Chapter 5

"Radiant." Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the stranger lower his big body to the floor beside her until he was sitting, his back against the love seat, his long legs stretched out in front of him. "Let me see your hand.".

"No. I'm fine." Words were coming from her mouth, but she wasn't sure what she was saying. She barely recognized her own voice. So cold.

She felt a warm, callused hand slide across her jaw and cheek, one long finger curling behind her ear as it had earlier just before she'd lost consciousness.

"Do it," she whispered. "Knock me out."

"You want to escape."

"I can't… do this." Tears burned and slid down her cheeks as the pain in her hand nearly rivaled that in her chest, but the grief was worse, tearing so much deeper, "It hurts too much."

The man released a heavy breath. "Making you sleep won't get rid of the pain." Slowly, he removed his hand. "I can't take it all, but I can help. I owe you that much."

His hand slid beneath her hair to curl around her neck, but instead of easing her pain, misery swamped her, a hundred times worse than before.

"Oh, God. Oh, God."

"Easy, little Radiant, I had to strip away your defenses to get to the real emotions. Give me a minute."

Grief tore through her body like a muscle-wrenching poison, doubling heir in half. "I can't do this. I can't…"

All at once, the pain eased, and she began to breathe again. In the space of half a dozen heartbeats, her grief lessened, aging, as if she'd been living with it for weeks or months, instead of minutes, dulling around the edges and slowly losing the ability to cut. The fear and confusion quieted in her head. Only her hand still swam with pain.

Kara lifted her gaze to his, meeting enigmatic amber eyes. "How do you do that? Are you some kind of healer? "

"It's just a skill."

She stared at him, really looked at him, her gaze skimming over the hard bones of an undeniably arresting face. His expression Remained cool, perhaps guarded, but his eyes had warmed considerably.

"What's your name?"

"Lyon."

"Is that your first name or your last?"

"My driver's license would say my last. But only humans use the first."

She looked away, a succession of chills snaking through her body before being snatched away, one after another, through the man's touch. Only humans. As if he wasn't one himself.

With a breath-stealing slam of understanding, she knew he wasn't. The things he could do… She dipped her forehead to rest on her updrawn knees. "I can't deal with this."

His thumb slid down her neck and back up again in a gentle and oddly sensual caress. "You can. Any woman with the courage and presence of mind to kill a draden the first time she sees one can handle a bit of truth."

Kara laughed, the sound more hysterical than humorous. "A bit of truth?" She raised her head to meet his gaze. "You're not crazy, are you? All that talk earlier of a different race… it's real."

"Yes."

"You're not human."

"No. Neither are you."

And somehow she knew that. She'd always known in some dark corner of her mind that she wasn't normal. Her cuts healed much too fast, and she never got sick. Had never, in twenty-seven years, even run a fever. Was that why her mother never let the doctors near her?

Had she known?

"What are we? Aliens?"

The man's smile, wide, crooked, and utterly charming, was so fleeting she almost missed it, but for an instant it transformed his face.

"We're Therians. A race similar to humans, but far less fragile. We don't age, and we heal most wounds quickly."

"So we're immortal?"

"To the humans, yes. Or virtually so. But we can die like any creatures. We just do it far less easily."

Questions crowded her mind as fear tried to clutch at her heart, but he held the emotion at bay with his touch.

"There's no need to be alarmed, little Radiant."

"Why do you call me Radiant?"

"You are the caller of the energies of the Earth. It's through you that your race renews its strength."

"I don't understand." She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. "I don't care. I don't want to be your Radiant."

The very thought that she was some kind of immortal chosen one was absurd. She was just Kara MacAllister, preschool teacher. A woman of average looks, average intelligence, average athletic ability. She was average in so many ways her picture ought to be inserted beside the word in the dictionary.

"I can't possibly be the one you're looking for. There's got to be a mistake."

She curled in on herself even tighter, inadvertently squeezing her injured hand. The wave of fresh pain brought tears to her eyes.

"I've got to heal that injury, Kara."

"It'll heal on its own."

"No. It won't. A wound from a draden is different. Let me see your hand." His thumb slid under her chin, and he tilted her face up to his. "I won't hurt you."

She believed him, though she figured he was probably forcing trust into her while he was taking the other emotions out. As she eased her hand away from her body, the pain exploded. Breath hissed into her mouth between clenched teeth.

Lyon took hold of her wrist and lifted her mangled hand to his mouth.

