Embrace Me at Dawn

Page 31

Thoughts of Lucan made her sex clench and spasm. She needed him, had to have him. If she died without him… wouldn’t that be what she deserved?

Sweat rolled over her skin, and she closed her eyes, trying to close out everything but the fantasy in her head where Lucan found her, led her to his bed, crawled between her legs, and tongued his way up her slick flesh until she cried out in…

“No!” Anka sat upright, expecting to be huddled on the sofa. Instead, Shock knelt between her legs, holding her thighs wide, his lips slick with her juices.

“Still hurt?” he asked.

She nodded. “Don’t.”

He drew his hands away immediately.

Anka wanted to apologize for her rebuff, caress his cheek. She wished she could let him know that, whatever their respective shortfalls as people that didn’t allow them to be a real couple, a part of her would always love him, despite the fact that her heart had chosen another.

He sat back on his heels with a sigh. “Aquarius came home and found you delirious and writhing on her sofa. She called me. Why did you leave MacTavish? You love him. He wants you. Are you afraid to be happy?”

Shock made happiness sound so simple. Order it from the value menu and poof! Someone served it up immediately, steaming and tasty, in a cardboard takeaway container.

“Doesn’t matter.” She curled her knees into her chest as another cramp overtook her. She cried out and bit her lip. Had to be mindful of the neighbors.

“It fucking does.” He picked her up in his arms.

Even that small touch sent every nerve in her body hurtling headfirst into an acute pain that had her screaming, neighbors be damned. Shock dropped her like a hot potato and cursed.

“You need him, little one, especially now. I think he’s worthless, but…”

“Can’t have him.”

He sighed. “You’ve grown stubborn, Anka.”

“Living with you.” She grimaced, bracing for another wave of pain.

“You’re in agony and you’re making jokes?”

She forced a small smile. “Working?”

“For fuck’s sake. Where is your mobile?”

So he could call Lucan to come and care for her? Yes, that’s what he would do. Under all his bad attitude and bluster, he cared for her deeply. She had hurt him…yet he was willing to put her needs above his own.

“Not telling.”

Shock didn’t waste time chastising her, just rummaged through the pockets of her discarded clothes, finally pulling the device free. “Where is the wanker’s number?”

As he scrolled through her menus, she forced her mind away from the pain and the pending wave of ruthless desire threatening to choke her. “Make me sleep.”

“I already tried.”

She frowned, blinked up at his scowling face. “When?”

“The second I walked in and saw you thrashing about in total misery. Believe me, calling the do-good fucker isn’t my first choice.”

So, in the absence of any other plan, Shock would give her back to his enemy and sacrifice his own happiness to save her. His innate goodness and loyalty to those he cared for had endeared him to her from day one. She wished it could be enough.

“I found it.” He started pressing buttons.

In a moment, that call would connect. Lucan would be awake and probably come running. He would insist on giving her whatever she needed to feel better. And they would create the next generation of banshee. Lucan would draw ever closer to finding the truth she sought to protect him from.

She had run out of options and out of time.

With only a vague plan in mind, she’d come to Aquarius’s. The moment to set it in motion had arrived. Once these words were spoken, even Lucan couldn’t touch her.

Anka licked her dry lips, trying to form all the words coherently. “As I become a part of you, you become a part of me. I will be honest, good, and true—”

“What the fuck are you doing?” Shock threw the phone aside and knelt to her. “Don’t.”

Saying the words he’d waited over a century to hear. Binding to him. It had to be done eventually if either he or Lucan were ever going to really be free. This was manipulative and terrible—and the only way she could help both of the men she loved. “I heed your Call. ’Tis you I seek.”

“You don’t mean any of those words. Shut it! Bloody shut it right now!”

He needed this. He might really hate her timing, but someday he would thank her. The fact that it gave Lucan an easy reason to turn his back on her forever didn’t hurt, either.

Gathering her strength, she drew in a shuddering breath and finished her vow. “From this moment on, there is no other for me but you.”

An explosion rocked her, splintering her with an agony a hundred times worse than what she’d endured before. She only thought she’d known pain, but she’d been wrong. Apparently Binding to the wizard her heart hadn’t chosen while craving another made her pain more terrible.

She yelped and cried, curling into a tight ball on the sofa. Death had to be coming soon.

“Why the fuck did you do that?” he asked softly, his hand hovering over her as if he wanted to touch and comfort her but didn’t dare.

“I am…” She swallowed. “Your mate now.”

“Do you think I want you now, when I know your heart belongs to that wanker? I couldn’t escape to the bottom of a bottle fast enough every bloody time I fucked you and you were pining for him. I don’t want to do that for the rest of my life. I don’t want to be your second choice, Anka.”

“Agreed.” She clenched her fists, trying to breathe past the pain buzzing through her system. “Did this…for you.”

“So I can remember every fucking time I come near you that you didn’t want me first? No. Hell no.”

She shook her head and tried to focus on the words, not the suffering. “Take me to Millie.”

Shock hesitated before understanding dawned on his dark face. He ripped off his sunglasses, and she had no doubt he’d done it so that she would see how deeply her gesture had disturbed him. Eventually, he would thank her. Maybe in a century or two. Now, he was simply furious.

“Are you fucking kidding me? You did this for me, to free me. No. Absolutely not. A mate breaking right now will kill you.”

“Not…worst thing.”