Love's Sacrifice (18 page)

‘
Are you happy, Lana?’

‘
Yes, I’m happy.’

‘
Good,’ he says softly.

‘
Is everything all right, Blake?’

‘
Yes, everything is just fine.’

And I laugh, a shaky, nervous, overjoyed sound. I feel as if we are just starting again. We’ve been given a second chance.

‘
Say hello to Sorab,’ I say and hold the phone to his ear. I don’t know what he says, but Sorab listens intently and suddenly grins.

I am still holding Sorab pressed against my body when our housekeeper comes in with a slim black box.

‘
Someone dropped this off at the front gate,’ she tells me.

I take the box from her curiously, snap it open and frown.

Inside, nestled on velvet, is Blake’s watch.

‘
Time and the ocean and some guiding star and High Cabal have made us what we are.’

—
Sir Winston Churchill,

Prime Minister, UK, 1940–1945 & 1951–1955

The woman awakens to the sound of a child’s laughter floating in through the open windows. She smiles and stretches, then strokes her belly. It is just beginning to show. A very small bump. She sits up and, hooking her feet into slippers, goes to the window. She can see her husband and son at the bottom of the garden. The boy is perched on his father’s shoulders and trying to peer into a bird’s nest.

She has the urge to run to them, but she doesn’t. Instead she savors that scene, a moment of beauty and joy. We have survived something so profound that it has bound us together like a tightly woven rope, she thinks. We aren’t the same fun-loving innocent people we once were but we are finally free.

Suddenly overwhelmed by emotion she finds herself running out of the bedroom and down the stairs like a child. Hurtling towards them.

At the double doors that lead to the garden she takes off her slippers and steps lightly on the tiles. They are already sun warmed. It is a beautiful day and there is not a cloud in the sky. The grass is cool under her feet. Before the man or the child have realized, she is already there. She throws her arms tightly around his waist and lays her cheek against his warm shirt. He stumbles forwards slightly with surprise and her son squeals. ‘Oh, Mummy,’ he scolds, ‘you’re going to make Daddy and I fall down.’

‘
Daddy and me,’ she corrects automatically.

Her husband doesn’t say anything, just looks down indulgently at her.

‘
What are the two of you doing?’

‘
We’re looking at bird’s eggs, but we’re not allowed to touch them.’

‘
That’s it,’ her husband says and puts the boy on the ground. Then he turns around fully to look at her. ‘Hey, gorgeous,’ he says to her.

‘
You have no idea how often I dreamed of this day,’ she says.

‘
Look, Daddy. I found a beetle,’ the boy cries and holds out his cupped palms.

‘
Be careful, Sorab,’ his father warns. ‘You don’t want to kill it. Even the lowly beetle’s life is precious to it.’

The woman raises her eyebrow. ‘Don’t you think it's a bit early for philosophy lessons?’

‘
No,’ says the man. ‘It’s never too early for him to learn wrong from right.’

‘
But Mummy kills ants all the time,’ the boy says.

‘
Well,’ sighs the man. ‘Mummy only kills them when they come into the house and make a nuisance of themselves.’

The boy opens his hand and the beetle flies out of it. He begins to run after it and the man turns to his woman.

‘
Do you ever miss that other life, Blake?’

‘
Never,’ he states emphatically.

‘
Nothing at all?’

He lays his hand on his wife’s belly and spreads his fingers out. ‘You are more beautiful to me today than ever.’

‘
Answer the question,’ she teases.

He looks into her eyes and makes a mental note of their color, how it has deepened with her pregnancy. ‘Oh Lana, Lana, Lana,’ he sighs softly. ‘When I met you, my heart was a blank canvas. Now, it is a kaleidoscope of color, rich and eternal.’

She smiles and lets his words warm her insides.

This is just the beginning…

Because this is a totally reader-generated effort –

here is another constant reader request.

Blake Law Barrington

When Lana Returned Home After Kissing Jack

She opens the front door of the apartment and finds me standing in the corridor. She stops and stares at me. I know her so well I can almost read her thoughts.
Why is he home? Why is he looking at me like that?
It’s a funny thing, but that look of surprise—For fuck’s sake, she has no idea at all what she is doing to me—totally flips my switch. And I start to move. Without thinking.

Without control!

In a flash, I have crossed the room and closed the door. I watch myself bend my head to kiss her and then rear back as if burned. Fuck her. She really does carry his scent, too. I want to strangle him. How dare he? How dare she? My eyes blaze into hers. She looks at me as if I am a maniac. Then I really lose it. Things happen so fast it’s a blur. I grab her by the upper arms and the next moment I have lifted her off the ground and she is lying dazed. Yup, flat on her back with me crouching over her like a fucking beast. I pull her skirt up and tear her underwear with my bare hands. Then I grab her legs by the kneecaps and open them wide. I jerk my face between her legs, and like a dog I
sniff
her pussy. The scent is sweet and familiar. My first reaction is to lick her and fucking take her right there. Stamp her with the scent of my possession. But I realize that I am holding onto legs that have been shocked into total stillness.

When I raise my head and look at her she is staring at me, speechless with disbelief and horror
.
Suddenly she seems to find her strength, and raising herself on her elbows, she stamps her feet on the carpet and pushes hard and away from me. I grab her foot and she kicks out with the other. I grab that one too and pull her toward me. She slides helplessly along the carpet, like a rag doll toward me. Her hands flail.

‘
Don’t,’ I growl. ‘I smelt a man on you.’

She stops fighting. When her face is very close to mine she closes her eyes. ‘I kissed Jack.’

