Not Quite Dead (A NightHunter Novel) (7 page)

"Tristan?" He frowned, his forehead furrowing with wrinkles that made him more human than she wanted him to be. "What does Tristan have to do with your soul mate going rogue?"

She dropped her hand from his jaw. "I came back here six months before Walter went rogue. My father had finally died, and I needed to arrange the funeral. I met Tristan in the graveyard when I was looking at gravesites, and we became friends." She smiled faintly, remembering that moment. "He was so nice to me. He had this great smile, with dimples." She glanced at him. "Like yours. He was working on some project relating to ancient cemeteries, and we wound up talking for hours in the graveyard. I didn't want to go back to the house I grew up in, or socialize with the people from my past, and he wanted company. We hit it off, hiding in the graveyard away from real life."

A muscle ticked in Eric's cheek. "He's a good guy."

"He is." She took a sip of her drink, letting the cool liquid slide down her throat. It was her favorite beverage, but it tasted almost bitter in the face of so many ugly memories. "I told Tristan about my upcoming anniversary, and he told me that there was no way I'd be able to fend off the final stage of the bond forever. He told me I couldn't go back, but I loved my husband, and I refused to listen to him." She laughed softly. "Do you ever wish you could redo one decision in your life? That if you could do one thing differently, it would change everything?"

Eric shook his head. "Thoughts like that will destroy you. You can't change the past."

She rolled her eyes at him. "I'm not an idiot. Of course I know that. I suppose you're above such mundane and human things as regret and guilt?"

His dark brown eyes studied hers. "No. I'm not."

The gritty intensity of his words caught her attention, and she looked sharply at him. Something dark roiled in his eyes, a grief so heavy she sucked in her breath. "What happened?"

He shook his head, denying her request. "Tell me the rest."

"The rest?" She shrugged. "There's not much more. I thought I loved Walter enough to save him from his destiny. I thought that my love was this great saving grace. It's like the ultimate reforming of the bad boy, you know? Save the rogue warrior from a living hell, just by loving him." It hadn't worked with her derelict father, and it hadn't worked with Walter. "I'm the worst stereotype ever. Isn't it pathetic?"

Eric's gaze bore into her. "Pathetic isn't the word I'd select, no."

"Naive? Is that better?" She shook her head. "Maybe just stupid. Whatever it was, I was determined to go back. Tristan said I would die if I did. He said others would die. I didn't care. I thought I could be strong enough for us both. So, he gave me a gun loaded with powdered demon bile. He said that was the only thing that would kill a rogue Calydon. He told me to use it on Walter as soon as I got home, before he went rogue."

Understanding flickered in Eric's eyes. "You waited, didn't you? That's why you blame yourself?"

She met his gaze. "I didn't use it, and Walter went rogue. By the time I ran into the basement and got the gun, people I loved were dead, because I was too selfish, stupid, and arrogant to stay away, or to kill him before he could turn."

Silence hung in the air, and then Eric nodded slowly. "And then you succumbed to the final stage of the
sheva
destiny, and you killed yourself because you were so distraught over his death. That's when Tristan resurrected you?"

"Yes." Oh, yes. God, she never wanted to feel that much anguish again. She'd felt like her soul had been wrenched from her body and sucked into a bottomless hell of torment and agony. Never had she understood what true despair was until she'd killed her soul mate and watched her daughter die. "It was horrible," she said. "It was as if a demon had gripped my mind and my heart and drained them of everything but darkness. It consumed me. Darkness. Agony. Grief. The most debilitating loneliness ever. I felt like I was standing in a vast wasteland of destruction, with this arid wind howling through me, ripping pieces of my soul apart as it blew." As she spoke, that familiar haunting came back, tightening in her chest until she had trouble breathing. She coughed, unnerved by how dark the bar suddenly seemed. That same haunting darkness was falling over her, that agonizing loss. Oh,
shit.

Eric frowned. "What's wrong?"

