“Don’t you think I understand that? Don’t you think it was murder for me? I took away his love. I married the woman he was trying to get back to. You. You took to being a vampire like you were made for it. You and I really are one of a kind. There was no unique formula. Nothing in all my years as a Keeper or an Alchemist could have combined with human blood to make them what we are.

  “It’s in our DNA. We were born with it. He was not. He begged me to turn him. To make him like me. So, we could live an eternity together. Then he was going to turn the love of his life. It took him forever to handle his new form. He ran off. Only to return for you the day he killed you. I had no idea.”

  “So, you thought it would be ok to spend nearly a century following me around, letting him try to win me back after what he’d done? No, it was not ok. I don’t care how badly you felt. That is what I hold against you now. Against the both of you.” She got up flinging her glass at me. I ducked, and it hit the island shattering behind me. “You can show yourself the door. I’m sure you knew where it was before you ever saw it from inside the building.” I stood watching her disappear into her room.

  The door didn’t close behind her, and I figured I already walked away once before. Being the good-guy, letting the one who was there before me have a chance to win her back. Had she told me she wanted nothing more to do with me I would have boarded the elevator and walked away again, but those words never escaped her lips.

  When I entered her bedroom, she was standing in the middle of the floor with her back to me. She obviously heard me enter the room, so I shut the door behind me and strode over to her.

  “I’ve waited far too long to make you mine again. I’m not leaving here without a fight.”

  “I don’t want to fight with you, Emerick.”

  “Ravana, I don’t want to fight with you either.”

  She spun around and punched me in the shoulder but not hard, then spun back around. Her hand cupping her face to hide the tears escaping her. She was never good at showing weakness.

  “What was that for?”

  “You called me Ravana.”

  “Oh, Anna.” My hands moved to her neck, tracing the lines of her skin with my fingers before pulling at the collar of her shirt. The buttons all popped, loosening the hold of the fabric against her skin. “Anna.” I pressed my lips to her flesh. She felt warm against my mouth.

  She pushed her backside toward me. My cock hardened with anticipation. I didn’t want to be a pity fuck. I didn’t want us to end up in bed together after so long until she knew what we once were to each other. This, this was what I wanted. To make love to the woman of my dreams. The woman I spent too long in search of and too long waiting for after I lost her.

  Her shirt fell to the floor, and her hands circled behind her pulling my head down to her again. My arms snaked around her waist as she pressed into me. I spun her around, catching her off guard.

  “Do you want this? Me?” I asked her. Making sure she knew what it was I was offering.

  “I do. I know who you are now. Not the Ancient One, but my husband. The father of my child. The man I felt I truly belonged with. We were the same when I was still human.”

  “And now we truly are the same.”

  “Yes, and you changed him, only because I asked you to?”

  “Yes. I wanted only for you to be happy. Even if it meant you would never know who I was. I wasn’t going to pressure you.” I nuzzled her, pressing kisses along her collarbone. “I wasn’t going to tell you who you were, who I am.” I kissed her shoulder. “I wanted you to know because you remembered. Not because it was what I wanted. So, so badly wanted.”

  “I remember, Emery. I remember everything.”

  She wrapped my face in her hands and brought me to her. “I remember how we met. I remember our secret training. Hiding away together to hunt. I remember how flushed I got whenever you were near. All those stolen glances at you when you pulled your bow to take a shot. I never did look at the target. Was never impressed by where the arrow landed. I was impressed by the way your skin glistened in the moonlight. How your muscles flexed at the strain in the bow.

  “I remember how nervous I was when you said you were ready to make our friendship known to my family. When you came to dinner that night, I closed the door on you to ask Papa to be nice. I had to wipe my hands against my dress to dry the sweat. Then that night in the snow when you kissed me, I thought I was in heaven, but I was wrong,” she spoke, staring into my eyes. Her hands pressed against my cheeks while mine settled on her waist. She forced our green eyes to bore into one another.

