by Tracy Tappan
She panted hoarsely, feeling like an insect pinned in a tray. Tears speared into the corners of her eyes. The thunderous roar of her heart echoed through her head next to Dev’s constant moaning pleasure. He was—
The ceiling evaporated into a wash of rainbow of colors, and tinsel sparkles popped all around her like old-timey flashbulbs, floating down on top of her. Her breath lightened in her lungs and swirled up her throat like bubbly laughter. Warmth seeped inside her so deeply, it became a part of her blood and bones. Moaning long and low, she arched her head back into the mattress as her belly filled with cotton candy, her head with jelly beans, and a hot, massaging fist took hold of her vagina. Her internal muscles throbbed a steady rhythm and her folds thickened with liquid desire; she was drawing close to an orgasm. With a hurried breath, she clamped her knees around Dev’s taut buttocks and tilted her pelvis up, encouraging him inside her.
But he was lifting off her.
“No,” she protested hoarsely. Scrambling to keep hold of him, she grabbed at his shoulders, but his skin was slick with sweat, and he slipped out of her grasping fingers.
He reared above her.
And everything changed. Her joy, arousal, need—vanished.
He was a vampire from the horror movies now, his face utterly savage, blood dripping from his fangs, his eyes preternaturally bright with bloodlust. Alarm crashed through her, wrenching her heart. The process of bonding will lead to increased excitability in the Vârcolac, the manual had said. What the hell? This was more than—
Dev flung his head back and unleashed a bellow that shook the room, a beastly roar of pleasure so far from human that she cried out. Twisting her fingers into the bed sheets, she clawed backward an inch or two, lungs pumping. What had she done, agreeing to bond with…with a…? She wasn’t ready for this! Rolling onto her hands and knees, she scrabbled to the edge of the futon and stumbled to her feet, leaping into a run for—
She was taken out at the knees in the bedroom doorway and plowed to the floor, Dev’s hard body flattening her to the carpet. A primal snarl came out of him, sending a parade of goose bumps up her arms and nape. Never run from a Pure-bred.
Oh, no.
Grabbing her hips, he flipped her over and snapped his teeth at her.
She gaped at his ferocious expression. The man she knew wasn’t recognizable anywhere in that face, in those dilated pupils. She tried to strain away from him, but his powerful grip wouldn’t give. She wracked her brain for what to do. Had this been in the manual…?
With a wordless growl, he hauled her forward onto his lap, the wide head of his sex banging against the side of her opening. She gasped. He was erect, hugely erect, thick and long almost like a rolling pin, with heavy sacs beneath.
An incoherent noise spilled from her throat. “Dev.” She tried to peel his hands off her hips. “You need to l-listen to me…”
Panting heavily through his open mouth, his hands quaked against her flesh as he probed almost frantically for her entrance. Saliva slid down the length of one of his fangs onto her thigh.
No. Everything inside her rebelled against what was happening. She jackknifed into a sitting position on his lap and threw herself against his chest, clasping him tightly to her body. Okay…okay… Think, Marissa…think, think, think. Dev was in some kind of primitive craze that hadn’t been explained—he growled, and she clutched him harder—in the manual, so she had to assume this was outside the bonding norm. She had to—
His hips surged upward.
“Stop it!” She had to believe he was somewhere inside. “You’re frightening me, Devid, and I need you to hear that.”
Air vented from his nostrils.
“Something’s happening to you. I-I don’t know what. I got nervous and ran from you, and then you turned very…vampiric. Please listen.”
He shuddered. His breathing fractured.
“Bring yourself out of it, Dev. I know you can.”
She felt some of the tension leave his body. He inhaled, then again, deeper.
She loosened her hold on him.
“You ran?” he asked hoarsely.
“Unfortunately.”
“Shit, I must’ve gone predator on you.” His hands slid from her hips to her ribcage, and he eased her back to meet her eyes. “Did I hurt you?”
She felt her bones shift, her relief was so profound. Dev was back. “Uh…almost.” She pressed a hand to the throbbing side of her neck. “Besides that damned bite.”
