Bound by Destiny

by Stephanie Yarns

  “Easy, love.” Micah’s hand stroked her back. She could feel the heat of the mark as it trailed down her spine. “You’ll make yourself sick.”

  The cup was empty now and she blinked, trying to clear her eyes. “How long?” She managed to get out.

  “Four nights,” Sebastian said.

  She cringed. No wonder she was parched.

  “What happened?”

  Gideon’s blurry face sat beside her. “I’m thinking it was your mark with Gabe. It’s a healing mark. You took from Gabe to give to Micah. Then Gabe took from you and from there a vicious cycle.”

  She blinked a few more times and finally, her vision cleared.

  Hands pulled her up and arms wrapped around her and held her so tight. She was stunned to realize it was Fallon.

  “When I said I was going to protect you, princess, I didn’t realize it would be from yourself.”

  “I didn’t either,” she said, trying to hold him, but her hands were taken by people that didn’t want to let her go.

  “How is she?” A voice came from the door. Gabe. She couldn’t look at him. Wouldn’t look at him. But she owed him so much more than that, so she did.

  There was a curious look in his eyes. Not the hatred she was expecting. “I’m thirsty and starving. How are you?”

  “Fine now,” he said, giving her a sardonic look. “All it takes is a good feeding for me to be back to normal.”

  “I’m sorry. Didn’t know this would happen.”

  He shrugged. “You had it worse. But maybe you should think things through next time.”

  “There wasn’t time.”

  “I know, I was there. Just saying, you don’t know what you can do, and you don’t know the drawbacks.” He glanced at Sebastian. “Didn’t the cut tell you that?”

  “I would do it again,” she said.

  He tilted his head, studying her like there was going to be a test afterward. “I think you would.” With those words, he glanced at Gideon and Sebastian. “I’m going out again, just to make sure that whatever… that… was, doesn’t happen again.” Then, he was gone.

  “Ignore him. He’s crazier than I am.” Fallon brushed her lips with his before standing. “I’ll get out of the way. You have others that want to say hello.”

  “Fallon, thank you.”

  “You probably won’t thank me next time we talk. See ya, princess.”

  She frowned. What did that mean? There was no telling with him.

  Alex sat in front of her now. “Gee, Eve, had I known you were going to go into a coma in my bed…” He laughed as her face flushed. “But you made a good point.” He kissed her forehead before leaving the room.

  There was a knock and Eve looked up. Duglas stood in the entrance with his trolley. The familiar silver dome shone brightly in the lamplight. Eve’s stomach rumbled and Micah laughed, fingers brushing her head.

  “Gabe informed me that Eve was awake.” He looked at Gideon. “He also said that she was hungry.”

  Gideon nodded and Duglas pushed the cart further into the room.

  “Thank you,” Eve said, throat still rough from thirst.

  He looked at her with a quickness that would have shocked her had she not known he wasn’t human. “You’re speaking to me again?” His question was soft, curious.

  Had she not said anything to him since that night? She thought back. Nope. “I suppose so.” Her smile was rueful. “I didn’t realize I didn’t.”

  “I don’t blame you,” he said and once again, she was reminded of her mom’s head in his arms.

  “You were trying to protect Sebastian.” She took a deep breath. “I understand that. But that person is my mother.”

  His quick shake of the head stopped further words. “No, Eve. I wasn’t. I was protecting you. And while she loves you, I’ve been around for a very long time and have seen over the centuries exactly what family are willing to do to each other.” His dark eyes studied her. “You could have died for someone under my protection.”

  “I didn’t know that that could happen.”

  “But you do now. And you said, ‘I would do it again’.” He looked at Gideon. “No further payment is required.” After one last glance at Eve, he left.

  She blew out a breath. “What does that mean? Is he mad at me?”

  “It means, sweetheart, that he considers you part of us now. He will protect you at all costs. And Gideon won’t have to bleed,” Sebastian said.

