Immortal Becoming (31 page)

Warriors from all three species worked at each location map. The Tellus were tunneling under the compounds, making trenches around each building to determine if any had underground passageways that Sam might have been unaware of. The Aquaties were in the tunnels behind the Tellus checking for the structural integrity of the underground walls and tunnels. If they were only lined with lead, then the unified abilities of the Aquaties and the Tellus working together could penetrate into the walls themselves. Because of the cost and availability of platinum, a lot of the compound buildings could probably be breached from below ground.

The Volaticus were clearing the ground levels of trip wires, cameras, infrared motion sensors, and heat sensors. Once found, the devices could be put on energy circulations, keeping them from activating. They would also disable any communication devices they found, either satellite monitoring or closed circuit.

Jess had a quick moment for introductions with his family, before Innanna approached. ”I know it will be difficult to take your minds off the operation, but you need to blood-bond for the success of the mission.”

According to Jorie, there were secluded natural hot springs on the property, hand-in-hand they set out to find them.

“Do you ever feel like everything is happening too fast?” The sun filtering through the trees lit the highlights of Jess’s hair. Shane was still coming to terms with the idea this wonderful female would be his bloodmate forever. He could hardly blame her for her question.

“Until you.” He held both of his arms straight out from his sides and lifted his face to the sun filtering through the leaves. “I’ve always run to whatever comes next. Now I am just enjoying the moment.” He turned his gaze back to hers. “You say too fast, I say, thank the Fates you’re finally here. What took you so long?”

Tears filled her beautiful eyes, and he pulled Jess into his embrace, her cheek to his chest. One hand stroked her back while the other buried itself in the weight of her shimmering blonde hair. “We could see the spring easier from the air, Beauty. Will you fly with me?”

“Oh, yes, Shane.” She wrapped her arms around his neck, squeezing her eyes closed. Grinning Shane cradled her and gave a hard flap of his wings. Catching an updraft, he lifted them above the orchard trees.

“Open your eyes, Beauty.”

Jess slowly opened her eyes. They were flying just above the treetops. If she stretched out her foot, she could skim the tops. “Amazing! I’m king of the world.” Her joy-filled laugh echoed against his soul.

Shane took her to the limits of the energy weave. Jess brushed her fingertips across it, and it shimmered like a rainbow under her fingertips. “It’s beautiful. What is it?” Her expression was full of such innocent wonder, Shane thought his heart would burst out of his chest. She humbled him, excited him, and aroused him.

He could barely speak for the dente’s in his mouth, let alone think for the erection pounding behind his jeans. He did his best to answer her. “It is an energy weave. Suena and Lugal, our best weavers, placed it. They too are bloodmated. The weave camouflages the farm from prying human eyes; from outside the weave, this looks like the sleepy farm it has always been. It also will sense the different energies that approach. If human energy comes to it, it will flex in front of the human, continuing to hide what’s really there.”

“Like a giant invisibility cloak?”

“That’s how it would be to a human. To the enlightened, it is more of a warning. No entity with psychic energy can pass through the weave unannounced, not by land, sea, or air. The weave will not halt them, it will just announce them.” Spotting the spring just below them, Shane began to descend, smiling at her quick intake of breath. She hugged him tighter, pressing her lush breasts against his chest.

“I could so get used to this,” Jess’s breathed, her eyes flashing, her adrenals firing from the thrill of the controlled plunge to the ground.

“You will, my beauty,” Shane whispered, his lips brushing against the outer edge of her ear. She shivered against him in response. His feet touched the ground gently, and he set her feet in the edge of the spring’s heated water. “Even after you have wings, I would be happy to be your chariot.” Jess wiggled her toes in the warm water. The bottom mud squished between her toes and she smiled. He pressed his hand to the ache the sight of her created in his chest. The pressure of his heart pounding felt like a band tightening. She held him mesmerized

“Are you alright?” Stepping out of the water towards him, Jess cupped his cheek in her hand.

