“Release me, Anne. Let me give you the same pleasure you’re giving me. Untie me.”
Gabriel’s words rolled across her dazed consciousness. Her body locked to his, she stared at him and nodded. The silk ribbons disappeared and his hands captured her breasts. Her soft moan filled the air as he teased her nipples. When his hands clamped onto her hips, Anne flung her head back and released all control.
She rolled her hips and he guided her, his thrusts taking her to new heights before his fingers brought her spiraling down into ecstasy. He taught her a rhythmic dance as ancient as the ebb and flow of the ocean’s tides. Passion escalated to a point where neither one could hold back when Gabriel’s deep thrusts and slow retreats sent Anne’s body into a cataclysmic whirlpool. Her sex quivered uncontrollably, the muscles gripping his penis.
Colors flooded her mind as their life threads mated with a wildness that matched what Gabriel was doing to her body. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, seeking a firm hold as spasm after spasm shook her very foundation. Like some far away echo, his voice surfaced in her awareness. Open for me. Let me touch your soul, sweet Anne.
She relaxed the walls of her womb, taking him as deep inside her as possible. Vibrations rippled across her flesh and her muscles involuntarily contracted. Gabriel roared her name as his release refused to be contained and jetted from the region of his balls. His body shuddered violently, setting off a second rush of pleasure for both.
When the final waves abated, she collapsed on his chest. Gabriel’s arms enfolded her, holding her tight against him and she squeezed her eyelids shut. Anne wasn’t sure whether he grasped the totality of her surrender. She was no longer closed to him. In the coming days, he would discover all the parts of her. What was good, what wasn’t. She had given all to her undead life mate —her heart, her soul, her life.
23
“How do you know my mother?”
Anne wrapped her arms around her waist and closed her eyes. Her heart plummeted and guilt rushed in. She laid in Gabriel’s arms, her body sated with pleasure. Her mind had been fully open to her life mate and he’d glimpsed the secret she hid from him before she could put up her barriers. His voice was frigid and he closed his mind to her.
She briefly considered refusing to answer, to give herself one more day to have her heart wrenched apart, to prepare for the hatred she knew would come. One more day before she had to tell her life mate, the one who held her soul and her love in his hands, that his mother’s blood was on her hands.
There was no appropriate time to admit her role in Mirelle’s death. Gabriel’s fury and pain wouldn’t be any less with one more day of silence. Her eyes followed Gabriel’s naked body as he climbed out of bed and crossed over to the fireplace. As ugly as the moment was about to become, she couldn’t stop the rush of desire that flamed through her.
Her eyes closed and she swallowed nervously. “Will you sit, Gabriel?”
“No, just answer,” he hissed. “How do you know my mother?”
Anne eased out of bed and walked to the table where the remains of their meal sat, wishing she could send for coffee. The drink would at least calm her frazzled nerves. With a quick backward glance at Gabriel, she poured herself a glass of wine, took a healthy sip, and turned to face him.
“After she fled England for Morocco, your mother was captured and sold into slavery. She ended up among those brought to Barbados. The one who paid for her believed she was beyond child-bearing and intend to use her as a house slave. At the moment of her capture your mother had concealed both her gifts and her true age. She told the man she was a midwife and healer.”
Anne took another sip of wine to ease her suddenly parched throat. “My brother and I sensed she was supernatural and not what she appeared. Our parents paid for her freedom and offered her a home and protection. Sadly, it wasn’t enough. Several demons came to the island in search of witches. Your mother chose to go with three younger women when they were captured. I went after them, hunted, and killed the demons. The younger women were returned to the lands of their birth.”
“Obviously my mother chose not to return to England,” Gabriel supplied. “Where is she?”
Anne looked away for a second. “She wanted to return to England, to her husband, her young son but Mirelle refused to endanger their lives. She chose another path to avoid being recaptured. She —”
“Why is the answer to a simple question taking so long, Anne? Just tell me where’s my mother.”
