Seducing Destiny (Brothers of Fate Book 2) (4 page)

Luci struggled to wrap her brain around the entire situation. Gods. Myths. Fate. There was no way any of it existed, let alone that she played any part in it. Her logic said it would be just as stupid of her to ignore what was right in front of her as it was to believe it. That included the way Blake kept looking at her. The way his gaze dipped over every inch of her. The flashes of unfamiliar but sharply sensual images every time he touched her. It should be the last thing on her mind, but it consumed most of her remaining mental resources.

She was certain of some things. The pizza he’d ordered had been almost heavenly—hand tossed crust, brick-oven crisp, and like nothing she’d ever tasted before. And she was sure that when she said she trusted him, she meant it. The idea of giving her faith to someone she barely knew terrified her. Now that it was clear what he’d been hiding that morning, the lingering uneasiness vanished. Whatever else happened, she believed him when he said they were working to find answers and keep her safe.

She settled back onto one of the couches after they finished eating, a permanent smile on her face from the conversation that had drifted from one topic to the next with ease. “You really got the pizza from Italy?”

He took the seat next to her, and his thigh brushed hers before he turned to face her. “You meet people when you’ve been alive as long as I have.”

Part of her wanted to know how long that was. Numbers ticked through her head. Five hundred years? One thousand? Her mind twitched at the logic of someone actually living that long. She could only handle so much reality in an evening. “I bet you’ve seen some amazing things.”

He furrowed his brow for a second, but his smile returned so quickly she thought she’d imagined the change. “I have. There are a lot of pluses to being immortal. It gets a little lonely at times, though.”

“But you saw so much as it happened. The moon landing, right? Were you there for that?”

“On the moon? No.” He winked. “But yes, I remember that. And hearing about the Wright Brothers taking their first flight. And watching large portions of Europe sail to the new world...” He trailed off. “But it all blurs together after a while. There are so many new and amazing things that new and amazing becomes passé.” He shook his head, as if to clear away a fog.

The new world. He really was that old. She struggled to place herself in that frame of mind. “It does sound like a lot, but I still bet it was awe inspiring. The world doesn’t do incredible things anymore.”

“Sure it does.” He slid his fingers under hers, where they rested on her knee. “It’s not a matter of scope; it’s what you remember. The day you graduated high school. Or college. You remember those?”

Should she pull away? No. This was comfortable. Reassuring. But she did wish it wasn’t all focused on her. “Of course. But those aren’t the kind of things that change the world.”

“They change someone’s world. Yours, and that’s important. Mine, since it’s part of what makes you who you are now. You remember your first kiss, right? The anticipation. The buildup. The nervousness?”

His smooth voice glided under her skin and summoned every sensation he described, until her pulse sped through her veins and her lips twitched from the suggestion. “How awkward it was.”

He dipped his head in, until his mouth hovered millimeters from her neck, close enough his breath shifted across her skin with every word. “But you had to start somewhere, right?”

Her chest constricted as he traced a line up to her jaw, never making contact. He rested his hand at the back of her neck. Tiny sparks danced through her entire body at the barely-there caress of his lips brushing hers, and she whimpered. He pulled back, but his gaze still lingered on her face, desire darkening his eyes. “It’s not about the big things. It’s about enjoying those things that are significant to you.” His tone was low. Hypnotic.

She wanted more. She licked her lips and tried to make her vocal chords work. “Like meeting a stranger in a coffee shop, who turns my entire world upside down?”

His grin was sinful and hungry. He traced tiny circles along the base of her neck with his thumb. “Exactly. Like that the most gorgeous woman who was in that room is sitting on my couch now.”

The compliment nudged a corner of her mind she was trying to keep locked, and her insecurities flooded back in. “You don’t have to say that.” Damn it, she hadn’t meant to let that slip out.

“Say what?”

“That I’m gorgeous.” Negative thoughts clawed their way to the surface. She wasn’t pretty. She was pudgy and clumsy and plain. Sexy guys like him—he was a god, for hell’s sake—didn’t look twice at women like her. His gaze said he meant the words, and his touch lit her nerve endings on fire, but her stupid self-doubt screamed in her skull.

