The Last Unforgiven - Freed (Demons, #5)

by Simcoe, Marina

  “One I think you’ll enjoy.” Raim got hold of her hand again.

  “Right.” She followed him to the airplane. “It really could be the distraction I need,” she said as if to herself.

  There weren’t that many days left for him in this world. What harm could it do if he spent one of them with this beautiful woman?

  Chapter 5

  TO MY UTTER EMBARRASSMENT, I actually fell asleep in the cushy leather seat during the flight. Raim woke me up upon landing by placing his hand on my bare shoulder, and I hoped I’d managed not to snore or drool while I slept.

  Then again, why worry? Raim didn’t seem to be someone who cared about anything at all. And even if he did, it made no difference what he thought about me. I hadn’t come here to impress him in any way.

  The nap on the plane had sobered me up a little, even making me feel rested, a good thing as by the time the helicopter landed on the roof of a tall wide tower, which seemed to rise straight out of the sea, it must have been around midnight.

  “Tired?” Raim asked me, helping me out of my seat.

  “No.” I shook my head, climbing out of the helicopter. It took off again in the air shortly after we had disembarked.

  “He’ll be back around noon tomorrow,” Raim assured me. “This way please.” He opened a wooden door, revealing a spiral staircase.

  “This used to be a monastery?” I made my way down the narrow stairs as Raim led the way.

  “Yes. From before I came to this world until the fifteenth century.”

  “Is that when you bought this island?” It was impossible not to marvel about the history of it all and the fact that he personally was a part of it.

  “Around that time, yes. People had been gone for a few decades when I acquired it.”

  “Why did they leave?”

  “Attacks by Saracen corsairs were frequent around here during those times. The monks took all their relics and left their monastery, never to return.” He took my hand as I reached the end of the stairs, then led me into a wide, dark hallway. “Most of the relics can still be found in a museum in Pisa if you’re interested in that piece of human history.”

  While history did interest me, right now what I found most fascinating was that Raim didn’t need to learn about any of it from a museum. He lived during those times. In his case, human history was his past.

  “Why did you buy it?”

  He paused in the spacious, lavishly decorated foyer. “I liked the location. It’s surrounded by water. Secluded, like a cabin in the woods.”

  A cold breeze ran along my spine in the low cut of the dress on my back, sending a ripple of goosebumps down my arms.

  “‘Cabin in the woods’ brings a bad horror movie to mind. How about ‘cottage in the forest’ instead? Or even better . . .” I moved my gaze along the dark wood paneling, marble floors, and gilded frames of old paintings on the walls. “Let’s call it what it is, ‘a castle on the sea.’”

  He inclined his head in a way I’d noticed him do on more than one occasion when he seemed to agree without voicing it. Or agreed to disagree, instead of arguing.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked, leading me to another large room off the foyer.

  “Not really.”

  Actually, I should be starving by now. I hadn’t eaten anything since lunch. Raim’s presence seemed to have absorbed all my senses and all my focus, leaving nothing for anything else. I felt no appetite whatsoever.

  “A glass of wine then?” he asked, letting go of my hand as he moved to a long, dark-wood table with what appeared to be a full formal dinner served on it.

  “When did this happen?” I asked, surprised to see food in this place, which seemed to be deserted. “How?”

  The whole atmosphere inside Raim’s castle wouldn’t make it too hard for me to believe that it was enchanted in some way.

  “I have staff.” He poured two glasses of wine from a decanter.

  “Where are they now?” I turned around, half expecting a flock of maids and housekeepers to appear, scurrying around.

  “They must have left already. A local elderly couple come over by boat, on an as needed basis. I called them from the plane.”

  “Right. A very normal thing then.” I approached the table. “Not an enchanted castle, after all.”

  I accepted a glass of wine from him, but hesitated taking another drink. The nervousness started vibrating through me again, mixed with the excitement of anticipation, but I hesitated drowning it in alcohol. I was afraid to lose control in the company of a demon—now that I had placed myself into his hands by coming here, to a secluded island, alone.

