There was one main street. One restaurant, that I could tell. A castle with dragons, whips, chains, and who knew what else.
“I will keep you safe.”
“What if you aren’t around? I heard you tell your friends you go out of town for business. What if Rose needs you to do something?”
“They will watch you if I’m gone.”
“The dragons?”
A soft chuckle rumbled in his chest. “In all honesty you would be safest in the Castle, but probably very uncomfortable.”
“Because of the whips and chains and stuff?”
He laughed aloud. “Yes, kjaere. But, everything that happens in the Castle is consensual. Nothing is done between two people that isn’t agreed upon in some form beforehand.”
“I can’t imagine wanting to be beaten,” I hissed back, my emotions seesawing back and forth between wanting to trust him and hating myself for even thinking I could. Kevin had used many things on me, including a whip, but his belt had created most of my scars. That, and his baseball bat.
“No one is beaten the way you are describing. A whip is used to heighten pleasure, not to torture and disfigure.” He spoke slowly, melodically.
I knew he wasn’t lying to me about the club, but even the idea of a whip or a chain made me want to vomit.
Most of my scars had lightened as the years passed. I was so used to them, I didn’t notice them much anymore, but one of the waitresses at the Seafood Shack saw one of my larger ones one day when my shirt came un-tucked. She never asked me about it, but her slight gasp of horror was enough to remind me how ugly Kevin had made my body.
I never dated. Never flirted. I refused any man who showed even the smallest interest in me. It was better to be labeled a cold-hearted bitch than to end up with another man like Kevin. Once or twice when I’d admired a handsome man from afar, I always reminded myself I wasn’t good enough. I wasn’t a young eighteen-year-old with a perfect body. Society labeled me a whore because I lived alone, unprotected by family. Most of the male staff thought I turned tricks on the side and had asked for my number on several occasions.
Erick was the first man I’d let embrace or touch me since Kevin.
“You’ll never ask me to do those things. Promise me.” I turned my head and strained to look up at him.
He loosed his grip, as if sensing I needed a visual connection with him.
I did.
His ocean blue eyes were soft. Kind. Tender. And then … there was something else in his gaze I didn’t recognize. Something unfamiliar that reminded me of those romantic books back in that Tennessee barn. He pressed another kiss to my forehead and shook his head. “I would never do anything you didn’t enjoy, min kjaereste.”
His endearment brought tears to my eyes again. He’d called me beautiful, when I’d smelled like a sewer, but would he still think of me that way when he saw the damaged parts of me? Even faded, I knew the scars were ghastly to look at.
“Why me?”
He looked away for a moment and sighed. Then back at me. “I’ve been hunting Darius since Elinor died.”
I gasped, biting back a sob. The Djinn had killed his wife.
He nodded. “Darius is a bloody menace who needs to be wiped from the face of the planet.” Erick laid me on my back and lay on his side next to me, propping his head up with his arm. “When I saw you … your eyes were so determined. You knew he was out there. You knew what he was and yet you stubbornly fought to get to a place where you thought you’d be safe.”
I closed my eyes as he traced the line of my jaw to my chin with his free hand. Then he let his hand travel back up my face and his fingers sank into my hair. He rubbed my scalp, massaging ever so gently.
“I wasn’t safe in the bus station was I?”
“No.”
“Would he have killed me?”
“Eventually.”
I run from one lunatic straight into another. It wasn’t fair. I deserved a break. A little bit of happiness in this screwed up world. Was that too much to hope for?
“I want to give you new memories, Bailey. Something to help drown out the pain and self-blame you heap on yourself. I don’t know what your ex did, but I want to help you find a way past it.”
I relaxed into his touch and felt tears well up in my eyes, I closed them to hide the pain.
“You’ve been running from him for so long to avoid physical pain, you never had time to forgive yourself for the emotional pain he inflicted. None of it was your fault. He was a predator.”
