by Deja Black
“When I was taken, one of the priestesses found you. I discovered much later that she secured a body for you, one that she would place your soul in until I could be recovered.” Raksha kissed Cole’s forehead softly.
“The temple? The priest? Our village?” There were so many people, people that Raksha protected. Without him, what would have happened to them all?
“Mostly massacred. It seemed that our non-involvement in the unrest stirring the country would not be accepted. The temple was under siege and its priests murdered.” Raksha’s pain saturated his words, making Cole bury himself against him, trying to buoy his spirit.
Snatches of memory came to Cole’s mind of children running, of prayers and chanting, priest in robes who smiled at him as he walked through the village.
“The story of the temple’s guardian, the yeti, was not lost on the regime that flooded our village, brandishing guns and destruction. They killed many, destroyed places built with sweat and love, and they found our home.”
Raksha was guardian to the Temple of Sagarmāthā, had been blessed with the yeti as his beast to care for the temple and its people. A myth to many, a story of nightmares to others. None but the inner circle knew of his human identity.
“How?”
“It would seem that the desire for wealth even reached our mountain, my love. “ Cole could tell the words hurt Raksha. “Someone in the inner circle received money for our secrets, and we were lost. I waited at home for you. Do you remember?”
“Yes, but I heard a sound on the way back, an injured tiger.” The poor whimpering thing had arrested Cole’s attention, and he’d worked to find it, lifting it gently and running home to Raksha, who he knew would be able to fix it. He’d done so many times for others.
“Your love for nature’s creatures was greatly known to all.” Raksha looked around Cole’s home from where they sat. It was modern, chic. The room where they were was an open plan with stairs in the center that lead up to his bedroom. Chrome fixtures, black furniture and hardwood floors. That was all. “And yet, you have nothing here. Only you.” Raksha looked down to Cole.
“I like it that way.” Cole looked down at his lap.
“You like being alone?” Raksha touched Cole’s chin, lifted it so Cole couldn’t hide.
“I like being safe.”
“And have you felt that way? Safe?” Raksha’s tone invited nothing other than truth.
Cole was quiet. “Not until you held me in your arms.”
Raksha bent, kissed Cole slowly, then laid his head on top of Cole’s.
“It was your need to protect all that they used. Knowing my strength grew with your presence, you were kept distracted. When you stopped to help the tiger, they attacked. There were many of them, and they held a blessed rope, one that would restrain me.”
Cole remembered it again, remembered seeing Raksha bound and struggling, unable to free himself.
“I tried to help you.”
“I told you to run!” Raksha ground out. “You never listened to me, too independent, even then. They were on you before you took the second step toward me. To see you, so many times they stabbed and tore, wearing you down. I watched as the keeper of my heart lay dying, and later I was taken.”
Chapter Eight
“I died that day. At least I thought I did.”
“Yes, Sunil. You were lost to me, and so in the absence of your energy, I lost my will to fight. For years, I was tortured, beaten, broken again and again until it just simply stopped. The few who were left behind were forced to give their support to those who would kill women and children for their cause. I was forgotten.”
Cole remembered being six years old, seeing the beast staring down at him. “I saw you when I was a child, saw you standing over me. I didn’t know you. Why didn’t I know you?”
“You were placed in the body of a child who would have died soon, but your soul gave it life. Then, you were adopted. The priestess thought that it would be best you remembered nothing, that to keep your sanity, you would wait until I was there to awaken you. I had only your dreams to visit you, to see the man I loved grow from child to man. “
“You said that before. Priestess? Who was the... ,” but it dawned on him. Who had been with him nearly his whole life? Who had remained at his side, whispering prayers nightly in words he hadn’t understood? “Ansu.”
“Yes, but we lost contact with her.”
“She was killed walking home one day.” She’d been found outside their home, and Cole had been devastated, his mother more so. Ansu had always been the connection between mother and child, so when she was gone, the divide between them was too vast to cross. Cole had gone away to college, only returning for brief holiday visits rather than move back into the home as his parents had wanted. It had taken years for him and his mother to heal.
