How could she think this-what happened between them-was a farce? How could she even think of living without him? For God as his witness, he could not think of living without her.

And who had she been with in the cavern?

He hesitated when everything inside him demanded he take her, fill her with himself, and never let her doubt who she belonged to. And he could do it, he knew. She was vulnerable and she cared for him-he knew she cared. But that wasn't enough. He wanted her to love him, as he loved her. He wanted the decision to come from within her heart, not because he'd roused her to the point of no return.

She's a liar, the voice in his head crooned.

Sean held Danni between his hands, unable to stop touching her even as he pulled away. She looked at him, her eyes heavy with passion, her features soft with desire. Slowly she focused, realizing he'd withdrawn. Her gray gaze settled on his face. A part of him burned out of control, became ash whipped by the wind as he stared into those beautiful eyes and watched them widen with surprise.

"Is it farce that makes you say my name like it's a prayer?" he said softly. "Farce that makes you beg for my touch?"

Her brows drew together, and a flush crept from her slender throat to her cheeks.

"You are more mine than any wife by name or deed. You'll not forget it in the future."

And then he turned and walked away, leaving the damaged door, like his heart, open behind him.

Chapter Thirty-three.

AT first, it was only surprise that hit Danni. Gripped by a cold numbness, she stared at the door, uncaring that the shower still spat its warm stream, that she stood naked and exposed in the draft. Then a voice that seemed at once inside and out began to whisper, Who does he think he is? How dare he talk to you that way? Hurt him. Hurt him.

The voice lit a wick of anger, and it hissed with a life of its own. It burned its way from her head to her feet, moving her before her brain had a chance to register the enormity of its blaze.

She twisted the knob on the shower, grabbed a towel, and stalked dripping wet out of the bathroom. Bean scurried to get out of her way, but Sean stood in the kitchen, unaware of the storm that approached. Danni was shaking, her entire body trembling with the waves of indignation. She tried to speak. Tried to spit out the vehemence locked in her throat. But her rage was too great. How dare he treat you that way? How dare he make demands that he had no right-no ability to back up? The voice fanned the flames. He's dead for God's sake. Not the kind of man you' d want for a husband anyway.

There was a heavy glass ashtray on the coffee table. She scooped it up and threw it at him.

The weighted glass slammed against the cupboard beside him and clattered to the floor without shattering. He spun around, but his look of shock only incensed her more. The voice applauded her efforts and provoked her to try again.

"What? You expected me to just take it? Sweet little Danni, too nice to fight back after she's manhandled in the shower? Do you think because of last night you can touch me whenever you want? I am not yours. Not now. Not ever."

The shouted words felt like balm against her injured pride and battered emotions. If she said it loud enough, repeated it enough times, maybe it would be true. With an angry tightening of her towel, she stomped to the curtained bedroom. But Sean had recovered from his surprise and was there, blocking her way.

"What?" she demanded. "You want to see if you can get a leash on me? Chain me to the bed?"

The idea of it obviously appealed to him, and the ghost of a smile pulled his mouth before he had the good sense to stop it. But it was enough. The nagging voice in her head demanded she slap that smug look away. Danni had been through too much in the past few days. Her emotions had been pushed and pulled, tattered and torn. Refashioned into something she didn't recognize, someone whose reactions she could no longer control. She raised her hand to strike, but he caught it before the satisfying connection could be made.

Her other hand swung and he caught that, too, stepping her back against the wall, restraining her wrists and pinning her body. Her towel fell away in a damp puddle at her feet, leaving her naked and exposed yet again.

Hurt him, hurt him, HURT HIM, the voice shouted, and suddenly she recognized it. That voice wasn't coming from inside her head. It was the Book. Christ, it was the Book.

She was breathing hard-deep, ragged breaths that burned her throat and rushed in her ears. Sean was, too. She realized the Book must be taunting him as well, driving them both into a frenzy of emotions that neither of them understood.

She felt his chest heave up to meet her own. The contact burned, soothed, threw her already chaotic feelings into a dizzying plunge. He stared into her eyes, holding her captive with the stormy sea she saw within him. She wanted to look away, but there was so much more beneath his stare than anger. There was hurt. Desperation. Agony. She saw that he was as battered, as bereft and confused and tormented as her. That he understood even less of his own reactions than she did. But like herself, he'd turned all that churning emotion into anger, something that could be thrown. Something that could find a mark, find a purpose. His eyes narrowed, and she heard a whisper in the stifled air.

Who was she with, she's a liar, who was she with?

The words revolved around them, unheard but felt. Danni clenched her eyes tight, furious now with herself for bringing the cursed thing here. What was she thinking? That it would be safe in a drawer? She'd been warned repeatedly about it, but she hadn't heeded the danger. And here it was manipulating them both.

