Darkness Surrendered (Primal Heat Trilogy #3) (Order of the Blade) (14 page)

Much as he wanted to lie and keep those looks coming, he knew he couldn’t mislead her. Elijah traced his finger down a lock of Ana’s hair. “Sweetheart, I’m as far from a gift as you’re ever going to get, and you sure as hell don’t want to be bonded with me.” He moved her arm so they both could see it, a visual reminder to him as well as to her.

He traced the lines on her arms, trying not to notice how soft her skin was. She was all the things he had never thought about: softness, kindness, tenderness, safety…He hadn’t thought of them, hadn’t bothered with them, but she was making him think of things like that, things that he would never be able to allow into his life. “No more of these marks,” he said. “We can’t afford it.” But even as he said it, his instincts pulsed deep inside him to bond them tighter. To make her his in every way possible—

He swore and dropped her hand. Demons suddenly swam across his vision, their claws out, and he felt the slide of their teeth across his skin—

Ana sank down on his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Elijah. Come back to me.”

His mind cleared, and he opened his eyes. There she was, his angel of mercy, bringing him back from the edge again. He grabbed her hair, fisting it, as if he could hold her tighter and draw her into his soul where she could keep the monsters at bay forever. A lie, of course. Nothing was going to keep them at bay. Not anymore.

Ana’s silver eyes were wide with concern. “It shouldn’t be this bad,” she said.

Elijah brought her hair to his face and breathed deeply. An image of a pale pink rose flashed in his mind, and he knew that’s the scent she carried. Not just flowers. Roses. “What shouldn’t?”

“The impact of the illusions I did while you were in the pit. It shouldn’t have affected you this badly. Your mind shouldn’t be so fragmented now that they’re over. There are no new illusions, yet they’re still in your head.” She narrowed her eyes, quiet intelligence brimming too sharply in them. “There’s something else going on, isn’t there?”

Elijah tensed. That was all he needed, for her to figure it out. He’d kept it a secret for five hundred years, and he wasn’t about to start spilling now. He couldn’t risk it. “There’s no time for this. We need to go.”

Ana frowned. “Elijah, I might be able to help you if you tell me.”

“Trust me, there’s nothing anyone can do.” He reached past her and grabbed a black T-shirt off the dresser. Fighting the urge to pull Ana back and bury himself in her, Elijah yanked the shirt over his head, touching minds with Quinn.
I’m up. Meet me in the living room in two.

We’re all here. You took long enough sleeping. Getting old?

Elijah grinned, relieved that Quinn was treating him like everything was fine. Like he wasn’t about to snap.
Fuck off
.

Back at ya.
Elijah cut off the connection, ready to focus, as Ana swung her leg off him to stand up. When she moved, he caught a glimpse of a brutal scar on her thigh.

“Stop.” Something dark pulsed through him, and he grabbed her leg, holding her still. “What the hell’s that?”

Ana’s hand went to his shoulder to keep her balance. “It’s from Nate. Not a big deal.”

Elijah tugged up the oversized shirt so he could get a good look. It was a deep puncture wound in the shape of a knife blade, still healing. He laid his hand over it and closed his eyes, trying to contain the rage building inside him. “You didn’t have this when I saw you outside the Gun Rack.” He had perfect recall of that moment, of the blood caked on her upper body, and the deep purple bruises up and down her legs, the haunted shadows in her eyes...and he knew there had been no stab wound in her thigh. His fingers tightened around her leg and he looked at her, his hand shaking with fury. “What happened?”

Her eyes were wide. “It’s not your problem—”

“Hell, Ana.” He rubbed his fingers over the scar, and he felt her wince. “I can heal this for you.” He slid his hand down her leg, suddenly becoming aware of the cast on her foot as well. Fierce anger swelled inside him, fury that she’d been hurt, and disgust at himself for being so screwed up that he hadn’t even noticed. “Jesus, Ana, what the hell did he do to you?”

Her eyes became shiny, and his chest tightened for the pain so evident on her face.

“Don’t ask me that.” She lifted her chin, fighting for courage and strength. “Please. I have to keep it together and the only way I can do that is if I don’t think about what happened. I don’t have that luxury right now.”

“I do.” He opened his mind to Ana’s and got a visual of Nate slamming his boot down on her already shattered ankle. Her agony and terror beat at him, filling him with the icy cold bile of fear. Her scream of anguish ripped through his mind. And then Nate raised his foot again and again... “Son of a bitch, Ana.” Elijah’s hand tightened on her ankle and his other hand went to her face, touching the scar under her eye. “How many times did he do it?”

“No. Don’t even go there. I
can’t
.” Ana shook her head once, but a tear slipped free, and Elijah knew then how truly badly she’d suffered.

She was brave and courageous, fighting to move forward, but he saw how deep the scars and damage went. Elijah’s soul broke for her, for this determined woman who carried so much weight, who had taken it upon herself to add his own problems to her burden.

“Dammit.” He caught her shoulders and pulled her toward him, his body coiled with fury. “I should have been there to protect you.” He cupped her chin, tormented by the anguish in her face that she tried to hide. “You’re my
sheva,
and I failed to protect you—”

“Because I killed you! How could you help me if you were dead?” She hit his shoulder to try to get him to release her.

