“No,” she said low and fervently. Before he could reach the door, she was standing in front of it. Moving quicker than she’d ever moved before, she turned the key in the lock and spun to face him, leaning back against the handle so he would have to go through her to open it. He looked like a drowning man hoping for a last minute lifejacket to be thrown his way.
“Last chance, Gabrielle,” he ground out warningly as he placed his hands against the door on either side of her face. “Last chance.”
She answered him by slowing beginning to undo the buttons down the front of the silk shirt she was wearing.
As she let the soft material fall open to show teasing glimpses of her breasts and the soft tangle of auburn curls further down her body, she saw as well as felt his utter surrender. A low growl issued from deep in his throat as he drank in the sight of her firm curves warmed by firelight. His eyes were slowly changing colour again, from almost entirely black back to sapphire and then the gold halo reappeared and gradually began to swallow the blue, his eyes taking on a hungry, molten glow. He was breathing hard and fast, his mouth slightly open, his canines lengthening as she watched. He leaned in towards her, dipping his head to get closer to her height and brushing her mouth with his lips. First, a feather-light touch of lips, and then, as she lifted her chin, straining to keep the contact, he deepened the kiss, plunging his tongue into her mouth, savouring the taste of her as he threaded one of his hands into her hair to hold her closer and the other began a slow, sensuous exploration of her body.
Her own hands had started off planted firmly against the door, but they soon found their way to his chest, where they encountered the barrier of cotton shirt and buttons. She tried to undo the buttons but soon lost patience and simply pulled the shirt open, buttons plinking across the floor. As she was finally able to lay her hands against his cool, smooth skin, she felt a slight easing of her intense need to be near him, but as she began to run her hands over his hard, muscled chest, pausing with interest at his small, rock hard nipples, making him groan into her mouth, and then skimming over his perfectly defined shoulders, she felt a wild, clenching desire building inside her core. She tore her mouth from his and began to explore his body with her mouth, kissing, licking, nipping her way down his neck, across his shoulder and down the flat planes of his chest.
Suddenly, she felt herself lifted into the air and just a quickly the soft give of the mattress under her body, his cool, hard body half covering hers. Then she felt him move and heard his boots hit the floor, and his full attention was back on her. The shirt she’d been wearing was gone, and she couldn’t remember him removing it.
“Lea,” he purred, “My Lea.” And she suddenly felt the slightest wash of his power against her skin. It was like a million caressing fingers stroking her already sensitive skin. She shivered with pleasure, revelling in the sensation. He smiled down at her, a thoroughly male smile of pleasure, passion and possession. His hands roamed her body confidently, playing over her breasts, skimming down her taut stomach, and tangling into the russet red triangle of curls between her legs.
“I am going to make you scream for me tonight,” he whispered, as he bent his head to take one of her nipples into his mouth and smoothly plunged his fingers into her tight, moist core.
Her body arched off the bed in exquisite, unbearable pleasure. A scream tore from her throat as his fangs grazed the hyper-sensitive flesh of her nipple and his thumb found the hard, throbbing nub of her clit at the same time. Her hands, where they had been restlessly tracing the contours of the muscles on his arms and shoulders, reacted instinctively as an orgasm tore through her body. She raked her fingernails down his arm and back and fought an insane need to bury her teeth in his flesh.
As she desperately tried to get him to bring his mouth back to hers, tried to gain some semblance of control over her need to touch and taste him, he looked up at her face and grinned a wicked smile, then slowly began to kiss and nibble his way down her lean body towards the place where his fingers were buried, causing her to cry out again and again. When his tongue replaced his fingers she screamed again, arching off the mattress and clenching the sheets so hard she felt them rip in her hands. When he skilfully used the tip of a fang to gently rasp over her clit, another orgasm hit her like a tidal wave, grabbing her and throwing her into a violent storm of sensation with no chance of resistance.
