djinn wars 04 - broken

by Pope, Christine

  “Of being rejected,” she replied. “Or, even worse, not being rejected.”

  On the surface, her response sounded contradictory. But Zahrias thought he knew what she meant. It was a frightening thing, to open yourself to another, and to find them opening themselves to you. Julia had built a shell around herself. He’d recognized that quality in her, for he had constructed a shell of his own, many centuries before she was even born.

  “And what do you think now?”

  Her eyes met his, wide and clear, the elusive blue-gray of a misty sea. “I think I’m done with being afraid.”

  The only thing he could do then was take the wine glass from her fingers and set it down on the table, then pull her to him. She tasted of that fruit, dark and heady, and yet there was more, her own flavor, one he savored as their tongues met. He was a being of fire, and yet she somehow managed to ignite an even brighter flame in him, one he knew could only be quenched by burying himself in her.

  She was shaking when they drew apart. Concerned, he laid a hand against her cheek. The smooth flesh felt cool to his touch, but he knew that was only because she was human, and did not burn with the same fire as he.

  “Are you well, my love?” he asked.

  A nod. Her full mouth looked almost bruised by their kiss, rosy and swollen. “I — I think so. I was trying to tell myself that it was all right to take this slowly, but….” She let the words trail off, and then she smiled, a slow curving of her lips that only served to further fan the flames of his desire. “I know there are other things we still need to discuss. I’m just not sure I can concentrate on them with you looking at me like that.”

  He needed no further urging. His arms went around her once again, only this time to lift her from the sofa. She felt light as a feather to him, despite her delicious curves. The bedchamber he had claimed as his own was down a fairly short hallway, but it felt miles off, so eager he was to take her there. But he forced himself to do this the human way, carrying her in his arms so he might lay her down on the bed. And, like a human, he stopped to tug off her boots and socks, to let her shrug out of her jacket. She was still fully dressed, but there was still something infinitely seductive about the way she lay there in her close-fitting white top, her pretty bare feet showing beneath the hems of the jeans she wore.

  His own clothing was less of an impediment; he cast off the long, loose robe he had on, but did not remove the pants. Not yet. He wanted to see more of Julia first.

  She did not protest as his fingers pulled her shirt free from the waistband of her pants and lifted it over her head. How beautiful the swell of her breasts, cupped by the lacy bra she wore. The women of his people did not wear such things, and yet he found the sight strangely arousing, the way the flimsy fabric hinted at the beauties of the flesh underneath.

  When he unbuckled her belt and pulled down her jeans, he saw that the undergarment she wore was of the same nude-colored lace. His breathing quickened, and he paused with his hands on her hips, feeling the rich curves of her body beneath his fingertips.

  “You are so very lovely,” he whispered.

  She gazed up at him, eyes fixed on his. “I want to be beautiful for you, Zahrias.”

  “You are.”

  That was all he could manage, for he knew he needed much more than talk now. He lay beside her and pulled her body against his, while his fingers found the clasp at the back of her bra and worked it free. Then there was nothing separating them, the rich fullness of her breasts pressed to his flesh, causing him to gasp at the wondrous sensation.

  Julia wanted more, it seemed, for her hands worked their way down to the drawstring of his pants, pulling it loose, then pushing the fabric out of the way. A small gasp of her own left her lips as she found him and took him between her fingers.

  He let out a sound that was half sigh, half moan. Truly, he had not thought she would be quite so forward. But there she was, stroking him, waves of sensation seeming to flow up and down his shaft as she touched him. And more, because she shifted, and then her mouth was on him, and he groaned aloud, hoping he would not spend then and there at the touch of her lips and tongue on the sensitive flesh. No, he would hold on, even though he had dreamed of this moment, dreamed of what it might be like. But no dream could ever hope to compete with the reality of her.

  And he knew he wanted all of her. Now.

  He pulled away from her mouth, and a flicker of surprise passed over her face. That surprise turned to outright astonishment as he pushed her down on her back and trailed kisses down her stomach, moving lower….

  Her voice was strained. “Zahrias, you don’t — ”

  Ah, but he did. He needed to taste her, to bring her pleasure the way she had pleasured him. And after the first several strokes of his tongue, her rich flavor filling his mouth, she abandoned all protest and allowed him to make love to her with his lips and tongue, to breathe in her scent and revel in the way her fingers knotted in his hair, keeping him in position, although of course he had no intention of stopping.

  Her climax seemed to roll through her like a breaker falling on a sandy beach. She shuddered on and on, breathing labored. Perhaps it had been a very long while for her. It had been for him.

