“If you keep doing that, colleen,” he said roughly, “there will not be much to remember.”
He pulled away, pushed me gently back against the mossy bank of the stream. Flowers crushed beneath me, filling the air with a sweet, bold scent. Water droplets clung to my eyelashes, fracturing the world into a kaleidoscope.
Irian folded himself beside me. His hungry gaze drank me in, sweeping down my reclining form. One restless hand followed, sketching my outline in searing lines—a touch against the side of my throat, a thumb gliding along the line of my collarbone, a palm skimming the curve of my breast. He splayed one large hand over my stomach, then slid it lower, sending spirals of heat coiling toward my center.
I arched myself toward him and recaptured his mouth. He made that sound in his throat again and drew me closer, fitting me against him as I hooked a leg over his. He moved his lips from mine, dragging his teeth against my jaw before sliding his tongue over the tender skin of my throat. I twined my arms around his neck, closing my eyes as I explored the shifting planes of his back, tracing the sharp lines of his tattoos by touch alone; the skin lightly puckered beneath my seeking fingertips. He shuddered, forearms flexing as he trailed his mouth lower. He kissed the outside of my breast, then slid his tongue over my nipple, stroking it to an aching peak.
“Yes.” He murmured against my skin. “Like this.”
I sighed, burying my hands in his silken hair as he explored lower. He trailed his mouth between my breasts, along the ridges of my ribs, down the soft, taut skin of my stomach. His hand flexed lower, moving slowly—deliciously—against the warmth between my thighs. He nipped my hip bone, making me hiss from the blurring of pleasure and pain. Anticipation intensified the ache building inside me.
Around us, bluebells unfurled from the mossy bank, glittering like sapphires in the moonlight. I tensed.
“Sorry,” I whispered, hoping I hadn’t ruined the moment.
Irian smiled against my skin. Slid his mouth lower. When he spoke, his breath sent shivers up my body. “Colleen, never apologize for who you are.”
I rocked my hips up to meet him. His tongue glided hot and wet over my sex, and I nearly came undone. My hands convulsed in his hair. He stilled, then slowly resumed, laving me with short, deliberate strokes that pushed me toward the edge yet didn’t force me over. My breath hitched, and I gazed toward the starry sky as he devoured me.
I should have closed my eyes instead. Glimmering, shimmering lights came wafting down from the trees, bright as moonlight and tiny as fireflies. Again I tensed, my body hardening. Irian stilled. He lifted his head from between my legs and followed my gaze.
“Sheeries.” His voice was rough with want. His scalding fingers curled around my thigh. “Ignore them. They are harmless.”
But sudden uncertainty tangled in my chest and cooled my blood. Echoes of lost things bubbled up inside me—memories of another night, another pond. Flickering lights in another sky. Another man.
And with them came Rogan’s bitter, brutal words from Lughnasa:Life hurts. Death levels. But love—love destroys.
And on the heels of those words, totally unbidden, Cathair’s voice slithered into my thoughts.You were made of bloodroot and mountain laurel. You were made to destroy.
I looked down. Irian was watching me. His eyes still blurred with twilight desire, but now they held an echo of my disquiet. “What is it?”
“It’s…me.” My voice was almost inaudible.
Irian’s eyes clouded, dark as a summer storm. He slid his frame back up over mine, propping himself on his forearms as he traced the lines of my face with taut, troubled eyes. The heat betweenus cooled as the promise of our joining faded. But this was a new kind of closeness—the weight of his body, the weight of his gaze. Heavy not with suspicion or wariness, but with concern. And acceptance—for whatever I might say.
“And what,” he murmured, “could possibly be the matter with you?”
“I was raised to be a weapon.” I gathered my thoughts like nettles, hoping not to get stung. “What if I am truly nothing more than rocks and bones and stinging things—a blade wrapped in brambles? My love has only ever destroyed.”
“Do you truly believe that, colleen?”
“Part of me does.” I prodded the edges of the long-festered wounds inside me. “My whole life, I have been treated as nothing more than a collection of sharp edges—a dark, wicked thing made to hurt. And there is truth in it—I am those things. I am hard as the earth. Sharp as a thorn. Ruthless as winter.” I waited for his eyes to shutter, for his mouth to twist in disdain. But he just watched me, absorbing my words with an attentiveness I’d never known before. “But the earth is gentle to the seeds she holds in her palm. Thorns protect the fruit swelling inside the thicket. Winter promises new growth in due time. I am all these things too. But I don’t know whether the love balances the hurt. Whether the life balances the death.”
“You are all those things and more.” His voice was rough, fervent. “You are dangerous and intoxicating. You are sharp thorns and bright flowers. You are darkness and the starlight shining within it. You are whatever you wish yourself to be. Do not let anyone tell you what you are or what you are not.”
My throat swelled with emotion. I breathed a laugh. “Not even you?”
“Especially not me.” He pressed his forehead to mine. I let my eyes fall closed as I breathed him in—cool nights and endless skies. When I rested my hand on the planes of his chest, his heartbeat throbbed against my fingertips. “When you give me your heart,colleen, I want all of it. I want all of you. If you are sharp with broken thorns, let them cut me. If you churn with dark shadows, let them engulf me. And if your love only destroys, let it destroy me. I am already a doomed man.”
His lips found mine in a careful, precarious kiss—as if I were the only thing tethering him to this world. His desire lingered, sweet as cool honey and deep as a mountain spring. My own blood quickened once more, a summertime flush of marigold and lilac.
But Irian pulled away from me and slowly rose to his feet. He held out a hand to help me up. We dressed in comfortable silence. If I thought he’d be sullen or angry in the wake of my hesitation during our lovemaking, I was wrong. There was no perceived rejection—no need to be comforted when I was the one hurting.
He was not what I’d been taught to expect from a love mate.
“I am willing to wait for you—forallof you.” His mouth was soft, bruised. But his gaze was winged with distant dread. “But I fear we are beginning to run out of time.”
We didn’t talk as we made the hot trek up the crumbling stairs toward the shadow fort. But Irian held my hand and didn’t let me go until I returned to the forest beyond the lough.
