Pine Needles (Veil Realms Series) (16 page)

I disengaged all other thoughts from my mind and crush
ed my lips against his, forcefully. My hands sought out his face and held him tight, for whatever its worth I wanted him to know how much I loved him. How much he meant to me, this kiss needed to confirm to him exactly how much I cared for us. He didn’t object or hesitate.  His hand finds my neck and pulls me in meeting my feverish strokes. His skilled mouth nurtures my needs and his. I moan softly reminiscing the way he used to touch me, the way we use to make each other feel. He breaks away and tips my head back, his mouth stakes his claim along my neck as he sucks at my tender flesh and kisses the burning sensation away.

Here, in the dark with him and sound of the rain pouring madly over the forest amp
s every desire, remorse, passion, shame, and sorrow. What I would do to go back in time, to have never left the pine grove that morning and stayed with him. Made love with him in the bed of pine needles. My eyes start to sting with memories of tears, tears that I will never be allowed to shed. Nonetheless, my body trembles as his hands trail down my back. His fingers press confidently into my skin, supporting his purchase on me. He leans against the interior of the tree and drags me down with him.

My legs weaken as I straddle his waist and run m
y hands over his bare muscular chest, up his throat and through his damp hair. That tight coil of yearning for him aches and reconstructs a whole new dilemma inside me. I want him and I want him to need me just as much as I need him right now. I kiss his jawline restlessly feeling the warmth radiating off of him and smoothness of his skin. The woodsy smell that envelopes his body entices me more and I curl in closer to his neck and deeply inhale. The intensity spreads from me to him and his hands quickly unfasten the golden chains that prevent him from touching my breasts. He wastes no time taking what he wants and I encourage him further caressing my hand lower along his abs and down near his restraining leather pants.

I pant
a little harder when his ministrations become more reckless as if he can’t touch me quick enough. The friction of our skin heats my body and I shiver all over. It’s not from the drop in temperature. It’s more from the sexual tension between us. His hands hungrily possess my thighs while his incautious lips rove up and down my neck. He’s like an animal innately wanting to reclaim his territory and the whole time my heart throbs combatively ready to crash straight through my chest. I let out a startled grunt as he whirls me beneath him. Even in this drab, lightless confining shelter I can feel his breath and I quietly plead to get a tiny glimpse of that uber chivalrous smile of his. Just want a tiny glimpse. I’ve missed seeing him this way. The way his expression suddenly changes to rough and needy to sultry and tender. The way he looks at me when we made love.

“God… you’
re breathtaking, Selene,” he confides in the dark. I follow my fingers along the chiseled angles of his strong cheekbones and jaw. My eyes close and I faintly trace every feature of his face. With a ghostlike touch I feel his lashes and I know his eyes are closed too absorbing my physical contact, taking it all in. His assertive mouth connects with mine depleting my hidden overjoyed grin, my demanding moans. Before I lose myself entirely to Rayden I mumble in between our lips, “I love you, Rayden. I’ve always loved you.”  

Chapter Eighteen

The Veil

I awake with his hard,
lean body above me. His arms propped on either side of my face and the pad of his thumb gently strokes my forehead. My eyelids drift lower and we’re both still naked. Sated, I grin and nestle my nose in the palm of his hand. For once I’m fully at ease, he’s here with me and it’s something real, it’s not a delusion, or some wild fantasy I’ve fabricated inside my head. When my eyes reopen I comb my fingers through his tousled hair, it’s much longer than I remember. I watch as the corner of his lips even out a smile that has my heart racing with adrenaline but his smile doesn’t meet his staid dark eyes.

I cup his face and ask
, “What? What’s wrong, Rayden?” 

