Chapter 44 Elena Heart -POV
I felt myself sinking, the familiar heaviness of limbs surrendering to rest, the distant awareness of my own breathing slowing, deepening, drawing me down into someplace else.
Then there he was.
Xavier. Not the beast, not the small lizard creature, not the shadow-creature that haunted the edges of my waking fears, but the man—the king in his human form, exactly as I'd first seen him in this very chamber what felt like lifetimes ago.
He stood in the doorway, moonlight pouring through the tall windows behind him, silhouetting the powerful lines of his body. Half-naked, dressed only in loose trousers that hung low on his hips, his chest bare and gleaming in the silver light, the scattered scars there like a map of battles survived.
He smiled. That smile—arrogant and knowing and somehow tender all at once, the one that had first unraveled me in this very room.
"We can do this together, Elena."
His voice reached me across the dream-distance, and I felt something in my chest loosen, some knot of fear I'd been carrying without knowing it.
He moved toward me with that predator's grace, all lean muscle and coiled power, and I saw that his eyes—those impossible blue eyes, held the same certainty I'd seen in waking moments, the same fierce devotion that had made me believe, against all reason, that we might actually survive what came for us.
He reached the bed. Stood over me. The dream felt real, too real, the scent of cedar and smoke wrapping around me, the warmth radiating from his skin, the slight roughness of his fingertips as he traced the line of my jaw.
"Xavier—" I started, but he silenced me with a kiss.
And oh, god, his kisses were the same. Exactly the same. That familiar collision of demand and reverence, his mouth hot and demanding against mine, his tongue tracing the seam of my lips until I opened for him with a sound that might have been surrender or might have been relief.
He tasted of wine and something darker, something that belonged only to him, and I found myself arching into the kiss, my hands coming up to grip his shoulders, feeling the powerful muscle there, the heat of his skin burning through my thin shift.
I knew this was a dream. Some part of me, some rational thread still clinging to waking awareness, understood that my body lay elsewhere, that this was the construct of longing and exhaustion and the desperate need to believe in something good.
But his kisses felt real.
More than real—they felt necessary, like water to thirsting, like air to drowning. I moaned against his mouth, the sound vibrating between us, and he answered with a low growl of satisfaction, his hands sliding down to grip my waist, lifting me easily, arranging me on the silk sheets with the confident possession of a man who had memorized every curve and hollow of my body.
"Xavier," I breathed again, and this time his name was prayer and curse and desperate plea all wound together.
He pulled back just enough to look at me, his eyes dark with desire in the moonlight, his chest heaving with controlled breath. One hand came up to trace the neckline of my shift, a single finger dipping beneath the fabric to graze the swell of my breast, and I shuddered at the contact, my nipple tightening painfully, seeking more.
"You dream of me," he murmured, and it wasn't a question. His thumb found my nipple through the thin silk, circling with devastating patience. "Even in sleep, your body calls for me."
I couldn't answer. Could only arch into his touch, my hips shifting restlessly against the sheets, seeking friction, seeking him. The dream had stripped away all pretense of resistance, all the careful guards I'd built around my heart. Here, in this moonlit construct of longing, I was nothing but need and aching, desperate want.
He seemed to understand. His smile softened into something almost tender, though the hunger in his eyes never dimmed. He leaned down, his breath hot against my throat, and I felt the scrape of his teeth, just enough pressure to make me gasp, to send a jolt of electric sensation straight to my core.
"I will taste every part of you," he promised against my skin, his voice a vibration I felt in my bones. "In dreams and waking. In darkness and light. You are mine, Elena. Mine to pleasure. Mine to claim."
His mouth found mine again, and this kiss was deeper, more demanding, his tongue sweeping through me with a possession that made my head spin. I clung to him, my fingers digging into the powerful muscles of his back, feeling the shift and flex as he moved over me, his weight pressing me into the silk sheets with a delicious, inescapable pressure.
When he finally broke the kiss, we were both panting, our breath mingling in the small space between us. His eyes held mine, searching, and I saw something there beyond desire—something that looked almost like fear, like the same desperate need to believe that this connection could survive whatever waited beyond the dream.
"We can do this together," he said again, and this time the words felt like a vow, like a promise etched into the fabric of the dream itself. "Whatever comes, Elena. Whatever they take from us. We find each other. Again and again. Until the end of all things."
I wanted to believe him. In this moonlit chamber, with his body warm against mine and his heart beating in time with my own, I could almost believe that love was stronger than kingdoms, stronger than duty, stronger than the endless machinations of power that sought to tear us apart.
But even as I opened my mouth to answer, to pour my own vows into the space between us, I felt the dream beginning to fray. The moonlight flickered. The scent of cedar and smoke grew faint, distant, like memory dissolving at the edges of waking.
"No—" I reached for him, my fingers grasping at empty air as his form began to blur, to shimmer like heat rising from summer stone.