by Nalini Singh
Her breath caught in her throat at her conscious acceptance of an impossible idea . . . except it wasn't. It was as real as the Manhattan skyline in front of her, steel against a cerulean sky streaked with white. The memories had cascaded one on top of the other since she woke in the early hours of this morning, crying so hard that her chest remained sore, her eyes swollen and her throat raw.
He is my husband.
Perhaps not in law, but as far as her soul was concerned, Dmitri belonged to her.
Always.
When the door slid open at her back, she glanced over, expecting the man at the center of her thoughts. It wasn't. She smiled at the hunter who came to sit beside her. "How did you get up here?" Security was airtight.
Ashwini swung her feet. "I sweet-talked Illium."
"I didn't know you knew him."
"I didn't. Now I do." Dark brown eyes full of liquid intensity settled on Honor. "He said you needed a friend. I knew that already, but I pretended it was news. What's wrong?"
Honor turned her face to the wind, letting it push back her unbound hair, tangle it into as wild a mess as Dmitri made of it in bed. "You'll never believe me."
A long silence before Ashwini said, "Remember the first time we met?"
The memory was crystal clear. It had been in a raucous bar filled with hunters and mercenaries. They'd laughed over drinks, eaten deep-fried everything, sowed the seeds of a deep, abiding friendship. And then, as they were walking out the door--"You called me an old soul," she whispered. "A lost soul."
"Still so old you make my chest hurt"--Ash leaned in so their shoulders touched for a moment--"but no longer lost."
Shuddering, she braced her palms on the rough surface on which they sat. There would be no more whispers, she knew, from a life long gone--there was no longer any need, the barrier between past and present wiped out in the storm of her tears until she saw the woman she'd been as clearly as the one she was now.
The reawakened memories caused her agonizing pain. The thought of losing Caterina and Misha . . . she couldn't bear it. But she'd remembered, understood something far more beautiful, too. Loved, she had been loved. And, she thought, remembering the arms that had held her so very tight this morning, she was loved again. He might never be able to say it, the lethal blade her husband had become, but she knew.
What she didn't know was whether her beautiful, wounded Dmitri was ready to hear what she had to tell him.
Dmitri watched the two women sitting out on the balcony and checked for the third time to ensure the wing of angels waiting below were on alert to catch if necessary. "I should go out there and drag them both inside," he said to Raphael when the archangel walked in to stand beside him.
"Yes," Raphael said. "It should be a most amusing sight."
Dmitri shot the archangel a dark look. "Your consort is a bad influence."
"My consort is now joining your woman."
Turning, Dmitri saw Elena come to a somewhat wobbly but safe landing on the balcony. She pumped her fist in the air before sitting down next to the long-legged hunter with the dark eyes who was Honor's best friend--and, according to the reports they had on her, an extremely gifted individual when it came to those senses that weren't accepted by most humans. Immortals, however, had been alive too long to dismiss such things as fancy. And so they kept watch on Ashwini. "Janvier courts her."
"I think it's time to pull him in." It'll give Venom a long enough period to ensure a smooth transfer.
Dmitri nodded, feeling a wild kind of peace within him when Honor laughed, her body half hidden behind the midnight and dawn spread of Elena's wings. "It'll be good for Venom to work alongside Galen." The vampire was strong but young and could be impulsive; while Galen was as stable and centered as a rock.
"I agree." Raphael's own wings rustled as he resettled them. "I spoke to Aodhan--he hasn't changed his mind."
Dmitri thought about the extraordinary, fractured angel, wondered if he'd find what he sought in this bold, brash city with its pulsing heartbeat of life. "Do you think this is the start of his healing?"
"Perhaps." A quiet pause. "We will be his shield, Dmitri."
"Yes." The young angel?
Resting. His will is strong--this won't break him.
Good.
Outside, the women continued to talk, their hair tangling together in the playful wind, Elena's brilliant near-white strands against Ashwini's sleek black and Honor's softer ebony curls. It was a sight that would make any man take notice. "We aren't who we were even two years ago, Raphael."
"Are you sorry about this change?"
