Dominic (3 page)

“You misunderstand,” said Carlo. “I meant to inquire regarding whether or not you told her what happened between us.”

Emma arched a brow. “Do you refer to my reluctance to conceive and your insistence?” she asked. She refused to pretend it had been something

else. “If so, no. I saw little point. However, you should be aware I’l not tolerate a repeat of your brutality.”

“Brutality? Come now, you overstate the case. You know how my blood stirs under a ful moon.” He pul ed her close again and bumped his

forehead to hers, his pretty eyes wil ing her plain ones to offer forgiveness.

She simply stared at him, stunned anew at his refusal to concede that there could be no excuses for what he’d done.

“It’s unnatural for a woman to thwart her husband’s efforts to beget heirs on her. Why did you do it, Emma? Why didn’t you want my child?”

Because this child shackles me to you forever. Makes it more difficult to leave you.
Unaccustomed anger surged in her, but she tamped it down.

Just get through tonight,
she reminded herself.
Tomorrow will be time enough for frank words.

A squeal of delight had them both turning. Emma’s older half sister Jane had peeked into the hal and seen them.

Carlo straightened, drawing Emma into the curve of his arm. Making a pretense that al was wel .

“You’ve returned at last, Carlo. How wonderful!” Jane said. “I’l summon the others.”

“Do! I’ve brought news of matters on the other side.” Carlo glanced behind himself, through the open front door. The air shifted as her sister

departed in a swirl of skirts, and candlelight from the hal sconces rose for a moment, flaring across his throat. Angry scratches striped the flesh there and

on his col arbone, spidering even lower within the concealment of his uniform.

“You’re hurt!” Emma said, impulsively reaching to inspect his injuries.

“Shhh!” Carlo grabbed her wrist, rejecting her touch. His mood had altered like lightning, transforming him into the monster she’d glimpsed only

once before. A month ago.

“He’s here!” Oblivious to any undercurrents, Jane had already departed. Her footsteps and voice receded down the corridor toward the dining

room.

Emma tugged at her arm, but Carlo held her fast in an intentional show of strength. With his free hand, he fastened his col ar over his injuries, firmly

shutting her out.

The distant scrape of chair legs against wooden parquet indicated that the rest of the Satyr clan would soon come rushing out to join them. Her

time alone with her husband was at an end. At least until they retired together upstairs.

His grip relaxed, and she pul ed her wrist from his hold and stepped away, rubbing it and surveying him through downcast lashes. Panic beat its

delicate wings in her chest.

Should she speak to Jane? Or to one of the others? Tel them what he’d done to her last month? No. She wouldn’t tel them, for the same reasons

she hadn’t told them before now. Carlo had gone to great lengths to obtain what he wanted of her—a child. It was unlikely he would chance harming it

when they were alone.

And, regardless, the rest of the family would soon be incapable of protecting her. When the ful moon came, al on the estate would fal under its

spel .

“Say nothing of this. There’s no need to alarm the family,” Carlo instructed. She shot him a sharp glance, wondering if he’d read her mind. But he

only touched his throat, indicating his injuries. “We’l speak more of my wounds privately. Later.”

He brushed past her, his boot heels tapping across polished Italian travertine.

Jane returned and dashed forward on silent slippers, taking him by surprise and enfolding him in a sisterly hug. He was too wel mannered not to

al ow it. But Emma read the tension in him as he endured the affectionate clasp.

The hal was narrow, and their presence temporarily trapped Emma just inside the front door. Watching them, she fidgeted, smoothing her long,

rustling skirts. Jane had insisted that she begin preparations for this momentous homecoming weeks ago, helping her in the selection of this extravagant

gown as wel as new nightclothes.

They’d spent today together, making sure she would look her best to greet her husband on the night they would become new parents. Emma

hadn’t had the heart to protest to her sister that she was attempting to make a silk purse from a sow’s ear. While Jane was beautiful and skil ed at

enhancing her beauty, Emma was plain and devoted little care to her appearance.

