Immortal Need (10 page)

“Piece-of-cake mission, right?” Sevani asked, laughing.

“Yeah, aren’t you always the lucky one?” Lei tossed back.

“Let’s get all this stuff put up in the house. I brought motion detectors, video cameras, sensors, and even some nasty surprises for anyone who comes on the land,” Valerie added, rubbing her hands together.

“That should be enough to alert whoever is coming after her not to try again. We just have to get her to survive for seven days and deal with the rest later,” Sevani said. “I didn’t get a chance to thank you guys for coming, but thank you.”

“Anytime. We’re family, and that’s what families do,” Alexander said then.

“So, let’s get ready, because I’m sure that someone is coming for her soon, and Ayah will be awake. She will have plenty of questions. Obviously, I prefer for you not to add I am the one who is supposed to kill her.”

Valerie looked at him questioningly. “I get the feeling you like this woman,” she asked quietly.

“I do,” Sevani answered, not having to think about it.

“And it’s more than her being Nila?” she asked.

“I don’t have the luxury of looking at it too closely. I just need to keep her alive for now.”

“Oh, I’m going to love having girl talk!” she answered.

“Give me a break,” Sevani groaned, laughing. He knew that, no matter what, they would find a way to get through this.

“I think I have an idea,” Alexander piped up.

“What is it?” Sevani asked.

“I don’t want to say any more until I’ve thought it through. Once I’ve gotten some results, I’ll get back to you. I may need to be gone for a day or so. Just hold the fort down. I’ll be back,” Alexander finished and stalked out of the room without another word.

“What the hell?” Sevani asked.

“Let him go. You know he won’t say more until he’s thought about it. If he says he’s got an idea, then he does. Just let him work through it. For now, we’ll do what we need to. And maybe give you a little free time to get closer to the human,” Valerie added.

“Val,” Sevani warned.

“Oh, don’t take that tone with me. You know you want her.”

“Freya also stated that she wanted her pure when the time came,” Sevani returned.

“Uh, hello, aren’t we now in the business of rebelling against the goddess?” Valerie asked incredulously. “Then that means you do what the hell you want. If you want her, take her. We all deserve a bit of happiness.” She slid a look to Lei.

“Yeah, I think we do,” Lei returned, and Sevani felt like a weight was lifted off his shoulders.

What if? What if he could take Ayah for his own? Make her his? What if he could dream that they would survive this and that he could save her, his own skin, Valerie’s and Lei’s? What if they did the impossible and defeated a goddess? If they could, then he would never let Ayah go. The sudden determination that flared through him as he put monitors and screens around the room buoyed him. That was exactly what he was going to do. If he was strong enough to defy a goddess, then he was strong enough to bring a human woman to her knees. And gods knew he was going to have fun doing it.

Chapter Seven

Ayah curled deeper into the warm pillow beneath her. She couldn’t remember a time she had slept so well. Ever since her father became ill, she’d become accustomed to being alert at night. His hospice nurse left around five in the evening, and then it was Ayah’s job to take care of him. She had become used to sleeping with one eye open. Now she felt safe, protected, and watched over. Her pillow kept her warm and was both hard and soft under her cheek. It thumped with a soothing, steady beat her heart matched. She stroked the pillow. It felt like hot silk over steel, unbroken until she sensed a satin-covered nub under her fingertips. She rubbed her fingers across it again, and her pillow suddenly shifted on a swift intake of breath.

She found herself flipped over and pinned by a half-naked Sevani as she struggled to open her eyes. God, he was strong. Sevani rose above her like an avenging angel. His blue-gray gaze pierced her soul, and an electric shock zinged through her system. She was on fire as his legs slid between hers and he rested in the cradle of her thighs. He felt so unbelievably good. His full lips were set in a hard line, and she could see a tick in his jaw where the muscles worked. She thought for a moment about what he felt when he looked down at her, and then his big, warm hands framed her face, and she stopped breathing. She could do nothing but focus on the slow descent of his face toward hers. He lifted her face to meet his mouth.

“Ayah,” he whispered against her mouth right before his lips claimed hers, and she crumbled. If he had been lost to passion for his dead wife, then she would have been able to fight. If he had called to Nila, she would have kicked his ass from her bed no matter what her treacherous body wanted. But he hadn’t. As his soft but demanding mouth sought to conquer hers, he had spoken her name. He wanted Ayah. He wanted her. She didn’t have the willpower to deny him, and she didn’t want to.

