She laughed softly. “You didn’t save me? You saved my life that night, because you gave me hope again.” She rinsed out the washcloth, the rosy water streaming down the drain, then lathered it up again. She kneeled behind Elijah and started gently washing the debris out of the wounds on the back of his calves. “But I set the trap that killed you,” she said quietly. “I’m the one who betrayed you.” There. It was out there. Finally. The truth she’d been carrying for so long.
Elijah winced, but didn’t protest her ablutions. “It wasn’t your fault. Helping Nate kill me. Don’t blame yourself.” His voice was slurring now.
Ana had to press her hand to her eyes to try to suppress her sudden tears. But the sobs still swelled in her throat. He didn’t hate her? He didn’t blame her? How could he not? “God, Elijah, I’m so sorry. I—”
His hand went to her head, his fingers stroking her hair. Ana.
His voice was a whispered caress that was so tender she wanted to crawl onto his lap and bury herself in his arms. How could he be so kind to her? She’d orchestrated his death, rendered him unable to defend himself from Nate’s dagger. She’d inflicted upon him torture of the mind, which was the worst kind of all. And yet he stood there, offering kindness in his touch and voice. She leaned her head into his hand, and closed her eyes. God, it felt so amazing just to be touched. Touched without pain or injury. A touch of comfort and reassurance…
No. She couldn’t let herself be weak. She couldn’t let herself forget how many people she’d hurt, Elijah especially. And now, how much more damage she could do to him if she let him get close to her. He was her chance to do it right, to save someone instead of destroy him. Elijah was this great treasure, a man of honor who had stumbled into her life, her chance to atone for who she was, for all who had suffered because of her. She would not let her weakness destroy him.
She forced herself to straighten and retreat from his caress. “But you despise me.”
He was quiet for a minute. “No, not you. But yeah, images get in my head when I connect with you.” He let his hand slide off her head, and she felt the distinct loss of the intimate contact.
She groaned at her thoughts. She needed to get a hold of herself. She knew better than to lean on anyone, especially him. She cleared her throat and went back to scrubbing, working on his narrow hips, and sliding the washcloth over his butt. Lean and muscled, his body was perfectly sculpted, even after weeks of abuse and damage. He was a male in every heated sense of the word, and she was horrified to realize she was getting aroused, even as she squatted in the shower, her jeans getting soaked as she scrubbed the back of his thigh, cleaning out the deep wound on his injured leg.
“I smell your arousal.” His voice was low. Sensual.
Her cheeks heated with embarrassment. “It’s the soap. It’s scented.”
He laughed softly, a bitter, ironic laugh. “I want you, but at the same time, I…”
“You despise me. I know. I get it.” She moved to the front of him and sucked in her breath at the sight of his erection. She quickly averted her eyes, but pulsing between her legs still increased as she kneeled and began to wash the crusted blood and dirt out of the deep gouge on his right thigh.
After a few moments of silence, she snuck a glance up at his face.
He was studying her, his eyes filled with shuttered heat, as if he was too exhausted to do anything about it, but if he weren’t so beaten down, he’d throw her to the floor of the shower and take her there. But there was also thoughtfulness, as if he was trying to figure her out. “Were you at the pit?” His voice was raw, edged with tension as he referenced the underground cavern he’d been held in, a below ground coliseum with dozens of tunnels, where Illusionists had tortured victims for centuries.
It was where the rite had occurred that freed Ezekiel. Ana had gone there with Frank Tully, the man who had orchestrated Ezekiel’s release. She’d gone there because she’d wanted to find Elijah, but God, how it had spiraled out of her control.
“I was.” She didn’t look up, not wanting to think about the last week when she’d been underground with Frank, the man who’d ordered Nate to kidnap her in the first place. Frank, the bastard who’d freed Ezekiel and murdered Ana’s parents so many years ago. He’d taken Ana to an underground cavern that had been used as a training compound to teach Illusionists how to torture, and he’d forced her to practice her illusions. Deadly ones. Horrific ones that had been a replay of Elijah’s death. Over and over and over again she’d murdered him in her illusions, and she’d been unable to stop them, powerless to change them.
