“Aww, honey, I love being your hero,” he laughed softly. He reached to frame her face with his hands and brought her teary eyes up to meet his. “Don’t condemn me if I am uncomfortable discussing my sexual predilections with you, or asking you to discuss yours.”
“But if it will help you in any way, Hunter, I would gladly do it. Maybe this time,” she teased gently, “I will be your hero.”
“Anything is possible,” he agreed. “Will you let me think on it? Give me some time to gather my thoughts and questions?”
“A wise idea,” she agreed with a nod before she leaned in to kiss his lips warmly. “You’ve become more careful and thoughtful, I think.”
“You’ve become incredibly gorgeous. Have I told you that?” he complimented her, just to see her blush and preen. He laughed at her, kissing her warmed cheek before turning her away and sending her back to her stool.
As soon as Annali stepped out of his line of sight, Tatyana suddenly appeared within it. Apparently, she’d been standing there for some time, if the expression on her face was anything to judge by. Hunter surged to his feet, holding out a placating hand as he stepped between her and Annali.
“Tatyana,” he warned as her eyes narrowed meanly on Annali. “Take a breath, Tatyana, and think about what you’re doing,” he demanded.
“It’s no use,” Annali said from behind him, tension in her voice. “She can’t overcome a familiar’s jealousy. Not this soon. Trust me on that.”
“Yes, she can. If I can regain control, so can she,” he argued.
“You? What do you mean? You are the master and she is the familiar. You are in complete control,” Annali insisted, looking confused.
“No. Not between us. Now isn’t the time to discuss this,” he said sharply, just as Tatyana growled nastily in her throat and lunged for Annali. He snagged the furiously jealous hellcat by both arms, jerking her back just in time to spare Annie from a set of clawing nails. Annali gasped when the other woman hissed violently, lunging against Hunter’s hold.
“My Lady Goddess, Hunter, I’ve never seen anything like this!”
That got Hunter’s full attention and his eyes widened as he jerked Tatyana back against his body and forced her to be still.
“I thought jealousy was part and parcel of our enhanced connection and hypersexuality,” he demanded.
“Jealousy, yes. This is ... I have no idea what this is,” she exclaimed, gesturing to the other woman. “She’s like an animal, Hunter.” She gasped. “Wait. Did you just say our? Hunter, are you behaving like this, too?” she asked, gesturing to Tatyana. “Uncontrollably emotional? Possessive? Jealous?”
“No ... I don’t know,” he snapped as he struggled to keep Tatyana under his control. She was nearly as tall as he was and her strength was fueled by intense emotion. “I have to get her away from you. We’ll talk about this later.”
With a jerk that whipped Tatyana up off her feet, he hauled her out of the conservatory.
Heat seethed through her mind, painting her vision with the scarlet of congealing blood. Fury rooted around in her gut and rage screamed for release as she bucked in frustration against the hands gripping her arms. She spewed out Russian curses; the very best ones that Rurik had taught her at age twelve, much to their mother’s dismay. Tatyana threw her weight around by kicking her feet up off the floor and wrenching her body. She was being dragged away from where she wanted to be, away from the target of her wrath.
How dare she touch him! How dare that blond witch invite his kisses and laughter and smother him with her own! After what she and Hunter had nearly meant to each other that morning? Was the bitch blind? First she stole Tatyana’s brother’s affections, and now this? She wanted to take Hunter, too? No one could be ignorant of the chemistry between her and Hunter! She’d done it on purpose, the conniving little whore!
“Enough!”
The roar of Hunter’s command penetrated the haze of her mind a moment before his weight crashed hers to the ground, forcing her facedown into a bank of freezing snow. The cold and wet slapped reality at her like a backhanded strike across her face. She was wearing nothing but a thin cotton dress Annali had loaned her. Finding herself suddenly knee-deep in a blizzard had her gasping in shock and horror as every inch of her skin rippled tight in goose bumps and shivers.