"No."
Honor challenged Dmitri to a sparring session that afternoon and lost. He took her to his bed that night, laid her out for his delectation. When she bit her lower lip and whispered, "I thought you said something about a velvet whip?" in a voice that held both anticipation and the tang of sensual nervousness, he took her mouth with a voracious need that had her scenting the air with the sweet musk of her arousal.
Drawing it in, he made her lie on her back--her unbound hands holding on to the bars of the headboard--and began to kiss, to taste, every tiny inch of her, from the smooth warmth of her brow to the hollow of her throat and the tight furl of her nipples. There, he stopped, took his time, until her nipples were wet and pouting, before moving to the dip of her navel, the quivering nub of flesh between her thighs, the curve of her knee, and finally, the graceful arch of her foot.
Breath coming out in ragged gasps, she shook her head when he told her to turn over.
"Honor." It was a command.
"No." Haunting eyes full of defiance that was an invitation, her body so sensitized that when he ran his finger lightly between her legs, she jerked up, her eyes clenched tight and her muscles tensed in readiness for a shattering peak. "Dmitri."
"No," he said, removing his touch and dipping his head to speak with his lips against her ear. "You don't get rewarded for misbehavior."
Unrepentant, she kissed the side of his face, his jaw. Soft, wet kisses that made his cock throb in the black pants he still wore, while she lay bare to him, her skin hot silk, her blood warm and aroused and whispering to him of an erotic addiction he couldn't afford to indulge.
"Does bribery work?" Another kiss.
He pressed his hand to her abdomen, nudging her flat onto her back again. "That's another rule you've broken." He'd ordered her to lie motionless.
"You're not going to have mercy on me, are you?" It was a husky question as he rose from the bed and went to a closet . . . but she kept the promise she'd made to him at the start, stayed in bed.
"You should know better than to expect it from me," he said, closing his hand around the handle of a soft velvet whip he'd never before used, as he hadn't used anything in this room. He'd built a bed for Ingrede, and in the same way, he'd put this room together for Honor.
Now, running his hand over the whip, he flicked the tails over his arm to ensure it would cause her no pain, only the most excruciating pleasure. Her eyes went to the whip when he turned to walk back to her, and he saw her hips twist in a way that told him she was very close to the edge. Allowing his lips to curve just a little, he ran the soft tails over her body from chest to thigh.
"Where," he murmured, "would you like to take your licks?" He circled the strands around her breasts. "Here?" Stroking lower, over her thighs. "Here?" Going back up, switching his hold to run the handle through her delicate folds. "Or maybe here?"
She cried out, and he knew she was on the precipice. Drawing back, he switched his hold again and flicked out with his hand. The velvet tails kissed the flushed skin of her thighs and her whimper turned into a throaty moan.
"Wider," he ordered.
Spreading her thighs, she locked gazes with him.
His next stroke hit her inner thighs and he saw the storm rising in those eyes akin to midnight forests. Gauging it precisely, he flicked out his hand again . . . so the velvet fell on the damp folds between her thighs.
Wanting her to ride it, to squeeze every drop of ecstasy out of it, he flicked the whip again, over her breasts.
Her pleasure took her over, and she was beautiful. Dropping the whip, he got rid of the remainder of his clothes and settled himself between her thighs, pushing inside her as she came down from the high, her flesh quivering with aftershocks. Tiny inner muscles spasmed around him, almost stealing his control. But he'd had centuries to hone it and he intended to draw out the night's pleasure.
Groaning, Honor held him tight as he rocked inside her in slow, shallow thrusts that tempted but never delivered. Sweat slicked their bodies ten long minutes later and the woman who was his lay on her back, clawing at the sheets and attempting to force him deeper with her ankles locked around his back. "Faster."
"I won the sparring session," he reminded her. "I get to do whatever I like." Leaning down, he licked up a droplet of sweat from along her throat. "Right now, I want to take you slow and easy."
Her chest heaving, she tried to thrust a hand between their bodies. Grabbing it, he pinned it above her head, before taking her other one and pinioning them both at the wrists with one hand. "Bad girl." Holding her gaze, he stroked again, heard her frustration in the low moan at the back of her throat. "Scared?" It was a serious question, because he had her restrained.
