Jewel of Darkness (24 page)

“It is scientifically proven that the act of falling in love has a calming effect on the mind and body. This, in turn, raises the levels of nerve growth in the mind for about a year. You might be asking yourself,
Why I’m telling you all of this and how does it pertain to the depth of a human’s emotions?
I’m glad you asked. I’m telling you this because the human beings’ reaction to love is so profound that it literally affects their physical body. It can help heal them, or the loss of it can cause them physical harm. The depth of the emotion is so strong that it replicates the feeling provided by an illegal drug that addicts will kill to possess.”

She took a step toward him and raised her chin piercing his heart with her razor sharp glare. “So don’t you dare tell me that humans aren’t capable of the depth of emotions that your race is. You are a fool if you think that some supernatural bond is the only way to be able to connect deeply with another person. And how dare you presume to know how I feel about you just because that damn bond is gone between us. I can’t believe that―”

“How do you feel about me?” Dalton cut her off midsentence because he had to know. He couldn’t stand there needing her like she was the oxygen that kept him alive but not knowing if she wanted him back.

Jewel was staring at him as though he’d just asked her to strip naked. He supposed sharing your heart and soul with someone was very much like baring yourself to them in all your clothes-less glory.

“How do you feel about me?” he asked again softer this time. “You said I shouldn’t have presumed. I can concede that. What conclusion should I draw when my mate rejects my touch as though I disgust her? What conclusion should I come up with when she won’t share her pain with me?” His anger and frustration was growing with every word. She had thrown him off and caused him to drop the mask that he kept in place. He was completely off kilter and he just didn’t know how to handle it. “How could I presume to know anything different?”

“Oh, I don’t know, Dalton! How about not presuming to know anything? How about asking before you stick your foot in your mouth and taste the crap that you’re throwing and then stepping in?” Jewel stepped even closer and jammed her finger into his chest. “In fact, how about you man up and throw yourself out there first? Why do I have to be the one to put my heart out there while fearing it will be crushed? After living with a psycho and having to endure his wrath, maybe I shouldn’t have to be the one to go first. Why don’t YOU step up?” She was yelling by the time she finished and her breaths were coming in quick succession.

She was right. He shouldn’t have put her in that position and yet he was terrified to give her what she was asking for. If she rejected him, it would destroy him. Nothing in his life could ever hurt the way losing Jewel would. How did a man drop to his knees and lay it all out there, especially when he didn’t know what her reaction would be? Why had this happened? Why did the Great Luna give him a mate only to have her ripped from his grasp?
Volcan,
his wolf rumbled. Yes, he agreed as his rage was fed by the devastation of what the fae had done to them.

“Answer me!” Jewel snapped at him. Her command only stoked the flames of his fury.

“YOU ARE MINE.” The tight leash Dalton usually kept on his emotions broke. He’d done all he could to keep his wolf locked down but it had broken free. She wanted to know what she was to him? He would tell her whether it terrified her or not. Dalton was just going to throw it out there like a life raft and hope that she would grab it. “Bond or no bond, you are my mate! I won’t lie and say that when the bond was broken I wasn’t confused about my feelings for you. But it didn’t last because the bond is not what made me love you.
You
made me love you. I've been inside your mind and I've felt the things you feel and how deeply you feel them. I've seen all that you've endured and yet you still maintain a desire to help others. The bond may have given me the ability to know you quickly, but I don't need it to want you. You, Jewel Stone, just being the incredible person that you are draws me to you. I don’t need the true mate bond to know that you were created for me and me for you.” He closed the rest of the space between them and took her shocked face in his hands. He was careful, despite his anger. Her skin against his was the sweetest thing he’d ever felt. He’d not known if he would ever see her again, let alone touch her. Dalton wanted to savor her. He wanted to soak her up until he was overflowing with her. He desperately wanted to pull her into his arms, but they needed to get the air clear before that could happen. “If you think that I will just walk away and give you up, you are a greater fool even than me.”