The redirection worked. She was jolted completely out of the furious grip of uncontrolled jealousy so foreign to her natural personality. As soon as the snow and ice enveloped her, she completely forgot that jealousy had even existed. All she was aware of was slush and snow soaking into her front, and the heat and weight of Hunter leaning over her back and holding her down into it. The contrasts were just about killing her as she quaked and trembled, trying to speak without screeching.
Then, for good measure, Hunter backed off of her just enough to flip her over onto her back, saturating the rear of her body with ice as well. Tatyana sucked in a staggering breath of absolute shock, her entire body clattering with rough, spastic movements that were more like seizures than shivers.
She was getting really sick of being cold.
Her eyes whipped open and stared up into the new familiarity of Hunter’s snapping blue gaze. “Are you insane?” she gasped up at him, twisting her body to try and buck him off of her. “It’s freezing out here! Get off of me!”
“Not until you cool down,” he contradicted her sharply.
“Cool down? I’m a freaking popsicle! What in hell possessed you to throw me into a snowbank? Are you some kind of kink freak or something? This is demented!”
Hunter’s mouth opened to say something, a look of sheer shock writhing across his expression, before he snapped it shut wordlessly. He reached out to wipe snow from her ruddy cheeks, pushing back the wild streaks of her cinnamon red hair. He looked seriously into her eyes, a frown toying with his lips.
“Are you calmed down now?” he asked.
“I’m always calm! Well,”—she relented quickly when he cocked a brow at her—“discounting fireball attacks, but I think that was understandable under the circumstances!”
He seemed to digest her reply for a moment, watching her warily as if for some kind of trick. Finally, he removed his weight from her body and kneeled over her. He reached out a hand, which she took, and hauled them both to their feet. Tatyana immediately set about brushing off slush and ice as her teeth chattered hard enough to give her a headache.
“Freakin’ snowstorm and a maniac throws me out into it!” she mumbled with vehement outrage.
“Better that than you taking off my friend’s skin five nails at a time,” he retorted.
“What friend? What nails? What in hell are you talking about?”
Hunter drew up short when he felt the realness of her confusion and indignation. She was dead serious. She had no idea why he’d dragged her out there.
“You mean to tell me you don’t remember flying at Annali like you wanted her pretty head on a silver platter?”
His words stopped all of her motion and for a moment her eyes narrowed with that gleam he’d just seen a few minutes ago. “You think she’s pretty?” she demanded.
Uh oh.
Was this blood bond between them really capable of heightening emotion to such an insane degree? Well, if their sexual attraction was anything to judge by ...
“Crap,” he muttered in frustration, running a wet hand through his hair.
Willow Coven could not afford this kind of volatility within its ranks just now. They were already weakened without Gracie, and Asher was still missing in action. Next time, as Braen had warned, Belladonna Coven would be prepared for the fact that Hunter had returned home.
“Tatyana, try and focus, please,” he begged her softly. “Don’t you remember that not five minutes ago you were furiously jealous of Annali?”
She snorted and looked at him like he’d lost his mind.
“I’m not the sort to become jealous,” she declared. “I’m the youngest of thirteen kids. Jealousy was a
waste of time, so I never bothered.”
He could believe that. However, he knew what he had seen. She had the capacity for jealousy, just like everyone else on the planet. She just kept it well hidden. After what he’d just seen in magnification? He’d bet she was more than capable of feeling possessive anger.
“Well, take my word for it. Before you hit that snowbank you were hissing and clawing like a crazed cat.” Hunter wisely avoided reminding her why. She’d walked in on him being affectionate with Annali and it had snowballed into hell having no fury. “Something bizarre is going on with this bond between us, Tatyana. Our emotions and needs are magnified, sometimes beyond our control.”
“Why?” she asked, looking very uncomfortable all of a sudden. This time when she shivered, he knew it wasn’t entirely because of the cold.
“Come here. Let’s go inside before you freeze to death.”
He gestured her forward, but she hesitated. Hunter understood. He’d felt the same way that morning. She didn’t trust herself.