“Demon—”
He strode over to her and snatched the glass from her hand. Draining it, he flung it at the hearth. “Where is my mother?”
She reached out a hand to him then let it fall to her side. “Mirelle Elstone is dead.”
“Why the fuck didn’t you just say that? There was no need for you to tell me a fucking story.”
Anne hesitated, and her heart started to race. She inhaled and slowly released the air before she confessed, “Your mother died by my hand.”
“Did you just admit to killing my mother?”
Gabriel’s question was so softly spoken Anne flinched and stepped away from him. His hands clenched into tight fists. “Please tell me you misspoke or I misheard. Please tell me you did not take my mother’s life.”
Tears slipped down Anne’s cheeks. “I can’t, Gabriel. I truly wish I could but it would be a lie.”
“Before I return the favor and end your murderous life,” he growled, “make me understand why you took her life when you have fought to kept the ones in this brothel alive.”
“One of the demons recognized her. He died but not before he sent word to Mephistopheles. Your mother knew the demon king would come for her. She swore never to bear him another son. She made me swear not to interfere.”
Anne choked back a sob and took a deep breath. “Mirelle ingested a mixture of poisonous herbs but death did not come quickly. I tried to heal her but she wouldn’t permit it. She feared Mephistopheles more than death. After two days of agony she begged me to send her to the ancestors. I couldn’t let her suffer. I had to respect her choice.”
“How did you end her life?”
She heard the raw agony in his voice. “Gabriel.”
“Just answer me, please. How did you kill her?”
“My dagger. It was the quickest death I could offer. She was in such misery, such pain. When her breath fled, I sang her to the ancestors where she lies deep in the Ahaggar Mountains.”
Gabriel took a menacing step toward her and Anne recoiled. As many times as she faced Gabriel’s anger she’d never feared he would harm her, until now. She glanced down at his clenched fists, his knuckle as pale as his hair. Anne sensed the tension beneath his impassive face. She needed to make him understand there were no easy choices. Before she could speak his voice questioned softly, “When did you realize Mirelle was my mother?”
Anne met his gaze. The truth would destroy any possibility of love, of a peaceful union between them. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to lie. She could live with the guilt and the remorse for the grief she brought her life mate for the rest of her life. She refused to live with a lie. “Gabriel, you must understand I had no choice. Your mother believed she had no choice.”
He turned away from her. “How long have you known Mirelle was my mother, Anne?”
“The day the archangel told you about her sacrifice. I wasn’t certain but I feared she might be the same Mirelle,” Anne whispered brokenly. “I knew for certain the first time you let me into your mind.”
“Let me see if I grasp this clearly. For nearly two months, I have fucked the woman who murdered my mother. I have shared my mind, my thoughts, my trust with her and this woman only now chooses to reveal her crime.”
Gabriel slowly shook his head before he swung back to face her. His face was a mask of iced animosity. Whatever feelings he had for her were gone.
“You want my forgiveness,” he said. “I am incapable of forgiving you but not for the reason you think. If she did attem
pt to end her life and begged your aid, I can’t condemn your compassion. Your act of kindness to a dying woman, to my mother, would earn my forgiveness. What I can’t forgive is your deceit. You should have told me the moment you knew she was my mother. I have not been kind or truly loving to you but did you hate my kind so much you couldn’t be truthful?”
He backed away from her, his fingers still clenched. Anne trembled when his pupils darkened to midnight blue. “Gabriel.”
“Don’t speak to me,” he snarled. “I will not give you pardon for your deception, Anne Willoughby. You claimed my trust and I gave it to you. You betrayed it and I . . . I just can’t . . .”
He vanished and Anne collapsed to the floor, heartbroken sobs wrenching her body. She was unaware when her bedroom door opened and closed. Not until Bella kneeled and gently pulled her into her arms did she realize she was no longer alone.
“You told Gabriel the truth about his mother,” Bella said.
Anne nodded. “He was so devastated. I’m his life mate and I killed his mother. Even worse, I said nothing until today. Raphael warned me.”
