“You have not let me finish. The reason that your presence makes me sorrowful is that you were once destined to be mine.”
“What?” I know my tonsils are showing since my mouth has dropped open so far.
Letting go of my hands, he places his on my cheeks and rubs them softly with his thumbs. “You were meant to share my burden with me. We would have helped each other through the loneliness and the pain. You would not have been a goddess as Armaita said, but you would have been just as powerful. With you by my side, I could have spent an eternity loving and being loved in return. Changing your destiny was the hardest thing that I ever had to do and my heart has still not recovered.”
I am so confused at the moment. “Then why? Why did you change it?”
“For all the reasons I said before. I did not want this for you. You deserve better than an eternity of feeling the woes of the universe. I wanted you to be happy and now you are.” I would have spent eternity loving him? He gave up his happiness for mine? “Yes, my love, I did. And I do not regret it, I am simply sad for the choice I had to make.”
Tears have sprung to my eyes. I am so overwhelmed right now and I don’t know what to do with this information. Do I thank him? Does he want me to ask him to change my destiny back? I am so lost. He gave up a destiny to be with someone he knew he would love dearly so that she, I, would be happier. And the worst part is that there’s a place in my heart that wants me to beg him to take me with him. Part of my soul seems to remember that I was once meant to be with him and I feel just a tiny bit of the love that we would have shared. But the rest of my soul wants desperately to be in this destiny with Kallen, even knowing how painful that must be for Raziel.
There’s that sad smile again. It doesn’t irritate me this time, though. “No, I will never ask that of you. It was selfish of me to tell you this, but I needed you to know that I will always be watching over you. If you ever find yourself in a situation that you cannot handle on your own, please call upon me. I will always come.”
I see love in his eyes. He loves me and I don’t even know him. I don’t know what else to say but, “Thank you, Raziel. For everything.” Tears are making streams down my face now.
He smiles again and pulls me into a hug. “Forgive me, I want to hold you in my arms just one time.”
Okay, I can handle a hug. But when he lowers his face in a way that tells me he’s going to kiss me, my brain starts to panic. I can’t kiss him. I can’t do that to Kallen. I don’t care what my original destiny was supposed to be, I’m living the one where I’m marrying Kallen. This one doesn’t include kissing other guys. Regardless, I begin crying even harder as his lips move away from mine.
“Then a kiss on the cheek,” he says softly and his voice wraps around me as tightly as his arms. I really want to kiss him. But I won’t. I am so relieved when he gives me a soft kiss on the cheek and steps back from me. “Enjoy your destiny, Xandra. Please spend every moment being as happy as you can be. I will now leave you with the only gift I can.”
Suddenly, I’m no longer in Angel time.
Chapter 25
There is a different kind of glowing light radiating from me now. My wings are gone, so it’s not that. I’m not using any Angel magic, so it’s not that. So, it must be coming from the band wrapped around my left ring finger. My ring is glowing like it did right after Kallen and I made love. My eyes find him across the room and his ring is glowing as well. And from how he’s looking at me, it’s not just the glow that has returned. I think his memory has, as well. He remembers the night we made love.
He is across the room in three strides and has me in his arms. He lifts me off my feet so he can kiss me, long and hard. My heart practically explodes from the heat being generated between us.
“If you take off that girl’s clothes in the living room, you both are going to get a smack in the head.” That’s the first time Tabitha has threatened to smack me. She must consider me family now.
Kallen ends the kiss slowly as he sets me back on my feet. Leaning his forehead against mine, he whispers, “I remember.”
And I thought my heart was ready to explode before. I need to get him alone. Peeking around him, I say to the others, “Kallen and I have some things we need to discuss.” I’m not fooling anyone, I know that. I also know that I don’t care. So, I teleport us to our bedroom.
Kallen swoops me up into his arms, his lips never leaving mine. It seems to take forever to reach the bed where he lies down with me. Every kiss, every touch makes me love him even more.
With a loud growl, he sits up on the bed. “I am going to kill him. Kegan, if you dare knock on that door, you are a dead Fairy.”
