The Warrior King (Inferno Rising #3) - Abigail Owen Page 0,123
heartbreak, and she sucked in a sharp breath, but at the same time, the vision she’d had cocooned the pain, making it more…bearable. She turned her head to find her mate watching her with shadowed eyes. He looked as though he’d aged a decade or two, face pinched and haggard. But the emotions radiating at her reflected her own. Grief cushioned by sheer relief and…happiness.
“Sam,” she croaked, throat dry and sore.
“I’m here.”
“I just saw—” She paused and shook her head. How could she explain it? He’d think it was a reaction to the trauma she’d been through.
But she knew, that knowledge settling into her heart like a balm and yet pinning her with an urgency that was undeniable.
He lifted a hand, tracing a finger over her cheek, gaze so tender it made her ache. “What did you see?”
Rather than answer, she leaned over in the bed and placed her lips on his. The need inside her clamored, the ache growing to need at the simple touch, at the sand and fire scent of him in her lungs. The mark on the back of her neck heated and burned, but in a good way.
Samael groaned against her lips, but he took her face in his hands, pulling back gently. “Do you remember anything?”
He thought she’d had the pain of those memories knocked from her? “I remember.” The tidal wave threatened to rush back in. “Make me forget, Sam. Just for a little while.”
She moved to kiss him again, but he held back, though he swallowed hard. “I want to, Mir. You have no idea how much. But…”
“But?” She searched his face, waited for emotions to pelt her.
Except that wall was up. “We have too much to discuss.”
She knew he was right, could feel his need to unburden himself of the emotions he’d been struggling with while she slept. He’d lost a man who’d been as close to him as a father, watched her lose hers all over again, and so much more.
Meira licked her lips. “Tell me.”
“The Black Clan has voted to accept me as king and you as queen. They are aware of our mating.”
She couldn’t get a reading on how he felt about that. “Were they angry?”
“After seeing us both fight and sacrifice for them?” He shook his head. “Most are…welcoming.” At that she did sense a sarcastic edge to his thoughts.
“And those who aren’t?”
He shrugged. “Some will leave, if they haven’t already. Most will stay and wait.”
“I see.” She blew out, long and low. “I’m so sorry. About Gorgon.”
Only a small shaft of blackness pierced the emotions inside him. Guilt and grief all fused together.
She took his face in her hands. “He sacrificed himself for you. Knowing that we’d mated. He forgave you, if he ever harbored any ill will. I’m sure of it.”
Samael nodded again. “I’m sorry about Maul.”
Meira closed her eyes against the slivers of reaction threatening to set in. “My father.” She’d take ages to sort through all that. Right now, all she knew was that underneath her own sorrow and shock was…a grateful heart. “He was with us all that time. Protecting us.” She opened her eyes, tears stinging but not falling, and smiled. “I wish I’d known.”
Sam nodded. He took a few breaths, as though getting ready to speak but not sure what to say. “And us?”
As if she could leave him? As if she ever would. “We’re mates.”
“I left you—”
Didn’t he understand? She lifted her hair from the back of her neck and turned so he could see the mark there. “You figured it out in the end.”
He brushed a finger over the brand, sending shivers of gorgeous sensation skating over every nerve ending.
Then he dropped his hands from her, fisting them on the bed beside her, leather gauntlets, for once, not worn. “You say that, but how can you forgive me? I was going to leave you, die so that you could be another man’s. I—”
She picked up one of his scarred hands and pressed a kiss to the puckered skin. “You were acting like a mate. Protecting me the only way you could see. I understand.”
“You’re amazing,” he murmured.
“Not really. I figured something out through all this…”
Her mate both frowned and smiled at the same time, as though the emotions themselves were battling to take over his face even as the struggle in his heart pressed against her. “What’s that?”