“I know. I’m sorry about that.” He frowned. “You’re shaking.”
“Yes, um…” She climbed off his lap. “Do you mind if we take a little break before the sex?” She pointed toward the futon. “I’m just going to go over to my clothes. Okay?”
He paled a bit. “Yeah, of course.”
On the way to the futon, she detoured to the closet, where she’d already unpacked some things, and found her bathrobe. “Is that, uh, something that’s going to happen often with you?” she asked, belting her robe in place.
Dev crossed to his pants and pulled them on. “I can usually control it,” he said, looking mortified. “On a normal day, that is, when I’m not running so low on blood and thoroughly fucked in the head.”
She threaded her bathrobe belt through her fingers. “This has been a very tough week,” she conceded. “My mother died, then you and I couldn’t bond because you got thrown into jail for six days. That was really hard on me, so it must’ve been horrendous for you. Then there was all that stuff about your dad. I know that churned you up pretty badly.”
He faced her, hands on his hips, bare-chested. He was quiet for a long moment. “Maybe…” He glanced down, shook his head, then looked back up. “Do you think we can start over?”
The pressure in her chest eased. She summoned a smile. “Yes, I’d like that.”
“All right.” He exhaled broadly. “Why don’t we have some wine? I brought that bottle of Château Cuvier III with me in my duffle bag. What do you say we open it, have a few glasses, and talk? We don’t have to do anything more than hold hands. We’ll just be together. How does that sound?”
She widened her smile. “Perfect.”
“Okay, then. I’ll be right back.” He went downstairs and returned in a moment with his bag.
She went into the bathroom and found a couple of water glasses. “I hope it’s as good as its reputation.”
His brows lifted as he rummaged through his duffle for the bottle of Cuvier and a corkscrew. “You mean you’ve never tried it?”
“Nope. So, it’ll be a perfect way to celebrate our union.”
He smiled. “Absolutely.” He stepped forward to pour.
She held out the water glasses. “Oops.” The wine sloshed crazily in the glass. “What—?”
Dev’s hand was shaking violently.
“Dear God, Dev…” She looked at him, and… She could hardly believe what she saw. He’d gone from mildly sweaty to completely drenched in the span of two seconds. “What on earth is happening to you?”
He showed her a set of gritted teeth. “I fed on you, but we didn’t have sex, so, uh…” Wine flung out of the spout of the bottle, and she hurriedly took the Cuvier from him. “I’m stuck in a half-bond. Didn’t think it would happen this fast, but…”
She blinked. A…? “Lord, something else?” She pressed a palm to her forehead. “Was that in the manual?”
He tried to smile, but it wobbled off his mouth. “P-probably not. D-doesn’t tend to be an issue. Everyone just…you know.”
Has sex. She set the wine bottle down. “All right, we need to get busy. Quickly, by the looks of it.”
“I don’t want it to be b-b-bad.” His teeth clattered together a couple of times.
“Jesus, Dev. At this point, that’s hardly the primary concern.”
“And I u-u-upset you.”
“Not on purpose. And it’s upsetting me more to see you suffer.” His body language was getting really weird, like he was on the verge of crumpling in on
himself. She marched over to the bureau. “Come here and take me from behind. That’s the quickest way to get it done.”
“S-such a s-sweet-talker, you are.”
“We’ll worry about making it pretty later. Come here.” Hiking her bathrobe up around her waist, she turned toward the dresser and planted her palms on top of it, presenting her naked hind end to him.
A breath came out of him, a catch of air that turned into a deep growl.
She shivered. Okay, soon, she needed to get used to those animal sounds he made. “Don’t get shy on me now, Vampire.” She arched her back and lifted her rump, offering him a better view of her lady parts.
He was on her so fast she had to stifle a gasp. How the devil did the man move that quickly?
His strong hands grasped her waist and pulled her back against him. She felt the heat of his hard length brush across her bottom, and she squeezed her eyes closed as the wide head of his sex found her entrance. He plunged inside.
A sharp, barbaric howl came out of him, his body spasming so hard, he stumbled slightly sideways.