“You are.” He glided his hand from her neck, to trail a finger down her cheek, gaze never leaving her. He traced her bottom lip. “Every inch of you is stunning.” He sounded sincere. He looked genuine.

But her mind still refused to accept it. “I bet that’s one of those things you don’t forget—the beautiful women you’ve loved in your lifetime.” Why had she said that? There was something wired wrong in her head. Maybe it would take the focus off her, though. Give her a chance to rebuild her walls and stash her uncertainty again.

He intertwined his fingers with hers. “I’m no more likely to tell you that, than you are to tell me about your past love life.”

Now he was keeping secrets from her. It was an irrational reaction, but knowing that didn’t stop her from feeling it. Her own insecurity was sabotaging an amazing conversation, and she couldn’t make herself stop. “I’ll tell you about my past loves. I was engaged once. To a handsome, smooth-talking, well-dressed guy, who turned every head when he walked in a room.” Shut up, shut up, shut up. It was too late. Blake’s frown told her that.

“And madly in love with him, I assume.” His seductive tone was gone, replaced with something unreadable. “I suspect a guy would have to be pretty spectacular, to catch your attention like that.”

He was making fun of her, wasn’t he? Except despite his flat words, there was no malice in his gaze. Not that she was any good at recognizing things like that. “He talked a good game. Even convinced me to go into business with him. Let me handle the accounting. Brought in huge sales.” She swallowed the growing lump in her throat at the swell of unpleasant memories. It was good she’d dredged this up. A painful but appropriate reminder she knew better than to lose herself in someone’s attention. “Until he skipped town, and I was brought up on money laundering charges.” That had been painful, humiliating, and incredibly difficult to clear her name of. If they were talking about moments burned in their memories, the day she testified against her ex was one of the most bittersweet of her life.

“Fuck, Luci.” His expression softened. “You didn’t deserve to go through that.”

“It was my own fault. I let myself be sweet-talked into oblivion and ignored some really obvious signs. I know better now than to trust too-good-to-be-true, all-encompassing lines like ‘you’re gorgeous.’” A new ache joined her discomfort when Blake frowned. She shouldn’t have said that. Her subconscious seemed to know better than her, though. Even if she took the words back, she wouldn’t sound genuine.

Blake cupped her chin and forced her to look him in the eye. His voice was firm but calm. “I’m not him. And I mean what I say.”

She wanted to believe him, but the mental floodgate was open, and she couldn’t convince herself he was sincere. Then again, she also couldn’t make herself pull away. “I spilled my guts. Now it’s your turn. You must have someone who’s left an impact on you. Some stunning beauty from the centuries of your life.”

He clenched his jaw and stood. “And if you weren’t using it as an excuse to sour the conversation, I might tell you about one of them.”

One of them... Of course he’d had eons of lovers. A guy like him, living for as long as he had. She clenched her hand hard enough her fingernails dug into her palm. “That’s fine. You have your past, it doesn’t impact me. I don’t have to know the details, as long as I remember it doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

“It doesn’t.” All emotion had vanished from his face and voice.

Luci lay in the unfamiliar bed, staring at the ceiling. Once she’d derailed the conversation with Blake, it was over. He’d backed off, shown her where a guest room was, and handed her a T-shirt to sleep in, if she wanted.

That had to have been at least an hour ago. Sleep eluded her, though. Everything around her smelled like Blake, seeping into her senses and taunting her with whispers of almost-kisses. She hated herself for derailing the conversation the way she had, but at the same time, it was for the best. As long as she kept repeating that, it would sink in, and she’d believe it. He and his brother would figure out why someone wanted to kill her, and they’d send her home, and life would go on.

She rolled onto her side, so she could see out the window. They were too close to the city for there to be anything besides black and the faintest smattering of dots. Light pollution bled into the bottom of the sky. She pulled her knees to her chest and tried to block out her onslaught of swirling thoughts. Life would definitely go on, and she’d be better for the experience once she came out the other side.

****

The sound of a knock on Elizabeth’s bedroom door sent her steadily beating heart pattering at a gallop. She lit the candle on the stand beside her, climbed from her bed—not that she had been able to sleep in this unfamiliar house—and crept to answer.