“You’re so beautiful.” Shane reached up, capturing her hand against his cheek and turning it to kiss the center of her palm. “You take my breath away when you smile like that, full of wonder. I’ve never seen anything so profoundly beautiful as you.” Her face relaxed, and Shane was again rewarded with her smile.

“Wanna know a secret?” she playfully whispered, one side of her mouth lifted in a grin. Shane nodded. “I think you’re beautiful too.”

He gave a small snort. “Males aren’t beautiful. We are manly and handsome. Hot, I think that is what you thought of me the first time you saw me. Yes, I remember. You thought, loudly I might add, ‘‘Oh, momma, that guy is hot. Change-my-panties hot.’” He rubbed his thumb across her full lower lip.

Two weeks would feel like an eternity. He had to hear her soft cries of pleasure once more before the call of duty took them from each other. Many Hulven died while Becoming, but Shane tried to keep his fear from ruining this moment.

Her mischievous grin was his only warning: Jess shifted, taking Shane’s balance from his elbow, and they began to roll. Warm water slapped against his back. Another roll submerged him on his back again. She kicked her legs and swam off into deeper water. The little yellow sundress she had put on before leaving her Mesa home turned sheer in the water, showing him the outline of the peaked nipples beneath. He groaned, his mouth watering, and his dentes fully emerged.

Shane worked to free himself from the wet denim encasing his legs, hindered by his boots. The siren laughed and splashed water at him. Shane finally tossed the offending jeans and boots to the grassy bank and launched himself at Jess. “Now you’re in trouble. I am going to spank that pretty little ass of yours.”

Squealing, Jess took off swimming hard, but Shane’s longer stokes caught up to her effortlessly. Grasping her ankle, he towed her toward him through the water. She splashed him again, and as Shane shook the water from his eyes, Jess, always one to take an advantage, used his hold on her ankle to nearly stand against. Both hands to his shoulders, she pushed him below the surface, then turned to swim away. Shane came up out of the water directly below her, lifting her midsection with one arm. Her ass just broke the surface before the smack of his hand came down on it.

“OH!” Startled, Jess opened her psyche fully to him. He could feel her nipples hard and aching, her womb clenched, her core pulsed. Did that just turn her on? Yes, he could tell it did. His shaft was practically whooping in joy at her reaction. She wiggled against Shane’s hold anew. Baiting him, she splashed him again.

Smack
. A second slap landed on her ass, followed by Shane rubbing the sting away. “Ohhhh.” The shiver of anticipation raced from her into him. She was close to orgasm. His eyes fell closed under the level of excitement his spanking created in her.

All humor gone, Jess turned in his arms “Get this dress off me. Now.”

Reaching to the seam of tiny pearled buttons between her lush breasts, Shane gave a hard tug,
RIP.
He reached lower to her now exposed belly button with the sparkle of a diamond hanging in it. One more tug,
RIP,
and he tore the material straight down the middle. She hadn’t worn a bra, something that had somehow escaped Shane’s notice until the dress had gotten wet. Her full breasts beckoning him, a call he had to answer. Lifting the perfect orb, he pulled the sweet berry of her nipple deep into the warm recess of his mouth. Jess let out a long moan of pleasure, her head falling back, arching into his mouth, her fingers digging into the back of his head, holding him to her. He tore away the strip of lace from between her legs, the tattered remains of her clothing floating around their entwined bodies.

Switching breasts, Shane guided them to a place where he was waist-deep in the spring. Jess rubbed her core against his erection. His hand behind her head, he pulled her into a kiss, swallowing her taste, drawing the heated oleander scent of her passion deep in his lungs. Shane released Jess’s upper body, and she floated before him, her long blond hair flowing in the water that surrounded her face like a halo. Her gold-filled green eyes flashed with passion, and her tiny tongue peeked out, licking her upper lip, tasting his kiss. Magnificent.

