“Hey!” Sarai protested but stopped when he smiled.
“A tactic that might save your life. Never apologize for doing anything it takes to stay alive. Even if it’s against me.”
Sarai lay in her bed where she stared at the white ceiling above her head, unable to pull her mind away from the enigma that was Zac Montclair.
After their sparring today, there had been a moment when the air had thickened with a combination of adrenaline and bare skin and need. They’d stared at each other. She had waited for him to make a move, could see the desire dark in his eyes. Hell, she could see the physical evidence he couldn’t hide. He wanted her. Just as much as she wanted him, she was willing to bet. But he’d shut down, a shutter blocking his emotions from her view, then he’d walked out.
The graphic image of the two of them together that she’d been seeing for months was burned in Sarai’s mind. She was finished denying herself what her gift told her would be unimaginable pleasure. She had no idea what was holding Zac back at this point. He had kissed her. Not often, and never for long. Nonetheless, he had kissed her. Then there were small signs. A glance. A gesture. A brief, heart-stopping touch.
Even more than that, Sarai knew Zac’s bedroom in this apartment was the location of her vision of the two of them together. She’d recognized the black sheets, comforter set, and mahogany furniture the first time she’d seen it.
Her visions were
not
changing…and she was done waiting.
Sarai tossed her covers back and hopped out of bed. She removed every stitch of clothing, then covered herself with a flimsy robe. With quiet purpose, she let herself out of her room, made her way the few doors down the hall to Zac’s, and let herself in. She closed his door behind her with a soft click. Then she made her way to where he slept. She’d sort of expected him to wake up when she entered the room.
Dang.
Sarai bit her lip as she decided what to do next.
With a small shrug, she untied her robe, letting it drop to the ground where it pooled at her feet. She was very glad now that she taken the time tonight to shave, buff, and lotion. She’d even given herself a mani-pedi. Hell, she’d even plucked her eyebrows and whitened her teeth. Zac Montclair was going to get the sexiest version of her she could deliver. He damn well better appreciate it.
With careful movements, she lifted up the sheets and slid into the bed beside him. His back was to her. Heart thundering, breath rushing, and heat already pooling low inside her, Sarai lifted a shaky hand.
But before she could touch him, she suddenly found herself flat on her back with her arms trapped above her head and an angry polar bear shifter pinning her body to the bed.
Make that a very naked angry polar bear shifter,
she thought as a low growl ripped from his throat.
Sarai gasped at the raw fury in his expression. She knew her wrists would be bruised tomorrow from the tight grip used to hold her down.
“Zac,” she said his name softly. “It’s Sarai.”
Recognition dawned. “Sarai?” he choked.
A series of emotions chase themselves across his face. Confusion. Guilt. Lust. That brief blaze of desire had Sarai’s heart hammering both with an answering need and with hope. The hope faded as his desire was replaced by denial.
Zac released her wrists and rolled away. He sat at the edge of the bed, his feet on the floor, his back to her. “Sarai? What do you think you’re doing?”
She bit her lip, tempted to scurry away in embarrassed defeat. But damned if she was going to let his overblown sense of honor, or whatever it was holding him back, stop her now.
She moved to her knees behind him. Reaching out, she trailed her fingertips down the muscles of his arms. “I should think that’s obvious,” she murmured.
“Well, whatever you think is going to happen, it’s not. You’re under
my
protection. I won’t take advantage of you.”
“You’re not. I’m taking advantage of you.” She scooted closer, laid her lips on the place where his neck and shoulder met. She breathed in the male scents of pine and spice.
Zac dropped his head into his hands. “Fuck,” he muttered.
Sarai moved in closer, letting her bare breasts touch his back, and wrapped her arms around his chest from behind. “I was thinking more making love, but that’s the general idea.”
Inwardly, Sarai was shocked at her own audaciousness, but nothing had ever felt this right. A sense of womanly power rushed over her as she felt a tremble move through his body. She could hear his breath coming in short pants.