Kegan’s chipper voice comes through the wood. “Sorry cousin, the presence of you and the Princess has been requested. You have two minutes to make it downstairs or they will come to you.” He enjoyed saying each and every one of those words. I’m beginning to understand why Kallen always threatens to kill him.
Leaning his forehead against mine and sighing, he says, “The sooner we go, the sooner we can do every single thing I remember…and then a couple hundred things I’ve dreamt about doing with you.”
I know he’s right; we do have to go back down. But getting off this bed is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. Kallen gets up first and then offers me his hand and pulls me to my feet.
“Um, Kallen, before we go down there I have to tell you something. Something that I don’t want to tell you in front of everyone else.”
“If you are about to tell me that you are leaving me for Raziel, you better let me sit down first.”
“What? No! Why would you say something like that?”
He shrugs but relief washes over his face. “I imagine it would be difficult to turn down an Archangel.”
I am so confused. “I didn’t turn him down.” Worry jumps back into his eyes, so I hurry to say, “Because there was never a competition. Why would you think there was?”
He pulls me close again. “Because Raziel told me that you were destined to be with him.”
My eyebrows practically touch the nape of my neck. “He did?”
Kallen nods. “He pulled me aside after you and I…disagreed. He did not want me to hear it from Armaita. Then he got all of us together and asked us to play along with Armaita’s plan of taking us hostage. There is no way that she would have been able to hold us if we did not let her. And Xandra, I am so sorry for what I said earlier. I love that you want to help everyone you care about. I do not want you to change one iota of who you are.”
I forgot about our argument earlier. Funny, it doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Snaking my arms up and around his neck I give him a light kiss. “That was a different destiny. In this one, I’m supposed to be with you. And I like this destiny. A lot.” This time the kiss isn’t so light.
“Your two minutes are up,” Kegan says. “I warned you.”
The door opens and Isla walks in. I think she’s relieved that we’re still wearing clothes. “I understand that you are eager to be alone, but there are things to discuss.” Her eyes dart to Kallen and I see his harden as he returns the look. Oh no. Raziel must not have explained this part.
“Grandmother, I do not…”
I interrupt him. “Kallen, it’s not what you think. Let’s go down and talk about it.”
“Or we can talk about it right here.” Tabitha comes in with Mom, Dad, Kegan and Alita in her wake. Talk about a mood killer.
Okay, I guess we do it here. I’ll give them the condensed version and hope that’s good enough for tonight. “Here’s what happened. Armaita was sent to Angel hell for lying and spreading rumors and some other Angels broke her out. She convinced the Angel I made the deal with to make me find the three Archangels for her. Only, she didn’t know that Raziel already knew her plan, which was stupid because the guy knows everything, and he had already promised Ambriel a promotion if he did what she asked because he wanted to just end this and he wanted to help me unlock my Angel
magic.” I glance up at Kallen when I say the next part. “He also told me why my destiny was changed and about the pact that was made between my great grandmother, Isla and Raziel.”
I reach up and put my hand on Kallen’s cheek. “She didn’t know Kallen. She didn’t know that it was going to happen while you were so young. She thought your father would live out his life and then she would send you to me. It wasn’t explained properly because she wouldn’t have agreed if it was. She did not agree to sacrifice him. It was a tragic misunderstanding. She was young and naïve.” I look over at Isla and there are tears on her cheeks. Wow. I’m rendered speechless by that.
Kallen’s face softens after a moment. “I was having a difficult time believing that you could do something like that, Grandmother. I am relieved to know that you did not.”
Isla’s about to say something but I cut her off. “Okay, so everyone knows what happened. I’ve had a rough few days and I could really use some sleep. So if you guys want to go back downstairs…” Hint. Strong hint. I give them my ‘I shouldn’t have to spell it out for you’ look.
I know they all have questions that they’re dying to ask, but I am not answering a single one of them tonight. After a moment, they seem to understand that. As they all turn to go, Tabitha turns back. “You two had better rest up because we have a hand-fasting to plan. We cannot have you two wandering around with those rings glowing like that. Xandra, you need to drink what I left on the nightstand if you do not want to be swaddling a baby anytime soon.” Leave it to Tabitha to think of everything. She closes the door on her way out and Kallen locks it with his magic.
