The men who normally took shots at innocent wolf families, babies and all, from helicopters – because that was just so very sporting – were suddenly finding themselves grounded.
And naked…
And stuck in the country without transportation or cell phones, running for their lives from unseen snipers whom they perceived to be shooting at them from treetops, towers, and helicopters of their own.
Selene turned away from the computer console to find Avery standing a few feet away, leaning casually against one of the book stacks, his leg bent at the knee, boot propped against the wood behind him, finely sculpted arms crossed over his chest. He was watching her so intently, she froze under the scrutiny, gaining the sudden sensation that he was reading something written lightly across her soul.
He cocked his head to one side, green eyes glittering. “Oh?”
Selene stared at him.
Had she said something? Damn it. He’d completely made her forget what she’d been thinking. Those eyes of his could erase a person’s memory; hell they could blot a person completely from existence.
But then it hit her again, fueled by something more than indignation this time, and therefore strong enough to get past Avery’s unwitting hypnotism.
“Yes,” she insisted. “I want to do something more.”
Avery calmly pushed off the shelf, uncrossed his arms, and took a step forward. As he did, another wave of that power she’d been sensing around him all afternoon washed over her.
She swallowed hard.
Someone at a desk across the library picked up the intercom phone. The sound of the speaker being negligently brushed against a collar hissed through the building. Attention guests, the library will be closing in fifteen minutes. Please gather your belongings and bring any materials you wish to check out to the self-check out station or the check-out counter at the front of the library.
“What did you have in mind this time, Wisher?”
He spoke the question so softly, it was nearly a whisper. And it was all kinds of intimate.
Again, she found herself attempting to swallow.
Why was that? How was he suddenly getting to her so strongly? He overshadowed her. He loomed over her. There was an abrasion of his power, his aura scraping against hers, and for the first time in hours, Selene thought about what he’d said when he’d first appeared to her. Really thought about it.
I am the king of the Seelie fae, and you are my queen.
She believed him now. She had taken it all in stride before, so focused on who and what she was and what she could do with her power, she barely registered his words and what they meant - until now.
Until now.
Emerald eyes made her head swim. The scent of him, masculine, expensive cologne, leather from some jacket he’d probably taken off yesterday or maybe from his boots…. He was more of a man than anyone she had ever met. He was too much, and suddenly Selene Trystaine realized she was terrified.
How could she not have been terrified before?
The novelty of what I am is wearing off, she realized. Up until that very moment, she had been overwhelmed with the new knowledge that she was a Wish Faerie, that her parents – one of them at least, anyway – had been scared into hiding and had conceived her and her sister and then left them to be raised in the mortal realm as Changelings. It was a lot to take in. It was easier for her than it would have been for a mortal, as this knowledge was encoded in her very being. But, it was still immense.
And now that knowledge was settling down and moving aside, and in its wake, what was left was reality.
And the reality was… him.
Oh hell.
Chapter Eighteen
Be strong! she told herself. Don’t lose your focus now! You haven’t done a single worthwhile thing with your powers!
It was strange for her to suddenly think this – to see it as if someone had wiped a cleansing cloth across a filthy mirror. She felt at once ashamed. And extremely anxious to remedy that shame. This is what really matters!
“I want to end rape,” she said softly – but firmly. “War. Genocide.” She shrugged, the images of women being demolished in the Congo flashing before her eyes and forcing her to look down at the multi-colored carpet. “Those kinds of things.”
“And yet,” he said softly, drawing her attention back to him. He closed the distance between them one slow, determined step after another. “Even as you say this, you know it isn’t possible. Don’t you, raven one?”
Selene just watched him come closer. She felt like a deer in headlights. Each word that rolled off his tongue was a mini magic spell.
“What does that mean? ‘Raven one’?” she asked, at once enthralled.
“It means lovely one,” he told her. And when he said “lovely one,” he did so without any pretense or guile. He honestly meant it.
“Everything in existence lives within its own boundaries,” he explained. When he stopped directly before her, he gently cupped her cheek with his right hand. “Even the Wishers.”
A wash of heat moved out over her skin when he ran his thumb across her bottom lip and tilted her head back, his green, green eyes making her weak.
“Wishers are the justice makers of the fae universe. It was not their ability to prevent wrong that frightened the rulers of old, Selene. But their ability to avenge it.”
Selene wanted to say something, but there was no point. He was right.
She couldn’t alter a human being’s desires, much less their inherent, evil psychopathic urges. She could not stop a war already in progress or heal others who were sick or wounded; only healers could do that, just as this Time King – whoever he was – was the only one who could control time.
She was limited. She was powerful beyond measure, but limited. She couldn’t stop evil. She could only get even with it.
It was like being the Genie from Disney’s Aladdin: “Phenomenal cosmic powers! Itty bitty living space.”
“But think of what you have accomplished,” he went on. “You’ve managed to turn the page in the story of the Wishers. You’ve gone beyond simple revenge.” His eyes became soulful. “You’ve done something no Wisher has ever done. You’ve made the world a better place.”
