Blood Oath: What Rough Beast
Page 13
She mewled in protest when he tore his mouth away. “Rick.”
“I have to—” Garrick bent his head to her breast, taking her nipple deep into his mouth. He slid his hand over the creamy stretch of skin his clumsy hands had revealed when he’d pushed the damned skirt away, loved the bunch of her flexing muscles when he licked and sucked her nipple.
But it wasn’t enough.
When she groaned at the erotic attention his mouth and tongue rendered, he arrowed his fingers through the drenched nest of curls at the apex of her thighs. She bucked into his touch, crying out in stunned delight.
“I love you.” He squeezed a finger into her cunt, bit her breast so the hot splash of her blood filled his mouth. He sucked ravenously at her, sliding his finger in and out. Urgent. Hot. Demanding. She writhed against him, wanton and so sexy in her need that fierce wonder flooded him, made him shiver and shake.
She screamed when the first orgasm tore through her.
Garrick was far too hungry, his own vampyr roused to giddy, greedy life. Primitive instincts he couldn’t control, didn’t even want to, rose up inside him to greet hers, revel in the impatient response of her body to his and the mind-blowing pleasure he could wring from her. Bring to them both.
He eased another finger inside her.
She groaned his name. “Please.”
He released her nipple to skate his lips down her belly, driving her up, relentlessly up once again. “I intend to. Please you. Quite thoroughly.”
Garrick buried his mouth in her cunt, staggered by his first unbelievable taste. She buried her fingers in his hair to push his ravaging lips and rapacious tongue more deeply into her cloying heat. He sampled, tasted, and feasted on her clit while his fingers danced inside her. She bucked and writhed, alternately demanded and begged.
But in the end, she was his.
All his.
Kate’s back bowed. Her nipples beaded to bright scarlet. Her swollen mouth widened to a shocked O. Her muscles dragged greedily at his invading fingers, tightening…tightening… She stiffened, her body clenching in the throes of exquisite release.
“That’s it, love,” he murmured into her sensitive, quivering flesh. Intimately linked to her, he shared her intense joy, her mindless passion. “Give it all. Give me everything.”
She lay boneless, still quaking with the force of her release when Garrick’s lips lighted on the flat stretch of her stomach, the curve of her hip. “You see how good it will be between us? Your vampyr is nothing to fear, nothing to hate or resent. Your body demands this pleasure, and I give it,” he murmured against her skin, his fingers yet inside her. She tossed her head back on a low moan. “You feel better, yes? The craving has become more tolerable?”
She sighed, her body curling to better seek his. “I feel so empty.”
He kissed her pussy, staggered by the sexy scent of her. “I’ll fuck you once we’re mated.”
She angled her hips into his palm, sliding his fingers deeper inside her. “Fuck me now. I can feel how much you want me.”
He sucked in his breath at the strength, the intensity of her vampyr. She might be momentarily pacified by the shattering release his mouth and hands could give her, but not for long. She needed more. She needed him, his cock slipping inside her and driving them both to madness. As did he. “Kate?”
“Yes,” she hissed, bewildered with desire, with their passion. Her hips writhed against his hand, seeking fulfillment once more.
Garrick knew she was far past reaching, as lost in the urgent lust her vampyr wrought inside her as he was. Kate’s mind had given way to the new and awesome demands of her body. Her heart couldn’t accept him to mate, not yet.
But her body would.
“We must share blood twice more, I from you and you from me,” he said, sliding his tongue along her thigh.
She groaned.
“There will be no more you, no more me.” His mouth found her pulse throbbing just beneath her satiny skin. “Only us. Just us,” he said and sank his teeth into her.
Ecstasy tightened her muscles as his fingers drove her higher. His mouth drew at the wound on her thigh with ruthless determination. She ground her hips into his palm and rode his fingers, seeking the mind-shattering release she knew his touch would give. As he sucked and pulled her life’s essence from her, Garrick thrust his fingers into her wet heat, harder, faster. Her heart thundered, muscles contracting.
