Air Bound (Sea Haven/Sisters of the Heart 3)

She shrugged. "If they come in, you have the advantage and they know it. Right now, they can't just spray the room with bullets because they'll hit Theodotus as well as me and their own men. We've got time . . . unless you're too chicken to lose to a woman."

"I won't lose."

"I hear you talk, but talk is cheap, buddy. I happen to be the champion dart player four years running at my school. No one could beat me."

He rolled his shoulders, loaded a smaller dart gun with empty darts and indicated the target. "You first. Let's see what you've got."

She stood up gingerly, but there was determination on her face. She lifted the gun and squeezed off three shots rapidly. It was a good grouping and he was impressed. There was no recoil on the small dart gun the way there was on a pistol and she had a steady hand, a good eye and true aim. He had no doubt that she'd hit what she was aiming at.

Maxim stepped back, crowding her so she couldn't accuse him of having any advantage. He took careful aim and slowly began to squeeze the trigger. Her hand slid up the back of his thigh to his buttocks, the lightest of brushes, but it nearly stopped his heart. His cock jumped and then swelled in response. He barely managed to stay his shot. The woman was one hell of a distraction. He'd spent months learning to condition his body against just such things and she blew his training out of the water. Training was everything.

"That was so unfair."

"I'm helping you," Airiana said, her smile just a little too complacent. "I wouldn't want anything to distract you when we're out on the deck fighting for our lives. I noticed you sometimes get a little sidetracked."

"You did, did you?" He turned fully to her, allowing his gaze to fall into hers. Distractions were bad in most cases, he'd learned that, but sometimes one just had to go with the flow.

He wrapped his free arm around her and dragged her into his body, his hand sliding down her back to shape her bottom, pressing her into him. She just seemed to melt, until he wasn't certain where he began and she left off. He wanted to be skin to skin. Inside her. Surrounded by her.

He brought his mouth down hard on hers, wanting to devour her. Needing the taste of her. There was such a brightness in her. She made him feel alive. Worse, happiness had found him. There was a part of him that was alarmed over her hold on him. She was making him more vulnerable by the moment. When he kissed her, he never wanted to let her go.

He kept kissing her, over and over, until neither of them could find air to draw into their lungs. Only then did he lift his head and look down at her face. She reached up with one hand, trembling fingers tracing his lips.

"I don't want you to die, Maxim," she said softly. "I know you've accepted death, but don't let it happen here. Or after you bring me home and go on your way. I think you're a good man, and the world needs you. Don't throw your life away because someone powerful decrees you're of no more use to them."

"Is that what you think I'm doing?"

She nodded slowly. "I don't think it's a conscious decision, but in your mind, you want to protect the people you love. In order to do that, you think you have to die. They made you believe that, right from the beginning. They separated you from your family and then held them over your head. To this day, after all that training, they're still doing it. All of you are lethal, and yet, to protect one another, you stay away from each other. Don't let them dictate to you anymore."

He studied her face. She believed what she said, and there was truth to her statement. He couldn't pretend there wasn't. He followed orders to keep his brothers safe. He refused to even consider the idea of staying with her in Sea Haven, no matter how strong the lure was, because he didn't want her in danger.

"Just please think about what I've said?" Airiana asked.

"I will."

"You know when I go home, this Evan Shackler-Gratsos will send someone else after me, don't you?"

He'd thought of that. But Lev and Stefan were there. They'd be alert to the danger now. He knew no one would get onto that farm without their knowledge. Still, if he was there as well, it would guarantee that no one would get to her. And there were the children.

"I've been giving that some thought. Staying until the threat has passed would also allow me to help you with those kids," he said.

She shook her head. "That's not what I was trying to say, Maxim. All four of those children have fixated on you as their safety net. If you come back to the farm and stay, even for a few days, they'll count on you more than ever. They've lost their parents and their sister. They've been abused and traumatized. I don't know if the best thing for them would be to think you'll always be there for them and then to lose you too."

She was basically telling him once he delivered her to the farm, he could leave. That anger, always buried deep, surged through him. She had awakened something in him he thought long dead, left him naked and vulnerable, and now she was going to decide whether or not he could be around her.

"I don't think you have a say in the matter of whether I decide to stay or not," he snapped, and turned away from her.