  Instead of the wine, I plucked a grape from the bunch on a dessert platter in the middle of the table and popped it in my mouth. My fingers shook again, and I fisted my hand at my side.

  “You’re scared,” Raim stated calmly.

  His impassive tone irritated me.

  “I already told you.” I placed my glass on the table, controlling the force with which I did it, so as not to break the glass. “I am not afraid of you, demon.”

  He put his glass down next to mine and came flush with me. “Then what makes the fear pulse inside you? It throbs raw like a fresh wound.”

  Tipping my head back, I searched his eyes with mine.

  “I want you to fuck it out of me, Raim.” The wound, and the pain, and the fear from being left completely alone in this world—I wished for him to take it all. I wanted him to make me feel free again, even if just for one night. “You promised me oblivion. I need it.”

  Silently, he lifted his hand, gliding the back of his fingers down the side of my face. Something in his expression softened, filling my heart with longing.

  Longing?

  It was not the emotion I was hoping for.

  “Too gentle,” I squeezed through my teeth. Grabbing his hand, I swayed forward, making our bodies touch chest to pelvis.

  A rumble vibrated deep in his throat. A flash in his eyes was not a reflection of my feelings this time, it was his very own emotion—hot and dangerous—as if the cool ice slid aside for a moment, revealing the storm raging inside.

  Cupping the back of my head, he pressed his mouth to mine before I managed to say another word. Hungry and punishing, there was nothing gentle about his kiss. His hand gripped my head like a vise. The fingers of the other one dug into my hip as he devoured my mouth.

  And I took it all.

  Sliding my hands up his back, I clung on to his shoulders to stay upright under the onslaught of passion that crashed into me like a tsunami.

  “This is good, Raim,” I panted when he let me come up for air. “So good . . .”

  It was exactly what I needed. As if the prison I had been held in for the past weeks cracked its door open a little, allowing me to draw a full breath for once.

  I wanted more. Lifting my leg, I hooked it around his hip, bringing him closer, as he kissed my neck with the same fervour and passion he had just kissed my lips with.

  His fingers spearing through my hair, he worked a pin out of my up-do. “This needs to go,” he growled.

  “What are you doing?” I lifted my hand up, but he batted it away, yanking more pins out and tossing them all to the floor.

  Capturing my mouth in another kiss, he swallowed my protests. His hands continued their work on destroying my carefully constructed hairdo. Having loosened it enough, he raked his fingers through my hair, shaking out what was left of my bun. Hairpins and clips rained to the marble floor with clinking sounds all around us as my hair unravelled to its full length, past my waist.

  Something inside me loosened as well, and I fully surrendered to the ocean of heat and desire rolling through me in waves.

  Giving me a series of hot, biting kisses, Raim walked me backwards until my butt hit the edge of the table. I clawed at his tunic, wishing he’d take it off.

  Instead, he swept his arm along the table behind me, sending the food and dishes crashing to the floor.

  I gas
ped as he lifted me up on the tabletop then lowered me to my back while kissing down my body. My shoes dropped to the floor when he circled my ankles, lifting my feet up to the table, too. My knees rose, stretching the silk of my dress between them. Grabbing the material, he ripped the skirt in two, making a slit up to my navel.

  My thighs trembled from the anticipation and need raging through me as he easily snapped the waistband of my panties apart then tossed them aside.

  I groaned with relief when he dipped his face between my legs. He wasn’t gentle here either. Sucking, nibbling, and rubbing sounds of ecstasy out of me.

  Moaning like a wild woman, I grabbed the edge of the table with my fingers, thrusting my hips up against his mouth and tongue.

  For the first time in weeks the pain in my chest ebbed under the onslaught of intense pleasure building up in waves. I no longer cared about feeling abandoned or lonely. Nothing else seemed to exist but his hot mouth on me, the slick tongue darting in and out, the strong hands gripping my thighs to the point of pain.

