Death is Forever

talking. He didn’t want to hear her low voice describing just how much of a blood sport sex had been to her fiancé.
    Even as Cole locked his jaw against the bile rising in his throat, he wondered at his own primitive response. He’d heard worse, seen worse, the kind of savagery that was labeled inhuman because sane people didn’t want to believe how low humanity could sink.
    Cole knew he shouldn’t be surprised, shouldn’t be appalled, and he certainly shouldn’t be enraged at what had been done to Erin.
    But he was.
    As he listened he clenched his teeth against the turmoil of emotions ripping through him, a combination of despair and killing rage the likes of which he hadn’t felt since Lai had casually aborted his child and married another man on the command of her family.
    Slowly Erin’s words faded into silence. She realized that Cole had long since rolled onto his side, removing his weight from her, touching her only in the slow sweep of his hand over her hair while she talked. She looked at his eyes and saw both rage and a sadness that made tears burn against her eyelids. Without stopping to think, she curled against him, needing the reassurance of his warmth, wondering if he ever needed reassurance in the same way.
    “Are you all right?” he asked finally.
    She nodded. “I thought I’d forgotten. But I hadn’t. Not really. I feel better now. Lighter. Kind of floating.” She rubbed her cheek against his chest and let out a long sigh. “Thank you for being…gentle.”
    “You’re the first one who ever accused me of that,” Cole said, smiling oddly.
    After a moment Erin looked up and saw a drop of blood slowly welling from Cole’s lower lip. She touched the small cut with her fingertips. “I’m sorry.”
    “No problem.”
    Her fingertips slid down beneath his chin, sensing the slight raised area where her head had bruised him.
    “Here too,” she said. “I hurt you.”
    He tried to subdue his elemental response to her touch. She frowned as she looked at the bruise. She touched him even more gently, almost caressingly. He closed his eyes and told himself she didn’t know what she was doing.
    “I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking,” she said, lifting her fingertips as the tension in his body communicated itself to her. “It must hurt to have me touch it.”
    He made a sound that could have been a throttled laugh or an equally throttled curse.
    “It doesn’t hurt. It feels good. Too damn good,” he said bluntly.
    “What?”
    “Your fingers. My skin. I like the combination. What about you?”
    Her hand hesitated, then resumed touching him. Silently she admitted that she was caressing him rather than looking for signs of injury.
    Very slowly Cole resumed stroking her hair. After a time his fingertips traced the shadows beneath her cheekbones and the outline of her mouth. She made an odd sound and looked up at him. His eyes were closed and his expression was intent, focused on the sensations coming from his fingertips while he traced again the curve of her lips.
    “You’re smiling,” he said without opening his eyes.
    “It tickles.”
    “Does it?” He ran his fingertip across her full lower lip again. “Is that why you’re holding your breath?” He felt her body tighten as he bent down to her. “Don’t panic, honey,” he whispered against her mouth. “This won’t hurt, I promise. I won’t even hold you. I just want to know if you taste half as good as you fight. Okay?”
    Surprised, caught off balance by the combination of humor and hunger in Cole’s voice, Erin waited for fear to claim her.
    Nothing happened except a delicate, intriguing brush of warmth against her lips when Cole exhaled. A spear of sensation went from her breastbone to her knees, making her shiver.
    “Frightened?” he whispered.
    “I…”
    He waited.
    “After Hans…” she said, then took a deep breath.
    “Afterward, the psychiatrists told me that virgins who had been brutalized the way I’d been nearly always became whores or nuns. I haven’t let a man get close to me in seven years. I don’t know if I can even now. I might panic again.”
    “I’ll risk it if you will.”
    “Will you…be gentle?”
    “What do you think?”
    She looked into the gray eyes that were only inches away and wondered how she had ever thought they were cold.
    “Yes,” she whispered.
    The tip of Cole’s tongue slowly traced the sensitive skin at the edge of her upper lip. At the first touch, she made a small