She was his sun, his moon and his stars. His universe. His only reason for living and breathing.
Even if she wanted nothing more from him than a quick fling…she was alive. It would kill him to walk away when they were done, but he’d manage. Somehow. Nothing mattered to him more than she did, and if what was best for her wasn’t him…he’d find the courage to walk away.
“She did. And I drew on her. A warrior’s marriage before battle.”
His hard expression dared his father to argue with him. It was his right, as Saarday himself, knew well. Roz might not carry his father’s name, he’d been disowned by his mother’s family, but he’d blazed his own trail without a name.
“I didn’t tell her, because it was my choice to pledge to her. She has her own choice to make. She’s not…shouldn’t be…constrained by the rites of a species she doesn’t belong to.”
His father’s gaze shifted to Summer and he tensed as he saw the calculating look. “So King…what do you have to say about this? Since it’s obvious you didn’t have any clue what my idiot child scribbled on you, or you on him…you can walk away.”
Forget punching him. Roz wanted to pulverize him. Before he could act on it, he felt her shift slightly. She had moved closer to him by backing against him, and he felt the tension in her.
“I think I don’t have to explain a damned thing to you about this. What is between Roz and I is none of your fucking business. You have no say in it.”
Holy shit, she sounds pissed.
“If you think I’d walk away from him, then you just proved once again you don’t know shit about me…and I swear to God and the Lady both if you call him an idiot child again, I’ll knock your teeth down your throat.”
At her words, Roz forgot about his father. Hell, the entire Wildcat company could have been crowded in here with them and he wouldn’t have noticed. With gentle, but unrelenting hands, he turned her toward him. Hope coiled in his chest, and blossomed outward with unstoppable force.
“You won’t walk away?” he queried, trying to crush the pathetic note out of his voice. He wanted her to stay with him so badly he physically ached with it. “Do you mean that, baby? You want to stay with me? We don’t have to be married…my culture works differently than yours—”
“Shhhh…”
She reached up and placed her fingers over his lips, effectively stopping the words that tumbled out of his mouth. The look in her eyes as she looked at him stole his breath away. Before he could even start to decipher what was in them, she spoke again, but her words were soft and meant for him alone.
“Of course I mean it. I don’t care if our cultures are different. None of that matters to me. You matter to me.”
She seemed to hesitate for a moment as if she were unsure of something before she said the words he never thought he’d ever hear from anyone, let alone someone as special as Summer. “I can’t walk away from you…ever. I love you, Roz.”
Triumph roared through him. Dragging her into his arms with more force than finesse, he kissed her. With no preliminaries, he parted her lips with a forceful sweep of his tongue and drove in. She tasted like heaven and the strawberry cheesecake she’d made for him and the Wildcats. She felt like coming home.
* * *
Roz sat on the edge of her bed while he listened to the sounds of her in the shower. They had left his father’s office and come straight here, but not for what he thought. At least not yet. Summer had kept him at arm’s length with a stern order to sit there while she cleaned up. He had been looking forward to something entirely different when she had pushed him toward the bed. He’d expected to peel the clothes off her and get reacquainted with every single inch of her. He snorted in frustration and shifted again. Dear Lady, help him. She wanted to talk.
Part of him wanted to bolt, to yank open the door and run. The idea of “talking” about how he felt was not high on his list of priorities. He wasn’t one to examine his inner feelings too much.
Looking around her room, his gaze settled on several drawings on the wall. His eyes widened in wonder. He looked at himself through her eyes. Several different drawings of him, some of only his face, others of him shirtless and showing him from various angles. In awe, he got up to get a closer look. The amount of detail was incredible. She’d even captured his tattoos correctly, which boggled his mind. How could she have memorized so much about him in such a short time?
He found a sketchbook on her bookshelf and flipped it open. More drawings, but not just of him. Jei, Mikko, Kes and many of the other warriors. There was even one he knew had to come from her imagination alone, of all of the Wildcats together, as if they had posed for her in a group. Unbidden jealousy rose sharp within him. Had she spent that much time looking at his men she could render their images as well as she had his own? Turning the page, he found more drawings of people he didn’t recognize. He was about to throw the book because it was clear she had spent a lot of time on this one, the same as the ones he had seen of himself. It was just he couldn’t stand the idea of her giving that kind of attention to anyone else but him. She was his.
Shutting the book, he tossed it back on the shelf as his gaze settled on a picture, a captured image of Summer…surrounded by four large men. Picking up the framed photo in his large hands, he stared at their faces. In his mind, he committed them to memory, so he could keep them away from her if they ever showed up again. He’d never been this jealous or possessive over a woman before, but then again, she was his wife now. Everything he felt about her was beyond reason or explanation.
“Those are my older brothers.”
He hadn’t heard her come out of the bathroom. Was there anything worse than being caught red-handed, looking with murderous intent at…her brothers?
Dressed in just a black tank top and low-rise, soft flannel-like lounge pants slung low on her hips, she was still just as stunning to him as she’d been that first night when she had “dressed to the nines” in that sexy purple dress.
