Silken skin. Moans. The press of her lips against his.
Cain felt the sensations on his body. They soothed him. She soothed him. Sanity was coming back. Moment by moment. Memories. Needs. Emotions.
Everything centered around Eve. He knew everything always would.
He’d driven them for hours. He’d had one destination in mind. Just one …
The beach.
He’d had to get her there. Had to be with her. So he’d driven until he’d smelled the ocean air. The salt water. Until he’d heard the cry of seagulls.
They were the only ones on the beach. The sun was rising. Eve was naked, pressing her body against his.
Her eyes were on him, and she stared at him with such a gentle gaze. No fear. She should have been afraid.
Had she ever feared him?
He’d feared her. He’d known that without her …
“I’m not going anywhere.” She kissed him again. Her hips were over his. Her knees digging into the sand. “Not … anywhere.” She took him inside her in one long, slow glide. Her hands were against his, pushing them back onto the sand. The sky above her was shot with red and gold. Just like fire.
She began to move on him, lifting her body, then pushing down against him. His cock was heavy, aching, and each movement made him even harder for her.
He could think again. Could focus past the rage and desperation. She was alive. Some way—alive.
His hips drove into her. Maybe too hard, but she didn’t pull away. She smiled. Arched back against him. Took him deeper.
His groan filled the air, merging with the crashing waves. She lowered her chest against his. Her nipples slid over him, tight peaks, and her mouth took his.
Cain took control. He rolled her beneath him, letting the sand cushion her back. His tongue pushed into her mouth and the strokes of his body within hers pounded faster. He couldn’t hold back. Not now.
With her, maybe not ever.
He wanted her to feel the pleasure first. His fingers stroked between her thighs. Stroked over the center of her need. He pumped into her. Thrust his tongue into her mouth.
Her sex clenched around him, and she stiffened.
Yes.
He knew her so well. Could tell every sweet move of her body. Loved the ripple of her release.
“Cain.”
His name whispered from her lips. She did that to him—made him a man, not a beast.
The pleasure hit him, brutal, total, consuming. He held on to her even as he pounded into her core.
Eve.
His breath was ragged, his body weak, but he lifted his head and stared down at her.
She was smiling.
She made him want to smile, too.
“I love you, Cain,” Eve said.
He kissed her. Tasted the truth on her lips. Somehow, someway, she actually did love him.
Only fair, considering that she was his whole fucking world. “I love you,” he told her, but wondered if the words were a lie. Love—too tame a word for the way he felt about her. Too easy. His feelings for her were wild, intense, damn near terrifying.
Not just love. It felt like more.
Her fingers curled around his neck. “You saved me.”
No. Not even close. Cain shook his head.
Her smile widened. “You did, Cain. You cried for me, didn’t you?”
The taste of salt on her neck.
“The tears of a phoenix can heal. Wyatt was right about that.” A sad sigh eased from her. “Just wrong about everything else.”
Wrong. Twisted. So desperate for his experiments … even though he’d been tortured by those same experiments when he’d been just a boy.
He hadn’t been the only Wyatt to make a monster. It looked like his dear old father had been the first to start the business.
You made your own son into a killer. A true monster.
When he’d been just a kid.
Cain would never do that to his own child. If he ever had a child, if Eve ever wanted … I’d be better. He could protect, not just destroy.
Did Eve know that?
He gazed down at her, saw the trust shining in her eyes, and understood that she did.
Cain realized that he liked the way he looked—from her eyes.
“What happens now?” he asked her.
A shadow of pain slid across her face. “Did you see—did Trace make it out?”
He didn’t know. Couldn’t remember what had become of the werewolf after the explosion. His focus had been on her. “The cop got out. Maybe Trace did, too.” He’d offer her hope, always.
Eve nodded.
“They’ll be looking for me now.”
They. Not Genesis. That organization was dead. Jeremiah Wyatt had blown it—and himself—to hell. And you don’t get a ticket back, bastard.
But the humans who’d been on that scene, they’d all gotten a clear look at him. Seen the fury and power that lurked inside him.
Subject Thirteen had a face. A face they would fear.
“You don’t have to hide,” Eve told him. “Not from me. Not from them.”
He’d never hide from her. But as for the others … “They’ll want me dead.”
“Then it’s a good thing you can’t die.”
Her words caught him off guard. He’d expected a plan, not—not her fast, caustic reply.
Cain laughed. The sound was rusty, old, but the laughter built inside him.
Eve blinked, then her eyes widened. “This is what I wanted,” she whispered.
The laughter faded slowly. This is what happiness feels like. No wonder humans went around smiling all the freaking time.
It felt good.
“You are what I want,” he told her. “When I thought that I’d lost you …”
No, he didn’t want to go back there. To the hopeless moments. He’d known only fury. Agony. Can’t lose her.
Won’t.
“Don’t ever get hurt again,” he ordered. He didn’t think he could stand it. And any humans around at the time of her pain … well, they might not be able to stand it, either.
“I’ll try not to,” she said softly, with a hint of a smile playing around her lips. “But, ah, can you do me a favor, too? Maybe … stop dying on me.”
Cain wasn’t sure how many more deaths he could survive. How much more darkness he could take.
Not true.
The knowledge sank inside him. He could die a hundred more times, he knew that. Die and come back—as long as she waited for him. “Stay with me,”
“There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”
There was no other place for him. He only wanted to be at her side. Always. He brought her hand to his lips. Kissed her knuckles.
He rose. Pulled her to her feet. He was aware of the darkness, lurking in the back of his mind, but with Eve’s hand in his, that darkness stayed in the background.
There wasn’t any death on the beach. No fear. No rage. Just Eve.
Just … hope.
For more.
Her fingers twined with his as they walked toward the ocean. His feet sank into the sand. Eve’s shoulder brushed against his arm.
There would be no more hiding in the shadows. Not for him. But the more he thought about it, the more Cain realized that he didn’t care. He’d find a way to deal with the humans.
He had something better than anonymity. He had life.
He had Eve.
Cain kissed her and the passion stirred once more between them.
How he did love that sweet burn.
Eve.