You refused to fall in love with anyone else, Dmitri.” A whisper with the impact of a gun-shot. “So I had to come back for you . . . husband.

No,” he responded, reaching out to trace the shell of her ear. “They grew back even more beautiful. Blue edged with silver.” Elena laughed at the scowl in his voice.

The power, it seduced, whispering to me to weave it into my own cells." A glance over his shoulder. "Before you, I would've no doubt accepted it and it would've destroyed me from the inside out." "Before you," she whispered, "I was shut up inside my heart, protecting it from harm, and never knowing the glory I missed." She linked her hand in his. "You and I, we're a unit. I dare any evil on this earth to tear us apart.

Go on,” he said in a low tone that was a dare. “Keep on poking the hungry wolf, see how naked it gets you.

Ever had a woman say no to you, Dmitri?” “Once.” He turned the corner with a smile that made her want to cup his face, trace those beautiful lips with her own. “I married her.

For the first time in forever, he was stunned to silence. Not by her words, but by the tenderness in her hands, the worry in her eyes. He was an archangel. He’d been wounded far, far worse and shrugged it off. But then, there had been no woman with sun kissed by the sunset and eyes of storm gray to tear into him for daring to get himself hurt.

Once, he hadn't been able to touch her without causing himself pain. Now, it only hurt when he didn't touch her.