Tor guided her to the secret entrance to his office, escorted her up the stairs, and into the grand bathroom off his bedroom. He cupped her chin, tilted her face upward and placed a tender kiss to her lips. The look in his eyes revealed his pain, making her ache to soothe him.
“Don’t attempt to use the secret passage again. It will be sealed the moment I leave. It is for your safety I do this.” The strict tone of his voice irked her, but she chose to take it as a challenge instead of letting her anger flare.
Before she issued a rebuttal, he stepped into the golden archway behind the bear and it sealed, hiding him from view. Deveney stood on the marble lever to test if what he said was true. Nothing happened. Jumping up and down several times gained her no access to the secret passage.
“Agh!” Frustrated, she turned and marched out of the bathroom.
Pacing back and forth in the bedroom, she ran the scenario of their morning together through her head. They’d just experienced the most magnificent orgasm of all time and still he locked her away like a prisoner. Did he still deny her as his mate? He hadn’t actually called her his mate nor had he spoken the words
I love you
. Those she heard spoken inside his head.
“Is he blind?” Deveney muttered and paced. Questions flew through her head at a rapid rate. Didn’t he see the bright-blue glow? Didn’t he feel the same electric heat hit him that she felt each time they had sex? And what did he mean by it was for her safety? From what? Few even knew she was here.
Ridiculous.
Maven called him stubborn. If he figured it out, would he send her back even if she didn’t want to go? Sex didn’t work on him. It hadn’t worn him down or made him see the truth. Or had it? Whether he admitted it or not, his eyes spoke the truth. She knew in her heart she’d read his pain. He resisted the pull of the mating magic.
Stubborn fool
flashed inside her head again. What he didn’t know… She
knew
he loved her. She’d heard his unguarded thoughts. He loved her. And that made her want to fight harder to crack his stubborn shell.
A slow smile spread across her lips. She walked to the window and stood on the settee. A large, golden bear running across the manicured garden, out the back gate and into the woods made her heart soar. Tor was handsome as man and even more majestic as a bear.
Would their child have the ability to shift? Deveney sighed as she watched him disappear into the trees. God, she hoped their baby could do that. It had to be invigorating to understand nature from both human and animal aspects. The outside world looked glorious from where she stood and she hungered to experience it. There was so much she didn’t know and being locked in this room didn’t help.
Sex didn’t work on him. Time to switch strategies, she decided, sinking onto the settee. No sex. Deveney crossed her arms over her chest and leaned into the plush, golden cushions. She’d seen him struggle to resist the magic of the mating ritual. She chewed her lower lip and prayed for the strength to follow this new path.
Withhold sex from Tor and see how long he’d last. He seemed to think he could fight the bonding between them by resisting the sexual pull. What if she turned the tables and made him think she wouldn’t give him sex even if he wanted it? Would that cut into his inflated male ego enough to make him prove she couldn’t resist him? Would this work?
A shiver shot down her spine as she stood. Doubt threatened to shake her resolve.
Stick to the no sex plan
, she reiterated. How, when just thinking of him turned her on? She shook her head. Absently, she caressed her lower abdomen. Tor belonged to her. She had to make him see the truth.
They were lifemates. She wanted to remain on the Isle of Avalonia and build a home with Tor and their baby.
“Now,” she said firmly. “Let’s get that door open without causing it to disappear or explode.”
Rubbing her palms together, she tried to ease the edge off the nervousness flowing through her veins. She could do this, she told herself. Standing in front of the oversized golden door, she looked it over from top to bottom and side to side. Then it dawned on her, the door wasn’t the problem. The lock kept her in, not the door.
Deveney smiled and concentrated on the smaller of the two obstacles. If the lock released with her magic, the door would open. She placed her hands, palms flat on either side of the knob. Both eyes closed, she focused on the mechanisms inside the handle that controlled the lock.
One word revolved in her head.
Open. Open. Open.
Click.
The sound reverberated in her ears and joy made her tremble as her eyes opened wide. The sight of a bright-blue glow dissipating from her hands for once didn’t scare her. Instead, she accepted it as a product of her magical strength. Had it worked?
As she reached for the knob, her fingers shook. When it turned and she opened the door without a sound, she smiled. Tor may have taken the secret passage away, but he couldn’t take her magic.
Freedom. She stuck her head through the slender gap and searched the hallway for guards or people. There were none. Empty. Stepping into the hall, she closed the door behind her, used her magic and relocked it.
Freedom belonged to her.
* * * * *
The moment the hidden passageway closed, Tor’s heart sank. He palmed the locking device that deactivated the floor lever in the bathroom. She was so beautiful, standing there watching the bear statue slide into place. Her lip poked in a pout and those gorgeous blue eyes held a hint of disbelief. It had to be this way, he reminded himself. He had to keep her safe.
If the other clansmen learned of her existence, they would demand to know how she got here and he wasn’t ready to answer the question. He wanted to determine that Maven’s plan held possibilities. Was Deveney the single exception in the world of Earth women? Were there others like her with magical properties who could quite possibly match mates here? So many questions without answers. He needed to speak with Maven but she still refused his summons. Stubborn magi.
The way Deveney handled his bear during sex in his office gave him a new vein of hope this might work. He could no longer deny she was his mate. His heart seemed to expand at the thought, bringing him a sliver of inner peace. Now all he had to do was convince her to stay.
The muscles of his arm tightened and grew heavy as if it resisted his brain’s command. It took a great deal of concentration to force his fingers to punch in a new code on the hidden keypad on the wall. Until he changed that combination, no one would be able to enter the passageway from his bathroom.
