Free consumed by Sandra Sookoo Page B

could no more deny her request than he could cease breathing on command. Once beside her warm, fragrant body, he drew the quilt around them and held her close. “It was never my intention to hurt you, Ava.”
    “You didn’t.” She wriggled her backside against him. His member twitched but didn’t respond further. “I guess I’m sad. After everything else, I thought somehow if you and I could sleep together, this whole coming-back-in-time thing would make sense or give me a purpose.”
    “I have found the longer I live, the less that makes sense. It is a matter of unlearning everything I knew before. This is especially true after meeting you.” He rested his chin on top of her head. “I am glad you came, for no other reason than the opportunity to meet you.”
    “You’re too charming for your own good.” Though he couldn’t see it for confirmation, he heard the smile in her voice.
    “Perhaps, but I am honest. You have brought light into my life where there was none. Spending my last days with you is quite delightful, despite my current difficulties.” Brushing his fingers over her breasts, urging her nipples into puckered flowers, he sighed. There was simply not enough time left to acquaint himself with her body as he’d like. “The life of a phoenix is harsh and exacting. It seems there is always a sacrifice involved.”
    “How so?”
    Sam felt the tremor that passed through her body. Despite her protests when he first met her, women were the more delicate of the species. He’d give up many things if granted the ability to remain alive and protect her, watch her do even the most mundane things, grow old alongside her. “Since there can only be one full-blooded phoenix living at a time, I never knew my father. If the stories are to be believed, he suffered from a malady of the heart and died the same day as my birth. This also happened to his father before him.”
    “I’m so sorry.” Turning in his arms, she pressed her body against him, her arms around his waist holding him close. “Did anyone ever explain to you why?”
    “No.” He stroked his fingers down her spine, enjoying the simplicity of feeling connected to a woman, able to lie in bed without the distraction of sex. “This is how the race works with no choice to the bearers. We are very much alone in the world.”
    “What about your mother? Is she gone as well?” Ava’s whispered words tickled his ear.
    “Unfortunately, yes. She was heartbroken when my father died. She managed to live for a few years more before she succumbed. I was her only child.” The customary sadness rolled over him from the premature loss of his mother. “One of my mother’s sisters took me in. When I attained my majority, I struck out on my own.”
    “You came to Destiny?” She accompanied the question with the swipe of her tongue on his neck.
    Desire shook his frame at the fleeting touch. “Some time later. I had to make peace with my fate first. I learned everything I could about my unique race from every library I could find. It would seem there is no set purpose for a phoenix, which is probably why the race is dying out. It is almost as if the Creator lost a train of thought and did not follow through.”
    Her low, breathy laughter sent gooseflesh over his skin. “You never had the desire to reproduce?”
    “Never through my adult life. One, I did not wish to give this lifestyle to another, and two, if I produced a son, upon his birth I would die.” He drew his palm down the length of her back, massaging the slight dip at the base of her spine. He loved that spot on a woman’s body. “Most of my life has been spent in selfish pursuits.”
    “And self-preservation. It’s not a crime, Sam.”
    “Perhaps.”
    “You never wanted a child in your own image, someone to carry on the family name?”
    “At times it is a delightful dream, I suppose.” Her scent lulled him into a sense of peace. “Until recently, I never found a woman I wanted to