The Guardian (18 page)

I
n seconds they were through the brush piles, slipped under the hides that covered the opening and stepped into complete and utter darkness. The weight of the darkness pressed on Fala, and she felt as if she were shrinking. Surely the spirit guides knew what she was about to do. Would they approve? Fear and indecision churned inside her. Was it wrong to be here, in this holy place? This place she'd made a point of avoiding because it frightened her?

Then she grew aware of Stephen, his strong hand in hers, guiding her through the darkness, the heat of his body close to her, his strength drawing her in.

In that instant, she experienced an epiphany, injected directly into her heart, the irrefutable truth that she loved Stephen. And nothing would ever stop her from loving him. Not her family, not her marriage to Akando, not her duties as Guardian. She would always care for him. And
all she'd have of him would be this memory. Nothing was more sacred than this moment, this giving of love. Nothing. Sharing true love with another soul was the ultimate spiritual experience. These few stolen moments together she'd carry with her the rest of her life. It was all she would ever have. A light from within warmed her insides, a peaceful feeling unlike any she'd experienced before flowed over her and through her and she knew that this couldn't be wrong.

Stephen said, “Is there something to start a fire with?”

Fala's body trembled from the overwhelming feelings coursing throughout her, and she had to clutch his forearm to steady herself. She found her voice and said, “Wait here.” Her voice trembled, and she cleared it before continuing. “I know where the matches are kept. I'll light a fire.”

After a moment, flames rose in a corner pit. Warm yellow light flicked over the cave, over the blessing mound, and flitted along the edges of the vast cavern's darkness. Fala couldn't drag her eyes from the pull of the cave's inner shadows, and the unknowns that it held. She stayed kneeling before the fire, gaze transfixed. Oddly, the darkness didn't frighten her now. Not with Stephen here.

“What are you thinking about?” Stephen asked as he moved in behind her and touched her shoulders.

She still knelt before the flames. His long shins touched the sensitive skin on either side of her spine, sending a shudder up and down her body. She could feel the sides of his knees touching her neck and she settled her head in the dip between his thighs.

“I was thinking how glad I am we came here,” she managed to answer.

She gazed up at him as he gazed down at her. The fire seemed to not only warm the cave but the air in it, expanding it until it throbbed between them. Looking at his face upside down did strange things to his eyes. All she could see were the gold flecks glistening in the firelight, the harsh silver glint gone.

His gaze devoured her as he dropped to his knees. He pulled her close, capturing her arms tight at her sides, until his broad chest pressed against her back. He held her and whispered in her ear, “God, you're beautiful.”

Fala let her chin drop onto his clasped forearms that were locked across the top of her chest. She rubbed the corded muscles of his arms, her fingers stroking the ridged hardness beneath the flannel shirt. Feeling his embrace encompassing her, the way she was nestled perfectly in between his thighs, his powerful chest meeting her back, his breath hot against her neck, the searing heat of his body warming her from the inside out, she couldn't ever remember feeling more secure and comfortable with a man in her life. Never in a million years would she have believed she could make this kind of connection with a warlock, and one she had distrusted so much after their first meeting. But he'd opened up, even cracked a few jokes with her family and smiled. She could feel the real Stephen breaking through the wall he had erected, and everything about him felt raw and new, and it played havoc with her senses.

He placed kisses along her neck while he unclasped his arms and let his hands slowly roam down her chest,
cupping her breasts. He stroked them through her bra until her nipples hardened.

Fala gasped, the barrier of the cloth agonizingly erotic. She reached behind him and awkwardly groped his erection through his jeans, but he grabbed her hand.

“Oh, no, sweetheart, if you touch me now, I won't be able to hold back. Just relax and let me savor every inch of you.”

Fala had never felt savored by any man. Not even the first time Stephen had made love to her. Then their coupling had been driven by urgent lust. What would it feel like now that she loved him, and he wanted to take his time making love to her? No doubt, torturous, in a sweet melting way. She was already wet for him and ached to feel him inside her.

“Okay, but I don't like this waiting,” she said.