The splendid taffeta gown she wore was adorned with intricate tatting at its hem and delicate Venetian glass beading at its neckline. It had been

designed and delivered earlier that week by the most skil ed dressmaker in al of Florence. Her hair had been brushed and styled, with fluted ribbon

woven through her brown curls.

Al in preparation for her husband’s homecoming. Al for a man who had no love for her, except as a means by which he could produce his

progeny.

“Welcome, Carlo!” The deep, masculine voice belonged to Jane’s husband, Nicholas, who’d joined them. He was fol owed by his younger

brothers, Raine and Lyon, and their respective wives, Jordan and Juliette. The entire family had gathered here tonight to wish them wel on the night their

first child would be born. The other three couples resided in the original
castello
s on the ancestral estate, which made visiting convenient.

As they al crowded into the hal way, Emma al owed herself to be shunted aside. It was natural for everyone to be excited, for they rarely saw Carlo.

He had been at war for so long, returning intermittently, only to bed her with a regularity dictated by the carnal stirrings of his Satyr blood.

The last time they’d coupled had been exactly one month ago. It had been a Cal ing time. The moon had been heavy and ripe, bursting with light.

As it would be again tonight.

He’d been tardy in coming to her bed that awful time four weeks ago, waking her sometime around midnight. The moon had risen hours earlier,

and she’d long since cried herself to sleep, assuming he’d found another outlet for his passions and would not come. For once dusk fel on a Cal ing night,

rituals commenced that engaged a Satyr male’s mind and body beyond al thought and reason.

Because she had given up expecting him, she hadn’t been prepared, and he’d—

No, she wouldn’t think of that. Not now.

When she’d awoken the next morning, bruised by his cruelty only in places her family wouldn’t see, he’d already departed for Else World.

But she hadn’t been alone. He’d left her with child. It would be their first, and it would be born at dawn.

Emma moved to shut the door but left it ajar when she saw that Carlo’s bag stil sat on the porch where he’d dropped it. Her child chose that

moment to shift inside her, causing the strange flip-flopping sensation that had become so familiar in the past few days. Her hand found her bel y, cupping

it in a protective gesture.

The late afternoon shadows stirred unnatural y beyond the steps, pul ing her gaze.

A man stood outside, watching her.

3

T
win beams of quicksilver lit the darkness, gleaming at Emma like the eyes of a cunning predator on the hunt—a lone beast lurking in the twilight while

others more civilized than he had already sought the warmth of home and hearth with the coming of dusk.

At her gasp, the voyeur stepped over the threshold, immediately commanding everyone’s attention. By candlelight, his face was arresting. Its

Creator had original y shaped it to be a handsome one. But time and experience had hardened it into something raw and pagan. His voluptuous lips bore

a ruthless curve, his hair was a midnight tangle, and a thin scar ran the length of his strong, square jaw.

As tal as Nicholas and as massive as Lyon, he cut a compel ing figure—brawny, broad-chested, and soldier straight. Unsmiling, he faced them al

with his muscular arms tensed at his sides as if prepared to ward off an attack. Or to wage one.

Nicholas and Lyon were nearest to her, and she felt them bristle with aggression, ral ying to protect their family. Strangers rarely visited the

compound. Theirs was a smal clan with reason to be secretive.

“Stay back,” Lyon growled, stepping in front of Jane and Emma.

Emma peeked around him, watching as the interloper advanced into the light. He wore the same gray uniform as Carlo. Austere in design, it had

nine buttons aligned down its center, each made of some indeterminate metal mined in Else World. Oblong and plump, they had a sanguine cast and had

always reminded her of the grapes on the vines of the Satyr estate. A daggerlike weapon identical to Carlo’s hung at his hip.

If this man had been on the same side of the fighting as her husband, surely he was no threat to them. She glanced over at Nicholas and Raine. Al

three brothers had formed a physical barrier between him and their women, their bearings rife with animosity and suspicion.

