The Passion of Cleopatra (Ramses the Damned 2)

He propped himself up on his elbows. In so doing, he caused the sheet to slide down his broad chest. It was dusted with black hairs she'd been twining her fingers through only seconds before. At first, she thought he was recoiling. But this was not so. He was simply trying to get a better look at her. There was no revulsion in his expression.

"Sick?" he asked. "How can that be when you survived the flames?"

"The very thing which all

owed me to survive the flames...there is..."

"A curse?" he asked. "Is that what it is? Some sort of curse?"

"Yes, perhaps we should call it a curse."

"What would you have me call it?" The anguish in his voice stabbed her. "I would so much rather think of you as an angel. It befits my experience of you entirely."

"I am not, Alex. I am not this thing you call an angel."

"Fine, then. I shall never call you anything but what you wish to be called."

Tears in her eyes at this. Tears that blurred her vision of this beautiful room and this fine, handsome man. He embraced her when he saw them, brought his lips to her neck, enfolded her in his warmth, his luscious mortal flesh.

"I shall seek no answers from you that you are not ready to give," he whispered. "Just, please. Don't leave me again. Please."

Oh, if only she could promise this. But when she parted her lips, her breath left her. She could do nothing but return his embrace. And then a silence fell, a silence filled by the suddenly slow and uneven sounds of his breath. Exhaustion claimed him.

When she realized he slept, she felt suddenly and utterly alone.

She withdrew from him only so far that she could see his face. It rested against the pillow now, next to her own bare shoulder. She reached for his cheek, intending to brush his hair from his forehead, much as he had done to her. And it was then that her fingers shook. And her despair turned to something darker. Something that chased away all sadness, replacing it with the comforting certainty of rage.

She cupped his chin in her hand. Ran her fingers along the delicate line of his jawbone. Felt the hot flush of mortal blood beneath his cheek. Ran her fingers gently along his throat; the veins pumping blood to his now-dreaming mind.

Was he dreaming of a future with her that could never be? A future sure to be destroyed by her coming madness?

What choices did she have in this moment?

To refuse him? Abandon him? Cast him back to the same grief he'd described to her moments before?

Or was it better to snap his neck? One quick movement. That was all it would take. And he would die believing he had attained her forever. He would die loving her. He would die having called her an angel only seconds before.

A mercy for him.

A mercy for her?

Inches from his throat, her hand shook. Her fingers trembled. And at first she mistook the ragged sounds of her own tortured breath for some creature scratching inside the walls.

Was this the fate of all beings, to destroy that which they found beautiful once they realized they could not possess it forever?

It was a sob that threatened to take her now. All her effort was required to choke back the sound as she withdrew from the bed, gently, so as not to wake him, but quickly enough that she could feel as if she were recoiling from the terrible possibility of what she had almost done. Snapping his neck. Ending his life. Claiming to spare him pain by quickly ridding herself of the source of her own.

It was torture now. Torture to be here with him. With his tenderness and his beauty.

He did not wake. And she wanted him to. But she knew it would be harder to leave him if he did.

And then there were sounds outside. She moved quietly to the window and saw men in dark suits emerging from several cars parked along the driveway. They passed the house's front door. Instead they walked in the direction of the lawn where the poisoning had taken place. They were the investigators he had mentioned earlier; they had to be. They'd come back to begin another day's work now that the full day had dawned.

An agony to remain here another moment. An agony she could not endure.

She raced down the steps, found her dress in a puddle on the floor of the drawing room, close to where they'd made love. She had just managed to slip it over her head and smooth it down over her waist and legs when she heard him calling to her. Heard his footsteps hit the floor above.

And so she ran. She ran through the empty rooms away from the lawn where the investigators were gathering. Even as she heard him pursuing her, she continued to run, out a side door and into a manicured garden. She realized now she was close to the path Julie had asked her to walk the day before. Perhaps she could escape using the very same tunnel through which she'd been abducted.