“It’s okay. I’ll be with you and I won’t let you do anything you’ll regret,” he assured her.
Too cold to worry too much about it, she hurried beneath the fall of his arm and let him bring her inside. It wasn’t until then that she realized he’d initially brought her out into a central courtyard, rather than beyond the actual perimeter of the house. It had an exit that led off of one side of the conservatory, but there were also three other entrances so that all four points of the compass were represented, all edged by gardens with a fountain in the center.
Tatyana didn’t bother with any further observations. She was so wet and cold that ice was forming on her hair. Hunter brought her in the door opposite that of the conservatory, the one fully across the courtyard. She comprehended that it was so she and Annali wouldn’t meet, and Tatyana wished she could remember what it was she was supposed to have done and why she’d done it. Try as she might, the memory wouldn’t come back. It made her feel out of her own control, a feeling she didn’t care for. If it was this bad being the familiar of a white witch, how horrid it must be for ...
She could barely finish the thought.
Hunter swept her indoors. She was surprised to find herself in an enormous room, the vast windows on all sides steamed with condensation, an indoor pool sprawling out before her in artful curves. A stone garden at one end framed a centerpiece waterfall tumbling from a height of about fifteen feet. Palms and ferns grew along rock steps at the sides of each level the waterfall struck before it eventually splashed down into the pool. At the opposite end was a large sunken hot tub with stairs leading both to the walkway and into the pool.
The water was bubbling and steaming and that was all Tatyana wanted to know. She broke away from Hunter and ran to the hot tub. She nearly threw herself into the steaming water, screeching when it felt hot enough to burn in contrast to her frozen body.
“Oh yes, yes, yes,” she groaned. “Ouch, ouch ... mmm...”
She looked up when Hunter’s deep chuckle floated down over her.
“Which is it,” he asked. “Yes, ouch or mmm?”
“(D) All of the above,” she told him. “Oh, this is heaven. And hot! I’m half frozen thanks to you!”
“I was just keeping you from doing something you might regret. I’m positive Annali would have regretted it.”
“I don’t suppose you’ll tell me what she did that freaked me out, will you?” she fished hopefully as she floated in a lazy circle around the circumference of the tub.
“No, I don’t suppose I will,” Hunter agreed grimly. “I’m not reminding you just in case you go all Freddy Krueger on her again.”
“Oh, come on! You must be exaggerating,” Tatyana scoffed.
“I never exaggerate.”
He didn’t have to exaggerate. Life, he thought, was intense enough. He watched her bob and dip in the steamy water, her thin dress as ineffective at hiding her figure as the wet silk had been the night before. Annali had loaned her something in simple white cotton and Tatyana wasn’t wearing a chemise or bra at present. Hunter knew this because he was fixating on the dark thrust of her nipples through the now sheer fabric. The temperature contrasts had worked wonders on the rigid tips of her breasts and they were so visible she was as good as naked. Better actually. There was something damned alluring about being able to see her, yet knowing she was still fully clothed.
Hunter was freezing, in spite of the heat climbing up his body and the steam of the room, but he wasn’t as bohemian as Tatyana was. He wasn’t about to plunge in with her sense of instant gratification. She thought nothing of jumping in with both feet. He’d learned at a young age to monitor his every action, reaction, and movement. That was the reason why this screwed-up bonding was especially disturbing to him. Without judgment and reserve to properly manage his impulses, he was afraid of what might happen. Everyone always credited him with remarkable wisdom and control in the face of chaos, but no one knew what that took. No one knew what impulses he had to repress in order to maintain that even keel.
He envied her abandon. He was getting a clearer picture of who this woman was, despite the distortion created by the blood bond. She was courageous and bold, that much was certain. Under those shy blushes lay a vixen who only exposed herself to one she could trust with that side of her nature. The heightened sensuality of the blood bond was bringing it out in spades, stronger as she came to be familiar with him. Much as his urge to seduce her with all the force of his own passion came out when he got close to her. His normal approach would never be so brutish ... so barbaric. He couldn’t seem to help himself, however, and he couldn’t make himself feel regret for his coarse, domineering behavior.
