by Sharon Kay
When she could breathe again, she realized he was still pounding against her backside. Then she decided turnabout was fair play, and reached her own hand back to cup his balls. He cursed and pumped her harder. She continued to massage him until she felt his body detonate as he roared her name.
He slumped forward, leaning his weight on her for the briefest moment. Then he swiftly flipped her to her back and set upon her breasts with his mouth and hands. He sucked, licked, tickled and teased her nipples and the tender skin around them until she writhed in the grass.
Keeping his lips closed around one achingly hard nipple, he moved one hand down to stroke between her thighs, which were soaked from their combined fluids. One stroke, then two, then he fluttered his finger devilishly against her clit. She cried out as her body rocked against his hand, her vision hazy, the sensations seeming to go on and on.
She rode out the last of the aftershocks and gazed up. Through her fog of delight, she could see his handsome face framed by the endlessly glowing blossoms. It would be so easy to believe this was some sort of Eden, that she had been transported straight into a dream she didn’t want to leave. All of Torth seemed that way so far. Even though they came here to gather information and had run into their share of trouble, the journey had been magical. They had found such a wealth of pleasure in each other’s arms that she knew she would never get enough of him.
But Eden had its snake, and so did Torth. The Vipers and Ghazsul demons had shown the vicious underside of life in the demon realm. And she and Gunnar were here to prevent another ugly evil from taking hold on Earth. She reached up to caress his jaw and he leaned into her hand, kissing it.
“This place is amazing,” she whispered. “It still feels like a dream.”
“A very wet one,” he murmured teasingly. “But yes, you look like some kind of dreamy sex goddess, lying here on the ground, sated from my touch, with your hair full of crushed phos-blooms.”
“What?” She reached up to touch her hair and couldn’t suppress a giggle. So much for not crushing any of the delicate flowers. Deciding to just leave them there, she said, “Lie down.”
He obliged, and she curled up next to him with her head on his shoulder, her arm thrown across his chest. She wanted to steal just a few more minutes in this magic place with him. They lay quietly entwined as the moon shone high overhead, its pale light adding to the soft glow of the phos-blooms and sharpening the edges of the tree trunks.
Today had been a momentous day for her. She felt closer to him than ever, but still, she knew he harbored a dark secret. She wanted to break down that last barrier between them. Something haunted the big dangerous demon in her arms, something that he hadn’t wanted to share with her. Is he hesitant because he’s not sure what I’ll think? She pressed a kiss to his shoulder, the knowledge growing in her that she cared for him with a surprising protectiveness. Whatever had happened was in the past, and nothing could alter their connection. She wanted so badly to understand him, to know every single thing about him, that tonight she felt bold enough to push him.
“Gunnar?” She traced his collarbone with tentative fingers. Please don’t shut me out.
“Mmm?” His rumbled response made her belly flutter.
“What happened between you and the Ghazsul demons?”
CHAPTER 17
THE ENTIRE WORLD froze. Gunnar went utterly still. The wind held its breath, as Nicole held hers. Even the crickets quieted their soft chirping.
She propped herself up on one elbow to look into his handsome face. His eyes shone with an azure luster, but his gaze hardened as he stared up at the moon. She gently cupped his cheek and whispered, “Please tell me.”
He lay silent for so long that she doubted he’d confide in her. Disappointment chilled her veins at the thought that he didn’t trust her or didn’t care enough about her to share this painful part of his life. Then she felt instantly chastened, worried she’d pushed too far. Unwelcome tears gathered and she closed her eyes, her heart beating in dull thuds of regret.
Her emotions tumbled to a halt as he nudged her down to the soft grass, reversing their positions so that he leaned on his elbow beside her. He gazed at her, his eyes glowing and soft. “It’s not easy to talk about.”
Afraid to speak for fear she’d ruin the moment, she reached for his hand and held it between both of hers. Tenderly she rubbed small circles along the back.
“I haven’t spoken of it in a long time.” Breaking her gaze, blue eyes looked off at some distant point in the trees. He seemed a million miles away. She continued to caress his hand, trying to convey the overwhelming devotion welling in her heart. His internal struggle painted on his face, she waited. Then he spoke.
“My family lived near a city called Halice. We had a house just outside the city limits.” His voice was rough. “It wasn’t huge, but it was nicer than most of the homes in the city. My sister was a year older than me, and we played games constantly. She and I looked alike enough that many people thought we were twins. Our mother taught us at home, and we always tried to get out of our studies.
“One day we were playing hide and seek. We had the perfect house for it–there were lots of rooms and closets. We even had a secret passageway; although my sister and I made up a rule that it was off limits. It was too obvious to hide in there.
“We convinced my parents to join us. Our mother played our games with us sometimes, but it was my dad who took more coaxing. He loved us, but there were a lot of demands on his time.
“We decided that since there were four of us playing, we would use the entire house and yard. My mother was “it.” I was hiding in a closet in one of the bedrooms when it seemed like it was taking a long time for her to find me. I didn’t hear my sister either, and she always made a lot of noise when her hiding place was discovered.”
A sick feeling filled Nicole’s stomach. She couldn’t look away from Gunnar as raw emotions fired across his beautiful eyes. Her fingers stilled and she squeezed his hand tightly.