“You will.” He spoke while he held her ponytail and gently rolled the band down. “You don't know how I've dreamed of touching you like this, feeling your hair against my naked skin.”

Fala felt him tenderly holding her hair so it wouldn't pull as he shoved the band off and tossed it on the cave floor. Then he buried his hands in the thick folds, massaging her scalp. Slowly he fanned her hair, letting it spill through his fingers and pour down her back.

“Beautiful,” he murmured, as he buried his face in her hair. He breathed deeply, his hot breath sending tingles down her scalp and neck. Then he brushed aside her hair and placed tiny kisses along her neck.

Fala let her head lull to the side, giving him free access, as she reached over and stroked his hard thighs.

The muscles beneath her hands tensed into granite
and he groaned at her touch. “No touching yet,” he said in a ragged murmur.

“Unfair.”

“Too bad.” He held her hands as he shifted and eased around to face her.

Cold air hit her back for a moment, and she missed his heat, then his lips found hers and he was pushing her back against the pelts and straddling her.

His wide hands slid beneath her sweater. When his hot palms touched her back, she sucked in her breath and wondered how long the delightful agony would go on.

He slid his hands over her flat belly, searing a line up to her breasts. When he cupped them, Fala gasped and arched her back, thrusting her breasts against his palms.

His breathing grew ragged near her ear as he lifted her bra and her breasts slid out. He teased her nipples, rubbing them between his finger and thumb. Tingles of desire shot through her. He unhooked her bra and lifted her sweater up to her neck, then suckled her nipples.

When his mouth touched her skin, she writhed fretfully beneath his gentle coaxing.

“Shhh,” he moaned, as he kissed a line over to the charm. She thought he might remove it, but he left it on as he eased the sweater over her head, trailing kisses up the center of her breastbone.

His tongue dipped into the sensitive skin at the base of her throat, even as he raised her arms over her head, then his wide palms slowly pushed the sweater and bra up her arms. She could feel the wool pooling around his hands as his palms singed an agonizing trail to her wrists.

When her sweater was off, he tossed it aside with a dull thump. Then his mouth found her right nipple again.

Fala arched her back, feeling him suckle while his tongue teased the hard little nub.

Fala dug her fingers into his hair, forcing his head closer to her breast, letting him know how he was driving her crazy.

His hands slowly moved to the waist of her pants, his tongue following the way of his touch. He opened her zipper and slid her panties and pants down.

Fala lifted up and helped him shove them over her hips. When they were near her knees, he used his foot to drag them the rest of the way off, never stopping the kisses he placed over her abdomen that branded her flesh and caused desire to burn out of control within her.

Then he separated her thighs and ever so slowly moved downward between her legs, his hands learning the curves of her stomach, her hips, her thighs. He stroked the dark triangular hair of her woman's mound while he parted her. His tongue found her pleasure center.

Waves of ecstasy broke over her as he teased and circled and used his tongue to pleasure her into an orgasm. Fala bucked and cried out, her body trembling with need.

He rose up and looked at her from between her thighs, his lips wet with her essence, his eyes hooded by thick, dark lashes, soft liquid silver in the firelight. “You like that, sweetheart?”

“No, because you still have your clothes on.” She sounded annoyed, but she smiled at him. “It's my turn now. I want to see your naked body and feel it.”

“It'll be my undoing.” He let his eyes slowly roam over her body. Lust caused his pupils to dilate. A vein pulsed in his temple from the strain it caused him to hold back his desire.

“I don't care.” Fala sat up, her body still strumming from coming. She pulled him up and captured his cheeks in her hands, kissing his mouth, tasting her own essence on him.

She yanked his overshirt and T-shirt off and stared at the firelight playing over the hard contours of his chest, along the dark spattering of hair there. It tapered below the bandages still around his chest, formed a midline on his belly and disappeared down into the waistband of his jeans.

She touched his nipples and he groaned, every muscle in his body hardening. Fala marveled at the power her touch had over him.

She worked on the zipper of his jeans, and he helped her pull off his jeans and underwear. His erection sprang free, and she stroked it, feeling the warm tip.

