The sea rocked gently back and forth, a cradle holding vast amounts of salt water. Beneath the black, glassy surface, great long arms of kelp reached first one way as the water tugged them, and then the other. The arms reached up from the ocean floor so that only the top of the canopy showed, and then only briefly.
As she swam, Emeline caught glimpses of hidden sea life when the kelp opened the lanes. Near the surface schools of fish moved in and out of the stalks, sometimes with a barracuda or yellowtail tuna pursuing them. It was the explosion of color that made the scene so beautiful, although oftentimes, over the years, she was never certain whether or not she was adding to the vivid colors.
Curious sea lions rocketed through the long blades, and sometimes she stopped to watch them play. Most times she swam along the rocky reef below, where pastel sea fans swayed back and forth with the surge and so many sea creatures made appearances. There were lobsters moving in and out of cracks, and octopus and moray eels peeking out of crevices. Bat rays rested in the sand, although it was night, and feeding time, so most were beginning to stir.
The kelp forests were generally between thirty and eighty feet deep, but these went down even farther, their air-filled bulbs planted in the uneven floor. She had been here countless times and knew the way as if it was her own home. She had been exploring the kelp forest from the time she was very young. She dove down into that wondrous world, glancing sideways to ensure Dragomir was with her. She wasn’t afraid; this – dreaming – was her forte. She knew exactly what she was doing – and she knew what she had to show him.
Other than his initial shock when she’d first taken him with her, sharing her dream, he had remained silent, content to allow her to lead the way. She stayed close to the ocean floor, moving in and out of the stalks straight to the large round pipes that stretched out for miles. The pipes were very large, tall enough that a man could easily stand in them. Wide enough to allow several men to walk side by side inside of them.
Instead of following the pipes out to the sea, staying on the floor of the ocean, she headed back toward San Diego.
Wait, I need to follow this out. Find out what is going on.
She stopped, turned back to him and caught at his arm, shaking her head. She’d done that already so many times. Recalling a dream, she could change the details, and she had, night after night, ever since she was a child. She had explored all the way to the end of the pipes.
It is like the catacombs ahead. People lying in wait to be taken by the vampires. There was horror in her voice – in her mind. She couldn’t do anything to save them. Or rescue them. She knew, because she’d spent months, years, trying to discover a way. In the end she’d given up and continued her explorations, trying to determine what the vampires no one believed in were up to or even – when she was so young – if they were real.
There is nothing to be done for them. But this is where I think is most important for you to see. I thought it wasn’t real because I’ve dreamt it for so many years, but… Follow me. She attempted to pour demand into her voice. She didn’t have the dominant trait that allowed him to speak so softly yet command everything and everyone around him. She had to be emphatic, insistent, to get her way. She should have known better. It took her pointing in the direction she wanted to go and a quick shake of her head. He was already swimming toward her, following her lead.
God, she loved him for the way he trusted her. She loved that everything she said or did mattered to him. She wasn’t positive she’d ever fully get used to it.
She led him along the pipes through the vast kelp forest back toward the mouth of the river. Once she was there, they found the narrow opening that ran underground and connected to the river. She swam through it and then began to swim along the bottom of the river with Dragomir right behind her.
She was aware of him in the way she always was aware of him. It didn’t matter that this was a dream that she was sharing with him, her reactions to him were the same. Every single cell in her body alerted to him. She felt beautiful. She felt sexy. She felt safe. That was all new. In her previous dreams, she’d never felt any of those things – especially safe. She’d learned even dreams could be dangerous.
She showed him the arteries that ran beneath the ground. Deep canals that led all over the city, that led to the lake where Tariq had built his fortress. Those deep canals led to the underground city where she had helped to rescue the children from Vadim.
Show me the lake access.
She hesitated and knew he was aware of her reluctance. He sets traps for me.
She felt his shock. His fingers shackled her wrist, and he brought her up against him. One arm circled her waist and he tugged until her body was pressed tight to him. What do you mean, he sets traps for you? Vadim knows you dream of these waterways? This is his method of traveling beneath the city?
She nodded. I was too young to recognize the importance of hiding from him when I first dreamt of these waters. I didn’t know where they were or what the significance was. The map is in my head now, and I can draw it out. I’ve explored far more than he has. I’ve been to places all over, places that connect from one part of the ocean to vast amounts of land.
