She bit his shoulder, as hard as she possibly could.
33
Doc howled.
In pleasure at first—then in utter panic.
He pushed Zoe away.
“No!”
They shouted the word at the same time. Her desperation echoed his. But he knew this addiction could not be allowed. He would protect his princess no matter the cost.
He grasped her wrists as she reached for him again.
“Don’t!” he grated.
He closed his eyes, fighting the need for the bonding. He wanted it. His soul demanded it. Needed his soul twined with hers. Feeding from her was not enough. Her taste was the sating taste, the food and wine of life. Giving, sharing, becoming one with this mortal woman was—
“Please, don’t, Zoe.”
“Matthias—”
The vampire wanted the completion.
The marine held this Primal part at bay. General Raven had to walk away. While the dark creature inside silently screamed.
He stumbled out of the cave, blind with pain and need. Out in the corridor he fell to his hands and knees, panting, gasping from the hard knot in his stomach, and in his heart, and the intensity of physical and soul arousal.
Eventually, he became aware of the throbbing ache in his shoulder. He sat back on his heels and touched it. The skin wasn’t broken; no blood had been shed. No blood had been shared.
He sighed—relief warring with disappointment.
Zoe crawled out of the low entrance. She didn’t look at him, but he could feel her tears as if they were his own. When she started to edge past him, he took her arm.
“Don’t,” she rasped as they knelt together on the corridor floor. “If you don’t want to—” She struggled to elude his grasp.
Her humiliation burned him, but he wouldn’t let her pull away.
“I love you,” he said, though he knew he shouldn’t.
Her gaze met his. “But not enough to—”
“Porphyrgia,” he dared to whisper.
She continued to glare, and he realized that the reminder wasn’t enough. She deserved truth from him. “To give our blood to one we feed from is a—completion. It’s more than sharing, it’s—marriage is the closest word in Standard. It’s so much more than that. It’s a forever thing. To do this with a mortal …” He shook his head at the thought of it. At the temptation. “Zoe, for us to do it right, vampire with human, there’s a ceremony first. You’d have to cut me and feed in front of witnesses, openly declare that you did this of your own free will. None of the others here have tasted me,” he promised her. “None of them ever will.”
He didn’t let her know that none of the other donors had even considered tasting him. That she wanted his blood was another sure indication of what they were meant to be to each other. If only this was another time, another place—and she was another person.
Her expression softened as he explained. But what had been hurt turned to sadness.
He stroked the back of his hand across her cheek. “You see why it can’t happen.”
She bit her lip like a stubborn child, then nodded reluctantly. “Not here. But—”
“Think straight, Zoe. No—Theodora.”
She grimaced at the name.
“Remember who you are,” he urged.
Her head came up proudly and there was an angry spark in her eyes. “I’m me. Zoe isn’t a mask I take on and off, Matthias. Theodora’s the mask. That’s the role I have to sometimes play.”
“Are you sure about that?”
She sighed. “Mostly.”
He ran his fingers through her soft hair. “Whoever you are, for reasons of state, you cannot bond with a Prime.”
“The suprahumans are—”
“I hate that word. We call ourselves Primes, and werefolk and all the other things we are,” he added. “We hate all that politically correct suprahuman terminology.”
“You do?”
He nodded. “At least, I do. I believe in keeping a low profile but I’m proud of who I am. But while our being together might be wonderful for you and me on a personal basis, think about it on a wider scale.”
“The political ramifications could be interesting.”
He wouldn’t allow her such diplomatic understatement. “Devastating, you mean.”
His particular minority wasn’t exactly beloved in some segments of the Empire. Her loving him could only cause her trouble. He was insanely flattered that she’d even consider lifemating with him. And it hurt like hell.
“Not necessari—”
“Sweetheart, you can do better than me.”
“I don’t want to.”
“It’s just the darkness making you think that. Once we get out of here—”
“We won’t get out. I won’t.” She swallowed a sob, then put her fingers to her temples. “Forget I said that. I hate to feel sorry for myself. And living in the dark has been making me do that.”
“Everyone has the right to a little hopeless hysteria occasionally.”
He stood, and helped her to her feet. They leaned against each other, both shaky. He ran a hand up her back. She rubbed her forehead on his chest.
“Let’s go back to the infirmary—where we can make love on a real bed.”
She looked up to meet his gaze. “At least we can agree on that.”
34
“I can’t seem to stop wanting you,” Zoe said as Doc set her down on his bed. “I don’t even mind people staring and knowing what we’re up to—even after I made such a fuss about not getting involved with anyone.”
“You do know there were bets taken on how long that would last, don’t you?”
The fact that he’d carried her across the plaza in full view of at least a dozen people didn’t bother her at all. The simmering need for him was all that mattered. She’d been more interested in the feel of his hard-muscled chest against her cheek than the buzz of gossip stirring up around them. It was the most natural thing in the world for him to take her through the infirmary and into the privacy of his bedroom.
“Bets, huh?” she asked, and shrugged. “It’s a good thing I didn’t have any money riding on my continuing celibacy.”
