Carpathian 18 - Dark Possesion

enough, and if he had somehow brought her into his life without her knowledge—or his—raging like he wanted to because she hadn't been safe would only make things worse.
    "If what you say is true, MaryAnn, then how is it we are lifemates? Speaking the ritual words cannot connect two people who arc not one. I could say them to every woman I met, but it would do me no good."
    "Maybe you made a mistake," she ventured. "Maybe we aren't really connected."
    "I see in color. I feel emotions. I can think of no other woman but you. I want no other woman. I recognize your soul. We are lifemates." His voice was firm, brooking no argument.
    MaryAnn couldn't find an argument. While it was true that she didn't know everything about Carpathian life, she knew enough that the possibility was strong. Judging by her reaction to him alone, she had to admit it was probable. "All right. Say we are lifemates, Manolito. You say you wronged me in some way and that is why you're stuck here. Why do you think that?"
    His thumb slid up the back of her hand, stroking tiny caresses over the silky smooth skin. He bent his head to nibble the pad of her thumb while he thought about it, the gesture automatic, sexy, burning through her with ease. "I felt like I was being judged for something I had done to you. I should know if I wronged you."
    "I should know, too," she conceded, trying not to react to the feeling of his teeth scraping erotically over her thumb. How could such a small thing be felt in the pit of her stomach? Or make her womb clench? Or her breasts feel swollen and achy? There was no way she could ever let this man touch her in a bedroom. She'd never get over it.
    "I'm reading your mind again."
    "You do that a lot." She wasn't going to apologize. "Stop being so sexy. I'm trying to think here. One of us has to get us out of here." She sent him a smoldering look from under her lashes, but he only grinned at her, his smile sending need skittering over her body as easily as his caresses had. She was in trouble. Big trouble.
    Huffing out her breath, she pulled her gaze away from his, determined to find a way to free them.
    "Could that be the wrong, Manolito, because tying us together without my consent and taking my blood without my knowledge shouldn't be okay by anyone's standards. Maybe you need to feel remorse in order for us to get out of here."
    "I can say I feel sorry for claiming my lifemate, but it would not be true."
    She sighed. "You aren't exactly getting into the spirit of the thing here. If we want out of this shadow world and you somehow wronged me, shouldn't we be figuring out what you did?"
    "The wrong cannot be binding us together. That is a natural act for a Carpathian male. I would be wrong not to bind our souls. I would turn vampire and you would eventually die of heartache."
    She snorted. "Of heartache? I don't even know you." But she'd grieved for him. Cried for him. Had been clinically depressed and now she was feeling hot and bothered and exhilarated in spite of the fact that she was surrounded by ghouls and insects and spiders the size of dinner plates. She tried again to make him understand. "What if I was married? You didn't even wait to find out. I could have been." Because a lot of men thought she was fine.
    His fingers tightened around her and tiny flames leapt in his eyes. "There is only one man for you."
    "Well maybe you were late in coming. The point is, I could have been married. I had a life before you came along and I liked that life. No one has the right to turn someone else's life upside down without that person's consent." She forced herself to look into his eyes. "I don't love you."
    His eyes went very black, liquid heat, turning her inside out and stealing reason along with her ability to breathe. "That may be, ainaak enyem , but it cannot change what is. You are my lifemate, the other half of my soul, as I am yours. We are meant to be together. I must find a way to make you fall in love with me." He leaned close, so that she felt the warmth of his breath on her skin, so that when he whispered to her, she felt the brush of his lips, soft and firm and tempting, over hers. "Rest assured, päläfertül , that I will focus my complete attention in that direction."
    Her heart went crazy, pounding and slamming so hard she thought she might have a heart attack. "You're lethal. And you know it, too, don't you? Were there other women? Maybe that's your big wrong." And the thought set her teeth on edge, even