Superstition

by Veronica Blake

  A smirk reclaimed his lips. He tossed the belt aside, then unsnapped his jeans and slid the zipper down with one swift motion. Hooking his thumbs in a belt loop on each side of his slender hips, he began to pull the pants down past his muscled thighs. He kicked them away from his feet and stood tall with his arms held out slightly from his body presenting her with a full-frontal view.

  She made a discreet attempt to clear her throat. To her ears, it sounded more as if a frog was croaking. He didn’t seem to notice or care. As this flawless man stood before her, she reveled in the realization that he was hers—her man—her dangerous vampire. His impressive cock stood out proudly below his masculine v-shaped abdomen, which was lean and taut. His legs were long, sinewy, with well-defined thigh and calf muscles.

  Yes, he truly was perfect.

  “Well?” Mateo asked as her lustful gaze held him captive. “Don’t you think you are the one who’s a bit overdressed now?”

  His voice snapped Dawn out of her drooling trance. She glanced down at her lacy fringe-trimmed dress and realized that as excited as she had been to wear this dress earlier tonight, she was way more anxious to get out of it now. She grinned impishly and scooted to the edge of the bed, sliding off so she was standing right in front of him. This game wasn’t quite over, yet.

  “Take it off,” she said forcefully, “And don’t waste any more time, understand?”

  “Loud and clear,” he retorted as he leaned over and grabbed the fringed hem of the vintage dress and pulled it effortlessly over her up-stretched arms. Since her second pair of panties for the night were already long gone, and he didn’t wait for her to order him to remove her black lace push up bra, in barely more than a blink of an eye she was as naked as he was. A fevered flush rippled through her body and made a light sheen of perspiration break out on her skin. This was delicious torture.

  “Wasn’t I supposed to be inside you now? That was an order, wasn’t it?” He glanced down at himself, adding, “And it appears I’m standing at attention.”

  “Oh, babe, I do think you’re getting the hang of this,” she muttered as he grasped her bare buttocks and fell onto the mattress with her landing on top of him. She giggled as they thudded against the bed and bounced together. But when she glanced up, she noticed a strange expression filter through Mateo’s face.

  “What?” she asked in a tentative tone.

  “I would like to try something, but I don’t know if I’m strong enough to do it without hurting you.”

  She drew in a deep sigh. “Okay? Does it have to do with that biting thing?”

  A chuckle escaped Mateo. He reached up and pulled one of the little rhinestone hair pins from her blonde curls. A long tendril of hair swirled down along the side of her cheek. His lips parted slightly as he exhaled a passion-laden sigh.

  She could feel his cock pressing hard and full against her bare thigh. The inferno inside of her was raging again. He could just slip so easily inside of her right now, and she was so ready. But obviously, he had something else in mind. Should she be scared? She didn’t have time to ask as he unexpectedly rolled her back over, pinning her beneath his hard body. The sudden movement made her squeal.

  Now, his swollen cock was throbbing against her stomach. The heat it radiated against her already fevered skin was sweet agony and only increased her curiosity and desire. She immersed her fingers in the profusion of his long hair as it fell over his shoulders and covered her bare skin with its lush strands. Her red nails raked through the heavy locks, down along the back of his neck and dug slightly into the hard muscles rippling at the top of his shoulders.

  He began sliding his body down the length of hers in a slow, sensuous decline. His mouth trailing hot kisses along the side of her neck, on each of her breasts, making her nipples hard the moment his lips encircled their eager knobs. His lips continued lower, lightly nipping and kissing down to her waist. When his wet tongue darted into her belly button on his sweet descent, she squirmed with delicious anticipation.

  His mouth rained more kisses and teasing bites over her taut stomach. He gently kissed the downy blonde curls covering the tip of her pelvic bone. Her pussy tightened with the expectation of how those taunting lips were about to take her to a whole new level of sexual euphoria.

  He gently spread Dawn’s legs as his head slipped between her thighs. The fleeting thought of how close he was to the spot in her thigh that concealed the large blood artery he so desperately wanted to bite passed through her delirious mind, but she was too far gone to care.

  Her hands slid downward with him, still entangled in his long hair. When the tip of his tongue flicked along the sensitive edge of her clit, her fingernails unconsciously clawed into his scalp. Her body buckled up against his face of its own accord. She felt his hands grasp the sides of her waist to hold her down on the mattress. If this was what he meant about hurting her, oh God, he could hurt her anytime he wanted to because it was hurting so damn good.

  His tongue worked its way into the concave of her pussy and flicked in and out, lapping around in teasing swirling motions. Her juices overflowed as he tasted the succulent nectar of her womanly core. He drove her to the brink of a frenzied orgasm, then produced a phenomenal climax that sent her washing over the edge with nothing more than his extraordinary tongue.

  When he finally rose from in between her shaking thighs, she was certain she couldn’t handle another mind-blowing event like the one that just occurred. She was wrong.

  The sweet indulgence of his tongue had only been a precursor to the rest of his plan to make her his love slave…tonight and forever. And to think she actually thought she was being the dominate one earlier this evening.