  “You were wrong?”

  “Yes. I was in heaven on our wedding day.”

  I hadn’t much thought about that day. I couldn’t. Not until she was mine for good. For eternity. “I haven’t thought of that day in so long.”

  “Me either,” she said, and we laughed. “I want this. You. Now. My, Emery.”

  “You forgive me?”

  “I forgave you before, didn’t I?”

  She was referring to the realization of finding out what I was before I was able to tell her. She forgave me, knowing we were both meant for it. It was our DNA which made us better the way we were now. She would have done it. Changed to be with me forever. Then our child. The fact our child didn’t make it suddenly weighed heavily on my mind.

  “You did.”

  “So, don’t you think it’s time we had our reunion.”

  I said nothing but pressed our mouths together. Anna was melting in my arms, so I lifted her, bringing her legs up around my waist. Her hands wound into my hair as I moved us to the foot of the bed setting her down so I could glance once more into the emerald orbs that were her eyes. Then pulling her close, I drew her hair into my face so I could smell the same peppermint fragrance she’d always used.

  “Mmm,” I murmured into her hair, and she tugged my head to look at her. “What?” I asked when she gave me a funny look.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Remembering.” I pushed our mouths together once more wasting no time to separate her lips with my tongue so I could taste her.

  I held her hair close to her scalp and pulled softly so I could trail my mouth down her throat. She was human when we were together last, so we had never mated by drinking each other’s blood. I wouldn’t press the issue this time either. I quickly moved to her collarbone again, relieving her of the strap of her lace bra.

  Anna moaned beneath my touch, her legs moving in a way that told me she was eager for me to take her, but it’d been so long I wanted to savor every inch of her. I sidled my hand to the back clasps and unhooked them, then used just one finger to push the fabric from her breast. My mouth moved lower to the valley between her bosom, kisses trailed all the way to her nipple which I took between my teeth and nipped ever so lightly before sucking and pulling on it with teeth and lips. Her hips raised, and she screamed out, a hand racing into my hair pulling my head into her.

  I flung the bra over the shoulder I was lying next to and trailed my way over to her other breast, assaulting her gum-drops as I trailed my fingertips down her exposed torso. I reached her belly-button, and her hips came up again.

  “Oh, Emery. Please,” she gasped as I walked my fingers lower to the line of her pants.

  I rubbed across her waist along the edge of her pants before I hooked a finger under the elastic band that held them snuggly to her thin frame. My tongue circled her earlobe, and I nipped it with my teeth as I let my fingers break past the line of fabric keeping me away from her core. She inched her body slightly upward toward the head of the bed, in a hurry to get the touch of me on her sex.

  “Shh,” I said in her ear, as I snaked myself away from her moving down to kneel on the floor at the foot of the bed.

  Slipping her pants and panties from her, I moved her legs apart allowing me to sit between her legs which dangled off the edge. I rubbed my hands up her thighs to her torso, and back down as she arched and whimpered beneath my touch.

  I let the heat of my breath coat her lips before delving into her with my tongue. I circled her clit enough to make her body squirm more then plunged my tongue into the depths of her folds. Her juices were sweet and made me crave the taste of her blood, but I reigned myself in. Instead, I slid a finger inside of her wetness, and her body began rocking against it while my tongue moved back to her clit. My cock was hard and pulsating beneath the clothes I still wore. Releasing myself, I flung my jeans and boxers aside and added another finger to Anna’s sex. She again pushed against them as if my cock had already been inside of her. I licked the pad of my thumb on my other hand and inserted it into her ass, rubbing the ring.

  “Ah, fuck, Emery!”

  “Too much?”

  She looked up from the bed, panting. “Yeah, maybe we can work up to that.”

  “Fine with me.”

  Anna grabbed my hair and gave a somewhat gentile pull. “I need you inside me, now.”