Keeping an arm beneath her hips, holding her core against his erection, Shane ran his hand down Jess’s body, memorizing her curves one last time. From her neck, his thumb following her pounding pulse, traveling down her chest and between her breasts, feeling the rise and fall of her heavy breathing. His fingers splayed across her belly, flipping the piercing that glittered up at him, rubbing the spot that, if she survived, would one-day carry his child. His fingers slid down to the folds of her female core. She was laid out for him. Open. Trusting. Wanting. His thumb gently circled the bundle of nerves. His hands shook with fear, and a lump formed in his throat.
Please, Fates, keep her safe,
he silently pleaded.

“Shane.” A sharp cry, her breath ragged. “Please. I need you.”

Floating in the warm water, surrounded by the heat of Jess’s body Shane knew without a doubt if Jess didn’t survive what was coming he would join her in death to be with her. His other half. “I love you, Beauty.” Placing the tip of his erection to her tight, sweet opening, Shane bit into his wrist and then placed it to her lips, groaning when Jess’s pink tongue peeked out and licked his coppery rich blood. Then she sucked his wrist, sealing her mouth against his flesh, drawing his essence into her. Holding her hips from below to keep her in place and keep her body afloat, Shane gave one hard thrust, burying himself to the hilt within her. Her cry strangled, she exploded against him, around him, pulsing, milking him.

“Lift your wrist to me, Beauty. Bond to me.” His words were barely discernible, spoken through the heavy weight of his dentes throbbing in beat to his pulse and his thrusts in and out of Jess’s perfect body. His voiced deepened to a near solid vibration in his lust. His blood coursed through her. He relished the knowledge that she could feel everything he felt, his passion and his love for her, forevermore.

Jess raised her arm out of the water, watching him through slit lids. He leaned in, kissed her palm, and then moving lower to her pulse, striking into her vein. Brilliant light filled his vision as their bodies screamed out in passion together. The power of the union caused her to make one long draw at Shane’s blood flowing into her as hers flowed into him. Every muscle in his body stretched to nearly snapping. He felt her womb clench to a nearly painful point. Higher their bodies climbed, reaching for the climatic release, drawing from each other’s blood, each other’s emotions, each other’s sensations, each other’s energies. The release crashed over them together, and they cried out in the violence of the climax. Jet after jet of his seed pumped deep within Jess’s clutching, pulsing core. “Oh God, I love you,” she whispered, her breath gone. They cleaved to each other, trying to regain their breath.

Several minutes passed before Shane could seal their bite wounds. Jess held his face between her hands. “Stop torturing yourself. We will get through this. I’m too stubborn to die. You’re not going to lose me.”

“You’re feeling my fears.” Fear wasn’t an emotion familiar to him. He was a battle warrior, yet the thought of her facing her Becoming filled him with terror. He understood death, but this was a perspective on the fragility of life.
Her life
.

Jess nodded, “I know this is dangerous, for
both
of us. We knew that when we agreed to this sacrifice. I can feel how honorable you are, and this would be an honorable death for a worthy cause. But I don’t believe the Fates everyone talks about intend for us to die. Innanna said we are the hope of our species. Let’s hold on to those words.”

Leaning his forehead against hers, grinning, Shane realized Jess was right. She was both wise and beautiful. Silently thanking the Fates for the miracle of her, he surrendered his fear and focused on enjoying the few moments they had together.

Energized, they headed back to the shoreline. Passing a piece of her torn panties, Jess lifted her fingers to her mouth. “What am I going to wear?”

“Nothing suits you fine.” Shane chuckled when Jess glared at him. He noticed fighting leathers and moccasins sitting on one of the rocks. “Looks like clothing is already covered.”

Blushing, Jess looked back at him. “Who left those here? Do you think they saw us?” She was biting her bottom lip, shifting from foot to foot, looking around to see if anyone was watching from the woods.

“Beauty, does it really matter? We love each other. We bonded that love. It was beautiful. I am not ashamed.” Holding her face by her chin, he let his love fill her through the new bond. Jess relaxed. Taking a deep breath, she picked up the clothes that had been left for them, including a pair of light-tan, leather tie-up pants. She looked from the pants to Shane.