Under His Wings (18 page)

“That’s not possible.” Damn, he sounded like a broken
record. Those three words should be branded on his forehead. “I
dreamed
of her. She was…”

Nicolai allowed his mind to traveled back five hundred years
to a time he had purposefully avoided. Seeing Pria for the first time in the
open-air market. The joy that had leapt in his heart when she smiled shyly at
him. When Nicolai had told her he loved her, confessed he’d dreamed of her,
Pria had thrown her arms around him and hugged him tight.

“I’ve always dreamed of this moment,” she had whispered.

Oh shit.

“Your bondmate, Nico,” Bastien murmured. “You dreamed of
your bondmate. But not Pria.”

It took several long moments before the gravity of Bastien’s
statement sank into Nicolai’s head. Disbelief, anger, joy—the emotions rioted
through him. He was swept up in a whirlwind of confusion, and when its chaotic
winds ceased he would be forever changed.

“Tamar.” He stared at his friend, his voice as rough as the
gravel that seemed to line his esophagus. “I dreamed of Tamar.”

Bastien dipped his chin in acknowledgment. “Tamar doesn’t
look like Pria—Pria looked like Tamar, your future bondmate.”

Nicolai back-pedaled several steps and sank onto the swing
Bastien had vacated. He peered into the darkness beyond the porch, his thoughts
once more returning to the past.

Pria and her family had come from a small community in
northern Italy. Her parents had been flattered and proud when the prince of
their people had courted their daughter. He’d assumed Pria shared his gift
because he’d dreamed of her and she hadn’t disabused him of the idea. Even told
him she’d dreamed of the moment…

But what if she’d meant
envisioned
, not literally
dreamed? And he, in his delight at finding his mate, had misinterpreted her
words? Because he’d wanted a mate—
his
bondmate—so badly. He’d been tired
of being alone. Of witnessing others finding their companions. Of watching
others mate, bear young. He’d yearned for someone’s face to light up when he
came home. He’d craved the intimacy, the sharing. Longed for his other half.

And now, staring the truth in the face, he wondered if his
assumption—not to mention his status as royalty and
Dimios
—had made it
difficult or too intimidating for Pria to confess her deception. Of course he
would have eventually discovered her dishonesty when her hippogryph didn’t
emerge. As there wasn’t a definitive time when a female experienced the change,
maybe Pria had hoped by the time Nicolai realized she’d lied, love and
forgiveness would’ve trumped his fury.

The what-ifs were numerable and irrelevant. At this moment
he couldn’t even summon the anger or a sense of betrayal over Pria and her
family’s duplicity.

Not when his true mate—the woman he’d fantasized about for
five hundred years—lay sleeping upstairs. Awe filled him. Tamar—fierce, brave,
beautiful Tamar was his bondmate. The other half of his soul.

And her death could be days away.

Terror capsized the joy. How fucked up was it that while
he’d vowed to protect her from Evander, he was the true threat to her life?

“So we can save her,” Nicolai said, lifting his gaze to
Bastien. Desperation raked at his chest, squeezed his throat. “If Tamar accepts
me, chooses to mate with me, she’ll survive the change?”

“Theoretically, yes. But Nico…” Bastien paused, the beat of
silence heavy with concern, “mating is about full acceptance—physical,
emotional and with the soul. She may love you, is definitely attracted to you,
but is she willing to surrender her all, including her humanity, to bond with
you and your hippogryph? The body—that’s biological. But submitting her life to
yours? That’s a choice.”

Nicolai closed his eyes.

My choice was taken away and I panicked. I know what it’s
like to be caged like an animal, dependent on my jailer. I want life on my
terms, not someone else’s.

Her words came back to haunt him. Whether he’d intended to
or not, he’d snatched her choice away just as surely as Kyle had. Mating him
would be caging her, cuffing her to him for the length of their existence. To
Tamar that would be the worst betrayal. He couldn’t do that to her. Couldn’t
look down into her tawny tiger gaze to find bitterness and pain.

She’d been through hell and back. Had fought to regain the
independence, freedom and normalcy that had been denied to her for three years.
The only reason she’d agreed to Nicolai’s protection was to regain the life
that had almost been lost.

