by Heidi Betts
Touching one with the tip of an index finger, she marveled at how real they were. How intimidating, and yet practically invisible most of the time.
“Why haven’t I seen them before?” she wanted to know. “I mean, we’ve talked and laughed. Kissed and done . . . all kinds of things with your teeth and mouth. Why didn’t I ever notice them when they’re so long and . . . obvious now?”
“I didn’t want you to see,” he told her, his lips brushing her fingers while she continued to probe and explore this interesting new aspect of his anatomy.
“So . . . what? You wished them away?”
He grinned at that, making the fangs even more evident.
“Not exactly. For one thing, they retract, so unless I’m hungry and about to feed, or feeling some extreme emotion, they pretty much align with the rest of my teeth, and as long as I’m careful, they’re fairly easy to hide. For another, vampires have the ability to . . . distort human perception, if you will.”
“Distort,” she repeated slowly, “human perception.”
His mouth closed, and he nodded. “Mm-hm.”
“As in . . . mind control?”
He winced slightly at her candid choice of words. “Yes. Sort of.”
“How ‘sort of’?” she asked, raising a brow.
Her brain was already racing over every interaction they’d ever had. Did he hypnotize people? Could he read minds? Had he ever intruded upon her thoughts, or made her do or say something against her will?
To Aidan’s credit, he didn’t shy away from the question or try to change the subject.
“It depends on the vampire,” he said. “The same as with mortals, the level of power and ability varies. Some are psychic. Some can control others’ actions and thoughts. But most of us simply use a kind of glamour to protect ourselves. To keep humans from noticing the fangs or our sometimes anemic pallor. . . . Or to daze them when we feed, dull the pain of our bite, and wipe the memory from their minds afterward.”
She waited a beat, wondering if the sensation filling her chest was dread or mere curiosity. “Did you ever do any of that to me?”
“Definitely not.”
His response came so quickly, and with such a decisive shake of his head, she knew he was telling the truth.
“I may have hidden a few of the nuances of my appearance from you at first, but by putting a mental veil over myself, not by doing anything to you.”
“So no reading my mind?”
“No.”
“Or persuading me to do things I wouldn’t have done on my own?”
“No.”
“Or making me feel attracted to you when I didn’t really?”
Everything from his chin to his forehead crinkled as he frowned. “Absolutely not. What man wants to be with a woman who doesn’t truly desire him? If I turn you on, that’s all you, babe. Well, it’s partly me,” he teased, arching his hips so she could feel even more of the turgid arousal pressing between them.
He did turn her on. He always had. But all the same, it was nice to know her feelings for him really were genuine, and had been from the beginning.
Even now, she had no doubt he could get her juices flowing in a way few other men ever had. His proposal that they go for a test run to see if everything was still working properly intrigued her, though. It was a little like role-playing, and if they really could go at it like horny minks after all they’d been through since last night, all the revelations and secrets revealed . . . well, then, she might believe they really could have a happily-ever-after marriage.
Granted, it would probably be the most bizarre marriage in history—a vampire and a mortal raising a young son together. Not to mention the fact that they lived in Las Vegas, and Aidan was one of the city’s most recognizable residents, which meant prying eyes and wagging tongues galore.
She didn’t know how he’d managed this long without questions and rumors and speculation running rampant about him and his brother. How had she—not to mention the entire rest of the world—never noticed that they didn’t go out in daylight? That they didn’t seem to age? That neither of them seemed to be connected to anyone—particularly companions of the feminine variety—for any length of time? Normally, the tabloids would sink their teeth into that sort of thing like a pit bull and not let go until they had answers or sold a hundred zillion copies, whichever came first.
So maybe this marriage would actually help him. She’d thought she was using him—for money, security, stability for Jake. But now she realized that he could use her, too. To convince people he was just an ordinary, run-of-the-mill, mortal guy. A family man. To turn away speculation that he was anything other than perfectly human.
Given her occupation as a showgirl—which she might not keep up forever, but had no problem sticking with for the time being—it would probably be even easier to explain why they were seen only at night and spent the day tucked away. And who would ever suspect that a couple raising a young son were anything other than exactly what they seemed?
Oh, yes. She was starting to see the up side of this bargain already. And if that wasn’t reason enough to jump his sturdy, undying bones, she didn’t know what was.
Jack
Lifting herself up slightly from his chest, she toyed with the buckle of his belt.
“You know, I think you’re right. I feel completely different about you now that I know what you really are.” Pursing her lips into a disappointed moue, she slipped the tail of the thin leather snake through one side of the buckle. “I’m not sure I’m attracted to you at all anymore.”
Just as she’d hoped, he took the bait. One dark brow went up and he said, “Oh, really?” in a tone filled with pure masculine challenge.
She held her expression and nodded, blowing out a long-suffering sigh.
“Hmm. We’ll just see about that.”
Sitting up, he ripped his shirt the rest of the way off, then he grabbed the hem of her top and yanked it straight up over her head. Her arms lifted, then flopped back down as she let him do whatever it was he planned to do.