His moist tongue slid into her mouth smoothly as if it belonged there. He tasted of lust and spice. Her heart pounded as a calloused hand gripped the back of her head, forcing her mouth tighter to his, and his other hand squeezed between her and the bed to grasp her bottom. He pinned her hard against him as he tilted his head to deepen the kiss. The first kiss they shared hadn’t felt like this. There was a promise here of pleasure beyond their stolen moments against her door. Somehow she knew that Sevani intended to take her, and she was powerless to stop him. If she were honest with herself, and she could be in the privacy of her own mind, she had wanted this. She’d been waiting for this moment between them. She hadn’t been satisfied with their moments on the wall before. She wanted to know what his possession would be like. For good or bad, she wanted to have this. She wanted to experience this so that, on the nights she was lonely, long after he was gone, she could pull it out to warm her. She would have it to sustain her. She wanted to experience passion, true passion, for once in her life. Sevani could give that to her. He would make any male pale in comparison. He already had.

“Goddesses do not know the worship I will set upon you. They will know what it is to envy a human woman,” he whispered and then kissed his way down her jawline. He stopped kissing her skin long enough to help her take off the T-shirt she had put on earlier, but his mouth wasn’t gone for long. He moved back to her neck as soon as her shirt was out of the way. As he sucked at her pulse, her toes curled with the sensation. He massaged her back with slow circles. He had deadly hands, hands that could, and had, killed men. But he touched her with awe-inspiring care.

Her muscles went liquid as his coarse fingers dug into her flesh. He found the clasp of her bra and upended it with deft fingers. He pulled her bra away from her, rising up slightly on his knees. His hot gaze raked down her flesh, and her nipples hardened in response. But as he looked his fill, so did she. If she had not known he was a warrior before, she could see it on his body now. There was a large
X
scar across his chest. Some part of her mind was functioning enough to wonder how an immortal warrior could be scarred, but even that thought obliterated as the urge to kiss the spot took hold. She wanted to feel the scar against her lips, under her tongue.

“Gods, you are beautiful,” he said roughly above her, and the decision was made.

She gripped his sides and pulled herself up to his body as he held himself up on his hands. She sucked in a breath as her nipples touched the plane of his stomach, and she touched her mouth to his scar. Her world stopped. So many memories flashed through her. A mud-packed house with two small windows in the front, and a door, loomed in her vision, and she knew there were two more in the back that she couldn’t see. She imagined where she washed their clothes, cooked their meals, and had planted vegetables in the backyard. Somehow she understood this was the house she shared with Sevani when she’d been Nila. Flash after flash showed her their time together, their love. And then he had come home, his smile the same as always, his touch inflaming her, and she’d lain with him. Then everything had turned dark when another Sevani, her Sevani, entered in a rage. The other man, now looking twisted and evil, disappeared, and she met Sevani’s sword. Ayah experienced the pain, the sense of loss, and the shame that she had given herself to another. When she’d died, she could think of nothing but getting back to him, loving him, and needing him. She’d ignored the urge of her soul to travel to the afterlife. She wanted Sevani, and she wouldn’t let him go. Ever! So she’d passed through lives, over and over again, searching for Sevani, unable to rest until she was his again.

And then the memories shifted. She watched Sevani in the hands of a blond-haired woman in a white dress and a golden necklace. She ranted and raved, her tresses flying around her unnaturally as Sevani screamed. Ayah watched his skin boil away only to be rejuvenated. Over and over again he was tortured, and never once did he stop screaming Nila’s name. Finally the woman thrust her hand into Sevani’s chest, blood spraying, and pulled out a glowing, white orb. Ayah didn’t understand what was happening, but Sevani wilted then, gave in to the cruel woman, and said he would do her bidding. Ayah was crying by the time the memories faded away, and Sevani clutched her to his chest. He shifted her and then his mouth crashed into hers. His mouth tasted of desperation now. Every swipe of his tongue was to conquer, every glide of his lips to plunder. White-hot desire sparked through her, chasing the sadness away. His touch sent shocks of light through her. Somehow, now, his touch was different, deeper. She dug her nails into his shoulders, holding on for dear life, as she rebuilt him with all that she had.