Still he remained rigid, resistant. With a deep breath, Sarai tried one last thing. Moving off the bed, she knelt on the floor in front of him. She took his face between her hands and looked him straight in the eyes, letting him see everything she wanted in her expression. “Please,” she pleaded. “Please, Zac, make love to me.”
Before she knew what was happening, Sarai found herself where she’d been only moments earlier. Flat on her back with what appeared to be an angry polar bear above her. He took her lips like a man parched, and Sarai gave herself up to him with complete abandon. She reveled in the sensations he pulled from her body with just the touch of his lips and tongue.
Abruptly, he pulled back. Disappointment whooshed through her. He wasn’t going to let this happen. She could no longer hold his gaze, dropping her own to the region of his chin.
“If we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it right.”
Sarai jerked her eyes back to his to find desire blazing down at her.
“This isn’t just some one-night stand,” he continued. “I want to learn every inch of this delectable body. I want your hands, your mouth, on every inch of mine. We’re going to go slow. We’re going to take all night…And this thing between us doesn’t stop in the morning. You do this, and you’re mine.”
Fire lit a trail through her blood as his words fizzed through her. All Sarai could do was nod.
Zac shook his head. “Say it.”
She knew what he wanted. “I’m yours,” she whispered.
Her words seemed to snap something inside him. “Ah, honey, you don’t know what you do to me,” he groaned. “If you’re mine, I sure as hell am yours.”
Then he shocked her as he entered her with one long stroke. She was so ready for him, that all she felt was full, complete.
A growl rumbled deep inside him. He buried his face in her neck, trying to control his breathing.
“Sorry,” he groaned. “I know I said slow, but…I
can’t
. We’ll take it slow on the next one. I promise.”
“Hey,” she whispered softly.
Zac levered up to look down into her eyes, releasing her hands as he did.
She took his face between her hands. “Don’t
ever
apologize for wanting me.” Then she leaned up and placed her lips over his in a tender kiss full of sensual promise.
As their lips touched, he started to move. The sensations layered together, building fast. He kept kissing her until the last moment, then stared deeply into her stormy blue eyes as they both rode the crest of their passion together.
As they came down from the high, he kept kissing her, slow and sweet. He moved to lay on his side, dragging her body in close to his so he could wrap his arm around her middle.
She felt soft kisses in her hair, on the back of her neck.
“Mine to protect,” he whispered. She stiffened slightly, then relaxed as he ran a hand over her shoulder down to her hip. “And now mine to hold. Mine to kiss. Mine to make love with.”
Sarai hummed her approval as she floated into a sleep made pure by utter contentment and a sense of true belonging.
Sarai ran her fingertips lightly over the keyboard then started playing a nocturne by Chopin that had always been one of her favorites. Many might say it had a melancholy sound to it. However, Sarai had seen the 1943 version of the movie
Phantom of the Opera
, and Susanna Foster had sung this tune. After hearing that, Sarai had always thought of it as the musical expression of love.
Love…was that what she was feeling? Her visions, and last night together, had her all mixed up. She knew one thing for absolute certain though—Zac made her feel happy and protected—even if that was an illusion. She was pretty sure she did the same for him. Not that he said.
Her fingers faltered on the keys, slowed, then stopped altogether. Sarai didn’t even notice as George looked up from his newspaper. She was focused on the pictures in her mind as a new image formed.
A baby? With blond hair and dark brown eyes. Then later…a little girl, giggling and laughing. Still further down the years, a spindly teenager with long, coltish legs. And, even later, a beautiful woman, proud and strong. She couldn’t see what animal her child would be able to shift into, though polar bear was most likely as it was the more dominant species. Nor could she see whether or not her little girl would be a Seer, though she hoped not. All she could see was the child.
“Hey there, darlin’. You don’t get to faint on me. I don’t handle faintin’ women well.”
George’s gruff voice brought Sarai back from wherever she’d gone. She opened her eyes, stunned to find she was lying on the floor beside the piano.
“Ouch,” she mumbled as she realized the back of her head was throbbing.
George let out a breath. “Welcome back.”
He helped her to sit up.
She rubbed her head as she looked at him. “What happened?”