She came up and took the photo from him. Her long, blond hair was twisted up to keep most of it dry from her quick shower, but some long pieces had fallen loose and were curled with moisture. Vaguely, he heard her telling him their names.
“Deacon’s the oldest, then there’s Jacob, Wyatt and Sam. They raised me…” Her soft voice seeped into his senses as she pointed each one out, but he was focused on something else. His gaze was locked on the satiny skin of her shoulder. There was a tattoo on her that hadn’t been there before. It was a beautiful rendering of a Phoenix in flames, but it wasn’t just the eternal firebird that caught his attention.
Reaching up, he found the darker lines at the edges of the flames, tucked in between the others. Tilting his head, he almost couldn’t believe his eyes. She had his name blended in with the design. Using his fingertips, he traced it on her skin. It was in English this time, but it was still his name. There were two hearts in the tail feathers. Our’s? He felt a smile spreading on his face.
The drawings she had done of him, the tattoo with his name on her shoulder…they all told him, without a doubt, she hadn’t stopped thinking of him or loving him the entire time they had been apart.
“Roz! Are you listening to me?” Her voice finally broke through and snapped him back to attention.
He stroked his fingers over the design, lovingly tracing each line. The silken feel of her skin under his fingers almost undid him. He wanted to feel that silky skin against his again, from head to toe…the two of them moving together, skin on skin.
“I’m listening.” His voice was quiet, his gaze still on the design.
Stepping back, he pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor. She gasped, her eyes widening as she caught sight of the elaborate design over his heart.
“In our culture a tattoo like this means a man has chosen his wife.” His voice was a low rasp in the silence of the room. “We have different forms of marriage, each one marked with a tattoo, and we can have more than one marriage
at a time.”
He rubbed his hand over his skin, over his heart, which had only begun to beat properly again when he’d seen her on the bridge. “A tattoo this large means a man has chosen his life partner, his soul mate. It leaves no room in his life or heart for anyone else.”
Roz watched as she placed the photo back on the bedside table and turned back toward him, moving close enough that he felt the heat radiating off her body. In a way that stole his breath, she slid her hand under his on his chest, so her palm was directly over that which only belonged to her—his heart. He stared at her, watching the expressions race across her beautiful face as she seemed to turn everything he had said over in her mind.
“So…there is no room for anyone else in your life? No other women?” He struggled to not smile smugly at the jealous tone that had crept into her voice. It seemed his little warrior woman was just as possessive as he was. Her next words only confirmed his suspicions. “I won’t share you with anyone, Roz.”
Closing his hand over hers, he laced their fingers together, keeping her hand right where it was over his pounding heart.
“No others,” he replied, his voice husky with the emotions he couldn’t force himself to talk about. He leaned down to press a kiss to her forehead. “I won’t share you, either, baby.”
There were unshed tears in her magnificent green eyes as she looked at him. Her expression was one he’d never forget, because it mirrored his own. Hopeful and full of love.
“So we’re really married? Just because we drew on each other this way?”
“Yes, baby…we’re really married. At least by my people’s customs we are.”
“That would make them my people too now. Since we’re married….”
He should have known she wouldn’t do anything in half measures. In accepting their marriage and him, she also seemed willing to accept his culture. Were there any limits to what she would do for him? The fact she could even love someone like him, a mercenary, humbled him greatly.
“Mmm….” She moved their clasped hands out of the way and pressed countless soft, reverent kisses to his chest as if she meant to kiss every inch of skin that was covered by the tattoo.
Closing his eyes, Roz groaned deep in his chest, as desire, never far away, roared to life in him. Each touch of her full lips on his skin sent a jolt to his suddenly throbbing cock. Impossibly hard and viciously aching, only one thing could ease the insistent need that beat at him. Her.
He needed to be buried so deeply inside her he wouldn’t be able to tell where he ended and she began. To claim her body and soul as his again, only this time it would be forever.
He dropped his head back and fought the desires that raged through him. All he wanted to do was pick her up, carry her across to the bed in the corner and make love to her until neither of them could speak. There was something he had to do first, though. Leaning back, he hooked a finger under her chin and made her look up at him.
“Baby…I know it’s not your thing,” he paused as he remembered that tattoo on her shoulder, “the tattoo I mean. The one I drew was big on purpose.”
His lips quirked wryly. He’d drawn it that way so there would be no room for any other marriages.
“But you don’t have to have a tattoo. What do your people do? A ring? I can get you one.”
A smile opened up on her face and he almost lost his train of thought. Her hands came up to hold his face as she pressed her lips to his. There was a shine in her eyes he didn’t recognize, but he loved the fire he saw in her. She burned brightly, standing there in front of him. So vibrant and alive.
“Yes, we do rings…but you don’t have to get me one, Roz. I’ve got everything I could ever want or need already.”
He shuddered as her thumb brushed across his lips. “Yeah? What’s that?” he asked, barely able to breathe.
“I’ve got you, Roz. You’re all I want. I don’t need anything else, though if you really want to, I wouldn’t turn down a ring.”
