Hers to Choose Read Online Free PDF

seven hells are we?”
    “ Where I was taking you when you passed out, L’ago Mistero , Mystery Lake. An oasis known to the Oshtesh . Your men are fine. We are safe. If you promise to lie still I will get Captain Biron for you.”
    He cracked an eyelid open and tried to glare at her.
    “I lost sleep over you, Eric DeStroia. I will not permit you to undo all my efforts. You must promise.” The slight tip to the corners of her mouth made a lie of her stern tone.
    A long sigh escaped. Goddess, even that hurts. “Promise,” he muttered.
    He felt her pull his blankets back up, straightening them. Her hand pressed his forehead, then cheek. “Good. You still feel cool. Don’t excite yourself. That’s an order, Commander.”
    He heard the swish of her robes and the rasp of her leather soles against the stone floor of the cave as she left. She returned a few minutes later.
    “As promised , Commander. I have brought you Captain Biron.” Her footsteps retreated.
    “Commander?” He lacked the energy to open his eyes.
    “ Jon. How are the men?”
    “Very well , under the circumstances. This place is amazing. You could pass within five feet of the access point and never know of its existence. None of our maps show it. It is a large, deep, freshwater lake, surrounded by mountain walls. Right in the middle of the godsbedamned wastelands. A fucking miracle.”
    Eric forced his eyes open. “How many did we lose, Jon?”
    “ Twenty-one during the battle. Three died later of their wounds.”
    “We left with thirty-two. We return with eight. ” Goddess. He lay quiet, thinking. “Where did they come from?”
    “Sir?”
    “The Haarb, Jon. More than a hundred attacked us. They should not be here in those numbers. Where did they come from? How did they get here? We must find out.” Some other detail about the Haarb lurked in his pounding head but he couldn’t pin it down.
    “Yes, sir. Scouts will be dispatched as soon as possible.”
    “All right, Captain Biron. That is enough for now.” Sophi shooed the captain away and stood looking down at him, a cup in her hand.
    “I’ll check on you later, Commander.” Biron nodded. “ Flight Leader .”
    As Jon walked away, Sophi bent down and put a supporting hand behind Eric’s neck. Her robe gaped at the neckline. His view went straight down to her sweetly rounded breasts.
    “Drink this, Commander.” She helped him swallow the contents of the cup.
    “Horse piss.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “Tastes like horse piss.”
    She gave an amused huff. “I’ll grant it does not taste good, but it is very good for you.”
    “What is it, Flight Leader , if not horse piss?”
    “Something to help your pain. Something to make you sleep.”
    “I don’t want to sleep.”
    Her aqua eyes held humor. “Too late, Commander.”
    His eyes crossed and he sank back into unconsciousness.
    Sophi watched as sleep claimed the warrior for whom she had cared so tenderly—so exclusively. I like you, Eric DeStroia—and I don’t want to. How did you work your way past my careful defenses? Sophi chided herself. It couldn’t possibly be his lean, sculptured body that flowed in well-defined curves of velvet skin under her fingers or his elegant face, now softened in sleep? She smoothed his thick, brown hair over his forehead, then cupped a hand over his beard-roughened jaw. You are outrageously handsome with a beautiful body. It is vastly unfair to a woman’s heart.
    When he had slipped unconscious from his horse at the cave’s entrance, she had flown to him and quickly stripped him nude. The extent and nature of his wounds appalled her and she had known real fear that she might lose this man so soon upon coming to know him. On the battlefield, Eric had seemed indomitable, an immortal warrior of unparalleled skill astride a black destrier itself disgorged from the fires of hell. His collapse had proved him as human as she. You aren’t a demi-god, are you, Eric? You hurt and bleed and feel, just like