He laid her back on the bed, pressing his body into her. His hands were rough as he pushed at her pants and underwear. She kept kissing him as she kicked away her clothes and ran her hands over the X on his chest and down the rippled waves of his abdominal muscles. He tightened under her touch. She could feel the indents above his hip bones that led to his groin, where his muscles were defined. Devil’s horns. She always loved a man who had devil’s horns. She would trace them with her tongue later. For now, she wanted to get him out of his clothes. Nimble fingers found his belt buckle, and she quickly undid it and the button underneath. His shaft, long and thick, pressed against his zipper. She could feel the heat of it through the denim as if he were on fire. She pulled his zipper down, and his cock hit her stomach. A smear of liquid burned her as surely as an inferno. He groaned into her mouth, tilting his head until their teeth almost clashed together. But she didn’t mind. She needed this. They may have wanted a slow, easy burn just moments before, but now something had happened. She could feel her urgency to have him inside her mirrored in his kiss and in the grip of his fingers.

He wrapped his arms around her, one palm cradling her head as he kissed her, and she pushed his pants over his hips. She helped him as best she could to get his pants down as he kicked them off his body. And then he was free. She ran her hands over the broad expanse of his back, memorizing the dips and curves of his muscles, loving how they flexed and tightened as he moved. She found the slope of his buttocks and gripped the globes, pulling him tighter into the cradle of her thighs. She gasped into his mouth. His cock slid against her clit as if it had always belonged. He growled against her lips, rolling his hips. She clung to him, matching his motions. She knew the pleasure he could give her, knew the reckless abandon he could incite. She wanted more, much more—deeper, harder, and stronger—from him.

“No, not again, I need you. I need…”

He trailed off as he broke away from her. He gripped her hips with rough hands and pushed away from her.

“Let me taste you.” He palmed her wrists and dragged them above her head, holding them in place on the bed. He kissed and sucked his way down her throat, over her collarbone, and then to the curve of one breast.

“Priceless. Mine,” he urged and then sucked her nipple into his mouth.

She arched beneath him, legs wrapping around him, as he laved the tip. His other hand held her hips firmly to the bed, away from him, and she felt the loss. She was in agony. Her body was throbbing with need. The air was filled with the scent of them, of their essence, and she wanted to wallow in it. Her room, always so peaceful to her in soft yellow and white, had become something else. Everything dimmed until she thought they were surrounded in darkness and only Sevani and she remained. Even the scratch of her covers against her back was sensual. She shifted as he switched his attentions to the opposite breast. He played there, nipping around her nipple before sucking it into his mouth. He bit down on it gently, and her back left the bed. She was as tight as a bowstring, her only grounding points his hands at her hip and wrists. Her head thrashed above him. She had never felt pleasure like this. Nothing had ever felt so right. It was as if her body was made for him.

“I need just a bit more. Are you wet for me, Ayah? Do you crave me as much as I crave you?”

“Yes,” she shouted, wanting him inside of her.

“Let me be sure,” he whispered back and kissed his way down to her navel. His tongue dipped in slowly before twirling around. She had never thought her navel to be an erogenous zone, but Sevani had proven her wrong. It was like a straight line from it to her core. He chuckled as she moaned louder and then continued down. He bit at the soft curve of her stomach, murmuring something like, “Thank the gods,” but then he moved beyond, and she didn’t think to ask anymore. He let go of her wrists, and she sank her fingers into his hair just as he positioned his shoulders between her thighs. He spread her lips apart with soft fingers and took one slow lick from the base of her to her pulsing nub.

“Ambrosia, fit for the gods,” he growled and then covered her with his mouth. She screamed as he tongued her clit, flicking and sucking the nub in intervals. She felt him shift, and then a thick digit was pushing against her sensitive walls. He pumped once, twice, and added a second finger. She rode his fingers, her hips rising and falling on the bed as he fed from her. She lost all sense of time as pleasure washed over her. He didn’t rush, slowing down when she felt she was ready to explode. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t think as he played sweet music on her. He devoured her as if he could not get enough of her, as if he were determined to keep her for more than tonight. Something in her clicked, her heart shuddering. She could not dare to love a man like him. She couldn’t dare tie herself to someone who was immortal, who would leave her. She had to stop, had to slow down. This couldn’t be. This just couldn’t.