One of the hands against his chest started moving down his abs, and he released her enough to let her go where she wanted. When she reached the head of him, her fingers stopped then began a light drift over the tip.

He groaned against her mouth, she parted her lips, and he drove inside … hard.

A sound between a cry and a moan erupted from her throat. She may have been insistent about moving into one of the guest rooms, but that had nothing to do with the strength of her attraction to him. She wanted him and right now, after all her protests about not wanting to feel so trapped, her desire, her need, felt very, very good to him.

He drew back and looked down at swollen lips and glittery eyes. She withdrew her fingers from his crown, then settled both hands on his waist, her fingers cool against his bare skin.

She was tall enough to fit him; even in her bare feet he didn’t have far to go to kiss her. What would it be like to be inside her head, to move inside her head and take possession? He knew that completing the breh-hedden meant that all three things had to happen at once: penetration, sharing of blood at the same time, and deep-mind engagement, much deeper than mere telepathic communication. And as much as he might complain about it, he wanted to be with Parisa in just that way, wholly connected.

He’d once overheard Kerrick and Marcus talk about it, bits and pieces. Mostly, he’d heard the low guttural sounds the men made as they agreed about the experience. Kerrick had said that Alison released power, her abdomen to his. Marcus had said that Havily often pulled them into the darkening and took them for a second ride right in the middle of everything.

What, then, would it be like with Parisa, with a woman so powerful? He’d always enjoyed sex, taking a woman, bringing her to a roaring orgasm. But this was infinitely more intense. How much of that was the breh-hedden? Shit, he’d never know. The breh-hedden seemed to be so different for those involved. How would it differ for them if they completed the act?

“What are you thinking about so hard?” she asked.

He blinked and she came into focus, a frown in her amethyst eyes. “Aren’t you curious, even a little, with that scientist’s mind of yours, what it would be like?”

“You mean the breh-hedden?” Her voice sounded low, a little hoarse.

He nodded slowly and trailed a finger down her cheek.

She drew in a ragged breath, turned into that finger, and licked the tip. Oh. God. “I’ve wondered,” she said. “Of course I’ve wondered.”

“You know what I wish?”

She looked up at him, her eyes smoldering. “What? What do you wish?”

“I wish we could do it without repercussions.” He pulled her hard against him. “I want to fuck you with my mind buried in your mind, my fangs sunk into your neck, and my cock so deep inside that you’d feel me for a week afterward.”

Her knees buckled. Her knees buckled.

He chuckled low as he supported her with his arms around her. He whispered into her ear, “I want you in my bed, Parisa. Fuck the guest room. I want you close so that when I get this hard, I can throw you on your back and plunge into you.”

He felt her breath hot against his neck. Her tongue flicked over his throat. To her mind, he sent, Imagine this, you riding me, your fangs in my throat, my fangs in your wrist, my mind moving into yours then you taking over and moving into mine. Imagine what that would be like.

She was moaning now, her body writhing against his, her tongue arching over his vein, flexing, bringing forth what he could tell she wanted … right now.

He knew that if he wanted to, he had the power in his hands to follow through with this, to fold her to his bed and live out the fantasy. Her body was clearly in a state of surrender.

But that’s all it was, a fantasy. If he seduced her right now, after all that she’d said to him so recently, she’d never forgive him afterward. If he understood things, the bond of the breh-hedden, once completed, couldn’t be broken afterward except by death.

So … shit.

He trembled, actually trembled as he drew back from her. She whimpered her protest. He gathered her hands and kissed her fingers.

“What … what are you doing? Why did you stop?” Her cheeks turned crimson. “Is it me?”

“No,” he cried. “Why would you say that?”

“Because I know I’m being difficult and I want you, Antony, I do. I’ve wanted you for such a long time, from the first time I mounted my wings and the voyeur window opened and there you were. I can still picture you. You were at the Blood and Bite standing next to Jean-Pierre. You were smiling and I thought, what a gorgeous man. But it wasn’t just that you were so handsome.” Her fingers touched his cheeks and there were tears in her eyes. “It was that I felt I could see into your soul as well. You … you have a light in your eyes you probably don’t even know is there. I … I have always believed in you.”

