My breath froze in my throat as his eyes shifted back to amber. He lowered one hand and brushed his fingers over my cheek before stepping hastily away. He turned toward the flap dividing my new room from the rest of the tent. I stood, unsettled and uncertain what to do as my gaze fell to the floor.
“River.” I lifted my head to look at him standing in the small doorway. “What you just did, what you feel and assumed everyone felt, that’s anentirelyangelic power.”
What was I supposed to say to that? I believed he was trying to be comforting, but I couldn’t be sure. “Oh.”
“If you leave this tent again without me by your side, I’m going to start tying you to the bed at night.”
He was enough to give me whiplash as he went from being almost nice to domineering again in the space of a heartbeat. My teeth clamped together and my hands fisted, but no sparks shot from the tips. Oh yes, I’d definitely figure out how to get that little ability to work again, if it was the last thing I did.
I didn’t get a chance to respond before he disappeared into the other side. I stared at the flap, still swaying between us, and tried to digest his words. Up until now, he’d said he believed I could be the one, but there had always been at least a little doubt, in him, in me, and I’m certain everyone else in the encampment.
With those sparks, it had vanished. There it was now, a little bit of every species inme. I could fling fire like a demon, die and love like a human, and feel the pulse of life like an angel, which somehow turned my fingers into their own Fourth of July celebration when around him.
Exhaustion clung to me as I shuffled over to the bed and pulled back the red blanket and sheets. I’d forgotten the lantern on the hill, but the dim glow of the ones in Kobal’s tent filtered around the edges of the flap dividing us. All I wanted was to go to sleep, but I knew I wouldn’t.
Not only had this night gone to complete shit, but my body still throbbed with its need for him. I tried to ignore it, but it was impossible as I curled into a ball beneath sheets smelling far too much like him to give me any relief from him.
Nothing could be worse than this, I decided. I was already in Hell.
CHAPTER 27
Kobal
“Try harder.”
If she figured out how to harvest the life around her, I was fairly certain I’d be lying in the middle of the field a hundred feet from here. She couldn’t know her fire wouldn’t have an effect on me, but if she learned how to turn that pulse of life into a weapon, she’d have me on my ass, and with the look on her face right now, she may keep me there.
“Iamtrying!” she snapped. “Maybe you could show me a better way to do it instead of barking at me to feel the pulse and try harder! I’m not Luke Skywalker; I can’t just feel the force like he did.”
A stab of jealousy tore through me at the mention of another man. I’d never felt jealousy before, never expected to experience the searing heat tearing through my chest and making my blood boil. My claws extended and if he’d been standing before me, I would have killed him.
“Who is this Luke?” I demanded.
She rolled her eyes. “He was a character in movie I saw once, years ago.”
“You humans and your infatuation with fictional characters.”
Her eyes narrowed on me. The shadows rimming them made their color a deeper almost midnight purple. “You demons and your dickhead comments.”
My eyebrows rose at her statement. She continued to glower at me, looking as exhausted and stressed as I felt. Dirt streaked her cheeks and the tip of her nose. Her black hair, pulled onto the top of her head when we started, now hung against her nape. Strands of it stuck to her flushed forehead and cheeks.
She was sweaty and disheveled, yet blood flooded into my cock at the thought of running my hands over her. I could still feel and taste her on me from last night. Could easily recall the suppleness of her flesh, the fullness of her breasts against my chest. Breasts that would fill my hand as I rubbed and kneaded them before running my tongue over her puckered nipple. I had never craved a woman the way I craved her. Never been so stimulated and frustrated by the inability to be with one before.
I kept telling myself I was this on edge because I hadn’t been with a woman since she’d arrived here and had never gone so long without one before. There was no need to deny myself for so long; there had always been plenty of willing women in Hell. There had been men too, but unlike some of the others, my tastes only ran to the women. I enjoyed the feel of them, the sound of them, the way their bodies moved and flowed with such easy grace. Their breasts, their breath, and the softness of their skin. Even in Hell, they had smelled sweeter and been more inviting.
But none so much as her. My fangs, having extended of their own accord, pressed against the inside of my mouth as she walked away from me, her firm ass swaying in the shorts she wore. The curve of her upper thigh had been revealed during her last fall, which had shoved her shorts up her legs.
I’d been keeping away from the fire and the women to make sure she stayed protected, but I couldn’t take one more night of relieving myself with my hand while images ofherran through my mind.
River had completely thrown me off, but I could end that easily enough tonight by returning to the fire. I’d be able to get her out of my mind after a few hours of rutting on top of one of the other willing humans. Bale could watch over her; she would make sure River stayed safe. I’d far prefer to have River in my bed, but entangling myself deeper with her would only create more problems. I was supposed to be training her, making her stronger, and preparing her for the fight ahead. Not fucking her senseless.
The only problem was, just thinking of trying to screw another woman caused something within me to recoil. My suspicions about what she might be to me grew every day, but there would be no way to know for sure if she was my Chosen or not without being inside of her. If it turned out she wasn’t my Chosen, sex would complicate our already complicated relationship.
I’d never had to consider such things before, but I did with her. Even if she wasn’t my Chosen, I didn’t want her to be hurt, and I would one day claim my throne and return to where I belonged. If she was my Chosen, I still intended for those things to happen. There was a chance she wouldn’t be able to live within Hell, and if she could, there was a bigger chance she wouldn’t want to.
I had been so close to knowing if she was my Chosen or not last night. If I’d kept kissing her, she wouldn’t have had any time to come to her senses. I also wouldn’t have noticed the sparks that had brought us to this empty patch of land, away from human and demon eyes alike. For now, I preferred it that no one else knew what she could be capable of.
My cock jumped when she bent over to reveal more of her tantalizing legs to the curve of her round, firm ass. I wiped at my mouth when saliva filled it.Take her, she’s yours!I thought as I watched her grab a bottle of water from the ground, open it, and greedily gulp down the contents.Her mouth around me in such a way, sliding up my shaft as her hands— No!
