by Jessica Lee
Ever since she’d found him lying injured and unconscious, her body and soul had yearned for him. Her life had changed forever that night. His words rang true in her heart and mind. Destiny had brought her to this moment in time.
“Yes,” she breathed.
“Are you absolutely sure?” His fingertips glided across her cheek. “There’s no way to reverse this once it’s done. No divorce like in the human world. We will be married on a plane so deep, death will not even part us.”
She took his hand in hers and laced their fingers. “Look at me.” She leaned in a little closer, her voice hoarse. “I would choose to die tomorrow, having shared my life with you—having been loved by you, rather than be gifted an eternity without you.” She sealed her pledge with a greedy kiss, yearning for the future he offered.
The leather pouch tumbled to the bed, reminding her of what they must do first. She removed her lips from his and scooped it up from the mattress. “I take it I need to secure you with these.” She lifted the small bag, indicating the bindings inside. He nodded before reaching behind his head, stretching his arms wide to grasp the headboard.
“Be sure you wear the gloves that are inside,” he said, lifting his chin to indicate the bag in her hand. “Dump the contents out first and find them. The silver on the underside of the straps will burn you, if you’re not careful. They were made specifically to contain a vampire.”
Her hands trembled, making it difficult to slide her fingers into the black leather gloves. With the gloves in place, she shifted off his body. The hardwood floor chilled her bare feet as she made her way to the headboard and the large wrists waiting for her there.
“When you bind me, be sure you place the silver to my wrist.” His darkened gaze flicked to hers.
“You want me to put this so it will burn you?” She took a step back from the bed. Oh my God. She couldn’t stand the thought of intentionally hurting him.
“This is about complete submission. I want this, Wildflower. I want to give myself only to you.” The tone in his voice clenched her core. He was hers.
Emily cinched the strap tight around his flesh. Within seconds, a tendril of white smoke curled from where the silver met his skin. The stench of burning flesh stung her nostrils, shooting the taste of bile to the back of her throat. Her gaze darted to his face. He hadn’t flinched. How could he stand the pain?
“Kenric, please… This has got to be excruciating.” She gripped the top of the headboard to keep herself from ripping the silver off him.
He tilted his head in her direction. “It’s not too bad. Don’t worry.” A slight shrug lifted his shoulders. “It’s going to be worth every minute, because when this is over, I’ll have you forever.”
“God… If I didn’t love you so much, I’d have you committed.” Even through the agony she knew coursed down his arms, he graced her with a smile that beckoned her to take him. She ran her fingers through her hair and sucked in a calming breath.
With his wrists secured, she tugged the leather gloves from her hands one finger at a time, enjoying the way he watched each movement, raking her body with his smoldering stare.
Her fingertips grazed the top of the silk sheet as she circled the four-poster bed. The air left her chest in shallow bursts. He was magnificent. Nude and fiercely aroused, the warrior lying bound to the massive bed met her perusal with equal intensity. She loved how he made her feel. Desired before all others. Powerful. In control, yet out of her mind at the same time. It had all happened so fast, and she could barely remember the trip. But she’d take it again in a heartbeat if it would bring her here. To this very moment.
Like a predator with her prey, she climbed onto the mattress beside him. She traced the rapid rise and fall of his chest lightly with her fingertips, following his ripples down the center of his abdomen. She mapped the hard lines, ending with the length of his straining erection. As she reached the tip, his back lifted from the bed, and a bead of moisture appeared in the slit. She smoothed the liquid over the flushed head and circled the ridge, wringing a hiss of approval from the back of his throat. She adored the way he responded to her touch.
“I love you.” His velvet voice caressed her, drawing her gaze to his. “I’m yours, now and forever. Take me for your pleasure, my love. My flesh, my soul, and my blood, they’re yours. Draw me into your body. Blend your essence with mine, and spend the remainder of eternity with me.”
Never in her wildest dreams had she dreamed that she would find someone who loved her so completely. She believed that someone found their one true love, a hero, only in fairy tales or romance novels. Somehow, by some divine intervention or destined fate, she’d found one, and he’d just offered her his life.