  While she still lay there, breaths coming in short gasps, he moved up to her, his mouth closing on her breast so he could feel the taut warmth of her nipple against his skin. She moaned again, and he began to press into her. At once she went quiet, and he paused.

  “My love — do you wish me to stop? If it is too soon — ”

  “Oh, God no,” she responded, halfway between a gasp and a chuckle. “If you stopped now, I think I would die. Please — keep going. I want you there. Please.”

  He needed no more urging than that. Eyes fixed on her beautiful face, he push in further, feeling her open to him, warm and welcoming and so much more than he could have ever hoped for. Her legs wrapped around him, pulling him in further, and they began to rock together, bodies finding their own rhythm, every breath, every sigh telling him that she was the only woman who would ever be right for him, who could find the broken pieces of his soul and quietly mend them.

  Julia, his love, his one.

  His Chosen.

  * * *

  She lay there for a long while afterward, saying nothing, only gazing into the depthless darkness of her lover’s eyes, memorizing every plane of his face, every angle, the long aristocratic nose and the finely sculpted curves of his lips and the sooty sweep of his lashes.

  At last she said softly, “I love you.”

  Did he know how much it had taken for her to tell him that? Because she’d told Ian she loved him — but had she, really? — and it hadn’t mattered. Her love had only been a weapon she’d willingly handed over to him.

  But Zahrias was no Ian. She knew that, and yet —

  “I love you,” Zahrias said. The words were hardly more than a whisper, but they were enough. The truth of his feelings seemed to echo in every syllable. “You are the one I have waited an eternity for, Julia Innes. And I can rejoice in knowing that I will spend the rest of eternity with you.”

  She reached out for him then, and his arms went around her, drawing their bodies close once more. It seemed the most natural thing in the world for Zahrias to pull her up on top of him so she could feel him buried deep within her once again, filling her, completing her.

  That should have sounded so silly, and yet she knew it was only the truth, that her entire life something had been missing, an aching space deep within her soul that she’d never wanted to acknowledge. Being with him now, she knew exactly what she’d lacked. Zahrias al-Harith, a man of a strange and terrible alien race, and the only one who could ever have made her feel this way.

  She cried out as the orgasm pulsed through her. In the past she’d always tried to be quiet, hadn’t wanted to give this much of herself away, but now that didn’t matter. She wanted Zahrias to know what he’d done to her, to know that no one else could make her scream like a banshe
e.

  After, he held her close, lips pressed against her hair. It felt so good to be together like this, to have the heat of his naked body flowing into her own flesh as they lay there next to one another, hip to hip, leg to leg. At last, though, she knew she needed to go get herself cleaned up. So she squeezed his hand before gently slipping off the bed and going to the en suite bathroom, where she performed a quick toilette, washing the last traces of their intimacy away, and then splashing some water on her face.

  When she returned to the bedroom, Zahrias was sitting with the covers pulled up around his waist. God, what arms and chest that man had. Julia knew she could probably spend hours staring at every muscle, every shadow of the tautly defined six-pack of his abs.

  Tempting as that prospect was, however, she knew they still had some unfinished business to take care of. She found her discarded panties on the floor and pulled them on, then shrugged her T-shirt over her head, although she didn’t bother with putting on the bra. As she picked up her jeans, Zahrias spoke.

  “I have noticed that most of you wear those sorts of trousers. Are they really that comfortable? Perhaps I should try some.”

  The thought of Zahrias walking around in Santa Fe while wearing a pair of Levi’s was so incongruous that Julia wanted to chuckle. Then again, she contemplated what a pair of nicely worn 501s might do for his muscular legs and slim hips, and decided maybe a chuckle wasn’t the best response.

  “Possibly,” she hedged. “What do you think your djinn would do if they saw their leader dressed like one of us mere mortals?”

  “Considering that half my people appear to have already adopted your form of dress, perhaps they would only think it was about time.”

  True enough. Come to think of it, she’d never seen Jace in anything except jeans and work shirts and motorcycle boots. Maybe he thought the djinn clothing was too impractical for milking goats or whatever.

  “Well, we can figure that out later,” she said. “In the meantime….” After picking up Zahrias’ billowy silk trousers, she handed them to him.

  With a resigned air, he pushed back the covers and climbed into his pants. Julia thought she did a pretty good job of not staring before he was covered up, but a warm flicker in his eyes told her she wasn’t fooling anyone.

  Still, he didn’t say anything as he also gathered up his discarded robe, then headed back to the living room. Once there, he extended Julia’s half-drunk glass of wine to her, and she took it gratefully. He then picked up his own glass and sat down on the couch.

  It was hard to concentrate with him so close to her. She wanted to down her wine and go for a three-peat right there on the sofa, but she knew they’d have plenty of time for that later.

