“Ready for me?” he growled, his eyes flashing.
The problem with trying to answer a vampire was the fact that they very rarely played by the rules. This was another thing Raven knew…and well. Thus, as her mind raced to come up with the perfect retort, she found herself inexplicably tackled to the ground.
“That’s three for three,” Nicholas purred, his hands closing around her wrists as his yellow eyes flashed triumphantly into hers. “You sure you’re playing with a full deck?”
“My deck,” she retorted, her hips bucking upward as by their own accord, “is plenty full.”
“Mmm.” His eyes wandered over her breasts covetously. “I’ll say.”
Raven put up a futile struggle. Well, not really a struggle. If she truly struggled, she could toss him off in a blink. Maybe. Nicholas never disclosed how much of her strength he could tap through the claim. She kept telling him to come at her full strength when they sparred, and he swore he never held back.
The tell in his eyes spoke differently. It always had.
“You ready to call it in?” he asked, running his tongue down the length of one fang. If possible, the gesture made him look even sexier, which was something she was certain he was aware of.
Raven smirked and flexed against the padded floor. They would soon need to get new padding, she absently noted. The stuff they bought was often too flimsy. Either that, or they were too hard on the rec room. Granted, the answer wasn’t exactly a mystery, but she liked to think they weren’t too horribly rough on their things.
“We’ve only gone three rounds,” she retorted. “Sorry. I don’t think so.”
Nicholas winked. “I love it when you’re feisty.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Then again,” he added, kissing her nose, “when it comes to you, I love everything.”
“You’re not charming your way out of going another round.”
He grinned. “Oh, I’m up for going a round…or ten.”
“A round of—”
“Glorious shagging?”
She flushed. “We’re sparring. And I seem to remember promising a certain someone I’d mop the floor with his admittedly scrumptious ass for not letting me take out the last vamp in that nest last night.”
Nicholas offered an unapologetic shrug. “To be fair, I called it.”
“You big liar!”
“Am not. What do you call lopping its head off?”
“Taking my kill,” she retorted, pouting.
“You say potato. Anyway…how do you think you’re gonna get up? I got you all nice and trapped.”
Raven rolled her eyes. “Oh, I dunno…” Her voice trailed off and lured him right into a headbutt. She was free in an instant, rolling to her feet and assuming position as Nicholas managed to climb upward, pressing his palm against his brow and glaring at her as though she’d kicked his favorite puppy.
“That actually hurt!”
Oh no. She wouldn’t fall for the fake guilt-trip. Not again. It won her over too easily, and she’d been duped more times than she wanted to admit.
It was silly, really. Nicholas loved this kind of pain. They both did.
After all, this was foreplay.
“If that hurt, I can’t imagine how this is gonna feel.”
Raven took off for him and dove in a forward-flip, her hands bracing the rubber-matted floor as her thighs closed around his neck. The tactic worked beautifully, sending them both to the ground, and trapping him snuggly between her legs.
“That was too easy.” She giggled.
He had the decency to look like it might have hurt, or, had he not been a vampire, that oxygen might have been an issue. That was, of course, until he quirked a brow and said, “Uh huh,” and utilized the obvious advantage of his position to nuzzle the warm and increasingly wet apex of her thighs. “You smell all nice.”
“Nicholas, we’re not—”
“I am.”
Raven frowned and wiggled, but he was gripping her hips and tugging her forward before she could stop him. “I’m trying to fight you here!”
“I know. And it’s making you very wet, you naughty girl.” He chuckled and tongued her through the cotton of her very thin sweatpants. “Why don’t you just admit you’ve been outdone by Nicholas the Great?”
“Stop calling yourself that! It’s totally lame!”
“Riles you up and makes you nice and gooey.”
Her struggles became more pronounced and even more futile. His hold on her was insurmountable. “Nicholas—”
“Oh yeah—”
“Nicolai!”
“That’s just hot.” He winked at her. “You wanna do this here or head back to our room? ’Cause once we start—”
Raven pouted and glanced down. “I was under the impression that we were sparring,” she said, her voice dropping.
“You can say that as much as you like, I’m not gonna cave.”
“You’re not the easiest person to love sometimes,” she said, feigning a hard sigh to cover how quickly her resistance was crumbling. Not that it did any good. Not that it ever did.
“I’m challenging,” he countered. “And for the last time, we were sparring. We’re not now. I won. Gimme my prize.”
“You get a prize?”
“’Course. I get you,” Nicholas replied, brushing a sweet kiss against her clothed inner thigh. “Won you fair and square, I did. And I have you all the time.”
“Some could argue that I won you fair and square,” she pointed out.
“Right now, I wanna have you on your back with your legs in the air. But since I’m in a giving mood, I’ll let you decide whether or not we race each other to the room or have at it right here.”
Raven quirked a brow. “Giving mood, huh?”
He shrugged. How he managed to shrug and managed to bark orders at her while he was on the floor with her straddling his face was completely beyond her. “You know me,” he said. “I’m a giver. So how about it? Me? I’d like to watch the sun rise.”
Heat flooded her face. It was amazing that nearly a decade later she could still blush over the artistic lovemaking that had occurred after they painted the mural on their wall. But then, for the way his eyes softened as he took in her blush, she knew he wouldn’t have it, or her, any other way.
He liked it when she blushed.
Just as she enjoyed watching the sunlight spread across their painted wall, even though she typically awoke alone in bed. It was something she never took for granted. Ever. Every day with him was a gift. A blessing. Something she’d fought to earn, but cheated to keep.
Something she would never give up.
“I let you win,” she informed him.
Nicholas grinned and released her immediately. “Believe what you like. I still get the prize.”
“That’s debatable.”
And then he was on his feet, grabbing her hand and tugging her out of their rec room and down the hall.
Into the room that was theirs. In the home that was theirs.
This life that was theirs.
It might have taken generations to make it, but made it they had. Even with the knowledge that for all that had passed, there was so much more ahead. The future didn’t scare her. Nothing did anymore.
The future, after all, was just another sunrise.
THE END
www.rosalie-stanton.com
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rosalie Stanton lives in southwest Missouri with her husband and two dachshunds, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. At an early age, she discovered a talent for creating worlds into which she could escape. Over the years, her vivid imagination evolved into a love of words and storytelling. Rosalie graduated from Missouri State University with a degree in English. When her attention is not employed by writing, she enjoys spending time with close friends and family.
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
Converted with Word to HTML.
nbsp;
Ripples Through Time (lit), Ripples Through Time
Ripples Through Time Page 32
