She couldn’t tell him. She didn’t talk about it with anyone.
“You’ll tell me about it, about him,” he said in a gentle voice, but it held a note that she knew. She tried to sit up.
“Just stay here where I can hold you,” he said, nuzzling the top of her head. “Tell me.”
She swallowed. “I was…I was…married.”
He stilled. Froze. As if he held no breath, no life, his heart stopped. She could feel it. She held perfectly still as well. When men grew that pensive, it was never good.
“Married?” he whispered.
She nodded. “I met him in college. I was working on my archaeology degree.” Why had she fallen for him? She licked her lips. “He seemed charming, sweet, nice. I was never one to date a lot, and it seemed amazing that this guy wanted me.” She shrugged. “So we eventually got married. My parents had already passed on.” That still hurt.
“You had no one to guide you. When?” he asked.
“About seven years ago. I made him hold off until I had graduated, which he didn’t like. I should have listened to that inner voice then, but I didn’t.” She took another deep breath, her stomach tightening, starting to burn. “Suffice to say, he wasn’t a nice man.”
“What did he do?”
She shook her head. “What didn’t he do?” she whispered. “Somewhere along the way, I started to believe him when he said it was all my fault—his moods, his anger, his drinking, his abuse. It was always my fault, and no matter how hard I tried to fix it, tried to be what he wanted, it was never, ever enough.” She shuddered out a breath. Just get it said, get it done. “So then I was pregnant, not very pregnant, but still. Part of me was so excited, and another was so scared.”
He didn’t say anything, just held her.
“I wanted a child. I wanted to be a mother, but I didn’t want to bring a child into that home, with him. It was a darkness, that place. Horrible.” Chills iced over her, prickling her skin. “So…”
She didn’t say anything for a bit.
“So?”
“So, I decided to leave him.” She drew another deep breath. “I tried, but he came home that day as I was packing.”
Images flashed in her mind, black and red, filled with terror, anger, pain, blood.
“I lost the baby,” she said and realized it no longer hurt so much to say it.
He hadn’t moved, wasn’t even breathing.
“He hurt you,” he said, his voice low and gruff.
For a long moment, she didn’t answer. “Yes. In little ways, in big ways, in every way he could think of. That day, other days.” She blew out a breath. “Didn’t matter.”
Silence settled between them. “Where is he?”
She ignored the question. “I still filed for divorce. Went to the hospital, the police were called, and he’s in jail now, and I’m free.”
Free.
She was free.
She closed her eyes and breathed deep. The chills eased away as heat enveloped her. Free.
“I’m going to kill him.”
She looked up at those liquid silver eyes. Rage pulsed in the depths. She ran her hand up his chest, just as he did on her back.
“I don’t want him to be a part of us. If you did that, he would always be a part of who we are.”
Those eyes never wavered from her.
“I want us to be us, about us, with him far, far away. And he is a world away in a dark, dank cell. We’re here.” She leaned in and kissed his chest. “I’ve finally found you.”
For a long moment, he said nothing, just held her stare. Finally, she felt some of the tension ease from him. “You know me.”
It wasn’t a question.
She didn’t answer.
He speared his fingers through her hair, nudging her face up to meet his. “You know me.”
“I really don’t know anything.”
A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth even as she could still feel the anger in him. But none of it was directed at her. Not in ways to which she’d grown accustomed.
This time when he leaned down, his lips were soft, undemanding but seducing. “You will think of nothing but what I’m doing to you,” he whispered against her mouth.
His fingers and hands calmed her, aroused her as they played across her skin.
He was made of fire and ice. “How can you be both cold and hot?”
“You are the only one who can bring the fire to my soul.” He propped himself on his elbow.
She watched him, met his gaze even as he lowered his mouth to her breast and licked, laved, small circles on her skin until she wanted to shift so that he took her into his mouth. Smiling, his eyes still troubled, he shook his head. “No. You must remain still. I get to do all the work.”
Fine by her.
She raised her arms above her head and met his stare.
“You trust me,” he said, kissing his way down her torso, his fingers playing over her ribs so that she squirmed.
“Yes. I don’t know why, and it’s probably stupid, but I do.”
His tongue twirled over her hip bones. First one, then the other. “You trust me because you know me.”
“No, I don’t. Not really.”
One corner of his mouth kicked up. “Then I’ll just have to make you remember.”
His mouth left hot, wet trails over her body. She assumed he, like her ex, would make quick work at the juncture of her thighs. As if he read her thoughts, he only placed one chaste kiss at the very top of the vee of her legs and kissed his way down one leg, his hands busy kneading her muscles. When he’d kissed and licked his way back up her body, she tried to pull him to her. Instead, he rolled her over onto her stomach.
His mouth found every sensitive place on her body.
“If we were at my place,” he told her, kissing his way down the back of her thighs. She moaned and squirmed. “I would have your body warmed with oil. Oil that I still have specially made for you. Its scent is—”
“Sandalwood and jasmine.”