“Oh yeah?” she asked sarcastically, still feeling ashamed, still needing to be sarcastic for some reason, despite the rising heat in her belly. “How? By giving people arthritis?”
“I can count two hundred cats and dogs that would thank their lucky stars you exist,” he told her frankly. “So that they can too.”
Selene fell silent.
“Not to mention the wolves. How many mothers and their wolflings have you allowed to see the sun come up because a bullet from the blue won’t be destroying them?”
Selene mulled this over, feeling more surprised with herself by the second.
“And then there are the trees.” His smile became heart-warming. “The Tuath hold the Redwoods in highest regard, and for good reason. There are souls in those trunks, spirits in the branches. Redwood hunters are stumbling into emergency rooms with wounds they will have a very hard time explaining. How many more Redwoods will survive to see the next century because of your interference?”
Selene was beginning to feel better. Much better.
“There are also the humans that you have undoubtedly rescued from terrible vehicle accidents by punishing those who would cause them.” He was referring to her acts of vengeance against the texter-drivers.
“You’ve forced people to understand how others feel,” he went on. “From students to doctors to police officers….”
Selene found herself smiling. He was so close, she could feel the heat from his body.
Avery matched her smile – and then some – and she lost a bit of her breath. “And in doing so,” he continued, “you’ve created in them the emotion in greatest deficit for humanity.”
“Empathy,” Selene softly supplied. Her pulse was quickening. She felt on the verge of something. Her eyes left
his and trailed to the sleeves of his shirt, where they were pulled taut across the muscles of his arms… and to his trim, narrow waist, where it was so lazily half-tucked in behind a masculine leather belt… and to his legs….
Selene swallowed and inhaled sharply when Avery’s finger curled beneath her chin to bring her eyes back up to his.
The library around them had grown very quiet, and vaguely, somewhere in the back of her mind, she realized the library must be about to lock its doors.
As if to prove her right, a man who appeared to be in his fifties, very thin and very tall, came toward them down one of the aisles. She saw him like a peripheral nuisance, a blur on the edge of a really good dream.
The man was smiling, but he was visibly irritated.
Without looking at the man or breaking eye contact with her, Avery said, “Why don’t we take this someplace else?” He lifted his hand, snapped his fingers, and the library vanished around them.
When the world solidified once more, Selene stood atop a crystal-clear glass bridge that spanned between one planet to another in some solar system she had never before imagined, much less laid eyes upon.
Stars twinkled around them, orbs of red, of orange, yellow and blue. The crystal bridge, smooth as ice, stretched invitingly. The darkness yawned ancient and forever, and the planets turned slowly, multi-colored and miraculous.
She was in space, but she could breathe, and this was unlike any space she’d ever heard of. Yet even so, it was underwhelming compared to the man standing over her, his power that coursed over her like a magic spell, his incredible, terrible sway. Maybe it was that fae glamour she’d read about so many times…. It had to be. He was taking her under. He was doing things to her.
“Where are we?” she whispered, trying to fight him.
“The Astral plane,” he told her easily, and yet he held her gaze, relentless in his building claim. “I come here often. It borders many different realms, acting as a buffer between them. Not far from here is the Phantom King’s realm. It’s a frequent stop.”
Selene felt dizzy. She felt overwhelmed and light as air, and she even felt giddy.
“I know,” he said softly. “I know you have a million questions, raven one. And I promise to answer them all…. We have forever.”
Selene felt something tilt inside her. In that moment, it didn’t matter that her life had been turned upside down in the space of a single day. For some reason she couldn’t name, it didn’t matter that she had unbelievable powers, that she’d just exacted revenge against a good portion of the population that had always either irritated or pissed her off. In that very moment, it didn’t even matter that she wasn’t human.
For once, for one beautiful, fraction of a moment – nothing mattered.
Nothing but this. And him. And now.
She’d wanted him since the first time she’d heard his voice. She hadn’t even seen him yet; he’d spoken behind her on that amethyst path – but the moment she’d heard that deep, crystal clear voice like silk and magic, she was lost. She knew that now.
It had been fate, after all.
She’d wanted to kiss him. She’d wanted it so bad, so desperately, she could almost imagine it – the feel of his lips on hers, like satin on silk, the pressure of him taking her deeper, the inevitable swirl of sensation that would ride lower through her body… making her yearn for more. But the world was changing around her and –
All at once, thought was blasted from Selene’s mind. Avery moved like a predator, his tall, hard, powerful form shadowing her with dizzying speed, and his power engulfing her in a warm wave of electric need. Her breath caught in her throat, her heart leapt as if it would tear from her chest, and a moan worked its way up from somewhere deep inside as he fiercely drew her against him, crushing her with an obvious hunger that mirrored her own, and finally – finally – captured her lips with his.
*****
It had been but a day, but in waiting for this, it felt like a lifetime.
And now that he held her in his arms and claimed her soul with his kiss, he was nearly overcome with emotion.
A whitewash mixture of relief, heart-wrenching fear, and overwhelming joy swirled within him, blotting out every sense he possessed save the ones that were occupied by Selene.