It could have been minutes or hours later that she came back to earth to find him licking and kissing his way back up her stomach. In a move that startled both of them, she flipped him onto his back and straddled him. She grabbed both of his hands and forced them down on the bed above his head, bending to run her tongue across his lips and then nip at his lower lip teasingly. He growled and tried to capture her mouth with his, but didn’t use his strength to break her grasp.
“Uh, uh,” she said warningly, “my turn now.”
He sank back and allowed her to explore his body with her hands, her lips, her teeth. As she moved lower, tracing the dips and grooves formed by his sculpted muscles with her tongue, grazing her nails roughly down his ribs, his breathing grew rougher and faster, his hands clenched into fists. When her warm hand finally moved to cup his balls and her hot, moist mouth moved to cover the tip of his erection, she closed her eyes in satisfaction, and his body bucked against the bed, a hoarse groan ripped from his throat. She moved to take more of his smooth, silk-over-steel shaft into her mouth using her tiny fangs to graze the edges, and he let out another guttural moan and pulled her away, flipping her over back onto the bed and trapping her body with his own. He was breathing in short, sharp pants, his eyes completely gold in colour.
“I’m sorry Lea, I need to be inside you now,” he gasped.
She smiled wickedly and opened herself to him.
“I think that can be arra…” before she could finish her sentence he plunged inside her and her sentence ended in a shout of pleasure.
He started out slow, retreating completely and then plunging inside her deep and hard. Her hands and nails bit into the skin on his back, trying to draw him closer and keep him inside her. As he finally capitulated to the speed and rhythm she demanded, her pleasure became a never-ending torrent, rising higher and higher with each thrust; she felt like she would splinter into pieces before she reached the crescendo. Through the haze of ecstasy, she felt him dip his head to her exposed neck and nuzzle at her jugular, felt his breathing become more irregular and then he fastened his mouth over hers again, drinking her in, pillaging her mouth with his tongue, and increasing the rhythm of his thrusts. She knew instinctively what he wanted, what else he needed in that moment. She pulled her mouth away from his, throwing her head back and exposing her neck.
“Take what you need,” she managed to gasp, and as he hesitated, she grabbed his head and pulled him to her neck. She felt his tongue run over her skin once, twice, and then twin points of pain for only a fraction of a second. There was a slight pulling sensation and then she screamed again, clawing at his back. Each pull from his mouth on her neck sent a spear of erotic sensation shooting through her veins, tightening her already hard nipples, turning her inner core to molten liquid and blotting out every other sense in her world. Her body clenched around his erection as the next mind-blowing orgasm took her. She was barely aware that he had stopped drawing blood from her, but felt it as he reached his own climax, shouting as he came with her into the prolonged climax.
Gabi wasn’t sure how much later it was that she felt him move away from her and rise from the bed. She followed his movements with her eyes; though her heartbeat had slowed to a steady canter and her breathing was almost normal, she couldn’t seem to make her body or her limbs respond to commands. Not that she felt any pressing need to be anywhere else, but she probably could’ve done with a trip to the bathroom. He moved to the curtains, pausing in front of the gently lightening skyline before drawing the curtains closed. Apparently sunrise wasn’t far off, she thought idly. He turned towards her again; his pale, perfe
ct body catching the dying light from the fire and making things clench low in her core when she thought she couldn’t possibly have it in her to feel like that again for at least a decade. Something in his expression cut through her post-orgasmic haze and made her frown.
“What is it Julius?” she asked, trying to keep the worry out of her voice.
He was as still as a glorious marble statue and then finally said in a voice barely a whisper, “I think I should go and find another room.” As she opened her mouth to protest, he continued, “Our sleep during the day,” he paused, searching for the right words, “well, it can be rather… disconcerting for someone who is not accustomed to seeing it. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”
She blinked slowly, still fighting the languor that threatened to overtake her mind and body. “Come here,” she said in a voice that brooked no argument. “It is your room, in your house. If I am uncomfortable I will leave. But at this moment in time I have no intention of going anywhere, even if my body would listen to a single command I gave it,” Then she rolled over and stretched, making a space on the bed behind her and patting it. His eyes showed his doubt, but he obeyed and slid back into the bed with her, scooping her up in his arms to hold her close against him and pulling the blankets over them both. She sighed contentedly and snuggled against him, and then suddenly stiffened.
