Page 48 of Dark Desire
“What? No! What is wrong with you?” I shouted, fighting with all my might to pull my hand away, but he was so fucking strong. The blade sliced against his throat in our struggle and as more blood started trickling down his throat, panic set in. “Zoran! Stop this! I don’t want to kill you!”
His other hand snapped up and wrapped around my throat almost tenderly and he pulled me towards him. I stopped fighting at the look in his eyes. They stormed with so much chaos, so much sorrow and hurt. I found tears springing to my eyes.
“Please,” he begged softly, his voice sounding so broken that it fractured something deep in my chest. “I can’t live with myself for what I’ve done to you. What I’ve put you through this past week. The only thing I can give you is your life back. Be free of me.”
I slipped off the bed onto the floor with him, kneeling in front of him as I grabbed the back of his head with my free hand and pulled it down until his forehead was resting against mine. “I don’t want to be free of you, Zoran. Hurting you will only hurt me. Punishing you will only punish me. Don’t you understand? If you don’t want to hurt me anymore, let go of the knife and talk to me.”
He closed his eyes, rolling his head against mine as his face scrunched up with anger and suffering. “Nothing I say will ever excuse what I’ve done to you. I tried to ruin your life. I taunted you. Scared you. Hurt you. Degraded you. Humiliated you. I tried to fucking kill you, Darcelle. Multiple times. I was so fucking lost in my rage, in my revenge, that I didn’t see the truth. I didn’t fucking ask for it.”
“Yeah.” I smiled a little, my fingers tightening in the back of his hair. “That all fucking sucked, I’m not going to lie. But I don’t blame you for it. You thought I was one of those twisted witches who tried to burn you alive. You thought I cursed you and left you to suffer in a trapped form for centuries.” I brushed my hand down the side of his face, forcing it back from mine until he opened his eyes. “You thought I didn’t want to be your soulmate. I forgive you, Zoran.”
He shook his head as a single tear escaped one eye and fell to the floor. I pressed my lips into a thin smile, trying to hold my shit together.
“Don’t forgive me. I’m evil. I’m a villain in your story.”
“Well, I do forgive you, so tough shit,” I argued with just as much anger in my tone to match his. His grip on the dagger loosened and I pulled it away from his throat. “Because yes, you did those things, but let’s not forget that you also protected me. You saved me from that seeker. You fought that demon. And even though you had the chance many times, you didn’t kill me. You couldn’t do it even when you thought I was some heartless, psycho bitch. That proves to me that you’re not evil at all.” I cupped his face with my hands as I stared into his pained eyes. “You aren’t the villain in my story, Zoran. Far from it.”
He let go of the dagger completely and wrapped his arms around my back, crushing me to his chest so hard that I almost couldn’t breathe. I threw the dagger across the room and buried my face into his shoulder as I hugged him back. Just the sheersize of him, the strength he exuded and the deliciousness of his manly scent made me feel so safe and protected in his arms. Yes, he’d been an ass. But I just wanted to start afresh. Who knew how long I had with him, and I wanted to make every second count.
“I’m so fucking sorry,” he grumbled into my hair, squeezing me tighter. “I will spend every day for the rest of my life making it up to you.”
I closed my eyes. “You don’t have that long, I’m afraid.”
He tensed. Releasing me from his embrace, he pulled back to stare at my face with concerned confusion. “What do you mean? I thought…you said you wanted me as your–”
Realising where he was going with this, I grabbed his huge biceps as I quickly reassured him, “I do! I do want you as my soulmate. It’s not that. It’s…” I glanced down. Oh. We were both still naked. And the sight of…that was rather distracting. And I was extremely sore, so we really needed to remove temptation. “I think we should put some clothes on before we have this conversation.”
He swallowed, his eyebrows furrowing, but nodded anyway and helped me stand. I walked over to my wardrobe and grabbed some comfy sweats while he tugged on his jeans. He remained shirtless, and honestly, I was grateful. He was too damn hot to cover up completely. When we were both more decent, I climbed onto my bed, sitting cross-legged as he stood uncomfortably in my room.
“We both have a lot of questions. So come here. Let’s get to know each other.” I patted the bed when he still didn’t move, and his eyes narrowed before he turned and zoomed out of my room and down the stairs with his vampire speed. The front door banged against the wall as he flung it open. What the actual fuck?
Before I had time to react, he was back. I blinked with surprise to see him holding a bunch of hand-picked wildflowers from the forest. He stepped up to the bed.
“Zoran Ambroz Nezera,” he said, his deep voice sounding as smooth as whiskey. A slow, beaming smile spread across my face when he held the flowers out to me. Oh. My. Goodness. So. Freaking. Cute.
“Darcelle Knightsbridge,” I replied, taking them from him and inhaling. “But I was born as Darcelle Raine.”
He lifted his chin a little with a small smile. “I’ve waited nearly five centuries to meet you, Darcelle Raine.”
My mouth dropped open. “Five centur— Wait! That’s how old you are?”
He nodded and sat on my bed in front of me, placing his enormous hand on my thigh. “Fucking hell! Talk about an age gap! I’m only thirty-six!”
He chuckled. Not one of his dark, intimidating chuckles I’d heard before. This one was light. It floated and kissed my skin with phantom affection, making me warm and fuzzy. I grinned at him. I couldn’t wait to see all sides of him, especially this side. My smile faltered when that nagging, depressing reminder that I might not get the chance returned. He squeezed my thigh when he noticed the change in my demeanour. “If it bothers you, we can ignore the three centuries I was a raven and pretend I only have a hundred or so years on you.”
I scoffed, shaking my head. “It doesn’t bother me.” I sighed and placed my hand on top of his, pausing the soft caresses he was giving. “I guess I should start from the very beginning so you can understand who I am.”
He inhaled deeply and shifted on the bed, leaning down on his elbow to make himself more comfortable. I braced myself before speaking about my past. It had been so long since I had, and I wasn’t sure what emotions it was going to stir in me. I flickedmy wrist and commanded my magic to pull out my keepsake chest at the bottom of the wardrobe. It floated towards me and dropped down on the bed between us. I did the same with the floorboard where I kept the box of photographs but frowned when nothing came through the floor.
“Oh, I, er, I found that one already,” Zoran muttered, giving me an apologetic look as he jumped off the bed. He left the room again with that vamp speed and came back holding my box of photographs. “Last night after we, um–”
“Had hot hate sex?”
“Yeah.” He rubbed his chin as he sat back down. “I found it and left because I was so confused. I showed my brother and friend because I didn’t know what to think of it all and—”
“You’re friend Leif? I met him last night. And you have a brother?” I honestly thought he was the only survivor from that fire.
“You met Leif?”