Next thing she knew, they were on their feet and he was unsnapping her jeans, dragging them down her legs. Unfastening his own and kicking off his shoes as he stepped out of them. She stepped out of her own shoes and left her pants a pile of inside-out denim on the floor.
She was still in her bra and panties, but Aidan was gloriously naked, his erection standing out in front of him, tall and proud. Fighting the urge to lick her lips—or fall to her knees and make a grab at him—she raised her head and met his piercing, sable-brown gaze.
Without a word, he hooked his hands under her arms and lifted her straight off the ground like she weighed nothing. Superhuman strength brought on by lust or simply supervampire strength? Oh, she was going to have to put this man through his paces until she knew all his vampy little secrets and the limits to all of his preternatural attributes.
He started walking, taking long strides with great purpose, and she thought he would carry her to the bedroom. Instead, he crossed to the far wall and backed her up against it, none too gently.
Her bare back hit with a thump, driving the air from her lungs, and she couldn’t even drag in more because he pressed right up against her, keeping her from drawing another breath. Holding her there with the solid wall of his torso alone, he hooked his thumbs into the elastic band of her panties and swept them down her legs as far as he could reach, letting them float the rest of the way to the floor on their own.
Then his attention came back up, zeroing in on her face. He looked at her like a starving man at one of the Inferno’s all-you-can-eat $9.99 buffets . . . and she was the dessert bar.
Taking her mouth, he kissed her with a heat and passion she’d never felt from him before. His tongue slowly scalded her from the top of her head to the tips of her curling toes. His lips took possession, laying claim to every quickly melting cell of her body.
As pleasurable as the sensations bombarding her were, for a second, she
tensed. It was too much too fast. He was overpowering her, trying to take over her thoughts and feelings, and drowning her senses with devastating sensations. Where was her judgment? Where was her control over her own actions?
Was he brainwashing her with some of his hypnotizing vampire woo-woo?
But, no, he swore he’d never done anything like that to her, and she trusted his word on that. Which meant all of this —what he was doing to her now, making her feel and think and believe—was real.
The realization washed over her like a warm, comforting ocean wave, and she let herself go, riding along with the gentle lull. Lifting her arms, she wound them around his neck and hugged him tight, actively kissing him back with everything she had in her.
Her breasts were pressed flat between them, but that didn’t keep her nipples from pebbling into hard, pointed peaks. Sliding his hands down either side of her hips and thighs, Aidan caught her behind the knees and lifted her legs to circle his hips.
She locked her ankles to hold herself in place while he ran the palms of his rough hands over every inch of bare flesh he could reach. Her waist, her back, the curve of her bottom and globes of her breasts. And then his fingers trailed down her abdomen, snaking between to find her pulsing center. Without pause, he parted her folds, letting the heel of his hand knead her bare mound while he spread her juices and readied her to take him.
Not that she needed it. She was burning up, a five-alarm fire blazing through her veins, threatening to make her explode with or without his active participation.
But as he opened her, nudged her with the tip of his cock, she threw her head back and moaned, doing her best to hold on. Aidan panted over her, his own desperation clear in the pinpricks of his pupils and the sweat beading his forehead. The little dots of dampness had a slight pink tinge to them, and she assumed it was another one of those “vampire things.”
How had she never noticed that before, either? There were so many details about him she’d apparently missed, but that she was now going to be on the lookout for. Fangs sprouting from nowhere, eyes glowing in the dark, bloody sweat, plasma protein shakes . . . All that was missing was lack of reflection and turning into a bat.
She didn’t have long to contemplate that, though, because instead of teasing and prodding with just the head of his hungry erection, he was now pushing forward, filling her in one long, powerful thrust. She bit her lip and held her breath, taking him, loving the feel of him so big and hard inside of her.
Whether she needed a minute to get used to his incredible size or to get her lungs functioning or not, he didn’t give it to her. As soon as he was seated to the hilt, he began to move. Grasping her ass, he tightened his hold and hiked her higher, holding her in place while he pounded into her again and again.
It was brutal, primal, on the verge of violent . . . and Chloe loved it. Sex between them had always been wild, sometimes even acrobatic, but it had never been like this.
Aidan seemed freer, more uninhibited than ever before . . . and apparently hornier and more desperate than ever before, too.
Not that she minded. It wasn’t her first time being banged against a wall like a Chinese gong, but it was the first time she’d enjoyed it quite so much. If he kept it up, she wouldn’t mind him taking her this way every night of the week—and twice on weekends.
She was wrapped around him like ivy, close enough to share skin. Each upward drive of his cock had him rubbing the swollen bud of her clitoris, creating just the right amount of friction to have her teetering on the edge of almost constant orgasm.
Grasping the back of his head, she wound her fingers through his hair, hanging on tight and simply riding the sensations. She let him do whatever he wanted to do. Set the pace, the force, the timing of what promised to be a climax of cataclysmic proportions.
Just as she’d hoped, he took the lead. Her back and shoulders were braced against the wall, her head making the occasional semi-painful crack into the paint-covered plaster. But he let her take his mouth, kissing her back like he wanted to swallow her whole.
In a matter of seconds, the tension coiling inside her built to a fever pitch. Every bone, every muscle, every drop of blood in her veins grew tight with anticipation.
