Dark Challenge. Christine Feehan. Dark Series – book 5

Julian lifted his head and regarded her carefully, searching her face for signs of recovery. Color ran under her skin, a much healthier glow. Breathing a sigh of relief, he allowed her to awaken slowly. His arms cradled her protectively. “I am sorry, cara. I should have been far more restrained in possessing you.”

Her hand brushed his throat, sending heat coursing through him, a sense of belonging and acceptance he had never known. Her smile tugged at his heart. “You are my love, Julian. You would never harm me. I know that as surely as I know I would be incapable of harming you. I was quite satisfied, if you must hear me say it, although I suspect you know that you provided me with pleasure such as I could not have imagined before.”

He stroked her hair, his eyes like molten gold. “It is more than giving you pleasure that I want, it is sharing something beautiful beyond compare, and that I cannot do if I cannot control my desire for you.” His expression held infinite tenderness as he watched her face.

Desari found she couldn’t breathe for a moment. Julian Savage was a beautiful male of their species, but he always looked so remote and rather harsh. She could not believe she was now seeing such tenderness in the depths of his eyes, in the curve of his mouth, in the touch of his hand. “Do you think that I would trade you for someone gentler?” she asked very softly.

He closed his eyes for a moment to hide the pain those words caused. “You have no choice who your lifemate is; we both know that, Desari. If you had, perhaps you would have wanted someone far different than me.”

Her smile robbed him of air. “I believe in God, Julian. I always have. Living through the centuries as we have, I have witnessed many wonderful, miraculous things he has wrought. I believe we were created two halves of the same whole. I had no idea this was so until I met you, but I am now convinced. I would never want another, never fit with another. I can feel that we are right together, and I do not believe God would put together two creatures who did not suit one another.” She rubbed at the frown on his face with the pad of her thumb. “I find your enthusiasm for me very sexy, Julian. You can want me like that anytime.” Her smile was a siren’s teasing enticement.

Effortlessly he shifted her in his arms so that he could press her against his heart, and he found himself breathing again after holding his breath. “I do not ever want to be without you, Desari,” he admitted softly. The words were torn from his heart; he felt them leave his body, felt the truth in them.

She wound her arms around his neck, liking the feel of his long hair against her skin. “I do not expect you to ever allow us to be apart. I am counting on that, lifemate. Now stop talking so much and find us a place to rest this night. Tomorrow we will proceed to Konocti in the bus with the others. They will remain at the campsite we have established this night.” A faint grin curved her soft mouth. “That is, if the bus will actually run. It is a disgrace that none of us have mechanical abilities. Even I read the owner’s manual, and found it too boring.”

“We do not need mechanical abilities,” Julian reminded her as he spun around, taking her with him as if she weighed no more than a feather. “We were meant to travel differently, under our own power.”

“If we want to blend in with the rest of the world,” she pointed out, “we can do no other than travel in the mortals’ machines.”

“It is much faster to travel our way through time and space.”

She laughed softly, the sound a husky blend of velvet and wine pouring over him, into him, so that Julian knew the meaning of joy. It was a woman’s laughter, her smile, the glow in her dancing eyes. “It certainly is less frustrating to simply join the wind and go where we wish without following those endless ribbons of highway,” she agreed.