difference to him. Fighting is what he does.”
“I think it is foolish if you do not try to change his mind.”
“He is not a man whose mind changes easily.”
Lin didn’t meet her gaze. A light flush tinted her cheekbones. “Then why did you lie with him?”
Try as she might, Fei couldn’t control her blush. She’d wanted her night and now that she’d had it, she wanted more, not less. “I do not know if there is one answer.”
“Do you worry that your father would not have approved?”
The last thought in her mind had been her father.
“The match my father would have approved would not have pleased me.”
Lin nodded and shifted the stack in her arm. “I have often thought you would not be a good second wife.”
Fei looked up. Lin’s blush deepened. “My father spoke to you of his plans?”
“No, but the mix of your blood would mean no good family would consider you for first wife.”
She said that so matter-of-factly. Just a fact of her father’s culture. But she was not only of Chinese culture. Her mother’s blood ran in her veins. And it was to her ancestors she prayed. She hadn’t told Lin of that yet. Her cousin was very traditional. Fei didn’t know if she would understand.
Lin shifted positions. The way she did when she had something she wanted to discuss.
“What is it?”
“I have not heard of your father’s plans for you, but I have heard the uncles talk.”
The uncles were her father’s five brothers. “What have they said?”
“They do not think it is seemly that you live out here with only your father.”
“That’s why they sent you?”
“I am only the excuse for their visit.”
“Oh.”
The uncles and her father fought a lot. If they had come only for a visit her father would have been suspicious. But it was reasonable for them to escort Lin back to Barren Ridge and then on to San Francisco. No proper Chinese woman traveled unescorted. The uncles were very proper. It had been hard to keep her father’s illness from them the last visit. The hostilities between them had made it easier. But now they would never allow Lin—or Fei—to stay. It simply wasn’t done. It was another complication. “What else have they said?”
“They’ve started a search for an alliance for you.”
Alliance, not marriage. Fei sat down on a log. “They think I will make a good concubine?”
“A woman of your lineage could be a concubine to a lord. There is much power in such a position.”
“And what if I don’t want to be a concubine?”
Lin sat beside her. “Then you should stay with the marriage you are in.”
A few sticks fell off Fei’s pile. She bent to pick them up. “He plans to repudiate me.”
Lin stood and gasped. Not a stick dropped, even in the midst of her indignation. Lin was always graceful. “You would be shamed before all!”
“Yes, but that doesn’t matter.”
“You will only be fit to be the lowest of concubines.”
If that. And it would be a worry if she planned on letting her uncles control her future. “I understand. But it is the price I must pay to leave here.”
“It is too high.”
No price was too high if she could have her freedom.
Lin sat down again. “I will intercede with the uncles. I will find you a place in our house.”
“You intend to go back to San Francisco, then?”
“Of course. Our family is there. I will tell Uncle Chung that y
ou saved my virtue. He will pay the debt owed with a place in our house.”
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