Marked by the Vampire

by Cynthia Eden

  She undid the snap of her pants. That warmth was too tempting, and she was freezing. She pushed the pants down but kept on her panties and her bra. Clothing rustled near her and she heard the slap of his wet garments hitting the rocks.

  He came back to her a few seconds later. “Move back a bit. It’s flat behind you.”

  She scooted back.

  “And, love, you need to lose the sexy bra and scrap of panties.”

  Olivia pretty much hated that he could see everything in the dark. “They stay on.”

  His hands wrapped around hers and then—then she was tumbling down on top of him. Because he was lying on the flat, rough space, and she was now sprawled all over the vamp. He wrapped his arms around her even as her legs slid between his powerful thighs. He held her tightly but…carefully…and the heat of his body slowly sank into her.

  Her mouth was against the curve of his shoulder, so close to the base of his neck. After their dive, he should have smelled of salt and the ocean, and he did, but, more than that, he had a rich, almost heady scent that seemed to seep into her.

  He was warm and solid, and he surrounded her in that darkness. Silence swept over them as they were cocooned there, and slowly, so slowly, the tremors stopped sweeping over her.

  But as the tremors subsided, she didn’t scramble off him. Olivia just kept taking in that delicious warmth as some of the terror she felt finally began to ebb. “Why do people think,” she murmured and her lips brushed over his neck as she spoke, “that vampires are cold?”

  “Because the movies say we’re dead. The dead are cold. The dead don’t have hearts that beat.”

  She could feel his heart racing.

  “They say we have no passion.”

  She could feel, um, something else pressing against her. She’d been aware of his heavy arousal from the moment he’d pulled her on top of him. There was really no missing it, especially since the vampire seemed to be very well endowed.

  Though she did try to shift away from him a bit then.

  He just pulled her right back against him. “But our hearts beat. We breathe. We live. We need.”

  Need. The word seemed to echo around them.

  “There’s something that I need right now,” he continued, his voice growing deeper, rougher, in the darkness. “Something I have to take.”

  She pushed up but his hands were tight around her waist. “Shane?”

  “Vampires are fast healers, so you can’t see where they cut me, and the blood was all washed away during our swim.”

  Oh, no. No.

  “I’m hungry,” those words were a deep, dark growl. “So fucking hungry…and I need you.”

  In that instant, she was glad for the darkness because Olivia didn’t want to see his face—or his fangs. “Shane, no.”

  “I need blood.” Deep, rumbling. “They took too much from me. If I’m going to protect us then I need you.”

  Her heart was about to fly right out of her chest. “I’m scared.” Hushed. “I’ve never…never been bitten before.”

  “I won’t hurt you.”

  She wanted to believe that, but she didn’t.

  “There can be pleasure in the bite.”

  In her mind, she could only see the pictures from her files at Purgatory. The dead victims. “What if you can’t stop?”

  “I’ve been a vampire longer than you can imagine.”

  What?

  “I can stop.” Certainty thickened his voice even more. “I will stop.” Then his right hand left her hip. Those fingers slid up her side, slowly, carefully, up and up…they slid around her bra and had her sucking in a sharp breath, but Shane didn’t touch her breast. That hand of his kept rising until his fingers curved around her throat. Her pulse raced beneath his touch. “I just need a little, just enough to boost my strength back up.”

  He’d saved her, so didn’t she owe this to him? She’d just feel much better about all of this if she had a stake in her hand. Then I could make him stop.

  “Maybe you’ll like it…”

  She licked her lips.

  “Maybe you’ll ask for my bite again.”

  Olivia shook her head. There was no way she could imagine that. Wanting him to sink his fangs into her? No, thank you. “J-just a sip, all right? Then you’ll stop?”

  “I need more than a sip.” There was such darkness in his words. “Need you.”

  Her eyes squeezed shut—why, she didn’t know. She already couldn’t see anything. “Do it.”