Choosing him would mean losing her life.

And walking away from him would mean losing her life.

* * * * *

Nicolai climbed the stairs, the fear that had propelled him
down the flight an hour ago now carrying the sharper metallic taste of despair.
The length of the hallway stretched out before him like the last mile of a dead
man. At the end, when he entered his bedroom, he would face the death of his
mate or the death of his heart.

The revelations of this night tumbled and twisted in his
head. Every time he tried to grab one and analyze it, it slipped out of his
grasp. The truths, the lies—they were too much for him to comprehend.

Except for one.

The human woman he loved would die in a matter of hours or
days if he didn’t convince her to give up her world and accept him and his
existence. An existence of violence, uncertainty and danger. She’d survived a
plane crash and abusive ex-boyfriend, endured years of physical therapy to
recapture a blessedly boring, normal life.

He chuckled, the low, bitter rumble echoing in the silent
hall.

Her piece-of-shit ex may have abused her, but Nicolai could
very well kill her.

Reaching the bedroom door, he clutched the knob, turned it
and entered the room. Immediately his eyes went to the figure on the bed,
huddled under the blankets. The fire had dimmed to glowing embers and he padded
across the room and crouched next to the fireplace. He grabbed the poker and kindled
the flames before adding a few more pieces of wood. After a couple of minutes,
he rose to his feet, satisfied.

He turned to the bed.

Tamar’s curls spread over the white pillow like a fantastic
pinwheel of gold, copper and brown. He couldn’t help imagining what her
hippogryph would look like. Petite with bronze wings? Would banded
sandy-and-white feathers cover her breast? He could picture her tawny eyes in a
regal, delicately rounded head.

A roar rolled in his gut, rushed up his chest, but Nicolai
trapped it in his throat.

Time was precious. Bastien didn’t know how long before her
transformation from human to hippogryph would begin. But from the increasing
frequency of Tamar’s symptoms, he believed it wouldn’t be long. Nicolai tamped
down his anger, sorrow and worry and shoved it aside. His first priority was
keeping Tamar alive.

By any means necessary.

He released the button on his jeans and lowered the zipper.
In seconds, he’d stripped the denim down his legs and slid under the covers,
gathered Tamar close. He held her within the cradle of his body, his thighs
cupping hers, his chest pressed to the slender line of her back. Her sweet
scent of hyacinth and sun-baked earth filled his nose, as much a comfort as her
soft curves. Tenderly, he placed a kiss to the wild profusion of spirals, slid
an arm under her head and tucked the other hand between her plump breasts.

What he wouldn’t give to have a thousand more nights where
he returned to her, receiving the calm and strength her presence provided. And
yet he would forsake every last one of them to have her live.

“Nico.” She stirred in his arms and the low murmur of his
name stroked over his skin.

“I’m here.” He kissed her head again, inhaling her special
perfume deep, so if the day came when he had to walk away it would be branded
in his olfactory memory.

With a husky hum, she stretched, arching her spine and
pushing her ass against his abdomen. His cock, already hungry for her again,
thickened and stretched along with her. It pounded with the blood filling it
and Nicolai couldn’t prevent the reflexive jerk of his hips.

Tamar turned and shifted closer, cushioning her breasts to
his chest and gliding her thigh over his. The heat of her open pussy called to
him—its warmth an erotic invitation he couldn’t ignore. She twined her arms
around his neck, hooked her foot behind his leg and rolled backward, bringing
him with her.

Needing no further encouragement, he came over her and moved
between her thighs. His cock nestled against her soft belly, the liquid fire of
her pussy dampening the base and his balls. A hungry growl rumbled in the back
of her throat and his heart leaped then dropped when her animalistic purr
vibrated through him. Her hips undulated beneath him and he surrendered to her
siren’s lure.

He crushed his mouth down on hers, plunging his tongue
between her lips and taking the sweetness that lay beyond. If the clash of his
lips, teeth and tongue was a bit desperate, he couldn’t help it. A tiny voice
whispered this could be the last time they were together like this—he had to
take everything she offered and hold it in his heart for the day he could no
longer stroke her cheek or sip at her mouth.