"No." Arching up, she bit his jaw. "You should be, though."
Rolling his hips, he loved her in ways that had her eyes closing and her breasts rising up toward his mouth. He took advantage, sucking and playing with her nipples as he continued to torment her with his cock. When he lifted his head and claimed a kiss, she sucked on his tongue . . . then she did the one thing that had always made him lose control, even before he was Made. Nuzzling her way down to his throat, she clamped her teeth over his pulse and licked out with her tongue.
Snarling, he released her wrists to fist a hand in her hair, pulling her off his throat--taking care so she felt no hurt--even as he seated his cock balls-deep inside her in the same motion.
She gasped. "Oh, God."
"How," he whispered, using his other hand to push up one of her knees, spreading her wider for him, "did you know to do that?" It was a very specific caress, one he'd discovered with Ingrede. In the years since, other women--Favashi included--had tried to go for his throat, but he'd never, ever left it unprotected.
Until Honor.
"You refused to fall in love with anyone else, Dmitri." A whisper with the impact of a gunshot. "So I had to come back for you . . . husband."
Every muscle in his body locked. "No."
Honor's response to that single harsh word was nothing he could've predicted. "It's okay." Cupping his face with gentle hands, she smiled crookedly, her eyes luminous with a love so deep, he thought he'd drown in the shimmering midnight green. "You don't have to believe me, or even think me sane. Just let me love you."
Her next words were whispered in an ancient, forgotten language, the dialect one that had been spoken only in a tiny village long since crumbled to the earth--a dialect Dmitri alone remembered. Except the lilting rhythm of it fell from Honor's lips as if she'd run wild through the same fields, danced under the same brilliant sun. "I've always been a little bit crazy when it comes to you."
"I can't--" he began, because what she was offering, it was too much, a gift too painful.
"Shh." She ran her fingers through his hair. "It's okay."
"No." It wasn't okay, wouldn't be okay until he had the answers he needed.
"So stubborn." Kissing him slow and deep, she held him to her with her legs around his hips when he would've pulled out. "I should've expected it from the man who once clambered up a mountainside at dawn to bring me wildflowers."
His entire body shuddered under the weight of the knowledge in her eyes, in her touch, in her voice. All the tiny things she'd done that had nudged at his memory, the echo of Ingrede's joy breaking his heart when it was Honor who laughed, the way she knew him, it crashed against the chaos inside him, leaving only a raw need in its wake.
"Let me give you what you need, husband. I've waited so very long." Haunting words tangled with an exquisite desire that sang to his blood. "Drink."
The final thread of his control snapped.
Roaring, he drove into her again and again and again, until she was clenching around him with feminine power and he was coming with such satisfaction that he had no memory of sinking his fangs into her neck. Then the tart, wild taste of her blood hit him with the ferocity of a windstorm, and suddenly he was hard once more.
Honor felt her eyes grow wide as Dmitri began to move again, his fangs sending a wave of sultry pleasure through her system--languid, persuasive, tasting of sin and sex and everything deliciously bad . . . and so unlike what she'd experienced in the basement that a comparison would've been laughable.
Moaning at the opulent swell of it through whimpering muscles and a pleasantly shattered body, she felt herself coating the hard intrusion of his arousal in lush need. "Oh, God, Dmitri."
The thick length of him pushed past swollen tissues, arcing ripples of ecstasy throughout her system, as he bent at her neck and fed. Thrusting her hand into his hair, she held him to her, the scorching sexuality of the moment cut with a wild tenderness. He sucked hard, and her body bucked.
Making a low, deep sound of satisfaction, he pulled out, pushed back in . . . and rode her to an orgasm that never seemed to stop.
Her muscles were still quivering from the erotic pleasure when, ending the blood kiss, he licked his tongue over the tiny wounds, sucked the skin again, and raised his head. "We're not done," he purred in her ear as her legs fell off his back, too exhausted to hold on. Reaching between them, he plucked at her clitoris with fingers that knew her far too well.
