Soul Thief (Dark Souls) (13 page)

“I’ll be all right as long as we don’t stay too long.”

In a trancelike gait, she ventured farther into the theater, stopping only when she reached a plush blue sofa. With reverent fingers, she caressed the backrest. “I fell asleep on this couch. You stayed here all night with me.”

Midnight-blue eyes silently observed her.

“Why? That must’ve been pretty uncomfortable for you.”

He bridged the distance between them until she could feel the energy resonating from his body. His head fell forward. “I needed to make sure you were safe.” Her cheek prickled where his breath touched it.

She fought the urge to close her eyes and thrust her chin up in unvoiced invitation. “Safe from who? Your uncle?”

He nodded, his gaze affixed to her mouth. A pleasant shiver raced down her back, and she almost forgot her next question. “Why was he after me?”

“Not
was
,
is
. He realized my old soul dwells within you.” His voice deepened, took on a morbid quality. “Now he’ll stop at nothing to destroy it.”

Angie’s blood ran cold. “If you’re trying to freak me out, it’s working.”

He palmed her face. “I won’t let him anywhere near you. No one will take you from me.” His fingers stroked her cheek. The caress was so sweet, so tender, emotion clogged her windpipe. If she had forever at her disposal, there was no doubt in her mind she would spend it with Adrian.

“Kyros can’t track you,” he explained. “I made sure of it. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t looking for you.” He gripped her by the shoulders and squeezed. “The best thing for you to do is to move away from New York.”

Her stomach folded in protest. “I can’t do that. My life is here—my home, my mother, my work…everything.”

“Maybe so, but your safety has to come first. You have no idea what my uncle is capable of.”

Her hands rose to his chest. Corded muscles spread beneath her palms, warm to the touch. “I can’t move. I won’t.”

“Then you leave me no choice.” Decisiveness hardened his features. “I’m going to have to guard you every minute of the day.” He lowered his mouth to her ear, whispered silkily, “And night.”

A pleasant shiver ran down her spine. “Is that a threat or a promise?”

“Both.” His eyes sparkled with a predatory gleam that was more seductive than a hot kiss or an intimate touch.

Her body grew warm and languid, and she melted like butter in his embrace. Every hard, muscled inch of him pressed against her, sending small sparks of pleasure racing over her skin. A pocket of heat formed around her heart, until the darn thing bucked and sputtered in her chest.

A feral smile split his face, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he’d heard it.

So what if he had?

Her defenses were unraveling, one thread at a time. She felt it, sensed it in the deepest corner of her soul. A soul that insisted on calling out to him, no matter how much she fought to silence it.

Now that she’d come clean about her illness, a weight seemed to have lifted from her shoulders. He knew the truth, understood the inherent risk of growing attached to her. And yet here he was, holding her, seducing her with his gaze alone.

He’d told her souls were constantly being reborn, had promised to find her again. Was it possible? In a world of over seven billion souls, what were the odds that their paths would cross not once but twice?

His hand skimmed the column of her throat, a brush of cool satin against her flesh. Angie’s head fell back. Her eyes drifted shut. Adrian’s touch was like a hypnotic dance, slow and sensual.

“You never told me where you live.” Her own voice sounded foreign to her, low and husky. It was a bold and reckless thing to say, an invitation to trouble, but Angie had never been one to shy away from life…or danger.

His perfectly shaped mouth grazed hers. The thin strip of air between them vibrated with an electrical charge that made her nerve endings hum with anticipation. Heat spiraled through her, pooling low in her belly.

He kissed the corner of her mouth, traced a burning trail toward her ear again. “Why don’t I show you?”

Chapter Twenty-One

When Adrian took her hand and guided her to the subway station, Angie assumed they’d be taking the train. Instead, he led her to a service door, beyond which an elaborate network of forgotten tunnels stretched. She didn’t know how long they walked or where he was taking her. All she knew was that they kept venturing deeper and deeper beneath the city.

“Where are we going?” she whispered.

“You’ll see.” Humor laced his voice, as did a note of mystery.

“How? It’s pitch-black down here.”

Adrian tightened his grip on her hand. “I won’t let you fall. Trust me.”

As she followed him into the heart of blackness, her fingers firmly secured in his, she did trust him. Never in her life had she felt safer.

Since she couldn’t rely on her sight, she focused on her other senses instead. A dank, musty odor permeated the air, a sure sign of abandonment and neglect. Her shoes glided across the slippery cement floor, and she became convinced that a thin film of condensation carpeted its hard surface. The distant sound of a train taking off or grinding to a halt occasionally pierced the deafening silence, growing fainter by the second.

Adrian escorted her down another flight of stairs. They took a few more sharp turns, then he came to an abrupt stop. A door creaked then swung open on rusted hinges.

Angie released his hand and crossed the threshold, her breath catching in her throat. “This is surreal.” She felt like Christine in
The
Phantom of the Opera
. She’d gone to see the Broadway play, and she had yet to forget the elaborate maze stretching beneath the opera house.

Roman columns—topped by rounded arches—held up a vaulted ceiling. Intricate designs adorned their surfaces, along with flickering sconces. Several huge chandeliers hung overhead, casting a golden glow throughout the vast, cavernous room. Angie could’ve sworn she stood in the foyer of some European chateau, certainly not in an abandoned subway station several stories beneath the ground.

“What is this place?”

A look she couldn’t decipher came over his face. “Home.”

“You live down here?”

He didn’t answer, simply urged her deeper into his beautiful, isolated sanctuary. The utility room around the corner had been converted to a kitchen, with all the conveniences she enjoyed at her Manhattan penthouse. A mahogany table flanked by velvet chairs squatted in the center, over an antique Oriental rug.

