My Immortal (18 page)

It was amazing to Marley that she’d actually slept at all, yet she must have, because she jerked out of a dark, suffocating nightmare when the door to her room opened.

God, if it was Rosa, she was going to scream.

Maybe if she pretended she was dead, Rosa would leave her alone and Marley could attempt to slink back off the property for the second time.

Or she could get her butt out of bed, thank Damien for the night before, and leave with her head held high like a big girl. Like a queen.

“Good morning.”

It wasn’t Rosa. It was the man himself. Marley forced her eyes open, but didn’t bother to lift her head from the pillow. She must have slept with clenched muscles, because every inch of her body ached, and her butt felt like she’d taken on a marathon with no previous training. Watching Damien cross the room, a smile on his face, she wasn’t sure if she was grateful or not that his mood from the night before seemed to have passed. It was easier to stay angry than to forgive and expose herself all over again.

“Hi.” Let him read anything into that. Marley dug into the corner of her eyes, wiping a stray lash out of the way. “What’s up?” She’d prefer to still be attempting to sleep rather than lying there worrying and wondering why he’d turned his back on her after coming in her mouth. Though she supposed she knew why. He hadn’t been ready and she’d forced the issue, taken his desire and used it against his emotions.

It hadn’t been fair of her, and she was sorry for it.

He stood next to her, striped button-up shirt undone, black pants on. “I need to go into town for a meeting. They refused to do it online.”

“Okay.” A note to her explaining would have sufficed as far as she was concerned. Marley yawned and pulled the sheet up higher, covering the thigh that had been exposed.

“And before I went, I wanted to make something clear.”

Not sure what to say, knowing an apology wasn’t right, determined not to sound needy or weird or clingy, she kept her mouth shut, flicking her hair out of her eyes. She needed a haircut.

“I don’t want you to leave. I know I was an asshole last night and I’m sorry. There are things about me you don’t know, can’t understand, but I want you to stay. I want you with me.”

“That’s it?” Marley watched him, the way he stood straight but not rigid, expression remorseful yet still confident. She mostly felt wary, displeased with her own reactions to him. If they were going to do this, she had to be honest, she had to remember the goal was her pleasure, not her attempting to heal him.

“I can’t give you any more than that.”

“I didn’t ask for any more than that.” Marley rolled onto her back, ran her eyes up and down the length of him. He was so damn good looking.

“No, I don’t suppose you did.”

“No.” Marley twirled a finger around a strand of hair, studying him, making him wait even when she already knew her answer. When he didn’t break eye contact, but met her stare straight on, bold, she wet her lips. “I’ll stay. Because I’m in control.”

His nostril flared. “I think you’re right.”

“Now get over here and give me a kiss before you leave.”

The corner of his mouth went up. “Yes, ma’am.” Knee on the mattress, he crawled up the bed, pinning the sheet against her, forcing her legs apart. Damien brushed her hair off her face and descended over her, giving her a hot, deep kiss.

Marley gave herself into it, groaned, passed that control right back over to him. Or not necessarily control, but direction. This was what she wanted and he would give it to her. Damien buried his lips in her neck, back to her mouth, slipped his tongue into her ear, ran over the front of her sleep shirt. The sheet was yanked down, kicked out of the way, panties gone with fast hard jerks, his belt clanging as he undid it and his zipper.

No touching, no prepping, no easy, soft, coaxing words or teasing touches with his tongue. He just pushed into her, hard and demanding.

Marley fell back on the pillow, shocked, thighs falling open farther as the tight, thrilling pressure ripped a moan from her. Her body hadn’t been ready, but now she moistened for him, growing slicker with each thrust, her hip caught by the sheet, her fingers digging into the mattress.

She meant to say something, to guide or praise or protest, but all she did was burst out with short exhalations of hot air with each powerful push, his body pounding against hers. Turning her head left and right, squirming, she looked toward the gallery, saw the sun was coming up, peeking through the silk draperies, and she gripped the sheet, mind empty and full and ferocious with the pleasure of his touch.

Damien cupped her cheek, forced her face back forward. “Look at me.”