  “Like that ever bothered me.” She looked up at the playful tone in Gideon’s voice. There was a smile on his face, but it didn’t come close to looking genuine. She couldn’t tell what he was feeling, as he had himself closed off, but judging by the storm in his eyes, it wasn’t good.

  “What’s—,” she started to ask before he held his fingers up to her lips.

  “If you ask me what’s wrong, I might get violent.” The smile was still there, but the storm intensified.

  She nodded, holding her breath.

  Micah’s fingers trailed her skin again before he got up. “Here, let’s see what he brought you.” Micah took the cover off the dish and there was a bowl of soup. She couldn’t see what kind, but the smell was both amazing and nauseating. Sebastian pushed pillows up behind her back and she wouldn’t look at Gideon again.

  Eve could pick out his relief that she was awake, but she wasn’t going to try to feel for the other. The rage behind his eyes. Nope. That could stay where locked away. He didn’t leave her side, but he did sit back as Micah brought the tray over. “Thank you.”

  She glanced up at him and smiled at the soft look in his eyes.

  “No,” he said, setting the tray across her legs. “Thank you. But do me a favor.”

  She lifted her brows, unable to speak as her mouth watered at the chicken noodle soup.

  “Never, ever do that again.” His lips brushed her upturned ones and he turned, leaving the room.

  She lifted the spoon and tremors shook her hand. Sebastian reached for it, but she shook her head. “I’ve got this, big guy.”

  Gideon made a sound before standing.

  She kept her eyes on the spoon, willing her hand to stop shaking before bringing the it to her mouth. The taste was better than she could have imagined and while it tasted like ambrosia, her stomach rebelled, a sharp pain shooting through her. She thought she held back the sound of her discomfort, but a different sound from Gideon’s back told her she failed.

  “We’ll talk later.” he all but growled before he vanished.

  “He’ll be okay, sweetheart.” Sebastian pulled her eyes from where Gideon had been standing. “He… He was scared.”

  He smiled at the sight of her eyes widening.

  “Then I never want to see him terrified.”

  Sebastian wasn’t going to be the one to tell her that she slept through that. Trees were uprooted out in the forest and due to his yelling, food was probably going to be hard to come by.

  “Eat,” Sebastian said. He was used to hiding his emotions, blocking them so that not even he could feel them. He had to assume that Gideon was mostly successful by the fact that she was still sitting in bed, not running down the mountainside.

  He couldn’t remember ever going hungry when he was a human, or as a vampire for that matter, but he heard stories. The body sometimes would revolt, causing pain, sometimes getting sick, when food was re-introduced to an empty stomach.

  Finally, she dropped the spoon and it clanged against empty ceramic.

  “Better?” he asked, taking the tray and setting it back on the cart. Sitting down, he took her hand.

  She nodded, leaning back again into the pillows.

  “Sleepy?”

  She laughed. “No. Not at all. Four nights?” His nod was slow and she whistled. “I’m sorry I worried you all.”

  Keeping his feelings locked away was a surprising struggle, being that is was second nature. But with the danger she put herself in, he wanted to lash out. Wanted so badly to do what Gideon did and let it
go in a burst of violence that would make scientist scratch their heads.

  But he couldn’t.

  Holding out his hand, he waited for her to take it. She did without hesitation, and he had never been more grateful that she couldn’t tell what was going on inside him.

  “What do you want to do tonight?” he asked as he pulled her to her feet.

  “Shower and clothes. Those would be nice.” She froze. Her stuff was now in Gideon’s room.

  Sebastian could see the panic in her eyes and held back a laugh. “Relax. He’s not in there.”

  The tension left her shoulders as she let out a breath. “I know he won’t hurt me, but there is something going on with him.” She met Sebastian’s eyes and for a half a second, she thought she could see the same storm there. If it was, it was gone in a blink.

  “Like I said, he’ll be fine.” He stroked her cheek, once he was certain his hand wasn’t going to shake.

  Leaving her for a moment, he took Alex’s terry robe from the back of a chair and wrapped her in it. Then he took her hand again.