His fingers curled into the pillow on either side of her
head as he ravaged her lips. He nipped and soothed then plundered and raided.
Tamar lifted her head, meeting him stroke for stroke, giving even as she
demanded and took.

“Nico.” She tore her mouth away from his, her breathless
gasps small explosions in the quiet of the room. Her fingers tunneled through
his hair, gripped and tugged, telling him without words what she needed,
desired from him. Planting one last kiss on the corner of her mouth, he slid
lower, his teeth scraping over her chin, down her slender neck to her chest
bone. Slowly, he retraced the path he forged, licking the tiny abrasions before
returning to her beautiful breasts with their dark, pointed tips.

Propping his weight on one elbow, he cupped a mound and
whisked the pad of his thumb over the nipple. She bowed under him, a keening
cry escaping her. He repeated the caress, circling the nub before pinching it
lightly. His name exploded from between her lips.

“I love when you say my name,” he murmured then dipped his
head and took the hard tip in his mouth. Her fingers twisted and the small bite
of pain on his scalp raced from his head to his cock. He sucked harder, lashing
the nipple unmercifully with his tongue, circling then tugging on her flesh.
Whispered pleas filled his ears, desperate petitions to suck harder, give her
more. He complied, switching breasts. He raked the edge of his teeth over the
distended peak, adding a hint of pain to her pleasure.Tamar released a
needy moan and Nicolai returned it. Refusing to leave her other breast
neglected, he rolled the tip between his thumb and forefinger, mimicking the
actions of his tongue.

He abandoned the soft mounds and traveled lower still, down
her taut belly, past the shallow pool of her navel and toward the nest of tight
bronze curls. Her cream glistened on the strands, making them gleam like wet
gold. His mouth watered for a taste of that intoxicating blend of sweet juice
and musky sex.

He nuzzled her dark-pink clit. Her hips bucked and he
murmured before closing his lips over the small bundle of nerves. She cried
out, writhed. Grasping her wild hips, he pinned her down to the mattress and
laved the sensitive flesh, teasing and tasting. Groaning, he swiped his tongue
through the wet slit of her pussy, gathering more of that delicious cream.
Damn, there was nothing to compare with the taste of her. Not the most
succulent, ripest fruit or the strongest, most potent alcohol. If he could
feast on her flesh for the remainder of his existence, he would never starve,
never wish for more.

Taking a plump lip between his teeth, he scored it lightly
before sucking it between his lips. Tamar’s thighs tightened around his head
but he moved his hands from her hips to her inner thighs and pushed them wider.
He wedged his shoulders in the vee and lifted her legs over them so her heels
pressed into his back.

Her fingers fell from his head to his shoulders and dug into
his skin. With a growl of pleasure at the minute sting, he returned to her
pussy and, after one more sweep through her slit and over her swollen lips,
bent his head and thrust his tongue into her hot core.

The hard stroke seemed to shatter something in her. She
shuddered beneath him, her wails reaching the ceiling. With a muttered curse,
he adjusted his hold on her thighs, spread them even wider and dove deeper into
her grasping sex. The tiny muscles spasmed around his tongue, trying to grab at
the invader and milk it dry.

“So sweet,” he growled, lifting his head and placing a kiss
to the engorged clit that peeked from between her lips. “So fucking sweet.”

“God, Nico,” she pleaded and gasped as he circled her clit
and tapped it with his tongue. “Make me come. I need to—” She loosed a high
piercing scream as he plunged two fingers deep within her sex.

Shit, she was wild and so damn gorgeous as she raced after
her pleasure. She held nothing back, her hips rolling and bucking as he
finger-fucked her. He withdrew then thrust forward, twisting his wrist and
screwing her deep and hard.

When she came it was a wonder to watch. She threw her head
back against the pillows, her neck and spine arched so tight he almost feared
they would snap. Her pussy clamped down on his fingers like a vise and her
honey flowed over his skin, bathing him.

As the shudders that racked her body eased and her harsh
breathing slowly quieted, he reluctantly left her pussy. But not before flexing
his fingertips over the small pouch of flesh behind her clit. She moaned and
trembled.

Rising to his knees, he stared down at her, awed and
humbled. This female was his—was created and born for him.