And they’d continued to come ever since.
Nate may have been the trigger to cause her illusions to shift from good ones to deadly ones, but once he’d died, she’d continued to do them. It was all her now, and there was no one else to blame.
“When I was at the pit—” Elijah paused, his voice cautious.
She looked up at him. Water was streaming down his face, rivulets of pink as it washed the blood from his hair. He was shattered, but still strong. So very strong. His jaw was rigid with a warrior’s strength and determination, his shoulders thick with muscle for battle, his chest sculpted. Elijah was a warrior who would exude strength no matter how damaged he was, and she knew that if the situation called for it, his adrenaline would fuel him into full battle, just like it had downstairs earlier. “When you were there, what?” she asked.
“I don’t remember much. Most of it blurs, like my memory of how I…” Elijah grimaced, “attacked the Order downstairs a few minutes ago. Not all that clear.”
She nodded and stood up to clean the puncture wounds in his stomach, the last bit left of him to wash. “That makes sense—”
His hand went to her hair again, and he tilted her head back so she had to look at him. He was a solid foot taller than she was, but with the way he was propped against the wall, she could almost look him in the eye. “When you touch me, or when our minds connect, I get visions of being back in the pit, being skinned alive, while you stand there laughing at me. That’s why I recoil from your touch, because I have these visions of you torturing me. The moment is so real—” His gaze met hers. “Did you torture me while I was at the pit, Ana?”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“Oh, God.” Ana stared at Elijah, dread welling in her stomach at the implications of what he was saying. “You saw the illusions?” How many times had she created the illusions of his murder? Again, and again, and again, she’d cast the images of his death into the world, death by torture, death by her hand, unable to stop reliving the nightmare of when she’d killed him for real.
His eyes darkened and shadows flashed across his face. “Saw? No, I didn’t see them. I lived them.”
Ana thought of all the damage to Elijah’s body when they’d pulled him out of the sinkhole, and her legs started to shake. Was that from her? Had he really experienced all the illusions she’d created? How was he even alive? How was his mind not shattered irrevocably? “I didn’t know you were there, I swear.” Her stomach roiled, and she went cold with horror at the thought of Elijah being subjected to her illusions. “I’d never have done them if I’d thought anyone was nearby. I can’t control them. Ever since that night at the Gun Rack, when you died because of me, that’s all I see. You dying. My fault. Again and again and again…”
His grip tightened on her hair. “My own soul mate tortured me. Aren’t you supposed to wait until the bond is completed before you drive me mad?”
Tears filled her eyes. “I didn’t do it on purpose. I had no idea you were there!”
His eyes flashed with anger, with insult. “How could you not know I was there? I sensed you there. I was out of my mind, and I still knew you were there.”
“I didn’t know—” She hesitated, as fresh horror welled inside her. She had sensed him. How many times had she heard his voice in her head, and wondered whether it was her imagination? She’d known, deep in her heart, she’d known he was there. And she’d done it any
way.
What had she become? Was she so weak that she couldn’t stop herself? So depraved and consumed by her nature that she delighted in it? She gripped her stomach against the sudden nausea—the reality she’d fear so much was true. She was becoming her worst nightmare, an Illusionist caught in the thrall of hurting others. Not just others. Those she cared about. “Oh, God—”
He caught her arm, his anger vanishing, replaced by concern. “Ana—”
“No!” She smacked her hand over his mouth. “Don’t say it. Just don’t. Dammit.” She bit back tears as she blindly ran the washcloth across his shoulder. God, it was happening. It was true. Exactly as she’d worried it might be. Exactly as she’d feared. She was turning into the monster Frank had predicted… “I’m sorry. I have no excuse, but I’m sorry. I really am.”
He pulled her hand off his mouth. “I can feel it,” he said quietly. “I can feel your agony.” He cupped her chin and lifted her face to his, searching her expression. “What the hell went on there?”