Another orgasm rocked through her, deep, so deep. "I can't take any more." It was a moan.
"Liar." A rolling move of his hips, and she was rising toward him, her hands caressing his chest, his arms.
He had endless patience, and he wasn't about to give her what she wanted this time. Not until half an hour later, when she was sucking on his throat, scratching his back, and threatening to use a blade on him. That was when he pulled out his cock to her frustrated scream, spread her thighs wide, and bent that dark head to suck her clitoris into his mouth.
The erotic shock was so intense, it seared her nerve endings, had lights exploding behind her eyes. She was fairly certain she lost consciousness for a blinding second. When she lifted her drugged eyelids at last, it was to feel her beautiful, dangerous Dmitri sliding into her in a primal thrust that was pure possession.
38
Freshly showered, they spoke sitting in bed, Honor lying against Dmitri's chest, her body soft and warm and his. Absolutely, categorically his.
"I couldn't hide this from you," she said as he ran his fingers through hair he'd dried as she sat slumped against him, lazy and sated, "but I was prepared for utter disbelief, thought it might take me years to prove it to you."
Taking her hand, he spread it over his heart. "Some part of me knew from the start." She was inside him, her soul forcing his own back to life. "I just wasn't ready to consciously accept it." Honor was the brave one, the one who had taken that leap of hope.
Her hand fisted. "I know this will hurt you so much, but I need to have this question answered." Eyes iridescent with tears, jewels in the rain. "Misha . . . what did they do to Misha?"
A searing burn on his chest, the scent of burning flesh and muscle and his body's silent screams. But his mouth he kept shut, though it cost him a piece of his sanity.
"There now, lover. You will never forget me." Isis's red lips pressing over the burned and scarred flesh, her tongue digging into the still painful wound. "Always, you will carry me within." Her flawless face stayed serene as she took up the branding iron and pressed it to his flesh a
second time to make certain of her words.
Blackness engulfed him and when he woke, his chest was ridged with a scar so heavy and thick, he thought nothing would ever erase it. Looking up, he saw Raphael staring at that brand with a cold intensity that spoke of death. The angel said nothing, but when their eyes met he jerked the chain that held his left hand cuffed to the wall. It took Dmitri's dazed mind a moment to see, to understand.
The stone was cracking. A year it had taken him, but Raphael had weakened his bonds enough to snap them--now, Dmitri simply had to survive, become strong again. So he did, though Isis had almost broken him. But he didn't do it to kill her, though that need was a fever in his blood. He did it so he could hold his son again, the only one of his family who remained.
"Shh, Misha," he said, his throat cracked and raw when his son screamed and convulsed, his tiny body attached to the wall by a cuff around his neck. "Papa will be there soon and he'll make it all right."
He'd kept his promise. He'd given his son peace.
The guilt of what he'd done clawed him bloody. "Isis tried to Make him."
A horrified sound. "He was too young."
"Yes." Dmitri couldn't put this pain into words, but when Honor's hands came up to cup his cheeks, he bent his head toward her, let her press her lips to his closed eyes, to his lips.
"I understand." Her voice was a husky whisper. "It is all right, Dmitri. It was the only thing you could've done."
Dmitri hadn't cried, not for near to a thousand years. But the remembered agony of cradling his son's body in his arms, of looking into those trusting eyes fevered and full of suffering and a madness that had already made Misha gnaw at his own flesh, of holding that gaze until the very end, when he ended the life of his brave, beautiful boy . . . it tore through him now, creating cutting rivers of pain.
He would've drowned but for the woman who held him through the storm, whose tears mixed with his own, whose gentle hands gave him forgiveness for a crime for which he'd never forgiven himself. "I was their father," he said at long last. "Caterina, Misha . . . I couldn't protect either of them. I couldn't protect you."
Honor shook her head. "You fought for us. You surrendered your pride, your body, your freedom. But most of all, you loved us until none of us knew what it was to live without being adored." Cupping his face again, she touched her forehead to his. "If I got a second chance, don't you think our babies must have, too?"