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"The best way to take care of a woman like Mikayla isn't storing her in a protective area while life passes her by. Leaving her won't save her, Nik."
"Neither will staying." The edge to his voice was sharp, furious. "What do you want, Ian? You think because marital bliss suits you that it suits the rest of the fucking world?"
Ian's lips quirked. "I think it eases the demons, Nik," he finally said. "And you have more than most. But if the demons make better bedfellows than that woman waiting inside, then that's your bad decision, not mine."
"Damned right," Nik snarled. "Remember that." Ian's smile was rueful and tinged with a hint of compassion that just further pissed Nik off.
"This conversation is over," Nik informed him. "Find something else to talk about or get the hell out of here. I don't care which."
"I should have the information you need soon, Nik," Ian told him, his tone somber now. "And if you need to talk later, then I'll be there." Nik gave his head a hard shake as a bitter laugh left his lips. "How long have we known each other, Ian?"
"A long time," Ian answered quietly.
"How many times have I needed a buddy powwow?"
"You've never asked for one, Nik," Ian stated. "But if a man ever needed one, then it was you. What happened to Nicolette wasn't your fault. But if blaming yourself helps you sleep better at night, then who am I to tell you different." Before Nik could sneer in response Ian turned and stepped back into the house.
"Hey, cutie," Nik heard Kira, Ian's wife, greet him. "The dresses are going to be so beautiful. All the other high-society witches are going to be so jealous of me." Laughter filled her voice as she teased her husband, "And all the guys are going to be so jealous of you. I'm going to be hot." She made a sizzling sound as she stepped into her husband's embrace.
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"You're always hot," he told her. "One of these days, those jealous bastards are going to come up missing eyes, though."
The teasing struck at Nik's soul, slicing through his heart with a jagged blade. He could have that, with Mikayla. But for how long? How long before the job, his responsibilities, tore at their relationship? How long before she decided she needed a lover? . . . That thought fractured.
No, if Mikayla made the vows, she would uphold them. But love died when it wasn't nurtured. He wasn't free. The Elite Ops still had two more years of his life, and the missions were often near-suicide trips.
If he and Mikayla had a child, if an enemy found Mikayla, if she fell out of love with Nik, if she learned who and what he truly was, if she needed more than he could give . . .
If. So many ifs. So many that he knew there was nothing to do at the end of the road but walk in the other direction.
As he entered the kitchen, his gaze moved to her. She was just as pale as Ian said she was, and she looked tired. She needed to be sleeping rather than putting up with this. She needed to be making her dresses rather than fearing for her life. She needed to be tucked close against Nik's body where he'd know she was safe. Her gaze lifted to him as he stepped inside the room, her unusual eyes flaring with hunger and pain. Even after he'd hurt her, made her cry, still she wanted him. Aching need and a fierce, almost furious desperation shadowed them now. Damn her, she was tying herself to him. She was falling in love with him, if she hadn't already. Dealing with that knowledge was something he found harder to do than facing terrorists. Facing the hungry need he could sense inside her was like facing a bomb. Nuclear. With the potential to destroy more than just his sanity. It had the potential to destroy his very soul.
"Now that you're happy with your dress, we'll head back to the hotel." Ian grinned down at his wife as though she were the socializing little butterfly she pretended to be. The truth was, Kira Richards was probably just as dangerous as her husband. In some ways, more so, because a man wouldn't expect it coming from her.
"I'm ready." Kira's gaze turned to Nik. "Take care of her, Nik; I have a feeling she and I are going to become very good friends."
That statement was enough to send frissons of alarm scattering down his spine, but he gave her a tight nod anyway. He held back the awareness in Kira's statement that he'd always have a tie to Mikayla. Kira would keep up with her. She would keep Mikayla safe.
That didn't help him sleep at night, though.
Holding Mikayla in the darkness hours later, Nik smoothed his hand down her back, over the light, sleeveless gown she wore, as his eyes closed in agony. There were few times in the past ten years that he had allowed himself to remember the fact that once he had loved his deceased wife. That he had trusted her, laughed with her. That he had lain in bed and dreamed of the future they would have together.
But it hadn't been the same, Nik admitted. There had always been a part of him that had wondered if his wife's affair with Anton had been fully dead. Anton Vileski.
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Nik's jaw clenched. She had been sleeping with Anton before Nik met her, but he hadn't learned of the affair until after their marriage. An affair that had supposedly been over before she met Nik.
He'd always wondered, though. He'd loved her more than he'd ever loved another woman at that time, but a part of him had always feared that his position inside the Russian federal government had been the reason she had married him. That she had married him for her lover.
Nik had never doubted Nicolette was his own, though. From the moment of her birth, staring into her pale, pale blue eyes he'd known that tiny scrap of screaming humanity was his. And he had adored her. Cherished her.
And he had lost her.
Stroking his hand lower, his fingers met bare flesh where Mikayla's gown had ridden up above her hips. She was naked. There were no panties covering her, just sweet, warm, feminine flesh.
Memories of his deceased wife retreated beneath the warmth of Mikayla's bare flesh. The need to touch her became more important than the need to push back the unfamiliar emotions crowding inside him.
