CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
I landed on the ground with a thud. I felt like I’d been hit by a truck. I don’t know how long I lay there in a heap, but I know it was dark and the grass was cool. And something smelled so divine that I just wanted to lie there forever.
“Maya!”
Wait. I knew that voice. Cesar?
“Dios! Liam, Liam! It is Maya!”
I heard a familiar brogue. “Let’s get her to the house.”
Then as I felt myself being carefully scooped up, a voice spoke soothingly to me in Spanish. I moved my head and looked up into Cesar’s black eyes. He smiled down at me and held me a little tighter.
Somewhere a screen door slammed, and then I heard Richard yelling at Damian to go find Matt.
They carried me inside. “Let’s get her on the couch,” Richard said. “Easy, that’s it.” He raised my head enough to tuck a couch pillow under it. “Maya? Can you hear me, Maya?”
“Yes.”
Suddenly Adriana was there, too. “How do you feel?” she asked me. “Should we get Selena?” she asked Richard.
“No, no,” I said. “I’m okay, just…sore. Really sore.”
“That’s probably from hitting the ground,” Richard said, “Do you feel like you’ve broken anything?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
Out of nowhere my soul was hit with a sudden urgency so overpowering that I started to scream. “Matt! Matt!”
“He’s by the outer wall. Damian went to get him. It shouldn’t take long,” Adriana answered.
“No, no, I need him now,” I said, gripped by panic. “Matt!” I tried to sit up, but Adriana was gently pushing me down. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Cesar slip through the sliding door in the kitchen.
“Easy, Maya,” Richard said, “He’ll be here any minute.”
“What’s going on?” she mouthed to Richard.
“It’s the mating call. Being forced apart must be speeding things up a bit.”
“A bit?” Adriana said, holding me down more forcefully.
Then I heard the screen door slam and watched as everyone backed out of the way.
“My?” Matt landed on his knees beside me. “Maya,” he whispered softly, tears running down his face. He laid his head on my chest and I brushed his soft hair with my hand as we cried together. There was a sense of completeness inside me that I had never felt before.
“Come on, everyone,” Adriana said after a minute. “Let’s give these two some privacy.”
Matt raised his head and looked into my eyes. I don’t know how long we sat that way. Then he stood up and took my hand, helping me with my wobbly knees. We walked slowly hand in hand toward the door, still looking into each other’s eyes.
“Matt,” Adriana said.
“No,” Richard said, holding her back. “Let them go. He’ll have her back in time. This may be the only chance they’ll ever have.”
As the door swung closed behind us, Matt phased and waited patiently for me as I got my bearings. I phased and he circled me once before taking the lead. He ran toward the back gate of the compound and jumped it easily. I followed him out, and we disappeared into the lush jungle. On and on we ran. We pushed forward with a wild urgency, barely stopping to rest. I followed him southeast until the moon was high above our heads and I could see the rainforest begin to open up ahead of us. We reached a rocky cliff that looked down on a secluded white sand beach. The dunes lay below Mayan ruins that sat on a high cliff along the water.
Matt made his way down the rock face to the sand and I followed him across the beach to the water’s edge. We had hardly phased back before we were pulling each other’s shirts off. We kissed and cried, our tears mixing together like the salty ocean that lapped at our feet.
“I was so afraid you were dead,” he said, as I caught his tears with kisses, “so afraid I’d lost you.”
“Shh, I’m here now.”
“I love you so much,” he said fiercely, pulling me to him. Then he picked me up and laid me down in the sand. We kissed hard, so deeply it was like we were trying to disappear into one another.
It was overwhelming at first, being able to feel his emotions as well as my own. I got lost in his pain, his urgency, his hunger. But then it only seemed to propel my desire, and something else took over. It was wild, feral, and I couldn’t stop it. I didn’t want to. I raked my fingernails down his back. Matt groaned. We licked at one another’s mouths, pulling at the rest of each other’s clothing.
I arched my back against him, moaning as he kissed me down my neck, my chest, my stomach. As he lay on top of me I could feel how every inch of his hard body fit perfectly into my soft curves. I wanted to roar in ecstasy. I wanted to bay at the moon. When we were finished, he pulled my tangled hair out of my face, his hands framing my cheekbones, and looked into my eyes.
“In Lak’ ech,” he murmured.
“Ala K’in,” I whispered, moving his hand from my face and kissing his palm.
We lay together on the sand, our bodies entwined, and looked up at the stars.
“I know this was our first time,” I said, “But this was…I mean….”
“Yeah, it must be a shifter thing. It was like I could feel you, all of you.”
“Like our souls connected somehow.”
“Feel like connecting them again?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah!”
Afterward, panting, sticky, and full of sand, we decided to take a quick swim to clean off. The water was warm, and as he held me in the moonlight, it looked like the horizon went on forever. I wanted to stay there safe in his arms and never go back. And for a little while, I was able to pretend that we could. I wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed him as he held me close. He tasted like salt and smelled sweet and clean.
Finally, though, we dressed and sat together on the beach, enjoying the last moments we would have together before we had to go back. Matt took my hand and we stood up. He took something out of his pocket.
“Adriana gave me this so I could give it to you.”
I gasped. It was a beautiful silver necklace with seven square plaques held together by chain. Each plaque was a couple of inches long and had a different Mayan glyph carved into it. It was so beautiful. I turned and lifted my hair so that he could put it on me. Somehow, it felt oddly familiar, as though I had felt its weight on my shoulders before.
“It once belonged to a Mayan Elder,” he said. “It’s been passed down by Adriana’s ancestors for hundreds of years. I wanted to give you something, you know, before….” His voice trailed off.
“I love it,” I said. “Thank you.”
“You look like the Mayan Queen that you are,” he said. He took my hand and we turned toward the forest, walking into the unknown, but walking into it together.