Why didn’t you tell me immediately? Why didn’t you tell Tariq?
She winced at his tone. It was a lash, and part of her felt she deserved it. Maybe she should have told Tariq, but then she wasn’t certain. She hadn’t made the connection between the pipeline and the lake. She had the underground city, but not the lake. She hadn’t realized the extent of Vadim’s empire beneath the ground.
I was a child when I accidentally discovered the kelp forest. It was a wonderland to a child without a home. A place I could escape. I dreamt of it as often as possible. When I first discovered the pipeline, I ignored it. Then I followed it. I had uncovered the catacombs, the dead suspended beneath the sea, in long rows of clear chambers beneath the pipes. It was something out of a horror film. I was around ten or eleven. I wasn’t certain it was real.
Sívamet. Just that one word of endearment. All the anger was gone from his voice, leaving it a purring caress.
She loved the sound of his voice and the way it brushed over her skin, on the inside of her mind, poured into her body.
I don’t know why I kept going back. I was drawn there. Every night I told myself I wouldn’t go, but I couldn’t stop myself. I would explore the ocean floor over and over, swim all along the pipeline, and then one day, when I was about fourteen, I saw him. He was in the chamber below the pipe. It was the first time I ever saw anyone alive. I was elated, thinking, at last someone that isn’t lying there dead. I almost came out from behind the rocks where I was hiding. Honestly, Dragomir, I’d been dreaming it for so long, I didn’t know if I made it up.
Her voice shook. She couldn’t help it. She would never forget those moments of her life. It was a dream, yet, for the first time she’d feared it was real. She’d known, as she’d walked the streets in San Diego, that just out from shore, where tourists dove and paid good money for locals to take them exploring along the kelp forests, a monster had begun to build a vast empire.
No one would have believed her had she told them. She’d tried to tell Sean McGuire, Blaze’s father, that there were vampires, and he’d told her she was having nightmares. That much was true, she couldn’t deny it, but the fact that she’d dreamt it hadn’t helped her cause.
Keep going. I need to understand.
I watched as he waved his hand and awakened a woman. I thought her dead, but she was sleeping. He smiled at her and held out his hand. Her fear was so strong it radiated all the way to me. I could feel her fear and his… delight. He needed her fear. He fed it. Amplified it and drank it in. I swear it was like an aphrodisiac to him. When he smiled again, I saw his teeth. He grabbed her and pulled her to him. She couldn’t fight him physically, but I felt her struggle. He felt it, too, and that made him ecstatic.
She shuddered and tasted fear in her mouth the way she always did when she thought of that night. She’d watched him sink his teeth into the woman’s neck and drain her blood. When he lifted his head, there was blood all over his lips and teeth. He left it there. He turned to go and then suddenly turned back and looked straight at me. I didn’t move. He strode to the glass and continued to look out. When he waved his hand, the kelp parted away from the surge, not with it. We stared at each other.
Dragomir stroked her hair, his hands as steady as his reassuring heartbeat. So he saw you. He knew what you looked like.
He was like a bloodhound sniffing my scent through the glass. He tried to force me to go to him, I could feel the pull of his commands, but I resisted. That shocked him. More, it aroused his curiosity. I don’t think many people had resisted his compulsions.
You would be correct. The fact that you were only fourteen would have really caught his attention. And you were in a dream. Controlling the dream. I can see why he searched for you.
She shivered again and pressed her face to his chest. To the steady rhythm of his heart. Her anchor. I backed up and got out of there. But I couldn’t stop going back.
He drew you back.
She bit down on her lip. Perhaps. I considered it. Eventually I began to see that he had access to so many places. I set out to find them all. Several years went by before I figured that out.
You mapped out the underground passageways, the arteries of his highway. You know where all his underground cities are. There’s more than one, isn’t there?
She nodded. When I came back from France to help Blaze find Sean’s killers, I considered going to the authorities, but of course, they would have thought me crazy, and Vadim has some sway with a few of them. He’d gotten in pretty deep with some of the crime families and was developing his own using male human psychics.
Why didn’t you tell Tariq?
