Abducting the Princess (9 page)

When she sank onto him, his growl reverberated around the room. He’d surely just died and gone to heaven? And though she sheathed him tight, she was slick and more than ready for him. “You’re a fast…learner,” he groaned.

Her hips tilted forward and up, the friction incredible as her inner muscles locked tight. Her head fell back a little, her breasts thrusting forward. His hands moved of their own volition. Her nipples pebbled his palms, her flesh feminine and soft on his hard skinned hands.

Then she dropped back onto his shaft and his breath left his lungs. Christ, he wasn’t going to hold it together for much longer. But he wanted to make this moment last as long as he could, savor it.

Her breasts swayed as she moved up and down, faster and faster, her little breathy cries music to his ears. She ground against him suddenly. Once. Twice. As her pussy contracted around him and her cries turned into a guttural moan, he didn’t even try to restrain himself.

His balls jerked and his seed jetted out. He hurtled off the ledge and into an abyss of pure ecstasy.

He came back down to earth with her lips touching his with a sweetness he wanted more of. He loved the taste of her mouth, her breath on his lips…her body fitted on top of his own.

With a pleased little sigh she pulled back and disengaged from him before all but collapsing beside him. He turned his head, drinking in the sight of his replete lover who looked so thoroughly, delectably fucked.

Her mussed bedroom hair framed the satiated look on her face. Her sweat dampened skin gleamed, her breasts rising and falling as she caught her breath.

Goddess, he could get used to this. Used to watching the expressions cross her face just before she came. Used to having her beside him on his bed and just stare at her beautiful form.

But he wanted much more. He wanted her to be his wife. He wanted her to be the mother of his children.

A man could dream, right?

Except he didn’t want it to be his dream, he wanted it to be his reality.

A smile curled his lips as she made a snuffling noise beside him. Evidently her lack of sleep and their recent love session had worn her right out. “Tired sweetheart?”

“Yes, but in a good way,” she mumbled sleepily, before rolling over, one arm snaking over his belly and her hand sitting on the jut of his hip, precariously close to his cock.

He stifled a moan as the bit of anatomy in question thickened and grew. He ignored his most basic needs when she said, “You know so much about me and yet I know so little about you.” She looked up at him. “Tell me about your family? Your mum and dad?”

“A bedtime story?” he mused aloud.

She nodded. “Mm hmm.” Then snuggled even closer as he began.

“Well…I never knew my mother. But she was apparently very beautiful. She was an only child who lived west of the
scantia
forest in a tiny village. I’ve only just recently come to know my father, but I learned that the moment my mom and dad set eyes on each other it was love at first sight. Except it was back in the days when shape shifters weren’t tolerated. My father was a
larakyte
…”She looked up at him, her tiredness seemingly forgotten. “He told her the truth about who he really was?”

“No. He didn’t want to lose her. He lied to her and pretended he was human. Only when she fell pregnant and he knew their child would have the
nightmix
gene, did he reveal his true identity.”

Her attention was absolute. “She forgave him?”

He shook his head. “No. She was inconsolable. She ran away from the village, hid herself in the poorest parts outside the
Zaneean
palace. She delivered her baby…delivered me. Then left me out in the street, no doubt hoping I’d die.”

“Oh Mahaya, no! Someone rescued you?”

He arched a brow. “If ‘rescue’ means having a lowlife couple take me into their home and teach me the art of pickpocket to support their gambling and drinking addiction, then yeah, I guess I was.”

Her face softened with empathy. “I’m so sorry.”

He refused to dwell on the resentment that at times reared its ugly head. The winds of fate had ensured he’d be a part of the princess’s life and for that he could only be grateful. “Don’t be sorry. My past is what shaped me to become the man today. And if my only accomplishment in life is to have seen you protected, I’ll die a happy man.”

Her eyes glistened. “You really mean that, don’t you?”

He nodded. “Yes, I really do, Mira.”

My Mira.

“You could have any woman you wanted.”

“You’re the only woman I want,” he answered softly.