Henry nudged his way into the room as soon as she cracked the door, and toed it shut behind him. Her tall, blond, strapping Henry. “My beautiful Beth.” He placed his hands on her hips and drew her close. He trailed his fingers under her nightgown and over her birthmark. The one shaped like a crow, that he loved to kiss. “Finally, I have you all to myself.”

She rested her hands on his chest, intensely aware she wore nothing but the thin shift she slept in. The heat from his palms seared through the fabric and left traces of longing on her skin. “Dinner did seem to wear on for a bit, didn’t it?”

He kissed her forehead, then her nose, and finally brushed his lips over hers. “It does not matter. It’s over now”—he guided her backward—“and you look stunning.” He spun before they reached the bed, dropped onto the feather mattress, and pulled her between his legs.

“What if someone hears us?” Even though they weren’t married yet, they’d been together several times, but he had so many guests staying at his home now. All in anticipation of their wedding in a few days.

“Then they will be jealous I’ve got the privilege of making the most gorgeous woman in the house scream in ecstasy.” He kissed her stomach through her nightgown, and her breasts tightened with need.

“My parents won’t be impressed.”

“Your father has already granted me your hand. No one but you may revoke that honor now.”

“I won’t scream with so many people here.”

In a single fluid gesture, he stripped her clothing off. The cool air brushed her flaming skin and caressed the dampness between her legs. “That sounds like a challenge.”

“It isn’t,” she squeaked out.

He cupped her bottom and drew her close. Her stomach fluttered in anticipation, as he tilted his head in and drew a nipple into his mouth. When he flicked his tongue back and forth over the sensitive nub she groaned and dug her fingers into his shoulders. He worked his hands forward, until he brushed her wet desire.

She gasped at the sensation. Damn being overheard. She leaned in enough to reach the laces on his breeches and fumbled until they were loose. When she worked him free, her fingers wrapped around his hard length, he let out a low groan that penetrated every inch of her.

He grabbed her wrists. “I want to watch you on top of me.” He lay back and tugged her with him.

He was so vocal. The words and desire throbbed inside her. She knelt on the bed and positioned herself above his erection. In a single thrust, he pushed inside her, and a cry tore from her throat.

“That’s my beautiful Beth.” His gaze traveled over her, as they built to a frantic rhythm. He slid his hands up her stomach, to her breasts. Each caress was a feather-light buzz through her body.

She groaned as the soft touches melted into hungry pinches and tugs. He rolled her swollen nipples between his fingers. Pleasure built inside her, dancing along the different sensations of Henry’s attentions. Each time with him was more spectacular than the last. Would it be like this forever?

When he dropped one hand between her legs and pressed against a sensitive button, another cry tore from her throat. That was new. And incredible. Her breathing turned into short pants for air, as he rubbed the new spot and thrust himself inside her. Her thoughts fluttered away, lost in a haze of bliss. Each push from Henry stole more of her reason. Waves of revelry splashed over her, and she ground against him, riding the intensity.

His grip on her breast tightened, and his grunts became staccato. She recognized the sound of him drawing close to finish. He drove up, filling her.

Luci’s eyes flew open, and she gasped. She’d had dreams like that before, where she was someone in the past, but they’d never been so vivid. Her lover had never had a name, now he had two. Henry from her dreams was Blake. The man whose guest bedroom she lay in.

The intensity of the vision still flooded her senses, mingling with faint scent of Blake on everything surrounding her. Need throbbed between her legs, and her nipples ached for attention. She didn’t know where the sleeping vision had come from, or why her subconscious had given her the name Elizabeth and placed her in Victorian England. At least, despite all the random unknown variables, her mind had been sadistic enough to still give her that damned birthmark on her hip she hated so much.

Right now, she didn’t care. The memory of Blake-as-Henry flowed over every inch of her, obliterating her sense and filling her with an insatiable desire. Still half-lost in the fantasy, she moved her hands to her chest and whimpered at the first brush against her sensitive skin. She squeezed, drawing back the images of his hands on her skin. The pinch of pain and pleasure.