  A good kind of pain.

  It didn’t even matter who was here with me at that moment, who made me feel this way. It could be anyone—a man, a demon, or even the devil himself for all I cared. The most important part was that it worked.

  I was getting exactly what I needed.

  Blissful oblivion.

  The orgasm hit me hard, nearly doubling me when I came. My whole body rocked with shudders of utter bliss. I growled, a feral sound of absolute release.

  “Oh, God . . .” I exhaled, staring up at the wooden beams in the ceiling, unable to come up with another word as heat flooded my veins, sparkling and crackling through my entire system.

  Everything inside me still quivered with aftershocks.

  I had suspected that being with an Incubus would be an extraordinary experience, but it turned out to be so much more than I could have ever expected. For me, it felt nearly cathartic.

  RAIM

  First, he took her pain. It was unavoidable—the dark shroud of it suffocated her pleasure. Some of it came back almost immediately, but he used the few seconds he had to build up her lust.

  The darkness in her now simply provided the background for the magnificent light, shining bright. The contrast was mesmerizing in its intensity.

  The sharp stab of her pain through his insides made him wince internally, but only briefly. He knew the unpleasant effects would pass quickly in him, as he had practiced for centuries to absorb and process the negative emotions of humans. Those he’d had to kill at the Base always died in peace, even bliss. He’d made sure of it.

  He carefully skimmed Dee’s arousal as he worked her body to produce more and more of the wonderful feelings in her—relaxation, pleasure, joy. They filled him as he skimmed them, making him slightly lightheaded. Intoxicated.

  As promised, he stayed far away from her life force. He felt no need for it. The energy he took from her was so much more satisfying. Strong. And extremely potent. Each gulp of it filled him up, pulsing through his body with life.

  More.

  He gripped her thighs harder, his fingers digging into her skin. The more he took, the more he wanted. More of everything about her.

  The taste of her emotions inside him, and the taste of her body on his tongue.

  The feeling of her sorrow next to his own inside his chest, and the sensation of her skin under his palms.

  It had been so very long since he took a woman this way, with all of his senses.

  His mind flashed back, centuries ago. When he made another dark-haired woman writhe with ecstasy under him. He couldn’t keep her then, mourning the loss ever since . . .

  Her orgasm blinded him, flooding his mind and his senses with pleasure that reached across the centuries. Past and present blended in one intense, powerful mix of pain, pleasure, and longing.

  ‘She should have been mine.’

  Mine!

  He could not lose her again.

  “I’m not letting you go.”

  Not this time.

  He needed her.

  Chapter 6

  I WAS NOT DONE YET. Just a minute of rest, but I was already looking forward to being pounded hard by him. On this table? Or maybe upstairs, in a bedroom somewhere? It didn’t matter. It was supposed to be a night to remember, and the beginning had blown past all my expectations already.

  Raim remained surprisingly still. His head was still between my legs, the side of his face pressed to my thigh, his breath fanning across my heated folds.

  Rising on my elbows, I caught his gaze just as he glanced up at me. His eyes of crimson red matched my dress, but it was not the colour that set alarms off in me. It was the wild, unhinged expression in them.

  “Raim?” I shifted my hips, trying to move away from him, but he grabbed my thighs at his shoulders, keeping me in place.

  Spread open, completely at his mercy, I felt extremely vulnerable.

  “I am not letting you go this time . . .” he muttered, as if under a spell or delusion. Moving his grip up to my shoulders, he brought himself eye level with me. “You were always meant to be mine,” he gritted out, his tone hollow, like the echo in a crypt. His body pressed to mine tightly, I felt the hard ridge of his sizable erection against my lower belly.

  His eyes remained on me, but he no longer seemed to see me, not even inside me, he stared somewhere right past me, into the void.

