Madre de Dios.
He'd nearly kissed her.
Still wanted to, and the admission - even to himself - was like a sucker punch to the gut. Kissing Dylan Alexander was a guaranteed way to turn a bad situation into something catastrophic. Because Rio knew without a shred of doubt that if he kissed the fiery beauty, it wouldn't stop there.
Just thinking about feeling the press of her lips on his made his blood quicken in his veins. His glyphs pulsed with the colors of his desire - churning in shades of dark wine and gold. And there was no denying the other evidence of that desire. His cock was as hard as granite, and had been since the instant she so unexpectedly laid her hand atop his.
Holy hell.
He didn't dare look back into the bedroom for fear that he wouldn't be able to keep his feet from doing an about-face march through the closed French doors and right into Dylan's arms.
Like she would actually have him, he thought viciously.
That pat of his hand had been a sweet gesture, the kind of "there, there" comfort a mother might offer a pouting child. Or worse than that, it might have been the pained sympathy of a charitable angel consoling one of God's most unfortunate blunders.
Maldecido.
Manos del diablo.
Monstruo.
Yes, he was all those things. And now Dylan had seen how ugly he truly was. To her credit she hadn't recoiled at all the twisted flesh or his fangs, but then she was made of stronger stuff than that.
But to think she might welcome his touch? That she might get close enough to his ruined face to let him kiss her?
Not fucking likely. And he thanked God for that, because it saved him from seeing her disgust. It saved him from doing something really stupid, like forgetting for even one second that she was in the compound - in his private quarters - only until he corrected the mistake he'd made in letting her get close to that cave. The sooner he could do that and get her gone, the better.
A staccato rap sounded on the door.
Rio pulled it open with a growl of self-directed frustration.
"You sounded like shit, so I thought I'd come along with Tess and take a look at you for myself." Dante's mouth quirked into that cocky grin of his as he stood at the threshold with his gorgeous Breedmate close at his side. "You gonna let us in, man?"
"Yeah." Rio backed off to give the couple space to enter.
Dante's mate looked prettier than ever. Her long honey-brown waves were pulled back in a loose ponytail, and her wise aquamarine eyes were soft, even when looking Rio full in the face.
"It's so good to see you," she said, and without hesitation she strode over to him and went up on her toes to give him a quick embrace and a kiss on his cheek. "Dante and I both have been so worried about you these past months, Rio."
"No need," he replied, but he couldn't deny that the concern warmed him.
Tess and Dante had only been together since late autumn of last year; she'd come into the Order's compound with an extraordinary gift for healing and restoring life with her tender hands. Tess's touch held amazing power, but not even she had been able to fix all that was wrong with Rio. He was too far gone by the time Tess arrived. His scars were permanent, both inside and out, though not for lack of trying on Tess's part.
Dante put his arm around his Breedmate in a move that was both protective and reverent, and it was then that Rio noticed the gentle swell of her belly underneath the pale rose tee-shirt and khaki pants she wore. She caught his downward glance and smiled as beatific as the Madonna herself.
"I'm just out of my first trimester," she said, turning all of that glowing love on Dante now. "Someone's making it his new mission in life to spoil me rotten."
Dante chuckled. "I aim to please."
"Congratulations," Rio murmured, genuinely happy for the pair.
It wasn't common for warriors and their mates to raise a family within the Order. Practically unheard of, in fact. Breed males who looked to devote their lives to combat typically weren't the home-and-hearth types. But then Dante never had been one to color within the lines.>When his tongue brushed across the pointed tips of his extended fangs, Rio understood the source of her terror. He stood before her, the vampire he'd told her he was but which her human mind refused to comprehend.
Now, it did.
She was seeing the truth of it for herself, in the physical changes that had come over him and transformed him from scarred madman to a creature out of a nightmare. There was no hiding the fangs that stretched even larger as his hunger for her swelled. No way to mask the elliptical sharpening of his pupils as the amber glow of bloodthirst swamped his vision.
He looked at the small cut, the rivulet of blood trailing down from it so red against the creamy skin of Dylan's cheek, and he could hardly form a coherent thought.