He knew only the feel of her lips against his, the smell of her skin, the sweet taste of her on his tongue, and the heat radiating from her tall, lithe form as he held her to him. She tasted like coconut; it had been the last thing they’d consumed before coming here. Pina Coladas, in some small bar in Idaho.
He wanted to devour her. He wanted to taste deeper. He thought he’d been in control, he was Seelie – he was good. But his heart was cracking open and bleeding a restless, starving need into his blood stream.
Without letting her break the kiss, Avery bent and lifted her into his arms. As he’d suspected, she melted into him, weighing almost nothing in his strength. She didn’t seem to notice that he carried her down the crystal bridge. He could hear her heart racing; he could feel it pounding against his chest, her body was pressed so tightly to his. He could hear her breaths as she gasped them desperately when he allowed her to break away just long enough before he crashed back in for more.
She didn’t notice when he opened a portal, stepped through, and closed it again around them. She didn’t even notice the fire crackling in the hearth of his bed chamber, or the stillness of his enormous master suite. She was lost in him; she’d succumbed, her lips parted for him and her tongue exploring, offering up her unspoken surrender. He had taken over, and he had his prize – and the universe would have to kill him to wrench it away from him.
He carried her toward the master bed, a giant construct of precious metal and posters like spires that stretched to the ceiling a hundred feet above them. Carvings, ancient and powerful, were etched into gold and platinum and metals that mortals did not yet know. Sheets cascaded over the mattress, cream in color and softer than silk, beckoning like a siren’s song.
A lifetime of sovereignty passed before Avery’s eyes, century upon century of tending to the loves and lives of others, of ruling over the magic and the miracles of the fae – of doing so alone. Thousands of years of searching, of waiting, of hoping, and of needing came rushing forward as he leaned into the bed, following her down until he was pressing her into the mattress. Still, he didn’t break the kiss. He couldn’t hold back. She was so precious in his arms, precious and tender and perhaps fragile in her rarity, but so very strong in what she was and what she promised, and the enigma of her drove him a little bit mad.
His kiss deepened, turning demanding, begging her to give him more of her. He moved his arms, releasing her into the bed, and his fingers found the bottom edges of her shirt.
He could have done this the easy way, the fast way, and that shirt and her bra and everything else that stood between him and his ultimate desire would have simply vanished into nothingness.
But that would have been too fast. He wanted to do anything he could to prolong this moment. The years leading up to it had certainly taken their time – it was his turn now.
Avery settled on willing away her boots and socks, knowing he would have no time or patience for those, and felt her surprise beneath him in her kiss. Slowly, he broke that kiss, pulling back long enough to gaze down at his queen-to-be. Her eyes were glassy, her lips red and parted, her breathing shallow. Her lids were heavy, lashes lowered, cheeks flushed.
By the Tuath, he thought. Have mercy. “Oh raven one,” he whispered, choking the words through an emotionally constricted throat. Without warning, he jerked her up and yanked the shirt up and over her head, tossing it to the floor. The patience in him was flittering away with sudden ferocity. He’d wanted to go slow, but there was a flame licking through his blood, and it was growing stronger.
Again, he claimed her lips with his own, stealing her breath. As he drove her into the mattress with his kiss, his hand slid up her side. Her skin was so soft, so warm; he growled
against her lips. His fingertips brushed the bottom of her bra, and a part of him – the Seelie, the “good,” the lightness – wanted to unhook it and gently pull it off her shoulders. But the darkness yawning over his spirit simply yearned to rip the garment off her and destroy it for keeping him at bay.
As he paused, struggling with his inner demon for a few precious, fleeting seconds, Selene made the decision for him.
“Just rip it off, Avery.”
His eyes widened, and he could feel them begin to glow with the fire that had all but engulfed him.
He looked down at her, her raven hair spilled across his bed – the only hair other than his own to grace his sheets in countless centuries – the unbelievably creamy swell of her breasts above the thin lace of her bra, the smooth slope of her shoulders, the tapering of her waist to her tiny, filmy skirt, and Avery knew that if he’d been one of his vampire friends rather than the king of the Seelie fae, he would have been all fang just then. He would have drained her dry.
Selene’s ice-blue irises were shrinking beneath the expanding pupils of what was a starkly hungry gaze. “For the love of god, Avery,” she said, shaking her head, her expression almost pleading. “Just take me.”
Chapter Nineteen
The fae in her had grown stronger, more perceptive. She could feel the hesitation in him, like a hiccup in the flow of his dark-light power over her increasingly exposed body. She knew, somehow instinctively, that there was a war going on inside him. She didn’t know why or what it meant, but she could feel it as if it were a part of her own body, her own soul.
We match, she thought. It was an unexpected thought, one that rode the waves of a desire that was rippling through her, pulsing and heated. But she understood it.
Their souls were matched, not only by the fates, but in this battle, this war going on inside of them both. And in that matching, they were melding now – becoming one.
Selene closed her eyes… and behind those closed lids, she saw things through his own, felt things through his own body and his hands, thought things with his mind.