Walking in Fire: Hawaiian Heroes, Book 1 (23 page)

He acknowledged her praise with a respectful nod, but then he froze, unable to speak. Memories burst in his mind like the lava exploding in the fissure. His heart swelled in his chest, not from the agony of the bullets that had passed through him but that of his heart breaking.

His ku’u ipo was dead. Even while losing consciousness after being mortally wounded, he’d heard her screams, felt her tugging on his arm at the edge of the abyss. Felt her pain and terror as he dragged her down.

She’d fallen into the fire with him. Because of him.

Because he had failed to protect her, she was gone. She wasn’t Ho’omalu like him. She couldn’t heal and rise again.

“I will reward you,” Pele said. “What will you ask of me, David Ho’omalu?”

“Nothing,” he said dully. “There is nothing I want.” How could even Pele bring back his love from the dead? Surely that was only for the Creator to do.

“Nothing?” Her long skirts swished as she stepped aside. For a moment, he didn’t even notice, lost in icy misery. Then something in her waiting stillness nudged him, and he looked up incuriously. His breath froze in his throat, his eyes widened, and his heart gave a great thump of incredulous joy.

Melia lay there in a heap on the floor of the chamber. She was nude, her long silky hair her only covering. From her tanned arms and legs to the white swell of her round bottom and breasts, she was perfect, only freckles dotting her soft skin.

With a choked cry, he scrambled forward on his knees, reaching out one hand to her. Was she real or a vision? She’d fallen after him—should have been burnt to a crisp. But her skin was warm, her heart beat under his palm, the sweetest syncopation he’d ever felt.

He looked up at Pele in agonized entreaty.

“She is real,” Pele assured him. “Because her heart is true, because she is your ku’u ipo, I healed her. Now, tell me, Ho’omalu, what would you give to have her as your reward?”

He tore his gaze away from Melia and looked up at her. His jaw hardened with absolute determination.

“Spare her life, O Pele, and I will give anything you ask of me,” he swore. “Anything. Only let her live.”

She reached out and caressed the side of his face, her fingers hot as fire. “Ah,” she sighed. “Will you stay with me and be my companion here, for the rest of my days?”

He looked into the dark fires in her eyes and shuddered, but his gaze did not waver. “Yes. And gladly, Mother Pele.”

With a hiss of anger, she drew back from him. He knelt there silently, his heart in his throat, as she strode back and forth across the chamber. His eyes went back to his Melia, so still, so pale.

“You call me mother?” She seemed to swell, her grandeur filling the room. “I am ageless. I am more woman than any mortal should ever hope to have.”

He bowed his head. “Yes.”

Finally, she sighed and subsided. She even chuckled, the rich sound vibrating off the walls of the cave.

“I suppose you do see me as a mother,” she said. “Both of you. Generations of your ancestors have come and gone, while I remain the same. Well, you are loyal to me, as they have been. And the two of you are well matched, for she uses clever words as you do.”

Turning with a great swish of her fiery cloak, she gestured regally to the woman lying on the floor.

“I will give you what you desire, Ho’omalu. Take your woman and child, and continue to watch over my island.”

Malu bowed deeply, touching his forehead to the floor. “Mahalo,” he said. “Mahalo, my patroness.” His gamble had worked.

He gathered Melia’s sweet, warm weight carefully into his arms. Then he straightened and turned back to Pele, his eyes wide.

“A child?”

She nodded, still amused. “Oh, yes. You Ho’omalu are a virile clan. I have seen to that. I need you to continue, do I not?”

“Mahalo,” he whispered. He looked down into his ku’u ipo’s face. A keiki. She carried his child in her womb already. He could hardly wait to see her round with it, to have their children toddling around his feet, laughing as he swept them up into his arms.

“Go,” said Pele with a wave of her hand. “You mortals, so excited about such swiftly passing things.”

Malu heard a rumble, and he turned to follow her pointing finger to the long, black passageway that had opened in the earth. The tunnel was black as cooled a’a, but that didn’t bother him. He carried his future, his family in his arms. He drew on her power, setting loose his own glow.

