Page 12 of Rotanev
Pain.
Distress.
Fear.
The very expression that I’d hoped to find the second she saw me tonight, but now found myself hating.
“Have I hurt you?” I heard myself asking, confused out of my mind.
She swallowed and started to shake her head, then nodded, and then shook her head again. “It’s… not you.”
“What is it?” I asked.
She tried to turn away, but I held her in place. “I just… I never expected… That is, I mean, I never anticipated my first time being… like that.”
First time?Impossible. Kailiani wasn’t a virgin. Sirens couldn’t survive without sex.
“And now I’m embarrassed,” she continued, attempting to hide again.
“Stop trying to look away,” I commanded, needing to see her expression, her eyes, hersoul.
Something wasn’t right.
I sensed her—my Kailiani. She bore the same name and traits as my betrothed. But… “You bled on me.”
“Oh, God…” Her cheeks turned bright red, the look on her actually quite adorable—and completely irrelevant. Because she’d just addressed me by name again.
“You know who I am,” I said. Not a question, but a statement.
“Yes. Nero.”
“Myrealname, Kailiani.”
Wrinkles appeared on her forehead. “You told me your name is Nero. I… I don’t know you by another name.”
Had she meant the deity on Earth? One born of religious texts? Times had changed in the Human Realm since my last visit. I was no longer the one worshipped and feared, merely joked about in entertainment venues.
What if… what if this isn’t a charade?I wondered, watching her closely for any hint of betrayal.
No sign of treachery.
Of course, I’d not noticed one all those years ago, either. But now I knew to look, and still, I saw nothing.
Had something happened to disrupt her memories? To put her soul in what appeared to be a human body?
But she’d not broken from the force of my thrusts.
So, what are you, my darling Kailiani?
My wrist buzzed with a warning of our ending session, causing me to wonder where the time had escaped to.
The vows, I realized. The force of our bonding—themating—had surpassed time and space. Impossibly so, but I’d felt it.
We were connected now in the most intimate of ways. An act that should not have been possible.
I needed to confer with some of the others to determine what the fuck had just occurred. And more importantly, to figure out why Kailiani appeared to be human without any memory of the past.
“I’ll be in touch,” I said, releasing her. “Don’t commit to anyone else.” I’d feel it if she did, and a mortal male did not want to be on the receiving end of my possessive rage.