“Yes. Oh, God, Aidan . . .” she panted into the curve of his neck.
Her tongue darted out to lick his skin, and she tasted spicy, slightly metallic male perspiration, as well as the throb of his arousal, his single-minded resolve.
Locating his jugular vein, she ran her teeth lightly over it and the cablelike tendon running alongside. When she bit down—gently, she’d never done this sort of thing before and didn’t want to hurt him—he groaned. A long, drawn-out sound that let her know he liked it. A lot.
Growing bolder, she bit him again, harder than before. This time, not only did he moan, but his body arched with pleasure and his hard length jerked inside of her. For a moment, she thought he’d come, but then he loosened up again and continued his quick, brutal thrusts.
With the building of her own pleasure, she knew there wasn’t much time left. Seconds, possibly, before they both went screaming into that orgasmic abyss.
But there was something she wanted to do first—for him, but also for herself. Because though she wasn’t entirely certain, she thought she understood now. Understood why he’d bitten her the last time they made love. Understood the added high it must provide for someone like him, if the mere act of nibbling at the side of his throat with her tongue and flat, human teeth was such a turn-on for her.
She nipped him one last time before moving her mouth to his jawline and across his lips.
“Aidan.” It wasn’t easy to speak past the squeeze in her chest or the cascade of rippling pleasure growing low in her belly and between her legs.
“Aidan,” she breathed again. And then without waiting for a response, “Bite me. Please.”
He stilled, almost as though she’d flipped a switch, making her whimper. She’d wanted more of him, not less, and the lack of movement caused the passion that had been building at a nice, steady pace to ebb.
His eyes met hers, dark and intense. When he spoke, his voice was scratchy and thick with exertion. “What?”
“Bite me,” she repeated, toying with the hair at the nape of his neck and tightening her legs around his waist. “Do what you did before. Break my skin and drink my blood.”
He started to shake his head, but before he could refuse, she gave his hair a sharp tug. “Yes. I want you to. Please.”
“Chloe . . .” Her name passed his lips on a strangled breath of sound.
“Do it, Aidan.” Her own voice was little more than a whisper, but she made it as much of an order as she could manage.
And it must have worked, because she felt him shudder a second before he leaned into her, put his face to her throat, and licked the pulse point throbbing there. Lower, he began moving again, returning the friction, the slow burn, the sharp climb toward ecstasy.
Chloe let her head fall back and her eyes slide closed. The feel of those razor-sharp incisors scraping along her skin when he opened his mouth sent tremors down her spine.
Never in a million years would she have thought something like this would appeal to her. More than appeal—it charged her up like a wind-up toy. She’d been so upset when she’d first discovered he’d bitten her last night, and now she craved it, was begging for it, wished he’d get on with it already.
No sooner did the thought trickle through her brain than he widened his mouth over her jugular. His hot breath grazed her skin, his tongue branded her with damp heat, and the tips of his fangs pricked like pins.
And then they did more than prick. They sank in, breaking the skin and making her jump at the sudden stab of pain. But as quickly as it came, the discomfort eased, replaced by a hazy, almost drugging fog of sheer pleasure. It filled her, surrounded her, made her feel as though she was floating in a cocoon of cotton gauze.
She didn’t know how long she hung there, suspended b
y the overwhelming and unfamiliar sensations, but at least she hadn’t passed out this time. Little by little, they began to lift, replaced once again with the heightened awareness of really good sex—only better.
All the usual feelings were there, but they were tinged with something more, something she couldn’t quite define. When she opened her eyes, everything seemed brighter, sharper, larger than life. She smelled Aidan’s scent more clearly, nuances she’d never noticed before. And his body inside and against hers . . . it was amazing. As though every pore of her skin possessed a zillion tiny little nerve endings, and all of them were alive and awake and humming like a buzz saw.
Chloe could hear him slurping at her throat, sucking the blood straight from her vein and swallowing it down almost as though it were a fine wine. A mewling sound rolled up from somewhere in her throat, and even without aggressive thrusts or direct stimulation to her clit, only the slow slide of his cock along her swollen folds, she started to come. With a gasp, her back bowed and she contracted around him, clutching him tighter and tighter, and driving him into his own orgasm.
Still latched on to her neck and drinking from her, he grasped her hips, canted her just so, and pounded into her once, twice, a third time before stiffening and spilling inside of her. She took everything he had to give, cushioning him when he collapsed against her, doing her best to buttress him when he started to go limp, even though she was the one with her back to the wall and no part of her touching the floor.
A moment later, he lifted his mouth from her throat, gently licking the abraded area . . . to speed healing, she remembered him saying . . . and then they were moving, sliding down the wall and onto the floor. They lay there in a tangle of arms and legs, and she, at least, was breathing heavily, her lungs burning as they attempted to re-absorb much-needed O2. Aidan’s hand hovered around her hip, stroking from waist to rear end and back again.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled, his chest rumbling beneath her cheek as he spoke.
Her limbs still felt rubbery and weak, but she managed to bend her free arm and touch the spot on her neck with the tips of her fingers. “I wanted you to.”
