One Grave at a Time (Night Huntress #6)(43)
“I’m not saying we try this Halloween and then stop if we fail. I’m willing to commit years to this because I want this sod locked in a box so he can forever know the helplessness and terror he’s inflicted on others, but I can accept that it might not happen. You need to accept that, too, because know this—I won’t let you sacrifice yourself in a never-ending quest to defeat someone who might not be able to be caught.”
My fists clenched. “You could do that? Turn your back on Elisabeth and all of Kramer’s future victims, knowing what will keep happening? You would let that murdering prick win—”
“This isn’t a game, Kitten,” he interrupted. “It’s life, and there will always be injustice no matter how frustrating that is to accept. We’ll give Kramer our best shot, but if we fail, we fail. And then we move on.”
I sucked in a breath to tell him what I thought of that quitter mentality, but under Bones’s hard, knowing stare, I expelled it not in a rant, but in a long sigh. Kramer was such a clear-cut case of evil prowling on the loose that it felt like a betrayal of everything those women had suffered to admit that Kramer could use his ghostly state to forever evade punishment. My knee-jerk response was to shout, Screw that, I’ll catch you if it’s the last thing I ever do!
And that was how Elisabeth had let the pursuit of him fill her life until there was room for nothing else. Part of me still wanted to call Bones a coldhearted bastard for even considering giving up the hunt on Kramer one day, but that would just be my denial talking. I wouldn’t mean those ugly words, and they wouldn’t be true; nonetheless they’d been frothing close to the surface. The knowledge that I’d been about to attack the man I loved because he pointed out the very obvious fact that we lived in a world where sometimes, good didn’t defeat evil, and the good guys didn’t ride off into the sunset made me realize how far down Elisabeth’s road I’d already traveled.
I still admired her for her strength of will under repeated, devastating circumstances, but now, I also pitied her. Elisabeth lived for defeating Kramer, and nothing else. How much richer would the long years of her life have been if she’d still sought a way to stop Kramer, but chosen to live for something else, like friendship or love?
“You’re not going to lose me to this,” I finally said. “Defeating Kramer is my goal, and I’ll try like hell to accomplish it, but you, Bones . . . you’re my life, and you always will be.”
He stood, catching my hand in his. Slowly, he raised it to his lips, kissing the ring he’d first put on my finger two years ago. Then his mouth moved up my hand, dragging over my wrist before continuing on its path up my arm, his gaze never leaving mine. By the time he reached my shoulder, I was quivering with desire and other, deeper emotions. I wanted to cry for all the years I’d let circumstances keep us apart, and I wanted to tear away his pants so he could be inside me, bringing us as close together as two people could be.
A moan escaped me when his mouth caressed my neck, his lips and fangs teasing the sensitive skin. He caught my wrists when I tried to slide my hands over his back, holding them gently at my sides. Now my moan was one of mild frustration. Even though he was so close that his aura brushed over me like a warm, invisible cloud, our bodies weren’t touching. The only contact we had was his mouth on my neck and his hands clasped around my wrists, and that wasn’t enough. Yet when I moved forward, he took a step back, his soft chuckle muffled by my throat.
“Not yet.”
Yes, yet. I edged closer again, but Bones sidestepped me once more. I couldn’t even slide my robe off to tempt him with bare flesh because he still held my wrists in a gentle yet unyielding grip.
“Bones,” I whispered. “I want to touch you.”
His low growl rumbled against my throat. “And I want to touch you, Kitten. So hold still and let me try.”
What did he mean, try? I was right here, attempting to bring our bodies together, and he was the one thwarting me. All he had to do was let go of my wrists, and we’d be touching every inch of each other in about two seconds flat—
I gasped, surprise and ecstasy flaring in me at the sudden tug along the sensitive tips of my nipples. They hardened in expectation of another touch, and it came, leaving them aching with the need for more. But Bones’s hands hadn’t left my wrists, and his mouth was still pressed to my neck, tongue and fangs grazing over the areas that made me weakest with desire.
“How?” I managed, the question ending on a groan as both tips felt like they were being slowly, sensually pinched.
His hands tightened on my wrists. “Because I want to touch you so badly, yet I’m not allowing myself. So my mind is doing it for me. Feel where I want to be touching you right now . . .”
I didn’t have time to be amazed at this exercise of his new power before a long, intimate caress had me shuddering with rapture. My loins clenched, greedily demanding more. The thought that he must’ve been practicing his telekinetic ability on the sly in order to wield it so skillfully now flitted through my mind before another tantalizing stroke cleared out any more musings under a tide of need. Bones continued to kiss my neck, his tongue flicking out to lave away the scant drops of blood he drew when his fangs broke my skin. A sharper, rougher moan left my lips, my eyelids lowering with the erotic sensations, until my vision was narrowed to two heavy-lidded slits.