It had to be done
, played inside his head, but it didn’t make the task any less difficult. He loved her. Tor’s shoulders sagged. He hated locking her in, but he had to keep her hidden if only for a little while longer. His legs wobbled, causing him to lean against the marble wall for support. The faint thump he heard coming from the bathroom brought a momentary slim smile to his lips. With his hypersensitive animalistic hearing, he knew Deveney jumped on the lever trying to make it work.
He liked the determination trait and she had plenty. But he sensed she jumped in anger, knowing he’d taken away her freedom,
again
. He shook his head, pushed from the wall and forced his legs to work, carrying him down the stairs to his office. It would have been to his advantage and made this task of hiding her easier
if
she weren’t beautiful, smart, determined and sexy. But she was all of that and more.
As he reached the door to his office, he looked across his shoulder at the impressive set of stairs. From where he stood, its direction was undeterminable. It took guts for her to travel down an unknown passage to find him. She didn’t know where it led and still she found his office. Guts were another character trait he liked. Tor shook his head and tried to stop the onslaught of her attributes from invading his brain.
When he opened his office door, her essence washed over him. Deveney’s scent lingered in the air. The image of her on his desk as they mated burned bright inside his head. Heat sizzled through his veins, setting his soul on fire with need. He wanted her again. The intense sexual game she played earlier on his desk tested his resistance, which he failed at miserably. Licking his lips, he tasted her there, causing his mouth to water.
A raw, animalistic urge to mate attempted to commandeer the last of his functioning brainwaves. Looking at his desk, he knew he couldn’t be in this room and not think of her. He needed to clear his head.
Tor shut the door, turned and exited through another passage, which led out into the gardens. By the time he reached the outside door, his skin sizzled as he threw off his robe. Naked, he stood, face tilted to the sun. His insides twisted in turmoil. His need for Deveney fueled the beast to burst through the surface of his flesh.
Anger didn’t push him to change this time. It happened of its own free will. He made the choice to run as his inner beast. He hoped the shift eased the torment of loving an Earth woman. And if he were lucky, maybe a jaunt through the woods would relieve the sexual craving for Deveney. Obviously fucking didn’t soothe his hunger. Instead, it created an addiction for more.
This morning’s adventure on his desk wasn’t enough. He hungered for sex morning, noon and night with Deveney. She equaled the epitome of perfection to him. One fact still scared him. The bear was stronger than the woman. But was he stronger than the bear? Self-doubt quaked him to the core. Until it hit him. Deveney made him whole. With her, he had the bear caged and he held the key to release it at will, not the other way around. The bear no longer controlled him.
Tor sprang from the open door, changed in mid-air and landed on four huge paws in the shape of his inner animal. The great golden bear obeyed his command and ran for the woods. A cool breeze drifted from the river and teased his senses, luring him to the water.
It felt good to run as the bear. It had been many months since he’d changed at will. Fear of turning
Proprius Bestia
made him avoid the shift. That wasn’t good, he decided. He missed this coexistence of man and bear. Avoiding the shift hadn’t aided in finding a cure. He growled as the realization came to light. It gifted him with pent-up magic, which led to anger, frustration and the occasional forced uncontrolled change.
Tor slid to a halt as he entered the tree line. Was it the excess of unused magic within his chakra that caused his lack of control over the bear? If he had changed at will more often, would man rule the beast instead of the other way around? Each individual’s magic guided the Morphionian’s ability to shift. Was he on to something with this train of thought?
The golden bear sauntered toward the river as thoughts flipped through his brain. Did those who fought the change for months prior to turning
Proprius Bestia
become crazed sooner? Thinking back to the years before he reached ninety-nine, he shifted whenever he wanted. He lived a more peaceful existence and enjoyed the attributes being one of the largest of the bears brought him. No other animal dared to attack him and obtaining food was not a problem.
He fished in the rapid rush of the Diabhal River with ease. Never had he gone without at least one meal from the water whenever he visited as bear. As man, that was a different story. A thin smile tugged at his animal lips at the memory of times when he and his brother failed at fishing off the bank. Those afternoons always ended with two bears in the water claiming the elusive fish with ease.
Tor ambled along at a slow pace, letting this new idea bloom inside his head. Most unmated men stopped changing at will the closer they got to the dreaded one-hundred-year mark. Fear kept them from transforming. He was guilty of denying the shifting magic. Thinking back, he realized it caused his attitude to worsen, his anger to rise and his control over the beast lessened.
Should this theory be shared with Visuvius? Yes. It warranted looking into, especially if it eased the anxiety of becoming
Proprius Bestia
. Maybe fewer men wouldn’t have changed immediately after their one-hundredth birthday if they hadn’t fought the natural urge to shift for long periods of time leading up to that particular day. When he returned, he planned to send
tabellaes
to the different clans requesting data on whether the men hovering near one hundred fought their inner beast or maintained the natural magic and changed at will. Once he compiled this data, he hoped it proved the theory seeded in his head.
Would changing at will even close to the
Proprius Bestia
birthday help postpone the actual descent into the madness of terminal animal existence?
He knew of several men who lasted for almost six months past the dreaded date before they turned. Tor snorted a heated breath through his snout. He wished he’d thought of this sooner and had the opportunity to speak with them about this idea. Now he’d have to rely on other members of their clans to remember if they continued to maintain the natural shift or if they fought it to the end.
Lifting his snout, he took a deep inhale and caught the scent of the river. The sound of its current beckoned him closer. He hoped a dip in the cool waters soothed his desire for a beautiful woman.
But he knew there was no water cold enough to douse the flames that kindled in him for Deveney. How a woman from some place called Earth managed to capture his heart astounded him. Her beauty outmatched the vast colors of the wildflowers along the riverbank. He growled as he stood among the fragrant plants and stared across the wild current of the river.