  He pulled her back down toward him, positioned her, held her easily. She felt his breath blow over her neck, and Olivia jerked in reaction.

  “Easy,” he whispered. “I told you…you might like my bite.”

  No way. That just wouldn’t happen.

  His teeth sank into her neck. Olivia gasped at the white-hot flash of pain, it rocked through her and she was ready to fight him, to yank back because—

  Pleasure lashed her. A wild, hot tide that made her whole body tense and yearn. Her hips rocked forward against the long, hard ridge of his cock as his mouth sucked along her neck. He was taking her blood, licking her skin, and she should have been repulsed.

  But the pleasure wouldn’t stop. It was electric, consuming, scorching her from the inside out. Incredibly, she felt her sex quaking—clenching—and a release hit her. An orgasm that had her choking back a scream because the pleasure had just ripped right through her.

  From his bite?

  “I can feel it…” Shane pressed a hot kiss to her neck. “Your pleasure…I can taste it.”

  His teeth pierced her once more.

  The pleasure built again, coiling inside of her, twisting and stretching and she couldn’t get close enough to him. Her hands grabbed his arms. Her nails sank into his skin. Her legs slid, parted, and she was over him, rubbing her sex against his cock as a wild hunger, a fierce lust that she’d never felt before, pushed through her.

  In that instant, she wanted him. More than life. More than breath. More than anything.

  “Shane.” His name was a demand. Her fear was gone. The pleasure was—

  Another climax hit her and she raked her nails down his arm.

  “In-fucking-credible,” Shane growled the words against her. “Never…before…never…” He yanked at her panties. The fabric tore. She couldn’t suck in a deep breath because the aftershocks of pleasure were hitting her.

  He was naked. So hot and powerful, and his cock pushed right between her thighs.

  “Take me,” he told her, the words a fierce order in the dark. “I want in. I want all of you.”

  And the pleasure wasn’t stopping. She was out of control, all reason lost, and she was the one to push that big cock into her body, to arch her hips down against him and take him inside her.

  Then Olivia was truly lost.

  Her sex closed greedily around him, even as he stretched her with his length, pushing her to the edge of pain and pleasure. Her body still quivered from her release and her sex seemed hyper sensitive to him.

  Her knees pushed into the hard surface beneath them as she tried to balance herself. She wanted the pleasure again, wanted that hot, wild burst—

  Shane heaved up, and his cock slammed deep into her. Olivia gasped out his name. His fingers clamped around her hips, and he started lifting her, up and down, fast and fiercely, again and again.

  He was out of control, driving fast, and she loved it. Her head tipped back and she moaned as her body took in that frantic rhythm.

  His hand slid around her hip. His thumb pushed against her clit.

  “You came…from my bite…”

  Her eyes flew open. She wanted to see him. Couldn’t in the dark.

  “Come again for me. Always, for me.”

  She wanted the release to hit. Her body yearned for that pleasure, addicted now, and she was fighting for the climax because it had been so good. Better than anything before—

  His thumb pushed against her once more.

  “Bite me,” Olivia
heard herself whisper. And she was the one to bend back toward him. To put her throat to his mouth.

  There was a part of her that was horrified by what she was doing. Offering herself to him. Fucking him so wildly. But that part was small…and quiet.

  The lust was dominating. She had no control then.

  He bit her.

  She erupted. The pleasure was even better this time because his cock was in her and her sex contracted around him. The orgasm was so strong that she couldn’t even scream, couldn’t do anything but shudder in that maelstrom of passion.

  Then she felt him inside of her, a long, hot tide of release that just sent after-shocks bursting through her.

  He pressed a kiss to her neck. Licked her skin.

  She collapsed on him. Her heartbeat was drumming, a thunder that blocked out everything else. Her sex was still contracting around him, and the pleasure had her gasping because it just wouldn’t stop.

  Nothing had ever been like that before.

  Olivia knew she should have been terrified of the way she was acting. It was too out of control. Too wild. What I always feared.