That cuts me. I take a sharp breath. ‘Why?’

She opens her eyes and stares at me. ‘Because he is leaving for a war-torn country. Because I may never see him again. Because he asked me and he has never asked me for anything before,’ she sobs. Tears flow freely. I have never been able to resist her tears.

I scoop her up in my arms ‘Shh… I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you,’ I croon.

But I cannot make her stop. The tears run quickly down her temples.

‘
Please don’t cry. You didn’t do anything wrong. I just can’t bear thinking of you with anyone else. I don’t even want you in the same room with other men,’ I confess.  

‘
What is happening to us, Blake?’ she whispers. She sounds scared. I have frightened her with my aggression.

‘
Nothing is happening to us. I just lost my head for a moment. I didn’t think. It was pure instinct.’

‘
What’s going to happen when the forty-two days are up, Blake?’

Not that again. I can’t tell her anything. Even what I have just done is incriminating. He will know when he sees the tapes that she is special. He will see me lose control. I will simply have to be more careful from now on.

‘
I don’t know,’ I tell her, ‘but will you trust me that everything I do is in your best interests?’

‘
And what is in my best interests, Blake?’

I can see that it is tearing her up inside. My heart feels heavy. How I wish I could tell her? But I can’t. Too risky. Strange, how much I want to tell her. I’ve never wanted to make another human being happy before. ‘In thirty-one days you will know.’

Gently, I start kissing her eyelids, her cheeks that still smell of him and her mouth. I kiss her hard, force her lips open and thrust my tongue into her mouth, making her suck my tongue. Possessively, staking claim on what is mine, erasing the mark, even the memory of his mouth. My hands unbutton her blouse, cup her breasts. She lets me lift her so I can undo her bra clasp. I pull the blouse out of her skirt. It slips easily from her shoulders. The skirt follows.

I claim her on the floor beside the front door.  

To anyone watching or listening let it be known: this is
my
woman.

Hey you awesome

people,

Sadly, we have reached the end of the Lana and Blake story. When I began this journey back in the autumn of 2013, I had no idea where it might lead, not even if I would still be writing books one year on.

It was always my hope that my readers would find the characters of Lana and Blake endearing, but never did I imagine they would have such a strong connection with you. I am truly humbled by your loyalty to this series and for all your reviews, emails, and words of encouragement thank you from the bottom of my heart. You are like my dear friends now and for you I am writing something new.

Below are my forthcoming releases. Until the back of the next book I wish your life to be filled with great stories and unforgettable characters.

Big, big kiss to all...

Georgia

One

Billie Black

‘
Fucking kids,’ I swear and bury my head under the pillow, but the irritating ringing of the doorbell continues mercilessly. The desire to go out and throttle them is so strong it makes me grit my teeth.

I pull myself out from under my pillow abruptly with a frown. Hang on a minute. I no longer live in the poor end of Kilburn, and there are no kids roaming the corridors annoying people on Sundays here. Also, I have no debts left so it can’t be debt collectors either. Not that those lazy fuckers will work on Sundays.

I get out of bed and, walking barefoot to the front door, curiously put my eye to the spy hole.  

Whoa!

I draw back hastily, and press my hand to my shocked belly. This is far worse than any debt collector. By far worse. The bell rings again and holds. The sound is loud and insistent. It’s not going to go away. I turn my head and look at myself in the mirror on the wall. My hair is a spiky rat’s nest. I pull my fingers viciously through the unruly mess, but it does not improve. The bell goes again. Oh, fuck it! Whatever. I don’t care, anyway. I take a deep breath, rearrange my face into one of impatient exasperation and fling open the door.

Cor… Look at that. Tight black T-shirt packed hard with muscles, he fills the corridor like the Incredible Hulk, only he is all blond, and he makes little kitty clench tight even on a Sunday. Damn this man to hell. How can anyone look this good at this time of the morning?

He removes his finger coolly off my doorbell and smiles a devastatingly attractive smile, before letting his gaze, all wicked and sexy, start roving down my body. It’s like having melted chocolate poured all over me. I want to lick myself. Keep it together now.

‘
What do you want?’ I demand aggressively.

‘
To fuck you senseless.’

I don’t succeed in stifling the gasp that rises into my mouth. The cheek of the man is astounding. Last night he brazenly introduces me to his girlfriend, and this morning he stands on my doorstep wanting a legover! I feel a fine rage in my veins.

‘
Fuck off, you cheating skunk,’ would, as Ali down the sweet shop would say, be giving him too much face. ‘Piss off, I don’t want you to fuck me senseless,’ would be a lie. So: I nod, and move quickly to slam the door in his lazily smiling face. With lightning speed he lays his palm firmly against the wood and resolutely pushes his way in. I am engulfed by the smell of his freshly showered body. Probably washing off her smell, I think sourly. I don’t do the undignified thing and attempt to fight against such a male show of strength. I will decimate him with pithy wit instead.

Inside, he looks as out of place as a rhino in a China shop.

‘
The polite thing to do would be to offer me some tea,’ he says, one blond eyebrow arching.

I cross my arms over my chest. ‘I’m actually not feeling very polite at the moment.’

He flashes a pearly white grin: wolfish in the extreme. The guy is a walking sex bomb. ‘That’s just grand,’ he says. ‘We can be impolite together.’

Pithy wit deserts me. ‘Don’t make me punch you in the face.’

‘
You were the best lay I ever had.’

My eyes widen. The surge of pleasure I experience irritates me. I pretend to laugh dryly. ‘Is that supposed to be some sort of compliment?’