“I do,” he acknowledged with a calm nod. “There was no reason to bring Jason into your bond with her, though, no reason at all. That should’ve been me, could’ve been if you’d waited for me to grow.”
“No, Dev. It would never have been you.”
He flinched away from the harshly spoken words.
I rushed on, struggling to find a way to make him understand. “You were too special, too closely tied to my change to be my favorite. The cold man exploited our bond, playing on it to overcome my will. I needed someone else, someone strong enough to help me control him.”
“So you chose Jason.”
“He was the logical choice. Strong, determined, eager to learn. And he loves Gianna, maybe more than I do. What else was I supposed to do? Let the cold man take me?”
He ran a hand over his face. “You could’ve waited…”
“Didn’t you hear what I said?” I glared at him and struggled against the black tide rising up and over me. “The cold man was beyond my control until Jase became my favorite. What about that don’t you get?”
“The part about how I wasn’t strong enough for you.”
“Jesus, Dev. You’ve got to stop this jealousy shit.”
“Jealousy?” He laughed, a cold, bitter noise that in no way resembled humor. “I loved you, more than I’ve ever loved another man, and you expected me to sit back and watch Jason take my place by your side. My place, Eric, mine. Not his.”
“Fuck you, Dev. Jason didn’t take your place. He made his own.” The ugliness growing within me roiled in my gut, mingling with disgust. “I guess it was too much to hope that you’d wait until I gained control and turned and made you a part of my stable.”
“Elizabet would never let me go like that.”
“Which shows what you know. She already told me I could have you.”
The color leached from his skin in a rush. “No.”
He breathed the word out, as if saying it could erase the truth.
“Yes,” I countered harshly. “You were supposed to be my first pet, my best, if not my favorite. You and Jase and Gianna were supposed to stand behind me while I gathered support and established my own house, and together, we were supposed to claim another city, broaden Elizabet’s base and the queen’s, bring stability to disorder.”
“Eric. God. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It was right there in my mind. You never bothered to look, not once.” I inhaled leaden air deep into my lungs and gave in to the ugliness swirling around me, eagerly following the ever expanding emotion, dark and fearless, ugly and unclean. The cold man reared up inside me, filtering through the other until he filled me, too, filled me, joined me, and chortled as I embraced him. “If you had, hell, if you’d bothered to talk to me, you wouldn’t have run to the wolf for the strength you needed.”
He stepped back at the low threat in my voice, held a hand out as if he could possibly stop what I was becoming. “Pull it back, love.”
“Love?” The word broke on my tongue, sour and empty. “What do you know of love?”
“I still love you, Eric.” He patted his outstretched hand against the air between us. “Don’t do anything rash.”
Rash? No. The cold man hunkered down in my mind, waiting gleefully to pounce. No, I wouldn’t do anything rash, but I would show Dev what he’d done to me, pour the gaping wound in my heart into him until he understood exactly what he’d lost when he turned his back on me and betrayed me by accepting the claim of the wolf.
I leapt across the room, faster than Dev could react. In half a second, I was on him, yanking him up with one hand by the front of his shirt. I heaved him onto the bed in a smooth, effortless throw. Claws sprang like sharp tacks from the ends of my fingernails, the agony of their growth lost in the sea of pain engulfing my heart. I lashed out, slashing Devin’s clothes from him as he gasped and made a futile attempt to scuttle backward, away from me. I grasped his leg and jerked him back, holding him in place as I fumbled with the fly of my trousers and shoved clothing out of the way. My dick sprang free, thick and hard, throbbing with the need to feel his slick, tight ass wrapped around it.
“Eric, please.” His fingers clutched the bedspread and his eyes went wide in his pale face. “Don’t do this.”
“Oh, but this is what you want, isn’t it?” I dropped my full weight onto him, pinning him against the mattress. “Shy little Eric, filling you up. Don’t lie to me now, Dev. This is what you wanted all along. This was the reason you brought me to Elizabet, on the hopes that I’d like it when you fucked me.”
