Echoes in Eternity (The Pella Series Book 1) (22 page)

 
“Need a hand boss?” I hear Anthony as he slices the air with a hand-to-hand melee he hasn’t used in a very long time. The excitement of a pending fight brews in me.

“Sometimes a man misses the battle cry,” he says grinning and positions his back to mine like we used to in the battle.

“Ellie?” I ask concerned. He points upstairs with his eyes. Without breaking our back to back position, he hands me a curved dagger.

“Stella’s present,
”he says with a smile in his voice. We both spin at the same time, and as the Doctor’s tendrils reach out to one of us, Anthony and I both strike him; his heart and his throat. His tendrils slowly retract as tar black thick blood oozes out of him slowly staining his shirt. I don’t wait around. I need to find Elissa.

I take two steps towards the hall to find Elissa and I hear a scream. The sound is coming from behind a closed door. Unable to hold myself back, I storm into her bedroom. Elissa is standing in the middle of the room with a strange jagged glaive to her throat held by an elegant looking woman. It’s odd to see such a weapon with a short handle, but it has the markings I have not seen since Marcus’ surrender. I know what they are capable of doing. So, I can’t take a chance on Elissa’s life. Fuck! This is the mommy dearest gone to Hades! Elissa’s eyes
are wide as she looks at me, shocked to see me.

“Don’t. Come. Any. Closer! I will thrust this into her throat and it will kill her easily!”
says her mother. Of course it will! It’s forged in the depths of Hades, especially made for this purpose. It’s a fucking sacrificial blade, in her mother’s hand!

“You would do that to your daughter?” I ask as I take a step forward, my face imperturbable.

“She was just a biological child, not my daughter! I never wanted to have her! She took everything that was rightfully mine! My gorgeous body, my parents’ love, and now my inheritance! But her death will rectify something. Uh...Ah. Like Abraham, sacrificing his son... Yes, just like Abraham...” she says with a glazed look over her eyes.

“The flaw in that argument is that Abraham was serving his God. Who are you serving, Sarah?” I probe her while taking another casual step forward as my eyes locked with hers, trying to draw her out of whatever spell she’s under, if any.

“Myself! I will reclaim my youth, my former beauty, and immortality. They promised! Once she’s out of the way, I can have everything that was rightfully mine!” she croons.

“I don’t want anything... You can have it all,” whispers Elissa.

“Don’t speak at all!” says Sarah pushing the glaive into her throat harder, and breaking skin. Bitch! A bead of blood collects at the tip of the glaive. I hold my hand as a universal gesture of peace, trying to get a read on Sarah. If I had not had hundreds of years of practice in controlling my anger, wrath, and tendency to exact revenge I’d have killed her already. I will endanger Elissa. What is Sarah? I take two easy steps, and she digs the glaive deeper into Elissa’s neck. Her blood runs slowly, lazily in a crimson streak over the silver of the jagged glaive. I can barely restrain the power coiled inside me.

“Don’t come any closer,” Sarah says smiling in a singsong voice.

“If you kill her Sarah, they will kill you. They need her alive,” I say placating her.

“No! They still need me. I’m the one who can touch her and kill her while they can’t even touch her like she’s the holy water to
the devil!” she says with an ear splitting, discordant laughter. “They can’t even touch her!” she repeats herself. “Yes, sir, they need me!” she croons, her eyes crazed and wild as her voice takes on a strange tone. “They said she’s an abomination! I knew that all along! She is! I was right!” she says with sibilance. A fast movement from the door doesn’t escape her notice, and I take advantage of her distraction and I grasp Sarah’s hand capturing the glaive and immediately I pull Elissa behind me protectively. I quickly notice that Stella captured Sarah and is binding her hands securely.

"Let go of me!" hisses Sarah.

"Like you let go of your daughter?" asks Stella sarcastically as she bends Sarah's arm forcefully.

"She's the reason I've
lost everything that was rightfully mine! Youth, beauty, inheritance, my parent's love, men..." growls Sarah inhumanly, but Stella interrupts her.