She closed her eyes for a moment, but not before he caught a flash of yearning in her stare. His joy could barely be restrained. She wanted him too! He just had to convince her that a life together was possible. That by marrying him she wasn’t forsaking her duty or abandoning her people.

His heavy lidded eyes moved past her thighs and the little beckoning triangle of fuzz that covered her mound, to linger on her flat belly. He could imagine her as a mother to their children. A child who could even now be growing inside her.

“Maybe I should build an extension on my cabin,” he mused.

A frown crinkled her smooth brow. “Why?”

“Make another couple of bedrooms to accommodate our children.”

Her eyelids flicked wide open. If anything could have shattered the moment, it was talk of babies. Surely he wouldn’t be so cruel as to suggest such a thing? But he was deadly serious, his face revealing a depth of longing that couldn’t be mistaken.

Bloody hell.
Clearly he didn’t know that the possibility of having a child together was next to impossible. She would soon be wed to another. She shook her head, sad beyond measure when she whispered, “That’s never going to happen.”

His jaw clenched, shoulders noticeably stiffening. “You don’t think I’m good enough?” He snorted disgust, awareness and accusation leaping from his eyes. “Or is it my
nightmix
blood that unnerves you?”

She frowned, taken aback by his distrust. “You say that after everything we’ve shared?”

“That’s exactly it though, isn’t it?” he rasped. “After everything we’ve shared I say I want to spend the rest of my life with you, want you to have our babies.” He jerked into a sitting position. “You. Don’t.”

She put a hand on his shoulder. He flinched and her words came out as if she’d just choked on sand. “That’s not it at all.”

The ear-piercing sound of what she guessed was a ram’s horn trumpeted outside. It was what many of the outlying people used to warn of imminent danger.

Mahaya swung into action. “Get dressed,” he rasped. “We’ve got company.”

But it was too late. Horses thundered to a stop just outside. She grabbed a bed cushion to hide herself even as Mahaya wrenched on his pants and retrieved his sword.

Men shouted protest as footsteps approached. The door was flung open and a man stood framed in the doorway.

She shrank back, disbelieving. “Jarvias.”

Chapter Seven

She turned to Mahaya, but he’d already withdrawn his blade, evidently aware the man in the doorway was a king’s soldier and no threat.

If only he knew.

Her fiancé stood immobile for perhaps another ten seconds, his stare taking in the scene. Disappointment bit into his face. But jealousy or even a touch of possessiveness was distinctly absent.

Relief was followed quickly by despair knowing this was to be her future.

“I didn’t expect this of you, Mira,” Jarvias said at last.

Why because everyone assumed she was sexless?

An avalanche of shame immediately buried the thought. It’d never been her intention to hurt Jarvias. Regardless of his detachment, he wasn’t a bad man. He was fair and considerate in every way. And he showed those traits even now.

Yet despite it all, she’d do it all over again.

Mahaya had been her everything.

But no more. She couldn’t abandon everyone. Her chin lifted. She had a duty to her kingdom to fulfill.

Jarvias glanced at his rival before he turned back to her and said evenly, “I’m willing to put this behind us, start afresh for our people.” His stare held hers. “If you are.”

For our people.

Had she become so conditioned to doing everything for everyone else that even those closest to her used it for their own gain? Not that it mattered, anyway. Jarvias was right. Like it or not, their marriage
was
for the good of their kingdom.

Mahaya loomed beside her as though a dark shadow. But he wasn’t the enemy she’d once assumed him to be. Goddess, he was the very antithesis. He was loyal, devoted to her needs. With him she wasn’t just a princess. She was a woman in every way that counted.

It was nothing short of a desecration that whatever they’d shared had to end here. Now. No matter that every fiber of her being screamed
no
!

Her mouth dried, evaporating the words even before they’d formed. She looked up at Mahaya, searching his face for something…anything. But though she had his whole attention, he remained stoic and tightlipped.

Something wilted within, even as she understood his silence. He’d fought for her once already, exposed his true feelings. And by his stony expression he knew she was about to ground all that under her heel. She swallowed. Hard. “I’m sorry, Mahaya. I can’t escape who I am. No matter how much I want to.”

