Corinne’s arms were clasped around his neck as he carried her through the night back toward the house where he and Cullen were staying. “Mortals? That implies all kinds of things, Dayan. Why would you use a word like mortals? Aren’t you mortal?”
* * *
Chapter 6
There was a long silence while Dayan listened to the sounds of the night, the murmur of the wind as it whispered to him of secret things. “Sometimes, honey, it is better not to inquire too closely into things you might not want to know about. I used the word mortal when another might have been a better choice. Are we not all both mortal and immortal at the same time? If you were to die, you would leave a part of you behind here on this earth, yet you would continue in another life elsewhere.”
“You believe that?”
“Absolutely,” Dayan answered solemnly, knowing she needed reassurance. For a brief moment he stopped walking to bury his face in the warmth of her neck, inhaling her scent. “Wherever you are, Corinne, you will never be alone. I will always be with you.”
At once the fragrance of her, the reality of her, rose up to overwhelm him, and just that fast he was battling the demon inside. It rose sharply, swift and furious, fangs exploding in his mouth, the male Carpathian demanding he complete the ritual and bind her to him. She was his savior. The keeper of his soul. Light. Colors. Without her, there was only an empty, barren existence he could never return to. Never endure. Her pulse beat beneath his mouth, her life force ebbing and flowing with a dark richness he craved, he needed. Red flames flickered and danced in the depths of his black eyes as he fought the demon.
Sensing danger, Corinne held herself very still, her arms cradling his head to her. She was aware of his great inner struggle, although she understood nothing of it. His body trembled for a moment, and she felt his mouth moving erotically, back and forth over her soft skin. Her fingers crushed his silky hair, rubbing at the strands in agitation. What was it he needed from her? Sex?
‘No!’ The word shimmered in her mind emphatically. His voice gentled. ‘Not just sex, my love, I need to make love to you all night. I need to bind us together for all eternity. I do not know how to tell you these things so you can understand, but it is as necessary to me as breathing.’ There was such intimacy in the way he spoke to her, in the tenderness of his voice as much as in the way he could communicate, mind to mind. ‘I need you so much, Corinne,’ he sighed against her pulse, his breath warm and intimate; so much.’ There was something very dangerous in him – she could feel it in his enormous strength, in the possessive way he held her – but his need was so great, she couldn’t think straight, couldn’t think to deny him, not even for her own self-preservation.
The answer was shimmering in her mind, in his mind. ‘I want to be whatever you need.’ There were no words spoken aloud, yet he heard her acceptance of him, of his differences, of his wild, untamed nature. It echoed in her mind and in her heart. He murmured her name softly, his sacred talisman to guide him back from the precipice of danger, the whisperings of madness she could not hope to understand.
His mouth moved over the slender column of her neck, touched her ear briefly, while both of them seemed to drown in a rush of molten heat. He could feel her body molding itself to his, responsive, inviting, enticing. She moved restlessly in his arms, and his body reacted with a hot surging of blood, creating a painful ache that would not go away.
Dayan closed his eyes and gave himself up to the luxury of feeling. His mouth moved up her throat to her chin, nibbled lightly before settling over her mouth. At once there was that curious sensation of the earth shifting beneath his feet, of the ground rocking, falling away from him until there was only Corinne. He felt every sensation – the satin softness of her skin, the silk of her hair, the hot need of her mouth as he took possession. She clung to him as the storm of need and hunger washed over them, as his mind filled hers with his hungry desire, with dark, erotic images and the ever building fire in his blood.