The golden waves of his hair skidded across cloth as he shook his head. “Not like this, Eric. Please God, don’t take me when you’re angry and half turned.”
“Why not? Don’t you like me like this?” I licked along his pulse, taking his salty woodsy taste into me, and along with it, his fear. “You helped make me this way. Don’t tell me you don’t want it now.”
I licked him again, harder, and he shuddered under the rasp of my tongue. His fingers loosened their hold on the bedspread and found my back through the clothes I still wore, the jacket of the suit he’d helped me pick out, the shirt he’d gifted me with at Christmas. Everything I was at that moment was Devin, from skin to heart and back again, and he’d rejected it all in the worst possible way.
I pressed the tip of my dick into the crack of his ass, holding it there. “Tell me you want me.”
He shook his head and squeezed his eyes shut, those beautiful amber eyes, but not before I caught the glow burning within them.
“Liar,” I growled. “Tell me you love me.”
“I do.”
He panted the words out into my ear. I shivered as the moist heat caressed me. “Tell me you want me.”
“Not like this. Just please, pull it back.”
Marco’s words to me echoed through my mind, the way he’d taken me even when I hadn’t wanted it, sharing his strength because he wanted me to be stronger.
Devin needed strength. I had plenty to spare.
I eased my hips forward, just enough for the tip of my dick to press against his anus, teasing him with what could be, with what had been, with what he’d rejected. “You wanted to be strong. Take from me.”
“You can’t. The wolf’s mark…”
I laughed, pure humor breaking through long enough for me to shoo the cold man into the corner of my mind where I kept him. I was pissed, yeah, hurt and torn up inside, but I didn’t need the cold man’s vicious strength for what needed doing. “I’ll take care of the mark, Dev. Don’t you worry about that.”
I struck swiftly, breaking the skin above his jugular with hard punches of my fangs. I left them there, used the pain it brought Devin to ease my passage through his mind, more carefully this time, gently even, like a lover and not the monster I was becoming. I found the werewolf’s mark, a thickly rooted rope that thinned as it hit the limit of Dev’s mind. The mark appeared blue to me, don’t know why; don’t know why it manifested itself as a rope, either, since it was a metaphysical connection, not a physical one. As Devin’s blood spilled across my tongue, I explored that mark, searching for a weakness, pinging it to see where it led once it crossed the outer reaches of Devin.
And found the icy stare of Darien, the twin dualities of wolf and man. He popped into Dev’s mind, following their bond until he located the threat to it. Amusement filtered out from the blue, tickling at my mind. With a swift mental chop, I hit the rope. It quivered but held, so I hit it again and again, shoving all the strength of me and one into the blows until the blue shattered, revealing an indigo thread, healthy and strong, my bond with Devin.
Darien hadn’t broken mine and Devin’s bond. He’d simply covered it so that I couldn’t find it anymore, effectively shutting me out of Devin’s mind in such a way that I had no warning our connection was damaged.
Fucking bastard.
Surprise jittered forward as I shoved Darien out. Beneath me, Dev went limp. As soon as I was certain Darien
couldn’t reconnect, I withdrew my fangs from Devin’s throat and sealed the wounds. The door to the Red Room opened as I braced myself above him. He’d passed out cold, his pasty skin contrasting sharply with the scarlet sheets. I ignored Elizabet’s horrified gasp and the satisfaction thrumming through Marco’s mind, and tapped Dev’s cheek until he roused.
He rolled his head, winced. “Happened?”
“I took care of the wolf problem.”
I pushed myself away from him, slid off the bed into a stand, and met Elizabet’s shocked gaze steadily.
“Eric, dearling.” She lifted a pale hand to the base of her throat, touching her fingers to the sluggish pulse beating there. “What have you done?”
“What had to be done,” I said, and felt Jason’s silent humor echo through my mind.
Chapter Three
The rest of the evening did not go well. Marco carried Devin to our room and looked after him while I fulfilled both mine and Dev’s duties to Elizabet. Though she submitted to my touch readily and drew greedily at my throat, an unfamiliar emotion pinged through our bond, pouring from her in soft, muted waves.
