“Come here.”
* * *
RAINE
Raine hurried away from the bed, keeping wary eyes on the animal. Creeped out by the way its eyes followed her without moving its head, she situated herself next to Skars where it remained in her eyesight.
“This is the drawing Reva’s sister gave her for me before she told me that I wouldn’t have a tru-mate.”
Taking the picture from him, she looked down at the drawing. She was puzzled by the picture, which was blank other than the charcoal color of the paper itself on both sides. The charcoal color appeared to have been applied to both sides of the paper. She could have drawn the same picture in pre-school once she had learned to use a pencil, to smear the lead onto the white paper. This picture showed none of the amazing drawing technique Reva’s sister had shown on her other drawings. Having no idea how a blank drawing was supposed to prove what point Skars was trying to make, Raine started to hand it back to him.
“I don’t understand how this proves an—”
As she started to hand it back, she stopped as the light hit the side that was facing up. Pulling the simple charcoal picture closer to her face, Raine peered carefully, able to catch the faint image the charcoal had been swirled over. Okay, she might not have been able to draw this in pre-K.
She shook her head; she had to be mistaken. There couldn’t be an image of her in a swirling grey mist.
Bringing the picture closer to her eyes, she saw tiny lines and dots going in different directions, creating different patterns within patterns. Different shades of gray had also been used, some darker than others. The amount of time spent on the drawing showed the mastery of the artist’s skill. Turning the paper over, she saw Skars’ image cleverly hidden, as hers had been.
Skars took her hand and placed it on his tattoo. “If you believe you can see the beginning of a new tree growing on my chest, then why can’t I believe this is you in the picture?”
She understood what Skars was trying to explain to her. What message Reva’s sister was conveying to her from galaxies away. She and Skars not being tru-mates was only one side of the picture. That part wasn’t important to the whole picture. What mattered was, if they searched for and found the intrinsic qualities which made tru-mates form an everlasting bond to each other, then it didn’t matter if they couldn’t see the proof on the outside of their bodies in the form of a mark; when the feelings they felt for each other marked their souls underneath.
“In her vision, we’re tru-mates,” she whispered.
“Já. When I touch you, I”—Skars pressed her hand more firmly down on his chest, over his heart—“I feel it here.”
“I do, too.”
Raine couldn’t hold back her joy-filled sob. Their not being tru-mates had been nagging at her; every insecurity that she had dealt with her whole life because of her size and looks had preyed on her that he would drop her when his tru-mate came along.
She hadn’t had the courage to believe he could truly love her the way she loved him because, if she did, it left her vulnerable to all the pain she had experienced from others. She was safe in her own little world of make-believe, so why chance heartache if you don’t have to?
Carefully laying the drawing on his chest, she looked back to where her hand was held underneath his.
Because make-believe could never live up to reality, despite how cleverly crafted love and pain have to be experienced to understand how they feel.
Her free hand went around his waist so she could fit herself snugly against him. “I finally get what you’ve been telling me, and I’m going to do it,” she vowed.
“You do?” His arm went around her.
She nodded against his chest. “I’m not going to back down. I’m going to love you like no other Viking male has ever been loved, and I’m not going to worry, even if you find millions of Viking women descendants. I’ll even add an amendment to our contract that I’m going to do it.”
“Do what?” He forced her face from his chest to stare down at her in puzzlement.
“Be brave.”
Chapter 32
Raine
“Uh … Nope. Sorry, not going to happen.”
Raine giggled, rolling away from Skars’ groping hand, making a sneaky attack toward an area declared off limits until she was able to catch a much-needed breather. Their wedding night had her body feeling as if she had come in last place in a fifty-mile marathon. In her extensive collection of romance books she had read, men needed a cooling-off period before men would be able to perform again.
His cooling-off period was non-existent. Clearly, Skars’ sexual traits came from the more Martian side of his heritage rather than his human side.