And yet, she felt it fill her with immeasurable light.
Suddenly, she saw an image of Hunter. It was of that moment when he’d held her; when their bodies had pressed close inside his etheric barrier before the battle two weeks ago. She could feel his hands on her skin and his tall, powerful body. She could smell the incredible dawn-star scent of him, sweet and drowning. As before, time stopped as Layla experienced the moment all over again, staring up at Hunter’s incredibly bright eyes. He was beautiful, he was frightful, he was powerful; and as she saw him, Layla felt once more how their Dragons had hauled their bodies close. It hadn’t been just him and it hadn’t been just her, but both of them.
Desiring something deeply about the other.
As Layla experienced it all again, she suddenly felt an enormous love rise up through the cosmos, inundating her. On the tide of Rake’s breath, that love swept into Layla’s every pore, breathing deep inside her. Rage and hate and zealotry were small things compared to that vastness. As Layla felt the universe’s love and watched Hunter’s beautiful eyes, she understood that despite all of Hunter’s power and madness, something inside him was still full of love. It was what drew her to him, she knew then.
Understanding that something inside Hunter was still pure and good – simply because the loving universe had made him.
Surfacing from the vision with a gasp, Layla’s entire body twitched like she’d fallen deeply asleep. Rake’s palms were pressed to her spine now behind her heart, using his magic to push her vision to completion. As he did, Layla felt an enormous love fill her in a roaring glow, her drakaina lifting her head and heaving a golden flame all through her body.
With a cry, Layla pushed up to a seat, her entire body undulating with the dance of the universe as an erotic flow rushed up through her, flooding out the crown of her head. Arching, she felt like an orgasm passed through her with that enormous, fiery heat. As she heaved hard breaths, shuddering with pleasure so overwhelming her body didn’t know what to do with it all, Rake enfolded her in his arms, holding her close to his naked chest.
“My god!” Layla gasped. “What did you just do?!”
“Easy, Layla,” Rake soothed. “I gave you a kundalini experience to clear the terror you were still holding from your last engagement with Hunter. I took your awareness out into the universe, then scattered you enough to realize that the ground nature of everything we are is love. Hunter’s terrors are a small thing compared to the vast love that is out there – and inside us. I helped you get there… and your own soul did the rest to heal the trauma.”
“You healed my trauma from my last engagement with Hunter?” Held in Rake’s arms, Layla’s body still moved in deep waves from the energy that had just passed through her. As she thought back over her vision, her memory of Hunter felt so bright inside her now that she blinked, realizing her fear of him was no longer so impactful.
“I let you engage with the deepest substance of the universe, Layla.” Rake spoke kindly at her temple, stroking her back as he cradled her. “Passion for a mate, affection for a friend, hatred for an enemy – they all come from the same place. Love is the substance that lies beneath us all, that brings us all together. Some people desire to understand love and come together beautifully. Some turn from love denied and do heinous deeds. But it’s all the same – and recognizing that heals all wounds. I let you have a taste of that right now. Hopefully, it will help clear more of what keeps your Dragon locked up inside you. But only time will tell.”
Still held close in Rake’s arms, Layla felt that deep love from the universe flowing through him as he held her. Whatever he’d pushed her into, he’d pushed himself into it also; and pulling back, Layla saw Rake gazing at her with a vastness in his smooth jade eyes now. Layla could see the universe in them – the dark brightness of the entire cosmos dancing in his beautiful eyes as he watched her. It was entrancing, and as he exhaled, his loving breath touched Layla’s lips with far more passion than before.
For the past five days, Rake had been the consummate gentleman as Layla stayed with him, slept in his house, fasted with him, and did guided breath-meditations in preparation for tonight. But he was silent now, his green eyes penetrating as they watched her in a way that held far more than just friendship. Suddenly, Layla realized she’d never been as alone with Rake as she was now. As if he picked up on her thoughts, the smallest smile lifted his lips, his green eyes sparkling in that clear, intensely sexy way he’d had when they first met. It was one of his shy-guy smiles, and it was just the thing to make Layla forget her problems with Hunter.