I was taken to his compound after Vadim had me. I was terrified he would find out that I was pregnant. Vadim kept whispering to me that Tariq and all the other Carpathians would reject me. I was terrified to leave the compound. I knew if I left, Vadim would get me. I barely knew Tariq or any of the others, only Blaze, and I hid from her as much as possible.
Dragomir tipped her chin up. Why didn’t you tell me?
I was going to. I needed to figure out what it all meant. I can’t get that piece as much as I try. Day after day I would go out and find every passageway I could to try to find just how large his holdings were. I tried to stop dreaming at night.
He went very still. Tried? You still dreamt at night?
Sometimes, I couldn’t help it.
Did you have other encounters with Vadim?
I would see him in the dream, close it down and the next time avoid that area. So yes, there were a few encounters, but I always woke up immediately if I saw him.
Did he know about Sean McGuire and Blaze?
She didn’t like where the conversation was going. I don’t know what he knew about me, only that when we would meet in the dream there was always an exchange of something, I didn’t even know what. I just knew I could feel him before he was there, stronger and stronger after each encounter. But he never got close to me. He certainly didn’t take my blood.
You were afraid of him. He sounded matter-of-fact.
Of course she had been. Who wouldn’t be? She wasn’t embarrassed or ashamed of being afraid of a master vampire. She nodded, uncertain where he was going with his statement.
Very much. Every time I saw him, I was terrified. I kept thinking he would find a way to trap me.
But he didn’t. He let you move through his waterways. His personal highway. Emeline, he didn’t create the map, you did. He just watched you explore it all and followed you. You knew the ways to go before he did.
She frowned, shaking her head. That’s not true. I just followed where he’d already gone. The dream… She trailed off, suddenly filled with doubt. Her eyes widened and one hand flew defensively to her throat. Dragomir. Are you saying I helped him?
No, of course you didn’t help him, but he found a way inside your dreams.
And I mapped out an entire city for him. More.
He shook his head. Don’t, Emeline. He was silent for a moment, and then she saw the dawning comprehension on his face. He doesn’t know. He knows the passages are there, but he doesn’t know how to access them. Only you do. He needs you. Vadim has no idea of those places he wishes to go. He knows how to get in and out of the underground city, and perhaps to the lake, although I doubt that, but he needs you for the rest. That’s why he’s sought you out from the very beginning. He didn’t know who you were until you went in for psychic testing.
My dreams? My ability to map out the ocean floor and connect it to the rivers and lakes? To all the cities? That’s what he’s after?
It’s more than that. You’re unusual, even among psychics. You can resist his compulsions, you can command dreams, you are so strong that even his poisonous blood can’t kill you. And you can map continents for him.
It would have killed me.
I don’t think so, Emeline. I was inside you, in your bloodstream. He kept forcing the parasites to reproduce because you kept killing them off. Your blood. If he hadn’t been able to get to the parasites, you would have managed to rid your body of them, not the Carpathian way, but by building antibodies that fought them off.
She frowned at him. I don’t understand what you’re saying.
I’m saying you’re of tremendous value to both sides. You know the location of Vadim’s stronghold, or at least you do within your dreams,. You can produce antibodies, which, because you’ve shared blood with me, means I can do the same, so at some point both of us will be immune to his parasites. That means every hunter, woman and child can be made immune. It isn’t just that he thought you could produce the child he wanted, you are the ultimate prize for him.
She shook her head. She’d created a map of the arteries and veins that made up the underground rivers. She had found all the passageways beneath the ground so that one could come in by sea and go just about anywhere they wanted. She knew them all like the back of her hand. Over the years she’d gone back nightly to try to find ways to stop the vampire. Find anything that might convince others of them. She’d never even told Blaze about her underwater dream, not after Sean dismissed it as a nightmare.
She’d been looking for a place to sleep one night when she stumbled across two vampires feeding on homeless people in a back alley. Sean had sent her to Paris, and then he’d been murdered. She’d come home to help Blaze find his killers. She’d come home, already knowing Vadim would get his hands on her and she’d be pregnant with his child by the time the others found and rescued her.
Take me to his underground city.
Her heart jumped. She shook her head. They guard that place. If we go near it, the chances of running into some of them are fairly high. I’ve tried to slip past the guards. Sometimes I make it. Most times I nearly get caught and have to wake up fast.