  Never one to be inconsiderate of others, I happily obliged.

  She took one glance at my hardened cock and smiled. “Right now,” she said as I lowered myself between her thighs.

  I lined up with her, but she thrust up locking her legs around my waist. I was plunged deep inside her, and we just stayed like that for a moment. I couldn’t tell if we were just both overwhelmed with the feeling of being together again, or if she needed that little bit of time to adjust to my girth, but to me, it was the beginning of the future I was waiting so long for.

  Once she started moving her hips I started pushing into her until I could feel my balls smacking her ass.

  “Emery!” she screamed, and I was glad for it. Coming from her lips once more I was almost taken aback.

  “Anna!” Her nails dug into my back and then she flipped me over so her breasts were in my face and she was riding me.

  Chapter – Thirty

  Ravana

  I wasn’t about to let him have all of the fun. It felt like a lifetime of waiting had gone on the minute I’d gotten that evil thing out of me. I got all of my memories, recent and past. How the three of them used glamour to get me to forget things, to protect me. Except in Massimo’s case he wanted to cover up what he had done. To get me back in his bed, and claim me, but he hadn’t. He didn’t feed on me.

  “What’s the matter?” Emery broke my train of thought has my movements on him slowed.

  “If we are married, then we should be mated. Shouldn’t we?”

  He sat up on his elbows and brushed my hair from my face. “Are you sure? You only just got those memories back. I get this, our being in bed right now means little, it was bound to happen, but that…it’ll mean always.”

  “You are mine always. Do it.” I leaned into him and felt his mouth brush my shoulder and moved to my neck. The heat of his lips was there, and then the points of his teeth. “Please. Be mine for always.”

  I could feel the points of his teeth as they sank down, piercing my skin. Then he pulled back.

  “What, why won’t you…”

  A crash landing outside of the room sounded through the apartment, and I froze. “That’s why,” he said pulling back.

  “I don’t care. I’m not going back to him. You were right, Emery. It’s us. I have it all. Everything. I won’t lose that much of myself again. If I lose you, then that part of myself will no longer exist. Anna won’t exist anymore.”

  “Yes, but if you can forgive me, what’s to say you won’t forgive him?”

  “Emery don’t do that. What you’ve done is not even close to what he has.”

  “Red!” Massimo screamed from the other side of the door. “I’m not breaking any doors down, and I’m not here to stop you from being with Emerick. There is something wrong with Delia.”

  I looked at Emery who was about to jump, and I pushed him down. “Delia was fine. This is just his way of stopping this. Don’t let him do this. You keep putting his needs and his feelings first, why?”

  “Because of what I found out. He’s my baby brother. I have to protect him.”

  “Because the last time you didn’t protect him…”

  “He died, and it took me centuries to find him again.”

  “He is not your responsibility.”

  “I know.” He looked down at where our bodies were joined before the interruption. “I think we have to table this until later anyway.”

  “I figured, but not the other part. Just do it now, and he can’t come between us.”

  “Anna, I want it to be special, not necessary. If you don’t want him to come between us, he won’t. Doing this… it shouldn’t be this way.”

  “I didn’t want to do it because I thought he would, or that I’d be tempted. I don’t want you to second guess it anymore. Now, that I know all of it. That I have my answers to everything, it’s done. It’s you. It’s always been you.”

  He sat up and wrapped his arms around my body and held me to him, then kissed my lips more tenderly than ever before. “You’re my butterfly. Once a caterpillar trapped by the confines of your human life, and now…a beautiful creature full of strength and power. I’m forever grateful to be your husband, in life and in death.”

  “I love you, Emery.”

  “I love you too, Anna.” Emery looked at me with a sideways glance when I began to laugh.

  “What’s so funny.” We moved from the bed to dress.

  “I was once a bad-ass, bitchy broad, and now I’m just happy and in love. I think I lost my hard exterior.”

  “No, you definitely wouldn’t lose that.”

