Arcana Rising (The Arcana Chronicles Book 5) (25 page)

“I can’t vow that you’ll never lose me, and no vow of yours will alleviate my dread.” Nothing could convince him that we’d actually—after two thousand years—sleep together.

“Then maybe we should make a promise
about tonight
,” I said. “We either consummate our relationship now—or never. If we don’t move forward, our worst fears will be realized in a way.”

“Tonight?” His voice had roughened.

I nodded up at him, aching to touch him. To trace those runes and make him quake. “Tonight.” Lightning crackled overhead, and the hail grew louder. “Before you decide, I need you to know something.” I placed my palms on his warm chest. His heart was racing beneath my fingertips. “Aside from everything else . . . I want you.”

Mesmerizing light radiated from his eyes. “That, you
must
say again.”

I wetted my lips. “I want you.” Desire sizzled between us. Soon neither of us would be able to fight it.

“For all these lifetimes, I’ve waited for you to say that and to
mean
it.” He had endless centuries of pent-up loneliness—and lust.

I was almost afraid of what we were about to unleash. “I do mean it.” I leaned in to press a kiss against one of his runes, my tongue flicking rain from his damp skin.

“My gods.”
Voice a rasp, he said, “And so I am snared? I won’t deny us—because I
can’t
?”

I drew back, shucking my pack, gaze drifting to his mouth, to that sexy dip in the center of his bottom lip. “Let’s talk after you kiss me.”

His arms wrapped around me. “Good idea.” He leaned down, his lips descending over mine. At the contact, my eyes slid closed; his pained groan rumbled against my mouth. When his tongue slipped between my lips, I twined my hands around his neck.

He slanted his mouth, his tongue slowly tangling with mine. For someone with so little practice, he was a devastating kisser. He tasted like rain and need.

My toes curled as we shared breaths. At some point he’d begun holding me upright—my legs had given way.

Gripping my ass, he easily lifted me. He groaned with approval when my legs wrapped around his hips.

My hands flew to his shoulders, kneading with delight as his muscles rippled beneath my palms.

But he broke away from our kiss, leaving me panting. His gaze narrowed with intent. With possessiveness. “If we cross this line, there is no returning from it. I will never let you go. You will be my wife in truth.”

“I won’t let you go either. And you’ll be my husband.” He. Was. Mine.

“We will be forever. We
are
forever.”

I gazed at his noble face, raising my hand to caress it. “Yes.”

His eyes slid shut with bliss when I smoothed my fingertips along his jawline, across his strong chin, over a broad cheekbone.
“Sievā.”
That one word was laden with yearning.

He wants to be a normal man.
I was determined to give him anything he needed from me.
Now.
Amid all of my emotions,
I
dreaded that something would prevent this. The gods, the universe, whatever . . . When I yanked my poncho over my head, his eyes opened and went wide.

“Here?” He swallowed thickly. “I need to get you ready . . . you should have a bed. . . .” His sentence died away when I pulled off my sweater, revealing my glowing glyphs. They reflected in his gaze.

“Here, Aric.” I unfastened my bra from the front, shrugging out of it.

He stared with such hunger that my breasts seemed to swell for him, aching for his sword-roughened palms to cover them. I whimpered, arching my back.

At the sight, his jaw slackened. His pupils were blown. Then came more of that starry light. Like a sunrise.

As I pulled his hand to me, the rain and hail intensified. I was glad of the wild storm all around us.
Feels fitting.

He kneaded me, biting out a choked sound of pleasure. “This will be over before it starts.” Had his accent ever been so thick?

My eyes went heavy-lidded. “Don’t wait another second.”

He shook his head hard. “I didn’t plan for this, don’t have anything.”

“I’m on something.” I’d refused to approach him with nothing new to promise, so I’d gone to Paul for contraception the night of the snow. “I’m ready for this, Aric.” For his first time. “For you.” I surrendered completely to lust and adrenaline and the driving need to experience passion with him. My senses overloaded. My skin was flushed, my nerve-endings hypersensitive.

I smelled the rain, the electricity, his addictive scent. How could he possibly smell so good? His taste lingered on my tongue, making my head swim. “I’m ready
now
.”

My expression must have betrayed my emotions; he looked stunned.
“Sievā?”

A pulse point beat frantically in his neck, drawing my gaze. I leaned forward to kiss it. With a moan, I sucked on his skin, feeling the strong beat against my tongue.

His head fell back. He bit out something in Latvian that sounded like a curse. In a dazed tone, he said, “This will happen. I . . . I
believe
.”

The awe in his voice made me desperate for him. “Now, Aric.” Lightning flared almost as bright as day, thunder booming mere instants later. “Before something stops us!”

He raised a knee, pinning me against a metal support to free his hands. “Nothing could take me from you.
Nothing
.” He tore open my riding pants, yanking them and my panties to my knees. Unhappy with the barrier between us, he used his strength to rip my clothes in two.

My glyphs swirled wildly.

He sucked in a breath, his rapt gaze following his fingers as they roamed between my thighs. Over me. In me. He groaned at the feel. “You’re so perfect.”

I rolled my hips to his hand.

“Yes, yes,”
he murmured as he watched me writhe. “You like my touch.” He teased me till I was just on the verge.

“Don’t wait!”

Material ripped as he shoved his pants down his narrow hips. Between my legs, his hardness nudged and prodded.

I moaned, my head lolling.

He wrapped my hair around his fist, holding my head up. “Look at me.” Our gazes met as he began to press inside. With wonder in his eyes, he rasped, “Gods almighty.” His chest muscles flexed against my breasts, his ancient runes kissing them.

Sudden winds howled, and the structure groaned. Aric withstood each gust; he was strong. As I clung to him, my hair whipped in the wind, snaking over him like vines.