If we get into trouble, you can wake up.
She didn’t like it. She was uneasy. The passageway to Vadim’s underground city was narrow, an easy place to set up an ambush. She knew Vadim was angry. The moment she’d entered the dream, she felt him in the water. His rage. His need to control her, to reacquire her. She didn’t want to lead Dragomir into a trap. She’d wanted to show him the extent of Vadim’s stronghold.
She knew Tariq wouldn’t abandon San Diego, but once he knew what he was really up against, with the information she could provide, maybe they could find Vadim and plan an attack. She wouldn’t be able to fight with the hunters, but she would at least feel as if she’d contributed something. She’d brought Dragomir with her rather than tell him, so that there would be no question whether or not she was crazy and just having nightmares.
She had taken Dragomir to the deep but thin ribbon of water beneath the ground that fed the lake Tariq’s compound bordered. She turned to swim back toward the main artery underground. As she turned, Dragomir suddenly caught her by the arm and thrust her behind him. To her horror, a shark, mouth open wide, snapped at him, catching his upper arm, spinning around and streaking through the water with him. At once blood turned the murky water red, so Emeline, rushing after them, swam through a red tunnel.
She didn’t dare end the dream with one of Vadim’s creatures holding on to him. Dragomir’s body was deep beneath the earth safe, but his spirit traveled with hers through the water in her dream. She should have been more vigilant. She knew Vadim had put traps throughout the waterways. This had never happened, but then she’d never taken Dragomir with her before. She wasn’t going to get a “do over.” She counted on having the dream night after night to correct any mistakes she made, such as triggering a trap.
She put on a burst of speed. One thing dreaming of swimming every night allowed her to do was to become a very fast and strong swimmer. She might not put her foot in the water when she was awake, but in her dream, she was kick-ass all the way. She also had the advantage of knowing the canals, where they were deep or shallow, where they dropped deeper into the earth, turned abruptly or lazily made an S before straightening out. She knew a few little veins that were just a trickle, with barely enough water to get through. They were shortcuts connecting one waterway to the next.
She hated losing sight of Dragomir. He was used to relying on his Carpathian powers, but in the dream, he didn’t have them. She’d been a young child unknowing of Carpathian powers when she began dreaming about the kelp forests and what lay hidden in them. Cursing herself for ever bringing him into her dream, she took the shortcut, streaking toward the wider underground river that ran out to sea.
She reached down to her leg where she’d strapped a knife. She’d started carrying one after she first saw Vadim when she was a teenager and knew she was hunted. She laid the blade along her wrist, her fist around the hilt. As she swam, the tops of her thighs skimmed the rocks on the floor, scraping skin, but she didn’t slow down. She barely felt the burn as she rounded the corner and slashed at the eye of the beast holding Dragomir in its mouth.
She thrust a second time, this time driving the point of her blade right into the eye. The shark opened its mouth, thrashing wildly, nose and tail wreaking havoc in the water. More blood floated away, creating a thin thread much like a bloody worm trailing through the water. Dragomir caught her around the waist and pushed her in front of him. She held tight to his arm and let go of the dream.
Usually she could force her eyes open and the dream ended. It wasn’t quite that simple now, not with the sun still in the sky. It took a few moments to open her eyes and then she was completely, utterly panicked. She was buried alive. She had to get out. She had to dig her way out. It took forever to get her hands moving, to try to rip away the soil, but already she was choking, breathing loose dirt into her lungs.
Suddenly the dirt over her head opened and she found herself staring at the ceiling of the basement in her house. Breathing heavily, she tried to roll, coughing.
Breathe normally. There is no dirt in your lungs. It is only your human imagination. Dragomir’s voice was gentle and soothing. Turn your head and see me.
She didn’t want to just in case he was wrong and she was alone, buried in the earth. She was lying a good six or eight feet under the soil. It was pitch-black there under the ground, the floorboards of the basement stacked to one side neatly, waiting for the command to rebuild. She could look all the way up to the ceiling, and see with her enhanced night vision.
Sívamet, this is a simple thing I have asked of you.