“Well…you were playing the piano, stopped, stared into space for a moment as you do now and then. Then your eyes rolled back into your head and you keeled right over.”
Sarai frowned. “I’ve never fainted from a vision before.”
Then again, she’d never pictured her own child before either.
Sarai’s eyes popped open as that realization struck.
Ohmygod. Ohmygod. Ohmygod. Am I pregnant?
“Are you okay?” George asked. “I don’t like how pale you are.”
Sarai didn’t answer right away, too busy searching through her visions. She sagged in relief. She wasn’t pregnant. Phew. This would be the worst possible moment to add that particular complication into the mix.
But after the relief came the joy. She was going to have a baby. Soon by the looks of things, within the next year. Zac’s baby. Sarai squealed and wrapped her arms around George in an ecstatic hug.
“I’m great, George. I’m better than great, I’m—”
Another realization hit. Neither she nor Zac were in any of those visions. Would he even be alive to see their child? Would she?
She looked at George with eyes swimming in tears. “I think I just need to be alone for a bit,” she choked.
In a daze, she rose to her feet and went to her bedroom. Once the door was closed behind her, she lay down on her bed and tried every trick she knew to trigger a vision and change the future.
Her daughter was going to have a father, dammit.
****
Zac let himself into the apartment, takeout bags in hand. Just in case someone was watching, he’d been picking up takeout every night. Harder to tell from a takeout bag how many people were being fed and no delivery boy to bribe for the information. Tonight was Chinese.
He found George in the living room, watching reruns of
Supernatural
. He switched off the TV when Zac entered and got to his feet.
“You might want to check on Sarai,” he said without preamble.
Zac dropped the bags of food onto the kitchen counter. He’d had a trying day. Since they were still in New York, he was taking advantage of that and meeting with his team of financial advisors. His ancestors had been very smart about how they’d gained land and built on it, but also about how they’d invested in other ventures such as oil, shipping, and more. It had netted them quite a bit of wealth, cumulatively in the hundreds of millions, over the years. No one would know it to look at their simple Inuit village.
However, it required a lot of savvy business decisions and important focus on a lot of different industries. Normally, Zac deferred to Oliver and his other men who were much smarter than he was in this arena, asking them to keep him informed. He’d stayed in contact with Oliver, but Zac, not Oliver, was the face of the tribe as well as the decision maker. He’d been putting this off, at least what he could, while he was with Andie and the Keller Dare in Idaho.
“What’s going on with Sarai?” he asked as he started to unload the food.
“First she passed out, then when she came to, after running through a gamut of emotions, she locked herself in her room. Hasn’t come out yet.”
Zac jerked his head up at the words
passed out
. By the time George got to her locking herself in her room, he was already across the apartment and down the hall.
He paused at her door, tamping down on the urge to bust it open. She’d been fine this morning when he’d left her. A tad shy maybe, but she’d smiled, kissed him goodbye. This couldn’t be about what had happened between them last night. Could it?
He knocked. “Sarai?”
“Come in.”
Okay. She was speaking, inviting him in. Couldn’t be that bad, right?
When he entered the room, Zac came to a screeching halt. Sarai sat in the middle of her rumpled bed, knees drawn up to her chest. By the look of her swollen eyes and tear-streaked cheeks, she’d been crying. But as soon as she saw him she delivered a glowing smile.
Had it been anyone else, Zac would have backed out and left her to it. But it was Sarai. Without thinking, he hurried across the room and onto the bed, where he pulled her into his arms. They sat like that for some time.
“Want to talk about it?” he finally asked.
Sarai snuggled deeper into his embrace. “I had my first vision when I was not more than five years old.”
She seemed to be gathering herself to say more, so Zac stayed silent.
“The first time I had a vision, I watched my father as he was ripped to shreds by another male mountain lion who wanted to claim my mother. Not that I understood most of the motivations until I was much older. Nor could I describe it in any way that made sense to my parents.”
She tipped her head to look at him. “As far as we know, there has never been another Seer in our family line. My mother thought I was just having nightmares. It’s supposed to be genetic.”