She realized what it was, of course—that she was surrendering to the idea of loving him. But she had to tread carefully. This thing between them was both too new and too old, embodying everything she both feared and craved. She found it was easier to watch the expressions that relaxed his face.
“Yes,” Christan said. “An absolute terror.” He slipped back into a past she could not remember. “I watched you for a moment, and then squatted down and asked what was upsetting you. You had been chasing butterflies but couldn’t catch any, and you were furious. I reached out and caught one in my hand. I remember you held out your finger. I opened my hand, and the butterfly walked from my palm over to yours and sat there, drying its wings in the sun. You had the strangest expression on your face. Like you were in awe and maybe afraid it might bite you.” His fingers nipped at her foot, and Lexi jumped. The warm sound of his laughter filled the quiet room. She had never heard him laugh. She reached out and touched the back of his bronzed hand.
“What then?”
“The butterfly drifted away. You looked at me and demanded to know my name. When I told you, you couldn’t pronounce it, but you came right up to me. You put your hands on either side of my face, and said very solemnly, ‘Your name is Christan’.” He shrugged. “I’ve used that name ever since.”
“Did you buy the villa from my uncle?” Lexi asked.
“When he died, I covered the debts and offered the property to your aunt. She accepted to protect you and your sister, but privately she refused to claim ownership. She remained until her death two years later.”
“We lived here,” Lexi said. “Gemma never knew the property was yours. She thought you might have married her for it.”
Christan shrugged. “It was always meant to be hers,” he said. “Later, I arranged for the property to change hands on paper to divert my enemies. Caretakers maintained the olive groves. There was a vineyard at one time. The vines still produce, but not at any significant level, so the crop is sold to others. My connection is obscured. But I don’t delude myself. My enemies will know I’m here. I imagine we’ll only have peace for a day or two at the most.”
Lexi gripped the edge of her blanket. She had never been good at surrender, but she was surrendering now.
“Then we don’t have time to waste,” she said, letting the edges fall open as she crawled back up Christan’s body. When she reached him, she straddled his hips and his big hands settled gently around her waist. Her golden hair shimmered in the firelight, brushing against his chest, and she placed her hand over the small tattoo just to the left of his heart. It was in the shape of a delicate curling line that resembled a butterfly.
“Your name is Christan,” she whispered. “And I choose you.”
Their lovemaking was slow and tender, her pale body moving against his darker frame. He moved deeper, and she accepted all of him, offering the redemption that he craved. And when he took her high into the stars where they exploded into a shimmer of light, she whispered gently against his heart, “I choose you, Christan. Only you.”
Dawn held the soft gray of a dove’s wing when Lexi woke. The strong male body was warm against her skin and she pressed in, stretched slightly as he stroked the hair from her face.
“You didn’t dream,” he said, those fingers tracing down the curve of her throat.
She thought about it. “No.” It was the first night in months. “I didn’t.”
“Must be the company in bed.”
“Must be.”
She rolled over to press her nose against his chest and he lifted her thigh, draped her leg across his hip.
“We should probably sleep this way more often,” he suggested.
“Yes.” Those wicked fingers were stroking again.
“I’m going to have to leave soon.”
“I don’t want you to go.”
“I’ll come back. I have to meet with One.”
“Who’s… One?” It was getting hard to focus. Lexi couldn’t remember if he told her about One or not.
“I mentioned her yesterday—there’s a teleconference with Three in Seattle. I have to be there to explain the mess I left in the alley.”
“More of those big warrior secrets?”
What he was doing ought to be illegal. “Curiosity will get you in trouble,” he said deep in his throat.
She shifted her leg higher. “I like trouble.”
Christan rolled her onto her back and was inside before she realized it, thrusting slowly. “I would have you safe, cara.”
“Then don’t leave.” A deeper thrust, so sensual she arched luxuriously. “Marking your territory, Enforcer?”
“Claiming what’s mine.”
“That sounds fairly arrogant.”
“You love my arrogant side.”
She draped her wrists around his neck and stared up into his hard face, watched it soften. Lifted against him. This was more than a joining, more than the furious redemption of sinners on the previous night. This was a caress between two lovers that luxuriated with a slowly building heat.
“How can I help you?” she managed to whisper as her body took him in.
“Work with Arsen. He’ll be here soon. He’s going to check our security systems, walk the perimeter, find any weaknesses.”
The war was intruding. Her fingers gripped his shoulders and she looked into those midnight eyes. “Don’t… go.”
“I must.”
“I’m afraid.”
His body flexed and she thought he was reaching toward her very core. “How can you want someone as broken and flawed as I am?”
“I have more than wanted you… many times.”
“Sei la mia vita,” he said.
“I don’t know what that means.”
“Someday you will.”
CHAPTER 30
The Casa della Farfalla was called the House of the Butterflies for many reasons, but most assumed it was due to the luxurious gardens. The two-story pink villa sat in the middle of gently rolling hills, given over to gnarled olive trees and neat rows of the old vines. The entrance road served a purpose in being completely in the open. No visitor would arrive unnoticed or unannounced.
The grounds had been impeccably maintained by the caretaker and his wife, Hannah. A terraced garden held pots of tumbling red flowers and small lemon trees. Gemma’s garden, as Christan called it, was once again filled with delphiniums, along with daisies and a riot of fragrant blooms. The remains of an evergreen maze were beyond a white gravel path that held the original well, now capped with wood and iron for safety. An ancient tree stood guard, along with several prowling multi-colored kittens. Lounges were arranged beneath the dappled shade.
Since the villa was used as a secure location there were few places to hide. But those, along with the entire estate, were monitored through a surveillance system that was both discreet and possessing a resolution surpassing anything available to human governments. The system was connected through wireless technology to a secure server, all of it highly encrypted. Arsen explained in depth as he led Lexi down a graveled path. They were walking toward a rustic stone shed that looked ancient because it was. Nearby, a round building with a tiled roof and rusted metal gutters shimmered in the sun. The dove-cote. Lexi remembered it, too.
“The place has held up rather well,” she said dryly, following Arsen inside the barrel-arched stone shed. It housed some of the monitoring equipment, hidden behind an ancient iron bed frame that had once been painted white.
Arsen shrugged. “Christan insisted,” he said.
“He always loved this place.”
Arsen was dressed more severely than usual; his jeans were heavy and the dark shirt looked flexible enough to allow him to move without restraint. There was a leather harness that crossed his back and held a small, black handgun close to his ribs. “I thought guns weren’t that handy if you have to shift.”
“But very handy if you don’t.”
“Yeah, I understand that whole low-profile thing now.”
“You’re safe here, Slick,” he said casually. “Right now, there’s probably three different groups of people watching what we do.”
“Then I shouldn’t reach out and pat your butt?”