It was – and yet it wasn’t. Her heart pounded so loudly it sounded like thunder drumming in her ears, but it was Dragomir and she couldn’t find it in her to deny him anything. She turned her head slowly. There he was, his strange golden eyes staring back at her. He was beautiful to her with the scars on his face and that strong, male jaw. Even lying in the dark, rich soil, he looked elegant.
Her gaze moved over him. His arm was chewed up, bloody, now that he was awake. She’d done that. I’m sorry. I should have checked for traps in all the places I was going to take you before I shared the dream.
You are extraordinary, Emeline, and you don’t even know it. You didn’t even hesitate facing the shark. You’ve been mapping Vadim’s waterways since you were a child and you know them better than he does. There was pride in his voice. Respect.
She found herself smiling at him. I can’t swim. Not really. I’m afraid to be in the water because I know what’s down there. It was a confession. She was slightly ashamed that she couldn’t be like other human beings, swimming on a hot day – or night.
I think you have courage enough for ten people, Emeline. Any more and I would spend an eternity being terrified my woman would do something crazy.
He made her feel whole and happy even in the midst of knowing Vadim and his army could move unseen throughout San Diego. How were they going to destroy him if they couldn’t find him? If he had so many exits?
That is the job of the hunters, Emeline. You did your job. You have supplied us with valuable information. We can find and destroy all the places he has built here. There are many of us now, more than he knows. Thanks to you, we have places we can start. From those places, we will find trails to others.
She took a deep breath. It is close to sunset. Just once, I would like to have a night with you when the children, or someone else, are not in danger. Just one night.
His laughter was soft in her mind. I would like that as well. It will happen. We have eternity together. Soon it will be a baby interrupting us at every turn.
Charlotte told me you are making a crib with your own hands. She said Tariq is helping you.
His sigh was heavy in her mind. Then male amusement. Charlotte shouldn’t have told you. It was my surprise for you. I like to give you things, and the thought of making something as Tariq has done, made by hand, was appealing to me. I thought about what I wanted it to look like as well as what we could incorporate to keep Carisma safe.
She said dragons.
You like dragons, so that seemed something I could use. The male was easy enough to carve, but the female, making her look beautiful and deadly at the same time, capturing that look in wood has been a challenge.
When are you doing this? You are always with me.
We really don’t have quite as many warrior councils as I’ve led you to believe.
She found herself laughing. Laughing. It had to be closer to sunset than she realized because the sound filled the basement beneath her home. She licked her lips. “You’re terrible.”
“You fell for it.”
“I thought lifemates couldn’t tell lies to each other.”
He rolled. Stretched. He looked delicious with his muscles rippling powerfully beneath his skin. “Only, apparently, when surprises are involved.”
He bunched her hair in his fist and turned her face fully toward him so he could take her mouth. Heat rolled through her. His mouth was paradise. He knew how to kiss, and she gave herself up to the exquisite beauty of his mouth on hers. Kissing over and over. Igniting a fire in her that couldn’t be put out unless his body was in hers.
He gathered her into his arms and then she was floating, his mouth working hers. Commanding. Demanding. So hot she was afraid she’d catch fire and burn before they were on the bed, their bodies clean, his healed. She loved that they could do that. Simply think about being clean and fresh and then they were.
He all but tossed her in the middle of the bed and came down on his knees, his hands on either side of her head. “Did I mention I love you?” Even as he asked the question he leaned down and licked at her nipples. First one then the other, making them peak. His mouth closed over her left breast, suckling, pulling strongly, and then her right.
She was sensitive, and his mouth was merciless, hot enough to scorch. He used the edge of his teeth and instantly her body was spilling liquid heat in invitation. He caught her ankles and twisted, rolling her over onto her stomach. He leaned forward again and bit her left cheek.
“You look lovely and very tasty, Emeline. I don’t know whether I want to devour you or be inside that hot, tight body.” He caught her hips and yanked her bottom back toward him so that she was on her knees. He pressed her head to the mattress with one hand, fingers circling her nape to hold her in position. She was supporting herself on her forearms, her face pressed tight to the mattress, looking back at him over her shoulder. Her body pulsed in anticipation. He hadn’t had to do much – just wake up – and she wanted him.
His hand was there, testing her readiness. She heard his growl of satisfaction. “I love when you’re like this. So wet for me.”
