Between Light and Dark (22 page)

However, once he had been assigned the role of fathering the Earth Balancer, learning about lovemaking had
been one of his assignments.

Now, as his fingers parted Laurell's slippery folds and she
lifted her hips in invitation, he was pleased he had paid
such close attention to the couples he had viewed in the
love act. He knew exactly what Laurell wanted and just
how to go about giving it to her.

He slid his tongue along the soft skin, over the outer lips,
then deeper. He suckled on the inner lips, tugging them oh,
so gently with his mouth.

"Oh god," she moaned.

He released the succulent flesh. "Yes?"

"Don't stop," she pleaded.

Happy to oblige, Axiom dipped his tongue into her entrance and rolled it around inside. She grabbed his head and
pressed him closer. She tasted salty and sweet at the same
time, a flavor he found pleasing. Her hips began a rocking
motion and she used his tongue as she earlier had used his
manhood.

His erection grew almost unbearable, but he resigned himself to letting it pulse against the sheets beneath his belly.
For now. He lifted his head and then closed his lips over the
tiny bundle of nerves shaped into such a pretty kernel.

Axiom licked and sucked the engorged nub as Laurell
bucked against his mouth. He pressed one finger, then two,
inside of her and moved them in and out in quick succession and sucked harder. With his free hand, he took one nipple
between thumb and forefinger and tugged.

"Oh," she breathed, then shuddered and tightened
around his fingers, and he knew she had found her release.
He wished he could see her expression, but dared not take
his tongue from her until certain her orgasm was complete.

Without giving her desire a chance to wane, he lifted
himself and positioned his hips between her thighs, erection pulsing.

"Yes," she groaned before her fingers circled him and
guided him inside.

What came over him, he could not fathom, but his movements, which he had intended to be slow and leisurely,
turned quick and frenzied. An inexplicable need to feel her,
to see her, to be felt, to be seen, overcame him. Suddenly,
the world slowed and narrowed to that moment in time, to
her trusting eyes opened to his, to her slender hands holding
his face.

He wanted to ... to ... He knew not what.

Axiom grimaced and tried to keep the raw need from his
face, but must have failed. In the next moment, moisture
welled in Laurell's eyes and in a husky voice she said, "I see
you.

The orgasm that ensued shook him to his core.

Afterwards, Laurell feigned sleep again. Axiom held her
tightly against his chest and she tucked her head beneath
his chin. Despite the fact that he held her, she sensed that,
at least right for this moment, she had assumed the role of
protector. She didn't know why she'd said those words.

I see you. What had she meant by that? Where had the
words come from? Something in Axiom's eyes, something
about the way he'd looked at her in that moment before he
reached his peak, had touched a place inside of her she re served for just herself. An isolated, lonely place, where she
hid her longing for acceptance, for someone to come along
and love her. Just as she was.

Not try to change her. Not try to force her into the mold
of a Hollywood legend's daughter or some warped idea of
perfection.

Laurell lifted her head. Axiom's full lips and angular jaw
were slack with sleep, his brow, normally furrowed with intent, wrinkle free. His breathing, even and strong, sounded
in time with her heartbeat. Her chest constricted with an
unfamiliar sensation. She tucked her head back under Axiom's chin and bit back the fear that accompanied her realization of what the sensation was. Hope.

A cool hand stroked her cheek, light as air. Sleep departed
slowly, and with muddled mind, Fiona woke in the middle
of the night and lifted her eyelids.

"Hey, Fi."

Fiona bolted upright, heart thumping so loudly she could
hear it. Her sister sat perched on the edge of her bed. Or
rather, a filmy, see-through version of her sister.

"I'm dreaming," Fiona said and rubbed her hands over
her face. When she removed them, though, Anne was still
there.

"No. It's really me." Anne smiled reassuringly.

Fiona's jaw went slack. She ran one hand through her hair
and gave herself a minute to focus. Anne was here. In the
flesh-well, in the spirit, actually.

"You're really real?"

"As can be. It's Samhain, silly. Did you think I'd miss the
opportunity to say hello?"

Fiona felt like clapping herself over the head. Samhain.
Veil between the worlds at its thinnest. Why hadn't she realized her sister might try to contact her? "I'm so glad to see
you. What's it like on the other side?"

Anne tilted her head to one side. "It's good. I'm good. I'll
probably reincarnate soon."

Fiona's eyebrows rose in surprise. "You always said you wouldn't come back to this place again. You said you'd
done all the learning you intended to do on this pit of a
planet." Fiona paraphrased her sister's earlier words.

Anne laughed. "Yeah, I did say that, didn't I?"

"Numerous times," Fiona said.

"Well, things look different once you're on the other
side. I've still some stuff to learn, things I want to do differently."

"Things that are worth another term on the worst planet
in the universe?" Fiona teased, vaguely realizing she and
Anne had settled into their usual sisterly repartee.

For a moment, she forgot Anne was dead and that this
was a mere spectral version of her sitting on her bed in the
middle of the night.

"Yup. Even worth another stint on Earth," Anne agreed.
Her laughter faded, and her expression turned serious. "Listen, sis, we need to talk."

"Is it the mission? Do you have a message?"

Anne shook her head. "I'm not the Liaison. As far as I
know, everything is going okay with that. I'm here to talk
to you about Reese."

Fiona's cheeks heated. Did her sister know she had feelings for Reese? Had she known when she was alive? Guilt
pierced her insides.