With one last respectful bow to his patroness, he turned and strode up the passageway, through the heart of her mountain. Lighting his way with Pele’s fire.

Melia woke slowly, sliding up through layers of dreams. Flashes of violence interspersed with cries of terror, aching loss, then fiery agony…and then the soft black velvet of rest. Visions of a woman with flaming hair, offering her a terrible choice. Then being carried, cradled in powerful, loving arms.

Those that held her now. Ah, she was awake. It had been only a terrible nightmare.

She opened her eyes and looked into the dark, liquid gaze of David Ho’omalu. They lay in a huge bed, on sheets soft as fine cotton, with only a sheet over them.

Behind him, a ceiling fan turned lazily, and gauzy white curtains stirred at the open french doors. The walls of the big room were sand hued, with richly colored paintings hung at intervals. A dolphin, carved from wood, leapt joyously in one corner.

Through the window, lush green trees and foliage waved slowly in a breeze, the sea visible far beyond them. She’d never seen the place before.

Her heart thumped. “Where are we?”

“My home,” he answered. He stroked her hair back with his fingertips and smiled at her, his eyes crinkling, deep creases in his cheeks. Oh, that smile.

But she frowned at him, and her breath caught in her throat. The nightmarish images flashed again, like terrible snapshots, now in sequence.

“You—
you died
,” she whispered, the horror of the moment flooding back. “I saw the bullets…rip through you. Blood—everywhere. I tried to grab you…and then we fell. Burning—it burned so badly. How…? Oh, Malu, was it—real…?” She was shaking now, her breath caught in her throat.

“Sh-shhh.” He gathered her close, against his broad chest, where his heart beat steadily under her cheek. She slipped her arms around him, and wriggled as close as she could get, wrapping one leg over his hip, pressing her body against his as if he might be ripped away from her.

He groaned, his arms tightening around her, his big hand flat on her bottom, pressing her to his groin. “It wasn’t a dream, pua. I’ll explain; I’ll explain it all—there are things you need to know, and I need to tell you what it meant to me when Pele told me that you jumped in, tried to save me. But now—ah, ku’u ipo,
I need you
.”

He arched his hips into her, and his penis raked the tender furrow of her labia. He was massively erect, rigid under silken skin. Yes. He was life and strength and
now.

Melia whimpered inarticulately, and he reached between them to open her with a swift slick of his fingers, then guided the head of his cock and thrust. He forged into her, hot and hard, and began to move his hips in swift lunges, pulling her up hard against him so she was open for his thrusts, helpless to do anything but accept what he gave her and experience it.

She was impaled on him, full of him, a vessel for his pleasure. Yet as he thrust, echoes of that power awoke in her, elemental as the forces that shaped the islands. He was hers, shaped to fill her, given strength to please her, stamina to carry her on until the pleasure built like magma inside her and broke, flooding out through her in waves of ecstasy.

She cried out her joy to him and to the quiet air. An answering rumble began low in his chest and surged upward until he threw back his head and gave a roar of male triumph. Heat flooded her.

Slowly, he relaxed, and they lay, still joined, hearts thundering together. He buried his face in her hair and inhaled deeply.

“I lost you and got you back,” he whispered. “I’ll never let you go now, Melia
a’u
.”

He tipped up her face enough to press a kiss to her forehead. “
Ko ‘u
—mine.”

She opened pleasure-drugged eyes enough to focus on his face. “Yours. I love you.”

“And I am yours.
Ma k’u poli
mai ‘oe e ku’u ipo aloha.
Here in my arms, you are cherished.”

She smiled mistily. “It sounds so much more beautiful when you say it in Hawaiian.”

“Yeah, so you gotta learn to talk mushy to me too, yeah?”

“Yeah.” They lay for a moment, looking into each other’s eyes.

A shadow intruded on her warm glow of happiness. “Malu, what happened to everyone? Your friend Keone—is he…dead?”

