CHAPTER FIVE
The minute they were in the hallway, Kel fought the urge to pick Sonia up, as something primitive and wholly male inside him began to expand and take control. They walked past rows of apartments, adrenaline pumping through him with every step, every long second. The instant they were inside the apartment and he shut the door, the adrenaline pouring through him surged and took over. This time he really did pick her up and carried her to the bed, going down onto the mattress with her on her back, the soft and delicate curves of her body beneath his bigger, harder form.
He kissed her, driven by passion, by a wild, almost desperate need to claim her. His hands slid over her body, over her breasts. She moaned softly into his mouth and fire burned inside him, and he knew he was millimeters from forgetting everything but this moment, forgetting the consequences.
He tore his mouth from hers, his words gravely with desire. “There are things you need to know.”
“I know the most important part. You’re alive.”
“I’m not human, Sonia. Not anymore.”
“You’re still the man I love.”
“You don’t know-”
“I know you.”
“I’ve changed.”
“Show me,” she whispered. “Show me who you are now.”
He kissed her, a deep passionate kiss that bled like lifeblood into him, powerful, passionate, yet oh so sweet. But he didn’t want sweet. He wanted the heat, the fierceness of what they felt when they were together, what he’d been without for so very long.
Kel deepened the kiss, drinking her in, thirsting for her as he had never thirsted. He wanted the lifebond mark that would show on her neck if they bonded to appear, knowing that it would, because lifebonds weren’t created from science, but from love. It was the one thing they knew of the bond, and the one thing he knew existed between him and Sonia. He craved that bond, justifying his actions, even as he swore he would not bond with her. As long as he didn’t exchange blood she would not be bound to him in life and death. But if he was forced to erase her memories, some part of him would stay with her with that marking.
He touched her, everywhere and anywhere. She clung to him, arched against him, responding with such utter passion that there was no way she wasn’t his lifebond. No way he could stop needing, and wanting, and caressing. His lips caressed her neck, and she tilted her head, giving him more, but not enough. Never enough. There was too much time to make up for, too many ways he wanted to know her again. Too much possibility that this was it, all he would ever have of her. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered in her ear, before he was kissing her again, ravenous with need. “You have no idea how much I missed you.”
“I know how empty I was without you,” she said, her breath heavy, her voice a whisper. There was real pain beneath those words that hurt him. Without the ability to wipe away memories he had now, he’d hurt her.
He kissed her again, desperate to make her forget the pain, to give her pleasure. His mouth trailed downward, over her breasts, and he pushed her shirt upward, removing the barriers between them. They’d had too many of those. They still did. She quickly rid herself of her sweatshirt and tank top. Impatient to see her, to feel her, he unhooked her bra while her arms were still over her head, filling his hands with her naked breasts before she’d even tossed away the garment.
He lapped at her nipples, suckling and licking, knowing how it turned her on. He knew her. He knew what she liked. The thought that some other man might know almost destroyed him. It’s why he’d had Sterling watching out for her, why he never asked if she was dating. He had no right to know, to ask. He’d lost her.
The thought was lost to the gentle twine of her fingers into his hair, the way her back arched forward, and the soft little purring sounds coming from her mouth. He missed those sounds more than he’d realized. He missed every inch of her and he set out to kiss every spot he should have been kissing for the past few years.
Kel barely remembered undressing, or how her pants and shoes came off. Impatiently, he ripped the tiny piece of black lace panties she wore away, removing everything that separated her from him. He was hot and hard, and he burned wickedly to be inside her, to feel her tight around him. To claim her as his again.
But he wanted this memory to last, he wanted it to be powerful enough to become her dreams, to defeat his power to erase her memories. It was a ridiculous thought, and an impossible idea, but it was the one that drove him, pushed him, made him have the power to pull back, to go slow when he wanted everything she was and ever would be now.
His hands were all over her body, her soft skin like a drug. He kissed her stomach, caressing her hips with his palms and then trailing his lips over the curve of one of them, traveling a path down her thigh and then back up. Tension coiled in her body beneath his hands and mouth. He could feel her stomach quiver under his palm where he rested it.
By the time his slid his shoulders between her legs and stroked the slick wet heat of her body with his tongue, they were both on edge, both shaking with need. He lapped at her, the salty feminine taste of her seeping into his senses, driving him wild. Somehow, he restrained himself, going slowly, licking and suckling as he slid two fingers inside her until she was on edge. Until she wanted harder and faster and he gave it to her, his reward being her gasp and then the spasm of her body around his fingers. Then she did what she always did. She turned her head and hid her face, embarrassed by the intensity of her orgasm. God, he loved that side of her, the woman who could be so vulnerable no matter how many times or ways, they made love.
He slid up her body, pulled her mouth to his and kissed her. Her shyness slipped away as they faced each other. Her gaze slid over the tattoo of angel wings on his left shoulder and arm. He’d gotten them when he was in a dark moment, in need of some faith.
Her beautiful green eyes lifted to his, filled with mischief. “Sexy. I like.”
“Do you now?” he asked, his blood heating as he pulled her on top of him and repeated her earlier words. “Show me.”
She smiled and kissed him, reaching behind her to stroke his cock and shifting to guide him inside her. The instant he felt the wet heat of her body, his lashes lowered, sensations roaring through him as she took him fully.
Together they sighed in pleasure and relief. “I love you,” he whispered, threading his fingers in the soft honey-colored strands of her hair. “I love you so much, Sonia. I was only trying to protect you.”
“Don’t protect me like that again,” she ordered.
He couldn’t promise that, and he didn’t promise that. He kissed her instead, thrusting into her at the same time, losing the question to the heat, the burn, the joining of their bodies. A slow sensual rhythm emerged, the two of them moving as one, kissing and swaying.
Sonia lifted her upper body away from him, sitting up to ride him, and he held her hips as she started to move, watched as her gaze swept his body and settled on one of the many tattoos he’d gotten in the past two years.
She stopped moving, her hand sweeping over the design. “You had my name tattooed on your chest?”
He gently pulled her to him, holding her close. “Because if this day ever came I didn’t want you to have any doubt you were always on my mind.”
She made a soft sound of surprise. “I love you,” she whispered and pressed her lips to his. He parted her lips, and tasted the salt of her tears, the emotion they represented. The slow raw need between them turned to wild, hot passion. They exploded in a frenzy of touching and thrusting until they were shaking again, this time with release. And when he held her in his arms, expecting the burn of the mating mark to cause her to react and she didn’t, he understood her tears, understood what she feared. That this was the end not the beginning. She wasn’t his lifebond. It was the one thing in the back of his mind that he now knew he hadn’t wanted to discover, but he had to know. She was destined for someone else. He had to set her free and it was going to destroy him.