Marie Harte - The Fire Within

She squealed to break free, instinctively wanting to distance herself from the fire, but couldn’t move under Darius’ grip.

To her astonishment, the fire didn’t burn. It felt warm, yes, but comfortable, a welcoming heat that made her insides flare with desire, with the urge to draw closer to Darius.

After a minute of staring from Samantha to the flame and back again, Darius cursed and released her hand. As he backed away, she saw her desire mirrored in his gaze, in his dark red eyes—a reminder that she was definitely living out her own episode of the Twilight Zone.

She swallowed the knot of nerves in her throat and stood up, needing all the presence she could muster in a room filled with gorgeous giants who stared at her as if she had three heads.

Unfortunately, standing put her that much closer to Darius, sparking her already overheated libido. She flushed and cleared her throat. “So, ah, someone care to tell me what’s going on? How long have I been sleeping?”

The men ignored her and began speaking amongst themselves. She caught vague snippets about Aerolus being missing and her eyes having gone haywire, though that made no sense considering she could see just fine.

“Excuse me,” she tried. When they continued to ignore her, she kicked Darius in the back of the knee, making him stumble. He turned to face her with a scowl mean enough to fell a tree. Odd that his anger only made him more attractive, his impatience infinitely more challenging than the bland businessmen she dealt with on a daily basis.

Shaking her head, she focused and tried again. “Let me say it a little louder. What the hell is going on around here?”

Cadmus had the nerve to grin. “She sounds just like you, Darius. How weird is that?” he asked Marcus. “Sexy as hell, but as surly as him?”

Seeing her eyes narrow, Darius glared in response but answered her question. “Easy, Samantha. As far as I know you just closed your eyes a few minutes ago.”

“Huh?” She felt way too refreshed to believe she’d only just fallen asleep.

“Yeah, you two weren’t gone more than a few minutes before Arim appeared with bad news.” Cadmus stared from her to Darius with a stupid grin, and she could easily see why Darius was so impatient all the time. His brothers were enough to drive her to drink.

“Would one of you explain this before I go postal?” Her voice rose with each word until she was shouting.

“Whatever that means.” Marcus shrugged. “You and flameboy left the living room.” With a wave of his hand, a shield of water demolished the fireball thrown his way. He continued as if nothing had happened, no doubt to further Darius’ annoyance. “Two seconds later Arim, our resident sorcerer, appeared with bad news about evil in between realms or something.”

“Actually,” Cadmus interrupted, “he said, ’There’s been a disturbance between the planes, a darkness pocketing the realms where there should only be waiting space’.”

Irritation swimming in his ocean-blue eyes, Marcus grumbled, “I hate it when you do that.” He shifted so that his back was to Cadmus. “As I was saying, Arim then freaked out and demanded to see you, Darius. Personally I thought he was going to fry you, Storm Lords and destiny be damned. But when I broke through your door, I found him freeing you from the Wraith’s Kiss.”

“It’s a magical spell created by ’Sin Garu as ammunition for his evil followers, the Netharat ,” Darius said before she could ask. “You saw one of the Netharat in your dream, that ghoulish monstrosity with rows of sharp black teeth? We call them wraiths.”

She nodded slowly, uneasy that she was beginning to understand and even follow their incredible story.

“Anyway, Arim yanked off the Knowing Crystal, which now that I think about it,” Marcus paused, his eyes narrowing, “wasn’t a Knowing Crystal at all.”

“Treachery in the Royal House,” Cadmus said thoughtfully.

“Okay, I think I understand some of this.” Samantha should have had a headache fuelled by tension and confusion at this point, but her head felt fine. In fact, the only time she’d felt any better had been right after sex with Darius. She glanced at him only to see the tension leave his frame. His eyes widened before tilting at the corners suggestively.

Crap. That mind reading thing.

Schooling her expression, she turned from his sensual gaze and asked Marcus, the arrogant one, as she’d come to think of him, “So why are you all looking at me like an alien, or worse, the enemy?” She hadn’t missed their suspicion earlier.

“Because Arim mentioned you’ve the capability of a lot of power, not to mention your encounter with ’Sin Garu—the greatest threat Tanselm has faced in a thousand years.” Marcus stared at her, as if gauging her innocence.

“You think I’ve got power?” She stared at them in astonishment. “I’m nothing like you four. Or should I say three? Where’s the grey-eyed one? Aerolus, right?”

Darius closed the distance between them and took her chin in his hands, tilting her face to his inspection. “Oh, you’ve power in you, sweet. It’s racing in you as we speak.”

She could only blink in confusion, the heat of his palm like warm honey, sweet and addicting.

“Your eyes turned red for a brief moment, Samantha, as red as mine. And the fire you withstand is elemental magic—my magic. It’s my fire that burns inside you. I can feel it.” His voice lowered, sounding guttural and needy and way more than she could handle this close to him.

“Not now,” Cadmus protested. “I want to hear her side of things.”

Marcus cursed and dragged his brother out of the room. “Come on, you idiot,” she heard through the doorway. “Darius isn’t big on sharing, and I’m not big on watching. Her, sure, but him? Borders on base perversity.”

The door suddenly slammed shut, leaving Samantha and Darius an inch apart.

“Darius?” she asked breathlessly.

“Later, love.” He kissed the corner of her mouth with a whisper-light touch and groaned. “You’re killing me,” he murmured before stealing her will to breathe, to think, to do anything but kiss him back.

Fast and furious, their desire fanned into a combustible inferno. Darius tore at her clothing, as desperate to enter her as Samantha was to feel him inside her. She helped him as best she could, needing him to soothe the ache only he stirred. Jeans and underwear followed her shoes, sliding to the floor. Then her back hit the bed as Darius crushed her beneath him in an erotic act of pure possession.

He fumbled at the clasp of his jeans briefly, then without warning plunged into her, no foreplay or teasing required to further the fiery desire they both felt.

Samantha groaned at the sensation of fullness, at how perfectly he fit her. She was wet and wild to have him and locked her ankles around his waist, making him groan her name. Over and over he thrust, the delicious friction of his cock against her clit ever present and growing.

And then she burst into a million fragments, staring into his taut face as he quickly followed her into oblivion. He continued to thrust, pummelling her into a second, consuming orgasm that siphoned the fire from her body into his. She could sense their hearts beating as one, their connection a living conduit of emotion and heat.

When at last her breathing slowed, she stared into his clear, deep red eyes now replete with satisfaction.

“I have no willpower when it comes to you,” he rasped lazily. His jeans rubbed against her legs and she realised he’d paused only long enough to remove her clothing and free his erection before making love to her.

Slowly withdrawing from her body, he took her with him as he rolled to his back. “How this keeps happening is a mystery to me,” he said and nuzzled the side of her face playfully.