Embrace the Night

Page 207



when they'd met before. Her eyes were brown instead of blue. She had known another man. But her heart and soul remained the same.

Sara Jayne.

The wonder of it rocked him to the core of his being.

"What's wrong?" Sarah asked, alarmed by the sudden intensity of his gaze. Slowly, he shook his head. "Nothing."

"You're scaring me."

"Sara." Her name whispered past his lips, tinged with awe. And then he knelt at her feet, his arms wrapping around her waist as he buried his face in her lap.

"Gabriel!"

"Don't ask questions," he murmured. "Please, just hold me, touch me."

She stared at his bowed head, his words echoing in her mind as she lightly stroked his hair. She'd heard those words before, only last night, in a dream. But it had been another woman's hand stroking his hair…

A cold chill swept through her, and she jerked her hand away from his head. What did it mean?

His arms tightened around her waist. "Don't be afraid. I won't hurt you, I swear it. Just hold me," he pleaded. "Just let me hold you a moment more."

Contentment washed through him as he felt her hand move in his hair again. Ah, the touch of a human hand, warm with compassion, flowing with life. It was the touch of Sara's hand, so welcome, so familiar.

Sara, Sara, can it really be you?

Tears burned her eyes as she lightly stroked his hair, caressed his nape, brushed her fingers across his cheek. She could feel his body trembling, or was it her own?

Sometime later, he raised his head, his gaze meeting hers, and in the dark gray depths of his eyes she saw a hunger so deep, a yearning so painful, that it caused her heart to ache.

Almost without conscious thought, she bent her head to his and kissed him.
And time stood still, trapped in the depths of his eyes.

And then his eyelids fluttered down and he kissed her with all the longing in his heart, with the loneliness born of more than half a century without her. Kissed her with all the love in his heart, a love which would always be hers, only hers.

Passion, need, longing. They swept through Sarah like a forest fire, burning away every doubt. She forgot everything but the need to comfort this man, to take him into herself, to fill all the empty spaces in his heart and soul. She wanted to hold him to her breast and whisper that everything would be all right, that he would never again be alone. And in some deep corner of her mind, she had the strange,