Emily straddled his hips, relishing the feel of his hard cock parting her swollen folds. This was it. Once they fell together over the precipice there would be no turning back. Two would become one. She wrapped her fingers around the hot shaft, smooth silk over hard steel, holding herself completely still. Her breath trapped in her lungs. Kenric moaned with anticipation, the head of his cock waiting at her entrance.
And she’d never wanted anything more in her entire life.
With one firm press of her hips, she claimed him. Her head fell back, and the room winked out for a split second. A deep groan, her own and his, returned her to her senses. No one had ever filled her the way he did. It wasn’t penetration with Kenric. Rather, it was a joining of two bodies.
Her fangs burst from her gums, coaxed by the lust for her mate. In slow, precise glides, she slid over his cock, every nerve on fire, and eased forward, seeking the pulse she craved. His head fell to the side. Her tongue flicked at his throbbing vein, her own heartbeat pounding away at her skull.
“Kenric,” she whispered. “Please tell me if you have any doubts before I can’t turn back.”
“I want you,” he growled. “Do it. Take me.”
Thank God. She struck. Hot blood spilled into her mouth, and she drank with greedy swallows. His back arched, followed by the driving thrusts of his hips. She matched each upward lunge with her own downward stroke. Each swift meeting buried his cock deeper, stroking the sensitized nerve endings until the dam on her orgasm broke.
A muffled scream wrenched from her throat.
Spasms of sheer ecstasy centered where his hard cock speared her core. Her muscles clenched, trying to capture and hold on to the rapture.
Beneath her, Kenric moaned her name, and the headboard protested. It creaked under the abuse of the warrior tied to it. With a loud bang of wood against plaster, he stiffened, and a guttural shout of pleasure filled the room. She swung her head from his neck. The straps remained intact, but the headboard lay broken and sagging against the wall.
Her gaze fell to his open vein. A trickle, instead of a stream, flowed from the wound. This was it. God, what if she lost him?
“Don’t stop.” His command came, as if he sensed her conflicted emotions. She gripped the pillow beneath his head. “Finish it,” he said on a ragged breath. “Drink, Emily.”
She returned, pulling at the wound, encouraging it to continue to give. His body grew cool and still beneath her. A wave of panic and dizziness inundated her. Don’t leave me, Kenric. Please don’t leave me.
A tidal wave of intoxicating blood raced through her system. The potent essence of her mate had created her, but she wasn’t accustomed to so much at once. Her heart sputtered, and her limbs trembled. Chills ran down her spine, and a shiver skated across her skin.
Suddenly, the cold subsided on the heels of a firestorm, building inside her. “Emily.” Her gaze swung to Kenric’s lips. “Emily.” His voice, except his mouth never moved. She’d heard him in her head.
“It’s you.” She closed her eyes and spoke inside her mind. “I can feel you. Your warmth consumes me.” Her palms roamed her body, pursuing the trail of his soul. It danced under her skin in a kaleidoscope of heat, then flame. Behind her eyelids, colors whirled in dazzling reds, yellows, and blues.
“Bring me back. It’s time. I must return, before it’s too late.” The urgency in his words yanked her back to the present and into action. Bringing her wrist to her fangs, she bit.
With the flow of blood at his mouth, she prayed and worked the stream into the small part between his lips. A trickle of red seeped from the corner of his mouth. He wouldn’t swallow.
“Kenric! Damn you. Drink, you hardheaded vampire!” She choked back a sob. Wrapping what he’d taught her about compulsion into her voice, she threw her words at him. “I swear, I’m going to kick your ass if you don’t swallow and come back to me.”
His eyelids flew open. Wild, dilated pupils searched her face with a glassy stare. He gulped, then released a strangled cough from the overflow in his mouth. His chest rose on a long, deep breath. The warm feel of it at her wrist melted her. If she’d been standing, she knew her legs would have failed her.