“We mostly use caf tablets as currency around here. And no, I didn’t have any caf riding on getting you into my bed.”
“I like being in your bed.”
It was the most natural place in the world for her to be. Maybe it wasn’t the best place in the Empire for her to be, but it was certainly the best place in their own private universe. She wasn’t going to think about the Empire. There was only him and her and now and the need between them.
“Yeah, I am kind of habit-forming,” he said.
They shed their clothes, then Zoe rubbed her hand across his slightly fuzzy scalp. “Full of yourself, aren’t you?” she teased, even though the touch of her skin against his sent shivers through her.
“Full of you,” he answered, and kissed her hungrily.
She wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders and held on for dear life, getting lost in the wild ride of sensation.
After a while she became aware of his hands on her—big hands, but, oh, so gentle and skilled. The frantic lust of earlier had morphed into something deeper, more meaningful. He caressed her breasts, her belly, between her thighs, touched and stroked inside her soft folds. Each separate touch brought her to a new height of pleasure.
His lips brushed against her ear. “Am I driving you crazy?”
Heat coiled through her, built to an explosive orgasm.
“Yes,” was all she could breathlessly answer as the explosion faded, but desire still burned.
“Drive me crazy,” he invited.
“Fair’s fair.”
They shifted positions on the narrow bed. When he lay on his back she kissed her way down his body, reveling in the hard muscles and male taste and scent. She ran her tongue along the length of his cock, then took the thick tip into her mouth. He moaned and bucked his hips
. Zoe reveled in the power of pleasing him.
She teased him with her lips and tongue for a while before lifting her head. Their eyes met. His glittered like dark jewels.
“Am I driving you crazy?”
“More, woman!” he growled.
Zoe laughed triumphantly, then took all of him inside her mouth.
Holy Goddess and all the Matri, the Purple Princess is sucking on my dick!
Purple Princess?
Don’t stop to laugh now, Zoe!
Her mouth continued to suckle, her tongue to tease. Her thoughts questioned, Purple Princess?
It took him a long time of being lost in glorious sensation before he could answer. You’ve never heard that before?
This was his last coherent thought for some time. If she answered he couldn’t process it. Everything became sensation focused on the building tension formed by the rhythm of his throbbing cock encompassed by her hot, sucking mouth. When the explosion came he disappeared into it, falling into a light as bright and searing as a star going nova.
35
When Doc came back to himself the first thing he saw was Zoe looking up at him from the foot of the bed, her chin tilted up proudly, her smile smug.
“What?” he asked.
“That was the first time I gave a blow job,” she answered. She folded her hands over her bare stomach. “You gave the impression that I did it correctly.”
He let out a booming laugh. Then Doc sat up and grabbed her around the waist, bringing her to lie on top of him. The length of her naked body on top of his was a warm delight. He kissed her cheeks and temples, then brushed his lips across hers. “If being the empress doesn’t work out for you, you could always get work on Solsangre.”
“In a pleasure house, you mean?” She sounded eager, taking this as the compliment he meant it to be.
Or you could come home and live with me forever.
The thought came unbidden and was totally opposite of what he’d already told her about their being together. It was just a—wish.
Doc hoped this totally inappropriate thought didn’t make the jump into Zoe’s head. He wasn’t sure how strongly he could shield himself from communicating with her. He was going to have to concentrate very hard on keeping his shields up. Though how he was going to do that if they continued the way they were going he didn’t know.
He relaxed when she didn’t react. He guessed he was safe for now.
She lifted her head and looked him in the eye, tucking her chin against his sternum. “Why would a vampire—”
“A Prime,” he corrected her. He touched the tip of her nose. “Not suprahuman, not vampire, at least not for our males. Our females use the ancient term we translate as ‘bloodgiver.’ Mortals translate that word as ‘vampire.’ ”
“I’ve studied your interactions with mortals more than I have your culture,” she admitted. “Bloodgiver.” She said the word with great thoughtfulness, then tilted her head to one side. “Not bloodtaker?”
Doc reveled in the swift play of emotions that crossed her face. He appreciated the depth of her curiosity.
He touched her forehead. “You should have all the correct terminology for every group in the Empire stored in there.”
She sighed, and he felt it all along his body. “I do,” she said. “But using it could be dangerous. I’ve decided not to access any more data than I have to. What if the Kril have a way to pick up energy fluctuations?”
He snorted. “They barely have any security in place. They have the monitor cameras in the plaza, the energy shield up top, and the guard staff. And don’t give me that bright-eyed ‘Then why don’t we try to escape?’ look. Maybe we could get to the surface, but where do we go from there? Now, what was it you were about to ask me?” he inquired.
“You’re distracting me.”
He caressed her back and she arched like a cat. “It’s for your own good. What was the question?”
“You don’t have to stop petting me while we’re talking, you know.”
“If we want to have a conversation, I do.” He grinned lecherously. “Of course, if you’d rather not talk—”
“How did a Prime become a medical doctor? Primes and vampires don’t need doctors, do they?”
