Which meant that I couldn’t risk taking a drink to restore my blood reserves. Still left with just my claws and my heightened senses. I shoved off the massive familiar and narrowed my eyes as I watched a much larger black orb zip out of the dead body. I had no idea how large the last familiar would be, but it wasn’t looking promising. I already felt like sitting down and calling it quits.
But I couldn’t quit. I never quit. Stagnation was death, movement was life.
So, I focused my attention, counting the remaining enemy heartbeats. I was stunned to find that the two hags were still alive, although one was bleeding profusely from her neck and the other had a nasty gut-wound that would kill her very slowly if she didn’t find help soon. What really shocked me was that they were both squaring off against Natalie, on the verge of one final attack. Natalie crouched warily in a silent challenge.
She no longer had her claws out, letting me realize how exhausted she must be.
Seeing that Natalie was unarmed against her foes, I gritted my teeth and formed the last of my blood reserves into foot-long daggers of shadow and blood. I was only able to form two of them, and even that almost failed.
“Get down, Natalie,” I whispered, feeling suddenly dizzy at the aggregate of energy I’d used. Knowing I couldn’t wait any longer, I weakly flung out my hand, sending the crystals at Lucille and Camille. The blood crystals struck them between the eyes like spikes hammered into stone, sinking entirely through their skulls. They died before they could even make a sound, crumpling to the street.
I felt a sudden sense of vertigo and stars had begun to twinkle at the edges of my vision when an unseen hand suddenly grabbed me by the back of my neck and yanked my head downward.
I expected pain, opening my mouth to cry out.
Instead, my lips met the feverish flesh of a graceful, familiar neck as an even warmer, lithe body backed up against my torso, contorting to press every inch of her against me like the missing piece of a puzzle. The sweet taste of cinnamon and salt exploded across my tongue in a tantalizing pairing and I managed to let out a heady moan of pleasure, wondering if I was dreaming. My vantage from over her shoulder allowed my gaze to rove over her slick, silky skin and feast on the swell of her breasts only inches away from my nose.
“Drink deeply,” Natalie purred, angling her head high to rest against my opposite collarbone so as to give me plenty of exposed shoulder and neck in which to feast upon. “I need you.”
I hesitated, understanding the need—hers and mine—that we would soon be killed by the familiars if I didn’t regain some power from her blood. We would both die. Here. Now.
But It would leave us momentarily vulnerable while I feasted. I also knew how dangerous it was in our current weakened states—my control was practically nonexistent. It was a risk to take time for a drink, but we didn’t stand a chance unless I did.
“I told you,” Natalie demanded, sounding annoyed by my reluctance. “You’re going to have some fucking dessert tonight, Sorin, even if I have to force-feed you myself.” True to her word, she took matters into her own hands.
Literally.
Her right hand wrapped around me to squeeze my ass like an anchor, trapping me in place. Then her free hand abruptly untucked the front of my shirt, snapping the buttons in her haste. Her sweaty palm trailed down my abdomen and slipped below the waist of my pants, her deft fingers dancing as they hungrily explored my skin in search of only one thing.
Before I knew it, she curled her silken fingers around my manhood, grabbing onto me and squeezing in a fever-hot grip that almost made my eyes roll back in my head, banishing all thoughts of concern.
I instinctively sunk my fangs deep into her neck with a desperate moan, encouraged by her shuddering whimper as her grip on me clenched tight enough to almost hurt. As her hot blood streamed down my throat, rapidly strengthening me, I realized that she had made an excellent point earlier in the car.
She was indeed a great little dessert place.
I suddenly remembered the familiars still circling us. Luckily, the deaths of their witches must have staggered them. Either that, or they were waiting for me to become too distracted by my feeding to notice a sudden coordinated attack. My fear of them trumped my carnal starvation.
Kind of.