  “So, other than a shower and clothes, what would you like to do tonight?”

  “Well, I owe Fallon a walk.”

  He stopped at Gideon’s door, hand on the knob. “That will not be happening anymore.” The steel in his voice was audible even to him and he gave a soft curse.

  “Sebastian?”

  It wasn’t until after he slowly opened the door that he met her eyes. “We were all afraid, Eve,” he said to her question. He motioned for her to enter then followed her through the door. “Go ahead, do what you need to do. I’ll be out here.” He dropped a kiss on her hand and let her go.

  She studied him for a moment longer before she finally gave a quick nod and turned away. After she closed the bathroom door, he dropped into the chair, face in his hands.

  The door opened and Gideon walked in. “I’m not staying, but I want to talk to her in my office. Alone.” He ran his hand through his hair. “Don’t worry. I won’t throttle the girl,” he said to the look in Sebastian’s eyes before he left.

  Sebastian gave a grim smile. His own anger aside, he felt bad for Eve.

  #

  Eve glanced up at Sebastian as they walked into a new room. This was more of an office than a study and Gideon sat behind a large oak desk, elbows propped on the wood, chin on his fists. His face was expressionless, but his eyes still raged.

  “Is he still scared?” she whispered her question, but in the silence of the room, she knew it carried.

  “No. He isn’t,” Gideon said, standing. “Thank you, Sebastian. This won’t take long.”

  The man at her side squeezed her hand before letting go and walking away. She stared after him, even after he closed the door, until Gideon spoke again.

  “I’m not afraid anymore. But you should be.”

  She spun to look at him. “I don’t understand.” The quiver in her voice pissed her off, but she didn’t know if it was her anger, or the rage that she could feel. The storm in his eyes now all around her.

  “So you don’t.” He leaned back against the front of his desk. “I wonder, Eve. Are you lying to me or yourself?”

  “Gideon, you’re not making any sense.” She wanted to go to him. To kiss him. To ease the maelstrom of emotion that threatened to sweep her away. She told Sebastian that it was rare when she couldn’t separate what she felt from someone else. This was one of those times.

  His lips, his sweet, soft, sexy lips, twisted into something that terrified her.

  His chest rose as he took a deliberate breath and the twist grew. “Good. You’re frightened. Maybe you have an inkling of the terror that tore at me when I realized that you might never wake up.”

  “That’s what this is about?” The question was quiet, but something about it stoked the vision of Gideon she never wanted to see.

  “Is that what this is about? This what, Eve? This rage that I have no right to feel? Is that what you are going to say next?”

  It was, but she kept quiet. He didn’t have a right to be angry with her. She did what she did willingly and wasn’t it only a few days ago that he thanked her?

  “It was my decision to make, Gideon.”

  “So it was.” His voice was soft, dangerous. “Until it put you at risk.”

  “Ahh, I see.” Her anger combined with his, filling her. “It was what Fallon said. You can’t protect me from me. And that interferes with your promise. I’m compromising your word. Well, how about this, Gideon. Fuck that promise. I absolve you of it. I don’t need you to protect me. I don’t want you to protect me. Is that better?”

  Wrong thing to say.

  “I promised Sebastian that I wasn’t going to throttle you, but all I want now is to choke some sense into you.” His fists tightened and he pushed away from the desk.

  Her step back was instinctual, fight or flight going hard in her blood. She knew he wouldn’t hurt her. Didn’t she? He had promised her that. But with his maelstrom of rage whipping at her, she had to be honest. She wasn’t so sure.

  His bark of laughter was harsh. “I’m not going to hurt you, beautiful. It’s just a pity you can’t make me the same promise.”

  Confusion warred with her anger. “I don’t know what you mean. Gideon. You are a vampire. How in the fuck could I ever hurt you?”

  “There are ways to torture someone without getting physical. In fact, some of the best ways of destroying someone is emotionally. Tearing a heart to shreds is often much more satisfying than ripping into flesh.”

  “Gross, but what has that got to do with me?”

  He closed his eyes.