“Selene…” he swallows intensely before he continues, “I promise you we will find a way to… fix you. There has to be a way to treat what they have done. Once we make it through the veil, just tell
whoever is in charge all that you know, tell them everything and I promise we’ll fix this. There has to be someone, a specialist, or an expert to…”

On impulse
I suddenly feel manipulated and numb as his words trail off. Defensively, my hands fall and plummet to my chest, a feeble attempt to protect the disappointment that sows inside. A dull painful ache traps my heart and it drowns out anything he says. We felt connected, like nothing had remotely changed between us and I took comfort in that. There was no other man that knew me better than him. My mind reels with the obvious problem, there’s a part of him that fears what I am. Maybe I should fear it too. My perspective has altered but I won’t deny his lack of devotion and compassion to save me.

“Okay Rayd
en, I know you will, I know you only want what’s best for me,” I profess.

His mouth invades
mine stifling off any rehashing thoughts. His lips navigate aptly towards my ear and he whispers in a soft husky voice, “I love you, Selene. Nothing’s going to keep me from you again.” I drape my arms around his neck and embrace him. Not sparing another second to nullify what we have, in this exact moment I try to redeem it, and savor it.

The
lights from outside makes Rayden squint as he adjusts to the brightness, he chuckles while staring at me. “It really doesn’t bother you,” he asks in disbelief rubbing his temples. I clasp the last clamp on the golden breastplate as I walk, stretching out my legs. I shake my head and smile.

“No, they…” I iterate while
unconcernedly point referring to my abnormal eyes, “seem to adjust rather quickly.” 

“Ah uh…”

He wants to ask more, I can sense it as he contritely glances over to me. It’s on the tip of his tongue. He was never one to hold back, he always spoke his mind, his thoughts whether anyone else wanted to hear it or not. His hand vehemently swats at the cloud of insects that have emerged after the storm. The air is heavy and humid and no relief of a breeze to cool us. The pestering bugs don’t flutter around me in the least but their main objective appears to be Rayden. We trod through the forest heading due west and while we adventure the rough rooted ground I silently listen to his grumbles and complaints. 

This place is filled with not only blood hungering beasts from other realms
, it’s seeded with invertebrates. Rayden’s flesh must be to their liking because his arms redden with miniature bites all the way from his wrists to his shoulders. I stop and look for a puddle or any small patch of mud that looks half way unpolluted and not floating with a film of slime. I shovel both my hands in a mound of sludge and start to pack it all over Rayden. 

“Don’t scratch it, Rayden!” I
reprimand him.

“I’m not!”
he refutes and reaches around to scratch his back.

“That’s the worst thing you can do, now quit it!” I scold him and swipe at his hand.

His brow quirks and says, “It’s the worst thing I can do, huh?”

He
grins impishly while I jerk back missing his grasp. His body is dripping with oozing brown muck and I can’t help but return his playful smile. His hand lashes out trying to capture me, again. His sly strides move with more determination. He cocks his head to the side as he mocks, “What are you afraid of Selene?” A feeble attempt to distract me. He slowly wipes the mud away from his neck and shakes it from his hands and taunts again, “A little mud?”

“I’m afraid of nothing…
not even
a little mud,” I call out and run behind a nearby tree. His boisterous laugh spooks a cluster of birds and they take flight soaring high above us. My focus follows the vibrant colored birds until I have no sight of them, it’s the first time I have ever seen such beautiful creatures floundering about here. Rayden’s voice pipes up from behind me before I rationalize my actions I cart around and throw my hands out. He skyrockets backwards and disappears into the nearly impenetrable tall grass. I suck in a staggered breath and run to him.   

“Rayden!
” I demand plowing back the grassy plot. I clear my throat and yell, “Rayden?!”

I find him lying flat on his back, eyes closed, and my heart stops. My hands tremble as I crawl over his immobile
body. I grasp his stoic face and lean in to his mouth, listening for the rhythmic signs of breathing. Any inclination that he’s fine, alive, and that I haven’t killed him, my chest tightens and I whisper, “Rayden, please, please be okay.”

His
deceitful hands creep over my hips and lock our bodies together, pressing us closer as the corner of his full lips dangle an unruly smile at me. I pull back and ineffectively squirm in his unpreventable hold. His dark cunning eyes reveal triumph. I drop my feigning smirk and ask, “Are you okay?” I’m answered with a slight upturn from his lips. I linger a little longer over his half naked body as I scan for any broken bones or obvious open wounds. 