“If Demon saw how his mother suffered, the agony she endured, his decision would not have been any different. What you did was merciful, Tamahaq. No one deserves to suffer as Mirelle did. I pray, should anything befall me, you’ll grant me quick passage to the ancestors. Did you share her suffering with him?”
“He closed his mind to me, Bella. There is so much I might have shared with him. He knows nothing about the Amazigh, about his mother. All Gabriel knows is she abandoned him when he was a child. For years he believed she died by a demon’s hands. Can you imagine how he must feel, how he must hate me? He is my life mate and I destroyed his life.”
“What will you do, Tamahaq?”
Anne eased herself from Bella’s embrace and rose to her feet. Her gaze went to the bed, her mind seeing her and Gabriel’s bodies entwined. Twin tears rolled down her cheeks. She swiped them away before she shifted into the body of Anne Holland.
“He is my life mate. Gabriel will always hold my heart and soul.” She walked to the door. “I’ve sworn to protect the women of Holland’s League and I will honor that vow as I honored the one I made to his mother.”
Gabriel sat on the edge of his bed, his head bowed, the palms of his hands pressed against his eyes. He was devastated, his mind numbed by Anne’s revelation. He had seen her pain, the anguish she carried. Given her compassionate nature, he knew she had done all she could to ease his mother’s suffering before plunging a dagger into her heart. The rational part of him understood Anne had very little choice. It was his heart that couldn’t accept her crime.
A voice in the depths of his awareness whispered Anne was not to blame. He batted the thought away. Her hand plunged the knife into his mother’s heart. Her hands bore the bloody watermark of murder, denying him his mother forever, and she expected him to understand. She wanted his forgiveness. He wasn’t certain he’d ever be able to not feel rage toward her.
That rage was why he immediately left Holland’s League and struck terror in Southwark as he permitted his bloodlust to rule. Although he hadn’t take any lives, he had been indiscriminate in his feeding. He hadn’t cared if the victim met his usual criteria for taking blood or not. Two of the men he used had done nothing more than cross his path.
The sensation of uncontrolled bloodlust had been exhilarating and terrifying. He had always maintained there was a difference between himself and those who served Mephistopheles. This night whatever distinction might have existed disappeared, except that his victims survived.
“Damn you, Anne Willoughby.”
A chair flew across the room, shattering against solid stone walls. The sound of glass breaking, furniture cracking, and his enraged howls echoed beyond the thick wood door. The silent screams of bedcover, sheets, and curtains being shredded did little to assuage his rage. The noise of destruction poured outside the bedroom’s walls like the fierce shrieks of a hurricane. Consumed by his fury, Gabriel didn’t hear the pounding on the door until it swung open and Jonas raced in.
“My lord, stop before you bring the house down about our heads,” he shouted.
Gabriel turned on the man with a vicious snarl. “Do you think I care? I’m undead. I’ll survive. For your loyalty, I will give you this one warning. If you value your existence you will leave now. In fact, get everyone away from me.”
The moment Jonas entered the whirling debris of broken furniture, cloth, and glass had stopped. He swallowed hard before he said, “I can’t leave you like this, my lord. You’re not in control of yourself.”
Gabriel stormed over until he was a few feet from Jonas. “No, I am not, which is why I’m telling you to get out.”
Jonas shook his head and moved past Gabriel. He set the broken bits of furniture in a pile and began gathering the shattered glass and bowls. He didn’t look at Gabriel as he cleaned. “What set you off, my lord?”
Somehow the softly posed question penetrated Gabriel’s fury and he sucked in a ragged breath. “The news that my mother didn’t die by a demon’s hand.”
He exhaled the air and his hands scrubbed his face. “Her death came at the hands of my life mate.”
The broken wine glass Jonas had just picked up slipped from his fingers and shattered into hundreds of tiny fragments. He stared at Gabriel. “How is that possible? The duchess disappeared over ten years ago. Mistress Holland couldn’t have been more than nine or ten years old.”