She exhaled raggedly and flexed her fingertips into the top of the bureau. The depth of his penetration was unimaginable. Thank God, his Fiinţă had prepared her sheath, or what might’ve been painful was only uncomfortable.
Hissing, he scrambled to right himself, then surged into her, setting a crazy tempo. The power of his pistoning hips jerked her chin up and down and clacked her teeth together. The pleasure rumblings in his chest were volcanic. She stared at a torn piece of wood veneer on the dresser and forced deep, even breaths. Just ride it out… God, the man was fricking huge.
She nearly sagged in relief when she felt him stiffen. A sound of utter astonishment tore out of him as his hips made a final, jerky push against her. His fingers dug into her flesh and a guttural roar of completion filled the bedroom. He collapsed on top of her, winded, shaking and sweating, his heart hammering against her spine. After a moment, she heard him gulp, then he raised himself slowly off her, a hand set on her lower back, and pulled out.
She straightened and let her bathrobe fall back into place, turning around in time to see him sit down heavily in the folding chair across the room, his jeans half-buttoned closed.
The other chair was by the bureau, and she perched herself carefully on the edge of it, her hands cupped together in her lap.
An awkward silence sank down between them.
“So I suck in bed,” he said at length. “There have to be worse things than that, right? Ah, fuck.” He leaned forward and slapped a hand over his face. “Somebody just stab me in the throat.”
“You don’t suck,” she said quietly.
“Really?” His eyes flew up. “You enjoyed that?”
“That was just the mechanics of sex, Dev. We weren’t sharing our love, so it wasn’t good or bad, it just…was what it needed to be right then.” She scrubbed a hand over her cheek. “This is my fault, honey. That was your first time, so it was my job to make it go smoothly. Instead, I didn’t keep my wits about me, so I ran from you, pushing you into a predatory state, and then made you go into a half-bond on top of that.”
“Shit, Riss, the Vârcolac culture is totally new to you. You couldn’t have expected to know all that crap was going to go down.” He flung a hand out. “Especially because that fucking manual is a work in progress. I’m the one who should’ve kept my head on straight.”
She gazed at him, and a slow smile spread across her face.
His eyebrows inched up. “What?”
“We’re sitting here arguing about who’s more to blame.” She chuckled. “We can’t be in too much trouble if we’re doing that, right?”
Dev hesitated, then snorted. “I suppose not.”
She stood up and crossed the space between their two chairs, lowering into a kneel in front of him. She set her hand on his knee. “Now we’re starting over.”
“Ah.” His lips twisted. “Nice to have that clarified.”
“You and I…we’ve always known how to have a good time together, so let’s do that. What do you say we hop in the shower, suds each other up, and show each other what we like?”
He searched her face for a long moment.
“Doesn’t that sound like fun?” she asked.
“Yeah, but…are you sure?”
She squeezed his knee. “Never more.”
Chapter Thirty-eight
Luvera hugged the Lalique crystal swan bowl against her breasts and looked around her apartment, trying to decide where to put it. On the standing bookshelf next to the Swarovski crystal swan figurine Alex had given her yesterday? Or on the coffee table beside the ceramic vase with a hand-painted swan on it which he’d given her the day before? She sighed a soft breath. In the ten days since the Tribunal had ended, Alex had been coming by every day to give her a present and ask her out. So far his gifts had all been swan themed.
Swans mated for life, he’d told her with one of his charmingly goofy Alex smiles.
No hidden subtext there, right?
Luvera bit her lips together. He was so danged chipper about her rejections, too, that was one of the worst parts. No long face. No attempt at a guilt trip.
“Okay,” he’d say, still smiling. “I’ll be back tomorrow to ask you again.”
Why she didn’t tell him not to bother, she didn’t know, except for the obvious part that she loved seeing him. Which was unfair of her. She could never be with Alex, no matter how much she yearned to say yes to him. She’d made her bed by blood-claiming another man with that Blood Ride. It didn’t matter that she’d bound herself through a cultural stricture rather than a physical one, she still had to lie in her consequences. Forever. Alone.
