Protector of the Flame (38 page)

“Soren said something along those lines when I bumped into him as he was leaving your personal quarters.”

Cyrus stopped eating and stared at Neith.

“Did he?” the ancient beauty asked.

“The sun was barely up and the hall was rather quiet at such an early hour.”

“I left well before the morning meal was served,” Neith replied.

“I noticed he has a key to your bedroom.”

“Yes.” Neith dipped a piece of bread in her stew.

The ancient beauty wasn’t going to confess anything. A pointed question might elicit more information or provoke her ire.

“I’ve learned so much about how the island operates,” Serenity said, “but I can’t figure out what task would be required of Soren in the wee hours of dawn in your bedroom.”

Neith narrowed her eyes. “Soren is indispensable. He is often required to do things I would not trust anyone else to handle.”

“I thought you had complete trust in me after today.”

A humorless smile lifted as Neith lowered her spork. “My dear, there is no greater way to show you how much I trust you than I have today by leaving you in charge of all.”

“Come on, Neith, let’s cut the crap.” Her lack of patience and a diplomatic tongue got the better of her. Cyrus laughed, choking on his food. “You’re far better at this game than I am. Why won’t you tell me where you were today or why Soren was in your room?”

“It is not a matter of trust. You don’t have a need to know. You want something. Therefore you think you’re entitled to have it. That’s not the case on my island. If the need for you to know where I was today or why Soren was in my bedchamber ever arises, it will be made clear to you. But I guarantee, you will rue the day and wish it never came.”

Chapter Thirty-Six

After the rest of their uneasy meal, Cyrus declined a walk in the garden.

Serenity probed his feelings and detected an eagerness to get to their room, but a sharp emotion she couldn’t pinpoint colored the rest of his feelings, giving her reservations.

He sank on the mattress, his knees higher than they should’ve been since the bed rested on the floor after he broke it. He took off his shirt and got under the sheet with his pants on. He’d never done that.

Even back at Valhalla, he always slept in the buff.

She quickly undressed and climbed in beside him. Eyes closed, he turned his head toward the wall as if too tired to be bothered with anything other than sleep.

Over the past few weeks he’d given more kisses to her forehead than lips, even rejected an advance or two, claiming there was no time, now this. Tension curled around her heart.

The last thing on her mind was sleep, especially after the day she’d had. She stroked his chiseled abdomen and kissed his shoulder. She needed a few hours of passion, a torrid physical connection to carry her from the depths of pleasure to the brink of exhaustion so she could sleep. She needed to believe that after everything and no matter what might come, their connection could always be salvaged. She slinked down beside him and walked her fingers over his arm to his stomach. He yawned in response. She might have to settle for a good, hot quickie, but she’d take what she could get.

Kissing his cheek, she slid her fingers down to the barrier where he held the sheets. She skimmed his fists moving to his crotch.

Eyes still closed, he caught her hand and gently pushed it back till it was off of his body. “Maybe in the morning.” He rolled onto his side.

“Are you tired of my body already?”

“I’m tired, but not of your body,” he said in a low voice.

“You’ve been tired before and it’s never stopped you from wanting me.”

No response.

The rush of heat between
kabashem
waned for some, in time. Not in less than a year.

She touched her small breasts and stomach, which was a little less taut than it used to be, and shrank at the possible reason his desire declined. She pulled the sheet up to cover her body. “This isn’t the first time you’ve rejected me.”

“I’m not rejecting you.” His tone was gentle. “I said in the morning.”

“Maybe.” She glared at his back. “Did you ever push her hand away?”

A cold wall of detachment dropped between them and he went rigid as a log.

She often wondered about his time with Lysandra, his nights with the gorgeous female whose body was built for pleasure. Feminine yet strong with luscious curves and an ample bosom to please any man. To please her man. “You were in Panama for twenty-three years. She spent eleven in your bed. Did you ever reject her?”

“It’s been a long day. Mine may have been more strenuous, but I don’t want to fight.”

She jerked upright. “You worked with the sentinels all day. The one detail you should’ve been happy to be on. What was so strenuous about it?”

Exhaling loudly, he rolled onto his back. “After you were done saving the island from one psychotic Kindred,” he said in a tone peppered with acrid sarcasm, “I had to clean up the mess you left behind.”

“What mess?”

“No shrines of the dead on this island, my love. Your crystal masterpiece had to be turned into dust and swept out to sea.” He sat straight up and stared at her. “Who do you think was lucky enough to be given the task? That crystal rock you created went two feet below ground. I had a pickaxe and a shovel to remove it by myself.”

“You’re strong enough to the do the work of twenty men without breaking a sweat.”

“It’s so easy for you to judge the weight of a task from a cool, airy perch in the library.”

“You’re jealous?”

A laugh brittle as glass scraped her ears. “Of what? The fact Neith has made you one of her pets or of the power still not fully in your grasp? Someone faster would’ve killed you.”

She refused to be sidetracked. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“What question?” he snapped, honestly looking confused.

“Did you ever tell her no? Did you ever push her hand away?”

“This is insane.” He threw the sheets back and stood. “Is it too much to ask for a modicum of propriety regarding our indelicate pasts? I don’t mention Evan or the sixteen years you spent with him.”

“Evan was only human. You know it’s not the same. Sex with Evan was like fucking a piece of driftwood in comparison to what it’s like with you.” She jumped out of bed and threw on her tunic to cover herself. “Did you feel her energy moving through you when you made love to her? She was luminous and perfect. You probably couldn’t keep your hands off of her tits.”

“Lysandra is dead.”

“But you didn’t kill her. You couldn’t because you loved her too much so you let Abbadon do your dirty work for you.”