“She loved you, would have given her life to protect you.” Raksha’s voice was soft as he spoke, sensitive to Cole’s pain.
“I know.” It made sense now, the way she cared for him. She kept him close, always watching, as if she were waiting for something from him. He felt her sadness, sometimes saw the tears at the corners of her eyes. He would ask her about them, but she would shake her head and tell him that the time would come someday.
“With her loss, I had nothing, only the dreams.”
“How did you escape?”
“When I was forgotten by the enemy, the priests began their search for the yeti. I was recovered broken, caught between beast and man, but alive. They took me to another temple, one no one knew of, and I was healed. But I was never completely whole.”
“And now you’re here.”
“I used your dreams and the information we gathered from Ansu. Compiling those things, we were able to locate your city, and through covert means, where you worked. It would seem that offers of wealth work both ways.
“And now, you can return to Nepal with me. We can guard our temple and the priests that are left to us, rebuild the village.”
Wait, what? Return to Nepal. Cole lived here, in Columbia, South Carolina. He had a job, his mother, and friends. He had a life. Raksha expected him to leave the world he’d known for the last thirty-two years and do what? Go back to a place where he was killed only to later be miraculously reborn? No. No, he wasn’t going to Nepal.
“No.”
Raksha moved back, the shock clear on his brown face.
“No, I’m not going to Nepal.”
Chapter Nine
“What do you mean?” The hurt those words held nearly broke Cole, but he wasn’t going to give in. How could he? He didn’t know Raksha anymore and only vaguely remembered what they used to be to each other. A life couldn’t be built on that.
“Exactly what I said, Raksha.” His voice was firm, his decision made.
“But, Sunil...”
And that was another thing, the name. It wasn’t his. “Cole.”
“What?” Raksha was confused, his brows bent in consternation as he watched Cole.
“My name is Cole, not Sunil. I am a thirty-two year old business exec living in Columbia, South Carolina. I did not go to school, work my way up to gain this position to return to a life where you loved me as someone I don’t even know.”
It may have been fear that started the feelings rushing through his blood stream, the ice cold chill that accompanied thoughts of his flesh being ripped apart, but it was anger now that moved Cole to give his words the sharp bite they were grounded in.
“But you love me. It’s there in the way you touched me, kissed me. It’s in the way you look at me, even now.” Raksha gripped Cole tighter as Cole leaned away from his touch. It was a war within, a struggle against his own need to be wrapped up in Raksha’s unyielding arms, to be safe, but his mind continued to flash back to another time, another moment when those arms hadn’t been able to protect him.
Cole pressed his hands against Raksha’s chest, pushed him away. “And while I will not argue that my feelings are very stro
ng for you, that to be held by you gives me something I’ve been longing for all my life, I’m not going to leave here and go to a place where I was murdered. That’s not happening.”
“You can’t do this. You were supposed to—” Raksha’s words were sharper now, tinged with his own fear, his own anger.
“I was supposed to do what? Leave with you as soon as it was revealed who you were? Like a fairy tale come to life complete with happy ever after? No. No, I’m not going. Do I still love you? I know Sunil’s love for you, his memories of you. But as Cole? I don’t know you at all. I have a life here, and that life has not included you. I’m sorry, Raksha.” Cole meant it. He was sorry. He hadn’t wanted to break Raksha’s heart, break his own heart, but what the man expected couldn’t be.
No matter how it felt to be next to him, how much he wanted Raksha’s body driving into his own, he was not the Sunil Raksha knew. It wouldn’t be fair to either of them to pretend he was.
Raksha’s look was hard, his shock at Cole’s words more than apparent. He stood stiffly and stepped back.
“You deny us.”
Cole rose quickly, his body chasing Raksha’s heat. “No, it’s not us I’m denying. I can’t say to you that I can be who or what you need right now. I don’t know you, not really. I know your touch, the way your hands feel on my body. I have memories of times gone by. But I need to know more of you as who I am right now.” Cole reached out, his hand against Raksha’s heart, the pulse of it wild against his fingertips. “Can you understand that? Let me get to know who you are now.”