“I do have a question for you though,” she said in a slightly indignant tone.
His body stilled, waiting.
“Who the hell is Lay-ah?” she demanded, her tongue tripping over the unfamiliar pronunciation. She felt his chest muscles move in a slight chuckle, and he laid a cool kiss on her shoulder.
“You are, my dear Gabrielle,” he said in his velvet purr. “Lea is a Latin word. It means lioness.” She relaxed again with a soft snort and then let sleep drag her down into its blissful depths.
Chapter 19
The insistent beep of a phone woke her. She blinked drowsily, forcing her eyelids open and trying to work out where the phone was. Her fog-filled brain finally processed the fact that she wasn’t in her own bed, and a cool arm was wrapped around her waist. Oh, Lord and Lady! She only barely managed to resist the compulsion to leap out of the bed. The events of the past few hours bubbled back to the surface of her consciousness. She calmed herself with a few deep, cleansing breathes. The room was still in darkness, but she could make out the gleam of daylight around the edges of the thick velvet curtains.
The phone beeped again. “Shit,” she swore softly, wondering what time it was, and hoping it was still the same day she thought it was. She carefully moved Julius’s arm and pulled herself away from his oddly warm embrace. He didn’t stir at all as she placed his arm on the bed, and Gabi was reminded of his statement that the way he ‘slept’ during the day could look disturbing.
She studied him for a moment. He lay on his side, his eyes closed, and his thick sweep of dark eyelashes resting, in striking contrast, to the pale pearlescence of his skin. His face was entirely relaxed; something she’d never seen before. It lent a certain vulnerability to his features; she found she could picture him as a young boy in her mind. He must been absolutely angelic looking. It was startling to realise how much he schooled his features when he was awake, how the pressure of his responsibilities and the weight of decades of existence hardened and etched the contours of his face. She could see why a person may be perturbed by his sleep. He lay like someone in a coma, add that to the total lack of vital signs and she could see how he may appear dead to some. But he didn’t appear dead to her; there was still an essence of him in the room. She’d seen plenty of dead, of all varieties, and she knew the difference, she could see and feel when the spark of life was gone. With Julius the spark was alive and well, and his presence enveloped her.
She sighed as the phone beeped a third time, intruding on her inner speculations. She found it on a dresser and scooped it up as she began cautiously opening doors in the room, hoping one of them led to a bathroom.
The date and time on the phone eased Gabi’s anxiety; it was 10am Wednesday morning, so at least she hadn’t slept another whole day away. The fight with the ghouls had gone down only nine or ten hours ago, so she couldn’t imagine there was wholesale panic about her state of health just yet. And yet, between Kyle and Byron, there were seven missed calls and five new messages. She sighed with relief when the second door she opened led to a huge modern bathroom complete with robes and huge, fluffy towels. She slipped into the smallest of the robes, it was miles too big for her, but warm and comfortable, before calling Byron. She felt a stab of guilt as she heard the relief in his voice when he answered her call. She assured him she was fine, that she was healed and didn’t even need to go and see Ian. It was only as she spoke to him, answering his worried questions that she realised she wasn’t hungry. She hadn’t eaten since the couple of pastries the previous night, before the mission to the warehouse, and normally she’d be absolutely ravenous by now. She dealt with Byron’s concern as quickly as she could, promising to pop in at his house later in the day to prove she was fine and answer the rest of his questions.