Fangs pierced the flesh at her wrist. She cried out from the sharp dig of his teeth. Ravenous hunger drove him to sink deeper. With her free hand, she wiped at the fine layer of sweat popping at her brow.
The hairs on her arms and her nape stood on end. A hot, tingling sensation leaked through her pores as a portion of her, merged with Kenric’s returning soul, left her body. She would have thought to feel empty, but the remaining essence of her mate left her complete.
Her heart skipped in her chest as his eyelashes lifted. The summer blue of his eyes cleared. Her warrior had returned.
His fevered pace at her vein slowed, replaced by the warmth of his tongue. He applied pressure at the wound they had both formed before pulling away. The growing light in his expression told her that he felt a new acute awareness of her.
She dropped onto the bed beside him and grabbed her gloves to release the restraints she’d almost forgotten were in place.
As soon as his arms slid free, he pushed into a sitting position. With trembling fingers, she climbed the planes of his abdomen and chest. She’d never fully realized the extraordinary power that lay restrained within the vampire she now called her mate. Her mind hummed with it.
His hand met hers, his fingers brushing her skin, before he brought it to his lips. The link they shared flooded her senses.
“You feel incredible in here.” He tapped the place above his heart with their joined hands. “I honestly don’t know how I’ve walked this world without you for so long.”
She squeezed his hand, her mind spinning, overwhelmed with the depth of his emotions. “My love, you’ll never again journey alone.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Arran shifted in his seat for the third time, trying his best to appear disinterested in the chestnut-haired beauty helping Michael clean the kitchen. He should find something else to focus on before someone noticed, but the sway of her hips and the curve of her back captivated his imagination. All the things he envisioned doing against those rounded curves tortured him. The endless places he wanted to bend her sweet ass over, or spread her naked on, or…
Shit. He needed to get a grip.
None of those fantasies would ever make it out of his head. Gabrielle was too precious. Too innocent. If she knew him, really knew him, the look in her eyes would turn to hate, instead of the adoration she touched him with now that made his heart turn inside out.
Arran pushed to his feet, sliding the chair back with a scrape along the hardwood floor. Across the table, Logan shot him an irritated glare. The heat of Gabrielle’s gaze tracked him out of the room. No one dared to ask about his abrupt departure. Excellent. The aura he wore did its trick.
Halfway up the stairs, his cell vibrated. He slid it from his jeans pocket and glanced at the blue-lit display. Markus. About damn time. “Nice of you to check in, bastard,” Arran said with a blast of sarcasm.
“Kiss my ass.”
“Where the hell have you been?” Arran flung his bedroom door closed and plopped down on the edge of his bed.
“I had to go. It was…personal. Something I couldn’t put off any longer.”
“So damn urgent, it had you walking out on the Enclave during a crisis? Kenric’s going to have your head.”
“Yeah, he probably will.” Markus grew silent on the line for a few seconds before asking, “Who’s all around tonight?”
“Guerin and Logan just came in from patrol. We’re all here.”
“So Guerin still has you on security detail for Kenric and his woman? I take it she survived.”
“Kenric gave Guerin an update earlier tonight. Looks like Emily’s going to make it. What’s up with you and the twenty questions, man? Why don’t you come in and see for yourself?” Markus didn’t sound right. Arran didn’t know what the hell was going on, but his partner hadn’t been the same since his freak accident.
“Yeah, I’ll be there soon. I have some loose ends to tie up first.”
“Markus…” The line went dead.
…
The sliding door to the Enclave central command hissed open before Arran could enter the password. Guerin exited, still dressed in patrol gear. A couple of hours remained before sunup, but he and Logan had called it for the night because of Markus’s stunt. With Kenric occupied with Emily’s transition, Guerin wanted a team on base at all times.
“Hey, man. I was looking for you,” Arran said as the steel door slid shut behind Guerin. “Markus contacted me, said he’d be in soon.”
Guerin brushed past him with an aggravated huff. “I want some food. So, if you see him before we do…” He pulled up short, long enough to glance over his shoulder, his dark eyes edged with frustration. “Tell him to find me the moment his ass crosses this threshold.”