Even as I guzzled Natalie, I immediately partitioned some of her blood to call up a rapidly rotating circle of dozens of blood crystals to surround us in a threatening ring of violence, daring the surviving familiars to interrupt us. They yowled in outrage. I hadn’t ever done that before—using my victim’s blood for my powers without fully absorbing it into my body.
It was more than Natalie could handle as the first orgasm ripped through her body in a convulsive tremor. Her fingers squeezed my rock-hard manhood and I cradled her tighter against me so her legs wouldn’t give out.
I refused to let her fall. I wasn’t finished yet.
Despite her weak knees, Natalie’s hand remained fully functional, and she had no intention of releasing her prize anytime soon. In fact…
Her hand began to squeeze and stroke in a slow, sensual rhythm that matched the speed of me gulping down her blood, and her breathless panting was rapidly fanning the tender flames of our budding passion into a blazing inferno that would not be easily or quietly doused.
I sucked harder on her neck, hungrily trying to keep up with the increasing tempo of her desperate stroking as I drew her blood into me, joining us as one being. A strange foreign power began to grow between us, bringing us closer than merely a vampire and his nourishment.
A man and a woman.
Something…different…was taking place in addition to her frenzied passion and my frantic feeding. She panted hoarsely, writhing her body up and down against mine, still squeezing my ass with her other hand to hold me close and prevent me from separating. In response, I wrapped my arm around her waist, locking her in place as I guzzled her blood.
The tips of her breasts hardened as she arched her back, and I watched her bosom flush red from inches away.
MINE! my inner demon crowed within my head. TAKE HER NOW! IN THE STREET!
I managed to restrain myself from his demand—but only barely, and only because I knew we were still in grave danger, even with the protective ring of daggers circling us, warning the familiars back.
My pulse thundered in my ears as that strange magic continued melding us together, reminding me of something else I’d recently felt, but it was all I could do to keep drinking and force myself not to rip her clothes off and follow my inner demon’s suggestion.
It wasn’t love. It wasn’t even lust. It was a necessity, fueled by that strange magic binding us together. Even more bizarre, tendrils of that magic seemed to be reaching out into the ether, searching for something unseen—a third anchor point in which to take root, bringing us all together as one.
Another climax caused Natalie to whimper huskily and redouble her efforts, fighting against me and herself for a better grip—torn between not wanting to break contact and desperately needing to briefly separate so as to find a more mutually beneficial body position.
I could now smell her lust in the air—an intoxicating perfume that threatened to shatter my tentative hold on rationality. As much as my body wanted her, some other part of me did not.
And above even those sensations, I knew we were still in very real danger despite my protective ring of blood crystals warning the familiars back.
12
I sensed the precise moment that the familiars chose to act, their heartbeats rapidly speeding up as they bolted towards us. I threw my hand out as I continued to lap up Natalie’s precious life fluid—again, I used her blood to directly power the daggers’ flight rather than tapping into my own reserves.
My blood daggers—easily two feet long now and covered in sinister thorns and wicked barbs of more crystallized blood—whipped out, ripping through every single enemy heart around me. With my enhanced senses, I felt and heard each of the hearts shatter and
explode in a crescendo of carnage, an orchestra of obliteration, a symphony of screams as the familiars wailed and died.
But this macabre music was accompanied by Natalie’s screams of pure rapture, because the moment I’d used her blood again, a trio of orgasms had roared through her, making her legs buckle as her cries of euphoria rose triumphantly above the sounds of shattered hearts, creating a hellacious harmony.
The only thing keeping her upright was my grip around her waist as her body bucked and writhed against mine, her whimpering instinctively making me bite deeper and suck harder.
TAKE HER! my demon screamed, incoherent in its desire. HERE! NOW! MAKE HER VERY SOUL SCREAM WITH PLEASURE!
The strange—unseen but definitely felt—vines of magic entwining us together doubled in thickness, the roots now reaching out from both of us to search for our missing third part. I felt like a sword thrust into the fires of the hottest forge and I knew I was only moments away from crossing the point of no return.