Hurt him, hurt him, hurt- Enough. The word became action, a net she cast around the voice. She felt the rebellion, the resistance, and she tightened her thoughts, drawing in the corners, fighting its evil power like her life depended on it. In her mind, she stuffed that voice into a dark corner, sealed it up with a stone wall. Trapped it in a prison it couldn't escape. It shrieked in rage, but for now, its poisonous cries were contained, muffled and insignificant, behind her barrier.

It was a temporary fix, but it held. Her mind cleared and with it went the rage. The inexplicable need to hurt this man she loved.

And she hadn't even touched it yet . . .

As she watched, Sean's eyes cleared as well, leaving him bewildered. Shame colored the green and made them shimmer.

It seemed he would speak, a quick intake of breath, his tongue moistening his lips. She was afraid of what he would say, afraid of what he wouldn't. There wasn't time for explanations. There was only here, now, the moments before she had to remove the indescribable darkness and evil of the Book from the drawer she'd foolishly placed it in and take it back to the cavern. Touch it.

Sean continued to stare into her eyes, deeply, beseechingly, hungrily. And she understood that the fire that was melting her heart and soul burned within him as well. There was no way out of this inferno.

She leaned forward, fighting the hands that still held her wrists and pressed her mouth to his in a hard, hungry kiss. It staggered him, amazed him, and the power of it flooded her veins. He didn't know whether to respond or rebuke, and that pleased her, too. She took his choice away, using teeth and tongue to tease and provoke. The sound he made was fuel to her ecstatic blaze. He groaned deep in his throat, and then his hands were cupping her face, long fingers digging into her scalp. Making her feel him.

She responded in like, tugging at his wet shirt, tearing it from his shoulders. He released her just long enough to cooperate. Then her fingers were digging into the hard muscles of his chest and arms, pulling him into the scorching furnace of emotion and desire.

He fumbled with his pants, trying to hold onto her and work them free at the same time. She ground her hips against him, hindering and encouraging with equal measures. At last he had them open and she shoved them down as he grabbed her hips and jerked her up to meet him.

He was hard and engorged, and he plunged himself into her without tenderness or finesse. There was nothing gentle, nothing loving about it, and it might have hurt had she not been ready and waiting. Had it not been what she'd waited for, what she wanted. She needed to feel with every sense she possessed, needed to embrace the pain and the glory of these moments which could be their last. She arched her back, wrapping her legs around his waist as her head thumped the wall.

She pressed her mouth to his, stealing his breath, taking from him everything she could. She left him defenseless, slave to his own driving need and her demanding mouth. He held her in place as he pumped relentlessly, brutally. Each time he buried himself in her then withdrew to do it again, she felt the rising inside her, the violent building and clenching. The suicidal height and intensity that increased with each fierce thrust.

And then it came, that dizzying moment just before everything inside her turned liquid and molten in an explosion of heat and hurt and pleasure. She felt like a torch, bright in the blackest night, hissing and burning and illuminated. An instant later he came with her, shouting her name as he drove himself deep, deep inside her, letting loose the rage and fear, letting it meet and tangle with her own. Letting their combined heat incinerate the crazy violence that impelled them both to this dangerous edge.

She felt the tension in him leave, her own following willingly. He turned his face to the hollow of her throat and tenderly kissed her neck.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"Don't be. I wanted it."

He looked up, seeing the truth in her eyes, understanding that she'd felt the same consuming passion, the same driving need to seize tight and to ward off. To hold on and to let go. Then he was moving away from the wall, still holding her, still connected. She wrapped her arms and legs more tightly around him and held on as he lowered her to the bed.

Chapter Thirty-four.

DANNI had only hours to decide what she was going to do. One part of her wanted to pull the covers over her head and pretend that nothing would change, pretend that tomorrow she'd awaken in Sean's arms just as she had that morning and the morning before. But Danni had spent most of her life denying what she didn't want to face. She refused to do it any longer.

In the drawer of the dresser, she sensed the Book waiting, watching. She'd managed to contain it before, but she was growing weak with the effort. She could feel it draining her strength.

Sighing, she wiggled out of bed, took a pair of panties from the dresser, and shrugged into Sean's discarded button-down shirt which she found on the floor. A flush covered her face as she thought of how she'd ripped it from his body. Bean looked up from the rug at the foot of the bed and wagged her stubby tail.

"Where are you going?" Sean asked, his voice thick and sleepy, rumbling deep in his chest.

"Water," she answered. "I'll bring you some, too."

