Page 143 of You Only Love Twice
"Make me forget today," she begged, sliding the charred edges of his coat off his broad shoulders.
Make me forget.He saw again the pistol smoking. The empty bridge coming into focus. And the world rushing back in upon him. Obsidian shook his head as he captured her face in both hands. "You cannot forget your pain without forgetting all the goodness that comes with it," he whispered.Trust me. I know. "Pain is what makes the pleasures of life seem so vibrant. If you didn't know pain or loss, then you would take for granted what had been gifted to you."
He breathed her in, pressing his face to her hair, one hand curled around the back of her neck.
Mine. All mine.
"Then make ithurt," Gemma said, before she stretched up on her toes and captured his lips in a demanding kiss.
He tore his mouth from hers with a shudder. "Nyet."
Capturing her hands, he held her there, fingers linked. Pain flashed through his synapses, but it was a dull ache now. A distant warning of the aversion therapy. The line between pleasure and pain was thin enough it could go either way; kissing her was torture in the most excruciatingly delicious sense.
But he didn't wantherto know such a sensation. Not tonight.
"Please."
"Gemma." Obsidian shook his head, swallowing hard. "Let me love you. Just this once."
Stillness spread through her as she tilted her head. "Love you?"
And there they were. The two words that had the ability to cut his heart right out of his chest.
"What would you call it?" He tried to make sense of the sudden riot in his mind. His heart was pounding, a physical response he couldn't seem to quell, despite his control.
But then, he'd never been able to control that recalcitrant organ when it came to her.
"Do you speak of taking me to bed? Or... something else?"
Obsidian laced his fingers through hers. When he felt like he had control over his facial features, he slowly looked up. "Something else. Perhaps. I have never felt rationally when it comes to you. I don't.... I don't know what I feel. But it is overwhelming. You are the beginning and the end of everything. You are all I see. You aremine.
"They tried to lock it all away inside me. To bind it with chains of hate, but even when I wanted to kill you, a part of me could not raise a hand. I've killed to protect you. I would die for you. And you alone have the power to bring me to my knees with a single kiss. Is this love?"
Gemma curled her fingers through his. She tried to laugh, and failed. "You're asking me? According to Malloryn my perception of the word is skewed."
"And you think the Duke of Malloryn knows what love is? He's a fool."
A laugh burst out of her.
Then the shadows came back as the day's events clearly returned.
"You make me believe," he added swiftly, "there is a place where I belong. And that place is in your arms. It doesn't matter where we are, or what we're fighting for. You are the only thing that matters to me."
Those luminous eyes were shuttered by the flicker of her lashes, but then she met his gaze, and all the pain and fear and anger washed out of her. "That's what I felt in Russia. I had a job to do, but for the first time in my life I wanted to run away with you. I wanted to leave behind all my burdens, all my duties. I wanted something I'd never wanted before. Love," she said, in a wondering tone.
If Malloryn lived, Obsidian was going to kill him for putting that doubt into her mind.
"Do you trust me,lyubov moya?"
"With my life."
Obsidian bent and caught her up beneath her thighs, lifting her easily. Gemma's arms slid around his broad shoulders and her thick black hair cascaded around his face.
They'd never had a moment in which to surrender to each other. There'd always been tension between them. Lies. Hot, hard kisses. Teeth in skin, as both of them sought to overwhelm the other. In Russia they'd both been playing a game, from what he could recall. Passion was easy to ignite. Sex, a means to communicate without saying a damned thing.
But this....
He lowered her onto the rough bed he'd created in the corner, and Gemma lay back like a bride surrendering to her husband on their wedding night as he knelt between her thighs.
