I looked around the room. Everyone was staring at me as if I were a bomb about to explode or a two-year-old who hadn’t quite finished her temper tantrum.
“Fine.” I snapped my fingers and strode toward the door. “Let’s go.”
Nix caught up to me in the hallway, took hold of my elbow and since his legs were much longer, kept right on going, and it was I who had to hurry to keep pace. He turned down a secondary corridor toward our rooms, and then he stopped, pressed me into the wall. All was quiet except for our breathing. I was caught in his stare. It was pure heat, but something more as well. Something I’d never seen before.
“Listen to me, Destiny. Listen and hear me. I’ll follow you to the pits of what Earthlings call hell. I’ll fuck you at your command. I’ll bend for you in any way I can to make you happy, mate, but you will not mistake that for weakness.”
I’d never heard him speak like this before, never felt the laser sharp focus of his attention out of bed. Weakness? Never. Nix was the strongest man I knew. “I—”
“You what?” he countered. “You’ll use my cock to ease your Ardor and toss me aside like garbage? You’ll ignore my desire to protect you and run headlong into battle? You’ll deny yourself my help because you are afraid to allow me to stand beside you? Do you not trust me? Do you not understand what you are to me?”
I blinked, licked my lips. Nix in bed was hot enough to make me lose my mind. But like this? My heart was aching, pain slicing through my chest like he was stabbing me with a knife, and I had no idea what to say. “You said I was your mate, Nix. But it wasn’t you talking. Not really. It was just your cock. Your body. We are great in bed, but as far as I can tell, you don’t like me very much. Everything I do makes you angry.”
He leaned his forearms on the wall on either side of my head so we were close. So close I felt his breath on my face. Felt the heat from his body seep into mine. “Only because you insist on doing it alone. And my cock didn’t say we were mates. The goddess did. I awakened only for you. Do you think all my life I envisioned a mate who was headstrong and stubborn and willful and disobedient?”
I took a deep breath, narrowed my eyes. “Exactly my point. If you don’t want me, that’s fine. Just go. Go home, wherever the hell that is. Forget about me. I’m sure the consort is around. He can finish me off and you’ll be free.”
I didn’t want him to go, but I wasn’t going to be with a guy who didn’t like me just the way I was. He could just go back to being a queen’s guard, and he wouldn’t have to deal with someone so willful and stubborn. Oh, and headstrong too. I was disobedient.
“Free?” He leaned in, pressed his forehead to mine. We shared breath. His heart was pounding. Hard. Like he was running a race, or fucking me raw. “Save me, mate. Don’t you understand?”
I pursed my lips. “Obviously, I don’t.”
He closed his eyes. Breathed. When he looked at me again, I sucked in a breath. I’d never seen him like this, not even when he was deep inside me and at the brink of a climax. “I am free. I am home. With you. Wherever the hell that is. Palace or cleric rooms at the fortress. Mytikas or Earth. You are where I belong. I am in love with you, Destiny.”
Wow, that had all the feels and that dagger in my heart twisted. Pain flooded my body and tears gathered. I couldn’t breathe. Was he trying to kill me? Did he mean it? Truly? “You don’t even know me.”
“Yes, I do. I want you. Your sharp brain, your brilliant brawn, your gorgeous body. I love the way you challenge me and everyone else. I respect you for your power and your strength. Everything about you makes your surrender in my arms all the sweeter. I want you. Your heart. Your trust. Your mind. I want all of it. Yes, we’ve been fucking like zebcats to soothe your Ardor and I want to end it and soon. I want to be able to prove to you I’m not here just to fuck you senseless, although you won’t hear me complain about that.”
I cracked a smile. A real smile, with tears. This was torment of the sweetest kind. A pain I’d never felt bloomed in my chest. Love. But not the kind of love I shared with my sisters or my parents. That love was safe. Old. Well worn. No, this was raw and powerful and hurt like a bitch. And I didn’t want it to stop. Ever.
“I want every stubborn, willful inch of you.”
“Nix.” I whispered his name and held his gaze. I didn’t try to hide what I was feeling. I didn’t know how. My smile grew wider and the tears slid silently down my cheeks as I saw the same agony in his gaze. The same pain. The same raw, vulnerable anguish.
He loved me. Holy shit. He really did.
Before I could even reach out and cup his cheek, he gripped my elbow and tugged me further down the hall to our rooms. “I’m not fucking you in a hallway. We’re finishing this in a bed.”
Kicking the door closed behind him, he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against it, watching me. We faced each other for long moments; neither of us said a word. This time was going to be different. This time was going to hurt in the most elemental of ways. Not physical pain, but raw emotion I’d never imagined.
After this, there would be no going back.
Was I okay with that? I closed my eyes and took my time, pulling air into my lungs, making sure it was me, and not the Ardor, answering that question. Nix. He’d given me everything. Every part of himself. He’d fought in the Hive wars, he killed. He protected. It was part of his DNA. Just like me, he was selfless. Honorable. Sexy. Intelligent. Possessive. Rough. Gentle. Honest. Fearless.
He was fucking perfect. Well, except for the caveman, over-protective, keep me in a bubble mode. But he’d learn.
Opening my eyes, I walked to him, lifted my hands to his cheeks and tilted his face down to mine. “Are you sure, Nix? Really sure? Because after this, I’m not going to be able to let you go.”
He sighed then, as if he were a balloon that had deflated. The fight left him and all that was left was Nix. My Nix. “I’m yours, mate. I’ve always been yours. It just took you a while to figure it out.”
He was right. I’d been the one holding back, not committing. Afraid to trust that his promises meant anything. But now I knew the truth. He was mine. Really mine. Forever. And that changed everything.
Lifting myself up on tiptoes, I kissed him. His hands came up to rest on my waist, but he didn’t pull me closer or try to dominate the kiss. He let me have my way, and I wanted to be gentle with him, only now realizing how my rejection must have hurt him. How frustrated and annoyed he’d been. “I’m sorry I was so slow on the uptake, mate.”
He groaned and closed his eyes. “Say that again.”
I grinned and ran my hands up and down his chest, his magnificent, muscled, perfect chest. Too many clothes. He was wearing too many clothes. “You’re mine, Nix. My mate. And I’m never letting you go.”