Natalie regained the use of her legs and I could tell by her sudden strength that she was about to make the decision for me, even if the price for attaining that pinnacle of bliss was her life.
Two simple words managed to finally slither past my primal urges, and they stopped me like an icy waterfall, momentarily snapping me out of my depthless hunger. With a choked gasp, I released Natalie from my bite and shoved her away before I lost that flicker of rationality.
I flung my head back and screamed, needing an outlet before I exploded. Natalie’s powerful werewolf blood and our strange new bond raged within me, frothing and foaming as it soaked my insides like hot, sensual oil. My arms shot down to my sides and every muscle in my body locked rigid.
Natalie cried out, having fallen to the ground on all fours with her back to me. I lowered my head, panting as I stared down at her submissive posture—fighting back the dark urges that swamped over me. Her hair hung down her jawline like sinister wings, dripping with blood and sweat and raw, undiluted passion. She slowly glanced over her shoulder at me, her eyes blazing with a fiery green glow as she bit her lip hard enough to make it bleed.
In that look, I knew there would be no sating her. Whatever that strange magic had been between us was permanent, and it wasn’t going to be stopped by mere words.
Especially not the two words that had ultimately stopped me.
Victoria Helsing.
“Take me,” she pleaded in a hoarse whisper, slowly swaying her hips at me.
I shuddered at her tone, fighting against every primitive bone in my body as I repeated Victoria Helsing’s name in my mind like a last-ditch prayer. Natalie’s eyes were filmed over with mindless lust—literally unable to control her wild desire to be ravaged here in the middle of the street.
Because her blood had already been burning up from our fight with the witches. Although having been unable to fully shift, she’d been forced to call her inner wolf closer to the surface in order to survive, needing to rely on instinct rather than rationality.
And our two inner monsters were of the same opinion. They had earned a reward for their hard work and demanded payment.
Only Victoria Helsing’s name had managed to snap me out of my mindless lust, and Natalie didn’t have such a totem to bring her back under control.
She had saved our lives by offering me her blood, yet I had been too hungry to properly establish a buffer between our inner monsters. Instead, I had unwittingly bonded us together, actively using her blood to empower my blood daggers rather than calling upon my own reserves. I hadn’t even known such a thing was possible.
And there had been those exploratory vines searching out to a third party. I knew they had somehow latched onto their target, joining the three of us together, because I could sense faint echoes from both Natalie and another person far off in the distance.
And I was almost certain that it was Victoria Helsing.
Thoughts of our new bond evaporated as I sensed a massive force leaping towards me from the side. I lunged forward, yanking Natalie up by the arm to toss her out of harm’s way.
One last familiar—somehow it had evaded the attack that had ended its brethren—struck the pavement where I had been standing, pulverizing the concrete with its silver claws before momentum sent it careening off into a lamppost, bending the metal and shattering the bulb above. I was surprised to see that the black clouds were still covering the streetlights—thinking they should have dissipated when the last witch died. Glass showered down over the hulking feline, and I grunted to find that it was now the size of a small car. It had long, thick fur and paws as wide as tires as it hissed at me with silver teeth the size of small swords. Its tail swished back and forth overhead as it hunkered low, preparing to pounce.
Natalie lay in a heap, unable to stand or snap out of her fervent lust.
I squared my shoulders against the familiar, stepping between it and Natalie as I tapped into my now pregnant blood reserves to call upon my cloak of shadows and blood. “Just you and me,” I said, baring my teeth as my cloak whipped and snapped around my shoulders like a nest of disturbed vipers.
The familiar leapt into the air from twenty feet away, easily capable of closing the distance. I heard a furious honking sound behind me as two beams of light struck the familiar’s eyes, making its pupils dilate. My own eyes widened in recognition and I instantly changed tactics. I shifted into a cloud of crimson mist, and an overloaded dump truck ripped through me without causing any harm—although it was extremely uncomfortable to suddenly be displaced by such a large force.