“I killed my first demon at nine. Age is not a factor in this war,” Gabriel stated coldly. “And her name isn’t Holland. It’s Willoughby.”
“Why would she kill the duchess? It doesn’t make sense.”
“Because my mother was sold into slavery.” Gabriel enunciated each word. “Because a demon captured her and would have given her to Mephistopheles. Because the duchess attempted to take her life. Because Anne’s compassion wouldn’t let my mother suffer.”
Jonas worriedly squeezed his chin. “What are you going to do, my lord? You and Mistress Holland . . . I mean Mistress Anne . . . can you walk away from her? I’ve seen you with her. You’re in love with her. Can you walk away?”
Gabriel stared at Jonas. He couldn’t answer the man’s question because he didn’t know the answer. He was undead. He shouldn’t feel for Anne what he did. It shouldn’t matter that Anne took his mother’s life. It did, and it hurt so very much. Even if her act was born of compassion, the woman he loved was responsible for his mother’s death.
The warring emotions inside him threatened to crush all reason and he knew Anne wasn’t safe from his rage as long as he remained in London. No one was safe.
“I will return in two days.”
“Where you going, my lord? Should I pack a trunk for both us?”
“Two days,” Gabriel repeated and vanished.
24
“How long do you think Demon will stand out in the cold, husband? Even if he is undead, his blood isn’t.”
Cadan Mortaine, Viscount Ashborne pulled his pregnant wife into the crook of his arm and kissed the top of her head. “Perhaps until he becomes a gargoyle. Or until the cold freezes what little blood remains in his veins, he falls forward, and we have to sweep up the broken bits and return them to his life mate.”
“You do know I can hear you both?” Gabriel muttered. “One of the benefits of being an undead supernatural is excellent hearing.”
Asiya Mortaine stepped from the warmth of her husband’s embrace and went outside onto the balcony where a bare-headed Gabriel stood. A wintry cold had descended on Cornwall, although snow had yet to fall. She shivered and gripped his hand, dragging him inside the house.
“I refuse to explain to my tayyawt why her idiotic life mate chose to end his life as a silly statue on my favorite balcony.”
Cadan laughed and followed his wife as she led Gabriel down a corridor and into a room. When she opened the door he hesitated. Asiya shot him a curious look before she pushed him ins
ide the room.
“I’ve had enough of your silliness. Cadan’s son is as irritated with you as the Tamahaq. Go sit,” she ordered, pointing to a large silk cushion. She turned to Cadan. “I will call you when I’m done. My cousin’s life mate needs to be educated. Hopefully, this will occur before your child is born.”
Cadan shot Gabriel a sympathetic glance. “It can be as painless as you choose to make it, Demon.”
A bemused Gabriel watched his friend hastily leave the room. A tightness in his chest kept him from speaking as he glanced around. The room was a twin to the one he and Anne shared just before his life unraveled. Large embroidered cushions dotted the room, while several small tables were strategically placed between the cushions. On one of the sand-colored walls hung a tapestry. The image of a desert oasis woven into the wall hanging reminded him of the tapestry he’d seen in Anne’s private office.
If he had any doubts about the closeness between Anne and Asiya, the identical furnishing of their private rooms, steeped in a history he was only beginning to learn, put those doubts to rest. He stood in the middle of the room, not sure whether to obey Asiya or flee. “Siya.”
“Sit, Demon.”
She walked over to a table and began to prepare two plates of food. When she finished, she went to him and handed him a plate. “Would you care for keyif or wine?”
“Keyif is better with Taguella.”
Asiya flashed him a smile. She poured two cups of keyif, handing him one before she lowered herself onto a cushioned chair. “She took you as her husband in the Tamahaq way. Good, this will make our conversation easier. Eat.”
For several minutes there was only silence in the room as they ate. Then Asiya said, “I would have given you dates but at the moment you don’t deserve them.”
Gabriel chuckled. “Are you going to tell me why you would deny me?”
Fate's Kiss Page 19
