Blind Destiny: Grimm's Circle, Book 7 [retail mobi]

by Shiloh Walker

  “No breaking point,” he murmured again, this time, right against my ear. He caught my wrists, dragged them down, held them still as he rocked against me. A whimper rose in my throat and I could have cried because it felt so good. “Sina…my dear…do you know how long it’s been since I’ve been with a woman?”

  I curled my lip. “Oh, I know you and your precious little Perci have been separated a few months, darling.”

  “A few months.” He laughed.

  The sound of it sent shivers down my spine. It was rough, husky…slightly menacing, and sexy as hell.

  “Try…thousands, Sina,” he purred. Then he reached around and as my mind tried to process what he’d just said, he pushed a hand under my blouse and cupped my breast, pinched my nipple lightly, until it was just on the very edge of pain. “Thousands, darling. Thousands. You have no idea how very close I’m hovering to the breaking point.”

  Thousands—

  He raked his teeth along my neck.

  I groaned.

  “What…”

  As he ran the flat of his palm down my belly, the neurons in my brain started to misfire. Damn it, I couldn’t think. Couldn’t, and I needed to. Grabbing his wrist, I wrenched it away from me and squirmed around until I could see him. “What in the hell are you talking about?”

  “I made a vow,” he said, his voice harsh. “And like a fool, I intended to keep it. It didn’t matter that she no longer loved me. That at some point, I’d fallen out of love with her. I’d made a vow, to the woman I’d wed. We both still lived. I kept it.”

  Blinking, I stared at him.

  There were several important things in that sentence. “You…you don’t love her?”

  He averted his face, swearing under his breath.

  I had to translate them—when he was angry, he reverted to French, and it wasn’t one of the languages I’d ever spent much time using. And he spoke a French, to boot, an odd patois of old and new that took a few seconds to process. I thought he might have said, weird mix of This is bullshit. Then he said, “You do not hear very well…I said I fell out of love with her. It isn’t the same thing as not loving her. I will always love her. She was…is my dearest friend. But I am no longer the boy who fell in love with her. We were too damaged to go on as we once were. Percinette saw this. I was too…” He reached up and touched his ruined eyes. “Too blind. In so many ways.”

  “That doesn’t explain why you spent centuries celibate.”

  “I don’t have to explain,” he growled, his sightless gaze slanting back at me and once more, I had the oddest sensation that he could in fact see me. Somehow. Then he reached up, unerringly, and laid a hand on my neck, his thumb resting in the hollow. “I don’t care if you understand, if it makes sense…but you persist in taunting me about breaking points and you mockingly call me a knight gallant.”

  He leaned in, aligning his mouth with mine until my air became his. He was breathing me in and it drove me crazy.

  “I’ve needed sex over the years,” he whispered and the sound of his voice was a caress along my flesh, one that pebbled my nipples, reached inside me and stroked me in a way that didn’t seem possible. “I’ve needed it, missed it, craved it. But I haven’t needed a woman…until you. I could spend myself with my fist and it worked well enough. But you…in the past few days, you’ve already managed to drive me insane. Just the smell of your skin, the sound of your voice is enough to make me feel like a ravaging beast. I want to push you up against the nearest flat surface and fuck you so deep and so hard, and then I want to do it again and again. For hours. Days. Weeks.”

  Oh.

  Oh, my.

  I caught my breath and immediately wished I hadn’t because it seemed to draw him even closer, and now his lips were on mine and I could taste him. Oh, how I could taste him. Wild, hungry and hot. It was a taste that had no other explanation.

  “Now, unless you want to see how very un-gallant you make me feel, you might want to quit taunting me. Because I really, really don’t want to fuck a woman who thinks I’m busy imagining another woman in her place.”

  He stepped back.

  As the hunger ripped through me, as need and want and love burned inside me, he took one step, then another, and another away from me.

  Oh, hell, no. He wasn’t walking away after he said something like that.