“I’m scared you won’t like what you see. He did things to me that … that I have to carry with me. I’m a fucked-up mess.” When I looked in the mirror in the mornings that’s what I saw. A broken, battered mess of a woman who barely survived by the skin of her teeth. More sobs slipped from my chest. I couldn’t hold them back.
“You never gave up, min kjaereste. You may feel broken or ugly, but you have the spirit of a warrior. In my homeland, you would have been respected and honored for your scars. My people see wounds as badges of honor. You didn’t let your enemy win—you never quit fighting.”
“They keep calling you a Viking. Were those your people?”
“Yes. We were seafaring warriors and raiders. Strong. Independent. Fierce. Loyal. Passionate.”
It would’ve been nice to live in a world where more people had those qualities. I opened my eyes and stared into the endless blue of his. He had such a beautiful way with words. I could listen to the ebb and flow of his deep velvety voice for hours.
My sobs had turned to the occasional hiccup and my heart had slowed to a more normal rhythm.
He moved his hand from my hair, moving it slowly down my neck, over the curve of my breast, and along my torso. Stopping at my hip, he caught the hem of my shirt and tugged it up a few inches, revealing half of my stomach and a handful of white jagged scars.
I held my breath. What would he do? Would he say something? I listened for an intake of breath, a gasp, a groan. Nothing. He didn’t make a sound.
The bed shifted as he leaned forward and kissed along the length of one scar and then the other, until he’d kissed every inch of the marred flesh he’d uncovered.
Then he looked back at me. Our gazes met and the heated desire in his eyes made me tremble. I wanted him. Not just a little want. I was wet, aching with need. If he couldn’t smell my arousal, my pheromones had to have given me away by now.
“Tell me what you want, kjaere. This only goes as far as you desire.”
Meaning what? If I said no in the middle of stripping, he’d back off? If I started panicking he’d just quit? I was supposed to trust this vampire, a predator by nature, to just leave me be if I so dictated?
But it wasn’t his wants and desires that left me confused the most. It was mine. I wanted to taste his lips again. I wanted to feel him against me, skin to skin. I wanted his cock inside me, stretching, filling me until it was all I could feel.
Erick had called me a warrior, not a victim. He said I was a fighter. I hadn’t given up. Even though I’d been running, I never gave in. He called me honorable, not shameful. No one had ever called me anything but worthless.
I lifted my arms, put my hands on his neck and pulled him closer. Our lips met and I parted mine, inviting him in. But it wasn’t just my mouth I opened. I knew a crack had opened in the walls surrounding my heart too. I was falling in love with this man who called me beautiful and strong—a warrior.
It was time to fight.
CHAPTER SEVEN
He nuzzled my neck and licked along the pulse point. Then his right leg moved across my abdomen, straddling me, but not putting pressure. He straightened himself, leaving my skin tingling and desperate for more attention. Pushing up my arms, he grabbed the hem of my shirt and tugged, gently pulling until it came over my head.
I closed my eyes, not wanting to see his initial reaction to my scars. I could hear him take a deep breath. “You are exquisite, Bailey. Look at me.”
The words
surprised me. I opened my eyes slowly. He held my gaze with a look I could only describe as adoration, while his hands slid behind my torso and unsnapped the bra. It slipped off easily and he tossed it, along with my shirt, to the floor.
I heaved a breath in and out. I was completely bare from the waist up. Long jagged streaks crisscrossed my chest and stomach, some were raised and others were just ghostly white shadows.
His hands caressed my breasts, rolling the nipples between his thumbs and forefingers, bringing them to a hard point. He leaned down again, pressing his lips against a scar that crossed over my left breast. “So beautiful, kjaere. So brave.”
Tears poured from the corners of my eyes, running down my temples and falling to the pillow beneath my head. He didn’t stop until he’d kissed and licked every mark. Then he gently rolled me over and began again.
“I will know and see everything. And I will revel in the beauty that is you.”