Raksha’s gaze bored into Cole’s.
Cole didn’t know what he was searching for there. Truth? Sincerity?
He must have found it, because he took Cole’s hand in his and held it close to his lips. “Yes, Cole. I can do that.” Taking one of Cole’s fingers, he drew it in his mouth and nipped at the tip, his teeth’s sharpness sending whorls of electricity all the way to Cole’s cock. He took his other arm and wrapped it around Cole’s body, slamming it against him. Raksha released Cole’s finger. “I want you to know me now, for your body to recognize its master, and your soul to know its home.” He bent, slid his lips along Cole’s neck, down to his collar bone. His mouth was wet, the damp tip of his tongue tasting his flesh before he opened to clamp Cole’s flesh between his teeth.
“Argh, Raksha.”
Raksha’s grasp tightened as Cole rocked against him, seeking more. Raksha’s hand lowered until his fingers brushed the top of Cole’s gym shorts, and then he was in, one finger in the crack of Cole’s ass on a path to his hole.
Cole’s heart beat faster, his dick stretching against the fabric as Raksha drew nearer. The skin Raksha held captive radiated pulses of need over Cole’s body, and he trembled with it, crying out when he felt the tip of Raksha’s finger as it pressed against his hole.
“You will let me in this place again. You will let me have you, keep you, worship you as I did years ago.” There was a moment, then Raksha’s other powerful hand moved from his back and wrapped around Cole’s dick, drawing up and down, the thumb sliding over the tip. When the hand was gone, Cole opened his eyes to see Raksha take the digit wet with Cole’s pre cum into his mouth and suck on it. “You will let me claim you. You say you don’t know me, don’t remember me? I will make you remember me.”
Cole watched as Raksha licked his palm, his eyes chips of ice as he focused on Cole. His finger slowly stretched Cole’s hole, going deeper and deeper, the burn making him gasp and plead.
“You will know my touch again. Love me.” Raksha’s wet grip nearly made Cole’s knees buckle. Raksha squeezed and pulled, tugging Cole’s pleasure from him.
“Oh, Raksha. I can’t. I need. Argh.” Cole’s orgasm raced through every nerve ending, raging over his body like a hurricane, and seed exploded from his cock. Collapsing in Raksha’s waiting arms, his body was languid when Raksha carried him.
In his own room with Raksha on top of him, Cole would have thought he was dreaming again. Only this time, his dream lover actually had a face, one that he knew.
Taking his hand into his mouth and sucking Cole’s cum from each digit, Raksha watched him, his gaze never leaving Cole’s. When he was done, he bent and kissed Cole, sank his tongue flavored with Cole between his lips, and shared his essence.
When Raksha rose again, he smiled.
“Rest, my love. I will be here when your eyes open.” With Raksha’s arms sheltering him, Cole closed his eyes and went to sleep.
Chapter Ten
Cole turned into the warmth of two powerful arms that held him tighter as he moved. Startled, he opened his eyes and looked into Raksha’s heated gaze.
“You’re here.” It wasn’t a dream.
“I am.”
“I’m not dreaming.”
“No, Su—, no Cole, you are not dreaming.”
Cole smiled at Raksha’s correction.
“I’m afraid I am. I’ve prayed so long to hold you like this again. I’m afraid if I stop, you will disappear.”
The fear in Raksha’s words touched Cole, who reached up to caress his cheek, his eyebrow, to run his fingers through the platinum strands of his hair.
“I’m here, Raksha. I’m real.” Easing closer, he kissed Raksha, enjoying his lips, the taste of himself still present from earlier. “You have to be hungry. Let me feed you.”