  Her body gave no resistance as he rolled her back over to the top position. His hands were still clasped around her waist and he effortlessly impaled her on his cock, which was still standing straight up. She was reeling from his tongue porn, but as she sank down letting him slide deep inside and fill her completely, she was elevated to an entirely new level of pleasure. She grasped onto his hips and gazed down to meet his shimmering black gaze. His expression was so filled with awe and love as their gazes locked she knew without a doubt she was the most cherished woman in the world.

  They began to move together, his hips rising up and her hips driving down to match each of his movements. She arched back as his hands cupped her breasts and kneaded them gently in his palms. She held on to his muscled hips, unaware of how deeply her nails were digging into his skin. Their hunger for one another seemed to have no limits and his energy was boundless. But Dawn matched his endurance until they both lay breathless, exhausted and fulfilled in more ways than their mortal and immortal bodies ever imagined.

  After tonight, she truly understood the meaning of the phrase, ‘Rode hard and put away wet’.

  ****

  With her head resting on his muscled chest and her fingers splayed out on his chiseled stomach, she stared at the way her shimmering red nails complimented the golden bronze of his satiny skin. They were just a perfect match in every way.

  She was finally feeling she could talk coherently after their most passionate night so far, and she had to ask a couple more questions before she knew he had to leave her.

  “Why were you worried about hurting me earlier? Was it because your mouth was so close to the artery in my thigh?”

  His fingertips were gently traipsing along her cheekbones and her jaw line as if he was a blind man and was trying to memorize the features of her face with his touch. He sighed heavily. “It has been difficult—excruciating—for me to be around you without wanting to drink your blood. Ever since the first time I bit your neck and tasted the indescribable sweetness of your blood I have fought the greatest battle of my life just to remain in control when I’m with you.”

  His arm slid down to encircle her body when he felt her shudder. “I didn’t know if I was strong enough to taste more of you without losing what little constraint I had, especially since I was so close—”
He wrapped both of his arms around her shivering body.

  “So, you were worried about biting me down there,” she murmured. It was not a question; just a statement. It was terrifying, and even a little sad, for her to realize every time they were together it was a grueling test of his strength to keep from sucking more of her blood. But it was also an amazing testament to just how much he loved her.

  “My entire existence now is about loving you and protecting you, Udaya, even though I have chosen to take a different path to begin our eternal life together than the one charted since the beginning of my vampire clan. I don’t know where this new course will lead us, but I know as long as we are together we will be able to overcome all the obstacles thrown in our way.”

  “I trust you,” Dawn whispered. “You are my entire existence now, too. I will follow you anywhere—whenever you are ready to lead me there.”

  She heard him exhale softly against the side of her head. As scary as it all was, she no longer had any doubts loving this immortal man with every fiber of her being and spending eternity with him had always been where she was bound since the beginning of her own life, too.

  They held each other in the quiet dark of her small bedroom for a while longer. She knew he would be leaving and there was one more thing she had to know before he left her this morning, although she knew the answer was going to be hard to hear.

  “Will you please tell me where Chloe is?” she asked in a quiet tone that seemed to shatter the peaceful atmosphere.

  A moment passed before he answered, but it felt more like eons. “She is at the gold mine.”

  “The-the Lost Dutchman’s Gold Mine?”

  “Yes. It exists and my family has guarded it for over two centuries.”

  “Oh, my God,” she whispered as her mind spun with all the stories, legends, and wild imaginings about the Lost Dutchman’s Gold Mine. It was real. Chloe believed and searched for that treasure until the day she—what?

  “Chloe is still alive, though?” Her raspy voice asked.

  He cleared his throat before speaking again. “Unfortunately, my father was the first one to sense her presence. Like others before her who got too close to our encampment and to the cave which contains the rich veins of gold, she could not be allowed to discover all the secrets of our hidden world.”

  Dawn’s body was numb as her mind tried to comprehend what he was saying. “But you said before that she wasn’t d-dead.” Another vicious tremor shot through her body. He held her tighter.

  “Not yet,” he said in a mournful tone. “She is still with the other blood sources, the real ones who provide the mature vampires of our clan with human blood. She is not in pain and does not have any idea what has happened to her. Her mind is gone. My father put her under his vampire spell and bit her before she even knew what was happening. He did not kill her. But eventually she will be drained of all her blood and her body will not be able to survive.”

  His voice was just a hoarse whisper when he added, “You will never know how sorry I am about your friend. But it’s not your fault, and I won’t allow you blame yourself. She was not going to give up until she found that gold mine and once she did find it her fate was sealed. It would have happened with or without you or any dream you might have had about it.”

  The heavy weight of guilt and the unbearable pain kept her from answering. The sensible part of her brain told her he was right about Chloe’s relentless quest to find the gold mine, but there was nothing else rational about what he was saying.

  She couldn’t even begin to comprehend Chloe sitting mindlessly, partially drained of her blood, in a cave surrounded by the gold she had sought so desperately to find for her entire life. Dawn tried to push the horrific image out of her mind. Acknowledging Chloe’s fate along with all that he had told her earlier tonight would be more than her fragile state could handle right now.