“I’ll let him know.”
With a grunt, Guerin resumed his trek for the kitchen, and Arran trailed him up the staircase. As their boots struck the first floor, a perimeter-breach alarm blared throughout the compound. Gabrielle and Logan bolted from the kitchen door a few feet down the hall, heading for the security office. Shock resonated throughout the compound, a palpable wave off each warrior. For years, the Enclave’s residence had remained a secured location, miles away from any DEAD activity. Though they were prepared for any assault, a direct attack on their headquarters blindsided them.
The locker for weapons on the main floor stood outside security. Arran slammed to a halt beside it, while Guerin headed straight to security to join Gabrielle and Logan. Arran entered the password and yanked the door open as a distinct shadow fell across his arm. Without looking back, he tossed several blades to Kenric and loaded himself down with as many as he could carry. When the last weapon passed to his leader, Arran banged the door shut and spun. Kenric appeared to have dressed in a hurry, since the only thing covering him were faded blue jeans and a row of bite marks on his neck. Damn. He jerked his gaze way. No time for jealousy over those telling marks. Arran bit down, clenching his jaw hard onto his resolve, and fell in behind Kenric.
“Report.” Kenric targeted Guerin inside security.
Guerin glanced over his shoulder. “We’ve got six intruders at various locations around the perimeter about two hundred fifty yards out.”
“They’re low-level heat signatures. Vampires,” Gabrielle said, her focus riveted to the computer monitor.
“I agree,” Guerin replied from his position opposite Kenric’s at Gabrielle’s shoulder. “Dammit and motherfucker!” Guerin’s fist collided with the oak desk. “More just appeared less than twenty-five feet from the compound walls. I count five. They’re moving in phase leaps across the grounds, never in the same location for more than a few seconds.”
Gabrielle jumped to her feet, grabbing earpieces for each warrior. For a brief moment, her gaze held Arran’s as she placed one of the wireless devices into his hand. “I’ll keep you updated as their locations change.” Her voice carried to everyone, but when her hand slid from his, the look in her eyes sent a clear message for him alone. Be careful. He coiled his fist around the piece and tightened the hold on his heart. She needed to stop w
asting her prayers and wishes on him.
He’d been dead long before she had even been born.
Arran wrapped the receiver around his ear and headed down the hall with his team. “Where’s Emily?” The question came in loud and clear over the device.
“Armed and secured in my quarters.” Kenric’s voice. “Where I told her to stay put.”
“You really expect her to follow your orders?” The underlying humor in Guerin’s tone was hard to miss. No verbal response came, but up ahead, Arran caught the kiss-my-ass glare Kenric threw Guerin.
They reached the end of the corridor as the sound of breaking glass echoed through the house. Michael rounded the corner and pointed to the blade Arran carried. “You got an extra one of those?”
Arran pulled the spare from the small of his back and handed it over, hilt first. “Keep close.”
“You can count on it.” Michael gripped the hilt and rotated it until the blade lay flush against his wrist.
“We’ve got six in the house now,” Gabrielle’s soft voice whispered in Arran’s ear. “One heading upstairs. Two at the entrance to operations. The others are heading straight for you.”
Kenric pivoted. His gaze tapped Arran, then Logan. “You two take the bastards down here. Guerin and I have the others.” No sooner had he given the orders when the commander and his second phased.
The house went dark, and a cry filled the dark void. One down. The emergency lights clicked, flooding the house in a soft yellow glow layered with shadows. Vampires attacking vampires, and the intruders took the time to kill the lights. A waste of fucking time. Except for two humans, everyone in the battle possessed superior night vision. Apparently the DEADs had a flair for drama. The Enclave had a flair for killing the stupid fucks, and no loss of light would lessen their advantage.
Adrenaline flooded Arran’s system, contracting his heart into a rapid battering of the walls inside his chest. For some, the hormone made them less effective, nervous, and edgy. For Arran, he soaked it up like a junkie, becoming more alive, alert, and ready for anything.