“Both of us.” His tongue on the back of her knee made her grip the bed sheets.
Already she was so damned aroused.
***
Bishop kissed his way down her body, the body made just for him. His anger was slowly fading. At least for now. He knew it was only locked away and he’d release his fury one day on the one who deserved it.
However, for now, what his lady needed was gentleness, caring, passion, love.
“I’ve cherished the memory of you for centuries,” he told her.
She didn’t answer him. As he reached her shoulder, he kissed the juncture where her nape met her shoulder. She tilted her head even more.
He should wait.
Wait to mark her.
He’d tasted her blood before. Knowing she was drinking his blood, he could no more control himself than he could have stopped the night from becoming day.
One of the reasons he’d mourned her before was because she’d wanted him to change her, to mark her permanently and he hadn’t. Though he’d tasted her and had marked her, he hadn’t changed her yet. Before, he’d been too late, and because he’d worried, he’d lost her, lost her to some unknown enemy that had taken her from him. She’d suffered so much in this time, in this lifetime, and what if there had been others that he didn’t know about? What if she’d come again sometime between then and now, and he’d somehow missed it?
If she wanted to change, to become his forever, this time he would not, could not deny her.
This time, he could not lose her.
Never again would any harm come to her.
He hadn’t changed her yet.
But at some point, he would.
He couldn’t lose her again.
But would she want to this time?
He pulled her up. “I want you like this, from behind.”
“Just do something. I’m so… I’m so wet.”
He looked down and knew she was right. “You’ve always responded to me.�
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This time, she raised her hips and stacked her hands, resting her cheek on them.
Sakra. What a view. Her juices glistened, beckoning, calling to him. He ran his hands over that tight little derrière. He squeezed, separated, squeezed the muscled cheeks of her ass.
They used to play games in bed, out of bed, anywhere he wanted, anywhere she wanted. Sometimes he was the aggressor; sometimes she was.
Now?
Now he knew he’d have to go slower on those games that had once been natural between them. After what she’d been through, he would not scare her off.
“Do you remember all the things we did, my Natiya?” He ran one lone finger through the wetness that even now glided down her thigh. He caught the nectar and brought it to his tongue, and her taste exploded through him.
He growled.
“You took me like this before.”
“Indeed. Many—hmmm—many times. And in any other way we devised, làska.”
He ran his fingers down her back, between the globes of her ass, to the wetness below. He gathered the wetness and brought it back to the tight little rosette of her ass.
She trembled.
He waited, then repeated the action.
She trembled again.
“You always did like that.”
This time, he took his cock in his hand, fisted, so that the veins stood out. He set the head of his cock to her slick, wet center.
“You are so damned hot.” He rubbed himself along her wetness, making her moan, and beg. When she was shimmying back against him, he said, “What do you want?”
“You! Now.”
“As my lady commands.” He gripped her hips and slid into her with one long glide.
He threw his head back and held still, felt the beat of her heart against his cock. Sweat broke out on his forehead, and he knew he wasn’t going to last long. He felt his teeth lengthen.
“I am what I am,” he told her as he began to move. “Do you remember?”
She lifted her hips and tried to move back onto him. “Please.”
“Do you remember?” He stilled and leaned over her, whispering in her ear, smiling when she shivered. “And it’s my way this time.”
“Yes!”
“Yes, what?” He slid into her in controlled and measured strokes.
“I remember. You cannot die.”
He reached around and rubbed her clit between his thumb and forefinger. She mewled and arched, her hands fisting in the sheets. “You remember? What exactly do you remember?” Still he kept his thrusts controlled, though he wanted to pound her into the bloody mattress.
“That you’re immortal. That I wanted to be before, but you wouldn’t let me, and something… Oh… Something happened.”
He didn’t want a damned history lesson right now.
He rolled her clit again, tugging slightly.
She moaned and tightened on his cock.
He wanted to take her so that she knew without a doubt, accepted without a doubt that she was his. And always would be.
With his other hand, he gathered her cream that coated his dick, gathered more and wet the pucker of her anus.
She jumped and jerked. “Ohhhh.”
He rimmed the tight opening of her body and had to take a deep breath as she tightened down on him.
Slowly, he watched as just the tip of his finger entered her. She stilled, and goose bumps dotted her skin.
“What are you doing?” she gasped.
“Reminding you.” He gathered more cream and repeated the process until she was relaxing, blooming for him.
He kept her relaxed, kept her just on the edge, and then he slid his thumb all the way to the second knuckle.
“Ohmygod.” She shook and moaned.
“You are mine, Natiya. You are mine, Skyler.”
He altered his strokes between his cock and his finger until he was hammering into her and she was pushing back, meeting him. He could feel it. Tingles licked wickedly at the base of his spine, tightened his balls.
“Yes. Yes. Yes!” she screamed.
He shoved deep and pressed her clit against his cock.