  There were things too horrible for words concealed in those mountains, and now she was also aware of innocent children and their human mothers who dwelled among the destruction and terror. There was so much she still had to learn about the hidden world where she would be living for the rest of her life—and eternity, but could she deal with more? Hopefully, her love for Mateo would give her all the courage she would need. She told him she trusted him, so now she just had to prove to him, and herself, how much.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Sunday morning. Alone. Dawn felt a strange sensation flood through her chest, a tightening around her heart and hard lump in her throat. Tears were escaping from her eyes and she couldn’t stop them. It had only been one week and two days—nine days—since Mateo Two Moons entered her life. Well, if she counted the first time she had seen him in her dreams, which she knew now really wasn’t a dream, it had been two weeks and two days.

  It was such a very short span of time, zilch when compared to eternity, since this vampire had invaded her entire world in every way. Nothing was, or ever would be, the same. She wiped angrily at the wayward tears wetting her cheeks and the pillow under her head. She hated waking up without him, but she hated the idea of him lying Dracula-like in some gloomy cave even more. Would it be better when she was lying there in that black hole next to him? She shuddered and pulled the sheet and bedspread up to her chin.

  Her mind was a vortex spinning with all the information he had given her about his clan of vampires, dhampyres, and everything else last night. Worst of all, was the information he disclosed regarding Chloe’s fate. A roaring furnace couldn’t warm the icy blast that chilled her to the bone.

  If only she could remember all the romantic and beautiful memories from last night and forget about the rest of it.

  The out-of-control sex in her front foyer was the prelude to an evening of enchantment and romance. Dancing with Mateo among the twinkling lights at the rooftop lounge to the soft guitar music of Joseph Red Feather would always be one of her most cherished memories. The sexual game they played afterward that led to an extra erotic love-making session, still made her body quiver with residual longings. An elated smile curved her lips.

  Making love with Mateo was beyond anything she ever imagined. She hoped the intimate part of their lives would never change, but would it still be the same when they were together on the mountain for all eternity? She pushed those thoughts away. For a moment longer, only those perfect images from the previous night filled her mind, and the tears stopped. But she couldn’t pretend forever that everything was as perfect as she wanted it to be.

  The unwelcome image of Chloe clouded her happy thoughts once again. Dawn squeezed her lids shut and tried to block out the tragic picture Mateo described about her friend’s fate at the top of the Superstitions. The tears returned heavier than before.

  Although, she wished she could give Chloe’s family some sort of closure, she knew it would probably be easier for everyone to believe she had fallen to her death somewhere in the high rugged peaks of the Superstitions like it was believed so many before her had done. If they only knew...

  Dawn became aware of a new concern that rattled her to the core as a fierce determination claimed her. No one could ever know the truth about the half breed dhampyre children, human mates, and centuries old vampires who lived at the Lost Dutchman’s Gold Mine. Mateo and his entire family’s existence would be threatened. She knew she would protect them with her life, because soon she would also be one of those hidden secrets.

  Wiping away the last of her tears, she forced herself to get out of bed. As she glanced at the clock, she gave her head a disgusted shake. It was nearly noon.

  “What have you done to me, Mr. Two Moons?” she said with sigh. Well, for one thing, he totally destroyed her internal clock. Tomorrow was Monday, so tonight she would have to remember to set the alarm for the next morning. She couldn’t trust herself to wake up early enough to make it to school on time.

  With all that happened over the past few days, she had almost forgotten she was still a school teacher. Just a very short time ago, teachin
g had been one of the most important things in her life. But the idea of being at school tomorrow with the students and the other teachers, who had no clue of all the unbelievable secrets Dawn now harbored, seemed completely foreign and so removed from her new life with her immortal lover.

  Every day, every minute, since Mateo entered her world, it was getting harder and harder to function in a normal way. There was no denying she was his love slave in almost every way already, even without being under his vampire spell. Why did she even think she could pretend to live her regular life any longer?

  Since she missed three days of teaching last week, however, she had to at least try to be responsible about her job for as long as she was still here. There were loose ends to tie up in her life before she became Mateo’s mate. Besides, what if something happened and she ended up not being with him in his hidden village on the mountain for all eternity? Something unforeseen might happen and they would break up and she would still need her teaching job, right? She gave a loud snort. She was acting like she was still living in the real one’s world. That world ceased to exist the first night she went up on the Superstitions and confronted her destiny.

  His handsome face floated through her mind and the love she could not deny overflowed from her heart. She would live on the mountain with her dangerous and sexy vampire; she would have his dhampyre babies and do anything else he compelled her to do. He didn’t need to bite her in the neck, wrist, or thigh to make any of those things happen. He was her eternal mate as much as she was his, and she would never be able to live without him.

  Dawn sighed. It was seriously time to get up and do something ordinary, like laundry. Ugh. She glanced over and saw the extra pregnancy test on the bedside table. Maybe she should just get that over with once and for all. As she slipped into her blue robe and started to grab the pregnancy test her phone started ringing.