Aurora's Promise (27 page)

The howling, epic darkness that swallowed his soul along
with that newly born hope left him with nothing but the bleak and granite
purpose of vengeance. He would do no violence to his mate, but he would tear
her co-conspirator apart with his bare hands until every bone was ripped from
its joint and every ligament shredded from the bone. With the thought, his rage
plumbed beyond the fire to a point of cold calculation.

“Tell me, Aurora. I know you could not have done this by
yourself.”

“Connyn! Listen to me. It wasn’t—”

“No!” He squeezed her just enough to cut off her lie as the
air was pushed from her lungs. He walked over to the side of the pool that had
a drop-off from the edge. It still was fairly shallow but would suit his
purpose. “A name, Aurora. That’s all I want to hear.”

She sucked in air. Shook her head. “Connyn, let’s talk about
this. I can explain. I don’t have a name. There wasn’t—”

“Enough!” he roared. That she would lie to protect this man
cut a grief so sharply through his soul he nearly lost the icy grip on his
control.

Her hair twined around his fingers as he fisted a thick mass
of it in his hand to hold her head still. He pulled it back so her neck arched
and her breasts crested the waterline. He lowered his own head next to hers
until his mouth was directly next to her ear. His harsh whisper grated out
through clenched teeth. “If you say another word that isn’t his name, I promise
you’ll regret it.”

She shuddered in his arms and then went so completely still
he wondered if she was even allowing herself to breathe. Something died inside
him when she held her silence on behalf of the other man, but the determination
to know who had stolen his mate out from under him on the eve of the Council’s
blessing fueled his purpose. No matter how empty the victory would be without
Aurora by his side, he would not stop until he knew the truth.

Aurora was frozen by shock. She’d been exhausted and nearly
spent before Connyn had found her and now she actually feared for her life.
When she’d first considered striking out for a portal on her own after Cait’s
comments, she’d accepted that there’d be a price to pay for defying Connyn’s
iron grip. She’d never in her life have guessed he’d reach such horribly wrong
conclusions.

Fury cracked against her with every word. Every accusation.
She knew she should be furious that he would even think she’d betray him. She’d
never do that. To anyone. If she was done with a man for whatever reasons, she
told him and left. And now when she’d actually started falling in love with a
man, he was certain she was a liar and a cheat.

Shit. What the hell could she actually say if he let her
explain? Better he think she was unfaithful than know the truth. He couldn’t.
Not yet. Damn, she had needed to hear from Ellen. Shit shit
shit
! She
hoped she hadn’t ruined everything.

Connyn leaned over her, bending her with him until her head
rested on the bank. Expecting hard ground, she was surprised to find her head
cushioned by a dry sponge-like material. Not as soft as a pillow but not
uncomfortable either.

The weight of Connyn’s body held her immobile against the
edge of the pool as he captured both her hands and stretched them out in front
of her into the tall weeds that surrounded the pond. Lifting her head, she
watched as he yanked down new leaves still hugging a dark purple stalk and
began wrapping them around and around her wrists. He left the bottom part of
the leaf attached to the plant, effectively anchoring her in place.

When he released her arms, she immediately tugged on the
restraints but the plant’s leaves held.

Connyn brushed her hair from her face and then stepped back
so that his weight wasn’t pressing the breath out of her anymore. She gasped
and tried to straighten, but Connyn grabbed her hips and pulled her back so
that her arms were pulled out straight in front of her, with her head resting
on the bank and her body bent over at the waist. The water level hit her so
that her stomach was in the water but her back was above it. With his foot, he
pushed her feet apart so that her legs were spread and then he held her pressed
against him, her ass cushioning his cock.

His low growl of need startled her, made her wonder what
kind of torture Ilyrians reserved for those they considered traitors. A
bone-deep shudder racked her body as he ran his hand down the center of her
back. It was a very possessive gesture that didn’t stop there. Both hands swept
back up her sides, around to her breasts and down her stomach. They continued
over her thighs and between her legs, around her hips and over her ass. His
hands were swift and would have been rough were it not for the softening aspect
of the water. His touch felt more like an experienced horse trainer examining
the muscle tone of a new acquisition than a lover’s caress.

She felt the weight of being possessed with every sweep of
his hands. Even though there was a coldness to his touch, it was no less expert
and soon had her body aching and shivering for more although she wished with
every molecule in her being she had enough magic left to blast the man right
out of the water.