As a very natural heat rose in her veins for Rake.
“The night’s getting late.” Rake spoke, though his eyes never left hers. “We should head inside and clean up, get some rest so you can fly out tomorrow back to Morocco.”
But though Rake’s words were polite, his gaze said far more. Suddenly Layla flushed, not thinking about anything except touching Rake’s incredibly cut yoga-body and having all that lean, viciously-honed muscle pressed up against her. Attraction had always been there between them, ever since they met at the Paris Hotel. But other than one time when Rake had helped Sylvania Eroganis heal Layla, they’d not had any alone time together. Rake had never pressed their attraction, and gradually Layla had put him in the friend zone and assumed he wasn’t interested. But as a deep heat shone from his eyes, Layla saw the truth.
A truth he’d never let her see until now – now that Layla was sharing her own truths with him.
But Rake only gave her his beautiful shy smile as he turned, pushing up from the pool. Moving to a silk pavilion that snapped in the cool midnight wind, he stepped to a small bar that Layla could barely see as the moon rose over the canyon’s rim. The bar was made from a Tibetan cabinet painted in royal blues and purples, with deep shelves and small drawers like a Chinese medicine chest. Taking up a highball glass, Rake mixed whiskey, vermouth, and Campari like a Boulevardier, then added a Meyer lemon, a sprig of tarragon, and a pinch of something glittering from one of the drawers like fairy dust. Blowing across his finger and stirring, he returned to the pool and stepped back in.
As Layla rose, curious, he handed it over. “Go ahead.”
“Okay.” Lifting the drink to her lips, Layla wondered what he’d mixed up for her. Just the first whiff of the beverage sent her reeling, sending a punch directly through her body. But it was cleansing also, and as Layla sipped, she felt the smoothest fire she’d ever tasted rush through her in a wave of sexual heat and blissful cool. It was like sipping whiskey and chewing Wintermint at the same time, and the combination after fasting all day spun Layla up so fast she reeled. But Rake was faster as he stepped in, catching her around the waist.
Pressing her close to his lean, incredible body.
“What did you put in this thing?” Layla breathed as she gazed up at him incredulously.
“Only the best for you.” Rake spoke with a subtle, amazing smile, as he gently took the cocktail from her fingers and set it down beside the pool. Icy-hot pleasure flooded Layla’s every sinew as she stared up at Rake’s beautiful face. His bright green eyes were hot now, the look in them very male as he lowered his chin.
Easing his full lips over Layla’s.
A curl of sensual breath moved between them, pressing in through Layla’s lips and gliding over her tongue as Rake caressed her. It was like something Adrian could do but sweeter, as Layla let Rake’s magic ease her mouth open and curl down her throat. Suddenly, she realized what was happening between them as she inhaled Rake like incense. Pleasure flooded her, and Layla remembered that Rake André had been Head Courtier of the Paris Hotel for a while. He was far more than a meditation guide, a yoga teacher, and bartender as Layla drank him in; drawing him deep into her lungs as they breathed together, tasting each other with the barest press of lips. Layla’s eyelashes flickered as she shuddered, Rake’s powerful breath igniting his drink into a roaring bonfire of passion and pleasure inside her.
Before Layla knew it, they were kissing; the breath of the entire universe in Rake’s deep passion as he reveled in her. Reveling in it also, Layla kissed him back.
Drinking every breath from his lips like she drank the cosmos itself.
CHAPTER 3 – RELAX
As Rake André eased his arms around Layla, drinking from her lips and making her shudder from his breath, Layla finally realized how deeply her power had been calling him over the past months – and how deeply his power had been calling her. Kissing him was like kissing light and darkness all at once; beautiful and strange as he breathed them together in a flowing dance. Her body surged to Rake; her entire self poured into him as he poured into her in a cascade of light and passion. He wasn’t a Dragon; there was no slamming connection of power between them. But his strange otherness was at once deeper and vastly more heady than Layla was used to with her other men. As she parted from their kiss, her entire body breathing high into the universe from pleasure, she realized they’d been swaying together.
As they’d pulled into a deeply intimate embrace.
