What Lies Beyond the Veil (Of Flesh & Bone, #1)(72)
One more nail in the coffin of what could have grown between us, if not for the threats looming on the horizon.
“No. I’m saying you should let yourself love someone. If it is your mate, then so be it. But do not keep yourself guarded from the possibility of something more, out of fear of being hurt, because it is worth every moment of pain it will bring when it ends,” he said, the knowing expression on his golden-skinned face nearly taking my breath away. His words were so close to the very same thoughts I’d had earlier in the evening, an echo of something I’d known deep inside.
“What’s the point in loving someone if fate is determined to tear you apart?” I asked, the words a faint whisper that hovered between us. He closed the distance, caressing my bottom lip with his mouth briefly before it curved into the smile.
“Because even just for a little while, we don’t have to be alone. There is no guarantee they’ll ever find us. No guarantee that we’ll ever be taken back to Alfheimr, but if they do, do you want to go never having lived or made a choice for yourself? Or do you want to have enjoyed your freedom while you had it, before they strip it all away from you?” he asked.
It reminded me of the nights I’d spent wrapped in Loris’s embrace, risking death for a few moments of the pleasure that was forbidden to me. He hadn’t been someone who would have ever been meant for me, but he hadn’t been a danger to my heart, either.
Could I really risk my heart in the process? Or had it never really been mine to give?
“I can feel you thinking too hard,” he murmured, cupping my cheek in his hand beneath the curtain of my hair. He leaned in, his mouth coasting over mine once again and chasing away all rational thought. He rolled into me, moving me beneath him as his weight settled over me and pinned me to the ground.
Instead of feeling suffocating like it so often had when Loris did it, all I felt was comfort being wrapped in Caelum’s embrace. He kissed me, letting one of his hands skim down my body over my dress until he could grasp me around the back of my thigh.
I moaned into his mouth when his fingers brushed against my ass, guiding my leg out and around his waist so that he could sink further into me. So that he could cover me with his body.
I helped him, wrapping my legs around him until the twinge of pain that shot up my ankle drew a startled gasp from me. Caelum froze in place, pulling his mouth away and leaving me bereft, as if I needed to remember how to breathe on my own all over again.
He sighed, reaching back to guide my injured leg to the ground as he lifted himself up onto his forearms and stared down at me.
“I’m sorry. I’ll be fine, really,” I said, sinking my teeth into my bottom lip. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him I didn’t want him to stop, that I was ready for all the pleasure he’d offered me on countless occasions.
It seemed a betrayal to myself to voice the weakness he’d brought out in me, and to admit how desperately I needed to feel something after losing everything I’d ever loved.
Caelum’s presence was the only thing that made me feel alive, as if I hadn’t died with Brann on that cliff.
“You will be, but we have all the time in the world, Little One,” he said, rolling off of me and dragging my body to drape me over his. He positioned my injured ankle over his hips, gently depositing it there as if the injury would keep him from disturbing me in the night.
His eyes drifted closed, the only sign he gave me that the time had come to sleep. Disappointment fluttered in my belly, having been so close to crossing the line in a way I could never come back.
It was only a matter of time before I did. That much was clear from my brief time spent with Caelum.
The real question was what would remain of me when it was all over with.
24
My weight shifted suddenly, my body thrown to the cave floor so hard that I drew in a shuddering breath after the wind was knocked free from my lungs. “Don’t fucking touch her,” Caelum warned, his voice filled with malice as I flung my alarmed gaze toward him. The haze of sleep vanished in an instant, my mind suddenly alert as I tried to take in what was happening.
The tip of a sword hovered just in front of my nose; the man holding it stood with his legs spread ever so slightly around mine. I swallowed as I met his cold blue stare, glancing over toward where Caelum struggled against the four men fighting to pin him to the ground.
He pulled the dagger from the sheath at his thigh, pressing it to the throat of one of the men so deeply that they all froze. The man standing over me watched with interest, cocking his head to the side as he shifted his attention back down to me and touched the tip of the blade to my chest.
To the space just above my heart; the spot that could take me to a true death if he pierced it.
“You could kill him,” the man spoke to Caelum, shrugging his shoulders. “But do you think you’ll get to her before I run her through?”
Caelum froze, his jaw clenched tightly as one of the other men wrapped their hands around his where it clutched the hilt of his dagger. He let them take it from him, his eyes never leaving mine or that blade pressed to my chest in warning. “When I’m through with you, there will be nothing left to reincarnate,” Caelum growled.
The man above me chuckled, his face twisting into mockery. “You’ve got him properly wrapped around your little finger, don’t you, pretty?” he asked, using the tip of his blade to flick the hair away from my neck. My Mark pulsed, drawing a blue glow from his own Fae Mark. He was the only one to wear the Mark, the other four men entirely human as they watched Caelum warily.