He moaned like a tortured man, his breathing growing to a freight-train pitch. “Fala…”

He couldn't stand it any longer, his whole body shaking from yearning. He forced her back onto the animal skins. Then he was covering her, the delicious weight of his nakedness melting into her own.

She could feel the charm digging into her chest and his. It became like a barrier between them. He must have felt it, too, because he stopped her as she was about to take it off. “Fala, tell me how you feel about me.”

“I love you…somehow I think I always have.”

He smiled down at her, though sadness pooled in his
eyes. She understood his sorrow. She dreaded a future without him, too.

Then he greedily kissed her as he thrust inside her, his thickness pushing deep.

The charm fell behind her shoulder as she moaned, locked her arms around his back and wrapped her legs around his thighs, holding him as tight as she could, feeling him moving inside her. White-hot yearning burst inside her and soared through her everywhere. She felt her spirit flickering and shifting, restless in her skin, demanding to bond with Stephen's spirit.

They moved together. Fala matched his movement thrust for thrust, feeling his need as strong as her own. They came together in a blinding, explosive harmony. She actually felt something tear inside Stephen, only for a split-second, a minor fissure. Was her love powerful enough to cross the blood-binding spell he'd made? The rent was enough to hear his heartbeat and sense his spirit, all yellows and violet and indigo, the colors of light and affection. His heart wasn't evil. She grasped at the tiny ray of his spirit like she was grasping at his body, not wanting to let either go.

 

Stephen lay snuggled beside Fala, her head resting on his chest, her hand over his heart. He had pulled a bearskin over them, and they huddled beneath it. The heady smell of sex braided with that of wild animal encompassed them.

He bent near her scalp and inhaled deeply the lilac-and-herb scent of her hair, trying to capture it in his memory. He knew that aroma would stay with him long after memories of her had faded. He recalled having had
her twice. And he wanted her again. He couldn't seem to get enough of her. He craved that euphoric sensation he experienced when she shimmered and almost shifted during an orgasm. It was like nothing he'd ever felt before, a tempting, insatiable sensation in which he wanted to drown himself.

He listened to the pop of the fire echoing through the cave as he played with her hair, feeling it spill over his chest and tickle his side. He wrapped the thick strands around his palm and watched the firelight glisten burgundy highlights over the long strands. Her eyes were closed, a sated smile stretched across her cheeks, deepening the dimple on her chin. Her bronze skin looked like silken cream in the flickering firelight. She was so lovely it made him forget for a while what he must do.

He glanced at the silver charm shining next to her shoulder where she'd dropped it. He couldn't believe she had said she loved him. She'd said it on her own. It hadn't been a suggestion. He didn't need to take off the charm now to make her fall in love with him. She loved him on her own.

The revelation had hit like a physical blow, stunned him at first. Now it ate at him like a canker. He cared for Fala more than any woman he'd ever come in contact with. He hated himself for lying to her and betraying her.

“Stephen.” Fala's eyes fluttered open. She lifted her head and looked at him from behind thick, hooded lashes, the unbound blue in her eyes swallowing him alive.

“Yes,” he said, feeling a dull throb in his heart when he looked into her trusting face.

She touched the scar on his cheek. “How did you get this?”

He hesitated, aware he had opened up to Fala about his past more than he ever had with his own brothers. They never spoke about their past. He knew he couldn't deny her this probing question, either, because he wanted to share it with her. “My uncle had been delving into black magic. And when the coven discovered evidence of it, he blamed it on me. We got into a fight. He picked up a fireplace poker and struck me. The coven believed him rather than me and they sent me away. That's when my—” He was about to say
my brothers and me,
but stopped himself. He cleared his throat and said, “That's when I left.”

“And you never went back to clear your name?”

Stephen's lips hardened as he recalled how they had lived on the streets, until he'd found a job as a dishwasher. How he had struggled to keep them together as a family. It hadn't been easy, but he had been determined to raise his brothers, even if to prove to himself he could succeed without the coven. Stephen had been devastated that they believed his uncle rather than him. Not one person had stood up at his trial and spoke for him. Not one. They had all shunned him. After that he had given up practicing magic totally and hid his warlock nature, until the government forced him to take up magic again.