The way his words flowed made my heart full, and my tears slowly subsided. I reached a point where I could begin to enjoy the way he ran his lips and his hands over my skin. Lines of fire surged from each touch, warming me all over. My breasts felt heavy and my sex wept with need.
He slid his hands down my hips and unsnapped my pants, sliding them off slowly. The waistband dragged across my mound and put delicious pressure on my swelling clit.
A wave of cool air grazed the mounds of my ass. Worries emerged again, but were dispelled as his mouth planted a kiss on each of my exposed cheeks.
“Perfection.”
The word was just a whisper, but it resonated deeply inside me.
I knew there were scars on my backside, too. But they didn’t seem to be turning him off. In fact, when he leaned down to kiss me again, I felt his arousal prod against the back of my thighs.
He wanted me—scars and all.
A breath later, he turned me onto my back, still gazing down on me as if he’d never seen anything more beautiful in his life. I knew I could never tire of seeing him look at me with such reverence.
I wanted to see him, too. I raised my hands to the hem of his polo shirt and tugged. He obliged and pulled it off, tossing it to the floor where my clothes had landed.
My lips parted at the vision before me. The light tan on his arms continued over the rest of his body. His shoulders were golden, too. Light blond hair dusted his chest and I drew my fingers along the center slope between his pecs. My gaze trailed lower, taking in and appreciating his tapered waist and six-pack abs. A thin trail of hair started again at his navel and led my eyes on a downward path. The waist of his pants hid the rest of him from view, but the bulge beneath spoke to his desire. When I looked back to his face, the intensity in his eyes heated me even more.
I fumbled with the button on his jeans for a second before I got it loose. Then pulled down the zipper and pushed them, along with his boxers down over his hips. His cock sprang free, already hard and glistening with pre-cum.
Instead of being nervous, like I thought I would be, I was excited. My heart raced and my skin tingled in anticipation. Even my mouth watered at the impressive male display. He wriggled the rest of the way out of his clothes and kicked them off the bed, turning back to me with the hungry look of a lion that hadn’t eaten in days.
He didn’t attack, though. Each move he made was slow and deliberate. His legs were on either side of my thighs, holding me firmly in place. He leaned down, blowing a stream of cool air across my bare nipples. They pebbled in an instant and I wanted nothing more than to feel his lips on them.
A tiny moan slipped from between my lips. Please. I wanted his mouth on me more than anything. “Please.” It was a whisper, but I had said it.
My eyes closed when the wisps of cold air returned to my breasts. Then the cool touch of his lips. They were so close. He kissed around the nipple, caressing every part of my breast with his mouth, then moving and doing the same with the other, but never taking either nipple.
“I love how sensitive you are. Your breasts are like heaven—soft, supple, and full.”
I was awash with sensations. His mouth made love to my breasts. There was no other way to describe it. He licked and sucked and nipped until I could feel my pulse pounding in my sex. It drove me wild.
When he finally closed his mouth over one of my nipples, I gasped. Each tug sent ribbons of fire coursing through my body straight to my wet, needy core. He switched to the other and used his fingers to roll the wet nipple back and forth, exerting just enough pressure to make me start panting.
My back arched up, thrusting my breasts closer to his luxurious mouth. He nipped and pulled at the other nipple, not giving a second of reprieve. I pushed my head back and fisted handfuls of the satiny comforter, biting back a groan. I couldn’t remember the last time I was this turned on.
Warmth flooded across every inch of my skin. Full-on body blush.
He shifted so that his shaft nudged at my mound while his mouth delved up and down the lines of my throat. “Look at me.” The command rumbled from deep in his chest.
I couldn’t deny him and I opened my eyes again just as he captured my mouth, plunging his tongue deep. He leaned to the side, resting on an elbow and sliding one palm beneath my head. His grip on my skull was firm and he used the leverage to kiss even harder.
