Immortal Hope (39 page)

Abruptly, Merrick withdrew his hand and his mouth. Lifting to his elbows, he caught her face between his palms and gazed down at her. His dark eyes filled with intensity. When he spoke, his hoarse whisper filled her to overflowing. “I have no right to ask, but swear to me you will never forget me.”

She closed her eyes to the tears that swelled and swallowed hard. “Never,” she whispered.

He nudged her thighs apart and entered her slowly. Pushing deep, she felt every thick inch of him fill her up and stretch her perfectly.

His body glided in and out of hers, steady, unhurried thrusts that awakened far more than physical pleasure. The familiar tide of sensation built with the pleasant friction, but it was different too. Not so much a quest for ultimate pleasure, but a rising storm of feeling Anne couldn’t comprehend. It flowed from him, into her, and caught her on a crest so high she trembled at its ferocity.

Love, she realized. He loved her. She recognized it in his kiss, tasted it on the velvety stroke of his tongue. Felt it in the reverent slide of his skin against hers. The discovery stole the breath from her lungs.

Ecstasy slammed into her, and the building tide of emotion crested. “Merrick, I—”

He silenced her with a possessive kiss as he thrust in deep and hard. Her body arced, and Anne surrendered to a staggering release. She hung suspended in his embrace, shaking as layer after layer of sensation slammed into her.

Merrick’s body stiffened. Deep within her, she felt him shudder, a tremor that rolled up his spine and coursed into his arms. He lifted his mouth from hers on a ragged gasp, then went utterly still.

Slowly, dark lashes lifted. His onyx eyes burned fierce. He lowered himself against her, his weight a welcome comfort. Unable to form words, they lay together in silence, the jagged sound of their breathing blending in the quiet.

When their shared gasps leveled into a somewhat normal rhythm, Merrick gathered her into the shelter of his strong arms. His mouth dusted across her shoulder, settled at the side of her neck. He ran a roughened palm down one arm, found her hand, and twined his fingers through hers, whispering, “If such were possible, I would wish my seed to sprout tonight.”

Anne shivered. She could think of nothing that could complete their loving more than a child. If he refused to leave with her, she would always have a piece of Merrick to remind her of these stolen nights together. But immortal knights couldn’t father children, and the wish was strictly fancy.

CHAPTER
31

Anne rolled over, seeking Merrick’s warmth. The gray light of morning seeped through the curtains, announcing the winter chill carried rain. She ran a hand down the hardened planes of his chest and traced the long scar that ran around his side with a nail. His skin jumped beneath the light touch, his belly tightened.

Tipping her chin up, Anne found him watching her. Beneath the heavy pile of quilts, one large hand found her bottom, and he pulled her against his side. “Good morn,” he murmured.

“Mm. Good morning.” She ran her fingertip over the crease in his smooth skin again. “What happened to you, Merrick?”

His torso turned rigid beneath her palm, and he turned his head to the window. The all-too-familiar tick crawled along the side of his jaw.

“Hey.” She gave him a gentle nudge. “I’m not trying to bring up bad memories. I want to know more about you.”

Merrick let out a long, heavy sigh. “’Tis too long a story.”

Determined, Anne lifted to an elbow and planted a kiss on the large vein that ran the length of his throat. “I have all morning.” She dragged her teeth down his neck to give his shoulder a playful nip. With a provocative wriggle of her hips, she promised, “I’ll make it worth the telling.” Besides, she could think of no better way to soften him to the discussion that would likely bring them to blows.

Merrick turned to her with a tight frown. But when she draped her body across his, and slipped a hand beneath the covers to take his cock into her hand, his mouth quirked, and a chuckle broke free. She felt him swell and quickly dislodged her hand.

“Little demon, cease your games,” he threatened.

Anne rained kisses across his chest. “Tell me what I want to know.”

Laughing freely now, Merrick rolled her over, pinned her to the mattress, and kissed her thoroughly. “How is it you take the ache away?” he asked quietly. Before she could answer, he propped himself up on an elbow. “Very well. ’Tis only fair, I do suppose.”

“Tell me how you became a Templar knight.”

He arched a dark eyebrow. “You ask for much.”

“So did you when you dragged me out of my house.”

His grunt made her giggle.

