Warriors of Poseidon 04 - Atlantis Unmasked

gauntlet thrown down between the souls of two warriors. She was impossibly young, and yet the knowledge in her eyes was ancient.
     
    Chronological age meant nothing when one had walked voluntarily into the fire.
     
    She didn‟t stop until she stood right in front of him, close enough that he could see the details of the golden specks in the dark amber of her eyes. She tilted her head, her mouth flat and unsmiling.
     
    “Why do I suddenly feel like this is a bad idea?” Her face gave away nothing, but the tip of her tongue suddenly darted out to moisten her lips. A clue. Tiny but telling.
     
    She felt it, too, then. And it was up to him to keep her from retreat.
     
    “It was your idea,” he pointed out. “But I will release you from your challenge if you are afraid.”
    Atlantis Unmasked - Warriors of Poseidon 04
    Page 143 of 314
     
    She lifted her chin, eyes narrowing. “It doesn‟t work on me, you know. I‟m not a child, that a little reverse psychology will pull my strings.”
     
    “Human children have strings? Atlantean children do not, to the best of my knowledge.”
    A sudden hunger flared inside him, biting sharply into his control. The idea of strings had led to the thought of silken cords tied around her delicate wrists and around the carved wooden posts of his bed. Pinning her in place so that he could look his fill of her.
    Touch her. Taste her.
     
    Never let her escape him. Hold her captive . . .
     
    Fantasy trailed off into bitter self-awareness. Hold her captive as he himself had been held captive. Was that truly what he wanted? What he needed? To roll and writhe in the destructive, decadent pleasures of bondage and pain?
     
    Suddenly, he needed to touch her. Needed her strength and purity to infuse the dark and twisted corners that had been seared into his soul.
     
    He caught her face in his hands, wishing they were alone. Wishing he could have captured her startled gasp with his lips. “Grace,” he rasped. “I cannot do this. I cannot banter with you as though nothing lies between us; as though this crouching monster of hunger and need and yearning doesn‟t threaten to burn through my defenses and my self-control. I will play the part you need me to play, but I beg of you, do not toy with me.
    The mask I always wear slips away with you. I am no tamed and defanged predator you can pet and tease. I‟m a man, and I‟m a warrior, and for hundreds of years I have taken what I wanted.”
     
    She stood frozen, her body trembling with an emotion he was afraid to try to name. The sounds of the trainees talking, sparring, and laughing faded to nothing more than a dull buzz in his ears. As he and Grace stood unmoving in a bizarre tableau, and the Atlantis Unmasked - Warriors of Poseidon 04
    Page 144 of 314
    seconds ticked by one after another, underscoring her silence—her utter silence—he felt hope turn to ash inside him.
     
    He should have expected no better. He‟d been a fool to hope. Grace was the descendant of a goddess. She deserved better than a broken warrior.
     
    She deserved better than him.
     
    He let his hands fall from her face and began to turn away, but she caught his hands in her own and stopped him. “What is it that you want?” She sounded breathless as though she‟d been running. But had she been running toward or away from him?
     
    “I want to see you shoot those arrows,” he replied, the vice grip that had been squeezing his lungs loosening a fraction of its hold. “I want world peace, freedom from tyranny, and a very large piece of pecan pie.”
     
    He leaned down until his face was only inches from hers. “I want you.”
     
    And then, because the need was too great, and to kiss her would have been to take her, right there in front of the gods and everyone, he stepped back a pace and unsheathed his daggers. “You mentioned a challenge?”
     
    Grace lifted her chin and took a long, deep breath. Then she slowly removed an arrow from the quiver hanging on her shoulder. “You‟re on, my friend. Dinner is definitely going to be on you, but I‟ll spring for the pecan pie.”
     
    She turned and shouted for Sam to clear the area in front of the targets, and then flashed a seductive smile back over her shoulder at Alexios. “You can go first, if you like. Age before beauty and all that.” Then she started to laugh. “Although I think you‟ve got me on the beauty front as well.”
     
    Atlantis Unmasked - Warriors of Poseidon 04
    Page 145 of