  But with the pleasure around her, with her vampire in her, there was no room for fear.

  That would come later. When reason returned.

  ***

  “The vampire took Dr. Maddox.” Case Killian marched in front of the guards he’d assembled. “They are somewhere on this island, and we will find them.”

  “Sir…”

  He whirled to face the guard and saw one of the newer recruits, a blond with golden eyes, staring at him with worry etched on his face. “What?”

  “How do you know Dr. Maddox is even still alive?”

  “We don’t know that.” She’d already been gone for over two hours. Anything could happen in that amount of time. “But until we have her body, we assume that she’s still breathing.”

  “Will he turn her?” Another question from another guard.

  “I don’t know what the fuck he’ll do.” His breath heaved out. “I just know we have to find them.” And he knew exactly how to do that. The vampire had fled with the woman, but they hadn’t just vanished. They would have left a trail behind. A scent.

  There were no tracking dogs on the island, but he had something far better than just a dog.

  He had werewolves.

  The alphas are the best at tracking.

  He knew one alpha in particular that would love to get his hands on Shane. “Bring me David Vincent. Now.” Because it was time to end this hunt.

  No one escapes from Purgatory. Not on my watch.

  Chapter Five

  The best orgasm of Shane’s very long life left him nearly gutted on that cave floor. His hands were locked around Olivia, and he was holding her as tightly as he could.

  Because I don’t want her to get away.

  The woman had come from his bite. His fucking bite. Not just once. Twice.

  Then she’d come a third time when he’d been sunk balls deep inside of her.

  Sure, humans had been known to find pleasure in the bite. It could be an aphrodisiac for many, but he’d never had a woman react like Olivia had.

  Her sex was still squeezing him.

  And he was getting harder for her.

  He should probably try to play the gentleman and pull out of her now. The heat of the moment had passed.

  Had it?

  He rocked his hips against her.

  And felt the sudden tension that coursed through Olivia’s delicate body, a body that he hadn’t been able to savor, not yet. He wanted to kiss her, to lick every single inch of her.

  I shouldn’t have taken her here. Should have been in a big bed with fucking rose petals or some damn thing like that spread around her.

  But after one taste…when her pleasure had rocked through him, there had been no going back.

  Olivia’s hands pushed against his chest. She rose up above him, and as she lifted her upper body, her sex pressed down harder against him, around him.

  His cock thickened even more within her. One good thing about vamps, stamina was definitely their strong suit.

  He caught her hands. Threaded his fingers with hers.

  And in the darkness there, he could have sworn that her eyes started to glow.

  A djinn.

  He couldn’t think about that, about the deadly ramifications if the werewolf’s claim turned out to be true.

  She was pushing her hips down against him again, her sex was a hot, wet dream around him, and Shane let go of his control. He wanted the wild rush of pleasure again. He wanted…her. Everything that she had to give. Every fucking thing.

  And even as he drove into her, thrusting as deep and hard as he could go, Shane realized the danger he was in.

  Because if the stories he’d heard over the years were true, the whispers, the legends…

  He could be losing his soul right then, becoming addicted to the sensual power of a djinn.

  ***

  “There,” David snarled as he stopped and pointed to the old silver grate in the bowels of the prison. “They went in there.”

  Case glared at the silver grate. How the hell did the vampire find this place?

  “Looks like someone had an escape plan,” David muttered as his gaze slanted toward Case. “I didn’t realize this little spot was here.”

  Case shoved the guy against the silver. David howled when the right side of his face hit that grate and burned. “And you’d better forget it, understand?” Yet even as he said the words, he knew it wouldn’t happen. David would tell the others about this discovery. He’d use it, try to escape himself later.

  And that’s why I might have to kill the guy when this little hunt is over.

  David was useful, and he was also expandable.

  The scent of burnt flesh filled the air. Case let the werewolf go, and David jerked back. The glare the werewolf sent Case was full of fury and the promise of retribution.