  “Luc.”

  He just shook his head.

  Swearing, I jerked off my blouse and threw it at the back of his head.

  It fell to the ground. He paused but kept walking, heading over to the dresser where he had his belongings packed.

  Fine. I whipped off my shirt. He didn’t pay much more attention to that, or the jeans that followed.

  The bra made him pause for a few more seconds.

  But then I took off my panties and threw them.

  And he caught them in mid-air. How can he do that…?

  Glittering blue eyes cut my way.

  I didn’t even see him move.

  But he did…

  Strong, powerful arms came around me. The towel had fallen away from his hips, I realized, because nothing separated us now. Nothing. The length of his cock was a brand against my belly, his hands clutched at my hips and his mouth came down on mine with devouring, devastating hunger.

  “I just hit my breaking point,” he snarled against my lips as he pushed one thigh between mine.

  “Good.” I might have said something else, but there was no time, and no breath, because he hooked his arms under my legs, spread me open and drove inside.

  If I could have breathed, I would have screamed.

  The burning, aching fullness spread, stretched, hovering just on the edge of pain. Against my mouth, he rasped, “I’m sorry…I can’t…I can’t wait.”

  “Don’t. I don’t want you to.”

  He groaned, withdrew and shoved back inside, his long, lean body trembling. The hunger raging within him shattered me and I clutched at him.

  Luc.

  This was Luc…

  And it was me that made him tremble like this. It was me he wanted.

  His tongue speared into my mouth and I bit him lightly. He stiffened and then slammed into me harder.

  There was no finesse to it.

  None.

  And still, I was wet. I could feel my hunger flaring, raging inside, and my clit throbbed. Part of me wanted to work a hand down between us, stroke it, but I couldn’t let him go. I just couldn’t. This was the one thing I’d let myself dream for—having this man in my arms.

  It ended too quickly, his long, powerful body tensing against mine and arching in long, powerful bow as he drove deep and held still. I felt him swell, felt the harsh, rhythmic jerking of his cock as he came deep inside me.

  His breath came in heavy gasps against my lips as he groaned. “Sorry… Fuck, I’m sorry, Sina.”

  “No.” I shook my head, stroking his hair back from his head. “Hell, after a few centuries, I figure you’re entitled.” I pressed a kiss to his lips. “But you’re going to make it up to me in an hour or so.”

  He nipped my lower lip.

  “Again, you don’t hear very well,” he told me. And then he started to move, surging inside me. Still hard. Almost achingly so. “I told you what you pushed me to. The nearest hard surface. Fucking you…for hours. I just started. That didn’t even take the edge off.”

  Pulling her against him, Luc shoved away the wall. Then, because he was off balance from the past few minutes, he pressed his brow to hers. “Can I…?” He pressed against her mind.

  She opened for him. “Whenever you need to.”

  He slipped inside and peered around the room. It was a seamless meld and without needing any guidance, she turned her head so he could see the room as needed, carrying her over to one of the narrow beds. “This bed isn’t right,” he said as he came down over her. “I want you in my bed. It’s almost half the size of this pitiful room, with sheets almost as soft and smooth as your skin.”

  Wa
rmth echoed from her. He thought maybe she smiled. Bracing his elbows on bed next to her, he lowered his head. “Now…the way I should have done…the way I wish I could have,” he murmured. “Soft skin. I imagine I’ve bruised you.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “I do.” He tangled his hands in the silk of hair, wished he could see how it looked spread out over the sheet. “Open for me, Sina. I want to taste you. Love you…”

  He caught the sigh as it escaped her and the warmth of her soul all but wrapped around him. As he started to ride her, slowly this time, slow and sweet, he stole one drugged kiss after another from her mouth.

  The silken, sweet grip of her pussy wrapped around him, milking him, and when he withdrew it was like she clutched at him, not wanting him to leave. He was fine with that, so very fine with that. This was the closest to heaven he’d been in a very long time.

