“What you did was the only way too. The only way to protect our daughter from everyone who would hurt her.”
A tear slid down my cheek. “Keeping secrets from each other sucks. From now on, we need to always find a way to do things together, no matter how hard it is. We have to find a way, Nero.”
“Yes.” His hand traced the sparkling stones of my necklace. “You wore it.”
“Of course I wore it. You gave it to me.” I sighed. “I’m just sorry I haven’t had time to buy you a gift.”
“You’re the greatest gift of all, Leda.”
My throat tightened up with emotion. “You’re just afraid I’d get you something that explodes.”
“Pandora.” His fingers intertwined with mine. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“Away from here.” He started walking, leading me toward the exit.
I glanced at him. “What an excellent idea.”
His eyes twinkled with comfortable arrogance. “I know.”
I chuckled. I stopped laughing when a spark of charged energy rippled across our joined hands, electrifying my skin with magic.
“Nero?” I said as we left the ballroom.
He glanced back to cock a single brow upward at me.
I was almost afraid to ask, but of course I did anyway. “Was that you?”
“Pandora, I’ve spent the last several days keeping my distance from you. My magic is a tad agitated.”
“A tad agitated? Is that what you call the big, bad storm cloud hovering over your house?” I teased him.
“Highly agitated then.”
“Highly agitated? Not completely distraught?”
“If that would make you happy.”
“I’m never happy when you’re distraught, Nero.” I stopped walking to touch my hand to his face.
He set his hand over mine. “These last few days have been trying. So many times I nearly broke.”
“Broke?”
“Gave in and told you everything. But I couldn’t. I had to keep my distance to protect you. I nearly failed you so many times, Leda. You don’t even know how often I did.” He drew in a deep breath. “Unable to bear the pain of not holding you, of not hearing your voice, your banter, how you always teased and provoked me.”
“We can do all of those things now.”
“Leda.” His voice was half-warning, half-invitation. “What are you doing?”
“Provoking you.” My hands were on his butt, pulling him closer as my hips pressed against him. “And teasing you.”
A deep, low groan rumbled on his lips. “Hold on,” he growled into my ear.
“Hold on? Hold on to what—”
My heart jumped as he swept me up into his arms.
“Hold on to me.”
“Always,” I promised him, wrapping my arms around him. I dropped my head to his chest and listened to the beautiful rhythm of his heart.
Nero carried me off down the hall. We passed a few soldiers along the way to my apartment. Some of them winked at me. Alec Morrows shot me two big thumbs up.
“Your friend Gypsy is right.” Nero carried me through the front door of my apartment, across the living room, and into the bedroom.
“About what?” I asked as he set me down gently on the bed.
Nero removed all his leather armor faster than I’d thought possible. “Your new shampoo is having quite a pronounced effect on me.”
I turned on my side, my gaze sliding down the length of him. “I can see that.” I peeled myself off the mattress. “I missed you, Nero.”
He replied with a sexy, easy twist of his lips. He reached out to me, his hand tracing my gown’s plunging neckline.
“Do you like my dress?” I asked him with a coy flutter of my eyelashes.
“Yes.” Nero slipped the strap off my right shoulder. “I really do.” He slipped off the other strap, and my dress tumbled to my waist. “But not so much that I’ll spare it by being gentle.”
“But it’s the most elegant and refined dress I own,” I laughed.
“Right now, Leda, I just don’t care.”
My heart jumped in desperate anticipation. “Good.”
Nero tugged my dress roughly over my hips and tossed it aside. I was now completely naked—except for the necklace he’d given me.
His hands returned to me, caressing the inside of my thighs as he slowly parted them. He met my eyes with a smile, then lowered himself between my legs. His kisses branded my belly. His mouth dipped lower.
A gasp escaped my lips.
He looked up at me. “Leda, we need to talk.”
“Now?” I laughed hoarsely, my body shuddering with denied need.
“It’s important. I want to make sure you realize I understand why you took that potion. I understand that you would do anything to protect our daughter from Faris. And I want to make sure you understand that I would do anything to protect our daughter too, with everything that I have.”
“Even if it means she won’t be born for a long time?”
“Someday, she will be born,” he replied. “I can wait.”
“You’re very patient.”
“Yes.”
“Nero?”
“Hmm?”
“I’m not very patient at all,” I told him.
“I’d noticed.”
Then his mouth descended between my legs. His tongue flicked out, teasing me.
I moaned, and my hips lifted toward him.
“My Pandora.” His mouth closed over me, and I screamed out.
White-hot pleasure collided with hard, desperate longing. I couldn’t reach Nero, couldn’t touch him. My fingernails clawed the mattress.
“Let’s never fight again,” I sobbed. “I can’t bear to be without you.”
He rose up my body, climbing on top of me. “It wasn’t a real fight.” He kissed my lips.
“Let’s not ever fake fight either. Agreed?”
“Agreed.” He pinned my hands to the bed.
I held my breath.
He dipped his mouth to my neck. “Tomorrow, we’re going on a vacation.” One of his fangs brushed lightly against my skin, teasing but not breaking the surface.
My pulse was pounding so hard, I barely heard him. “Nyx will never let us go. We’re in the middle of a crisis.”
“We’re always in the middle of a crisis. After two hundred years, I’m taking a damn vacation.”
“Where will we go?”
He licked his lips. “It’s a surprise.”
“Should I be worried?”
“Yes, Pandora.” His green eyes flashed with untamed sexuality. “You should be very worried.”
He drew in a deep breath, drinking in my scent for a moment, then his fangs sank into me. Liquid fire shot through my veins. My body quaked and quivered in pleasure and pain. I wanted him so badly I could hardly stand it. Our fight had left a hollow, empty hole inside of me, an ache only he could fill.
A gasp broke my lips as he slid inside of me. He captured my lips with his mouth, his searing kiss ruthless, unrelenting. Our bodies moved together in a rhapsody of love and lust. Heat pulsed through my body. My body twitched, caught on the precipice of ecstasy.