“I… I never want to hurt you, Rayden.” The thought of ever harming him constricts my heart into a thousand barbed knots
. I could never live with myself if he became injured or worse by me.

His firm hand tips my chin up as his thumb
silently strokes my lower lip, he’s studying me. The hush between us hangs on stilling the moment as we wordlessly watch each other. He opens his mouth to speak but the words fail him. I start to gently ease myself off his mud soaked form when he draws me in, refusing my body to leave him.

“Did it hurt… when they changed you?” He seethes out his teeth practically grinding together. 

“Like hell,” I state. His eyes narrow as he takes a long inhale processing my words, I can see it in his eyes he’s reeling with so many questions but I know him and he doesn’t want to come off sounding like he’s debriefing me. I want to remove all his concerns without secrets.

“Rayden… there’s something I think you should know.”

“Is this going to piss me off?”

“Probably… if you don’t want to know then just say it and I won’t bring it up.” I swallow the lump in my throat
down. Afraid, terrified of what he may be thinking. He looks away, his jaw working double time as the anger boils inside him which makes his chest heave faster. Finally, he looks back at me.

“Okay… I want to know. I want to know everything,” He announces and I drop my eyes down adverting my face, but he forces my head back up. “Look at me Selene… whatever has happened, has happened and no matter what I
will still love you. I’ll always love you. I just need you to tell me.”

I’m h
ugged so tightly to him I have no room wiggle out of this, with my arms snuggly crossing over his chest we’re face to face, a breath apart and I begin to explain how and why I was converted.

“The humanistic side of me died when he changed me. I don’t hunger for food or have a thirst for water and I’m gradually adopting the way I see things…” I break for a long
much needed sigh and notice his eyes shifting nervously back and forth, his heart pounds beneath me as he waits for my next words.

“Rayden? Can I ask you something?” I lick my lips afraid to delve
in this topic but I can’t stave off the images of him and her any longer.

His tone is raspy
and lower as he urges me, “I think you know, Selene, you can ask me anything.”

“Who is she to you
?
Louisa
? I… I overheard you two talking and I saw the way she touches you. Rayden, she looks at you like she’s in love with you.” His body stiffens at my bluntness. His brows furrow together as a trove of emotions roll through his visage. His hands catch my face before I can turn away. I feel wrong for bringing that up, we’ve been apart for a year. What did I expect him to do?

His consoling mouth tenderly kisses mine and he whispers in the air between our lips, “
Please don’t do this, Selene, not here, not now. Look, I made a mistake. A mistake I regret.” His kiss becomes urgent turning from soft and soothing to crucial. The kiss erupts every distressing emotion we ever felt, crushing our lips painfully together. I let the euphoria tangle me in this sheltered, unrestricted moment we have, wrapping his arms around me possessively. I angle my head and deepen the kiss, his hand fists tighter through my long disheveled hair.

Through our heavy
frenzied breathing I tentatively whisper, “You slept with her?” My eyes tightly squeeze shut, unwilling to break this surreal salvation we have. I’m caving into a pit of doubt and I can’t believe I’m actually asking this. I don’t want to know, but I do. Nevertheless, I can feel his deeply hued golden-brown eyes piercing straight through me. His arms clutch me securely forcing me to hear his reply.

My lips tremble as his
lips continue to collide again and again but through his pleading kisses he groans out, “
Yes
.”

In
a normal circumstance I would want to take all my pain, rage, and disappointment out on him but I can’t. I can’t muster a single trace of vengeance. I just can’t. Not here, not after everything we have been through. Rayden loosens his hold and strokes the stray ringlets of hair from my face. “It’s going to be okay, Selene, everything is going to be okay. I don’t ever want you to doubt my love for you,” he sanctions. “And this…” he reaches down and lifts my wrist revealing the ambiguous mark. “Will be removed and I don’t care how it’s done because you do not belong to anyone but me, Selene. It’s you and me. We’re going to survive this fucking nightmare together.”