His other hand slid down the left side of my body, sending shivers of exhilaration straight to my nerve endings. I rolled my shoulders, wiggling my arms free, and wrapped my hands around his bulging ones, giving myself a little bit of leverage to push back into his all-consuming kiss, wanting to give back as much as he was giving me.
His biceps flexed beneath my fingers, distracting me for a moment from his wandering right hand, but I froze when his fingers brushed over my swollen clit. Nerve endings fired and I sucked in a breath to keep from tumbling down the cliff of the first orgasm I’d had in years.
He pulled back from my mouth and nuzzled my ear. “If you don’t want this to go further, just tell me.”
“Please don’t stop. I’m going to come, but I don’t want this to be over.” I gasped for a breath. “And you haven’t even taken your pleasure yet.”
His tongue traced the lobe of my ear. “My precious, Bailey. I have no intention of stopping after you come or taking any pleasure for myself unless it is more than fulfilling for you. I do not take from a woman. Sex is a gift from your body to mine.”
“But, everyone ...” I quashed those thoughts. It didn’t matter if I understood what he said. It didn’t matter if this expression of physical love went against everything I’d been told my whole life.
He slid his forefinger between my slick folds, brushing ever so slightly along my clit as he delved into my vagina. I gasped. The pressure of having his finger inside me was exquisite and worrisome at the same time. I was so tight and it was just one finger. How would I ever take all of him?
“Just feel, stop thinking,” He whispered before covering my mouth with his again. The faint scent of peppermint filled my lungs and I relaxed into his touch.
My orgasm built, swirling inside me like the outer winds of a hurricane. I moaned into his mouth and arched my hips, giving him better access to my sex. His finger slid in and out, coated with my juices. He circled my clit with his thumb and thrust inside again, but this time with two fingers. Pushing, stretching, and getting me ready for more. I shuddered. His thumb touched my swollen clit and I moaned again. So close. I was almost there.
As nerves fired throughout my body, I began to writhe between him and the bed. I wanted to come. I needed release. He worked me close again and again and then backed away at the last second. His two fingers were still in my vagina, scissoring open and closed, pumping in and out.
“Please,” I begged into his mouth.
He pulled back and I stared into his bright blue eyes. “Come now.” He pressed down on my clit and pushed his fingers inside as deep as he could.
My pussy clenched and I screamed as the orgasm ripped through my body. I arch
ed upward, trying to follow the floating feeling. It was as if I had left the gravity of the earth’s atmosphere. I’d never known an orgasm could feel as if the entire universe rocked.
Every muscle in my body contracted and squeezed. My toes curled into the covers and I dug my fingers into the muscles of his biceps. He pushed his fingers deeper than I thought possible and another wave of contractions fluttered through me like a swarm of butterflies.
I slowly relaxed, sinking back onto the bed. My arms slipped from his and fell silently to my sides. My legs relaxed and my body switched from a floating feeling to exhausted and limp.
“Oh my.” I stared into his eyes, drinking in his lustful gaze. A twitch against my thigh reminded me we still had a long way to go. His hard cock was cool against my skin. In fact his whole body was cool to the touch. My body burned with arousal. Each graze of his arm, touch of his lips, brush of his leg was like ice against my flushed skin.
“That was only the beginning, min kjaereste. I want to hear you scream in pleasure over and over, until the only thing you worry about is when we will have time to make love again.”
I gasped. Make love? No one I knew had ever referred to having sex as making love. Sure, there were some couples who seemed really happy together, but that was not the norm in my world. In my world, people fucked or had sex. Maybe it was because he was from a different time.
“I don’t think I can move.” A tiny giggle followed my admission. Where had that come from? I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed at anything. What would he think? “I’m sorry. I wasn’t laughing at you. I … I just …”
“Bailey,” he hushed. “It’s perfectly natural to be happy.” His face split into a wide grin and he leaned down, sucking first one of my nipples and then the other, each tug reawakening my nerves.
“Ahhhh,” I moaned, arching my back, taking pressure off of the nipples he pulled on.
My Viking Vampire Page 9