Her second call was to Kyle. He was a little less concerned about her injury, he’d seen the wound close in front of him, and more concerned about any other side effects. She side-stepped the questions as best she could, she wasn’t ready to tell him what had gone down a few hours ago between her and Julius – she hadn’t quite figured that one out herself yet. He was also calling to say that Razor had threatened to rip him into little shreds when he’d gone to her place this morning, and even Rose was having a hard time keeping him from destroying the house.
“I’ll be there just as soon as I can grab a quick shower and find some clothes to wear. I assume mine were unsalvageable, as I can’t find them anywhere in J….. uh, the room I was sleeping in.” She hoped Kyle didn’t notice the slip. “Drat, I also need to find my car keys.”
Kyle was chuckling into the phone. “I’m on my way to the Estate now, I have some clothes for you, as well as coffee and breakfast. I was hoping you’d be conscious sometime soon.”
Gabi could hear the roar of the van’s engine as he started it up. “Thanks, Wolfie,” she said, grudgingly appreciative. “Sometimes you prove to be surprisingly useful to have around.”
Kyle’s chuckle grew evil. “I should warn you that I have ulterior motives this morning though,” he told her.
Gabi drew in a breath and sighed. “What now?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” he tried to sound casual, but failed miserably, “I’m just interested to know why Gregory refused to call Julius or you to the phone just before sunrise this morning, even though he insisted that you were, and I quote, ‘definitely not injured or unconscious’. He sounded rather uncomfortable, in fact. Just what were the two of you up to?”
Gabi growled low into the phone and found herself in front of the bathroom mirror checking the state of her throat where she’d made him bite her. She was relieved when she couldn’t find any sign of puncture wounds or bruising.
“None of your business, Wolf.” She hit the disconnect button. “Shit,” she cursed softly, belatedly realising that Julius wasn’t going to hear her anyway. Bloody Gregory, surely he could have come up with some better story to cover for his boss. Kyle wasn’t going to leave her alone until she gave him an explanation. She just hoped she could put him off until she figured it out for herself. She started the shower and stepped in, a hundred thoughts running in tiny, confusing circles through her brain.
She drank her latté in silence and picked at a croissant as Kyle relayed what had happened at the warehouse after she passed out. Athena had gone down into the ‘Ghoul Hole’, as it was now being dubbed, and declared that they needed to seal off the inhabitants until it became clear whether the rest were going to turn or not. So food and water had been taken in to those still alive, under heavy Vampire guard, and corpses had been removed and burned. Hunters with full field teams were supposed to return that night to see wh
at had developed. Magi were working hard today trying to track down anecdotal evidence or records of how long it took for humans to complete the change to Ghoul, or how to prevent the change. No one was holding out too much hope there, though. Julius had ‘questioned’ the Vampire that Alexander had managed to capture alive, but he hadn’t known anything of use, he was just a hired hand who was supposed to watch that the Demons did what they were supposed to. He didn’t have any idea where Danté was hiding out. The only contact he had with Danté was a phone number, which Sebastian was following up.
The two of them were sitting on the tiled veranda just off the entertainment area they usually converged in, soaking up the morning sun. The house had been quiet and empty except for two women (Werewolves, Gabi thought) who were cleaning the house. They had looked a little quizzically at the two newcomers but hadn’t tried to make any conversation, just nodded politely and carried on with their duties. Kyle confirmed that there were Weres on duty at the front gate too, they’d buzzed him through with no problems.
“Have you eaten already this morning?” Kyle asked suddenly, changing the topic.
“No,” Gabi said, confused by the odd question. “Why?”
“Well, I’ve never seen you pick at food first thing in the morning. It just struck me as odd. Are you sure you’re feeling alright?” He hadn’t yet started interrogating her about what was going on with her and Julius, but Gabi realised he was heading that way now.
“I think it’s the blood, you know?” she answered a bit hesitantly. “I feel great, better than I can remember feeling for a long time.” She paused and chewed on her bottom lip for a moment. “I don’t feel hungry at all, and that’s a new experience for me,” she tried a smile, but she knew he could tell it was forced. She buried her nose back in her coffee.
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