She looked at him in disbelief. "Kissing it is not going to make it feel better." No matter how much her preschoolers believed otherwise.

Her words seemed to amuse him. "I heal through my tongue."

"Your… ?" She gasped as her aching thumb slid into a cocoon of warm silk. His velvet tongue stroked her skin, stealing the pain, sending shivers of heat flowing into her blood.

Her eyes widened as she felt her body begin to melt. Her breath quickened with a desire that shouldn't be there. A desire she didn't want.

He watched her with sharp eyes as he released her thumb and took each finger into his mouth, one by one, healing the flesh, easing the hurt, ensnaring her in a web of restless need. Her fingers healed, he pulled the back of her hand to his mouth and stroked his warm tongue over the cuts until the only pain remaining was from the raw tears on her palm.

When he turned her hand and pressed her palm to his mouth, fire leaped deep inside her, a living ache centered low in her body, at her very core. An ache that built and grew with every stroke of his tongue.

"Lyon…"

Her breaths came in small gasps as the pressure between her legs built. She was racing toward….

No. This wasn't right. Her mother lay dead only a few feet away. She clamped her knees together, fighting the rising tide, and lost. The orgasm broke over her in a sudden rush, tightening her womb in spasms of hot joy. Wave after wave of glorious sensation ripped through her, release singing through her veins. The best…the absolute best….

With a shudder of pure perfection, she collapsed against the coffee table and met Lyon's shocked gaze.

"Oh, God." She buried her face in her free hand in a. useless attempt to hide from the utter mortification. How had she gotten so excited from such a simple touch?

She hadn't. Not by herself. She peeked between her fingers, then lowered her hand and glared at him.

"You did that to me. You're a master of manipulation, aren't you?"

He opened his mouth, then closed it with a snap, "We need to get going." His voice was gruff, almost strained, as he released her hand and rose to his feet. "The draden found us once. They'll find us again."

Kara shuddered and stood, happy to drop the subject of her small sexual overreaction, even as aftershocks tightened her womb, refusing to let her forget.

"What about my mom?"

"She's dead, Kara. We can leave her for others to dispose of in a more traditional manner, or we can bury her now. Your choice. But we can't stay. The longer you're here, the more likely other draden will find you. And there's no protection."

Kara opened her mouth to argue, then sighed, feeling her control over her life slipping from her hands. She was going with him. Tonight. Not only was it no longer safe for her here, but she had to know who she was. What she was. And there was only one way to get the answers.

Lyon.

"You found her," Tighe called, hopping down from the cockpit of the small Cessna several hours later.

Lyon nodded as he ushered Kara across the dark tarmac. The rain had finally stopped while they'd dug the grave for Kara's adoptive mother. He'd called Tighe to come get them, deciding to leave his BMW behind. After the evening's events, he'd given up any thoughts of driving cross-country with the woman. They faced the danger of another draden attack, of course. But the bigger danger, he'd realized, was to himself.

He'd always been somewhat sensitive to others' emotions, but he seemed to read Kara's extraordinarily clearly.

Sweet goddess, all he'd done was heal her injured hand, yet with every stroke of his tongue, her excitement had risen, driving his own right along with it until he'd been on fire for her. When her passion broke, he'd nearly lost it in his pants. Since he hadn't… quite… he was still hard as a rock and painfully aware of her. Her sweet scent, the curve of her jaw, the fine silk of her skin.

Goddess help me. The last thing he wanted was an obsession for any woman, let alone the chosen one. Yet every time he touched her, he felt need power through him like a charge of pure lightning.

When they reached the plane, Tighe greeted him in the usual fashion, extending his hand as they clasped one another just below the elbow in a slam of hard flesh.

Tighe looked at Kara curiously as he bowed his head. "Radiant."

"I'm… Kara." Wariness and exhaustion laced her voice. "Kara MacAllister."

Tighe threw Lyon a questioning look over Kara's head.

"She's the one," Lyon confirmed. "She was raised human, with no knowledge of the Therian race."

Tighe whistled low. "That's awkward." He took Kara's suitcase from Lyon, then turned to Kara, flashing a pair of dimples that had slain too many feminine hearts to count. "So, it was a bit of a surprise to you, huh? Being chosen to live with a bunch of sh—"

"Tighe…" Lyon warned, silencing the man with a look. She wasn't ready for any more surprises. "Kara's had a tough night."

Tighe nodded. "Understood." He slipped on his dark shades, then slung his arm across Kara's stiff shoulders, ushering her to the plane.