She shouted his name with the brutal slap of her climax.
Garrick eased his fingers out of her, stroking and petting her supple skin. Hers dived into his hair, holding him firmly to her as he fed.
And fed.
And fed.
Her blood beat sluggishly in her veins, tiring.
Weakening.
In her mind, sharing her thoughts, her stunned and reeling emotions, Garrick felt the sweet exhaustion of her pleasure washing through her first. He wondered, too, at her weary satisfaction, her awe at the heights to which she’d soared.
Her heart skipped a beat. Her limbs slackened, too tired even to support their weight. Her fingers, only moments before so strong in his hair, so demanding that he drink, loosened.
“Rick.” She called to him, afraid now of the ever-increasing drain on her body, the light-headed chill that invaded her senses as both passion and blood loss demanded their due.
The suckling draw of his mouth did not slow, did not falter. “Trust me.”
Her skin paled, the pink glow of health sapping from her. Her hands fell from his hair, too frail to maintain her light grasp on him. “I’m dying.”
“Yes. I know.”
* * *
The waning whisper of her mind held no alarm, no surprise, just a stunned recognition and acceptance that made Garrick’s blood run like molten heat in his veins.
She trusted him.
With her life.
Garrick fed at the wound, reveling in the taste of her. “You are my miracle.” He immersed himself in her flavor, the feel of her soft body, the musky scent of her sex. Her heart fluttered, struggling for survival. Still, his mouth worked her flesh, demanding her blood, every dizzying drop. “I love you, Kate.”
Her breath hitched and slowly hissed from her parted lips.
Her chest didn’t rise.
Her heart didn’t pump.
Garrick lifted his head, staring at her dead eyes, her translucent skin, the limp weight of her body. Astonished joy flooded him.
And dread.
“Stay with me, love.”
“Rick!”
He rose from the cradle of her thighs, and gathering her lifeless body to his, he sank against the chair. Fingers shaking, he slashed at his chest, just above his heart. “Drink.” He rubbed his blood to her pale lips. Shifting his hand to her jaw, he settled her slack mouth to the wound. Stark, viscous red bathed her neck as their shared blood surged from his torn chest, precious little sliding down her throat.
“You killed me!”
Her sense of betrayal speared through his mind with such ferocity, panic crippled him. For one heart-stopping moment, he couldn’t think, couldn’t move. He could only feel, drown with her in her wounded grief. Her turmoil and the rabid chaos teeming inside her paralyzed him.
Fear lodged in his throat.
He couldn’t breathe.
Without her, Garrick didn’t want to.
He shook off the numb terror, nudged her mouth more firmly to the wound he’d made for her. “Don’t leave me, love. You have to try.”
Too much blood trickled from his chest to hers, but a thin stream dripped down her throat. “Your vampyr needs so little to restart your heart. Swallow for me, Kate. Live for me.”
Her heart quivered. Embedded in her mind, he felt it shudder violently, then gather to pulse one frail beat.
That first punch of power hit Kate like a kick in the gut.
It knocked Garrick flat.
His teeth clenched.
His muscles coiled.
Her mo
uth sprang open to suck in her breath, and she choked instead on the blood pouring from his wounded chest.
“Your body will absorb oxygen from our shared blood. Don’t try to breathe. Just drink.” His hand shook as he stroked her hair, urging her to swallow, weakly swallow, just a little more. His heart twisted at her fragility. It jumped at the gentle tug of her mouth on his skin and sang when she sipped at him. “You are so beautiful—”
“You killed me!”
He threw his head back and laughed at the furious accusation of her voice in his mind. He didn’t even care that she bit into him. The small cruelty thrilled him, for it meant her strength was restoring, their shared blood refilling her. “Yes, I killed you, and you’ve my undying devotion that you returned to me.”
“You—Luc—the both of you are psychopaths. This is insane. Don’t ever do that again.” She sucked greedily at his chest, her vitality building. Her ashen skin flushed to a healthy glow. Her lax fingers abruptly sprang wide, then clutched at him. They dug into his side like talons. And her smell…
Garrick’s body slumped. His breath left him in a wild rush at the heady scent intensifying around them. If she’d driven him mad with wanting before, Garrick knew there was no hope for him now. He’d never resist the subtle musk that perfumed the air around them. Or her.