Pale, chest heaving, he stared at her with pitch black eyes.

“Just because she’s dead and I’ve never spoken of it, doesn’t mean I don’t think about it. You knew all about Evan. We never talked about her, not in this way,” she said, on the verge of tears, her voice cracking.

“What’s wrong with you?” Disgust rang in his tone.

“Now there’s something wrong with me? What about you? You’re always in a bad mood and all you want to do is sleep.”

“That’s because you’re sucking the life out of me!”

She choked on her heart throbbing in her throat. Her energy stream churned.

A tangle of poisonous emotion glinted in his eyes. “You have no idea what it’s like for me. I want you all the time. I crave you—now more than ever—but I can’t bear to be around you. You constantly tug on my energy stream. When I kiss you, it’s as if you want to drain my soul dry. And when we make love you draw off of me in such deep gusts I can barely breathe.”

Trembling, she stared at him while the bitter sting of his words bit deep. Her heart ached as if squeezed in a fist as she listened to the brutal onslaught of his truth.

“I had sex with Lysandra every night for eleven years.” His eyes flickered blue and back to the color of cold, hard coal. “It was always a pleasure to be around her. I never pushed her hand away and I never told her ‘no’. Is that really what you want to hear?”

A furious rush of savage anger swamped all sadness, all weakness, all pain. Serenity reined in her energy stream away from him. Her pulsating pool sloshed and clawed in defiance, determined to stay connected. Harnessing her strength, she concentrated on the blinding rage heating her blood and commanded her stream to detach.

As she reeled in the voracious tentacles suckling him, a sharp pain punched at her stomach causing her to double over. Thrashing as if it were alive, her stream rushed up to her head and surged down to her toes, converging back in her core with such force she gasped.

Exquisite relief surfaced on his face. Then, his eyes grew wide as he might’ve suspected what she was preparing to do.

With a deep exhale, she released her energy, focused on venting her frustration as he had done. Instead of a wave or plasma ball, her stream lashed out in a magenta whip, sending him crashing into the wall.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

His body left a dent in the wall as he fell to his knees in concrete rubble. Two drawings sailed to the floor around him.

She gaped at Cyrus, shocked and queerly satisfied by what she’d done. “I’m sorry,” she uttered, rushing to him.

He raised a hand, head lowered, urging her to stay away.

Her energy stream unfurled. A thousand tiny tendrils slithered over him, reconnecting and drawing on his. She ran to the dresser, tugged on clothes and her sneakers. She grabbed an elastic hair tie and glanced at him.

Cyrus rose slowly, leaning against the smashed wall. He took several deep breaths but didn’t look at her.

She swallowed hard, uncertain what he would do. He wouldn’t hurt her physically, but she didn’t know if he’d yell, shake her, or spout more venomous words to make her soul cringe.

“Cyrus?” she said in a whisper.

Other than putting his hand up again as if he couldn’t bear the sound of her voice, he did nothing, and that was worse than anything else she could imagine.

She ran from the room, down the hall. When their streams severed, nausea pummeled her. She put her hand to her mouth, fearful she might vomit, and leaned against the railing. Her stream settled and the queasiness dissipated.

The halls bustled with people. A few stared as she made her way to the lower level. Not meeting anyone’s gaze, she went out through the front doors.

Running through the garden, she headed for the secluded beach Adriel had shown her. She didn’t stop until she reached the patch of clovers. Catching her breath, she plopped down.

Her limbs, tight and aching, groaned for a jog. Although flooded with enough energy to run for hours, she didn’t know if her body could keep up with her bubbling pool.

Dark waves rolled in, slapping against the shore, then receded back out. There used to be an ebb and flow to her connection with Cyrus, reciprocal and nourishing.

Somewhere on the island, everything had been thrown into chaos. He’d confirmed her worst fear. She was draining him and couldn’t stop. Pressing the edges of her palms into her temple, she realized he’d finally get a decent night of rest if she stayed away.

How could he feel refreshed or be himself when she lay awake beside him every night, feeding on him, literally sucking the life from him? And he had never complained about it, not once until tonight.

He’d said things she didn’t need to hear, things that cut down to her soul, making her heart bleed, but she’d antagonized him. She pushed him to his breaking point and once he reached it, she didn’t show the compassion of a loving wife. She’d shown the understanding of a mule by sending him flying into a wall.

Shaking her head, she stared at the ocean, berating herself.

Her stream clawed out behind her, stretching upward and back—straining to reach Cyrus. She couldn’t be sure if he was flying or walking based on the direction of the pull. She got up and ran out to the beach.

Backing up toward the water, she looked around. He flew up from the tree line, his skin shifting from the darkness of the trees to the midnight sky, but he was easy enough to spot from the cream-colored garb.

She commanded her stream to be still as he floated toward her, but backed away. Her energy pool gushed like a volcano ready to explode. With each breath she did her best to contain it, to prevent it from merging with his.

“Please stay back!”

As his feet hit the sand, he shifted to his normal complexion. “I’m not going hurt you.” His voice cracked with incredulity and sadness.

Twenty feet of sand separated them. Her body shuddered from the strain of controlling her agitated stream. It surged up to her head, down her legs, colliding in her core, over and over, thirsting for him, demanding to be released.

“I know,” she said, trembling.

He moved closer. “Forgive me. I was ugly and cruel.”

“Stay there.” She clutched her stomach. The struggle intensified to the point she feared something inside might snap.

He hurried toward her. “What’s wrong?”

As soon as he touched her, all willpower failed and her stream erupted in triumph, connecting to him. He winced but held her.