  All the time in the world, in fact.

  A decent-sized swallow of wine helped a little to get her racing thoughts in order. “So….”

  One of his eyebrows lifted. “So….”

  “I think I’m going to like it here in Santa Fe,” she said, and he smiled. “But there’s still Los Alamos.”

  “True,” Zahrias agreed. “Do you have a plan?”

  Did she? More like an idea. “At first I thought of Miles, since people do sort of look up to him, despite his faults. But then I knew that would never work. He needs to be able to focus on his research. Besides, he has about the worst interpersonal skills of anyone I’ve ever met.”

  Zahrias chuckled, and she couldn’t help grinning in response.

  “And then I realized I shouldn’t be appointing anyone. Los Alamos — it’s like the last piece of America, you know?”

  It seemed he didn’t know, because his brows drew together in a faint frown. “Forgive me, but wasn’t all of this land part of America?”

  “Yes, but the djinn control everything else now, don’t they? Los Alamos is the only place where it’s just regular people, the last Americans, really. And the American thing for them to do is vote for who they want to lead them. It shouldn’t be my decision. It shouldn’t be any one person’s decision. They can all decide together what’s best for them. Does that make any sense?”

  For a long moment, Zahrias was silent as he seemed to consider what she had just told him. Then he nodded. “I think this would be a good thing. Margolis wanted to make himself a despot, but that was not how your people did things, and so he doomed himself to failure. I do see how giving them the power to make their own choice will allow the people of Los Alamos to understand that they are also an important part of this new world. Different from us here in Santa Fe, but no less important.”

  Had she ever loved him more than she did right then? Julia set down her wine glass so she could lean forward and kiss him. His lips warmed against hers, and she knew that the three-peat she’d been fantasizing about probably wasn’t too far off.

  But then he pulled away slightly, dark eyes scanning her face. “And it is important to you as well. I can see that. I hope our two communities will continue to work together. Perhaps one day….”

  He didn’t finish the sentence, but Julia thought she knew what he was thinking. Maybe a day would come when the people from the two towns would be able to mingle freely. It wouldn’t matter who was mortal or djinn or Chosen, because they were all working together toward the same future, one where their children could safely grow up in this forever changed world of theirs.

  “That day will come,” she said firmly, then took his hand and held it, felt the encouraging warmth of his fingers.

  “And we can begin working on it right now.”

  The End

  * * *

  The Djinn Wars will continue with Qadim’s story in Forsaken, due out in late spring 2016.

  If You Enjoyed This Book…

  If you enjoyed reading Broken, please consider taking a minute or two to leave a review. Reviews are a valuable resource in helping readers find other books they may enjoy — and they help the author, too, as there are many promotional opportunities only available for books that have a certain number of reviews.

  Thank you again for reading!

  Also by Christine Pope

  THE WITCHES OF CLEOPATRA HILL

  (Paranormal Romance)

  Darkangel

  Darknight

  Darkmoon

  Sympathetic Magic

  Protector

  Spellbound

  A Cleopatra Hill Christmas

  The first three books of this series are also available in an omnibus edition at a special low price!

  * * *

  THE DJINN WARS

  (Paranormal Romance)

  Chosen

  Taken

  Fallen

  Broken

  * * *

  THE SEDONA FILES

  (Paranormal Romance)

  Bad Vibrations

  Desert Hearts

  Angel Fire

  Star Crossed

  The first three books of this series are also available in an omnibus edition at a special low price!

  * * *

  TALES OF THE LATTER KINGDOMS

  (Fantasy Romance)

  All Fall Down

  Dragon Rose

  Binding Spell

  Ashes of Roses

  One Thousand Nights

  Threads of Gold

  * * *

  THE GAIAN CONSORTIUM SERIES

  (Science Fiction Romance)

  Breath of Life

  Blood Will Tell

  The Gaia Gambit

  The Mandala Maneuver

  The Titan Trap

  The Zhore Deception

  The three Zhore books (Breath of Life, The Mandala Maneuver, and The Zhore Deception) are also available in a specially priced boxed set!

  About the Author

  Christine Pope has been writing stories ever since she commandeered her family’s Smith-Corona typewriter back in the sixth grade. Her work includes paranormal romance, fantasy romance, and science fiction/space opera romance. She fell in love with Sedona, Arizona, while researching the Sedona Files seri
es and now makes her home there, surrounded by the red rocks. No alien sightings, though...not yet, anyway!

  To be notified of new releases by Christine Pope, please sign up here.

  Christine Pope on the Web:

  @ChristineJPope

  ChristinePopeAuthor

  www.christinepope.com