Lawe stared into her eyes, saw the conviction there, saw the woman she knew herself to be as well as the woman he knew she could be. “You only see the warrior you are, Diane.” He sighed, feeling as weary as she had sounded moments ago. “You don’t see the rest of you, but I sense her. I hope you find her, before you destroy both of us.”
Mating heat was so much more than a sexual hunger that brought a couple together. Lawe knew it for the emotional abyss it could be as well as the thriving, beautiful relationship it could become.
Staring into her eyes, he tried, God knew he tried with everything inside him, to still the dominance that was so much a part of him. To tell her what he felt and know it wouldn’t give her the encouragement he was certain she would get from it.
He’d felt her hurt, knew what he’d done to hurt her and he hated himself for it.
Without a thought he’d attempted to wound her self-confidence just as he’d attempted to weaken her belief in herself.
He’d done it without thinking, without a moment’s hesitation, and she’d seen right through him. He’d seen it in her eyes, in her expression. She’d known even before he had what he was up to. And she deserved so much more.
She deserved much more from him.
“Before I destroy both of us.” She sighed as she turned away from him. “There is no ‘us,’ Lawe. There’s still just you and what you want.”
She looked alone, bereft. Staring at her, Lawe couldn’t believe the gift standing before him or the incredible strength and will she possessed. She was as strong as the woman who had given him birth. And he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt she would die for him the same as Morningstar had died for her mate, Elder.
“After my escape from the labs I avoided every woman who I felt, even remotely, could have been my mate.” The surprise on her face was nothing compared to his own as he heard himself speaking.
Reaching out Lawe touched the side of her face with the backs of his fingers, brushing her hair back as he did so. “Not because I didn’t want you.” He cupped the back of her neck as that remembered ache of hunger shot through him. “Because I did, Diane. With everything I am, everything I was, I wanted my mate. I wanted to hold you, to have you hold me. I wanted to laugh and feel the contentment I knew other Breeds felt with their mates. I wanted to sleep with that sense of peace others spoke of. But even more, even more than that, I wanted to ensure that the evil I knew existed in this world never touched you. Because I knew the dangers, I knew the pain and horrors that I could bring to you. And I wanted nothing more than to vanquish all your dragons. And here I was, the greatest of all those dragons.”
She turned her head away, blinking. Damn, she was blinking back tears?
“Tears,” he whispered, amazed. “I never wanted you to have reason to shed tears or to feel the helplessness that rages through me when you do.” To know she hurt enough to cry made him crazy. It made all the animal genetics that raged inside him threaten to overtake him once again.
“You can’t hold back life, Lawe,” she stated, the frustration eating at her, and raking at the control Lawe was fighting to hold on to as he sensed it.
“I know I can’t hold back life,” he agreed as he pulled his hand back rather than tightening his hold on her. “I don’t want to hold back your life. I want to fucking share it. Damn it, Diane, I just want to ensure that nothing takes us from the other. We’re mates. If you die, then I may as well die with you. And if I die . . .” He shook his head, the other side of mating suddenly clearer to him than it had ever been. “If I’m gone, then you’ll be always alone. Always, Diane. Always suffering that loss because you’ll be unable to bear to have another man touch you. You would be completely vulnerable. You and any children we may have unless you’re in Sanctuary. Unless you’re protected and you understand that need for protection.”
Watching her face, watching the pain that flashed in her eyes, and the fear, he suddenly wondered if those Breeds who were still unaware of the true depth of it, would allow it to begin if they knew the truth. He knew that fear. The fear of being enclosed, of being imprisoned. She was terrified he would find a way to cage her, and Lawe couldn’t swear to her that the day wouldn’t come when it would have to be done.
Lowering his head he pressed his forehead against her temple, inhaling the scent of her. The mating heat, a spicy, fruity scent, a combination of him and her, a merging of who they were.
That was the mating scent. It was what mating did. It merged two beings, it merged their scents, and sometimes, when needed, it merged their dreams along with their hearts and souls.
“You are more than a soldier,” he promised her as he let his lips brush against her hair, as he inhaled the scent of both of them merging. “You are more than a mate, more than just a woman, a sister or an aunt. You can’t fight this fight alone, Diane, and that’s what you’re trying to do. Nor can you fight against rogue Breeds who can smell you coming a mile away. Or Council Coyotes who can smell your scent and know it for what it is. And if you’re taken because of it, if you’re taken, you become the same as the other mates the Council has captured. You become a science experiment.” Screams echoed in his head now. “Vivisected, screaming, begging and dying as they compare your organs, compare the changes to them, against those they’ve murdered in the same way before you.”
Pulling back, he stared into her tormented gaze and wanted to roar out his rage and his pain at what he saw there.
A woman fighting not just her hunger but all the dreams and all the needs she had never had to deny herself before. Dreams and needs he was asking—no, demanding—she give up. She was more than just a soldier, she was his mate. She was the woman he’d always dreamed of having and the one whose sheer bravery terrified him.
“Lawe.” She touched him. Her palm against his jaw, her fingers against his cheek. “Sanctuary is attacked at least once a year. I know of two attempts against the community during the social events Callan and Merinus are forced to throw throughout the year. Snipers have been caught twice attempting to get into position and Callan was nearly killed at an event thrown by a Breed supporter. Sanctuary isn’t safe either. And each time it was attacked, each time a Breed, a mate or any member of the community was harmed I’d die inside. I’d always feel I could have helped. I’ll always feel responsible.”
He tried to protest, only to have her fingers press against his lips to hold the words back.
Her hands weren’t silk and satin, but neither were they calloused and rough. They were a true woman’s hands. She used them. She worked with them. She touched him and he swore she breathed life into his soul the night he rescued her.
“I can’t be more than a soldier, Lawe. Even for you. It’s all I’ve dreamed of being. And, until you, it’s all I’ve dreamed of having. I don’t want a protector or a jailer. I want a partner. And that’s what I’ll have or I’ll have nothing or no one at all. Even you.” She stepped slowly back from him even though he could feel, sense, her need to crawl into his body and stay there.
And that was where he wanted her. Buried so deep inside him that he knew every breath she took. That he felt it. That he could reach out at any given time and assure himself of her safety, of her happiness.
As he watched her, she slung the strap of the duffel bag over one shoulder, the strap of the backpack over the other, then hefted the black duffel bag that contained her weapons. Lawe almost shook his head in bemusement. The gear looked far too heavy for her to manage on her own.
Yet she did manage it. It weighed heavily on her slender shoulders, pulled at her arm, yet she went out the door and slammed it behind her.