Forever The World of Nightwalkers - By Jacquelyn Frank Page 0,30
bottom lip, sending more of that electrical awareness through some very private nerves inside her. If she accepted what he said, accepted what her very own eyes had just seen, then maybe his touch truly was full of magic. The idea made her shiver, warring with her still-healthy fear of the man touching her.
“I will not hurt you,” he promised her in deep, gentling tones. “You mean too much to us, Marissa.”
The sentence took her breath away. And it wasn’t because his use of alternating personal pronouns was disturbing to her. Well, it was, but that wasn’t what she was reacting to. Was he implying that he had feelings for her? Was she excited by that insane thought? There were thousands of reasons why she shouldn’t entertain or encourage something like that, but what she had witnessed him do to that other person was really all she should need.
So why was her heart leaping with excitement?
“I want to tell you you’re insane. I want to say you are delusional and hallucinatory. Hell, I want to say that about myself. But I know this isn’t a dream. I know what you are capable of is not normal or human.”
“On the contrary,” he argued quietly. “It was the most basic act of humanity you will ever see. A being with good morals and conscience eradicating one without. He was from a sect of Bodywalkers called the Templars. Somehow he must have discovered that we are Menes, the leader of the Politic Bodywalkers. The lawful ones. He was an assassin bent on destroying me, hoping that my death will give them an advantage in the war we fight against his kind. If he had succeeded in killing me Jackson would be dead, and I would have returned to the Ether, trapped there for another hundred years.”
“Why a hundred years?” she asked. Of all the things she should be asking … questioning … it seemed to be the safest choice.
“It is as the gods decide, Marissa. We are powerful as a species, but we are not omnipotent. Far from it. I am not a god,” he said as he gently brushed her hair back with his fingertips. How, she wondered, could a touch be so comforting and disturbing at the same time?
“I don’t want to believe anything you are saying,” she confessed to him fiercely. “I want to be a thousand miles from here and I want to wish I had never laid eyes on you, Jackson Waverly … or … Menes. Whoever you are! I just want you to let me go. Are you going to let me go? Now that I know this incredible secret, are you going to let me go or … or do you have to d-do something to make me not remember any of this?”
“It cannot be done twice, Marissa. The human brain is too fragile to be manipulated in such ways too often. And yes, I would set you free and I would trust you to keep your countenance.”
“I sense there’s a ‘but’ coming,” she said wryly.
“But,” he obliged her, “I believe you would not be saf in the first place. ie unless you were under my protection from now on, Marissa. The creature that escaped has seen you. He will report to his masters about this battle, and part of that report will include you. They will assume you”—he paused with difficulty—“are of importance to me. If I let you go, they would seek you out and try to find a way to use you against me. Whether as a bargaining chip or as a corpse meant to shatter my calm, they will see to it your value is used for their benefit.”
“So you mean just because I was standing next to you I’m going to be a target for the rest of my life?” She sounded angry now, and maybe that was a good thing. She desperately wanted to feel something else other than fear or … or …
“No. Because I protected you. Because I reacted emotionally to you possibly being harmed. That is how they know you mean something to me.” He was touching her lips again, looking at them as though he wanted to use her for his benefit. And the thought made frissons of heat slip through every last vessel in her body. “But I will not let anyone hurt you, Marissa. I promise you that.”
“You can’t. You can’t promise me anything of the kind! You can’t be there every second of