Accidentally…Over? (Accidentally Yours #5)(17)
Author: Mimi Jean Pamfiloff

“I do not joke, Ashli,” he censured her. His hot, sensual scent filled her nostrils. “You will cease your foolish behavior and listen carefully because there is nothing more important than saving you.”

Simultaneous explosions of heated thunderbolts and ice-cold shivers exploded over her body. She didn’t know why, but she found herself needing to touch him, to make sure he was real. It was… as if… she needed it more than the blood in her veins. She felt her heart might actually collapse if she couldn’t have proof. Proof he was really, really there.

Cautiously, she reached for him, her breath sticking in her throat. Her palms collided with hot flesh. A man’s flesh. She gasped as a jolt of unchaste neediness surged through her. She couldn’t pull back. Her hands molded to his face and began to explore. A sculpted jaw covered in a thick, short beard; sharp cheekbones; soft, thick brows. She heard his breathing stop. Was he holding it? Did he feel the same wanton elation? Ohmygod. It was amazing, like nothing she’d ever experienced in her entire life.

Her hands slid just above his ears and found soft hair. She gingerly glided her fingertips down, down, down, following the silky strands until she reached their tips, lingering just above his shoulder. Skin. Oh, God. She wanted to touch every taut inch.

“What are you?” she whispered.

He pulled away, leaving her grasping nothing but air.

She blinked and snapped out of her trance. Had it been an illusion? No. Please, no. She just might die if she discovered that pool of lifesaving water was a mirage.

“Don’t go,” she begged. She never begged anyone for anything.

“I am here.” His voice sounded irritated, shaken.

“Please, tell me. What are you?”

Máax stood with his back pressed to the wall and stared down at Ashli, her hands extended in midair as if beckoning him to return.

What happened? He didn’t know, but now he was in a state of what he believed humans referred to as WTFH. Because he knew damned well that LOVE was just an acronym for “loss of valuable energy,” and love was exactly what he’d felt. Or was it merely his mate’s bond drawing him in, the Universe’s masterful way of conspiring?

The moment Ashli touched him, his light erupted with rapturous energy that spiraled and twisted, coalescing into a single strand of light. He wanted to envelop himself in it and drink from it. Then the strand sieved through his skin, into his veins, and tangled itself around his heart like a boa constrictor capturing its prey. The cord began to elongate, stretching through time, through this world into the next, until it reached the land of dead souls. Ashli. Ashli was there! He witnessed the strand of brilliant light tether itself to Ashli’s wrist. He began pulling, exerting every fiber of his being to extract her like a desperate man attempting to salvage his own heart from a pit of hungry vipers. Máax watched in terror as his grip faltered, and the cord slid from his blistering hands. He screamed Ashli’s name, mirroring her cries of agony as she dissolved inside a pool of vicious, hungry souls, feeding from her light.

WTFAIGTDN? What the f**k am I going to do now?

And why do I keep speaking to myself in acronyms? They are quite annoying.

Máax’s heart raced at a sickening pace, and his chest expanded with one careful breath, the kind of breath a man takes when he’s about to pray for a miracle. What had the vision meant? Yes, he understood his role was to save her, but there was something else. The Universe was trying to tell him something.

“What. Are. You?” she repeated.

He felt an unfamiliar lump of doubt in his throat. “I am your mate.”

“Sorry?” she said.

He cleared his throat. “You are my… match. My soul mate, which I already knew. But what I do not comprehend is why the Universe wants to exterminate you. And she will not quit until she has you.”

Some things in life have no explanation. This was one of them. Because when the strange male voice spoke those words, Ashli knew he’d spoken the truth. It was like drinking a glass of cold water from a mountain stream; you recognize the taste of purity, even if you’re unable to describe or articulate it. That’s how his words felt. There was simply an absence of lies or deceit. Just… truth.

“Oh, God.” She sat up slowly, rubbing her forehead. “I always knew I was different, but this is too much.”

A warm hand embraced her own and that strange current of electricity once again flowed through her body. Her eyes couldn’t help but seek him out.

“Why can’t I see you?” she said. She recalled the image of the man coming from the ocean, the outline of his flawless male body glistening in the sun. He was definitely worth seeing.

Ohmygod. The dreams! She’d had them ever since the accident. This man in her dreams had been faceless, he’d done things to her body that left her feeling almost embarrassed but also deliciously weak and sated, and he’d pleasured her in every possible way known to man—errr, woman.

That’s him! He’s the man from my dreams!

“It is my punishment for breaking a few rules,” he explained without emotion. “My mortal shell was taken from me. But I do not want to discuss that now. I must go to see my brethren.”

What? He was leaving? “You can’t go.”

That warm hand, gentle but rough, trailed across her cheek. “I will return as quickly as I can.”

“Why do you have to leave?”

“Because the Universe is waiting for any opportunity to take you. I must find out why.”

She watched the door open.

“Wait!” But he was already gone. She felt his absence in the air.

She shook her head—ow, ow, ow—unable to process the barrage of emotions barreling over her. He was real. He wasn’t Death, but an invisible god. He was her soul mate. The Universe wanted to kill her.

This can’t be happening. I need meds. “Dr. Ruiz?”

Eight

Like a drippy old faucet, an anxious voice inside Máax’s head commenced nagging the moment he walked out of that hospital. “Go back. Go back to her,” it said. And while the sensible part of his mind understood this to be the effect of their bond—a bond he was still determined to forget once this mission concluded—his body did not seem to give a rat’s ass and protested violently. Leaving her felt like having his atoms busted apart with a crowbar. Not only that, but traveling to a time where Ashli no longer existed felt like traveling to hell. In the future, she was still dead. He had not saved her yet.