12

AIRIANA watched Maxim slam the loaded darts into the small gun before handing it to her. She could feel his anger seething just below the surface, but she knew he would never let it out. Still, she was right. The children had been through so much already, and if he stayed for a few days, even if it was to protect her, they would cling to him rather than transferring their dependence and trust to her.

"I have to do what's best for the children," Airiana said, slipping the gun beneath her shirt, into her belt.

"How the hell would you know what's best for them?" he demanded. "You have no idea, you just think that you do."

"Maybe you're right," Airiana admitted. "I haven't gone through the things they have, although my mother was murdered as their parents were, but there are others living at the farm who have had nearly the same experiences. They'll help. I also know an amazing counselor. I'll do my best to see them through this."

"You'd make a lifetime commitment to children you barely know?"

Airiana lifted her chin. There was disbelief in his voice. "You don't have to believe me, Maxim. Only they do. I was willing to give you a lifetime commitment, remember? I believe I can help those children. At the very least I can give them a safe place where people will love and protect them. I may have my issues, but I'm capable of real love and real commitment."

"Unlike me."

"I didn't say that. I didn't even think it. I'm not about to second-guess your motives. You saved my life and you've protected and taken care of me throughout this entire ordeal. You saved those children. You could have taken the easy way out, but you didn't. Clearly, when you give your word, it means something."

Airiana allowed herself a brief moment just to drink him in. She was walking out the door in a couple of minutes and putting her life on the line for this man. Didn't he see that she believed he was worth it? He didn't know he was--but she did.

She saw beyond the scars and his rough, unsmiling face. He was beautiful in a purely masculine way, a dark, brooding man with a perpetual five-o'clock shadow and shaggy hair she always wanted to tame. Mostly, he was lost. He didn't realize he was lost, but she saw that he was.

Maxim Prakenskii was so busy protecting everyone around him that he had given up on himself. He clearly felt he had sinned one too many times, and there was no redemption as far as he was concerned. She wanted to gather him into her arms and hold him close, just as she'd wanted to gather those children to her.

"Stop looking at me like that." He nearly growled the order, his eyes darkening, the heralding of a turbulent storm.

She sent him a small smile. "You can't stop me from looking at you, Maxim. You can't control everything around you, especially me. I look at you because I enjoy it. I see the man you refuse to see. I'm not afraid of either of you, because you're one and the same."

"Damn it, Airiana, you're messing me up."

> "I can't help how you feel, Maxim, any more than I can help how I feel." She watched him preparing for battle, shoving guns and knives and ammunition into loops on his belt. His features had gone grim and he looked lonely.

"Maxim." She said his name softly, insisting he look at her.

His breath hissed out in a long, irritated rush.

She met his stormy eyes. "Unlike you, I don't want to die and I'm very afraid. But I'd much rather go out there, knowing if I do, you have a chance to stay alive. You matter. If you don't to anyone else, you do to me."

He swore again, and took a threatening step toward her. She didn't move, but her heart accelerated. Not out of fear--she knew with every cell in her body that Maxim Prakenskii would never hurt her--but because she knew he was afraid. Not of the men with guns, or dying out there on the deck, but of her. Of wanting her so much. Of wanting the life she could give him that he no longer believed in.

"I won't hurt you," she said softly. "I'd never hurt you."

He caught the front of her shirt in his fist and yanked her close to him, his icy eyes suddenly blazing with fire, a blue flame of exquisite heat. "You have to stop. I can't do this, any of this, if I feel anything. You can't make me feel. If I loved you and then lost you . . ." He shook his head. "I can't do that."

"I know. I'm not asking you to," she replied patiently, refusing to look away from his stricken eyes. He didn't even see that he was too alone. Or that she already mattered far too much. "I just wanted you to know how I felt about you."

He kissed her hard. She tasted desperation. She tasted love--she knew she did. He could deny it all he wanted, but there, in his kiss, he was honest with both of them. She poured everything she felt for him into her answering kiss, giving herself up totally to him, without reservation. It might be the only time she ever gave herself that way, and she did it wholeheartedly, kissing him as if it were her last and only time with the man she loved.

Maxim's body trembled, a strong, invincible man. All muscle. All power. He trembled for her. She kissed him over and over, melting into him, wanting to let him know that once--one time in his life--someone had loved him. What she felt in that moment was absolute love. He was . . . extraordinary.