Worth Dying For Read Online Free Page A

ego-driven battles.
    He ran towards their camp, drawn closer by the knowledge they were asleep. The sound of Amber’s gentle snores, barely audible under David’s ear-splitting grunts, perturbed him. A longing he thought he’d overcome sparked to life in his chest and he thought back to a time when his love would sleep soundly in his arms, safe in the knowledge he would keep her from harm.
    Bane envied David. The woman sharing his sleeping quarters might not want him but David could still find love one day, and he wouldn’t have to face eternity without her when she died.
    A change in the rhythm of Amber’s breathing warned Bane she would wake imminently and he moved away, scanning the area around him, ensuring he would be shrouded in darkness before settling down to watch them again. The sound of the tent’s zipper ripping open announced the start of their day a few minutes later. David appeared first, half-naked in no more than his boxers, and looking mighty proud of himself. He stretched and preened as he stared out over the ocean, patting and rubbing his torso like a displaying mountain gorilla. Bane fought the urge to laugh out loud.
    The woman emerged a few minutes later. More modest than the man, she had donned a bathing suit and taken her long auburn hair out of the bun she’d worn the day before. Bane turned away when he found he couldn’t drag his gaze from her shapely form. A dark hunger roared to life in his gut—as it did whenever he hunted or had sex—but he pushed it away, disgusted with himself and her. How dare she force her presence on him and reduce him to no more than a reluctant voyeur? But even as his thoughts railed at her, he knew his anger was misplaced. It had been way too long since he’d been with a woman, if a semi-naked one affected him so. His sex drive had always been strong—as it was with most of his kind—but still controllable. Bane’s reaction to Amber was a weakness on his part. Unchecked desire could cloud his mind and make him an easier target. He rarely allowed anything to distract him so.
    He grinned as he remembered the boy—for that’s what David seemed to Bane—trying to make a manly show of carrying the woman off after she’d sensed something watching them. His weak legs had trembled under the strain and the situation must have been humiliating for both of them. The thought pulled him up short. What did it matter to him how they felt? Once, in a former life, he’d cared. And where had it got him? His only love had died mere feet away with him helpless to stop it. Since that day, nobody’s feelings had mattered. Not even his.
    Bane’s gaze returned to Amber, following the path of the sun’s early rays playing on her pale skin. Freckles danced across her nose and the back of her shoulders, a shade lighter than her hair. The breeze carried her essence to him, intensifying her assault on his senses as a heady mix of synthetic orchids and perfume chemicals burned his nose but did nothing to mask her natural, almond-like scent.
    She turned her body towards the island, fluffing her auburn tresses around her head and smiling up into the sky before staring directly at him. Had her vision been as sharp as his, she would have seen him watching her and, no doubt noticed his reaction, but she simply closed her eyes and allowed the heat to warm her face. The impact of her stare hit Bane like a kick in the chest. His fingers dug into the rough bark of the tree beneath him, holding him still and preventing him from following the urge to leap from his hiding place and fall at her feet.
    Mary . She had Mary’s eyes.
    For one insane moment, he wondered if he’d conjured up the image of his dead wife by thinking of her. The woman below held a striking resemblance to her that he hadn’t noticed until that very second, probably because he hadn’t seen her clearly without the dark glasses she wore. But the moment he looked into her eyes, he understood the reason for his