“Hardly.” She bit her lip as she met him stroke for stroke. “No wonder Andarions keep such a tight leash on themselves. Otherwise you’d never leave your bedrooms.”

He laughed harder at that than what was warranted.

“What’s that about?”

He cupped her chin and kissed her. “Last year, when Darling had himself wired with explosives, and was ready to blow himself and half his capital city to hell, Caillen and Nyk said that all we needed to do to redirect him from vengeance was get him laid. I scoffed at them for the suggestion, and they laughed at my stupidity. As much as I hate to admit those bastards were right. They’re right. I understand completely now. There is nothing sweeter than being inside you, mu tara. I would gladly give up any quest to stay here with you, like this.”

She ran her hand over his prickly cheek as he thrust faster against her hips. “I meant what I said, Dancer. I would gladly carry your lineage forward.”

“As would I with you. But the gods won’t grant us that and we both know it.”

Tears choked her as she wrapped her legs around his hips and wished she’d met him in a different time and place. If Fain was half the male and lover Dancer was, how could Omira have ever betrayed him with another? How could her sister have held so much in her hand and then callously thrown it all away?

Was she out of her mind?

“Mia?” He paused to wipe the tears from her cheeks. “Am I hurting you?”

She shook her head. “It’s the future that hurts me.”

“Don’t think about it. Just look into my eyes and know that you hold a place inside me no one else has ever touched. It’s reserved solely for you.”

That made her cry harder.

Hauk let out a breath of heart-wrenching frustration.

She buried her hands in his hair and held him against her. “It’s not you, baby. I’m a woman. Not an Andarion female. I have a hard time keeping tender emotions bottled inside me sometimes. The mere thought of losing you now…” She teased his lips with hers as she rolled him over so that she straddled him. “It’s not fair that I’ve waited my whole life for you and now that I’ve finally found you, I have to let you go.”

Hauk growled as she took control of their pleasure. If he could, he would stop time so that they’d never have to leave this place. How ironic really that in this desert that had destroyed his life when it’d taken Keris’s, it had given him a new one with Sumi.

Only this one couldn’t last and he knew it. All too soon, he’d have to let her go and return for a death sentence.

How can I let her go?