Alexis blushed. She’d become so accustomed to the freedom of unrestricted thoughts that she’d forgotten Adonis … no Helen, had snatched it from her head.
Aurora took it from a drawer and returned, placing it on Alexis’ head. “We did not return it to you because we needed to monitor you while you were so ill.” She paused, seemed to collect her thoughts. “Thor is the result of our attempts at artificial birth—the only successful attempt. I had never born a child, still haven’t—he was conceived and incubated outside the womb. But he is still my child, born from my ovum, which we revitalized because I was already well beyond my childbearing years, fertilized and injected with the ‘perfect’ DNA. He was to be a superior being. At first, we thought we had erred badly. He possessed gifts even beyond our wildest imagining, but he had difficulty controlling his gifts, in particular his greatest gift.”
Alexis struggled up on one elbow, trying to sit up. Aurora frowned disapprovingly but helped her adjust her pillows. “What was the gift?”
“Sound.”
Alexis frowned, perplexed. “But, everyone can make sound.”
Aurora smiled. “Did you know that your scientists had learned, in recent years, that dolphins were capable of emitting sound waves that are so powerfully intense they produce heat? That they can use this ability to kill when threatened? Your science is only beginning to realize the potential of sound, to utilize it now in medicine.
It was this gift we gave Thor, the power to harness sonic waves, project them. We had no idea of how powerful a weapon we had made him until the first time he tried to use it.
The results were … horrific. He could not control the intensity or focus. He leveled all within his path, reducing it to dust. For a time, he was afraid to use it, even when we needed his protection. We, too, were afraid.
Over time, he has learned to control it better, but it is still the one gift we all fear most, even Thor.”
Stunned, Alexis could only stare at her for several moments, realizing that the event Aurora spoke of had to have happened long ago. “God of thunder.”
Aurora flushed, looked uncomfortable. “The young are prone to irresponsibility. It hardly seems just to judge someone on their childish antics, particularly when—if—they mature to become a very responsible adult. Thor was a precocious child, but he was never cruel and he has grown into a good, honest, responsible man.”
“It wasn’t a judgment, and you’re right, I doubt many people could boast of making no bad decisions when they were young and inexperienced. I was mostly thinking out loud, because I had guessed … but it seems almost inconceivable. He could not be that old, surely?”
Aurora chuckled. “Indeed he is not … probably older than you think … but no, nor am I, I might add,” she said dryly. “But the world, in any time, was his playground, and, indeed, he was not the only one who played such … inexcusable tricks.”
Alexis had trouble absorbing it, but found after some moments that it just seemed too unreal to accept. It made no difference, really. Thor was Thor, the man she’d come to know, to love. “This power you spoke of—he used it to….”
Looking more than a little relieved that Alexis had moved on, Aurora nodded. “And worse, he did so while in the grips of a fearful rage. It is nothing short of a miracle that he was able to exercise control. He has left us for a time. Once he saw that you were going to be all right, he said that he had to try again to find the rebels … and, of course, he does. We have learned that they have managed to develop a band that protects them even from Thor, to whom our bands are as nothing. But, more than that, Thor was badly shaken, by his failure to prevent your injury, by the events that led up to it, by the events that followed. He needed time to be alone with his thoughts."
Alexis stared at her. As intriguing as the thought was that Thor was distressed by her injuries, which might imply he still cared, another comment Aurora had made wiped everything that came before, and after, from Alexis’ mind. “The bands are as nothing? Are you telling me Thor … Are you saying Thor could read my … a person’s mind even if they were wearing the band?”
Aurora looked surprised, then a smile began to form. “You did not know this?”
Alexis felt heat rise to her cheeks until they seemed to pulsate with each heart beat. “No, I did not know this, damn it! Nobody told me this!”
Aurora tried to keep a straight face, but a chuckle escaped her. “Child! What thoughts have you shared with Thor?”
She was obviously delighted by the prospect. Alexis glared at her, not amused in the least. “It isn’t funny!”