He was deep, so far inside she wasn’t sure she could take it, the pleasure acute and agonizing, elemental. Heels slipping, arm up in the air, Marley was overwhelmed by the sensations, the intensity, the feeling that he was everywhere in her, from head to toe, taking her, stroking, electric. His breath blasted over her, and she returned it, their lips brushing but not kissing, his forehead resting on hers, pressing, eyes sinking into her as her own lost focus.

The entire world lost clarity, and in the hot cocoon of his body over hers, she climaxed, jerking up, silent, arching into him, a shudder sliding from shoulder to shoulder, her thighs clamping onto his.

Damien came right after her, with tight, gritted teeth, forehead grinding down into hers.

Then they were panting, sweat trickling between them, shirts rumpled and lips moist. He was heavy on top of her, but Marley didn’t care. She stared up at him, with no words, but no awkwardness either.

If they both walked away right that minute and never spoke again, she would be content. That was the best sex she’d ever had in her life, primal and raw, and that was hers to keep forever.

“How was that for a kiss good-bye?” he asked, finally pulling back slightly. Whatever hesitation he’d been grappling with the night before, this was clearly his way of showing her he was over it.

“It worked for me.”

“Good. Me too.” Damien peeled himself off her, leaving her bare chest glistening, T-shirt shoved around her neck. “I’ll be done around noon. Want to go to lunch with me?”

“Sure. Should I meet you somewhere?” Marley was impressed with herself. She sounded casual. Hell, she even felt casual. He was still in the process of disengaging his penis from her, and yet there she was having an utterly inane conversation like they did that every day, and it felt perfectly normal.

Damien kissed the right corner of her mouth. Then the left. “It seems a waste for you to drive in separately and then have to follow me right back home. Why don’t you pack a bag and we’ll spend the night in my city house.”

“You have a city house?” Why did that surprise her? It shouldn’t, yet it did.

“Yes. On Esplanade, the edge of the French Quarter. I don’t go there as much as I used to.”

Marley gripped his lapels and gave him a light kiss. “Sounds good. Just tell me where to meet you. And make sure you change your shirt before you leave.”

“You don’t think sex and sweat are good scents for a boardroom?” The corner of his mouth went up and he peeled the shirt off, pushing up on his knees.

“Probably not.” He had an amazing chest, smooth and muscular. She indulged herself by squeezing his biceps a little. Nice, very nice.

“What are you going to do today?” he asked, getting out of bed and rubbing the back of his head.

“I’m going to stay in bed, just like this, for at least another hour. Then I’m going to move my right leg.”

Damien laughed. “Perfect plan. You make me jealous.”

If he had anything else to say, she didn’t hear it, because Marley drifted back into sleep, a rich, thick sleep void of dreams and deeply satisfying.

Marley wondered if anyone looked at her and knew that she’d had earth-shattering sex just hours earlier. That she still felt that languid afterglow coursing through her. Did they know she was having an affair, that she was doing what she knew intellectually was morally wrong, a sin some would even say, yet what felt so right?

Is this what appealed to her sister, this secret satisfaction, this walking around knowing she’d been naughty, looking at people and thinking
I had sex today. Did you?

There was no future in these feelings, no way she and Damien could go beyond that morning, but for the day, Marley wanted to just enjoy it, to remember the feeling of him over her, in her. Her skin prickled in the hot sun as she strolled down the sidewalk, having haphazardly taken a parking spot she’d seen on St. Anne’s, and walked toward the restaurant Damien had directed her to.

“Out for a stroll?” an older man asked her as he watered down the sidewalk in front of his tobacco shop.

“Yes. It’s a beautiful day.” And she was Snow White, birds singing, bunnies blinking, squirrels chattering around her feet. She smiled at the man, content. In the next few days, she was going home and she was going to start the adoption process. But until then she was Damien du Bourg’s lover, and she was going to enjoy that.

Damien was standing outside, in front of the black awning, talking on his cell phone, hand in his pocket. When he saw her, he smiled. As she approached, he was hanging up. He leaned forward, slipping his phone into a pocket, and he kissed her.

