“Open your eyes,” he said. Though wrapped in velvet, the order brooked no argument. When she obeyed, the fire had returned to his gaze and stoked the flames inside her higher. “I want you to see the truth in my eyes and never question this again.”
She nodded, her lips parted on a soft pant.
“Yes, you look like Pria.” His fingers drifted over the cleft in her chin, lingered on the dent that had been the butt of many jokes as a child. “But it wasn’t Pria I dreamed with these last six months. I didn’t see your face, Tamar. All I knew was your body, as familiar to me as my own now. I knew your arms that offered me comfort when I returned from fighting. I knew your body that beat back the loneliness and gave me pleasure and forgetfulness.”
He smoothed a palm over her wild curls. But the fierce, hungry expression he wore made her feel as if her bane-of-my-existence hair were made of the finest spun gold.
“In the past few days I’ve discovered you are brave, loyal, resourceful.” His mouth twisted and she thought of her botched escape attempt. “You are a warrior…beautiful and honorable. Lukas, Adon, Dorian and I…we’re protecting you because you are worthy and we can do nothing else.”
Awe, pride and joy coalesced in her chest, gathered heat like a swirling supernova before exploding and cascading in a shower that rained throughout her body. Tears stung her eyes and she disobeyed Nicolai and squeezed them shut.
Kyle hadn’t been the only abuser. She’d berated and belittled herself. Weak, ugly, scarred—those words had been the bat she’d used to beat her self-esteem. Kyle had screamed she would never find anyone who would want her. And she’d agreed with him. Who could possibly want her, a woman disfigured inside and out?
She was afraid of the dark, refused to get on a plane, limped when tired and bore a road map of scars that covered half her body.
He’d called her beautiful with a gentleness that made her sink her teeth into her bottom lip.
Beautiful. Brave.
A warrior.
Her. A warrior.
She lifted her lashes, met his hot gaze. In that stare she spied the truth he’d promised. And desire. Such desire her breath snagged in her throat.
“Nicolai,” she whispered.
“Nico,” he rasped, gripping a handful of her hair, still careful not to tug on her healing scalp. “You always call me Nico in our dreams. Say it for me here, now.”
“Nico,” she murmured and turned her face into the palm that cradled her cheek. She placed a kiss there and delighted in the slight abrasion of the roughened skin over her lips.
With a groan, he drew her head back and covered her mouth with his.
Oh God. She shuddered. The wind-and-heather taste of him…the sensation of his firm, wide mouth crushed to hers…they were better than the dreams.
He didn’t coax her into opening her lips—his wasn’t a hesitant first kiss. They’d been lovers for six months and he kissed her as a man who knew what his woman wanted, needed. His tongue thrust forward, capturing and claiming like the animal that lurked inside him. He swept the interior of her mouth, tangled with her tongue, inviting her to play.
Accepting, she turned fully toward him, slid her hands up his shoulders, skipped to his cheeks and burrowed her fingers through his thick, golden curls. Silky and bright, they were the only soft thing about this warrior. The strands tickled her wrists, adding another sensory experience to the moment.
Their tongues danced, dueled, mated. Desire and its ruthless twin, lust, flowed and surged through her blood stream. More… She moaned, licking the roof of his mouth. I need more. I’m burning up.
A growl met her demand, the rumble pouring directly into her. Had she voiced the words aloud?
But then his broad hands cupped her breasts through her top and she didn’t give a damn if she’d verbalized the request or texted it.
He molded her flesh, squeezed it even as he continued to kiss her senseless. Before she’d considered her breasts average—not too small, but nothing to make a man fall down and worship at her feet. Yet as Nicolai lifted his head and stared down at her chest with lust stamped on his features, she believed herself perfect. His eyes blazed, his skin pulled taut over his cheekbones and his sensual lips were swollen and damp. No one could fake that hunger. He wanted her and the thought ratcheted her desire up another searing decimal.
She arched into his touch, needing more pressure. As if he’d read her mind again, he cupped her breasts and whisked his thumbs over the nipples until she cried out.
“Take it off,” she said. “Please.” She didn’t have to explain what she meant. Which was good because she didn’t have the words or the breath. Nicolai released her, grasped the bottom of her shirt and dragged it up her torso and over her head.