Thank God he didn’t have to try.
Humming low satisfaction, he threaded his fingers through her hair, pushing her mouth forward so that she gulped at him.
“You taste…different. Better. Why do you taste so good?”
Garrick smiled into her hair, woozy now from blood loss himself. She needed every drop, as much as he could give her, and he’d lost too much coaxing her unresponsive body to feed.
“It is the flavor of our mating, of our joined blood.” He let his eyes drift shut, let the ecstasy of her rapacious mouth take him. “You and I, our blood mingling, merging.” He made a hungry sound in the back of his throat though her pace slackened, her thirst finally easing. “That is what you taste: our mixed blood. By virtue of it, we essentially become one being. Blood mated.”
She shivered in his arms.
“You were mortal only a few weeks ago, Kate. No matter all that’s happened since, your mind remains very human. Give it time.” He gathered her close, enjoyed the soft weight of her in his arms. “The transition changed your body. Your thoughts, perceptions, how you understand the world, these adapt to suit your new nature more slowly. Blood-mating seems bizarre and barbaric to that human side of you, but your vampyr was ready. And eager.”
He laughed when she glared at him. “It’s completely natural for our kind, I promise.”
She wiped at her ruddy chin, shuddered. “This is so not natural.”
“For us, it is. Natural and necessary. Our longevity requires the deepest of unions between us. Total physical intimacy. The act of sex, of making love, is not enough. Our minds, our hearts, and our bodies must be as one.”
“Flesh of one flesh,” she murmured, glance shifting away.
“Bone of my bones, Genesis 2:23.” The corners of his mouth curved to a tired smile. “The Scriptures speak of Eve’s union with Adam, their marriage, as so. Humans aspire to attain it with sex alone, but vampyr have mated much more intimately for millennia.”
“Killing somebody is not intimate. I don’t care who or what you are.” When she looked up at him, exhaustion shadowed her eyes with faint blue smudges. “You should have told me. Given me some kind of warning.”
“Knowing it must be done and understanding why doesn’t make it easier.” Garrick breathed in her scent, their mingled scent now, held her to him. “I was terrified.”
Her eyes widened. “You?”
“I’m not impervious to fear, Kate.” He tangled fingers slicked scarlet with hers. “Especially where you are concerned.”
“Link with me.”
She slowly shook her head but didn’t tug her hand away.
“You criticize me for failing to prepare you for blood-mating. Maybe justifiably so. But when I offer to open my mind to you, you will not seek to know my thoughts, to share what I feel.” He arched a sardonic eyebrow. “Were you this contrary when you were human, or is it new?”
She scowled at him. “You are such a jerk.”
He chuckled, his delight with her lifting his heart. How could he not love her? How could his heart not race to have her in his arms, glowering at him, after such a harrowing ordeal?
They’d lived.
She’d blood-mated to him, and they’d survived it.
So he laughed, hugged her to him, and gave himself up to his relieved satisfaction.
Her frown gradually smoothed. “You should do that more often.”
His lips curled to a wry grin. “Kill you?”
She aimed a punch, her fist brushing his biceps. “Laugh,” she said. “You should laugh more often.”
“You should link with me more often.”
Her nose wrinkled. “Now who’s being stubborn?”
“I need that intimacy. We both will now. More and more.” He brought their intertwined fingers to her pale, blood-smeared cheek. “One heart, one mind, one body.”
“Remember?”
Her gaze drifted from his. “I don’t like you in my head. I don’t even want Luc rattling around in there.”
He tried to understand.
He really did.
But she’d been deeply embedded in his mind and he in hers during their blood-mating only moments before. Instinctively, she’d sought him out, and they’d been as close as two of their kind could be. The mind-numbing perfection of it still rattled him. “Why not?”