No way could she tell him what was going on. Not until she knew how to handle it…if she could. Her touch repulsed him now? God, if he knew what she really was, he would kill her himself. She had to find her way back to who she used to be and reverse all the damage she’d caused.
There was one way she could think of to clean the blood from her hands, and she couldn’t stop until she’d done it, until she’d fixed what she’d broken. She needed to help the Order put Ezekiel away, and help Elijah reclaim himself. She had to break the cycle that she’d set in motion. Maybe then it would be better. Maybe then she could be who she used to be. “Okay, so here’s the plan,” she said, willing the tears to subside, forcing herself to sound calm and focused. “You need to kill Ezekiel. That’s our goal. We’re stuck with each other because of the whole insanity thing—I take responsibility for it entirely—but that’s it. Nothing more. We focus on the job. Okay?”
His eyes narrowed as he let his hand drop to his side, and she saw his one good leg starting to tremble. “You really want Ezekiel dead?”
“Absolutely. Nothing else matters.” God, she was so glad he hadn’t pursued asking her what was so wrong. She didn’t want to talk about it. Couldn’t talk about. She could tell from the determined expression on his face that he wasn’t going to give up on it, but he understood her need, and he was willing to give her the space she needed.
He nodded, his eyes flickering with approval at the conviction he heard in her voice. “Good.”
She glanced up and saw how pale he’d become, his lips turning gray. Blood was still oozing from the various wounds in his body. Dammit. Why was she freaking on him? He needed care, not her falling apart on him. “You’re clean enough. Can you get to the bed?
“Hell, yeah. I’m not taking a damn nap in the shower.” His words were tougher than his voice, and his entire body was trembling with the effort of holding himself upright.
She turned off the water, whisked a towel over him to get the worst of the water and blood, then slipped her arm around his waist to help him out of the bathroom to the bed she’d been using since she’d been rescued from Nate.
His face was ashen as he limped across the room, his left leg dragging uselessly as he leaned heavily on her for support.
She could feel his blood oozing down her side where she was pressed up against him, and he groaned as he fell onto the bed, face down on the comforter. Immediately, his blood began to stain the pale blue comforter, oozing from a huge gash on the back of his crippled leg. Had his hamstring been severed? “Can you heal from this?”
“Yeah.” He closed his eyes, sweat beading over his brow. “Doesn’t hurt. Not a big deal.”
She snorted and rested one hand on the broad planes of his back while she filched some of the first aid supplies someone had left by the bed. Not because Elijah needed them to heal, but because he wouldn’t be able to heal if he bled out first. She could hear the low murmurings of male voices outside the door and knew they were being guarded. Were they waiting for sounds of battle before they came rushing in to kill him?
Elijah didn’t seem to care, which was good. It meant he knew they were friends and not the enemy. “If we complete the bond, we lose that which we care most about,” Elijah said, his eyes closed, his words a mumbled slur as he held tightly to her. “Since we both want him dead, completing the bond would mean Ezekiel lives.”
Bile churned in her stomach as she packed his thigh wound with gauze pads. “No. He can’t be allowed to live.” Making this nightmare end was the only way to atone for her role in it, for all the dead Calydons who’d been used to free Ezekiel, all the warriors who’d died because of her illusions.
Elijah’s eyes slit open, his eyes so cold with deadly intent that she shuddered. “Ezekiel. Will. Die.” His words were laced with such venom and determination that she shivered. She sat back, the hair on her arms standing up in response to his threats.
She realized his need to kill Ezekiel wasn’t merely Order business. There was something so personal, so dark, so driven about his words. For the first time, she saw in Elijah that deadly warrior that had ruthlessly slaughtered so many over five hundred years as an Order member, but there was something else in him as well. A rogue element that made him relentlessly brutal, deadly not just to Ezekiel but to anyone who stood in the way of Elijah killing him.
Including her.
Something deeper was driving Elijah, something beyond what he’d shared. Even as badly as she wanted Ezekiel dead, she suddenly feared it wouldn’t be worth whatever price Elijah would make them both pay for it happening.
Her hand slipped off his back and his body went rigid in the split second before she forced herself to touch him again. Even then it took a minute for his body to relax.