She forced herself to meet Anne's gaze. "What about
him? Do you want me to give him a message for you?"

"No. I want you to give him a message for you." Anne's
lips curved into a half smile.

"What? I'm confused."

"Tell him you're in love with him."

Fiona's face turned so hot she feared it might melt off.
Shit. She hadn't stopped to think that once Anne was in
spirit form, she might be able to pick up on Fiona's feelings for Reese. What else did her sister know? An image of herself thinking of Reese, moaning his name while her hand
slid between her legs late at night flashed through her
brain. Did her sister know about that too?

"I don't know what you're talking about," Fiona insisted.

Anne rolled her eyes. "Fi, don't deny it. Quite frankly, I
knew you were in love with him long before I died. I just
wasn't sure I was ready to let him go. Even if it was what he
wanted. And I guess I was a bit envious of you."

Fiona frowned. "Envious of me? Why?" And what did
Anne mean about letting Reese go?

"Because you still had a chance with him. I don't know if
he has feelings for you or not, but I know he sure didn't for
me." Anne sighed and shrugged.

"Wait a minute." Realization dawned. "Did you and
Reese break up?"

Anne nodded. "Yeah. About a month before I died."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Fiona bit back a surge of anger.
She hated the idea of Anne keeping a secret like that from
her. They'd never kept secrets from each other. Except she'd
neglected to tell Anne she loved her boyfriend. So maybe
that was two secrets.

"I hoped he'd change his mind. As if Reese ever changes
his mind once it's made up," Anne said with a rueful smile.

Fiona sighed. Reese could be stubborn, alright.

"Why did he break up with you?" Fiona asked.

"He said he just didn't feel the same way for me as he
had. We'd been dating so long, you know, we'd become
more friends than lovers. I guess if I was honest with myself
then, I'd have realized we'd been drifting apart for a while.
I just got used to him being my boyfriend. I wanted to hold
on to that."

"You never did like change much," Fiona said.

"Well, I'm learning to deal."

They both laughed. Fiona thought it hard to imagine a
bigger change than death.

Anne looked serious again. "So tell Reese how you feel.
And stop torturing the mother of the Earth Balancer. She
is not to blame for my death. And she doesn't have any
feelings for Reese or he for her. He's a consummate flirt, as
you know."

"Why do you want me to tell him how I feel? I don't
want to end up embarrassed." Fiona thought of something
else. "And are you sure you're okay with all of this?"

Anne chuckled. "Come on. I'm dead. I'm over my jealousy. Besides, I want to see you happy."

"How do you know about Laurell- Wait a minute,
you've been spying!" Fiona's eyes widened.

Anne shook her head vehemently. "I haven't been spying, Fi. I've only checked in on you guys a couple times and
I saw you giving Laurell grief. That's all. It's not like you
think, you know? We can't just hang out for hours watching your every move. We can only hone in on snippets of
your life here and there. It takes immense amounts of energy to hover around the Earth plane."

Anne's form shimmered and grew more transparent.

"You're leaving, aren't you?" Fiona said sadly.

"Yes, my energy is waning fast." Anne smiled a smile so
full of love and light, goose bumps broke out over Fiona's
flesh, and it became difficult to breathe.

"Anne, there's so much I want to say to you," Fiona said,
her words choked on unshed tears.

Anne's hand touched Fiona's cheek again, the barest
brush, the puff of air from a sigh. "I know, sweetie. I love
you too."

Then she disappeared, fading until all that remained was a bedroom barely lit by a moon-shaped night-light, and
Fiona's heart, which swelled with love for her brave, dead
sister. A sister who had just reached out from beyond the
grave to give Fiona permission to love her man.

Damn, he was pretty. Laurell slipped back into the only
clothes she had with her in Shakti's Den. She pulled the
peasant dress over her shoulders with a slight rustle. The
dress was a wrinkled mess from spending the night on the
floor. Axiom stirred in his sleep, and she stood stock-still for
a minute. She didn't want to wake him. He lay on his side,
one arm flung over his head. The crimson silk sheet pooled
around his narrow hips.

She slipped her shoes on and crept to the door. She
didn't know why exactly, but the idea of his waking up, of
having to exchange the awkward "night after" banalities,
made her stomach say hello to her throat. She needed some
time. Time to shower. To think. To make sense of last night.
She pressed one hand to her belly and thought of the life
already growing inside.

A thrill sparked through her. She was pregnant. A baby.
There would be a baby. A child of her own. Mixed emotions
battled for dominance: elation, fear, sadness. She didn't
know how to feel, but she was suddenly unsteady, and the
room tilted slightly. She needed to lie down, to think. Laurell exited the cabin and hurried through the ice-strewn
grass and biting morning air to her own cabin, careful not to
look back.

"The Earth Balancer has been conceived," Axiom announced that night as the group reclined in folding chairs
around a small campfire beneath an ink-black, diamondstudded sky.

He did not miss the way Laurell's head pivoted toward
him or how her forehead knitted. Perhaps they should have
talked and reached a mutual agreement as to how and when
to inform the group, but when he had woken that morning,
she was gone. And when he had attempted to speak with
her that afternoon, she had not answered his knock, though
he had been able to sense her presence on the other side of
the cold, wooden door. He had the distinct feeling Laurell
was avoiding him. A feeling he strongly disliked.