J
ewel stared at him stupidly. Her heart was pounding painfully in her chest and her lungs were tight as she tried to force in air. His words seemed so sincere. The passion behind them seemed honest. But there was a tiny voice that repeated over and over that there was no way she could know for sure, not anymore. Jewel wanted to tell the voice to shut up, that it didn’t matter if she could hear his thoughts or feel his emotions. The things that he was telling her could still be true. But then, he didn’t understand what he was saying. He didn’t understand who she was now. She hadn’t told him yet that the darkness that he loathed, the darkness he once killed Gwen for obtaining, now lived inside of her. Once he realized that, he wouldn’t want her. And even if he did, they couldn’t be together because he couldn’t even touch her. Damn Volcan and his dark magic!

Even as she stood there staring at him, she could feel the taint of Volcan’s blood flowing in her veins, itching to get out. He’d told her that she wouldn’t be able to help herself, that the magic would demand release. And it did. Her blood sang with the need to be set free, to seek out its victim and do what it was created to do. Jewel was nauseated by the fact that she enjoyed the feeling of power pulsing in her. She should be disgusted, and to an extent she was, but not completely. Some part of her reveled in the power. What would this wolf say to that? Would he profess his undying love if he knew that she enjoyed the magic Volcan had given her? She doubted it.

“Do you have anything to say to me?” Dalton asked.

Jewel blinked several times. He was still waiting for her to respond to his declaration. “I just… I just don’t know if us being together is the best thing.”

“The hell it isn’t,” he growled as he dropped his hands from her face. The loss of the contact was like having ice water poured over her head. She fought the urge to cringe. “Tell me why,” he demanded.

Jewel wasn’t sure how much she should tell him, how much she
could
tell him. She thought about her mom and the things she had said. She thought about her original decision to leave and go with Volcan. She’d thought she could protect the other girls. So far her own reasoning hadn’t helped anyone. Jewel had left him yesterday needing to protect him. Jewel should have known better. She’d dug herself a grave and needed someone else to pull her out. She hated being a burden. That was when she decided. She wasn’t going to let there be any barriers between them. She would tell him the truth, but she would also tell him because of the truth: They simply couldn’t be together.

“We can’t be together because Volcan put a spell on me,” she blurted out. “He wants me to be with him. So to ensure that you and I wouldn’t move further in our relationship, he put a terrible dark spell on me.” There, she’d said it.

Dalton’s eyes widened. Jewel wasn’t sure what she thought he’d been expecting, but it clearly wasn’t that. “What does the spell do?” he finally asked.

Jewel really didn’t want to go there. Their relationship had been so new to begin with. Talking with him about being intimate was a little uncomfortable to say the least. “If you touch me in a… in a lustful way, it will cause the darkness in you to grow at a faster rate. Rather than healing you, as a true mate should, I’ll be hastening your descent into madness. It will begin to eat away anything good in you. And if we…” ― she paused, biting her bottom lip as she gathered her nerve ― “if we consummate our relationship it will destroy you instantly. You will go feral within a matter of minutes. So, you see, we can’t be together. We just can’t. I mean, I am presuming that you are attracted to me, and I realize that maybe I shouldn’t have assumed that. It’s just that, I find you quite attractive and though the bond might have initially drawn me to you, it didn’t change whether or not I wanted you, um, wanted you, that is, I wanted…” Jewel stumbled embarrassingly over her words. Up until that point she’d been doing so good holding everything together. Leave it to the genius to muff up the part about sex. “I still find my body responding to yours.” She wanted to clap for herself. She’d gotten it out and she had kept from turning eight shades of red. She was sure she’d actually only turned four.

“You aren’t sure if I’m attracted to you?”

Okay, from all of that, that’s all he got? What is it with guys and sex? She’d told him that if he touched her that it would destroy him. Was he worried about that? Nope.

She shrugged. “It’s not like we’ve had a lot of time to spend together, not really.” She was trying to look anywhere but at him. She heard his feet move, but she still wouldn’t look up at him.