“Then I heard screams coming from downstairs. I tiptoed to the second floor landing and looked down to see our foyer full of Ghazsul demons. I didn’t know it then, but it turns out it was a group of thugs who had broken into some homes in the city a few months back. They had never been caught, but things had been quiet for a while, so everyone thought they had moved on.
“Being Lash demons, my father and mother were both excellent fighters, but they were vastly outnumbered. My mother was on the floor, trying to protect my sister who was cowering and crying underneath her. But they pulled her away.”
Gunnar broke off, his face a mask of painful memories. She wanted to reach for him, but she was afraid to move. At this moment he wouldn’t want her comfort. He was finally sharing with her the burden of his past, and she sensed he would do it by finding the strength within himself to get the words out.
His voice dropped to a whisper. “Two of them held my sister. Three each held my mother and father. They slit their throats, one by one. First my sister, then my mother. They forced my father to watch. Then it was his turn.
“I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t move. I was frozen in a nightmare, watching my family being murdered. Then someone yelled to search the house, and I ran for the secret passageway. I stayed there as the Ghazsuls ransacked our home. Then they were gone.”
Nicole bit her lip and tears again brimmed in her eyes. She ached to hold him, to embrace the dark-haired boy she saw in her mind’s eye. But that boy was gone, replaced by the dangerous man who’d finally opened his soul to her. She swallowed hard and waited.
“I stayed in the passageway for hours, scared that one of them might have stayed behind. Finally I got too hungry to stay put, so I came out. I crept through the house as quietly as I could, but there was no sign of the Ghazsuls. They had just left my family there on the floor. I couldn’t move them–I was too little. I sat down next to them and cried. Night came and I stayed with them. I almost wished the Ghazsuls had killed me
, too, because I didn’t know what to do. We had no other family.
“I took some bread from the kitchen, took some bedding from my room, and went back into the secret passageway. I did that for a few days, until there was no more food. Then I had to find a way to eat.
His expression darkened. “That’s when I became a criminal. I stole food and slept in the street. If I got caught by the shop owners I got beaten, so I learned how to sneak through the shadows undetected.
“On the streets there were other young feral demons like me. Most were looking for food or a fight. Most were stronger, so I had to be careful. The bigger ones slept in the better places, the alleys that weren’t full of piss and biting rats. I was small and alone, and I had my dinner taken away from me more than once. But as I grew older, I grew bigger. A lot bigger than the others, since most of them weren’t Lash. I learned how to fight any way that I could, even if it meant fighting dirty. I made a lot of enemies.
“My anger only grew stronger. If I came across a Ghazsul demon, I killed it. No questions asked. If anyone stole from me, I killed them. Whenever I thought of my family, I was filled with rage. I wanted to avenge them. Deep down, on some subconscious level, I knew I wasn’t going about it in the right way. My father wouldn’t have wanted me to live like that. But I didn’t know anything else. At that point, I didn’t know who I was. I was nothing more than a thief and a killer.
“One day I came across a group of demons fighting near the waterfront. Some were Lash, and some were Domu. They were the two most powerful species that I knew of, and they were fighting to the death. It was like watching a macabre ballet–the way they leapt, dodged blows, and sliced with their swords. The ground was soaked and slippery with spilled blood, but they never lost their footing. Heads flew into the water as they were separated from their bodies. I hid behind some barrels and watched as the Lash eventually defeated all the others, finishing them off with demonfire from their palms.
“Watching members of my own species fight like that gave me an idea. Maybe I could fight with them; channel my anger into something productive. I felt like I already had something in common with them, and joining them would be my way out of the hellish way I’d been living. If they would let me in.
“I came out of my spot behind the barrels. I didn’t know if they would kill me, and at that point I didn’t care. My pathetic existence wasn’t helping anyone. I knew I would either fight with them or I would die, and either option was fine with me.”
He turned to her and gave her a wry smile. “Obviously they didn’t kill me. They brought me to Arawn, the leader of the Lash demons. He remembered my parents, but no one had ever known the whole story of what happened to them. He accepted me into the Watcher ranks and I began to train with them. That was nearly two centuries ago.”
Blue eyes locked with hers in the parti-colored clearing. “To this day, Ghazsuls make me angrier than any other foe. I don’t always shift into the thing you saw yesterday. But I can’t control it. When it happens, it needs to run its course.”
Nicole reached up to caress his stubbly cheek. Her heart broke for the child he had been. The horrors he witnessed had hardened him and taken his innocence, but he retained a resolute sense of fairness. Like her, loss had shaped his life but didn’t define it. She stroked his face and whispered, “I’m so sorry.”
He gazed down at her. “I was a criminal. Then a warrior. At one point,” he paused. “I didn’t imagine I’d live to see two centuries pass.”
“You did what you had to. No child should have to endure the things you saw. But you never stopped fighting.”
He shook his head. “And now, by some twist of fate, I find myself in the arms of a Solsti. I thought the gods hated me. But I must have found favor with at least one of them.”
