17 - A Hard Days Night Searcher.doc by Unknown Read Free Book Online

passionately.
    Celena clung to him as she lifted one leg to wrap it around his hips. Taking the invitation, he drove himself deep inside her.
    Rafael's head spun as an unimagined ecstasy tore through him. Celena had almost died to protect him. No woman had ever done such a thing for him before. Her strength, her courage . . .
    It was unlike anything he'd ever known.
    And now she met him stroke for stroke as they made love furiously. He smiled as each thrust was punctuated by the sound of the beads on the ends of her braids scraping against the wall.
    Celena buried her lips against Rafael's throat as she forced herself not to think about what was going to happen tomorrow. She couldn't stay with him. She knew it. He was a Dark-Hunter. But here for the moment, he was hers, and that was all that mattered.

    Arching her back, she cried out with every powerful thrust of him inside her as she clutched him to her. He dipped his head down to capture her breast and tongue it in time to his strokes. She cradled his head to her as her body was overwhelmed by pleasure. With every stroke it increased until she finally couldn't stand it anymore. Her body burst into a thousand tendrils of ecstasy.
    Rafael growled as he felt Celena climaxing. Wanting to give her even more, he quickened his strokes and watched as she threw her head back and moaned.
    His smile faded as he lost himself to his own orgasm. Burying himself deep inside her, he shook with the force of it. Her breathing ragged in his ear, she gently stroked his back as he slowly drifted back into himself. This was one of the most amazing moments in his life. Not because of the sex, but because he was being held by a woman who was willing to sacrifice herself for him. A woman who was willing to break the rules. . . .
    Most of all, a woman who loved him.
    He kissed her tenderly on the lips. "Don't leave, Celena."
    "I'll be here until morning."
    "No," he said, his voice thick with the emotions that were churning inside him. "I mean don't leave. Ever."
    Her mouth opened ever so slightly. "What are you saying, Rafael?"
    "I love you."
    She couldn't believe her ears. It was more than she'd ever hoped for. "You don't have to say that."
    "It's not that I'm saying it. It's that I'm feeling it."
    Thrilled by his words, she squeezed him tight. "So what's to become of us now?"
    "Looks like I'll be joining the human race again."
    "Are you sure?"
    Rafael grew quiet as he considered it. If he continued being a Dark-Hunter, he'd have to let her go.
    The Apollite's words rang in Rafael's head. He'd been alone for all these centuries. Not once in all this time had any woman ever made him feel his emotions more strongly than Celena. She made him crazy, angry happy. . . .
    But most of all, she made him feel like he could fly.
    He didn't want to live without this. Without her.
    "Yeah, I'm sure. That is, if you're willing to take Artemis's test."
    "For you, my pirate, I'd walk through the fires of hell."
    Epilogue
    TWO   MONTHS   LATER
     
    Celena stared at Acheron, the Dark-Hunter leader, as he explained that in order to free Rafael from Artemis's service she would have to kill him.
    "You've got to be kidding me." "Do I look like I'm joking?"
    She raked her gaze from the top of his long black hair to the tips of his custom-made Goth biker boots with bat buckles. And at six foot eight there was a lot of him to rake, too, but every bit of his long, lean frame was deadly sincere, which made her sick to her stomach.
    How could she kill the man she loved? What kind of psycho had instituted that policy?
    Then she looked to Rafael, who was standing behind Acheron, in the hallway. His handsome face betrayed nothing but trust. His black eyes were kind and gentle, encouraging, and that made the love she felt for him swell.
    "I can't kill him."
    Acheron let out a patient breath. "He won't be dead long. You simply stop his heart from beating, then you hold the stone against his bow and arrow tattoo. His soul will