  Stroking a hand down her side, along the rounded flare of her hip, he caught her behind the knee, dragged it up, held it against him as he rode her. So damned soft. So damned sweet. And her fingers gripped him, digging into the muscles as she rose to meet each thrust—so damned strong.

  A match. A match for the dazed hunger burning through him.

  Catching her hand, he laced their fingers and slammed it down on the bed. “You drive me insane,” he muttered. “Out of my mind insane.”

  “Hmmm. That’s rather nice, since you do the same to me.” She twined her free arm around his neck and pulled him down. As she slanted her mouth over his, she demanded, “Kiss me.”

  But she didn’t wait for him. She stabbed her tongue into his mouth, demanding, hungry.

  He opened for her and then shuddered as she bit him, sucking on him. Lightly. He felt it right in his balls and it went blistering through him.

  Tearing his mouth away, he sucked in a breath right before he started to climax. Again. Already. So sudden and so painfully intense.

  But this time, Sina tightened around him and cried out, locking her thighs around his hips and rising up to meet him, thrust for thrust, as the muscles of her pussy startled to milk him with her orgasm.

  Sweet. Too sweet.

  Collapsing next to her on the bed, face buried in her hair, he sucked in a breath.

  “Sina…”

  “Hmmm?”

  “I think you might be right. Maybe you are the villain in your story. After all, wasn’t the wicked stepmother able to enchant people? I think you went and bewitched me or something.”

  For a second, she was quiet and then she started to laugh.

  “Well, if that’s the case, I’ll have to make certain this sticks.” She stroked a hand up his back. “I could get used to this.”

  Chapter Ten

  Natasha was pretty sure she was the only one awake in the little villa.

  Not because she wanted to be.

  She’d tried drinking herself into oblivion.

  That was what Lee and Max had done. Fiona had taken a couple of sleeping pills. Natasha was pretty sure the prescribed dose was one. Which was one reason Natasha hadn’t been able to sleep at first, because she’d been worried about her friend, but after checking on Fiona several times, she figured all the woman was going to do was sleep it off.

  It was past midnight now and there wasn’t any chance of her sleeping. Natasha was painfully awake. Painfully. Her eyes achingly dry, her mind buzzing, and every time she tried to settle down to sleep, she had horrible, horrible images flashing through her mind.

  Jake was dead—

  It didn’t make sense. He was healthy. He was young. He wasn’t stupid or crazy or messed up in the head. That was her department, so why had he gone wandering off in the middle of the night—

  Cold chills broke out over her arms. A voice.

  Whispering.

  She could hear it.

  Way, way back, like it was stuck somewhere. Trapped.

  Jerking upright, she stared off into the darkness.

  But there was nothing.

  Swearing, she covered her face with her hands and muttered, “I’m going crazy. Absolutely crazy.”

  She climbed to her feet and shuffled into the kitchen. Maybe she should have just done what the others had—drink or drug herself into unconsciousness. Tomorrow they had to start making plans to go back home.

  No—

  She flinched.

  This was no whisper.

  It was almost like a death wail.

  One that hadn’t come from her. Rubbing her hand over her ear, she turned, looking around the room, but there was nobody there. Just her.

  And the scream.

  She swallowed.

  It was like it had come from inside her.

  “I really am going crazy.”

  Jerking open the cabinet, she spied the bottle of booze left over from Lee and Max’s drinking binge and grabbed it.

  If it had managed to put Max under, she could count on it to do the same to her, she figured. She just needed to give it a shot. She padded back over to the couch where she settled down, cradling the bottle in her arms.

  But instead of drinking, she closed her eyes. And waited.

  From outside, he watched.

  It had been a long, long time since he’d had this much trouble.

  Crow faded in and out of existence, only coming into this plane when he had no other alternative, but for the past few centuries, he’d been sucked into this pocket of existence too often.

  All because of this bit of dirt.

  First, the old woman.

  Then, one of them.