“We have special needs and our own medical researchers and practitioners, but I’m not a vampire doctor. Humans live on Solsangre, too,” he reminded her. “Humans need doctors. My people have been involved in medical research far longer than mortals have. It took us many generations before we discovered ways to counteract our allergies to sun and silver and all those other things. And we weren’t looking for a cure for vampirism,” he added. “We accept our strengths, but not our limitations. Once we found the Dark Star worlds we didn’t need the drugs we’d discovered. I’ve never taken the daylight drugs, but those of us who live on bright sun worlds still use them.” He patted the lovely round curve of her bottom. “What was your question again?”
“Why are you a doctor for humans?”
“A Prime can’t make a lifetime career of being a sex toy, even on Solsangre,” he answered. He grinned again. “Not that working my way through medical school wasn’t fun.”
“A straight answer if you please, Matthias.”
“Yes’m,” he said, responding to her crisp tone. “People don’t come to Solsangre only for entertainment. Some come for rest, some for healing. Some come to die in comfort. We began to establish hospitals, rehab centers, sanitariums, and hospices for mortals quite a while ago. I had a girlfriend who was in medical research and—”
“A vampire girlfriend?”
“Yes. And she got me interested in studying mortal diseases. I ended up a physician. After a while I decided to have a look around the rest of the Empire, so I joined the Marines. Then the war came along and I ended up here. Do I detect a thread of jealousy over the fact that I’ve had many girlfriends?”
“Are you going home to this vampire girlfriend when the war is over?” she asked.
“No. Are you going home to a mortal male?” he asked with equal jealousy.
“No. Maybe we should avoid this subject,” she added.
“Good idea.”
He could certainly think of a better way to spend their time.
He lifted her like she was a feather and shifted their positions. When Zoe was lying on her back under him he began kissing her at the top of her head and proceeded with great thoroughness down the length of her body. Occasionally, he gave her soft skin a sharp nip of fang, letting himself have the merest taste. Her responses grew steadily more urgent and wild. Doc gloried in her reaction to him, gloried in pleasing her.
When he finally reached the swollen bud between her widely spread thighs, he began to show her just how truly skilled his tongue really was.
He wanted to go on pleasing her forever. But he settled for now and tried to make it perfect.
36
“You know, it’s been three cycles since you disappeared into the infirmary with Doc,” Maria said. “We were beginning to get worried.”
“We?” Zoe asked, and rubbed her temples with her fingertips. She hadn’t been drinking Mischa and Siler’s hooch, had she? She supposed she’d been drunk, all right—at least all that sex was a major narcotic.
She was so exhausted—in a good way—that she barely understood what Maria had said. She tried not to resent her friend’s barging into Doc’s room and waking her up. Especially since the first thing she noticed when she opened her eyes was the steaming cup of caf Maria held out toward her.
“Does Arco know you have the caf he saves for the Kril?” she asked. She didn’t hesitate to cradle the cup, breathe in the marvelous scent, then take a greedy gulp. Let the Kril find their own stimulants.
“Arco agreed this once giving up his bribe stash was in a good cause.”
The caf helped to clear Zoe’s head. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and got shakily to her feet. She was naked and covered in bite marks but unembarrassed by Maria’s fran
k stare as her friend looked her over.
“He’s really been keeping you busy,” Maria commented.
“Uh—yeah.” She finished the caf and thrust the cup back at Maria. She ran her fingers through tangled hair and yawned. “Three cycles?”
To herself she admitted that she sometimes got the difference between the measurement of planetary days and military timekeeping confused. Out in the Empire she had aides and her data enhancements to keep these sorts of things straight for her. What she knew for a fact now was that she and Doc had been going at it for days no matter how one chose to measure it.
“Time flies when you’re having orgasms,” Maria added.
It finally occurred to Zoe that by ‘we’ Maria meant every human in Camp Five. “Oh my God,” she groaned.
She quickly snatched up and pulled on a large shirt lying on the floor. It was Doc’s. His scent lingered on it and made her dizzy with lust.
She fought off her primitive urges and faced her friend. “He’s been doing this to me on purpose to distract me. I should have realized it sooner—but he’s so great in bed I couldn’t think of anything else. Which was just what he wanted. The rat.” She smiled and took another heady sniff of his shirt. “The dear rat.”
“Why would he want to distract you?”
Zoe caught herself before explaining that Matthias Raven had stopped her from trying to commit suicide and how things had gone on erotically—and continued from there with a few breaks for sleep for quite some time. It was evident to her that his plan had been a heroic effort to keep her distracted in the best way he knew how. She chuckled at how well it had worked.
“Where’s Doc?” she asked.
“He was called up top by the commandant,” Maria answered. “So Arco let me know that it was safe to sneak in and check on you. Doc’s been like a bear guarding his cave since this orgy started. Not even Arco or Alwyn have been allowed into the infirmary. Good thing there haven’t been any medical emergencies.”
“Yeah,” Zoe said. She stretched, and rubbed a bruise on her left hip. “I appreciate your concern but—”
Dark Stranger Page 17