She pushed back against his hand. “I’m totally wet for you,” she whispered. “I want you so much I can barely breathe.” That was true. Her lungs burned for air. She felt raw. Exposed. She didn’t care that he knew how much she wanted him. She knew he was the same way. She loved the way he held her so easily, his fingers stroking and teasing, bringing her close, moving away so that she cried out in demand, her fists gathering the comforter into her palms. It was a beautiful ache. A hunger that grew and grew. She loved that so much.
Then his mouth was there, his tongue wicked and sinful, stroking, flicking, stabbing deep. He suckled, drew out honey and then raked her clit gently with his teeth.
“Dragomir.” She could barely get his name out. A demand.
“Don’t know what you want, sívamet. You’re going to have to be specific.”
She loved that, too. More liquid heat spilled out for his tongue to catch. “You in me.” She was panting so hard, her breath so ragged she could barely talk.
“My tongue is in you,” he said and lapped at the fresh wave of honey. “Mmm, you taste so good. Maybe you want my fingers.” He replaced his tongue with first one finger, then two, pushing deep into her scorching-hot, very tight sheath.
She gave a groan of sheer frustration. “Not your fingers. I want your cock.” She blushed when she said it, but she knew that was what he wanted, and in giving that to him, she found her body hotter than ever.
She couldn’t tear her eyes from him as he knelt up, his hand circling the girth of his cock, his eyes on her. She wiggled, pushed back, trying to get him to hurry. He leaned down and bit her again. The shock of that sting sent another fresh wave of honey spilling out so that she was certain her inner thighs were glistening.
“Please, honey,” she whispered. “Right now. Hurry.”
“You want gentle?” He lodged the head of his cock in her entrance, giving her just enough to make her feel as if he was stretching her, but not enough to fill her.
Frustrated, she pushed back again, trying to impale herself on him. “I’m going up in flames. I need you right now.” This time, along with the pleading little sob there was demand.
He laughed and surged into her. Hard. Fire streaked through her. White lightning. At the angle he had her, holding her helpless, he could power deep, his shaft a piston, moving in and out while flames poured over her skin and into her veins. It was good, so good. Better than she could ever have conceived.
She loved that teasing laugh. Almost carefree. She’d given him that. She watched the beauty on his face. Those hard lines and the scars softened, only to be replaced by a mixture of lust and love carved deep. There in the molten gold of his eyes. It was beautiful to see. That tension rising in him just as it coiled in her. Hot and bright, a fierce loving burn.
Then she couldn’t think, only feel. He took her up so high, only to stop just short of letting her tip over the edge. Over and over again, until her body was so ready, so coiled. Until tension stretched her beyond her breaking point. She could hear the sob in her voice. The demand. The promise of retaliation. But the look on his face, that fallen angel skating so close to heaven, to paradise, was as much a reward as the desperate hunger in her body.
Tied vogyok, ainaak. Tet vigyázam. Peje míca.
He murmured something. She caught the words Tet vigyázam and knew it meant “I love you.” She wasn’t certain what else he’d said, but the way he’d said it was beautiful. His hair fell around his face like a beautiful Renaissance painting. He stole her breath. Her heart. Her soul. She knew she did the same for him. She didn’t know why or how, only that for him, she was special. He made her feel that way every moment.
She couldn’t speak, not with her heart so full, not with lightning zinging through her veins and that unbearable pleasure coiling so tightly she thought she might go insane. I love you, Dragomir, but I need…
I know exactly what you need.
His body kept moving in hers. Hard and fast and so deep she felt so connected to him, felt they lived in the same skin. She kept her eyes on him, her cheek pressed to the mattress, his hand on her neck, collaring her. She felt her heartbeat surrounding him, pulsing and gripping. His heartbeat answered, throbbing like a drum in her deepest core.
His face. That face – her fallen angel. So beautiful to her. She watched the rush come over him. The way his eyes darkened and the gold turned antique. The way the lines of lust and love carved deeper, giving him a look of pure sensuality. His fingers tightened on her neck and hip.
“Now, míca. With me now.”
His shaft swelled in her, stretching her tight muscles, the burn adding to the terrible, brutal beauty of the friction, of that steel spike moving in and out of her. His command whispered in that silken voice, hot and husky with need, sent her careening over the edge. Hot seed poured into her, bathing the walls of her sheath. She was flung into the sky. Free-falling. Soaring. It was as terrifying as it was beautiful.
