Page 11 of Offering Herself to Darkness

“I’m ready!” she declared. “I’m going to be the best flower girl ever!”

“I know you will be.” Nora bent down and kissed her daughter on the cheek. “Now let’s go—the music says it’s time.”

“Good luck, doll. You look gorgeous!” Kat kissed her on the cheek and then Nora took her mother’s arm.

“You look beautiful,” her mother murmured as they left the tent. “But honey, it’s not too late. Are you sure you want to do this? I saw that boss of yours out there and he looks so big and frightening!”

“There’s no other way to get help for Anna,” Nora reminded her in a whisper. “I’ll do anything to save her, you know that.”

“I know, sweetheart.” Her mother squeezed her arm. “I’m so proud of you. I just want you to be safe.”

Nora thought of all the bondage porn she’d seen on her boss’s computer and tried to repress a shiver. She hadn’t told her mother the details of what she was going to have to do in order to get Anna seen at the Kindred Mother Ship’s Med Center. She preferred to keep that to herself. But there was no doubt she was definitely going to be paying.

Then her eyes drifted to the black oxygen pack slung under Anna’s arm again and she straightened her spine. Anything she had to do was worth it to save her daughter.

They walked down the aisle to the strains of the Wedding March and she couldn’t help looking up in awe at Commander Xarex, who was standing at the end with the priestess who was going to perform the ceremony. He was wearing a black tux that molded to his muscular body perfectly and his chiseled features were handsome and imposing. Other than his skin and eye coloring, he would have looked like a male model posing for a wedding photo shoot, she thought. It still amazed her that someone who looked like him wanted someone who looked like her.

Anna was also staring at the huge Kindred with wide eyes. When she got to the end of the aisle she just stood there, looking up at him. Nora’s mother had to take her by the hand and lead her to the section they were sitting in because she seemed so transfixed by Xarex.

“Grandma,” she whispered loudly as they got seated. “Why is Mommy marrying a giant?”

Of course, everyone heard her because the string quartet had just stopped playing and there was a muted ripple of laughter from the wedding guests. Some were friends from Nora’s law firm and others were coworkers from the HKR building. There were also a few faces she didn’t recognize at all, which she assumed must be friends of Xarex.

She took her place across from him and the ceremony began.

It went in a blur. The priestess, who had odd, green-within-green eyes and green streaks in her long blonde hair, spoke about the value of marriage and how the Goddess brought men and women together in holy and sacred bonds that must never be broken. Then she got to the vows.

“Repeat after me,” she told Nora.

Nora repeated the words about honoring and cherishing her new husband with a twinge of guilt. She knew this marriage was only temporary and it felt like sacrilege to talk about loving and caring for her big Kindred boss until “death do us part” when it was probably going to last less than a month.

But then it was Xarex’s turn, he shook his head at the priestess.

“If it is permitted, I have written my own vows,” he told her.

The priestess looked as surprised as Nora felt, but nodded her head regally.

“As you wish, Warrior. Please, proceed.”

“Nora,” he murmured, looking down at her from his great height. “I vow to stand by your side for as long as you need me to be there. I will protect you from any danger with my body and guard you with my life. Where you go, I will follow. What you need, I will provide. I vow always to put your pleasure first, before my own, and to do everything in my power to make you happy. Please guide me in the ways of feeling so that I can understand your emotions and act accordingly.”

He held her hands and looked into her eyes as he spoke and Nora found herself unexpectedly moved. Did he really mean everything he was saying? She’d never known him to be disingenuous before, so she assumed he did. Also, his face looked more open than she’d ever seen it.

He was serious yet hopeful—that was the best way she could describe his look. At any rate, he didn’t seem like a big scary emotionless robot at all. Well, he was still big and scary and he did still talk kind of like a robot but the feeling in his deep voice moved her.

“I…I’ll do my best to guide you in the, er, way of emotions,” she murmured, looking up at him. She couldn’t help thinking that he didn’t seem like a man who was just going through a ceremony so he could get sex in the end. He really almost seemed like he cared about her.

The ceremony ended with a kiss and it was the gentlest one they’d shared so far. Xarex leaned down from his great height and Nora stood on her tiptoes until their lips met. A tingle ran through her whole body and she felt almost dizzy for a moment as his warm, spicy, masculine scent filled her senses.

Then, amid the roars of approval and clapping from the wedding guests, she took his arm and floated down the aisle, feeling like she was in the middle of a very vivid dream.

6

NORA

“Mommy, Mommy—I remember where I saw the giant before!” Anna exclaimed, pulling on Nora’s sleeve.

Nora had changed into a less formal dress—a pretty green one that brought out the green flecks in her brown eyes—and was attending the reception which Kat had also set up in the parklands beside the Sacred Grove. The vast rolling meadow-like space was dotted with trees and covered in green and purple grass.

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