  The heat of sex instantly cooled off of my skin, leaving a sheen of cold sweat. Dread prickled along my spine like icy needles.

  “Raim?” I pleaded again, but he did not reply.

  His bare hands were on my naked shoulders. It wouldn’t take long for him to drain me dry.

  Panic urged me to scream and thrash, but I held still. Pinning me to the table, his hold firm, he clearly had no intention of letting go. A woman had no chance to wrestle free from a demon.

  An average woman, with average strength.

  I, however, still could try. As long as I had the element of surprise on my side. Which meant I only had one chance at this.

  I slowly wrapped my fingers around his wrists, gathering the strength I had been striving to conceal my entire life.

  “Get off me!” I spat in his face, straining all my muscles at once. Flipping him to the side, I dropped my feet to the floor and sprang up.

  Gathering my skirt in my arms, I sprinted for the door in wide strides, grateful for the high slit he had made in my dress.

  “Dee!” My nickname, shouted in Raim’s voice, cut through my heart, making me run even faster.

  I headed down the corridor to the foyer with the tall double doors that would likely lead outside. On my way to them, I skidded to a stop as Raim’s tall figure emerged from the wall, cutting off my escape route.

  “Shit!” I spun on my heel, searching for an alternative.

  Across from the entrance was a wide staircase to the second floor, and I dashed to it then up the stairs, leaping up two at a time.

  “Wait!” I heard Raim’s footsteps right behind me. Afraid to turn, I kept running down the wide, dark hallway of the second floor. Another set of double doors was at the end of it, and I slammed into them at full speed, shoulder first.

  The doors groaned and screeched but gave in under my force, opening into a large room. It was lit only by moonlight from the tall, barred windows that lined the entire length of the opposite wall.

  I stopped in my tracks, wildly searching for a way out, with Raim’s footsteps approaching. Then the sound halted, and I turned around, expecting to see him right behind me.

  Arms over his head, he was standing in the door.

  “Delilah, come over here,” he said, returning to his usual even tone of voice.

  Taking a closer look, I realized he was not just standing, he was leaning against an invisible barrier separating the room from the hallway.

  I fingered my pendant, taking a step in his direction.

  “So, this is how it works . . .” I said slowly. “You’
re locked out, huh?”

  This was good.

  Despite his marvellous ability to walk through walls, the pendant sealed him out of here completely.

  Locking me in, too.

  “Delilah—”

  “Shut it!” I snapped back. “Unless you want to tell me you’re calling that helicopter to pick me up right now—”

  “No.” The finality in that one word of his was chilling.

  I struggled to hold the panic at bay.

  “Then I don’t care about anything you have to say.”

  Clutching the pendant in my hand, I furiously paced in front of the open doors, the demon’s gaze following my every move.

  Slamming his fist against the barrier between us, he shoved away from it, taking a step back.

  “Very well then.” His voice was cold and sharp, just like his glare on me. “Stay in there until the end of my days.”

  His days.

  Coming from an immortal that was just another way to say ‘for an eternity.’

  Asshole.

  “Fine!” I shoved at both doors, shutting them closed with a crashing sound.

  Half expecting him to kick them back open again, I stepped away as a precaution, but nothing happened. Instead, I heard the receding sound of footsteps as Raim stomped away down the hallway.

  Coming closer, I inspected the doors carefully, trying to figure out how exactly the pendant worked. The barrier must have formed at the very edge of the threshold, leaving the door on my side of it. Which meant that Raim couldn’t kick them open. He probably couldn’t even get to the handle, which in turn meant that whether or not the door was open or closed was entirely up to me.

  Good. I didn’t have to see his face if I didn’t want to.

  Anger burned through me, hot and unbridled, and I let it loose. Pacing the perimeter of the room, I didn’t even try to calm down, letting the rage spread and grow.

  ‘I’m not letting you go.’

  Lying son of a bitch. This was supposed to be one night and one night only. I’d made that clear.

  I’d trusted him . . .