The massive truck had been driving entirely too fast—likely not seeing us in the darkened, deserted street—and it struck the familiar with an explosion of snapping bone, screaming metal, and the damp splash of blood and gore. The dump truck slammed on its brakes too late, and the smell of burnt rubber filled the air, fighting for dominance over the putrid stench of offal and smoke from the damaged engine.
I heard a terrible squealing sound as the driver tried to force the warped metal door open, and I instantly coalesced back into my typical human form, diving for Natalie. I covered us both in my cloak, mentally shifting it to the blackest of shadows so that the driver couldn’t see us. Natalie latched onto me, taking my sudden embrace as an invitation to pick up where we had left off moments ago. I tried to remain as still as possible while protecting myself from Natalie’s eager hands and mouth, needing all my attention to conceal us from the man who suddenly fell out of the dump truck, cursing up a storm.
“What the FUCK was that?” he shouted to no one in particular. “Was it a fucking kid? Oh my god, tell me it wasn’t a fucking kid. HELLO?” he called out, cupping his hands around his mouth. His wild eyes swept over us without notice, only seeing a smear of shadow on the already dark street as he tried to find whatever had destroyed his truck. I wanted to be gone before he found it—or the dead witches.
I panted hoarsely as Natalie began tugging at my pants hard enough to almost snap the button. Instead of fighting her and possibly drawing the driver’s attention, I held my breath and let her work freely. The moment the driver looked the other way, I instantly leaned back and punched Natalie in the jaw, knocking her unconscious. Then I hoisted her over my shoulder and ran into the alley, hoping it was in the direction of Mr. Hyde’s place that Natalie had mentioned—Tequila Mockingbird.
I heard the driver shout out in surprise, but I was already down the opposite end of the alley, leaping over a parked car before crossing the next street. Strangely enough, it had rained on this street, even though the one with the witches had been dry. Natalie hung slumped over the back of my neck, her body hot to the touch. I used one hand to hold her head steady over my left shoulder and the other to grip a handful of her naked ass over my right shoulder.
Because at some point, she had started tugging down her pants before I knocked her out.
I bit down on my lip, hoping that the pain would distract my mind from both the feel of her sweaty flesh and the heady perfum
e of her earlier arousal. Being a vampire, the smells of sex and desire were as strong a scent as freshly-cooked bacon was to humans.
And even more enticing.
I bit my lip harder, ignoring every sensation but the pounding of my feet on the damp pavement. Even those wet slaps taunted me, reminding me that I still held a pleasant handful of Natalie’s bare ass.
I bit my lip hard enough to pierce skin this time and adjusted my grip on the werewolf.
Natalie moaned absently, still unconscious but coming to.
I felt that faint echo of our new bond in the distance and let out an uneasy sigh. “It really was just dessert, but Victoria is definitely going to kill me,” I added, thinking of the times I had so nobly chosen not to take the vampire hunter to my bed. If I had done so, Victoria might have been able to give me the benefit of the doubt about tonight’s adventures. As it stood now, I didn’t like my odds.
I imagined my gravestone.
Here lies Sorin. Nobility killed him, but sex would have saved him.
13
I had covered at least six blocks before I found a relatively quiet street far away from both crime scenes we had left behind. Natalie had murmured Poole Street a few times as I ran, so I’d stopped here upon seeing a sign of that very name, hoping she hadn’t been dreaming about something else that was located on Poole Street. I set her down and pulled her pants all the way up, hoping that Victoria didn’t choose this exact moment to find me. Natalie was slowly coming awake, mumbling unintelligibly to herself as if dreaming. I gently shook her shoulder. She murmured sleepily before opening her eyes and blinking at me.
“It’s okay,” I reassured her. “We’re safe.”
Her eyes widened and she swept our surroundings, realizing we were in an entirely different place. She let out a nervous breath, licking her lips. She carefully touched her jaw where I had punched her. “Tell me it wasn’t one of the old hags who clocked me.”
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