  “Gideon, I don’t know what you want me to say. What do you want me to do?”

  His voice was low and she had to strain to hear it. “It has everything to do with you, because of the way I feel.” His words steadily grew in volume. “You could have died before we figured out what was going on with you. You could have died!” he was shouting now and he opened his eyes. The swirl of emotion in them was staggering. “You broke me, Eve.” A whisper. “Do you want to know how?”

  There was something in the overcharged atmosphere, something important. She could feel it on her skin. Something was about to happen that could never be taken back. Was she ready for it? No. No she wasn’t. Her heart thudded in her throat. She was terrified now, the emotion sliding into her, wrapping around that pounding organ, squeezing so tight, she thought it was going to explode. Don’t ask. Don’t ask!

  “How?”

  He was suddenly standing in front of her. His hands were holding her arms, gripping her tight. Too tight. But she couldn’t say anything. Not when he was looking at her like she was the only thing on earth that mattered.

  “Because I love you.”

  Shock robbed her of speech and all she could do was watch him. He loved her? He loved her? How… Didn’t matter. Could she… Could she do it? Say it? Could she be brave enough to say words she had never spoken to a partner. Words she already knew she wanted to say but would never have been prepared for.

  During her silence, Gideon had let her go and as she gathered her wits, she realized he was back behind the desk, sitting there, looking shattered.

  Backbone, princess. That’s what Fallon would say, right?

  He looked up at her and she flinched from the pain in his eyes. But it was a pain that she could fix. “Don’t look at me like that, Gideon.” She took a step toward him then another. “You surprised me, that’s all. I also have something to say.” Slowly, she eased around his desk. He watched her the whole time like she was going to bite him. Had he ever fallen in love before?

  He sat back in his chair as she leaned against the wood, needing support for what she was going to say.

  Gideon opened his mouth and this time, she put her finger over his lips.

  “Your first question to me was whether I was lying to you or myself.” His eyes never left hers as she pulled her hand away. “Maybe a bit of both, although, it wasn’t real
ly intentional. I’m afraid. Terrified. Not because of you, but because of what I feel for you. And that is more than ‘like a lot’.” She smiled. “I’m still terrified, because all of this is complicated. Mom said that I would find beauty and be attracted to many things. But the thing is, it’s more than that. It’s not just attraction. It’s not beauty. It’s this. I love you, Gideon. Just as much as I love Sebastian. As much as I love Micah, Alex and, damn him, Fallon.

  “Somehow, I lost myself here, with all of you, and I can’t begin to tell you how… how… how incredible this is, sharing your lives.” She touched his face and his eyes that closed with her words, opened and while he looked at her, she said “I love you, Gideon.”

  He had her in his lap, his lips on hers, as his fingers ran through her hair. “My god, Eve. When I thought that I might lose you, that we might lose you, it drove me insane. I would have made Fallon proud with my tantrum.” His forehead pressed against hers as he spoke against her lips. “I… I can’t—.”

  “You don’t have to, Gideon. I’m not going anywhere. I’m here, in your arms and I’m not going anywhere.”

  His arms crushed her to him as he swallowed her words, letting them fill his heart, easing the remaining ache. Her tiny sound of pleasure broke the rest of him and the desperation he felt earlier filled him. He stood, one arm holding her to him, the other sweeping everything off his desk. Papers fluttered in the air as he leaned over her, mouth devouring her.

  Her hands moved to back of his head, fingers gripping his hair as she tried to crawl into his kiss. She shifted as the edge of the desk pressed into the skin of her back and she was sitting on it, knees spread, body held flush against the man who loved her. She could feel him swell against her and she moaned against his lips. The arm wrapped around her lowered, slid around her bottom and pulled her tighter against him.

  Her head fell back as desire filled her. Desire for the man that offered her his heart.

  His mouth moved down her throat and she arched against him as his teeth scrapped the skin over her pulse. His body bent over her, forcing her back as his hand gripped her leg, lifting it as he pressed his erection against her core.