When she returned, he was sitting up, propped by pillows, his hands linked behind his head. She stared at him, admiring the flat ridges of his stomach, the hard broadness of his chest, the slope and gleam of muscles rising from shoulder to bunched bicep. The perfect weave of sinew and bone. He was beautiful in shape, in face, in mind. She climbed on the bed beside him, legs together and tucked beneath her.

He thanked her for the water and drank it down. After the wild sex they both seemed suddenly shy, neither meeting the other's eyes. There was still much unsaid between them, and it turned the intimate aftermath into tense waiting.

Finally, he sat forward, putting a large warm hand on her bent knee. "What happened today?" he asked softly.

"My father threatened me. In the kitchen," she said.

Sudden tears burned her eyes, and she covered her face with her hands to hide them. Sean cursed beneath his breath, and then he was kneeling beside her, pulling her into an embrace that was gentle and solid.

"I was going to ask for his help but . . . he's been using the Book of Fennore, and it's made him crazy. Bronagh and my mother both walked in, and he told them he'd caught me stealing . . ." she trailed off, stuttering over the horror of it.

Sean rubbed her back in slow gentle circles. "What did they say?" he asked.

"Bronagh told me to leave. I don't know what else was said after."

"Is that why you went to the cavern?"

She nodded. "I had to hide. I was so upset. He said he'd kill me before he let me have the Book. My father is a monster. I was so happy to meet him but he's . . ." She took a deep breath, unable to speak it.

"Look at me," he said, squeezing her shoulders. "Danni, look at me." He waited until she complied and then, staring deeply into her eyes, he said, "Who or what he is-it doesn't matter. It doesn't define who you are."

She wanted to believe it, but his words were such hypocrisy that she couldn't. "Doesn't it? Haven't you been measuring yourself by your father's failures and crimes all these years?"

Sean's mouth tightened, and she knew he wanted to argue. But at his core, Sean was an honest man. He couldn't deny the truth, even to himself.

"Well, I guess that makes me a fool," he said softly. "I'm sure you already knew that."

She stared into his face, into the turbulent sea of his green eyes. She almost wished for the insulating anger she'd felt in the shower when he'd left her shaking and needing. But there was too much pain here now, in this moment of truth. Too much heartbreak and finality, for she knew what needed to be said next and there was no room for petty anger. No room for vengeance.

She pulled away, and he let his arms fall as he watched her. His gaze was intense, focused and probing. She felt like he was seeing through her, to the pain inside.

"There's something I need to tell you," she said.

"There's something I need to tell you, too," he answered.

That caught her off balance and made her ask, "What is it?"

He smiled, though he still managed to look serious and intent and somehow vulnerable. Unsure of himself. Unsure of her.

"I'm sorry, about earlier, in the shower. I meant what I said, though. What's between us, what I feel when I'm with you, it's real."

His hand moved to her throat, slipping back to tunnel through her hair and pull her closer for his kiss. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to the warmth and surrender of it.

"I'm in love with you, Danni. I want to be with you. Always. Forever."

There were tears in her eyes again, only these were not the hot and bitter tears of her anger and humiliation. These were huge, glistening drops that slid down her cheeks. He loved her. And God knew she loved him, too. But he didn't know the whole truth about what had happened to them on her fifth birthday. And when he realized she'd known all along and kept it from him. . . .

He pressed his lips to her face, to the salty tears. "Don't cry," he said, and his deep voice was low with pain.

"Sean .. ."

He heard the note of doom in her voice and stiffened, lips still pressed to her cheek. Slowly he pulled back, staring into her face with guarded eyes.

Danni stood, needing to put some distance between them before she spoke. She didn't know where to begin explaining to this man that he'd been dead for the past two decades. And what scared her the most, what had kept her from speaking of it before, was one looming question: What would happen when he knew? What was his existence made of? Was it his belief that he was alive that made him seem so real? If she shattered that, would he become the ghost she knew him to be?

"Do you remember when you came to my house?" she asked.

"It was just a few days ago."

"I know. But do you remember how you got there?"

He frowned. "What do you mean?"

"How you got there, Sean. Did you take a cab?"

He shook his head, brows pulled together in consternation. "No."

"You didn't have a car. I would have seen it."

"I don't know where you're going with this. What's your point, Danni?"

"And how did you get back to your hotel?" she asked.

He shrugged. "I guess I walked."

"Maybe you did. But you should remember it, shouldn't you?"

He shook his head, noncommittal. But now he looked angry. Feeling as if something were breaking inside her, she went on. "What about the flight over from Ireland? Do you remember that?"

"Of course," he said, but the frown had become a scowl and she knew he was trying to recall it even as he spoke.

"Where did you layover?" she asked.

"What?"

"A flight that long had to have a layover. Which city?"

Mutely, he shook his head again.