“
Entrare, entrare
.” Only Carlo had brightened at the unknown man’s approach. There was a lightness in his step as he wove through the

assemblage in the vestibule to usher the gentleman—if he could be cal ed that—forward. “Calm yourselves,” he told the family. Slinging an arm across the

newcomer’s back, he companionably hooked his hand at the man’s opposite shoulder. Emma stared at that hand, astonished at how easily her normal y

standoffish husband had embraced this stranger.

“Everyone, this is—”

“Dominic Janus.” The deep timbre of the man’s voice superseded Carlo’s and sent prickles over Emma’s skin. His speech was tinged with an

accent she couldn’t place, and she briefly wondered what his native tongue sounded like.

“Guardians of portals and passageways,” she murmured.

Though she’d spoken softly, the stranger heard, and his eyes flashed in her direction. “My sect serves in the way yours does, though we guard the

gate between our worlds from its other side.”

The secret gate between Earth World and Else World, he meant, for it was hidden deep in the heart of the nearby forest on Satyr land. Nicholas,

Raine, Lyon, and their ancestors had secured it against trespass since ancient times.

Everyone visibly relaxed at the news of the visitor’s lineage, though something in the three Satyr siblings’ expressions remained dubious.

“Come, Dom, and meet my brothers,” Carlo effused. Though he liked to cal them such, his precise blood tie to the Satyr lords was actual y

unknown and was likely far more distant than a fraternal one.

After Carlo had presented the rest of the family, Jane surreptitiously elbowed him and nodded her way. Though Emma appreciated her sister’s

good intentions, her actions had only drawn attention to his oversight.

“Of course, of course.
Scusa,
darling.” Belatedly Carlo gestured Emma forward and held her to stand before him so she faced his friend. “And

lastly this is my lovely wife…Emma.” He sounded almost reluctant to claim her, and she cringed inwardly.

“Welcome to our home, signore.” Lord, the man was even more imposing up close. She peered up at Dominic through her lashes and found that

his gaze had fal en to her most prominent feature—her rounded bel y. It seemed to permeate the layers of taffeta and silk, and she fought the inclination to

hide the bulge of her unborn child under her palms.

She hadn’t ventured from the estate even once over the past month. Not since Carlo had gotten her with child. Therefore, aside from the family and

the servants, no one had witnessed her physical condition. Didn’t this man realize it was rude to stare so? Though she knew it was sil y, it embarrassed

her to think he might be dwel ing on the fact that her expanded waistline was the obvious result of copulation with her husband.

Silver eyes lifted at last to meet hers. “My pleasure,” he solemnly informed her.

The velvet rumble of his voice drove a shiver of awareness down her spine. She might not have Jane’s Fey ability to read strong emotions, but her

Human intuition told her she intrigued him more than the others did.

Something brushed her skirts, and she glanced down, relieved to have a reason to look away from Dominic. Lyon’s panthers had sidled closer.

Lured by the smel s of food from her kitchen, they no doubt hoped to sneak into the house while everyone was preoccupied. She stroked their silky heads,

and they angled their faces against her hand, marking her with their ownership.

“Wait your turns, you two,” she scolded softly. “You’l get leftovers as usual, after we’ve eaten.”

“Out!” Carlo commanded, pushing her aside with a brusque nudge and shooing the animals away with slaps upon their rumps. Liber, the larger of

the two, snapped at him with his spiked pearly teeth. Carlo drew back a hand to strike him more fiercely.

Before Emma could raise her own objections, Lyon caught Carlo’s arm with stern fingers and glared at him. Like his pets, Lyon had never quite

warmed to her husband.

Sensing imminent conflict, Juliette stepped between the two men and took Lyon’s arm, urging him toward the interior of the house.

Emma pasted on a smile. “Excel ent suggestion, Juliette. Let us al adjourn to the
sala da pranzo
,” she told the group at large. “Dinner is prepared

and waiting to be served.”

Turning, Emma went to the front door and gently coaxed the panthers outside. They went, grumbling in a way that struck her as similar to the

behavior of the men she and Juliette had just ushered down the corridor. A smal , genuine smile curved her lips at the comparison.

As she began to close the door behind the animals, a hand caught its edge. Dominic’s. His powerful warrior’s body leaned closer, and he braced