It felt too good.
That was it, Hunter realized. The thoughts and feelings were genuine. It was the impulse control that was damaged, that part of a person that years of experience normally tempered. It was as if it were wiped completely away. They were being taken over by their impulses.
He instantly related the theory to Tatyana.
She was silent and thoughtful for a long minute as she digested the information. She found one of the seats in the tub and settled down, the curtain of her hair skimming on top of the water and fanning out around her. Soon she looked as though she were surrounded by a wine-colored sea anemone. It was the most beautiful sight Hunter had ever seen in his life. She looked like a sea sprite ... or Aphrodite about to be born from the ocean. His entire body clenched with desire, need rooting profound and low and turning him steel hard with want.
God, he thought, I’m never going to survive this.
Not if he had to withstand these kinds of onslaughts every five minutes.
If he didn’t figure out how to ease these assaults on his senses and emotions, he would be throwing her into his bed and using her to exhaustion by the end of the day.
“So you’re saying what we feel is being greatly magnified,” she said.
“Yes,” he agreed, clearing the hoarse catch from his throat. “It is.”
“But the original feelings are real.”
“Yes.”
Tatyana tilted her head slightly, her pretty pale eyes speculative as she ran them with slow, blatant appraisal over his body. She stopped when she spied the rampant evidence of his present feelings and thoughts.
“I see,” she said, a silky, sensual note creeping into her voice. “So if I didn’t like you to start, I’d probably hate you by now and wouldn’t be able to bear the”—she smiled slyly—“the sight of you.”
Hunter had to agree with the hypothesis, because, at the moment, he wanted to reach out and strangle the little tease to death. Or pull her head into his lap. Only the knowledge that she was working under the influence of an enhanced sensual nature saved her from either fate. His hands did curl into fists, however, as he went about forcing himself to resist many more wild impulses.
“That appears to be the case,” he said stiffly.
“I was attracted to you from t
he start,” she mused, standing up in the water and leaning her elbows on the ledge behind her so she could lounge back casually. The material of her wet dress pulled taut across the resulting forward push of her breasts. “So now I find I’m extremely attracted to you. Beyond reason, perhaps. That would explain why I have such incredible urges to strip you naked and ... mmm ...” she paused to contemplate all the possibilities.
Good. Hunter was damn well contemplating them, too, and in about five seconds he was going to do more than just contemplate. The sexy little witch was purposely pushing him. How was he supposed to fight that? Why would he want to?
“I’ve a question, then,” she said unexpectedly, altering his one-track thoughts abruptly. “How can we keep ourselves from hurting others? You said I almost took Annali’s head off. This morning when Ryce told me a joke at breakfast you just about took off his.”
“I did not,” he denied sharply. “I would never be disrespectful to Ryce.”
“Really?” She laughed with an irreverent snort. “Hunter, you told him if he touched me one more time you were going to stab your fork through his hand.”
All flirtation instantly banished, Hunter looked at her completely aghast. Seeing his horror, she clucked her tongue sympathetically. He knew she was telling the truth, even though he had no memory of it. He no more remembered his jealousy than she had, the incidents being repressed for some reason.
“Well, at least I didn’t threaten him with magic,” Hunter said weakly, finding a seat at the edge of the tub. He kicked away his shoes, cuffed his pants up to his knees, and sank his cold feet into the hot water, suddenly needing the small comfort. “That would have been unforgivable.”
“Ah, but you would never think of using magic against Ryce, so you wouldn’t do that. I, however, am admittedly capable of entertaining the thought of scratching someone’s eyes out, though I’d normally resist that impulse.”
“But I’d entertain stabbing a fork through my best friend’s hand?” Hunter shuddered. “Resisted impulses or not, it makes you reevaluate the kind of person you think you are.”