Mona Lisa Craving

FIVE

I SCRAMBLED UP and off of him, and frantically threw on my clothes while that refrain ran over and over in my mind. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God! What have I done?

“What’s wrong?” Dante demanded, and I realized that I’d been muttering the words out loud. I shook my head and stumbled to the door, desperate to get away, my instinctive unease of him twining with fear of what I’d just done. Behind me chains rattled, jerked harshly as he came up against the restraining length of them. “What did I do wrong?”

I glanced back, saw his face, harsh and wild, the muscles of his body bunched tight as he strained against the chains, trying to come after me. His body glistened—the sweat of his malady mixing with the sweat of the sexual exertion that had healed him. His male organ, semihard, was wet with our combined essence, with my fluid and his ejaculated seed that swam even now in me. That hard male body, that fierce, frightening face, the smell of sex thick and pungent in the air—I saw it all, smelled it all, and had to get away. Had to leave. Him. Everything. What I had done.

I slammed out of the room, past the startled faces of his brother, his father. Then I was outside in the dark and starry night. A cool, cleansing breeze drifted over me like a soothing hand, easing some of the panic, some of the madness that had gripped me for a second. Our mother moon, whose light we held within us, glimmered serenely down from above, her soft lunar rays falling upon me like the hand of a Madonna soothing her restless child. A comparison that reminded me starkly of my dilemma. That I may have just gotten myself pregnant…knowingly. That was the hard part to swallow.

I found a large, flat rock a short distance away from the house and sat there, my hand drifting down to cover my belly, the gesture part protective, part horrified. Sounds drifted from the house and I ignored it, shut it out, lost in my own world, my own tormenting reflections.

A baby. How could I have done that? Risked that?

How could I have not? a voice within me demanded. That dominant part of me that was woman. That was Monère.

The odds were against my getting pregnant because the Monère are not a fertile people. It’s hard for our women to get pregnant. But the man whose seed lay wet and pungent within me came from a line that had proven obviously potent. Not just one son, but two. Twins.

Shit.

I sat there, lost and alone, for a countless space of time. I don’t know how many minutes passed before the crunching of footsteps on fallen leaves alerted me to another’s presence. Sounds that were deliberately made to give me warning of their approach. Not that I needed it. Even lost in my thoughts as I was, I would have felt him. Dante. The possible father of my child…or not.

It was with this new and stunning realization in my eyes that I rose to my feet and turned to face the young man I’d just had sex with: If I became pregnant, I might not even know who the father of my child was. Dante or Amber. I’d slept with Amber several days ago, right after Basking.

Dante had showered, shaved, and dressed. His wet hair was slicked back and the grizzly beard gone from his face, allowing me to see the rough, stark beauty of his angles. But even groomed and dressed in the trappings of civilization, nothing could change those eyes. Those pale blue eyes that shimmered with wildness and aggression barely contained. The madness in them was gone, but not even sanity could soften the instinctive fright that coursed through my body like a shocking jolt when I looked into those formidable eyes. Eyes that I could have sworn I knew. He was unchained, free, and fear suddenly thudded within me, coursed in a riot through my blood.

He stopped twenty feet away and spread his hands in front of him to show he was unarmed, that he meant no harm. But my heartbeat did not lessen its rapid-fire staccato. When he took a step forward, I took a step back. I couldn’t help myself.

Something moved in his eyes. Hurt, pain. Reciprocal wariness, perhaps. His eyes dropped down to my hands that I had unconsciously lifted to ward him off, to keep him back, and his eyes narrowed. Something in him grew very still.

Suddenly aware of what I’d done, I made myself drop my hands back to my sides. “Are you well now?”

“Yeah.” But he spoke as if he were troubled, distracted, making no move to draw closer to me. With effort, he brought his attention back to me. “What about you? Are you well? Did I hurt you?”

“No,” I said, as gently as I could with all the adrenaline coursing in me.

“Then what’s wrong?”

“I may be pregnant.” My whisper vibrated with the horror I was feeling. “And I just realized, if I am, I may never know for sure who the father is.”

His attention centered even more sharply on me. “You have another lover?”

“More than one.” A choked sound came out of me that was half-sob, half-laugh. “But only one before you who could get me with child.” Not Halcyon, my demon dead lover. Not Gryphon, whose child I had wanted in remembrance of him. Not Dontaine, with whom I had lain, but not in a way that could result in a child. “Just Amber. Or you.”

Something flared in those eyes for a moment before he dropped his gaze. His hands curled into fists, and tension seeped into his body before he consciously released it with a slow, deep breath.

“Thank you for saving me,” he said, his rough voice deliberately gentle, oddly formal. “And my deep regrets for any discomfort I may have caused you with my fumbling. It was not meant intentionally.”

Frightened though I was of him, I pushed aside my distress to soothe his. “You didn’t cause me any discomfort. Nor was there any fumbling on your part. You brought me great pleasure. Made me come three times, in fact. How can you doubt that you pleased me?” I said, shaking my head. “Was that your first time?”

He cast me an odd look but nodded.

“Well, let’s just say you show a true natural talent,” I said with a wobbly smile.

“Then why did you run from me?”

My smile disappeared. “Because we didn’t use the condom. It was right there in my hand. Then your need flared up my own and I felt this terrible, gripping urge to bear life, to have a baby. It came out of nowhere, ambushed me, drowned me in it, until I felt as if I would literally die if I didn’t feel your seed jetting into me. The condom was right there in my hand, and I deliberately dropped it, let it go. How could I have done that? I don’t even know myself anymore, who I am, what I’m becoming.”

“Would being pregnant be so bad if that is what your body craves?”

“You don’t understand.” And I couldn’t explain it to him. “It could be disastrous. Not for me, but for the baby. And I knowingly risked it.”

Even more distressing, I thought I was going crazy. I felt as if I should recognize Dante. That even though I’d never laid eyes on him before, my body knew him in some way…and feared him.

“Do I know you?” I felt like an idiot asking him that question, but was compelled to ask it anyway.

He stilled. Froze in a way that made him seem as if he were not real, not living. Then he moved, released a breath. He cast me a searing, searching gaze. Then without a word he turned and walked swiftly away—as if a ghost had suddenly sprung up before him and he was fleeing it.

Only when he was gone did my heart slow down.

God, I thought. Who the hell are you? How do I know you? And most important of all: Why do I fear you?