"Just when I think that you cannot be any shallower, you manage to drain the tub a little more, Sarah
. You are making me lose hope in humanity!" Stella hisses disgustedly. Ellie's eyes widen, the shock of her mother's actions and the stab of her words finally manage to penetrate her as the adrenaline is wearing off. She trembles like a leaf, speechless; unable to cry, unable to form a word, unable to stand without support. She doesn't notice the blood seeping down from her neck, lazily coursing over her chest, and disappearing under her black blouse, darkening over her right breast, slowly coagulating. Elissa's gaze is fixed anywhere in the room, but the three of us.

“Take Ellie away, and protect my girl, Alex,” Stella says. Elissa’s eyes finally manage to turn to her
and widen, somehow the tender words uttered by the
Fallen Angel
who became the woman to raise her finally manages to break the dam that's been welling up behind her sapphire blue eyes.

“Go on dear! Go out into the world and live your life! I’ll be there when you need me!” Stella whispers gently. I become aware that my arms are protectively wrapped around Elissa’s body and she’s clutching onto me with all she’s got as though
 without me she would be a heap on the floor! I feel Sarah’s malicious grin following Elissa’s every move. I direct the searing intensity of my focus upon her; abhorrent and unforgiving. I want to lunge forward and shred her to pieces with my hands; it’s taking all my self-control to restrain my actions. I keep reminding myself that this woman gave birth to Elissa, and yet she was ready to cut her open without any qualms. I tug Elissa out of the bedroom into the relative privacy of the hallway.

“My bags,” she says dazed, shaking, and crying as she points back to her room.

“Anthony will get them,” I say tenderly. She’s too shaken, too worried, and too distressed. I can’t stand it! This is my girl, she was my wife, she’s my life, the reason for my existence.

“Thank you, Mr. Pella...” she
 stutters shyly and wipes her tears away fiercely, shaken.

"
Shhhh..." I say softly, holding her hands back. Our proximity is overwhelming. I want to take her grief away and make her forget; make her know that I’m all she needs, all she should want, desire and depend on. I hold her tightly fisted hands; my gaze fixed on her sapphire blues and I slowly lift them up to my lips. I kiss each and every knuckle as if I’m kissing her lips with all the yearning, desire and love I have for her. With each kiss on her knuckles, I feel her tension depart from her body, all the way through her extremities. Her fingers relax and open up. I turn her hands over and kiss her palms. I feel a soft moaning out of her lips. Her lips part, gaze locked on mine, she searches my eyes. I slowly put her hands down and place them on her sides. Reaching up to her face, I dry her cheeks and eyes with my fingers slowly and tenderly. There’s wonder in her eyes.

"It's okay, you're okay. I'm here, now," I whisper gently in a soothing yet commanding tone. I know that despite all my efforts, I can’t conceal my love, the overpowering craving, attraction and desire for her. I am completely relieved that my feelings for her
are exponentially reciprocated by her. She places her head on my chest with relief, inhaling my scent, feeling me, and her arms automatically wrap around my torso as if they always belonged there, so natural. 

"You saved me, Mr. Pella...again..." she murmurs and for first time she realizes that she's holding
me
.
Realizing that we’re in one another’s arms, she tries to pull back looking at me chagrined and I cock my eyebrows at her quizzically as I hold her arms firmly in place not willing her to let me go. I want her to be intimate with me, not formal. To my relief she amends.

“Alex,” she says correcting herself. I can feel her fluttering heart th
rough our embrace. The inescapable pull we have for each other is prodigiously clear. Her proximity to me is beguiling, bewitching, seductive, drawing like an undercurrent I can’t escape. Like a moth to a flame, like a riptide you can’t escape, she’s all of my heart... Her soul is calling to mine like its lost half is seeking to merge. Even with my eyes closed, I feel her. Passion ignites inside me, searing, boiling my blood like wild fire. The love I feel for Elissa is so overwhelming that I, Alexander Aurelius Pella, a man who has ruled and conquered the known world would fall on his knees before her. I have sought her at the corners of the globe. I love her with simplicity and elementally. The proud, controlling and extremely self-disciplined man that I am, I love this woman without pride, boundaries or control, because, I don’t know any other way. If she couldn't exist, neither could I, nor would I want to! Her hands on my waist, her gaze locked on my eyes; looking, seeking, desiring, penetrating through my soul in such a way that if she were to inhale my chest would swell, if she were to look, I would see, if she were to close her eyes, I would sleep, and if she were to sleep, I would dream. I’m hot and hard and half-crazy with my craving for her. I search her face and see that my desire is reflected and reciprocated in her face.