As if he was going to let her shut him out. “You didn’t kill me. Nate did, and then Frank revived me. How can you take responsibility for that?”

“Because I did the illusion that enabled him to get to you—”

“So what?” Elijah was so pissed he wanted to shake the entire damn earth. He hated the look of self-blame in her eyes. “Nate was a bastard, and he beat you. How can you possibly blame yourself for what you did?”

“I killed you! Don’t you understand? You and eleven others.” She held up her hands, palms out, tears streaming down her face. “Don’t you see it?” She shook her hands at him. “Don’t you see the blood on them? I’m covered!

He was shocked by the depth of her pain and guilt. Eleven others? She carried the deaths of eleven men in her soul? He wanted to ask questions, to find out what she’d done, but he didn’t dare push her in that direction. Not now. Not when she was struggling so hard to cope with her role in his death. “Ana,” he said softly, finally beginning to understand his
sheva
and all that drove her.

He took her hands and pressed his lips to her palms, first one hand and then the other. “They’re clean,” he said, barely keeping the fury out of his voice, anger at what had happened to her. He held her hands up, almost shaking with the need to make her understand that it wasn’t her fault, that it was he who had screwed up. “There’s no blood on them. Look at them, Ana. See what they are. Just beautiful hands that give comfort.”

Ana was confused by the intensity of the emotions raging on Elijah’s face. So much fury, but not at her. At Nate. For her, she saw depth and warmth in his eyes. Understanding. No judgment.

“He beat you,” Elijah said, his voice raw and gritty, as if merely saying the words tore at his very soul. “I had you in my arms, and I didn’t finish my job to keep you safe. I dropped the ball, and you had to go back to him.” The tendons were ticking in his neck, the muscles in his shoulders bunching as he tried to keep himself in check.

His face still sported the faint scars from when he’d tried to claw out his eyes, his stomach still covered in the marks of wounds that were self-inflicted. All that damage was because of what she’d done to him, both on the night he’d died and when they were in the pit. And yet, he didn’t blame her? He was upset because she’d been hurt? How could he think like that? It didn’t make sense. She didn’t deserve it.

Elijah cared. He didn’t want to, and he was stupid to...but he
cared
. Overwhelmed by that realization, Ana’s hands went to his face, his whiskers prickling under her fingers...and then she pulled back, forcing herself to be strong. “No.
No.
Don’t do that to me. Don’t you dare!”

“Do what? Dare to protect you?”

“Care! Don’t pretend you care!”

“I do care, damn it!”

“No, it’s the bond, and we both know it.” She retreated from him, trying to shut down the vulnerability that had arisen. “Any attraction between us isn’t real, and don’t you dare try to make me feel like it’s more than what it is. It isn’t, and we couldn’t afford it even if it was. Don’t make me count on you, Elijah. God, don’t do that to me.” She couldn’t keep the desperation out of her voice, and she knew by the way his mouth tightened that he heard it. He felt her absolute terror at the idea of letting herself count on anyone, of getting him tangled up in her mess.

His grip softened on her wrists, his restraining hold gentling to a light caress. He closed his eyes for a long moment and took a deep breath. Then he opened them and met her gaze. “I will never be able to walk away from keeping you safe,” he said evenly. “You
can
count on that.”

Something tripped inside her at the utter conviction of his words. “Don’t say that to me—”

“It’s true. You know it even if I don’t say it.”

Her protest died in her throat at the intensity of his expression. He was telling the truth. She could see it in the strength of his stance. She could feel it in the heat rolling off him. There was no way to get him to absolve himself of responsibility for her. Dread rippled through her, fear of the past repeating itself, but at the same time, it felt so amazing, like this tremendous gift, to know that he was there to help her. She immediately felt guilty for even liking how it felt.

How could she let him risk himself for her? It was her job to help him, to atone for all the deaths she had caused, the damage she’d unleashed, including the deaths that had occurred long before Nate had kidnapped her. Ezekiel would not have been freed if it weren’t for her, and everyone knew it. There was so much about her past that she couldn’t fix, people she couldn’t bring back to life, but this time, if she could help stop Ezekiel and help Elijah recover, then it was the first step toward atonement.

When they had both been Nate’s captives, Lily had offered to kill Ana rather than have her responsible for more deaths, but Ana hadn’t been strong enough to do what was right. Because of that, Nate had been able to kill so many warriors and steal the weapons that had been used to free Ezekiel. Without Ana, none of it would have happened. No one would have died, and the earth would not be catapulting toward its destruction in that very moment. “Elijah,” she protested. “This can’t get personal between us. We can’t afford it—”

“You’ll have to learn how to live with it, sweetheart, because I’m not going away.” Not waiting for a response, Elijah grabbed the rest of his clothes off the table, his body language shifting from sensual protector to badass warrior. “Dress for the desert and pack an overnight bag. We’re going hunting.”

Ana swallowed, trying to recover her composure. She was grateful to move onto the one thing that truly mattered to both of them, besides healing Elijah. “For Ezekiel?”

“For Ezekiel.”