“All right, demon Anne. Tell me what you know of Geoffrey Martel.”

Anne scoured her brain, digging for names she had little cause to remember. The French territories were so vast, had changed hands so many times and shared a dozen different ties that crossed and recrossed between families, it was like one big jigsaw puzzle. “He was the count of Anjou, allied with King Henry I against William of Normandy and had a bunch of wives. Right?”

Merrick nodded. “Only he sired no heirs. He bequeathed his holdings to his oldest nephew, Geoffrey the Bearded.”

Anne propped herself up with a pillow, her interest piqued. “The Bearded fought with his brother, right?”

“Aye. Fulk le Rechin coveted the inheritance, and seven years later, he imprisoned his brother at Sable. Pope Gregory II demanded Geoffrey’s release, and all seemed quiet in the country for a short time.”

“Forgive me, Merrick, but I’ve forgotten the details. I’m sorry.” Anne ducked her head with a blush.

“’Tis understood. Fulk imprisoned my father again, a year later at Chinon. There he stayed for twenty-eight years. He died shortly after his release.”

It took a moment for Anne to realize what Merrick had said. As the dawning settled on her, her lips parted in surprise. “Your father?” she gasped.

“Aye. My uncle imprisoned all who swore loyalty to my father. According to law, my mother, the blooded heir of two formerly royal families, was naught but a peasant. She cared for my father whilst he was in prison. They would have wed, had my father lived long enough. When I was conceived, he sent her from Chinon to keep my uncle from discovering me.”

Anne stared, dumbfounded. A noble bastard. His blood gave him the right to join the Templars, his birth condemned him. Her heart twisted, envisioning the young life he must have suffered. She reached between them and took his hand. “Merrick, I’m so sorry.”

Bristling, he withdrew his hand. “Nay. I will finish before you give me pity. ’Tis unnecessary.” He ran his fingers through his mussed hair and heaved a sigh. “We lived in a small village near the Loire. I could see Chinon from my doorstep. There were several men in my village who once bore arms for my father. They took me in their tutelage, taught me the ways of swords and horses. Though ’twas forbidden to own weapons, we hid them beneath the floors, and my lessons were oft at night.”

Unable to offer comfort she sensed he needed despite his staunch pride, Anne snuggled into his embrace and linked her leg through his. Merrick dropped his arm around her waist and held her close.

“I joined with those who opposed my uncle. It mattered not what fight, so long as I could hold the hope of taking his life. There were victories, there were losses, but my mother’s health demanded my return. I was thirty-two, and some ten years earlier a baron of Fulk’s had forced himself on my mother for rents she owed. She never recovered. She died that year. After I sent her body down the Loire, I sought her distant family, de Payans.”

“And rode to Jerusalem.”

“Aye.”

Anne lay quiet, absorbing his tale. Treachery, betrayal, the severed bonds of family, vows thrown to the wind—no wonder the man put so much weight in oaths. He’d known nothing but deceit. The full weight of his birthright wasn’t lost on her either. Almost two hundred years later, the mighty fortress at Chinon would hold his sworn brethren on charges of treason and heresy.

She’d deceived him too. Was deceiving him still, albeit in a rather benign way compared to his past.

Swallowing rising guilt, she ran her fingertip down the length of his scar. “And this?” she whispered.

He covered her hand, stilling it. “The price I would pay for defending the Almighty. King Philip’s eternal brand.”

“But your wounds heal. How did you scar?”

Merrick wrapped her fingers tightly in his. “A Templar blade will wound and leave behind the evidence. The holy steel, and Azazel’s demons, are the only weaknesses we have.” His mouth curled in a cruel smirk. “What better way to torture the devoted than to turn his sword upon him.”

Anne couldn’t stop a shocked cry from tumbling free. She bolted upright. “But the Inquisition could not draw blood.”

He shook his head with a snort. “They did. They hung me from the rafters with weights on my legs in my own property and carved on me to contrive a confession.”

Anne’s throat closed. Imprisoned at Chinon.
Oh God.
Impulsively, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to the timeless reminder of what his loyalty cost. Working her way up his body, she showered him with light kisses until she found his mouth. There, she settled in deep, telling him the only way she knew how that she shared his pain, his grief … That she understood.