“If anyone comes through that door again, please use your newly found Angel magic to turn them to dust,” Kallen says, wrapping his arms around me again.
I laugh. “I don’t think I’m supposed to use it that way.” I move out of his arms and take his hand, leading him back to the bed. “But for you, anything.”
After drinking the liquid birth control, which tastes nasty by the way, I slide across the bed pulling him in after me. “I love you so much,” I say as I wrap my arms around him. “Will you marry me?”
It’s Kallen’s turn to laugh. “As if there is a doubt in your mind about that.” He pushes me back gently against the pillows and follows me with his body. This is going to happen. We are going to make love again. Finally. Raziel may be hot, but I can’t imagine a destiny without Kallen in it.
Using his magic to remove everything except my bra and panties, his lips leave mine to kiss a trail down my body and then back up again. His hands are setting me on fire as he explores my curves. I can’t be patient, though. I want more. “Kallen, please make love to me.”
He chuckles softly as he kisses my thigh. “I am.”
I’d be annoyed if I didn’t want him so badly. So, drastic measures are needed. I use my magic to remove all of our clothes and I use my hands to guide him back up to kiss me. “If you don’t make love to me right this second, my frustrated magic is going to cause the house to crumble around us,” I murmur against his lips.
A low groan in the back of his throat as he finds my center is enough to know he’s done teasing me. Wrapping my legs around him, I’m in heaven as we’re joined as one. My hands are exploring his muscular body as we find a rhythm that will bring us both where we want to go.
Neither of us will be getting any sleep tonight. That’s okay. This is so much better than sleep and I wasn’t that tired anyway.
Chapter 26
“Xandra, wake up.”
I swat at the voice. Like that will do any good. It doesn’t have a body. “Go away, Nixie. I just fell asleep.”
“You can’t sleep. You have to get up. Right now.”
The agitation and fear in her voice is enough to make me open my eyes. I don’t know why, I can’t see her as anything except a light on a wall. “Why?”
“Tabitha’s gone.”
I sigh and yawn at the same time. “She’s probably in the garden, Nixie. Or she went to the market.”
“She’s not in the garden. She’s not at market or the palace or the sea shore. She’s not anywhere she would normally be. She’s gone. And there’s a note.”
“A note?” I sit up now. Kallen begins to stir beside me. “What kind of note?”
“The kind that says she’s been kidnapped.”
Kallen is sitting up now as well. “Nixie, just tell us what it says,” he growls. He’s not the biggest Nixie fan.
“It says that she’s been taken and they want a ransom. They want Kallen and Isla’s magic.”
Huh? “What?”
“It says that if Kallen and Isla don’t willingly give up their magic, they’re going to kill Tabitha,” Nixie says and the hysteria is building in her voice.
“I don’t understand. How can you give your magic to someone else? I thought it could only be bound.”
Kallen answers me. “There are ancient spells. Dark magic.”
“Yeah, that’s what the note said. They want Kallen to perform the spell or they’re going to kill her.”
The sleep has been washed out of his eyes by the rage that’s building in them. “Nixie, ask everyone to meet us in the kitchen. We will be rescuing Tabitha without anyone giving up their magic.”
After he’s sure that Nixie left, he turns to me. Cupping my cheeks with his hands, he says, “I love you and I am so sorry that another morning brings catastrophe. I wanted to wake up with you in my arms and convince you not to get out of bed all day.”
I smile. “I wouldn’t have been hard to convince.” I put my hand on his cheek. “But, if you’re going to marry me, you have to understand that catastrophe follows me everywhere I go.”
I get a half smile for that. “Indeed. Though, I believe this time it is me that has called catastrophe to us.”
“That’s okay. I love you and we’re partners. I’ll take on your catastrophes just like you do mine. Let’s go find Tabitha.”
After a kiss that is not nearly as long as I would have liked, we get out of bed to face the new day that destiny has planned for us.
Blood of Destiny (Witch Fairy #6) Page 19