AN ETERNAL LOVE

CHAPTER: 31

Frowning at her, Damien shook his head. "No. Even with the collar, the fall could have broken your wee

neck." And his forefinger danced across her neck as he said it, sending shivers down her spine.

"I could have," Adira said. "But did not."

His eyes were piercing, as if he sought to see inside her mind, to the truth hidden there.

"There was no life in you when I held you in my arms," he whispered. "You were not pretending that,"

Damien said.

"No," Adira whispered, half afraid he would see right through the lie. "I fainted. Perhaps from the fall, or

the fear, I cannot say. But I woke in..." she shuddered at the memory. "In a horrible place."

His face softened then. Slowly he lowered his head. "Yeah, I know about that," he said softly. Then

meeting her gaze, he asked, "And your mother? Did she wear this trick collar as well?" Damien asked

her.

Adira closed her eyes, her pain all too real. "Someone saw my friend and he had to run away, or be

caught. There was no time for him to help her as he did me. When I woke among the dead, she was

beside me... and..." Tears choked her throat, and she could not go on.

His hand came to her, stroking her cheek. Adira wanted to clasp it in her own and press a kiss to his

palm. But she only stood still, closing her eyes at the feelings his touch evoked. Weak with relief that

she was feeling this man's touch again, as she had so often dreamed of doing. Weak, too, with the

remembered pain of finding her precious mother, dead.

"I went there," Damien said. "To the place where they took you. But you were not there. Nor was your

mother."

Adira looked at him through her tears. "Why?" she asked.Contentt bel0ngs to N0ve/lDrâ/ma.O(r)g!

"I could not save you, girl. I thought... at least I might give you a proper burial," he said.

She smiled gently at him, and he brushed a tear from her cheek.

"You are a kind man, Damien Walter," Adira said.

"No," he said softly, eyes going harder. "Not so kind, not when I am lied to," he said.

She swallowed hard. He could be a dangerous man as well. Dangerous to her. To her life, as well as to

her heart.

"Go on, girl. What happened when you woke?" he asked.

"I carried my mother into the forest and buried her there. She would have been pleased with the spot I

chose, I think," Adira replied.

"She would have been pleased," he said, "to know that you survived."

"She knew," Adira whispered. And then she sniffed and impatiently dashed the tears from her face. "If

you tell them what you know of me, Damien..."

"I will not tell them," he said.

Adira could only blink in surprise.

"I will not betray your secret, Adira. I swear it on all that I am. But you must tell me the truth. All of the

truth."

She could not look him in the eye when he asked her that. "I can only tell you that I have never brought

harm to another human being. Not in all my life, Damien. On my mother's soul, I swear it is the truth,"

Adira replied.

His hand turned her face towards his again. He searched her face for a long moment, his velvet brown

eyes as piercing as before. And then he nodded. "I believe you," he said. "But there is another question

I have, and you must know what it is. I am a trainee priest, Adira, a man of God, even though I

abandoned my studies for the priesthood. And yet... and yet you have haunted my soul." He closed his

eyes slowly. "I have to know the truth. Am I condemning myself to punishment in the afterlife, by letting

you haunt my thoughts day and night? Am I, Adira? Are you, truly, a ..."

The doors burst open then, and Alex Davies, of all people, marched inside, saw them together, and

stopped dead.

"Condemning yourself?" Adira whispered, and anger swelled in her chest until she thought she would

burst with it. "How dare you?"

She took a single step toward the door and stopped when she saw the way Alex was staring at Damien

and Adira, his cheeks reddening with anger before he hid the emotion. Instead, he painted his face with

a false smile.

"I wondered where you had gone, Reverend." Then he nodded at her. "Mistress Thompson."

Adira acknowledged him with a glance, then turned to Damien again. "Thank you for helping me find

my shawl, Reverend Walter," Adira said, her tone dripping ice." Aunt Helen said I would lose my head

were it not for my neck keeping it attached."

"Then I am glad your neck is intact," he said softly, and there was an apology in his eyes. One she

refused to acknowledge. More softly, he whispered, "Very glad."

No. She would not feel this way for him. She would not. Adira muttered to herself. Yet her knees were

weak as she strode out of the church. And her heart was, a quivering puddle.