Aurora shook her head, but she couldn’t refrain from chuckling. “You did not try to block his mind probe once you began to wear the band?”
Alexis slid down in the bed, covering her head with the sheets, trying frantically to remember all the thoughts that had run through her mind from the time she’d moved back in with Thor.
Not that it mattered. She could remember enough to make her wish she could find a nice, deep, dark hole to crawl into.
She didn’t know who she wanted to choke worse, Aurora or her son.
* * * *
Thor was not absent long, nor did he stray far from her, not that Alexis cared. She was too busy sulking over her humiliation. She felt like a blind woman who’d been handed a sheet of clear film and been told she could cover herself with it … exposed, and deceived.
She supposed it was merely an oversight that she had not been warned, but she couldn’t help but wonder if Aurora had had an ulterior motive for not telling her the band was useless around Thor.
She had to wonder if the walls of his house even helped. She recalled that he’d told her once that the walls would shield her from most, which she should have realized was a warning of sorts. He hadn’t said everyone, just most.
Damn it! It wasn’t fair! They knew she didn’t understand the half of what was going on in Atlantis, that she was not used to any of their abilities, or their traditions. And yet she’d been judged by her thoughts, and her actions, as if she was one of them and knew better.
The only bright spot in what had otherwise become a miserable existence, was that, as the days turned into weeks, she realized that her baby still resided safely in her womb, healthy and growing.
Alexis, almost unconsciously, treated Thor to a taste of his own medicine when he returned. She was angry with him for knowing her unguarded thoughts, and embarrassed about her own thoughts and actions. She didn’t decide to repay in kind for the cold shoulder he’d treated her to before the attack. She simply could not bring herself to speak to him, and she was too busy guarding her thoughts from him to allow for much else anyway.
After the third night of staring at her back, Thor rolled onto his side, grasped her and hauled her against him. She resisted, for all the good it did. She fumed about it for several minutes, but she realized fairly quickly that she had missed the sense of security she felt when she was cuddled close to him. She relaxed after a few minutes, drifting toward sleep.
“You are angry with me?”
Alexis roused, trying to make sense of the question. “An understatement if I ever heard one,” she said finally.
“Because I broke my word and failed to protect you.”
“Dolt,” Alexis said succinctly.
Thor was silent for several minutes. Alexis sensed he was wrestling with confusion. “Not because of that?” he asked tentatively.
“No.”
“Why then?”
Alexis did not want to bring it up. She wanted to forget it had ever happened.
She felt his lips brush her shoulder. They were curled in a smile.
“If you say another word,” Alexis threatened, “I swear I’ll choke you.”
A chuckle rumbled from his chest. “You could not.”
“Try me.”
He nipped her shoulder with his teeth. “You would strangle the man you adore?”
Alexis flopped onto her back, glaring up at him as he came up
on one elbow, supporting his head with his hand so that he could look down at her. “I do NOT adore you! You are the most … the most annoying man I have ever known in my life!”
He reached up to brush her hair from her cheek, caressing her lightly with his fingers. “I thought … It seemed to me that you cared for me a little.”
Alexis’ lips pursed, she tried to roll back over on her side.
Thor stopped her.
Alexis stared up at him, feeling her anger dissolve into nothingness at the barely concealed anxiety in his expression. A knot of emotion formed in her throat, making it difficult to swallow, or to speak. “I love you,” she said finally. “I know you probably don’t believe me after … after, but I do.”
Thor touched her lips. “Shhh. I was … wounded, and angry because it caused me such pain, but I have loved you from the first moment that I saw you. I do not think that I could withhold forgiveness even if I desired to do so. In truth, it has caused more pain even to try.”
“Really?” Alexis said doubtfully. “From the first?”
Thor nodded.
“Even though….”
Thor frowned. “Perhaps not the very first moment.”
Alexis sighed deeply. “I didn’t think so.”