It wasn’t until afterward, as I made my way to Devin’s room, that realization crashed down around me. By breaking the wolf’s hold over my roster mate, I’d somehow frightened Elizabet. Didn’t understand why, though. Darien wouldn’t come rushing over to reclaim my lover, not when he’d been ejected so violently from Dev’s mind. He sure as hell wouldn’t weaken his position by breaking the mutual peace between his pack and Elizabet. Only a foolish man messed with a vampire. The Atlanta Alpha struck me as a canny opponent, not a foolhardy one.
Of course, I fully expected him to retaliate in some way, but nothing that would threaten his alliance with the Vampyr. Maybe he’d catch me out in the open one night, chase me down in a run like the one he’d invited me on the first time we’d met.
I padded down the hallway, a smile the only covering I wore. I was a good deal stronger than I’d been on that night and a great deal more agile. A run with a werewolf might be kinda fun. Challenging and dangerous, yeah, but fun.
Devin was tucked under the covers sleeping when I entered our room. I closed the door quietly, did a quick mental check of his mind. Satisfaction filled me when I found not one trace of wolfiness within him, save for memories I refused to touch. I hadn’t the right to take those.
Protecting my bond was one thing, tampering with permanent memories another. My control wasn’t precise enough for that, nor would I risk damaging Dev simply to test my growing ability to manipulate others. Practice would hone that skill. Unfortunately, the practice I needed usually came only on the heels of necessity. One of these days, I’d have to begin a concerted and deliberate mental exercise regime. For now, fatigue and blood loss weighed on me. Elizabet had taken too much and I’d urged her to, knowing she’d otherwise do without.
I showered quickly, slid under the covers, curled myself around Dev’s slightly warmer body. He stirred and turned away from me in his sleep. I hissed in a breath at the ache the gesture roused in my heart.
We’d sort this out tomorrow, had to. God please let it be so.
When I woke a few hours later, he was gone. The sun had barely risen over the rolling hills surrounding Elizabet’s home, backlighting the thick curtains covering the windows. I stretched out a hand, frowned when I found his side of the bed cold. Surely he hadn’t left already. It was still early, well before we needed to get back to the city for work and school.
I threw the covers off and padded to the bathroom with a yawn, flipped on the overhead light, wincing at its bright glare, and stumbled to a stop. Devin’s toiletry bag was gone. I stared at the spot on the bathroom’s counter where it normally rested, next to the right-hand sink. My breath shallowed in my lungs as my gut clenched into a sick knot. I retraced my steps, delved into the closet, and locked my knees in place when they threatened to buckle. His clothes were gone, too, the space where they should’ve been a yawning maw.
I stumbled back to the bed and sank down onto the edge of the mattress. Jesus. He’d really left, either moved his things to another room while I slept or fled Elizabet’s home in the dead of the night while his mind was still recovering from the trauma of having a bond broken.
Why?
I scrubbed a tired hand through my hair, mussing it, willing my groggy brain cells to work the way they were supposed to.
Nope. Too much Suck and Fuck, not enough rest.
I flopped onto the bed, rolled beneath the covers, ignoring the light I’d left on in the bathroom. I’d pushed Dev a little too hard tonight. Didn’t matter that he’d needed pushing and deserved a good deal of the anger I’d poured into him.
It was still there, stirring uneasily beneath the fatigue tugging me toward sleep. How could he have betrayed my trust like that? And with a werewolf, no less. When I found him again, we were going to have a long talk about places and hearts and love and stuff like that. I jerked out of bed, snapped the light off, and fell into sleep the moment my head touched the pillow again.
The mattress tilted slightly, waking me. I patted around, found the space next to me empty. “Dev?”
“No, dearling.”
Elizabet flipped on the bedside lamp. I winced and blinked against the glare, threw an arm over my eyes. It took a minute for them to focus. Finally, though, her image sharpened. She wore jeans and a sweater and had pulled her silky black hair into a loose knot at the nape of her slender neck.