“Little Dove.” His voice was soft. It was a stark contrast to how angry they’d both been only minutes ago. “Look at me.”

Jewel wanted to look at him, but at the same time she was too embarrassed to raise her eyes to his.

“Please, Jewel, look at me.”

Finally, she slowly raised her head until her eyes met his fervent ones. She could feel the emotions pouring off of him; she didn’t need a bond to tell her that he wanted to touch her. He wanted to wrap her in his arms and never let her go.

“I can’t describe how attracted I am to you. I’m sure that if I did you would turn and run as fast and as far as you could. It goes beyond your physical appearance. I’m attracted to your intelligence, your kindness, your beautiful spirit, and, yes, I’m attracted to your red hair and your fair, soft skin. I’m attracted to your small frame even though I’m afraid I might break you if I touch you. I’m attracted to the curve of your neck, the slope of your shoulders, the indentions of your waist, the length of your legs. To every bit of you that I’ve been allowed to see I am greatly attracted. I do not want you to doubt for a minute that I desire you.”

What does a girl say to that especially when she’d just told him that they couldn’t be together because he couldn’t touch her? “And for all of those reasons we can’t be together. I will not be the reason you are destroyed.”

Dalton seemed to be thinking as he stared at her. He wasn’t touching her and now that she thought about it, she’d let him touch her face.
Crap,
she thought, he’d distracted her so completely that she’d forgotten how dangerous it was for him to put his hands on her. She took, what she hoped was, a subtle step back. His lips tightened slightly. Nope, he hadn’t missed it.

“I have a proposition for you,” he said coolly.

Jewel crossed her arms in front of her. “Okay, let’s hear it.” She was only humoring him. If whatever he was going to suggest had anything to do with them being together, then her answer was no.

“I understand your concern and I am so unbelievably humbled by your concern for me. And I understand that you are worried that I will be taken over by the darkness because of my inability to keep from touching you. But, perhaps, we would be being too hasty to just walk away. We’re a good thing, Jewel. Do you feel it?”

She nodded without realizing what she was doing.

“If we let this go, we are letting him win already. What if we go through a courtship of sorts?”

“A courtship?”

He nodded. “It’s kind of like dating,”

“I know what a courtship is,” she interrupted.

Dalton continued as though she hadn’t spoken, “But moving a lot slower. In a true courtship, I wouldn’t even be allowed to spend time alone with you. I certainly wouldn’t be allowed to touch you.”

“A courtship,” she said again as though she was tasting it on her tongue. Could they really do it? Could they date without spending time alone? Could they date without touching one another? She supposed it was doable considering that was how things were done a couple hundred years ago. Maybe she didn’t have to walk away from him, at least not yet. She could do the courtship and see how it goes, but if they began to slip up then she’d walk. She refused to let herself hope that maybe, just maybe, they’d find a way to break Volcan’s spell and that she and Dalton could actually be together.

D
alton watched the wheels turn in Jewel’s head. The argument going on inside of her was written all over her face. She wanted this; she wanted him. Just that little bit of confirmation helped shore up his conviction that they belonged together. Not only did he not want to be separated from Jewel but he also felt that if they weren’t together something terrible would happen. He waited and gathered more arguments in his own mind just in case she objected to the idea. After what felt like an eternity, she finally spoke.

“I can agree to a courtship, but” ― she held up her finger ― “if we slip up, I walk. I mean it, Dalton. I will walk away if it means keeping you alive and sane.”

He closed his eyes and let his head fall back. Peace fell over him like a cool rain. It was right. Being together was right, regardless of the true mate bond. He knew that this didn’t mean that everything was going to be easy. No, it most definitely wasn’t going to be easy. He was keeping Jewel, but he wasn’t going to be able to touch her. Touch. It was essential to a wolf. They needed it, craved it, especially from their mate. But if it was either touch her or lose her, then he’d tie his hands behind him if he had to.