Thor studied her a moment. “Truthfully, I thought that you were the most beautiful creature that I had ever seen in my life the first time I looked upon you. In that moment, I wanted you. I was—jealous that Adonis had you.”
Alexis blushed, pleased but still doubtful. It would have been a little easier to believe if he hadn’t laid it on so thick.
He touched her face, made her look at him. “Heart, mind, body, soul, the most beautiful. On my life, I swear it.”
Alexis squirmed uncomfortably. “So when did you really fall in love with me?”
“When you defied me,” Thor responded, grinning.
Alexis’ brows rose. “Which time?”
“The first time, when I commanded you to come with me and you spoke foul words to me.”
Alexis laughed. “You’re joking.”
He shook his head solemnly.
“You were smitten?”
“To be honest, I thought for several moments that you had put a mind hold upon me. I could not think clearly at all.”
Alexis knew he had to be teasing her, but it sounded good. “Even after what I did at the coliseum?”
“Even after you stunned me by kicking me in the head,” Thor said, laughing.
“I am sorry. I didn’t really want to hurt you. I just wanted to get away.”
Thor seemed to debate with himself a moment. “You did not stun me, at least not in the way that you thought.”
“Liar!”
He smiled faintly. “It is the truth. I swear it.”
Alexis frowned. “Then how, exactly, do you mean?”
“I had never seen the like of it … that jump and kick. If my reflexes had been a little slower, I think you might, truly, have felled me, but you only grazed me. I was more stunned by what you had tried to do. I could only stare after you in wonder as you took flight.”
Alexis was indignant, not the least because he sounded as if he was teasing. “You’re saying you LET me?”
“Not … precisely.”
“That was low, really low. Letting me think I had a chance.”
Thor frowned. “Now you are angry with me again. I will begin to fear to speak.”
Despite her irritation, Alexis couldn’t help but be amused. “Right.”
“Truly,” Thor said, almost with complete sincerity.
“I don’t believe you’re afraid of anything. You’ve no reason to be, after all.”
Thor shook his head. “I do not fear death. I do not fear physical injury. But I do fear the pain only you can inflict.”
“Me?”
“You. Only you can break my heart. I love you.”
Chapter Thirteen
Alexis lifted her hand, cupping the back of his head and pulling him down so that his lips met hers. He teased her, resisting her effort to deepen the kiss, merely brushing his lips tantalizingly over hers.
“Make love to me,” she whispered against his lips.
Thor lifted his head. “I dare not.”
Alexis looked at him blankly, certain, at first, that he must be joking. “Why?”
“You are not healed, Alexis. I could hurt you. I could hurt our babe,” he said quietly.
“Oh,” Alexis said, disconcerted that she hadn’t thought of that herself, but then her mind had been elsewhere, and she hadn’t felt so much as a twinge of pain in the past day or two. “You wouldn’t,” she insisted after a moment.
“You do not know this,” Thor said gently.
He was right, unfortunately. She didn’t know. She thought it would be all right, but she couldn’t be completely certain.
She sighed, deeply regretful. “You’re right. We should wait until the doctor says it’s safe.”
Thor settled back, pulled her close and began stroking her back. Several moments passed in silence. “I could pleasure you,” he said tentatively.
It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out, but Alexis realized that it had little appeal at the moment. What she really wanted, needed, was to feel him inside of her, possessing her so that the ugly memory of her rape would begin to fade.
“No. We’ll wait.”
He tipped her chin up, brushed his lips lightly across hers. Alexis felt her lips tingle pleasantly at his touch, felt a welcome and familiar stirring in her lower belly. Her lips parted in invitation, her breath catching in her throat as he plucked lightly at her lower lip, sucking it gently into his mouth. He released her lower lip, his tongue skating across the sensitive flesh, then caressing her upper lip.
The pent-up breath Alexis had forgotten she was holding rushed from her lungs and with it the tension she hadn’t realized was there, replaced by a far more pleasant tension of expectancy as he plunged his tongue inside her mouth to explore the sensitive inner recesses.