  Like that was supposed to scare him. “Move the grate,” Case directed his guards.

  It took four of them to get that heavy grate down, but, it would have been easy for the vamp to move it. With his enhanced strength, the guy had probably just given a little tug and the grate would have popped free.

  “Go in,” Case snapped at the werewolf as soon as the opening was clear. “Find them.” Because they had to still be on the island. The ferry wouldn’t arrive for days, and the seaplane hadn’t flown in yet. Wherever you’re hiding, I will find you.

  No one had ever escaped from a tracking alpha before.

  David led the way into that tunnel. Case followed, and he made sure to keep a tight grip on the remote that controlled David’s silver collar. The collar gleamed in the darkness.

  As they followed that long, twisting tunnel, the guards used flashlights to illuminate their path. The sound of water grew stronger and—

  “I can’t track them anymore.” David had stilled near the edge of the dark water. Murky. Deep. A pool that would lead back to the ocean. David stared down at the water. “The scent ends here.”

  No, that wasn’t possible. “They can’t swim back to the mainland!”

  David’s laughter was bitter. “Maybe the sexy doctor was a mermaid in disguise. Never seen one of those before. Thought they were just myths—”

  Case sent a powerful charge of silver coursing through the werewolf’s collar. “They are myths!”

  David sank to his knees, but his head tilted back and his eyes blazed up at Case. “That’s what…people used to say…about vamps. About…werewolves…”

  Case’s mind raced as he considered possibilities. Mainland, my ass. “They just swam out and around to the side of the island. That’s the only option they had. They’re still here.” He was sure of it. “We need to get outside of Purgatory’s walls and search the island.” He lifted the remote, but didn’t send another surge of silver out, not yet. “You will find them.”

  Pain darkened the werewolf’s face. The guards’ lights
were trained on the werewolf, so Case could see David easily as the guy rasped, “I’ll find her…”

  “If you don’t…” Case leaned toward him. Made sure that his voice was too low for the guards to hear him. “I’ll pump you full of so much silver that you’ll beg for death.”

  He waited for the werewolf to show fear.

  But, instead, the werewolf smiled. “I don’t beg.”

  ***

  Olivia’s eyelids flew open and awareness came back to her with a shocking rush.

  She’d been asleep, curled up on the hard rocks, and she whirled around now to see—

  Faint light, drifting in through the cracks and crevices in the cave. Her heart was thundering in her chest—her naked chest.

  Because she was totally nude and her horrified gasp seemed way too loud to her own ears.

  Her gaze whipped to the left and to the right. She saw her clothes, spread out, drying? And she also realized that the vampire was gone.

  He’d left her. No, no, he couldn’t have. Olivia jumped to her feet. “Shane?” Her voice echoed back to her. “Shane, where are you?” The pool of water was near her feet, glistening. The rocky walls of the cave surrounded her. Was there a tunnel hidden somewhere in those walls? An opening that she couldn’t see in that dim light?

  Olivia snatched up her clothes and dressed as quickly as she could. The clothing was still damp and it rubbed roughly over her too-sensitive skin. Skin that was sensitive because of…him.

  What did I do? Why?

  She’d lost herself with Shane. Her control—the careful control that she’d maintained for years—had vanished the moment he’d taken her blood.

  It shouldn’t have happened. It couldn’t happen again.

  No worries on that score, especially seeing as how he fucked me and left me.

  Vampires. They weren’t exactly known to be trustworthy.

  Her bare feet slid over the rough flooring of the cave. She started inching toward the darkness of the walls. Her hands lifted as she tried to search for an opening, search for some kind of way out other than a dive into that water once more.

  What did I do? Why? Why?

  She could hardly remember anything about the sex with Shane—except that she’d needed him, desperately. Fire had ignited within her when his teeth sank into her neck, and she’d been overwhelmed by a sensual hunger for him. So consumed that she would have done anything to have him plunge into her.