Beverly Barton - Raintree - Santuary

Whenever Judah was this close, their bodies almost touching, Mercy found it difficult to concentrate, and he damn well knew it. Ignore the fact that your heartbeat has accelerated and your nipples have hardened, Mercy told herself. He doesn’t know that you’re moist with desire, that your body yearns for his.

“Wouldn’t our brief time together be better spent not talking?” Judah leaned over just far enough so that they were nose to nose, mouth to mouth. “As I recall, neither of us needs words to express what we want.”

Shivering internally, she barely managed to keep her body from shaking. Her breathing quickened. Her nostrils flared. Her feminine core clenched and unclenched.

“Why does your brother hate you enough to kill you?”

Her question acted as the deterrent she had hoped it would. Judah lifted his head and withdrew from her, at least far enough so that she could take a free breath.

“I told you that Cael’s mother killed my mother. There’s been bad blood between us all our lives.”

“If his mother killed yours, then you should be the one who hates him, the one who wants to kill him. Why is it the other way around?”

“I’m my father’s legitimate son. Cael is not. It’s as simple as that. An insane mind needs little excuse to act irrationally.”

Mercy told herself that she was questioning Judah to acquire needed information about the Ansara, but that was only part of her reason. Curiosity? Perhaps. All she knew was that she felt a great need to know this man, her child’s father.

“How old were you when your mother died?” she asked.

Judah’s jaw tensed. “My mother was murdered.” He tapered his gaze until his eyes slanted almost closed.

Of its own volition, her hand reached over and spread out across the center of his chest, covering his heart. For one millisecond, while emotion made him vulnerable, Mercy absorbed his innermost thoughts. He had been an infant when his mother died, too young to remember her face or the sound of her voice. A small boy’s sadness lingered deep inside Judah, both a hunger for a mother’s love and a denial that he needed love from anyone.

“I’m very sorry about your mother,” Mercy told him. “No child should grow up without a mother to love him unconditionally.”

With his mouth twisted in a snarl, his eyes mere slits and tension etched on his features, Judah grabbed her hand and flung it off his chest. “I neither want nor need your sympathy.”

Bombarded with his anger and resentment, Mercy gasped for air. The rage boiling inside him spilled over onto her, engulfing her, drowning her in its intensity. This was her fault, not his, she realized. She should have known better than offer him kindness and caring when he understood neither.

And she shouldn’t have touched him.

Mercy fought to free herself from the dangerous havoc Judah’s fury was creating within her. She had somehow connected to him empathically, and try as she might, she couldn’t manage to sever the link. A heaviness bore down on her chest, a weight that robbed her of breath. She gasped for air, struggling for speech to demand that he release her.

Judah grabbed her shoulders. “What’s wrong with you?”

She managed to expel a gasping moan.

“Mercy!” He shook her.

She felt herself growing weaker by the minute, her oxygen supply cut off as if she were being smothered. Help me. Please, Judah, help me.

Tell me what to do.

Barely conscious, Mercy swayed toward him. Don’t be angry with me. Don’t hate me.

I did this to you?

He caught her as her knees gave way, swooping her up in his arms. “Sweet Mercy.”

Closing her eyes, she sank to a level just below consciousness. Judah lowered his head and pressed his cheek against hers as he held her securely. As swiftly as his negative energy had invaded her mind and body, it dissipated, draining from her as it drained from him. She felt a flash of concern and genuine regret before he swiftly placed a protective barrier between them.

Weak from the experience and recovering slowly, Mercy opened her eyes and met Judah’s concerned gaze.

“I didn’t mean for that to happen,” he told her.

“It was my fault,” she said. “I let my guard down.”

“That’s a dangerous thing to do, especially around me.”

She nodded. “Would you please put me down now? I’ll be all right.”

“Are you sure? I could-”

“No, thank you. Just put me on my feet.”

He eased her down and out of his arms, slowly, maddeningly, making sure her body skimmed over his. When he released her, she staggered, and he grabbed her upper arms to steady her.

“Should I get Sidonia?” he asked.

“No, I’ll be all right. Please…” She wriggled, trying to loosen his secure grip on her arms.

He released her.

“I need to be alone for a while,” she told him, then turned her back on him, afraid she would succumb to her weakness for a man who was not only dangerous to her, but to her daughter. Seconds later, the door to her study closed, and she knew Judah had left the room.

After a half hour on the phone with Claude, discussing the fact that Cael had not returned to Terrebonne and had somehow dropped off the Ansara radar, Judah had gone in search of his daughter. He needed to build a strong rapport with Eve as quickly as possible. Only if he bonded with her, if she trusted him completely, would he be able to persuade her to leave the Raintree sanctuary with him. So, he spent hours with her that Thursday morning and afternoon, every moment under the vigilant supervision of Nanny Sidonia. The old woman watched him like a hawk, as if she expected him to sprout horns and a tail. Wouldn’t she be shocked if he did just that? he thought And he could. At least, he could create the illusion of horns and a tail, enough to scare the crap out of the old woman. It would serve her right if he did. But it might frighten Eve and possibly give her the wrong impression of him. He was sure the grumbling old hag had already badmouthed him to his child, telling her all sorts of improbable stories about the wicked Ansara.

He supposed there was some grain of truth to it. The good Raintree. The bad Ansara. But all Raintree weren’t saints. And not every Ansara was the devil incarnate.

From time immemorial, the Raintree, as a people, had chosen the straight and narrow, taking the high ground, showing an emotional weakness for the welfare of the Ungifted and preferring peace to war. Wizards with far too much conscience.

The Ansara tolerated humankind, manipulated them when they were useful, disregarded them when they were not. Ansara prided themselves on their skills as warriors and defended to the death what was theirs. But they were not monsters, not evil demons. They lived and loved and cherished their families. In that respect, they were no different from the Raintree.

But there were also Ansara like Cael. A few in every generation. Depraved. Evil. True monsters. Often innate sorcerers, they possessed the ability to lure the dregs of Ansara society into their service. They killed for the pleasure of killing. Took great delight in inflicting pain, in torturing others. They were as unlike Judah and his kind as they were unlike the Raintree.

When circumstances required it, Judah had killed. To protect himself and others, or out of necessity, when killing was simply a business decision. He didn’t tolerate disobedience or disrespect. As the Dranir, he possessed unequaled power among his people.

He liked power. Respected power.

He used and discarded women as it pleased him, Ansara and human alike. And once, even a Raintree princess.

Eve tugged on his hand, reminding Judah that he was tied to Mercy Raintree through their daughter, a bond that only death could break.