Elijah’s eyes narrowed, and he swept his gaze over her with so much heat that her belly clenched with desire. She became tantalizingly aware of his naked body stretched out on the bed. He was pure male beauty. Perfection. Even with the injuries and the extensive damage, he radiated sensuality.
“Even though I’m too hurt to move, even though a part of me still recoils from your touch, I want you so badly I can’t even concentrate.” He met her gaze. “Every minute with you makes me want to bind you tighter.”
The mark on her arm burned for him. “We can’t bond.”
He shook his head. “The only way to stop the bond is to separate, which is why the Order always kills off Order shevas. We both know that.”
“So, you’re going to kill me?”
Wry amusement flickered in his eyes. “No. I’ll go crazy if I do. Not worth it.”
She swallowed, fairly certain his instinctive need to protect his sheva would keep him from being able to kill her, but not entirely sure exactly how dark his demons ran. Not sure what his need to kill Ezekiel would drive him to do. “So what do we do?”
“We move fast, and we take Ezekiel out before we bond. Resist the bond. Race to the finish line.” His eyes darkened. “All that matters is Ezekiel dying. That’s it. Nothing else. We need to go after him, but first I need to heal. I’m going down.”
This was the warrior who’d given his life for her when they’d met: focused, fearless, ruthlessly targeted toward his goal, a man who would never be stopped by his limitations. She wanted to be like him, so certain in who he was, so convinced of his power.
Elijah closed his eyes, then his body stiffened and he opened them again almost immediately. “Lie with me.”
Heat swelled in her belly at the thought of climbing into the bed with him. He was far too naked for that kind of activity to remain in the platonic “nursing him back to health” category. “Why?”
He ground his teeth. “I have nightmares when I close my eyes. I need more contact with you to be able to go into the healing sleep. I won’t be able to concentrate.”
Ana felt his reluctance and realized how difficult it was for him to admit his need for her. A warrior of Elijah’s caliber didn’t admit weakness, no
t even to himself. His willingness to trust her and ask for her help indicated how truly dangerous the monster inside of him was. He was willing to do whatever it took to survive, and right now, what he needed was to heal. There was no choice to be made, no matter how risky intimacy was between them. “Okay.”
She wrapped his hand around her wrist to keep contact, then she kicked off her wet sneakers and peeled off her soaked jeans, peering longingly at her dresser, which was across the room. Too far for her to reach without letting go of Elijah. Then she saw her night tee shirt on the floor next to the bed.
It would have to be enough. She didn’t want to hunker down with him in wet clothes for the next eight hours, or however long it took him to heal.
He moved his hand to her bare hip as she yanked off her drenched shirt and bra. She glanced at him as she bent down to retrieve her oversized tee shirt, and saw the heat of his gaze through his slitted eyelids as he watched her.
Awareness rippled over her and desire pulsed low in her belly. She could feel the heat from his gaze as it swept over her bare breasts, over her stomach and down her legs. It was almost as if he were touching her, his mouth sliding over her skin, across her belly, down lower— She sucked in her breath, realizing she was picking up his thoughts. “That’s you?”
He nodded, his eyes dark with heat. “I can’t believe I’m too beat to do anything about the fact my sheva is almost naked.” His gaze locked on hers, a bottomless depth of fire and passion, laced with anguish so deep she felt it deep in her own heart, lacing into the feelings she tried so hard to suppress inside herself.
His hand tightened on her waist, sending ripples of desire through her. “I’m pissed as hell that I can’t throw you down and make love to you until neither of us can move.”
She swallowed, her entire body pulsing with wanting, with the need to connect with him, to have his hands gliding over her skin, over her hips, over her breasts—
Her hands trembling, she grabbed the dry shirt and pulled it on, hiding behind the shield of thin cotton. “We can’t have sex,” she managed to say, embarrassed at how throaty and breathless she sounded. “It’ll tighten the bond.”
Darkness Surrendered (Primal Heat Trilogy #3) (Order of the Blade) Page 8