  Delia was having a problem. Kelly wanted to get into her apartment to see her and Delia wouldn’t let her. It was a matter of safety, I understood that, but on the same hand, I understand where Kelly was coming from. Having gotten all of my memories, I would be chomping at the bit to get close to Emerick. Since Kelly had been locked up for months, with Delia so close by, I definitely could understand her plight.

  “I don’t know what will happen,” Delia said once I was able to pry Kelly away from the door so I could get in.

  “We will be right there. Nobody is going to let you hurt her.”

  “Ravana, you don’t know that. You’ve never changed a human before.”

  “Emerick has.”

  “No, you were all born with some kind of supernatural blood. There has not been a human changed into your kind of vampire. I can at least be a test subject on the matter, but I won’t jeopardize Kelly’s life in that way. She needs to be patient.” She got up to pace the room. “I need to run tests, and we need to analyze Massimo, Torrid and me for any inconsistencies. Once I have analytical data to prove I am in fact the same, then we can introduce human interactions. Until then, the answer is no.” She plopped her ass down on the sofa. I could always count on Delia to be the voice of reason. To be the Keeper with the brain enough not to rush into things, even as a super vamp.

  “Well, I don’t know that I can say no to that.”

  “There is one other thing we failed to mention.”

  “And that would be?”

  “When Kelly and I transferred that monster, there was an explosion, and the Seal of Solomon disappeared.”

  “You put the Barathrum in the ring? Are you fucking mad?”

  “Ravana, mouth.” She stood with her fists clenched. I could also count on her to keep me in line. “I’ve heard your temper before, but never have you used vulgar words. Shit, ass…”

  “Delia! Off topic.” I stood making my way to her kitchen, pulling my cell phone from my pocket. “Hey, what’s this absurd business that a Barathrum was transferred into the Seal of Solomon?” I shook my head yes as the voice on the other line said it with me. “So, I guess you know something about it then since you are our only witch contact at the moment.”

  “Yes. I am so sorry, but it was that or let you go evil on everyone. I don’t think Gia would let you around the children with red eyes.”

  “I don’t give a flying fuck what Gia would like. That has nothing to do with this. The Seal? Seriously, you thought that was a good idea to do with a new vampire and a newly released, albeit supposed to be dead Keeper?”

  “New vampire? No, it was Delia and her girlfriend.”

  “Oh, my. It was before…shit.” I hung up the phone, not wanting to deal with the shit storm I’d just un-wakened. When it started vibrating in my hand, I hit ignore and dialed Massimo. I didn’t have Emerick’s number yet, and I didn’t feel like trying to hunt him down.

  “I need you to get in touch with Emery. I’m not asking as Red, I’m telling you as the CO of the Order. Or at the very least get me his number.”

  “He’s not with you?”

  “No, your brother had to deal with other matters.”

  “Brother?” Delia asked from across the room. She was too intrigued, which was terrible for me. A Keeper is in-tuned to learning all the time, which meant this was a witch hunt she wouldn’t let up on.

  “Not my business to tell, Delia,” I shouted to her as she looked at me stunned silent. For her that was astonishing. On the phone, I said, “Do you have his number? I need to speak to you both. Delia and Kelly lost the Seal of Solomon.”

  “Oh, shit.” Echoed between the room and phone as Massimo entered with the phone to his ear still. “I’ll call him.” He and I hit end on the phones at the same time.

  While Massimo got ahold of Emerick for me, I stared Delia down who was looking intently between Massimo and me. I shook my head no, as I could hear the questions turning inside her head. That discussion was better left for another day. I could only hope she understood that.

  “Hello, I need Ester. ASAP.”

  “Well, hello to you, Ravana. Are we having an eventful day?”

  “Yes, Marcus, we are. I need Ester at the Tower, now…yesterday. I need a witch.”

  “I had Meralda stop by, didn’t she have the answers you sought?”

 

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