His lashes swept low and concealed his emotions, even as his face leached of color. A fist took hold of her heart and squeezed. Damn if his acceptance of her decision wounded her like nothing else. Right then she?d almost welcome the raw fury of his
nightmix
rather than his silence.

She pushed to her feet, careless of her nakedness as she reached for her clothes. But Mahaya turned his back on her, staring out the bedroom window as if she no longer existed.

She refrained from crying out his name, refrained from wailing denial. It had to end between them, but not in this way. Her hands clenched and unclenched. Perhaps it
was
for the best. At least with his hating her she’d never see him again. At least a little piece of her wouldn’t die a slow death at their every encounter.

At the touch of Jarvias’ mildly appreciative stare on her body, she shivered, before dressing quickly. Some things hadn’t changed in the interim she’d been away. She still felt a frigid kind of detachment toward her fiancé.

Is that really what you want for the rest of your life?

She paused, biting into her bottom lip as indecision warred in her heart between her deeply ingrained duty to her people and her love for Mahaya. Goddess, she hadn’t even told him her true feelings!

Jarvias held out his hand, beckoning to her. She ignored him for a moment and turned to Mahaya. But the hard, unforgivable line of his back radiated coldness. She swallowed back a rush of words that had her begging for his forgiveness. “Goodbye,” she whispered.

I’ll never forget you.

* * * * *

It had been a little over four weeks since Mira had last seen Mahaya. Four weeks since she’d left him at the cabin. Four long, exhausting weeks where her every thought seemed fractured, debilitated, her every waking moment a nightmare she couldn’t escape.

And now the “special” day had arrived she could only stare into the gold-framed mirror with a peculiar numbness to the beautiful woman staring back in her exquisite, lace wedding gown.

Did no one else notice that beneath the splendor was an empty shell, devoid of joy?

She sighed, weighted down by the loveless years facing her ahead. Jarvias would do his best, but she didn’t need to be a scholar to know his affections weren’t any more enthusiastic than her own, despite his obvious appreciation of her assets at Mahaya’s cabin.

Mahaya. She couldn’t even think his name without the emptiness within growing that little bit more. Four weeks since she’d seen him and yet it felt a lifetime.

At the approaching footsteps of undoubtedly one of her many
cotesh
servants, she dropped her gaze with a resigned sigh. Hadn’t her servants already done enough plucking and brushing and fussing over her?

She peered at the intricate white rose embroidery threaded through the lace of her wedding gown, distantly acknowledging the fine craftsmanship. It was wasted on her for all the appreciation she felt. But at least her people might be awed by the beauty in its design.

She’d agreed to go with the traditional human nuptials first to satisfy the majority of her people. It would be followed right after by a wedding attended exclusively by
larakytes
and shape shifters. And then open invitation to a huge reception featuring limitless food, drink and entertainment.

And speeches. Don’t forget the speeches.

She pressed a hand to her belly, sickened by the thought of having to pretend a wedded bliss she simply didn’t feel. At having to speak aloud her love for a man she didn’t love.

Oh, she had great affection for Jarvias, but nothing more. And she was aware the sacrifice wasn’t all her own. Call it woman’s intuition or perhaps the senses of her inner cat, but she had a feeling his heart also lay elsewhere.

A cloth abruptly slid over her eyes and pulled tight. A hand pressed over her mouth, stifling her sharp gasp.

Dissenters!

But just as quickly Mahaya’s warm scent filled her nostrils, his chuckle music to her ears. “Shh,” he murmured, his hand moving from her mouth to stroke silkily across her jaw. “My Mira.”

Her heart rate kicked into double beats as joy tore through her simultaneously to equal amounts of despair. What was he doing here? Why the need for a
darfe
?

“Do you trust me?” he asked.

He’d blindfolded her and was about to take her goddess knew where, and he expected her trust? Conversely, she
did
trust him. “Yes,” she said weakly.

He clasped the crook of her elbow and gently turned her around. “Allow me to guide you.”