Sarah stared up at him raptly as he continued to thrust, grinding against her, driving her pleasure ever upward. Short, dark hair fell over his forehead in wet spikes that dripped cool water onto her every time he thrust. His luminous amber eyes were brighter than she had ever seen them. His fangs had lengthened and peeked out from between soft lips. Heavy muscles bunched beneath smooth skin beaded with moisture.

Sliding her hands down his back, she gripped his muscled ass and urged him on, arching against him as the pressure built and built and built. He felt so good inside her. So hard. Touching all the right places.

She screamed his name as she came, heard her own emerge from his lips on a groan as he followed her over the edge.

Their breath emerged in gasps as the pleasure gradually spiraled downward and a lazy contentment enfolded them. Drawing one of her legs up over his hip, Roland rolled them onto their sides, bodies still joined, and cuddled her close.

By the time she regained enough of her breath to speak, the fatigue brought on by too many days with too little rest and too much adrenaline caught up with her and she drifted into a deep sleep, surrounded by his warmth and soothed by soft caresses.

Chapter 12

“You said earlier that I wasn’t the only woman you’ve cared about that you had found standing over you with a knife,” Sarah broached softly. She had awoken some time ago to the wondrous feeling of Roland’s hands and mouth exploring every inch of her.

It had been slow and sweet this second time, each of them leisurely learning where and how the other liked to be touched, what evoked the most pleasure, until they were once again swept away.

Roland sighed. He was lying on his back with her curled up against him.

“Who was she?”

His hand covered hers on his chest and toyed with her fingers. “There were two,” he confided grimly. “The first was my wife.”

Her heart clenched. While the thought of him with another woman was unpalatable, the knowledge that that woman had deceived him both infuriated and baffled her.

Why would any woman in her right mind want to hurt Roland?

Sarah propped her chin on his chest so she could look up at him, but he avoided her gaze, instead focusing on her hair as he combed his fingers through it.

“Once I escaped the vampire, all I could think about was getting home to Beatrice. Though ours was an arranged marriage, I loved her and thought she loved me. We had known each other since I was sent to foster with her father when we were children and shared a close friendship. Our marriage was a happy one and gave me two beautiful children before I was captured and transformed.”

If his children had looked anything like him, they had been gorgeous.

His lips formed a bitter smile. “They were all so surprised to see me when I strode into the great hall after making my escape. I had been gone for months. Everyone believed I was dead, killed with the rest of my party that day. Those seated around the trestle tables went absolutely silent. At the high table, Beatrice whispered my name and fainted. I thought my brother would, too, so pale did he turn. I didn’t know yet, you see, that he had betrayed me.”

He twined a lock of her hair around one finger. “Edward embraced me, told me how he had searched and searched for me. My wife, once she roused, ran to me, covered my face with kisses and tears of joy. I was such a fool I damn near wept, too.”

Sarah stroked his chest, wishing she could ease his pain, regretting stirring up such bad memories.

“She took me upstairs, bathed me, fed me, made love to me oh so tenderly”—that was hard to hear—“and tucked me into bed. I awoke an hour later to the feel of her plunging a dagger into my chest.”

Shock pierced Sarah. His wife had stabbed him?

Roland met her gaze, his brown eyes full of self-mockery. “She didn’t know what I had become—that I could live through such a wound—and, thinking I was dying, told me all.

“When my brother had returned home shortly after we married, she had fallen in love with him.”

Inside, Sarah cringed.

“Edward loved her as well and the two of them secretly cuckolded me from then on. The son and daughter I adored, she swore, were my brother’s offspring, not my own.”

“Oh, Roland.”

“And it was she who had heard rumors of the vampire and talked my brother into arranging for me to be taken and killed so Edward could have both the title and Beatrice. By returning, apparently hale and hearty, I had ruined everything.”

“So she stabbed you?” Sarah asked incredulously.

“That didn’t work out quite the way she thought it would.”

“I should hope not!” Sitting up, unable to contain the outrage she felt on his behalf, she settled back on her heels, facing him. “I can’t believe she did that to you! That she would even cheat on you, let alone try to kill you! Your brother was clearly an asshole. And even if he wasn’t, why the hell would she want him when she could have you? Was she friggin’ crazy?”

His eyebrows flew up.

“What did you do?”