Cannonballs of hail pounded the dish. Louder. Louder.
Louder.

So earsplitting I needed to scream. Vibrations shook the metal at my back. Bolts of lightning struck nearby rocks. Bits of stone were darts against my skin. Thunder boomed so violently, I could feel the percussion in my stomach.

Pouring rain, hail, lightning, winds—as if the universe warned us not to go further. Two opposing forces joining together.

Life and Death.

With his forehead resting against mine, he bit out, “We might be going . . . to hell for this.” But that wasn’t stopping him; pressure grew as he pushed deeper.

I gasped. “Then we’ll rule it together.”

His lips parted.
“Es tevi mīlu
.” I love you.

For an instant, I saw Jack above me.
A moment of time. . . .

I blinked, and I was staring into starry amber eyes again. “I love you too.”

Aric tilted his hips up and plunged.

My scream and his yell were lost to the roaring winds.

When he was deep inside me, he clenched me close, somehow holding himself still. I felt his heart pounding as he grated words in Latvian.

“English . . . ?”

“You’re
mine
.” He withdrew with a shudder. “How long I’ve waited.” The heat of his body seared me when he thrust.

“Oh, God,
yes
.” My hands drifted down to his hips, urging him on.

Between ragged breaths, he said, “Nothing . . . could possibly . . . feel this good. Nothing!” Supporting me with one hand, he used his other to caress me.

“Aric!” The pressure inside me kept mounting.

He gnashed his teeth. “Never want this to end!”

Heat and friction. Electricity. Aric’s increasingly desperate groans. The storm. Everything built and built. “So close . . .” Soon I was on the brink, could only moan and move with him.

“I can’t hold back!” His pace turned feverish. “
Sievā
, you feel like heaven!”

Sensation overwhelmed me, and I screamed.

I dimly heard him telling me that I was his, that we were forever, that he could feel my pleasure.

That he was helpless not to follow me.

His muscles stiffened. Eyes lost, he bit out:
“Dream?”

“No, no . . .”

His body arched, head thrown back. His bellows shook the night, over . . . and over. . . .

Afterward, we clung together, our breaths so loud.

He pressed his lips to my forehead. “Mine.” He clasped me even tighter, his strong arms locked around me as if he’d never let me go.

The storm ebbed. The winds died down, and the hail ended. The last lightning bolt faded away.

We lay in the bed in the cabin, just stripped of our wet, ruined clothes. We’d returned to find Cyclops whimpering at the door, but Aric had simply said, “You are
quite
forgiven. Go home.”

Now Aric wedged his hips between my legs and stroked the back of his fingers over my cheek. “I plan to have you all night, love. Do we need to do something more for contraception?” He dipped down to nuzzle my breasts.

Cheeks gone red, I muttered, “I had a shot.” Paul had said it’d start working right away, but I’d waited a few days to be on the safe side.

Aric raised his head. “You
premeditated
this?” That seemed to delight him. “I never stood a chance, did I?”

“Just shut up!” I slapped his shoulder.

He grinned, so sexy he robbed me of breath. “You
did
want me, little wife.” His arrogance had rebounded with a vengeance. “I couldn’t resist you before I loved you; now . . . you hold my heart in your hand once more.”

I swept my palm over his tattooed chest. “I’ll have a care with it this time.”

His eyes went starry again. “I believe that.”

“You’re not disappointed I took precautions? You wanted a kid.” I was ready for a future with Aric—but not with a baby.

Bringing a child into a world without daylight seemed cruel. Would we describe the sun? Maybe we’d say: “Yes, it was millions of miles away, but you could still
feel
its warmth. I guess you had to be there.”

“Do I appear disappointed?” he asked in a wry tone. No, he appeared overjoyed with me.

“Such a turnaround from before?”

“I’ve realized how selfish that was. And things are . . . different now. If we never have a child, I will be happy. I want all the time I can get with you.”

What little time we had left.

He lowered his head to kiss across one collarbone, his lips hot on me. He scorched a line up my neck . . . across my cheek . . . the corner of my lips. Then fully on my mouth. Cradling the back of my head, he kissed me thoroughly.

When he broke away, he left me aching, my hips rolling for him.

He rose up on straightened arms, raking his gaze over my face, my body, my bright glyphs and restless hips. “I still think this is a reverie, one of my countless fantasies of you.” When he pressed inside, his eyes nearly rolled back in his head. In a strangled voice, he said, “How could
this
 . . . be real?”

_______________

Afterward, we lay on our sides facing each other. I murmured, “I know it couldn’t possibly be worth the wait for you, but was it—”

“By all the gods, it was worth the wait.” He cupped my face, had to clear his throat before he could say, “Do you understand how precious you are to me? Not because I can touch you—that merely allowed me to recognize you.”

I laid my hand over his heart. For two thousand years, it’d been one way. Now it was changed.

His brows drew together, as if he was trying to sort through chaotic thoughts. He opened his mouth to speak, closed it, then tried again: “That wild storm was a tiny fraction of what was going on inside me. I look at you . . . and I
soar
. I make love to you, and everything is new; I feel . . .
so much
. I’m certain my chest will explode from it. . . . Gods, I make no sense, do I?” Color tinged his broad cheekbones. “Tonight has boggled my mind.
You
have boggled my mind.” He held my gaze with his own. “
Sievā
, I am a planet off its axis.”

I lost myself in his eyes. “I love you too, Aric.”

The corner of his lips curled.

_______________

He dozed with me tucked against his side. I peeked up and sighed over his spellbinding face, wondering how I could ever have hurt this tender, caring man.

But now we’d rewritten history.

He stirred and opened his eyes, his amber gaze studying my expression. “Regrets?”