Her orgasm went on and on, tearing through her with a force she’d never known. Taking every cell by storm. All the while she watched his face, watched what it did to him. Such perfection. She could only hang on to the comforter with both fists and ride out into the night sky with him.
He was there, surrounding her with his protection. To catch her when she came tumbling down, gasping for breath, heart exploding, so far gone she wasn’t sure who she was, where she was. Only that he was there. That face. His hands, stroking her, soothing her. His mouth, whispering to her, kissing his way up her spine. His cock, inside her, tying them together, giving her love with every stroke. Giving her ecstasy. Just simply giving her – everything.
He withdrew, and she cried out as his heavy cock slid over the bundle of sensitized nerves, setting off another strong wave of ripples. His arms went around her and he pulled her down to her side, his body curling protectively around hers. One hand went to her belly, where their child was growing.
“Every time I touch you, it is a miracle.” He nuzzled her hair aside with his chin. The brush of the bristles of the shadow on his jaw sent yet another round of heat and ripples careening through her. “Your skin is incredibly soft. I thought of you so many times over the centuries, but the reality is so much better than anything I could ever have conceived of.”
“I didn’t dare hope to dream of someone like you,” she admitted. Her lashes drifted down so she could savor him. Savor the scent of him, the feel of his body against hers and his arms, so strong, surrounding her. She felt safe. In her life, she didn’t remember a single time before him when she’d ever felt safe. Now she equated that with him.
He kissed the nape of her neck, gently put her on her back. He stayed on his side, bending over her, waiting until she opened her eyes. His hair fell in long waves around both of them, brushing her skin as he kissed her eyes, brushed her nose, and then his mouth settled on hers, causing the flight of a thousand butterflies in her stomach. He kissed his way down her throat to her breasts, spent a few minutes there and continued to her belly button. His tongue strayed, did a quick foray and then he was whispering to the baby in his own language. Talking to her. Reassuring her.
Love swamped Emeline. So much she couldn’t contain the emotion. It filled her heart and soul and spilled over so that she didn’t know what to do with so much feeling. She could only stroke his hair with trembling fingers, and vow to herself that as much as he gave her, she would find a way to give him the same.
“You give me as much or more every minute in your company,” Dragomir whispered against her skin. He kissed the pooch where the baby nestled. “You’ve given me a child. What greater gift is there? You’ve given me your love, your heart and soul. You’ve given me you. There is nothing else, Emeline. You are my miracle.”
“This from a man who carves dragons for our child’s crib.” She didn’t want to cry. Blood tears were messy. “I know you have to go to your council thingy, but would you teach me to do the clothing thing? And flying? And maybe cleaning house?”
He laughed and rolled to the side of the bed, keeping her hand. “Just picture what you want to wear in your head. Have the image of you fresh and clean from a shower, your hair washed and dry. The details are the most difficult. Just pay attention to every detail.”
Emeline wrinkled her nose. Could it really be that easy? She pictured herself clean and fresh and added a dress of soft white covered in delicate red roses. It had been one of her favorites in a catalogue she’d looked at almost daily. She chose it because she remembered every detail. She found herself wearing it, the soft material falling around her ankles, flowing in swirls when she jumped up, shocked and excited that it had worked. “I did it. I can’t believe I actually did it.” She flung her arms around his neck and hugged him. Of course he was fully clothed and looking perfect. “I’m going to clean every room. It’s good practice. Then I’m going to talk to Liv about dragons and how to fly them.”
He kissed her. “Housecleaning – okay. Talking to Liv about flying dragons – absolutely not. That child is in enough trouble without you helping her get into more.” He stalked to the door, that other Dragomir already taking over. The one that was intimidating and scary. The dangerous predator that moved with fluid power over the ground and through buildings. The one that took her breath just as easily as the one that treated her so gently.
He paused at the door and turned back to her. “Before you go outside, sívamet, you might want to add undergarments. Personally, I like you without panties and a bra, but I’m not so certain you will be as thrilled when someone else notices.”
She watched the door close and then burst out laughing, hugging the baby, knowing she was truly happy for the first time.