A rumble of pleasure rose to the back of his throat, and clasping her body to his, he eased her into the pillows. One roughened hand covered her breast as he claimed her mouth with greedy hunger. Against her thigh, she felt the hard length of his arousal, sure evidence of his intentions. Resigning herself to a morning of absolute bliss, Anne looped her arms around his neck and made room for him between her legs.

The loud peal of a horn crashed through the pitter of rainfall against her windowpane.

Merrick leapt from the bed so quickly she almost believed he’d never been beside her. In seconds, he had his jeans on and was shaking out his shirt.

Anne sat up, her brows furrowed in confusion. “What is it?”

“Azazel has found the third nail.”

Her heart drummed to a stop. Not the nail. Shaking her head, she refused to believe his implication.

But as he reached for his sword and buckled it around his waist, she couldn’t pretend ignorance. The time for silence was over. They must discuss her vision now. She swallowed hard and asked quietly, “You’re going to fight?”

He paused only a moment, the look he gave her full of dark foreboding. With a short nod, he murmured, “Aye.” Merrick turned away to stuff his feet into his laceless boots. “Wait here. I will attend you before I leave.”

As he straightened, Anne clutched at his hand. He was leaving without their binding oath. Mikhail sent him regardless, and Mikhail swore none would return. This wasn’t happening. She had to stop it. Words rushed out, discombobulated and nowhere near as eloquent as she’d planned. “Don’t go, Merrick. You don’t have to fight. Stay with me. We can leave, we can go wherever, but don’t go to this battle.”

His stern expression squashed all the hope she’d harbored. “Never ask such of me again, Anne. I gave my word. I am sworn to the sword.”

With that, he stormed from her room.

*   *   *

Merrick descended into the lower chambers, then deeper, entering the inner sanctum. There, every man filed into place and stood at rigid attention, turning the spacious, circular nave into a sea of expectant faces. From atop the far dais, Mikhail and Raphael looked out amongst the gathered knights, patiently waiting for the slower members to arrive. Beside them, Caradoc, Nikolas, and Gareth stood silently.

Merrick joined them, his heart heavy. Hours from now, he would inevitably meet his cousin to fulfill their oath. But Merrick found the vow no longer mattered. The only thing he cared for lay upstairs in that great bed, and all he desired was the means to spend a life with Anne. But her proposition that they leave was unacceptable.

He stared out at his brothers, feeling the futility of their plight. No other seraph had arrived, and Anne knew not her intended. Without one strong enough, without the moral compass to lead the faltering knights, they were certain to fail. ’Twould be a better fate to surrender the third nail and rally for Azazel’s subsequent strike.

Looking to the three who gathered with him on the dais, he read the same futility in their vacant stares.

“Brothers in arms,” Mikhail’s voice rose above the hushed murmurs. The room fell silent. “Raphael has returned from Louisiana only a few moments ago. Gate three is strained to its limits. By nightfall it will fail. We have reason to believe all manner of darkness will converge upon the adytum along the Bayou Bourbeaux and the nail hidden in her stairs. Elspeth has been relocated to safeguard her life.”

Merrick eyed Mikhail as he mentally processed the grounds, the coordinated plans, and where the knights would have the largest advantage. If Elspeth no longer resided in the antebellum home, then he would need to assign several men to guard the front doors. He would take that position as well—for most assuredly Fulk would strike for the nail ensconced beneath the sweeping stairwell. Meanwhile, Uriel would lead a handful of the European knights in rebuilding the time-decayed gate between Azazel’s realm and man’s.

“The cars are ready. You will depart in groups of ten, close quarters, I know. Fill the vehicles and depart immediately. Your placements will be given in cipher over your phones. I am sorry I cannot better prepare you with our strategy. Our time is too short, the travel too long.”

A low rumble broke through the ranks as the men grasped the urgency. Even Merrick felt the thrum of anxiety. After centuries of fighting, the call of battle ran so deep in their blood they could not help but anticipate the conflict. Too long their skills lay idle, tested only in brief skirmishes at ruptured gates with creatures who offered no severe threat.

“Begin your personal preparations. Attend to your prayers, your armor, your thoughts. Gabriel shall return to look after the temple in my stead, and I will fight, as will Raphael, beside you. Go now. I shall see you all along the banks.”