Unfortunately, she’d felt much of her magic leach away with
the body-racking shudders that had overcome her every time she stepped through
one of those damn portals. She’d used a large amount of magic to keep her
stomach inside her body instead of allowing it to lurch its way free as it had
been quite insistent about doing. It reminded her of the step into Ilyria, but
today it had been much worse.

When his hands slipped between her legs again and brushed
over her clit, a revealing moan whimpered out of her before she could stop it.
He passed his fingers over her again and she pressed her face against the bank
to keep another moan from escaping.

“Give me the name of the man who helped you and this will go
much easier for you,” he promised. He continued the firm strokes of his fingers
on her pussy until she had to turn her head to the side and breathe. Gulping in
air, she tried to look back at him but her hair had fallen over her eyes and
this time he did not brush it aside.

“I did it all myself. I had no help.” Even though her voice
rasped out of a throat nearly closed from fear, her words were clear.

Connyn stood motionless for a moment before leaning over her
and whispering, “That isn’t possible and lying only makes it worse. I’m tired
of waiting for you to willingly tell me the truth. Time to take it from you.”

Aurora jerked her head up. “What?” Her vision was obscured
by wet strands of hair, but in her mind the fragmented images all fused
together of a relentless ruthlessness in which there was not a shred of mercy.
She struggled anew to pull free of the plant, but she only succeeded in
tightening the fibrous leaves around her wrists.

Connyn’s big hand came down on top of her wrists. “Stop. You’ll
only injure yourself.”

Her laughter barked out harsh and hollow. “Afraid I’ll hurt
myself before you get a chance to?”

His hand flexed around her wrists once before he released
them. “It’s not my plan to hurt you.” Splaying his hands over her shoulders, he
smoothed them down her back again, his thumbs pressing along the sides of her
spine. “But I will get my answer.”

Inwardly he cursed the fates that had not held her in their
world until her first birthday, allowing them to go through the Matching Ritual
so many years ago. She’d have had a Guardian in place that would have kept her
from taking any other man as her mate. It was a scourge he’d lived with and
carried on his soul since he could remember. But when he’d first seen her dark
brown eyes flashing up at him, he believed that she was his,
knew
she
was his. Forever.

How quickly dreams could burn.

His palms slid over her ass, his thumbs sliding into the
crevice between her buttocks sending a shiver over her skin. “Did you know that
your mind opens to mine when you climax?” His thumbs slid in deeper. “What I’ve
discovered is that the harder you come,” he said as he pulled apart her ass
cheeks, allowing the water to lap at the tightly puckered hole between them, “the
easier it is to read your thoughts.” He brushed his thumb over her anus.

“Connyn—”

“No. I don’t want to hear another word.”

Leaning back over her, he reached for another plant growing
beside the pool and, gripping it around its base, squeezed the center of it
upward until several translucent globules popped out of the top. A spicy
cinnamon scent wafted from the whitish balls when he picked one up and held it
in front of her face.

“See this little thing?” he asked, turning it around so she
could get a good look at it. “It’s amazing what it can do. If you squeeze it,
jelly comes out.” He demonstrated and then wiped the cool, sticky gel-like
substance along her bottom lip. It warmed and tingled, created a sort of
low-level electric buzz that shot straight to her cunt.

His eyes narrowed arrogantly at her reaction. “And that’s
not all it can do. When you squeeze it, not only does the gel come out, the
little ball starts to vibrate.”

He stood, scooping up the half dozen little globules in his
palm. She closed her eyes and focused on gathering her remaining strength.
Steeling herself for an assault on her senses she’d be able to do nothing to
deflect, she focused her energy on covering the secrets buried deep in her mind
that were not hers to reveal. Desperately she prayed she had enough magic left
to do that at least.

First, she felt the cool gel drawn in a thin stripe down the
center of her spine. Almost immediately, the gel began to work its magic,
sending warm tingles out in pulses that had her arching her back as the need
that had been simmering in her pussy since he’d first started touching her
increased. She held her breath as Connyn continued spreading the gel down past
her tailbone, afraid that he was going to rub it on the one place that might
undo her far too fast to keep any control of her thoughts.

Connyn stopped just short of her anus and Aurora took the
opportunity to breathe again.

“If you like that,” Connyn whispered, “you’re going to love
this.” His voice was icy. Words that should have been gentle against her skin
were instead laced with a thinly veiled threat. His hands dipped into the water
on either side of her, his palms skating over the sides of her breasts. Her
muscles wound tight as she waited, knowing what was most certainly coming. But
he drew her tension out, pressing the sides of her breasts in, rotating his
palms to increase the friction and weighting them against the push of the
water.