Tears climbed up the back of her throat. Stars, not again. She wept so easily these days. But then, she’d been on one heck of an emotional rollercoaster ride for quite some time, struggling through the long recovery from the aftereffects of that Blood Ride with Shọn, discovering the Nichita family’s dirty secrets, being smack in the middle of the life-altering event of moving into her own place—her mother had kicked her out of the house the day after the Tribunal, though kindly—and all of that topped off with Alex’s heartbreaking pursuit.
Thank goodness for Jennilĩth. Her new roommate had been an incredible support during—
Someone knocked on the door.
Crud. She wasn’t in the mood for visitors. Setting the crystal bowl on the coffee table, she wiped her eyes with the heels of her palms as she crossed her living room. She opened the door, and a surprised breath escaped her. “Shọn.”
His black eyes were turbulent, and his body looked spring-loaded inside his black T-shirt and jeans, all rigid muscle poised to strike.
Oh, boy. She tightened her hand around the doorknob. Dealing with Shọn in a bad mood definitely wasn’t on her wish list of things to do right now. “What do you want, Shọn? This isn’t a good time.”
“Apparently no time is good for you, Luvera.” He shoved passed her into her apartment, jerked the door out of her hand, and slammed it shut. “I’ve had my dick on ice for over two weeks now, waiting for you to come by and finish what we started.”
A knot of shame curdled in her stomach. “Shọn, no. We can’t…mess around anymore.”
“That’s awfully damned selfish of you, don’t you think?” His shoulders hunched up beneath his tight T-shirt, somehow making him look more threatening than usual, which was quite a feat by Shọn standards. “You got your fun. I want mine.”
“No, you don’t, I’m telling you. Blood Rides are awful.”
His upper lip tugged upward. “It didn’t seem so awful when you were wriggling against my face.”
“For heaven’s sake!” She felt herself blushing to the roots of her hair. “Could you please not talk about it like that, and I meant afterwards. Ingesting the blood of someone who’s not your mate is like poisoning yourself. You’ll feel miserable for weeks, I swear.”
“Your concern is touching. But I
think I’ll worry about taking the hit later and get my jollies now.” Grabbing her by the arm, he hauled her, stumbling, to the couch and shoved her down onto it. He planted himself right in front of her, his crotch at eye level.
Her belly clenched and hot prickles ran the length of her spine. “Shọn, stop this.” She tried to get to her feet.
He pushed her back down, retaining a hold on one of her wrists. A knife appeared in his hand, and with a quick slash, he cut across her inner forearm.
She gasped as blood welled in a thin line across her skin, bright red drops dribbling down her fair flesh. The rich, molasses-thick scent of it filled the air, and a tremor raced through her upper jaw. She yanked at her wrist. “I said, stop. I don’t want to do this.”
Shọn stared down on her with merciless eyes. “Did you or did you not come when I ate out your pussy?”
Mortification flushed her cheeks. “Would you quit being so disgusting!”
“Is it or is it not fair that I receive the same consideration?”
“I—” The rest of the sentence died on her tongue. She didn’t have the strength to feint and parry around Shọn’s manipulations anymore. Emotionally, she’d already been run over by a truck. Maybe two. She had no idea what the rules of an illegal Blood Ride were. On some twisted level, it probably was fair to give him a turn, she…just couldn’t do it, not after learning she was the product of an act her mother hadn’t wanted. Not after realizing how badly she’d messed up her life by being a doormat. If she’d had an ounce more bravery, maybe she wouldn’t have hidden her true feelings for Alex behind a guise of friendship and instead, encouraged him to ask her out before she’d irrevocably wrecked everything with that Blood Ride.
“Perhaps it is fair, Shọn,” she granted him. “But I’m sorry, I just can’t. It messes me up too much being with someone who”—I don’t love—“who’s not my mate. You, too, I think.” Truth was, she’d never seen him like this. This was more than just his usual heartless manipulation. This was outright belligerence.
“Nice speech.” He sneered. “Now suck my dick.” With his free hand, he wrested his pants open.