They continued walking, and Angie took in the sights around her with unabashed awe. There were paintings on the walls, sculptures tucked away in quiet corners, a bookcase lined with numerous thick volumes that looked centuries old.

She ran her fingers over a marble statue, a woman with a veil over her head. The detailing was simply exquisite. “Where did you get all this stuff?”

“Some things I took, others I convinced people to give me.” No pride resonated in his voice. “I haven’t exactly lived an honorable existence.”

If the confession was meant to repel her, it didn’t work. She’d devoted her life to reforming thieves, and Adrian was no exception. His shady past only fueled her fascination with him, as did the loneliness she sensed in him. He’d surrounded himself with beauty, with art and literature and glimmering chandeliers, yet none of these things had filled the void within him. A void that only grew deeper with each additional year he spent in isolation.

“I’ve never brought anyone down here before,” he told her, confirming her thoughts. She withdrew her hand from the statue and raised it to his face, stroking his cheek. His skin felt smooth and cool beneath her palm. “I’m glad you chose to share it with me.”

He lowered his head until his nose brushed hers. She closed her eyes against the sweet sensation gathering in her throat. In that one suspended breath, Angie had everything she’d ever wanted, everything she could possibly need. Forever no longer felt like a dream, but a promise. One she ached to seal with a kiss.

Lifting her chin, she vanquished the distance between their mouths.

He made a deep, silky sound that warmed her blood and sharpened the escalating yearning within her. Tentatively, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. The air between their bodies vanished. The hard wall of his chest dug into her breasts, making every inch of her skin pulse.

He seized her by the waist, let his hands wander up her back and buried them in her hair. Angie went liquid against him. Her knees grew wobbly, unreliable, so she strengthened the grip she had on him by digging her nails into his shoulders.

Adrian didn’t complain. He held her so tight she could barely breathe. He swamped all her senses, surrounded her with his heat. She gasped when he spun her around and pinned her against a column. Her entire world blurred, shifted out of focus. Never before had she experienced so many sensations at once.

She drew in a shaky breath, broke the kiss. “Wait. There’s something you should know before—” Heat flooded her cheeks. “Before this goes any further.”

“More secrets?” he rasped against her mouth, his fingers stroking her throat, his leg wedged between her thighs in a most unsettling way.

“I’ve never—” She bit her lower lip. “This is really embarrassing.”

His hand traveled down the length of her neck, swept across her chest to close enticingly over her breast. His leg moved against her, stroking her so intimately, words failed her.
 

To her surprise, he said it for her. “You’re a virgin.”

She froze. “How did you know? Is it that obvious? Do I walk around with a big, flashing neon sign over my—”

He cut her off with another sweltering kiss. “I may not be able to read your mind, but I can
feel
your soul.” He ran his tongue across the very lip she had the nasty habit of mauling. “I can sense your hopes, your dreams, your deepest desires.” His wicked mouth traced a burning trail toward the sensitive spot behind her ear. “Desires you won’t even admit to yourself.”

Angie swallowed past her discomfort. “Well, where’s the fun in that? Every relationship needs a little mystery.”

“I disagree.” He raised her leg, securing it around his hip. If she hadn’t been convinced as to how much he wanted her before, she was now. Knowing she had this kind of an effect on him bolstered her confidence and made her ache for him all the more. “And tonight, I have every intention of teaching you all the benefits of full disclosure. If you’ll let me.”

A smile blossomed inside her. Maybe she didn’t have forever like he did. Maybe she was weak and fragile, held prisoner by her human frailties. Maybe tomorrow would come and yank the rug out from under her.

But none of that mattered now. All that mattered was loving him. The only thing sadder than dying was dying a virgin. If she let this moment pass her by, she’d regret it for the rest of her life.

“All right.” Excitement shimmied down her spine, tempered by a flush of nervous insecurity, which she willed herself to overcome. “Teach me.”

With a boldness that surprised her as much as it did him, she raised her other leg and wrapped herself around him. His heat pressed into her, taunted and seduced her. Anticipation zipped through her veins. “Make love to me, Adrian.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

“Make love to me.”

Adrian had been waiting for weeks to hear Angie utter those words. All he’d wanted to do from the moment he’d met her was seduce her, and now that he’d succeeded, uncertainty stilled his hands.

Contradictory thoughts and feelings raged inside him. The untamed beast within him wanted to possess her, to put his mark on her and have her put her mark on him. But the man she’d slowly brought back to life hesitated.

She was so perfect, so pure, so unlike him. What if his love corrupted her? What if he lost control and pulled her essence deep inside him, robbing her of whatever time she had left on this earth?

She pressed a gentle palm against his cheek. “Is something wrong?”

When he failed to answer, her eyes flitted away from his face, and she unwrapped her legs from around his waist. Embarrassment made her skin flush with color. “I thought you wanted this.”

A harsh laugh issued from his chest. “You have no idea.”

Her unsteady gaze reluctantly met his. “Then what’s holding you back?”

“My goddamn conscience.” Of all the times to develop scruples. He’d never had trouble taking this kind of risk before, but Angie was different. The mere possibility of hurting her chilled his blood. “My kind, we’re not meant to mate with humans. Sometimes things go wrong.”

“Like what?”

He had to be honest with her. She needed to know exactly what kind of risk she was taking by being here with him. “If I’m not careful, I could kill you.”

Her self-consciousness forgotten, she raised herself on the tips of her toes and kissed the corner of his mouth. The delicate gesture was so seductive his entire body shook with need. “I can think of worse ways to go.” Her words feathered across his mouth, her breath smelling faintly of strawberries.

A pained groan formed deep in his throat. “What if I lose control? What if I steal your soul?”