Maybe, just maybe he wasn’t—”
Oh!
” she cried out as he
pinched both her nipples between his fingers and twisted them, transferring
more of the gel onto her over-sensitized peaks. A hot, sizzling sting shot a
new wave of need through her body and she would have sunk to her knees if
Connyn hadn’t grabbed her by her hips and held her in place. When she had stabilized,
he began applying the gel to the inside of her thighs, around her navel and
along the nape of her neck.

The electricity buzzing through her body could have lit up a
small town. It crackled and sparked like a live wire over wet pavement until
her hands were fisting, her toes were curling and she had long given up on
silencing her moans.

She could feel the probing of Connyn’s mind like a steady
force against hers, resolute and determined. Before, she’d never realized she
was blocking him. During sex her magic had always swirled through her mind. It
never bothered her that she could feel the magic pulse and stream in a steady
current beneath her skin as her body heated. She’d just assumed that that was
the way of it, at least for her. Until Connyn and his alien thought probe, all
she’d ever struggled with was to keep the magic in check as far as outward
signs went. At an early age she’d learned that it was better to walk across the
room and flip a switch than panic those around you by engulfing a room in
darkness with a simple
off
thought directed toward it.

But now, with her powers used and weak, she felt the full
pressure of his mental powers as he pressed through one flimsy barrier after
another. She didn’t know how much he was actually able to “read” or if he could
only sense emotions. And she sure as hell wasn’t about to ask.

A rush of frustration poured through her that wasn’t hers.
Perhaps he wasn’t being as successful as she thought he was. But then he surged
forward again, both with his body and mind. The heat of his flesh pressing down
where her body was already hot with the tingling gel had her crying out,
bucking and losing her footing. He wrapped his arm around her waist and kept
her up. Whispered in her ear. “So you like Brooke’s garden?”

“What?” It shocked her enough to clear her mind of some of
the sexual haze and push his thoughts back.

“And just when we were making progress.” He reached around
her and roughly squeezed more globules out of another plant. “There is one
thing I forgot to mention,” he said as the water around her began to bubble. “There
are tiny fish in this pool that feed off this plant. They especially love the
jelly.”

Aurora gasped out his name as tiny sucking bites latched on
to every spot where he’d spread the gel. Was this what being at the center of
an orgy was like? The tingling heat continued while her nipples, her inner
thighs, her navel, everywhere underwater he’d spread the gel was sucked and
teased at once.

Connyn’s clever finger dipped back between her legs and he
spread a liberal dose of the stimulant over her pussy lips and her clit. Her
clit, already distended with her arousal, made an easy target for the fish.

Her cry bounced back at her from the surrounding trees. She
jerked forward and clamped her thighs shut. The resulting pressure streamed the
fire of orgasm straight from her center to the ends of her toes and tips of her
hair. Jagged blazes of electricity curled around her bones and licked at her
skin. The culmination of the days roiled through her, the fear and hope, the
lust and love, the confusion and determination. She drew in shallow panting
breaths as the waves of orgasm continued to roll through her, pushed higher by
the constant nibbling, sucking and tingling.

Her body started to shake, was still shaking when Connyn
pulled her back and pushed her legs apart. Once again the fish swarmed her clit
for a just a moment before Connyn’s hand flicked them away. Aurora pulled in a
great breath of air, ready to gush out thanks for the small relief.

Until he pushed one after another of the small globules into
her cunt.

“What are you doing? Wait! They might get stuck and—” She
gasped as the fiery frissons that had been on the outside of her body invaded
with a militant strength.

“Don’t worry,” he said, the smugness unmistakable. “They
dissolve.”

Before he’d finished explaining, her inner walls constricted
and the gel filled her cunt and then started streaming out. Heavier than the
water, it flowed down over her clit sending new jolts of scalding sensations
and a fresh wave of frenzied feeding by the tiny fish. The water churned around
her pussy as more fish joined the feast, their minute tails and fins now
teasing her tender skin as well as their sucking bites.

The little balls inside her cunt started to vibrate and
another orgasm built with such ferocity, such speed, that when it hit, she
could only throw her head back and scream as lightning arced through her body.
Her skin was too thin a boundary to hold in the sharp edges of her climax. It
tore through her and lanced into the sky, turning everything within her sight
to a fiery amber. The universe began to close in on her. Stars and planets,
comets and galaxies rushed toward her, pushing her past her magic, past control
and reason.