She closed her eyes, and tried to take deep breaths. "Sometimes the desolation tries to come back. The last three times Tristan resurrected me, I thought I had it managed, then it would return with a howling vengeance. Like now." Sharp pains began to echo in her chest, and she set her hand over her heart. "I shouldn't have talked about it. It's making it come back." Her eyes filled with tears, and she shoved her chair back from the table. "I can't do this. I can't let this take me again. I can't—"

"Jordyn." Eric caught her hand, as she tried to back away. "Stay with me."

"No. I can't." She stumbled to her feet, gasping for air as the grief started to pour down upon her. Walter's face flooded her mind, and she saw him reaching for her as he fell, dying from her blow, his face twisted in the agony of her betrayal when he realized that she'd killed him. "Oh, God—"

"Jordyn." Eric grabbed her around the waist and pulled her against him. "Look at me."

She fought against his grip as the darkness began to close in around her. She heard the distant howl of the wasteland of her soul, and a cold chill settled in her bones. It was coming back again, attacking her, that insurmountable darkness from which the only escape was death...and Tristan wasn't around to save her this time.

"Jordyn!" Eric framed her face with his hands, forcing her to look toward him. His dark gaze pinned her with its intensity, and she went still, shocked by how steady they were in the blackness that was trying to consume her. His eyes were like an anchor, plunging through the abyss to grab her.

"Eric!" Instinctively, she gripped his wrists, trying to focus on the feel of his skin beneath her fingers. He was so alive, so strong, so warm, and so
present.
She tried to cling to his strength, and the sheer magnitude of his life force, but it wasn't enough. The darkness continued to build, an anguish so deep it wanted to tear her apart—

He sighed. "You're faking it just so I'll kiss you again, aren't you?"

Her legs started to tremble. "What?" His words were a distant blur in her mind, drowned out by the emptiness howling through her. "Kiss me?" The idea was preposterous. She was about to fall into the pit again, and he was talking about kissing her?

"All you have to do is ask. I've been wanting to get you naked since the first moment you pulled that damned bazooka on me. I'm a good guy, so I'm willing to sacrifice my self-respect and honor and kiss you."

His tone was so flippant, that same edge that he'd used in the jungle, that same subtle humor that was so good at prying her out from under the grip of stress, and suddenly, she realized he was her chance for survival, for hope, for redemption.

He'd kissed her before, but she hadn't wanted it. She'd wanted space, not seduction, intimacy, or connection with another man. And yet, when he'd kissed her, each time it had been this great salvation, ripping her from her isolation and plunging her into a world where she felt vibrant and alive. Eric and his kisses could reach her in a way that nothing else could. Could he save her from this? She gripped his arms. "Eric?"

His smile faded into a look of such unabashed thirst for her that her stomach clenched. "Just say the word, Jordyn, and I'm all yours."

I'm all yours.
The promise disintegrated the last remnants of resistance, and she looked up at him. "Kiss me," she whispered. "God, yes, kiss me. Kiss me like you want to own every last piece of my body and soul."

"Now that sounds like a kiss." He grinned, a wicked smile of such promise and temptation that she wanted to run...right into his arms. "As you wish." Then he slid one hand behind her head, lowered his head, and let his mouth descend onto hers in the first kiss she'd ever wanted from him, or from any man, in far too long.

Eric knew that he wanted Jordyn.

He was well aware that his attraction for her ran at a fever pitch higher than anything he'd ever experienced.

He knew damn well exactly what those few kisses they'd shared had done to him.

But
nothing
had prepared him for how different it would be when she kissed him back without reservation.

The moment his lips descended upon hers, she melted against him so completely it was as if their bodies had suddenly become one. Her hands slid around his neck, holding him close as her mouth opened to his. The kiss became a heated dance of tongues, ravenousness, and passion that wound through his body like a chain of fire trapping him in its searing heat. The lust that he'd held in check since they'd met exploded out of his grasp with no mercy.

He wrapped his arms around her and hauled her up against him, but she was already there, her body as tight against his as it was possible to get. The kiss was desperate, flooded with emotion that spun through his mind. For a split second, he wanted to pull away. He wasn't ready for a kiss that was so wrought with emotional need. He wanted light and irreverent—

"
Eric.
" She whispered the word, and the sound of his name on her lips undid all his resistance.