“You look gorgeous,” he murmured. “Like a woman well fucked.”

Marley let him nuzzle her ear, enjoying the hard, grizzly feeling of his unshaven chin on her soft flesh. “What a coincidence. Because I am.”

“I should be ashamed of myself. I should feel bad for leading you into such base behavior. But I don’t.”

“I don’t either.” Marley laughed, moving out of his touch, feeling light and confident and desirable. “And I’m hoping you’ll debase me again later in this city house of yours.”

Damien watched Marley sashay away from him in a floral skirt, tossing her hair over her shoulder as she reached for the door of the restaurant. He had to remind himself that this wasn’t real. That her attraction to him was because of the power of the Grigori, that she was allowing him to strip down her moral boundaries because of the temptation of lust.

Yet something in him kept saying it was different. Marley had been able to resist him, had been able to evade his touches and get her mouth around his cock on the boat the night before. Never had any woman been able to resist his distractions, his determination to pleasure her and avoid her touching him. It had surprised him, caught him defenseless, and he’d barely grabbed a breath before he’d been exploding in her mouth.

He hadn’t handled it well, afterward. But he had needed time, away from her, to sort through what had happened. Spending the night tossing and turning and thinking from every angle possible, he had decided Marley was entirely different than any other woman he had known in the last two hundred years, because not only could she resist him, she actually appeared to like him. That was a completely unique response. Women were attracted to him based solely on the physical, the demon lure. Yet Marley liked him. Damien. As both a person and a man.

And it was that certainty that had allowed him to let himself go that morning, let him explode inside her, take the pleasure she had offered so freely, so generously. It was different with Marley, and that was damn dangerous.

Because he wasn’t different. Nothing had changed, and he was using rationalization to excuse his behavior. A hundred years of conviction thrown over for a few days’ pleasure, and ultimately at her expense. He should be castigating himself, but he just felt easy, content, and oddly at peace.

Marley turned back to him and smiled as they entered the restaurant. “What’s their specialty here? I’d like to try something new.”

“I can recommend all kinds of new specialties,” he said, sliding his hand around her waist, wanting to touch her, feel her, be closer to her laugh and her smile.

If this wasn’t real, he didn’t care.

He’d had entirely too much reality for the last two centuries.

Marley sat on Damien’s balcony, a glass of wine in her hand. “This is beautiful. All these hanging baskets…who takes care of these?”

“There’s a building manager for these condos.” Damien pulled his chair closer to the railings and propped his feet up. “I give him free rein to take care of the place.”

Lunch had been delicious Creole food, and Marley was sleepy from the sun, a full stomach, and the restless night’s sleep. “I could take a nap right now.”

“We could do that.” Damien’s eyes were closed and he looked just as languid as she felt. “There’s a bed four feet away. All we have to do is stand up.”

Like they’d actually sleep if they made it to a mattress. “Is this a ploy to get me naked?”

“No.” His head tilted back, like he wanted more of the sun. “If I wanted you naked right this minute I’d just say so. Or make it so. No, I was actually talking about taking a nap. I’m dead tired.”

When he stood up and took her hand, she went with him, figuring sex or sleep would be the outcome and both sounded damn appealing.

The bed was low, crisp white bedding against navy blue walls, which were outlined by thick, creamy woodwork. Silver mirrors faced each other over the dresser and bench, and a metallic nightstand bounced light from the windows around the room, casting rainbow shadows. Marley loved the order of all of Damien’s furnishings, the understated elegance, how every object served a purpose.

She kicked off her sandals and climbed onto that fluffy oasis, the duvet sinking beneath her knees. “Very soft.”

“Pull the duvet back.” Damien had taken his own shoes off and was unbuttoning his shirt.

Marley peeled the comforter and sheet down and slipped inside, giving a sigh as her head hit the pillow. “Oh, crap, this feels good.”

Damien slid in from the left and stuffed two pillows behind his neck. He lay on his back, hands steepled on his bare chest. “I think Americans should initiate the siesta. This feels amazing with the sun on us.”