“I would be grateful for your care, Cole. Thank you.” Raksha kissed Cole and opened his arms. Sometime while Cole lay sleeping, Raksha had completely taken off all of his clothes. The man’s body was a chiseled work of art, brown and granite hard. His chest was wide, his waist narrow, his legs long and powerful. Cole’s mouth watered when he allowed himself a glimpse of the man’s dick, but he fought the urge to bend down and greedily take as much as he could of it in his mouth. Instead, he stood and walked away.
“I can smell your need for me, Cole.” Raksha called as Cole left. Cole laughed, shaking his head.
In the kitchen, Cole looked for food that Raksha might like. Did he eat meat now? Was he still a vegetarian? It was details like this, ones he couldn’t remember, didn’t know, that told Cole he needed to learn his mate before they could go anywhere.
Wait. His mate? When had he started thinking of Raksha as his mate? And here he stood, in the kitchen looking for ways to care for him.
But it was natural to want to see to Raksha’s needs, to want to please him. And it felt good.
Grateful that Maya had fresh fruit for him along with fresh bread and juice, he returned to the bedroom.
Seeing Raksha on his Michael Amini Cortina sleigh bed, stretched out and waiting for him, was an image he wanted to frame and keep forever.
Raksha rose and moved to come to him, but then he stopped and just looked. “When I was a prisoner and my mind played games with me, I would see you there, a tray in your hand or fruit in your palm, ready to feed me.” Raksha’s voice was soft as he spoke. “But when I would reach out to touch you, to feel your skin, you would disappear, and my heart would break from the loss of you once again.”
Cole moved, placing the tray on the nightstand beside the bed. “Reach for me, Raksha.”
“And what if you disappear? What if I’m only seeing what I want to, what I need to? What if all the work, the journey, the movement of our people—what if none of it is real?”
“Reach for me, Raksha. You want me to trust you, to know you again. Reach for me. Trust that I’m here.” There was a pause, but suddenly strong hands grabbed him, pulled him close.
Ragged breaths rushed against his ear as Raksha held him, hands running over Cole’s back, his heartbeat thrumming within his chest.
“Mine.” Cole’s cheeks were wet, and when Raksha’s head rose, he saw his lover’s cheeks were wet, too. The word was a question, and Cole only knew one answer.
“Yours.”
Chapter Eleven
“Let’s go to the park,” Cole said as he watched Raksha eat his fill of fruit and bread, jealous of every morsel
that went into his mate’s mouth.
Raksha’s gaze lifted as he popped a grape inside. “It is cold for you.”
“But not for you. And as long as you’re there, I won’t feel it. If it helps at all, I’ll throw on a sweater.” Raksha was a yeti. The cold would not affect him here, so Cole wasn’t worried about the weather. He wanted to take Raksha for a walk, though, show him what Columbia was like.
Columbia, a city of gray buildings and fast cars—the Metro, as it was often called, wouldn’t be anything like their home in the past. Still, Cole lived there, and he wanted Raksha to be there, too, see where he was now and perhaps call it home.
“Good. I would like to go, would go anywhere with you ,as you should with me.”
“Raksha.”
“My apologies, Cole.” He lowered to kiss Cole briefly. “Yes, a walk. But I’ll need a shower first, then fresh clothing. Let me make a call.”
Raksha rose and picked up a pair of shorts lying discarded on the floor. Cole didn’t avert his eyes from the dazzling view of Raksha’s ass as he dragged them on and finally pulled a phone from the pocket. Cole was more than tempted to go over to him and part those cheeks, place his face...
Raksha pressed a button, then put the phone to his ear. A short time later he spoke in familiar words, the rhythm even more so, but Cole couldn’t make out what he was saying.
When Raksha finished speaking, he turned back to Cole. “Kamal is pleased for me. He says I must work hard to keep you no matter what.” Raksha walked to Cole, easily hauling him into his arms. “He is right. I will let nothing stand in the way of us being reunited for a lifetime. Not even you.”
His growl was hungry as he took Cole’s mouth, plunging his tongue into its depths, making Cole shiver and shake with need. There was the taste of strawberries and grapes, the spicy flavor of pumpkin bread as he thrust his tongue deeper, staking his claim.