Of all the things he might have expected her to say after he’d shut down the passion between them, this wasn’t it. He’d expected her to cry out, to complain, maybe even to shout at him—not to extol his virtues.

Again … shit.

He so didn’t want this, need this, but something inside his chest began to fall, like a wall of clay against powerful ocean waves. The crumbling began in stages, but all those walls fell, the ones he’d erected thirteen centuries ago, the ones he’d thought were made of obsidian. Instead, just clay to the right kind of woman.

Double shit.

He drew her close and she opened her arms at the same time, wrapping them around his back. He felt a little sob against his chest. They were so fucked.

Neither of them wanted what was happening. He’d been crushed by life. So had she. He couldn’t say he totally understood the difficulties of her childhood, of moving several times a year so that she never felt grounded, that she could never establish long-term friendships, but he did know what it was like to have life take a destructive turn leaving only one thought: How do I keep myself from getting hurt ever again?

But would it ever be possible for the walls of isolation she’d created for herself to crumble against the weight of his presence in her life? Could she love him?

Could she love him?

He held her for a long time, and she didn’t move except to nestle into his shoulder. He felt her breathe in between his own breaths.

Finally, she said, “I can hear your heart beating. I love that sound. I think I could listen to it forever.”

A heavy sigh rolled out of his body. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what the fuck to do. Every second he was with her, he just sank deeper into these feelings that seemed a helluva lot like, yeah, love.

But there was something he could do for her that had nothing to do with whether either of them should surrender to the breh-hedden.

He drew back and once more took her hands. “You practiced flying in Burma, right?”

“Every day. Rith demanded exercise first thing in the morning, so I flew.”

He nodded. “I want to take you someplace special right now to do our flying. It will be a challenge but I won’t let anything happen to you. Are you willing?”

She smiled. No … she beamed. “Hells, yeah, Warrior. Let’s do it.”

There it was again. She was so game when she’d been dropped right into the middle of a war.

“And Antony—”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I can’t—”

He shook his head. “It’s okay. I can’t, either.”

“So we’re stuck.”

“Yep, but what the hell, let’s fly.”

Her smile broadened.

He closed his eyes. He thought the thought. The distance from his villa to the Mogollon Rim was over a hundred miles. But folding took only seconds.

When his feet touched down and he released her from the circle of his arms, she gasped. The canyon floor lay two thousand feet below.

“This is the Mogollon Rim,” he said. “I don’t know if you ever visited here or not. I know you can take jeep tours from Sedona, Mortal Earth, all the way up.”

The small town of Sedona Two rested below, nestled at the base of the rim, bisected by Oak Creek. From where they stood, the town wasn’t visible. There were too many twists and turns in the various canyon walls. “Both Thorne and Jean-Pierre have homes here. Did you know that?”

“Huh-uh,” she murmured. “But I’m not surprised. Who wouldn’t want to live here? Oh, smell the pine. It’s heavenly. And it’s much cooler than in Phoenix.”

“We’re not quite at seven thousand feet.” He dipped down to look at her again, to once more catch sight of the eager glitter in her eye. “You ready to fly?”

“Oh, Antony, yes. More than anything in the world.”

***

Parisa sucked in the dry mountain air, the resinous pine scent, and the sage that belonged to the man whose arms were still holding her from behind. She wanted to cry, then cry out.

This was where she belonged. Here. This was home. “I want to live here,” she said.

He leaned close to her ear. “Then you should. You’d have two great neighbors.”

“Yes, I would. I love the warriors, Antony. I love them. Does that sound strange?”

“They’re my brothers so I love that you love them. No, it doesn’t sound strange.”

“I will never forget seeing all of them, all of them, in Burma. They were there for me and I want to be there for them, to repay them in whatever way I can.” She turned her head to look at him. She kissed him on the lips. “Thank you,” she said.

“For what?”

“For not holding on.” She pressed the arms wrapped around her, which seemed ironic. Thanks for not holding on.

He nuzzled her neck. “It’s both of us, Parisa. I never intended to take a wife again. I still don’t.”

She nodded. So they were both inaccessible. She smiled. “There’s only one thing to do.”