She screamed again and contracted around his shaft, his finger, jerking him into a hard climax, ripping a yell from his throat, stealing a piece of his soul. He heard his own heart beat as his passion roared through him, heard hers mix with his, and wanted her to the point of madness.
They collapsed on the bed.
“I’m never letting you go again,” he growled.
She sighed. “Promises, promises.”
He’d remind her later.
***
One month later
Skyler walked along the Vltava River again.
Why aren’t you here? Bishop’s voice asked in her head.
I’m busy, she answered.
She shielded, something she realized she could do to him with very little thought. Which did not sit well with him, but a girl needed her space.
The bridge was behind as she made her way back to the club. He’d be furious she was out by herself without an escort. The man really needed to join the twenty-first century. Granted, as he said, he didn’t care what fucking century it was—if he didn’t know where she was, if she didn’t want him to know, how the bloody hell was he supposed to protect her?
She smiled. The man’s voice positively gave her an orgasm when it got all rough and gravelly.
The guards, especially Andre, would not be happy, because he would have been taking his anger out on them, snapping and snarling.
Tonight they were leaving to travel to the mountains in the southern Bohemian region near Austria. She wanted to go there, to the ruins. She had to see where once they had lived.
Neither of them knew what exactly had happened to her, though she had a feeling he knew more than he was willing to tell her. After talking with Bishop, she knew they’d been in the city many centuries ago. Her body had been found in the river, not far from the Charles Bridge. He also said he had learned a man he’d once trusted had paid to have her killed because the man had not liked her influence on Bishop. Since the man was dead, she couldn’t meet with him and see if she recognized him or if any memory returned. Bishop, of course, still felt he needed to know who exactly had hurt her. Apparently there had been bruises on her throat.
She had no idea who the actual villain had been, but felt that in time, she might. And they’d face whatever that forgotten truth was when it came. If it came. In the end, it wouldn’t matter. What happened before helped to make them who they were today.
Today was what mattered.
She stepped around the queue of people, a ribbon of club mongers that took up most of the sidewalk. Slight thumps from the music within beat on the air.
“He’s not pleased,” Andre told her, clearly waiting for her.
The other bouncer only shook his head.
“I’ll take care of him.”
“Of that I have no doubt,” Andre answered.
She strolled into the club, her dark green short skirt flashing a bit more skin than she normally did. Her boots were her favorite pair, and the tight black shirt fit her like a glove.
“You were supposed to wait for Andre.” His voice snarled in her ear.
He led her onto the dance floor. The music thrummed through the air as they made their way through the bodies gyrating on the black floor. The people parted for them.
The music was sexy, a real fuck song. He turned and held her gaze with his silvery eyes. He stalked around her, his hands always on her, then he pulled her back against him so that he could talk in her ear as they moved.
“I love the boots. I want to see you later with nothing else on other than the boots.” His cool breath blew across her ear.
Those long-fingered hands skimmed from the hem of her short skirt up over her hip bones to pull her closer to him. She turned and straddled his thigh, moving down him, back up him to the beat of the music.
The other patrons moved back, watchi
ng them.
His eyes were only for her.
Hers were only for him.
She knew it would always be like this for them. She ran her hands up his thighs, grazed her thumbs across the erection she could feel, up his torso, all the while moving against him, taunting him.
“I want you,” she said.
His smile was slow, sexy, and filled with promise.
“Oh, làska, you’ll have me. Of that there is no doubt.” He jerked her to him, and she leaned back to stretch over his arm, letting the music flow through her. The beat would be perfect for him to thrust into her. Again. Again. And forever again.
“Always,” she said, slowly rolling up and wrapping her arms around him to pull him down so she could kiss him. “Always.”
“And forever.” His tongue flicked over his fang, and she knew they would be up the rest of the night.
He led her off the floor, his hand at the small of her back as he guided her to the stairs and up them to his private office. Once inside, the music dulled, but she could still feel the beat of it.
“I just went for a walk, Bishop,” she said, leaning back against his chest as he kissed the top of her head.
“I know. But I will always worry.” They walked over to the wide windows that overlooked the night. Prague glistened, a forgotten jewel in the darkness, the green lights of the castle washing the ancient walls emerald. His hand grazed up her arm, down, linking their fingers. He leaned in and kissed her softly. “You’re my heart, my soul, my other half. I’ve lived so long without you, I’m not ready to face that again.”
She cupped his cheek, this strong man who brought her back to the world. A different world than she’d assumed she knew about, but a world full of love all the same.
“I know. And my search is finally over. I found you.”
His brows wiggled, and a devilish gleam danced in his eyes. “Bloody good thing I convinced you that night.”
“And if you hadn’t?” She’d asked the question before.
“I just would have negotiated for another night. And then another. Until I’d finally worn you down.” He teased his mouth along her lips, to her jaw, along her neck.
She grinned and settled against him.
His arms held her tighter. “One night of passion, làska, will never, ever be enough for us.”
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