“I’m going do something I
have wanted to do since I first laid eyes on you!” I say in a lascivious tone looking intensely in her eyes. Her breath hitches. Her eyes are wide and unblinking, she looks at me. I place my hand on the small of her back, coaxing her to merge with my front, my cock hard and in full salute mode digging against her waist, struggling to get out. 

“What?” she asks in a breathy voice, swallowing. Inadvertently she lifts herself on her toes reaching up towards me, her eyes begging me to close the space between us and kiss her. I suppress a smile and, “This...” I say leaning down. I tilt her chin up, and seal her lips with mine. She’s pushing her body into mine seeking to merge with me. At first, our kiss is soft and sweet. But our connection pushes us over the limit, and unleashes the desire we have stored
up for over two hundred years. I find myself lifting her up off the floor and she wraps her long legs around my body, pushing into me. My left hand holds her from under her buttocks while my right hand is caressing her back sensually up and down, making strategic stops.

My lips consume hers telling her of my love and desire for her in a way I’m not allowed to express
to her with words yet. My desire for her is overwhelming, helpless, and nothing would end this yearning until we are completely united. She is reading my soul with her lips without knowing that she’s my whole universe! At this moment, I surrender myself to her; let her conquer me while I acquiesce, conquering her anew. This kiss surely should unite our souls. I don’t care about anything else right now, but the two of us united with this kiss in this moment, and I have finally relocated my soul! My kiss turns into a demanding, insistent one; and she is encouraging it, parting her lips, sighing, granting my tongue access to explore her mouth. As one of her hands travels into my hair pulling it, the other clutches  my shirt fisting the material, as it clings to my body, popping a few buttons, causing me to groan into her mouth. I taste and lick her inside her mouth, a familiar yet long lost dance of our tongues starts, finally finding their perfect match. I suck and nip her lower lip and she whimpers into my mouth, her breasts pushing into my chest, nipples hardening, straining against her shirt, and friction between us. If I remain here, I’m going to take her right here on the floor, and she deserves better than that.

My tongue clashes with hers as she pulls me to her forcefully with the grasp of her arms, trying to merge our bodies, and my erection reaches to its full potential, protesting, trying to reach through the layers of clothing into her body, her sex so close! She moans in pleasure. She sucks my tongue in such a sensual way that I’m nearly transported to our last love making before I lost her. I nip her lower lip again, and slow our kiss again to a tender and a sensual one.

Once our lips part, I trail my kisses down  her chin, her cheeks and neck. Someone clears his throat behind me.

“Mr. Pella, we should get going
, sir,” says Anthony. He must have been giving us this time to reacquaint ourselves, watching my back as he always does. I reluctantly free Elissa from my kisses. It’s not safe for her here.

“Will you be driving or flying
, sir?”

“Fly...”I say. I don’t think I can wait three hours.

“They’ll clean up here; you two should take the back stairs. I will bring Miss Duncan’s belongings in the SUV, sir,” he says with reverence in his voice towards Elissa. I narrow my eyes, but he says nothing. I take Elissa’s hand, and for the first time in over two-hundred years, there’s a spark of hope and relief in my heart.

“Are we going back to LA?” she asks. I think for a second.

“No, Ellie,” I say and mouth, "Arizona," knowing we're still in the earshot of her enemies.

“Oh, of course, my first day of work,” she says her face falling.

We will work, of course. But, I want to show her a horse ranch, first. She likes riding, well, she's in luck. I'll show her my horses, and how to break a sweat.

Anthony looks at me questioning.