She smiled up at him, her heart swelling as she realized that a piece of it would forever belong to him. The massive demon at her side had lost one family and gained another, and bore the scars on his very soul. She wanted to kiss the hurt away, but knew from her own life that it would always be there. The sadness would remain, but it would exist next to new, buoyant memories. He had come through his own fiery trial as she had hers, not unscathed, but forged into something altogether different and stronger. “Come here.” She tugged his face down to hers and kissed his mouth tenderly, then dotted his jaw with tiny kisses. “I’m so glad you found me.”
“That makes two of us.” He rolled them so that she lay atop him, their bodies aligned.
Her hair had to be a tangled mess of grass and glowing petals, but she let it fall around their faces like a curtain. She studied him, never wanting to forget how he looked beneath her in the moonlight, his body, mind, and soul open to her. Resting her head on his shoulder, she nuzzled his neck and inhaled his dark, masculine scent. She was flooded with the realization that one lifetime with him would never be enough.
With the steady beat of his heart at her ear, she lay pressed against him, his hand at the small of her back. An unfamiliar sense of blissful, contented joy mixed with fierce possession washed over her. She adored her scarred and lethal demon, and she luxuriated in the knowledge of him that warmed every fiber of her being. She didn’t know how much time had passed before he slid his hand down to pat her bottom, a gentle reminder that they needed to return to the colony.
She pushed herself up to a sitting position and, out of habit, looked around for her clothes. Huffing out a small sound of frustration, she realized that her leafy dress lay in hopeless shreds on the grass.
He quirked an eyebrow.
“We have to walk back into the colony, and I’ll be naked.”
“Trust me, none of the nymphs will be offended.”
She glared at him. “Other males will see me.”
“They’ll look the other way if they want to avoid bodily harm.” He got up and ducked behind a tree, only to come out holding something. “I left this here earlier today.”
She beamed as she recognized one of his T-shirts. It would be huge on her, but she would be covered. “You think of everything,” she sighed softly. “Do you do dishes and cuddle, too?”
He frowned. “Hmm. I can’t make any promises about dishes, but we did just cuddle, so that’s a definite yes.” He closed the distance between them and said against her lips, “Besides, cuddling leads to fucking.”
“I thought cuddling happened after fucking.”
“It’s both.” he growled. “And hearing your pretty mouth say ‘fucking’ is really hot.”
She grinned as she pulled on his enormous T shirt and raised her arms. “Then let’s start cuddling again right now. You can carry me back to the colony.”
CHAPTER 18
MAERON PACED IN his underground lab, mindful of the bare light bulbs, his head nearly reaching the ceiling. He towered over the Skells, who scurried to complete their tasks and stay out of his way at the same time. Only a few of them had returned with blood this evening, no doubt due to the interference of the blasted Lash demons. They considered themselves to be some kind of white knights for the entire immortal realm, and now they had spilled over to Earth. Picking up an empty glass jar, Maeron hurled it across the room, satisfied as it shattered against the concrete wall.
With shuffling feet and downcast eyes, the last of the night’s successful Skells descended to the deepest part of the lair and crept toward the work table. It carried a plastic container, which it held up for him to see. Just a few precious drops, but it would do. He only needed one drop from each pathetic human.
“Pour it in!” he snarled. “Carefully!”
Shaking, the Skell walked to the end of the table where a vat lay beneath a large beveled opening in the stone surface. Flush with the opening, the top edge aligned so none of the blood could be spilled by the clumsy Skells. This one actually managed to be careful as it overturned its container into the vat, which was more than half full.
Its contents more valuable than gold, the vat would soon be filled with the blood of five h
undred human souls. The more destitute and down-trodden, the greater the despair of the souls, the more powerful the blood. Hence, he sent the Skells into the worst areas of the city. Not only did the residents provide the perfect ingredient, but no one would give credence to their claims of being cut up by gray-skinned creatures. Maeron watched the crimson blood drip into the vat before barking at the Skell to leave.
The pathetic Skells had some ridiculous claims of their own. A few nights ago, several had received telepathic messages from three of their kin. They bungled their job and, in the middle of a human gang fight, met a quick demise at the hands of the Lash demons. His Skells claimed to see two female fae in the middle of the ruckus. They fancied the females manipulated both air and water, causing harm and distraction to the humans. Maeron snorted his disgust. The Skells would believe in anything, even creatures that didn’t exist.
His icy heart swelled a little as he regarded his crimson treasure. Kept at a warm simmer by magic, the vat maintained the blood’s viability until he attained the necessary amount. He had all the other ingredients ready. Maeron would collect the blood himself if not for his decidedly demonic appearance. The Skells at least bore a slight resemblance to the human form. Being a Domu had great advantages, but looking human was not one of them. He stood nearly seven feet tall, with dark charcoal gray skin, yellow eyes, and claws that tipped long spindly fingers. His figure was too distinct to move freely on Earth, but soon that would change.
One of the benefits of this spell was the ability to create changes in his own appearance, as well as illusions of an individual’s environment. And that was only the beginning. A grin cracked his dry, charcoal face. The spell, hidden for so long, was one of the most powerful in existence. He would be able to teleport, erase memories, and conjure demonfire, among other things. Once complete, he would finally receive his due respect.