She glided one palm down her stomach, to the pleading need between her thighs. How could a dream be so intense and feel so real, as if she’d lived it? She pushed her panties aside and dipped her fingers between her wet folds. Her clit blossomed in delight when she sought it out.

She rubbed frantic circles, hips pumping against her hand. Climax tore through her, and she had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from crying out. In her head, she still felt the visions mingling with the present, as if Blake had been buried inside her, stroking her until she came.

Her orgasm ebbed, and she eased off and slumped back against the mattress. Reality slunk its way back in, as the buzz faded, reminding her where she was—what had happened. Pointing out there were voices drifting up from somewhere in the house.

Wait. Voices?

*

After Luci went to bed, Blake tried to work. He didn’t need sleep unless he’d exhausted his power on something, and tonight he wasn’t interested in indulging the habit. Instead, he spent a few hours staring at the wall, trying to figure out how the conversation that evening had gone so completely off track.

He hated to see Luci’s insecurities rear their head, and that was what he was dealing with. On the other hand, he refused to indulge them. He could only tell her he was being honest so many times, before it wasn’t worth the effort anymore.

Except he couldn’t make himself believe he’d been right to stop trying when he’d done so. At least sending her upstairs and putting some distance between them had helped him banish the flashes of his past that had haunted him all day.

The past. Something was there… The notion floated just out of his conscious reach. What was it? He closed his eyes, to block out as much external distraction as possible, and honed in on his thoughts. Something about Beth. Grace. This morning.

Morrigan. Of course. Seeing her had never been a good sign. Millennia ago, he and she had dated. When she’d killed Sayuri, he’d assumed it was jealousy. When she obliterated Elizabeth, he suspected it ran deeper than resentment and insanity. And when she went after Grace as well, he knew there was more there.

The words of the legend floated to mind. Words he’d memorized after Grace, hoping he could make sense of them.

The woman who bears her mark will undertake a battle of overthrowing.

He’d never figured it out. It seemed obvious on the surface, given they’d all had the same birthmark, except he had no idea why his past loves would be play a part in overthrowing Morrigan. There certainly hadn’t been any battles involved. It had always ended in an instant. He cringed at the vivid memories.

But the women Morrigan had gone after before had been Blake’s lovers. Wives. Luci certainly made his pulse race, and he enjoyed her company, but the relationship wasn’t the same. Luci wasn’t the same as the rest. Then again, there was that sense of déjà vu every time they touched. That flash of memory. That feeling he knew Luci on a deeper level than was possible after such a short amount of time.

And he was reading too much into the situation. Never a good idea.

A soft knock interrupted his painful journey into the past, and he padded to the front door. Surprise and concern filled him when he saw Marley. He stepped aside. “The phone was too difficult to pick up?” What was meant to sound teasing came out as a bark. He gave her a weak smile. “Sorry. Long day.”

She didn’t seem to take offence. “Tell me about it.” She stepped inside and handed him a manila folder. “How’s your guest?”

“As well as can be expected, I suppose.”

Marley rested a hand on his arm. “You don’t know this, but it’s not easy being where she is. You just turned her entire world upside down. At least you filled her in quickly and didn’t drag it out for several months. But she has to cope.”

He didn’t miss the hint of irritation that crept into Marley’s voice. Even though she said she understood Eli’s reasons for keeping his identity secret for so long, Blake knew it still bothered her on some level. She’d gotten immortality out of the entire affair. Was that what waited for Luci?

For some reason the thought left a foul taste in his mouth. Marley seemed to enjoy the newfound power that came with godhood, but Blake wouldn’t wish immortality on anyone. Not unless they got to walk into it eyes wide open.

He shook the thought away and held up the folder. “What’s this?”

“Can we talk in your office?”

He held out an arm in that direction. “After you.”

Seconds later, she closed the door, shutting them off from the rest of the house. “Look inside.”

“Just tell me what it is.” He opened the folder anyway. His stomach lurched at the contents. Photocopies of documents he’d buried long ago.

“You recognize them, then.” Marley’s tone was soft.

He should. They were marriage certificates—or at least their historical equivalent. One from feudal Japan, one from Victorian England, and the last from here in the U.S. almost a century ago.