  His lip curled as he thought of it and agitation had the darkness around him whirling.

  It should have been done after that, but no. Of course not. It hadn’t ended and it had taken him a while to work through the muddle of his mind. Time lost meaning to one as old as he was. Days didn’t exist to him. Weeks were like seconds, and months were just a blink. Years could pass without him knowing and it seemed like just yesterday that the old woman had died.

  But it had been longer.

  He knew it.

  Sucked back into this place by the darkness, that darkness that called to his very core, he hovered in the air. He could feel the echo of her passing, still, and now, there was another. A younger woman’s, although her death wasn’t so fragmented, so full of conflict and rage.

  He’d forget her death in a moment. The easier deaths never mattered to him. Absently, he thought there might be one more that he’d forgotten already.

  A man’s.

  Yes…

  There had been a man. Crow didn’t think he’d done that one. Something wrong in the mind. A strange weakness, and too much fear had broken something inside him. But it was neither here nor there. It didn’t matter to him. People lived. People died.

  People suffered and that was what was pulled at him.

  What drew him back here time and time again. It was an addictive, rich flood of it, one he could get lost in. And here he was, back in the mortal plane.

  Again.

  He crouched on the building, staring down into the night and trying to find what had drawn him this time.

  So many strings, tangled threads of misery, and working his way through them was a puzzle.

  Hearing a noise, he rose, wrapped in the shadows that were his gift, and moved to the edge of the roof, peering down.

  The door opened and a wedge of light spilled out. A woman.

  He watched as she stumbled off, her movements odd and irregular. Humans didn’t always move with grace, he knew, but they also didn’t move like that.

  Sighing, he launched himself into the air. The shadows around him spread and his wings formed.

  “I tire of this.”

  Natasha was in the bathroom when she heard the front door open.

  Fear was an icy cold finger down her back as she jerked the door open, her hands still wet, and took off running down the hall. Max was snoring—she could hear him. Hell, it was a wonder the entire village didn’t hear him.
/>   Lee was asleep, her thick, pink-streaked brown hair lying in a tangle down her back.

  But Fiona’s bed was empty.

  “What the hell?” she demanded as she ran into the living room and shoved her feet into her boots, lacing them hastily. She didn’t have time for clothes. Hurry, hurry, hurry—

  It was a chant in her brain but even louder than her fear was that odd little whisper.

  You can’t stop this. You can’t. Stay here, just stay.

  It was an oddly compelling little voice, but Natasha ignored it.

  She didn’t what in the hell Fiona was up to, but the woman was getting her ass back here. Now.

  Before it was too late.

  She took off running out the door.

  And she almost pitched face first down the steps as she heard an old woman’s mocking voice say, “Child, it’s already too late.”

  I woke to heaven.

  And an angel between my thighs.

  Shuddering, I reached down and speared my hands through Luc’s hair as he lifted me upward. “I love the taste of you,” he rasped against my flesh. “I want to spend hours doing just this. Only this.”

  Whimpering, I shivered as he stroked his tongue around my clit. He pushed two fingers inside me, twisted them in. Out.

  “Luc…”

  He lifted his head and blew a puff of air against me.

  With a strangled cry, I slammed my head back against the pillow.

  “Love the taste,” he muttered again.

  A fact he proved over and over as he brought me to not one, but two climaxes before he urged me onto my hands and knees.

  With my face buried in the pillow and his hands gripping my hips, he took me from behind, the heated length of his cock slowly pushing in. I shuddered, feeling every pulse of his flesh, every ridge. And he was so damned slow—Groaning, I rolled my hips and tried to take him deeper, faster, but he was relentless, his hands holding me pinned in place, and when I started to thrash, he bore me down to the bed, pinning me with his weight.

  Hissing out a breath, I snarled at him over my shoulder even as the dazed delight sparked through me. I clenched my legs and shoved my butt back against him even as I milked him, shuddering at the pleasure ripping through me.