She focused a frigid glare on him. “You’re not supposed to be in my head. That’s impossible.”
“We are very possible.” He stared into her dark frustrated eyes, traced their conjoined fingers along the line of her jaw. “You must come to terms with what you are and what we, together, are capable of.”
“I don’t—”
He arched a cool eyebrow. “Link with me.”
“This is just sex, and don’t look at me like that,” she said when his brow furrowed. “You started it. You and Luc both. You got that heat thing started, all these hormones driving me crazy when you knew I hadn’t even decided if I liked you yet.” She focused dark, defiant eyes on him that glinted with rising fury. “Which right now, I don’t. Like you. At all.”
She shoved at him. “You wanted sex? Fine. You’ve got it. There’s not a damn thing I can do to stop it.” Her eyes narrowed to slits. “Mentally? I can’t keep you out of my head, no.”
“But what I’m thinking and feeling is my business and none of yours, pal.”
Chapter Ten
Garrick moved her into his rooms that night.
Kate glared at him. She glanced over the edge of her Kindle to sniff regal disdain at Luc and Garrick both as they gathered her few favorite things—the jewelry she’d shown any preference for, a fleece throw she’d curled up in when she read on the loveseat, the pillow she’d liked on the bed she’d shared with her traitorous guardian. They shoved everything in a box that would be hauled to the private suite she’d share with Garrick.
Kate said nothing.
When Luc had asked her what she’d like to keep, she pressed her lips together and focused her attention on Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy. Pride and Prejudice, she could deal with. A pair of stubborn vampires? Not so much.
“If we’ve left anything behind, I’ll bring it to you.” Luc draped acres of diaphanous skirts over his arm while Garrick pawed through the jewelry chest, selecting and rejecting baubles at random. “You’re only moving to the other wing of the house, bébé.”
This, of course, would go hand-in-hand with the I’m-not-abandoning-you speech he’d treated her to earlier.
She snorted.
Maybe he wasn’t abandoning her, but he certainly seemed eager to abandon her virtue.
Not that Kate was feeling particularly virtuous.
She was still horny, damn it.
The shower Garrick had taken to clean up their sticky blood after mating hadn’t erased his sexy smell. Her mouth watered at the scent that wafted from him each time the air stirred as he passed by. She shivered at the tang of new sweat. His natural musk tickled her nostrils and made her ache.
The discernible bulge of his cock behind the fly of the sturdy blue jeans he’d changed into didn’t help.
She’d felt that dick rubbing her clit, traced it through his trousers with the palm of her hand. But she hadn’t seen it. Or tasted it.
The lack was making her crazy.
Luc and Garrick unceremoniously moving her into his rooms was making her crazier still.
She wanted his cock in her mouth, but she also wanted to slap both men silly for treating her like an ottoman they could nudge from room to room as the whim struck.
“I would never mistake you for a piece of furniture.”
Garrick beamed a lecherous grin. “And you can have my dick whenever you like.”
Luc grunted. “I hope she ties it into a knot.”
Kate scowled.
Thunderously.
Focused on her Kindle.
Elizabeth didn’t know how good she had it.
At least Mr. Darcy didn’t have fangs.
Garrick snickered.
Her lips pursed. Instead of concentrating on the words on the screen, she pictured dead baby ducks and her grandmother’s voluminous underwear.
Luc frowned. “Your bath didn’t scrub away your scent either. You won’t kill his erection while he can smell you, but I may never get hard again.”
Kate added elderly nuns in crisp black robes to her mental imagery. And the Saturday-afternoon line at every cash register in Walmart.
Garrick laughed.
Luc rolled his eyes.
“This is the last of it,” he said, folding a heaping stack of dresses over the box Garrick hefted off the desk. “Let’s go.”
Kindle in hand, she trooped on wooden legs behind them when, arms laden, they marched from Luc’s rooms into the interior of the house. She followed them through the double doors of Garrick’s master suite and settled in the center of his king-size, four-poster bed to sneer at them as they salted the things they decided she should have in Garrick’s living quarters.