His kiss was a slow, gentle caress, his hand equally gentle as it skated along her back, cupped her buttock, then traveled down her thigh, moving restlessly, aimlessly, as if he were a blind man, learning the feel of her skin, the suppleness of her flesh, each curve and hollow.
Alexis’ heart thudded into overtime as he moved his hand up along her thigh and cupped her sex, delving inside with one finger.
He released her lips, making his way slowly down the length of her body with mouth and tongue, kindling a higher and higher fire in her blood as he lingered over her breasts with a thoroughness that had her struggling to catch her breath, drunk with desire, boneless and at the same time taut with building tension.
The muscles of her stomach, hypersensitive now to his lightest touch, jerked as he moved over her belly, nipping her with his teeth, lathing her with his tongue. She waited, breathless with anticipation as his mouth moved over her lower belly, his teeth gently nipped the ultra sensitive flesh at the top of her thighs.
He stopped, lifted his head to look at her. His expression was harsh with desire. His eyes gleamed as he held her for several heartbeats with his gaze. He grasped her legs, spreading her thighs and kneeling between them. Sitting back on his feet, he placed his palm on her belly, hesitated for several moments, then moved his hand down, parting the folds of flesh in her sex, rubbing the tiny nub that was her pleasure center.
Her eyes slumberous, she watched him as he studied her.
He caught her gaze, held it as he lowered his head, replacing his hand with his mouth.
Alexis gasped, gripped two handfuls of the sheets, dug her heels into the mattress at the onslaught of incredible pleasure emanating from his tongue as he teased her clit, sucked it.
Pleasure rose inside her like the tide, higher and higher until she was gasping for air, her mouth parched, her head swimming. She hovered at the edge of ultimate pleasure for so long she thought she would die of it. And suddenly she knew what she neede
d to take her over the precipice.
She grasped his cheeks, sitting up as he lifted his head, leaning forward to kiss him. She tasted herself on his lips. It was wildly erotic, escalating her desire. When she ended the kiss, she twisted around, lowered herself to the bed and took his engorged member into her mouth, lavishing it with her attention. He groaned, leaned over her and began to make love to her with his mouth once more.
She found as she moved her mouth over him that she was moving beyond the plateau of pleasure she’d been hovering on, climbing higher still. She suckled his member as her climax caught her. She felt him go rigid, trying to hold back. She wouldn’t have it, catching his buttocks in her hands to hold him to her, suckling harder as he tried to pull away. He groaned as if he were being tortured, and then she felt his hot juices against the back of her throat as he climaxed. She held him until he stopped shuddering.
When she lifted her head at last, he fell weakly to his side, gasping.
He was looking at her, his eyes still glazed with spent passion. “That was … not necessary.”
A faint smile curled Alexis’ lips. “Oh, but it was.”
He gripped her arms, pulling her down and tucking her snugly against his body. “I wanted to give you pleasure.”
“I wanted to give it in return,” Alexis said, pleased with herself. She had never done that before. She hadn’t realized she would enjoy it so much, but the truth was, feeling his pleasure had heightened her own considerably.
His hand was still shaking as he began to rub her back once more.
* * * *
Alexis lived for the moment. She didn’t realize that she had simply refused to do anything else until Aurora asked when she and Thor would wed.
Alexis kept her smile with an effort, glad that Thor was far away—hopefully too far to ‘hear’ her thoughts—glad that she was wearing her band.
“We haven’t discussed it yet,” she said evasively.
“But--you will not wait until the child is born, surely?” Aurora demanded. “If you do not feel strong enough yet to make arrangements, I would do this for you.”
Alexis could see the hope in the older woman’s eyes, knew she was trying to hide the fact that it was something she desperately wanted to do. Alexis would gladly have given her the task, only to make her happy, except for one major stumbling block.
Atlantium Trilogy I: Bride of Atlantis Page 13