His gaze turned watchful. “I killed them.”

“Oh.” That took some of the wind out of her sails. “Well. Good then.”

“You don’t think me a monster for doing so?”

“No, I’m a firm believer in an eye for an eye. They tried to kill you … twice … and would have succeeded if you weren’t different. If you had let them live, they probably would’ve tried a third time. As far as I’m concerned, it was self-defense.”

He rested a hand on her thigh. “To be honest, it was an accident. I was newly turned and unused to my increased strength and hungers. The craving for blood is strong in the beginning and I was losing a lot from the hole in my chest. In my rage and pain, I drained her dry before I even realized what I was doing.”

That must have made him feel even worse. “And your brother?”

“When he came to collect my body after she supposedly finished me off, I hit him too hard and fractured his skull. Badly. Because the wound in my chest had not had sufficient time to mend itself completely, healing him would have left me weak and at his mercy, so … I did nothing. I let him die.”

There was guilt there, despite all that his brother had purposely done to him.

Lying down again, Sarah slid over and stretched out on top of him like a blanket. “I’m sorry, Roland.”

His arms came around her and held her tightly. “It was a long time ago.”

“But I can tell it still hurts.”

“Yes,” he reluctantly acknowledged.

“Maybe she lied about the children.” That had probably hurt more than anything else.

“She did. I’m sure of it.”

She looked up at him. “How?”

He smiled. “I told you I was born with special gifts.”

“Yes.”

“Those gifts were passed down to me from my mother, who had similar gifts. My father had none. When my mother died, he remarried and my stepmother bore him Edward and three girls, none of whom were gifted ones.” His smile softened. “My son was born a healer, my daughter with telekinetic abilities. Edward could not possibly have fathered them.”

Clearly he had loved his children. Sarah could almost picture them. A smaller version of Roland, marching around in imitation of the proud papa his pretty sister had wrapped around her tiny finger. She smiled. “What were their names?”

“Thomas and Emma.”

“What happened after …? Did you stay?”

“Yes. I didn’t know where else to go, so I buried Beatrice and Edward in secret and let everyone believe they had run away together. It was very difficult. I was still adjusting to the changes and feared what others would think. I explained my photosensitivity away as an exotic illness I had contracted when my captors shipped me off to the Holy Land.”

She pursed her lips. “Did it work?”

“Some accepted it. Others did not and feared me. Superstition had a stranglehold on many back then.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“I frightened myself at times. After what happened with Beatrice, I worried I might inadvertently hurt the children and was almost afraid to be around them. Then Seth arrived and helped me understand everything better.”

“How did he know who and what you were? That you needed help?”

“I don’t know. He’s so much older than I am, his powers unimaginable. He always seems to sense when gifted ones have been transformed and makes his way to them to help them, teach them, and eventually train them in ways to protect themselves and hunt vampires. If he can’t do it himself, he assigns another immortal to train them.”

She frowned. “Why didn’t he come to you when the vampire first took you? Why didn’t he free you? You were down there for months.”

“Gifted ones are harder for him to pin down than immortals and I didn’t transform completely until right before I escaped. He had sensed I was turning and begun to search for me. But, you have to understand, there were fewer of us back then. So if he passed through an area with a vampire problem, he had to pause long enough to take care of it before moving on.”

“Oh.” Wrapping her arms around him, she hugged him tighter. “I just hate the idea of you suffering the way you did.”

Roland pressed a kiss to the soft hair atop her head and rolled them to their sides. He felt … strange. Lighter, perhaps. As if sharing with Sarah the pain and anger that had pressed down upon him for so long had finally liberated him from it.

Was this contentment he felt, seeping into his very marrow as he twined his legs through hers? It had been so long, he barely recognized it.

With a wondrous sense of peace, he realized he could finally think of his children without their memory being overshadowed by Edward and Beatrice’s betrayal.

“I presided over my home for a decade and was able to watch my children grow to adulthood before people began to notice I wasn’t aging.” He smiled. “Emma became a beautiful young woman, sweet-natured and generous. Thomas was nearly as tall as I am and so handsome the girls all fought over him. Both of them were incredibly bright. I could not have been more proud. Thomas was an immensely powerful knight and earned his spurs a year younger than I did,” he boasted. “He had such honor within him, was so like my father.”