it again.
If she would allow him to remain near her, he would be a better male.
He wanted to laugh at that.
He wasn’t sure he knew how to be a better male, or that he would get a choice in the matter if he was close to her again and his past hit him and filled his head with lies, making him feel she meant to steal something from him, that she was like the demigoddess. He couldn’t trust any female.
He continued to stare at her back.
That wasn’t true.
He could trust her.
Calindria had done nothing to hurt him, had accepted him when he had been the one to initiate things. She had let him be close to her, had given him something special, and he had been the one who had mistreated her.
“Calindria,” he started as he sheathed his sword and she looked back at him, actually slowed to a halt when she saw he had stopped and there was a great distance between them. “Rest a moment, so we can… talk?”
She looked as if she wanted to say no, but the longer she looked at him, the softer her expression grew, and he knew he was reaching her. Sweet relief washed through him as she turned towards him, as she began walking back to him. Every step closer she came to him, some of the tension cranking him tight inside melted away. Just her presence was enough to soothe him. What power she had over him.
“Talk about what?” She stopped close to him, so near he could reach out and touch her if he were brave enough.
He wasn’t. The thought of her rejecting him was too terrifying. Gods, how she made him weak, but at the same time he felt stronger just for knowing her, felt invincible whenever she looked into his eyes and there was warmth in hers, a shimmer of affection.
“Us.” He croaked that word, swallowed to wet his dry throat, and felt as if he was standing on a precipice and liable to fall, and only death awaited him in the abyss that surrounded him. He sighed and mustered the words, lined them up and checked them twice to make sure he wouldn’t say anything that would cause her further upset. “I am sorry. There are… things… in my past I am not ready to talk about yet. It influences me at times, alters my mood, and I have little control over it. I tend to… You were right about me. I do find it impossible to trust others.”
Her eyes gently leaped between his, her beautiful face softening further as a wealth of understanding dawned in them. “I find it hard, too… but I trust you, Thanatos. You’re the only person I have trusted in almost six centuries… so it hurt when you—”
Her lips flattened and the tears that lined her lashes cut at him, cleaving great gashes in his heart. He risked it, lifted his hand and smoothed his palm along her jaw to her nape and drew her to him. He lowered his head and pressed his brow to hers, let his eyes fall shut as he sighed.
“I am sorry.”
She nodded slightly, her forehead moving against his, and brought her hands up, pressing them to his bare chest. The feel of her palms against him was bliss, the warmth of her touch searing him, branding him with her name. She was the only female who could touch him like this without him growing agitated, without the darkness within him wanting to snarl and lash out to protect himself. Somehow, this strong, beautiful female was slowly taming that side of him.
Replacing fear of her touching him with a craving for her touch.
“I thought perhaps—” She cut herself off when her voice grew tight and he held back the urge to press her to continue, contented himself with holding her to him, feeling her close to him. She sighed. “It is silly… but I felt perhaps you had… lied to me. That you had wanted that female you chased and tried to satisfy your urges with me, but I wasn’t… I wasn’t good enough.”
Those final four words rushed from her, each a blade that embedded itself deep in his heart, cleaving right down to his soul.
Gods.
How wrong he had been.
He deserved more than death for making her feel that way, should be chained in Tartarus for all to whip and laugh at, to kill repeatedly for his sins.
“Never,” he whispered and brought his other hand up, wrapped