The sun was slipping in the sky, staining the water rose and gold.
“I thought the children of the sea were immortal,” she said.
He turned to face her. “As long as we stay in the sea. Or live protected by the magic of Sanctuary. But we pay for that immortality with a low birth rate.”
A pause while she digested that. “So Dylan Hunter is selkie.”
“A selkie warden, one of the sea lord’s elite.”
“You know him?”
“I did.”
He remembered the day Dylan’s mother brought him to the prince’s court on Sanctuary, a sneering, black-eyed boy with a chip on his shoulder and a shield around him even Griff’s patient teaching could not dent. Dylan had been younger than Iestyn then. Dylan’s determination to grow up, the time he spent away from the magic of Sanctuary, had quickly aged him beyond the others.
Stil, it had been a shock, Iestyn recal ed, when he learned the sul en youth had been made a warden on the human island of World’s End.
He could practical y hear the click, snap, pop, as Lara’s busy mind made the connections. “So if Caleb is Dylan’s brother, then their sister is. ”
“Lucy Hunter.”
Her smile broke like dawn. “But that’s wonderful!
You’re almost there. We’re almost done.”
“We’re not done.”
She nodded seriously. “Of course not. We stil have to find him. Her. But. ”
“We’re not done,” he repeated. His heart pumped, panicked for the first time by the end of a journey. “I’m not finished with you yet.”
When she stared at him, wide-eyed, he crossed the room to her and pul ed her into his arms.
18
H e wa s d e s pe r at e f o r h e r.
Her taste. Her smel. The wide, soft curve of her lower lip.
The fine, shining core of her, like tempered steel.
He pressed his lips to her shoulder and felt her tremble, pressed a kiss to her throat and heard her sigh. The quiet exhalation stirred his soul like wind on the water, moving him to the depths.
“Lara.” He stopped, at a loss for words.
“I’m not asking you for promises, ” she’d said.
But he wanted to make them.
“Ssh.” Her fingers winnowed his hair, brushed his jaw, her touch as light as air. “Kiss me.”
How could he think when she looked at him from under those dark winged brows, her big eyes shining with trust and need? How could he speak?
So he kissed her, hoping that would be enough, trying to tel her without words al the longing that bloomed in his heart, soft, tender kisses to her temple, her cheek, her mouth.
When her fingers found the edge of his shirt and the hot skin underneath, he stepped back and ripped it over his head.
Her eyes widened and then narrowed. She reached for the burn that stil throbbed below the hol ow of his throat.
But he didn’t need her healing now. He needed her with him, in this room, in this moment, al of her with him.
Catching her hand, he pul ed her to him, coaxing her shirt up, inch by inch.
Her skin had the thick, creamy texture of lilies. Her scent swam in his head. He pushed her jeans down, frowning at the faint shadows that marched along her hip. Bruises.
He’d bruised her with his hands, his fingertips.
Sinking to his knees, he kissed each careless mark and then the curve of her bel y and then the silky dark thatch between her thighs. Her legs trembled. Her hips arched in silent invitation. He pushed her back to lie on the bed, licking into her, sipping from her skin, drinking her heady response. She moved with him and against him, against his mouth and hands, her body fluid and restless as water, until everything that was in him gathered like a flood, and he surged from the floor, rising over her, crawling to get to her, dying to be inside her.
He dug a condom from his discarded jeans— almost the last one, maybe the last time, the finality of it beat in his blood — and covered himself with shaking hands.
She lay back, watching him, as he nudged her thighs apart and found his place between them. Everything he was, everything inside him, he gave to her, pleasure flowing through him, tenderness brimming inside him, and it almost didn’t matter where they went from here, what they did, who they found. If this was love, he was fathoms deep and drowning.
When he sank into her, he was already home.
She wanted to take him inside her, hold him inside her, absorb him through her skin. Every kiss, every stroke, pul ed her deeper into something sacred, something holy, a sacrament of flesh and love. She loved him.
But she would not force her words on him and risk his puzzled disbelief. He did not want her guarantees.
And so she gave him herself instead, her body, loving him with everything in her, everything she’d held inside, pouring herself into their union, feeling his pleasure rise and build and crest. Until the wave that took him swamped them both, carrying her away, leaving her heart stranded on an unfamiliar shore.
She hugged him tightly while their ragged breathing smoothed, while their rapid heartbeats slowed, while their bodies cooled, sealed together by sweat and sex.
A finger of sunset stole through the pretty white curtains and lay across the bed.
She could never go home again.
“Have you thought what you’re going to say to him?” Lara asked as they climbed the hil toward the center of town, a two-block stretch of parked cars, telephone poles, and gray-shingled houses. A few family groups wandered the dusk, peering in the darkened windows of picturesque storefronts. Island Realty.
Lighthouse Gift Shop. An amorphous group of teenagers blocking the sidewalk in front of Wiley’s Market shuffled to let them by. One of the boys muttered a comment as they passed. One of the girls laughed. With a pang, Lara thought of Bria.
It was al very ordinary, she supposed. It was like nothing she knew. She had never been part of a family. She had never been like those teens, chafing against the restrictions of a parent’s love, experimenting with freedom within safe distance of home.
Maybe she was going through some kind of delayed adolescence.
She stole a glance at Iestyn. He looked at home here, with his sun-streaked hair and easy, waterman’s stride.
There was more to her flight from Rockhaven than teenage rebel ion. More to her feelings for him than a dizzy infatuation with sex.
He could belong here. Her heart swel ed with hope and loss. He could make a life here.
For a moment, she let herself imagine it, Iestyn, working on the water during the day, coming home at night to a grayshingled house and a couple of children with golden eyes.
He slanted a look down at her. “Say to who?”
She pul ed her thoughts back together, embarrassed to be caught dreaming over a future that didn’t belong to her.
“Dylan Hunter. Have you planned what to say?”
“Besides hello?”
“I’m sure you have questions, but I think it’s important to explain about the amnesia because. ” She caught him grinning at her and broke off. “What? It’s good to be prepared.”
“It is if you know what you’re preparing for. We don’t.”
He caught her hand, making her jolt with surprise and pleasure, adjusting his steps to hers. Anyone looking at them would think they were any couple strol ing to dinner.
But they weren’t.
“Relax,” he murmured. “We’l make it up as we go along.”