He watched as she pulled the tank top off, over her head in one long, slow movement. She had on the sexiest black satin and lace bra he had ever seen. The delicate fabric cupped her high, firm breasts, showcasing her gorgeous curves. He almost fell on her right then and there, like a starving man presented with a feast. He wanted to devour her alive. Her words brought him up short again as she cut into the thoughts and images racing through his mind.
“I don’t mind the tattoos, Angel. I’m growing very fond of them. It’s true what they say about them being addicting…though to be honest, I think it’s only because they make me think of you, that I love them so much.”
Her smile turned into something beautiful and shy at the same time. What could she have to be shy about?
His brow furrowed as she hesitated before beginning to turn slowly.
“Tattoos for marriage? Do you suppose this one will be good enough?” she asked, her voice soft, yet enticing, as she finally turned all the way around.
His jaw hit the deck as the artwork over her back was revealed. The design he’d painstakingly traced on her skin was there, bold as brass in black ink. He’d expected her to have let the design fade, wash off until it, and their nights together, were nothing more than a fond memory. Instead, she’d had them etched into her skin. A permanent reminder of their time together, his name in pride of place across her back.
“Oh yeah…oh my Lady, yes!”
He couldn’t stop the grin that spread across his face as he slid to his knees behind her. The design had colors added to it, deep purple and blue, but it was still the same one he’d filled her back with. Visible proof of how she felt about him.
His heart expanded, the horror of the past few days disappearing as if it had never been. Large hands on her hips, he turned her around and looked up.
“Be mine, Summer. Forever.”
Chapter Twelve
“Lady’s teeth! I thought he’d never leave,” Mikko complained loudly, earning him a bemused look from Summer.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” She pinned him with a look, though it lacked any true annoyance.
Handsome face split into a grin, Mikko leaned toward her, way too close, before Jei grabbed him by the hair and yanked him away. “Shut it, Mik.”
She just smiled at him as he pushed the smaller warrior back. She was seated at a table in the small club with several of the Wildcat warriors and her husband’s father, Saarday Vann. She still couldn’t really believe she was married to Roz. Husband. She let the word roll around in her mind. It felt good. Right.
Smiling to herself, she watched as “Her Boys” joked with each other around the table. It had been just over a month since Roz had come crashing back into her life. It was amazing to wake up every morning to find him next to her, and to fall asleep from exhaustion every night after spending hours making love. Twisting around, she looked to see where her husband had gone, but didn’t see him.
“You know if you weren’t Lead’s wife, I’d run away with you.” Jei’s words reached her ears over the music and noise from the bar.
She turned wide eyes to the tall, gorgeous warrior. Where did that comment come from? Did I miss something?
“Excuse me?” She knew he joked with her, at least she hoped he did, but it still made her blush to hear him say something like that.
Jei leaned closer, all the while smacking at Mikko, trying to keep the smaller man from talking over him. “I said that if you weren’t Lead’s wife I’d want to run away with you. Unless you have a friend you’d like to hook me up with? She’d have to be able to cook like you, though.”
The smaller warrior, seemingly tired of being put off, punched Jei in the stomach. “You twat, why would she want to run away with you when she could run away with someone much better looking, like me?”
She didn’t know what to say, but she tried not to laugh at them. She failed, and turned to look at Saarday as he sat next to her. He rolled his eyes at the smack talk the warriors tossed back and forth. His expres
sion made it clear things like this were a common occurrence around Sargosian warriors when a woman was involved. His full lips compressed into a thin line, caught between annoyed and amused as he shook his head.
“Don’t encourage them, whatever you do,” he muttered.
Kes took that opportunity to speak up. “You two losers are mental if you think she’d run away with either of you lot. She’s got better taste in men than that. She’d pick me over you—”
All three warriors jumped up to grapple and put each other in headlocks, or try to twist arms around into holds that would put the other into submission.
“Hey!” She raised her voice, not sure if they were heading toward a serious altercation or not. It was hard to tell between their “play” and a serious fight sometimes, unless she could see their faces.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake…children!” Saarday groused, but didn’t look willing to get out of his seat to break it up.
Summer watched as the fight escalated in intensity. Grunts from big fists making contact with solid muscle could be heard, but the speed at which said fists flew made it hard for her to keep track of just who was getting hit the most.
Whack! Smack! Pop! Pop! Pop!
“You’re too ugly for her!” Mikko taunted Jei.
“Oh—” Punch! “—yeah? You’re too dumb!” Jei shot back and emphasized his words with his fist.
Slap!
“Lady on a stick! Did you just slap me?” Jei asked incredulously. Mikko snickered and took advantage of the taller warrior’s shock by hitting him with a right hook to the jaw.
“You little—”
Kes, meanwhile, was busy punching both of them as if they were punching bags and he was merely practicing.
“She wouldn’t want either of you two degenerates. She wants a real warrior to give her strong sons and daughters. You lot hit like a bunch of little girls.” The words were barely out of Kes’ mouth before Jei and Mikko both turned on him as a team.
Taming the Wildcat (Sargosian Chronicles) Page 10