“Time is it?” I said.
“Nearly noon.”
I reached for her with one hand and came abruptly awake when she hesitated. “What’s wrong?”
Her eyes were twin dots of coal in her pale, impassive face. After a long moment, she touched her fingers lightly to the back of my hand. I turned it over. My heart kicked into overdrive when she stared down at it instead of taking it.
What the hell was going on?
I sat up, scrubbed my hands over my face. “Don’t leave me in the dark.”
“I shan’t,” she said softly. “It is difficult to know where to begin.”
“How about at the beginning?”
Her smile was gentle and somehow sad. “There is no beginning here, sweetling, only an end I had not foreseen.”
An uneasy chill shivered over me. “What do you mean?”
“You’ve grown so strong, Eric, much stronger than I anticipated.”
“I thought that was the plan, me being strong.”
“Not like this.” She folded her hands in her lap, dropped her eyes to the knot of her entwined fingers. “What do you know of the differences between a male vampire and a female vampire?”
“Not much,” I admitted. “Male vampires have a harder time controlling themselves. That’s pretty much it.”
“There is much more to it than that, my sweet.” She relented and took my hand, rubbing her thumb gently across my palm. The friction of her skin on mine comforted me. “Male vampires heal faster. Their blood regenerates more quickly.”
“I thought that was because I was a pet,” I murmured.
“In part, yes, but the regeneration rate for male vampires is much higher, from blood to bone to tissue.” A tiny wrinkle appeared between her eyebrows. “They need not feed as often, and they can be quite strong in many ways.”
A wave of something akin to fear pulsed toward me, ebbed back. “You think I’m going to hurt you.”
“No, dearling. Oh, my sweet, how could I ever believe such?”
She opened her arms and in I went, like a child to his mother. Which, in a way, she was. Was I not turning because of her, because of the blood she’d given me? Elizabet was wrong. This story had a beginning, a very clear one, and it had taken place in this very bed the first night she’d come to me, offering up her lovely, pale throat and the nourishing life flowing within it.
I rested my head against her shoulder with my forehead against her pulse. I wanted to feel it in me, sync my heartbeat with hers, commune with
her the way I did with Jason and Gianna. An impossibility, but that didn’t keep me from wanting it. She had Marco, and Marco had her, and together, they were one. I squeezed my eyes shut and curled my fingers into her sweater, surrounded by the sweet tang of her perfume and the rich hint of blood pulsing underneath her soft skin. How could he stand to leave that beautiful place? Why would he ever want to?
Elizabet cradled me to her, stroking my hair and back, and pressed a tender kiss to the top of my head. “You feel my fear, but it is not of you, or not from the belief that you would ever betray or harm me. It is fear for you. You grow too quickly. Soon, you will outstrip my ability to hold you in check and the queen will insist that you turn. If not, she will have you destroyed for fear that you will outgrow her.”
I knew what she was saying. Turn now and hope that the change halted my growth at a point where I could be controlled, but that didn’t make much sense to me. I had only just learned to control myself. What was it Devin had told me after the cold man took up residence? Right. Emotion helps a vampire control himself. It was what separated them from animals, the same as for humans.
I guess, weirdly enough, that a vampire’s humanity allowed them to remain a vampire, emotions suppressed, yes, but still there, still functioning the way they did for humans.
I’d learned to control my inner beast through steady relationships with the people around me, with Elizabet, Marco, and Devin, obviously, but more importantly, through the bonds created between me, the real me, and my family. Jason, my favorite; Gianna, the woman of my dreams; and the final kicker, the fierce love I held for my unborn child, growing quietly within Gianna’s womb. If I turned too quickly, I would lose those relationships in the mad rush of the change and the cold man would slip free of my control, submersing my will beneath his lust for power and blood.
I would truly be a monster, then.
I shuddered. Please God, not yet. “I thought I had time. A couple of years at least, if I stopped taking so much blood.”
The Vampire's Pet (The Vampyr Book 1) Page 27