His face tightened grimly. “No, he’s alive. If I know Leilani, she’s by his bed at the hospital, waiting to cuss him out as soon as he wakes up. Then I’m gonna beef his ass.”

“The others—Dane and his horrible boss, and those other men. They’re dead, aren’t they?”

He nodded, his face implacable. “As far as anyone knows, there was a climbing accident. There are places where the lava flows cover up hollow tubes in the flow, some bottomless crevices. Dane, Helman and their party all fell through. Happens to arrogant tourists once in a while.”

“Will Keone be arrested, or anything?”

“No. Why would they arrest him? He saw the accident, and tried to fire his gun to signal for help. Shot himself instead.”

“Oh. You can just…whitewash it like that?”

He shrugged, a slight movement of his big shoulders. “He’s not gonna talk. He’d be facing drug charges if he did. He mek ass, but he’s not stupid. He won’t be trying any more stupid stunts.”

“No one will blame you?”

“No, pua. The story will make the papers, but there will be no evidence to suggest foul play on anyone’s part but theirs. The Helman brothers are into some very shady dealings on the mainland. Cops have been after them for years, but they have expensive lawyers. Stefan avoided prison. Both of his brothers did time for murder and drug charges. He won’t be missed by anyone else.”

She stroked his chest. “None of them will be missed,” she agreed fiercely. “They wanted to use your island to make themselves rich while people suffered. You
are
a protector of Hawaii, David Ho’omalu. I’m sorry you have to bear the burden of their deaths, but I’m not sorry they’re dead.”

He lifted her hand to kiss her palm. “Pele took them. And I’m not alone, pua. We Ho’omalu, we support each other.” He looked at her. “And now I have you beside me. I remember everything, pua. I know what you did. Pupule wahine, trying to keep me from falling into the rift. I weigh twice what you do.”

“I…didn’t exactly have time to plan, you know. But I couldn’t let you go.”

“You are the bravest wahine I know,” he said. “And the most stubborn. Took you long enough to admit I was the
kāne
for you.”

She looked into his eyes. “Malu…I think I…met Pele. Either that or I had the most amazing dream ever. I…bargained with her for you.”

His dark gaze, liquid with emotion, drank in her face. “Like I said, the bravest wahine I know.”

“I didn’t believe in love at first sight,” she mused, lifting her hand to touch his face, enjoying the smooth skin over his high cheekbones and the sandpapery feel of his wide jaw. “Until I walked onto that boat and there you were, scowling like a Hawaiian war god, only much, much more handsome. Come to think of it, it was more like lust at first sight. But I didn’t want to admit it, because you already had two wahines hanging on you.”

He grinned slowly, and her eyes widened as she felt him begin to swell inside her again. “And there you were, like a delectable sacrifice to a war god. And I had to wait to claim you, as well, so now”—he moved his hips slightly, and his fingers dipped wickedly between her ass cheeks—“I’m gonna make up for lost time. We can talk more later.”

As his big fingertip, slicked with their come, probed her ass, she opened her mouth to scold him, but then bit her lip uncertainly, instead, as naughty pleasure made her pussy contract sharply around him.

“Let me have you here, too, pua,” he whispered against her mouth.

“I don’t know.”

He smiled slowly, caressing her. “Oh, my shy little wahine. I’m gonna teach you so many things.”

“You’ve been with lots of women,” she accused him, pouting a little even as she arched her back, moving on his hard shaft.

“Yes,” he said, kissing her mouth. “But now I’m yours. Think you can handle me?” His dark gaze dared her as his finger teased her.

“Malu…” She hung on the cusp of submission. But his dark eyes held not only a dare; they held love. “Yes,” she said. “Teach me all the ways to love you, David Ho’omalu.”

And then she moaned again as he showed her that surrender was sweet triumph. He held her there and fucked her with piston-like precision until she was whimpering his name, begging him for more, and then giving it to her until pleasure took her again, shivering around him in sheer ecstasy.

He waited until she could focus on him and then drew her hand to his own flank, flattening her smaller hand on the hard swell of his ass and pushing her fingertips gently into the crevice there.