With a low rumble, he angled his head and deepened the kiss. What had been hot and desperate a moment ago, took on an entirely new level of intensity. He couldn't touch enough of her, his hands roaming her lower back, her hips, and the curve of her butt. Her arms were wrapped so tightly around his neck it was as if she would never let him go. The heat burning between them was electric, pouring off them in batches of steam that made the humid, sweaty night even more intoxicating.

Her shirt was damp with perspiration, her skin so hot that it felt like she was a living, breathing inferno wrapped around him. He slid his hand down her thigh and pulled her leg up against his hip. Her skirt slid up her thigh, giving him access to a broad expanse of flesh so tempting that he wanted to throw her down on the table and—

The table?
Holy crap, he'd forgotten that they were in public.

Swearing, he broke the kiss and lowered her leg, tugging her skirt back down over her thigh. He kept his other arm locked around her lower back, and she didn't let go of him either. She looked up at him, beads of perspiration shining on her upper lip, her cheeks flushed.

Unable to summon the willpower to resist, he slid his thumb over her lip, wiping away the droplets in a sensual move that seemed to crackle with intensity.

She swallowed, and then cleared her throat. "Wow."

Wow. It was one word, but it made him grin. His loquacious woman had been kissed into wordlessness. Yeah, he was good. Or at least, he was good with her. He wasn't going to lie to himself. She brought out a side of him that no other woman ever had. "I have a lot more where that came from."

She took a deep breath. "Why doesn't that surprise me?" She slowly untangled her fingers from around his neck, sliding her hands over his shoulders and down his arms, as if she couldn't quite make herself break contact. "Well, that worked."

"It worked?" He frowned, and then recalled that he'd kissed her to ground her when the memories had become too overwhelming. Funny how the kiss had gone from therapy to pure sex in a fraction of a second. Not a surprise, given the intensity of what was developing between them. "See? If you'd had me around to kiss you, you wouldn't have needed Tristan." As he said the words, a flicker of envy rippled through him. Yeah, the fact that she'd still been with Walter when she'd met Tristan made it apparent that there'd been no naked, sweaty nights between Jordyn and his brother, which was good. No, more than good. It was
great
news. But it was also apparent that she and Tristan had a bond, and his brother had been there for her when she'd needed someone.

He wanted to be that guy for her.

Shit. What? He wanted to be a go-to guy? No. He didn't. He wanted to be her hot sex guy. That was it. Nothing else. He didn't do the go-to-guy thing anymore.

She laughed softly and finally stepped back, and he reluctantly released her. "As magnificent as your kisses are, I don't think they would have been sufficient back then. The grief was pretty debilitating." She sat back down in her seat, and he eased down across from her.

He didn't want to be sitting across from her. He wanted to haul her into his arms and kiss her until neither of them could think. He wanted to slide his hands over her skin, and kiss his way across her body. He wanted to hear her breath catch as he touched her. He wanted to feel her hands in his hair. He wanted to taste the salty sweat on her body. He needed to hear her whisper his name as he sank between her thighs and—

"It got better after the eighth time," she said, interrupting his thoughts. "I was able to manage it better."

"Yeah?" He could barely remember what they were talking about, and he was a little cranky that she seemed to have recovered so completely from the kiss, while he was still fixated on how insanely good her mouth had tasted.

"I thought I was over it, but apparently, it can still come back." She grimaced, and her gaze went to his mouth. "But apparently, it can be averted by a kiss from the right guy."

Yeah, he was the right guy. He liked the sound of that. "I'm here for you whenever you need it."

She laughed softly, clearly aware of his thinly veiled offer. "You never give up, do you?"

He took a deep breath and finally leaned back in his chair. "It's just you. No other woman affects me like that. It's a little distracting."

She met his gaze. "I know what you mean."

For a long moment, silence hung between them, a silence beating with the pulse of desire and need.