“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. Franklin had a passion for the arts but his life was steeped in depression. Most of his work was dark, dangerous even. Not the kind of stuff most folks want hung in their homes or offices, but he did gain some following. The piece he did of me differed from anything he’d ever done before.”
“But he could never show it.”
She smiled and drank from her glass. He knew her so well. No, she’d never let such an intimate piece be placed on public display. “He couldn’t. I took it with me when I left. He had already given it to me, so it was mine to take.”
“And I bet you took his heart with you when you left him.”
Thalya said nothing, merely stared back at him.
“The woman in that painting has a soul. He saw it in you.”
She shrugged. “He was an artist. He saw what he wanted to see.”
Samuel shook his head. “No, he saw what could be. As do I. Come here,” he spoke softly, yet with a current of electricity during a lightning storm running though his words. Giving them a veneer of power.
“Samuel.” It came out as a plea for him to stop.
“I know you read the passage. If there’s a chance—”
She gripped the stem of her glass tightly. “No, Samuel. I won’t risk it. I can’t.”
He rested his wineglass on the coffee table in front of him, got up and came to her. Kneeling in front of her, he took the glass from her and placed it on the floor. “You’re not risking anything. We’ll take things nice and slow.”
When she nodded, he put his hands on her knees and parted her legs. Grabbing the tie on her silk robe, he undid the bow, pushing the robe aside to reveal the matching dark blue bra and panty she wore underneath. “Beautiful,” he crooned, before stripping her of the robe completely. He lifted one hand to wrap around her neck while the other he placed on her thigh. He pulled her toward his waiting mouth and they did a different kind of feasting on each other.
Samuel understood her hesitation. He however had no reservations, nor would he stop what had to happen between them. What had begun from the first time they’d met. He unhooked her bra, dropping it to the floor and traveled from her mouth to her neck, licking and taking tiny bites of her skin as he covered her. Becoming high off her unique taste. For a brief moment, the thought flashed through his mind, what would the blood beneath her skin taste like? By the time he reached her bared breast, the thought disappeared. Only one of pure primal need remained. The need to take her dusky plump nipple into his mouth.
Her breasts weren’t large, but they were full enough to fit nicely in his palm and he savored her. While he sucked on one nipple, he massaged the other with his thumb. Then he switched breasts.
She arched her back, thrusting her breast more fully into his eager mouth. Her fingers tightened at the nape of his neck, holding him closely to her.
Reaching around, he removed her hand and raised his head so once again, he could ravage her mouth. But he continued to shift his hand ever downward until he reached her strip of underwear, which proved no barrier to his goal. No longer patient, he merely ripped it off her. “Put your legs over the arms of the chair,” he ordered, not recognizing the huskiness coming from his own voice.
She did as he’d commanded, opening herself fully to him.
Only divine intervention could stop him now.
He cupped her hairless mound, moving his finger down to her heat and found it wet. “Mmm, you feel so good,” he whispered over her mouth before filling it again with his tongue. At the same time, he rubbed his thumb over her opening. Making her push down, he stuck one finger into her moist passage. “Damn, and you’re tight.”
After that—he couldn’t say anymore. Just feel.
His tongue stroked in and out of her sweet mouth while his finger pumped in and out of her woman’s heat.
Her breath came in heavier pants; her chest fell and rose faster.
The scent of her lust drifted off her, surrounding them both and igniting his even higher. He managed to place a second finger inside her and continued to pump in and out of her core. Her inner muscles flexed and tensed around his fingers. “Mmm,” he moaned. She was close, but he didn’t want her to come. Not yet.
Slowing the rhythm of his strokes gave them both a breather. When he stopped kissing her, her eyes popped open. Samuel placed his thumb over her lips, gently rubbing it back and forth over her top and bottom lips. “Shhh,” he said before she could voice the protest forming. Then he angled his head, so he could see his fingers sliding in and out between her spread thighs.
He moved until he knelt fully in front of her, never stopping his intimate stroking between her legs. His fingers now coated with her moisture, he watched her nectar dripping from her and thought he’d never seen anything more erotic in his long life. “Nice,” he rasped. “I want to taste.”
“Yes, please,” she gasped back.
Removing his digits, he rubbed his nose against her clit, taking her scent right into his blood, enrapturing every cell in his body. He pressed an open mouthed kiss at the center of her pleasure.
She screamed his name, her hips rose up to push against his face. Her thighs trembled against his hands holding her in place.
He kept his mouth on her to cover her opening just as the first rush peaked and he savored every sweet drop gushing out of her. Eventually, she slowed and her body stopped contracting. He stopped sucking on her and instead began to lick, making sure he took in every delicious droplet of her moisture. She even tasted like the toffee she resembled.
The pleasure reached into a part of him, allowing instinct to take over. He turned his head and did something he’d never done in his life. He bit the inside of her thigh, sharp enough to draw a little blood. The minute he did, her body shuddered. Samuel rubbed his thumb over her nub while he sucked on her blood.
Her body rose off the chair as she came again, even stronger than before.
He returned his mouth to her opening to lick her there too and when the combined taste of her blood and cum hit his mouth, a volcano erupted inside him. He shook with the effort to stop it, but unable to stop what happened next. Like an untried youth, he came. Hard.
Too late, his hand shot to his fly. He squeezed himself to try to alleviate the intensity of his climax. Oh, God! He wasn’t even inside her. Quickly, he stood, pulled off his t-shirt, then got rid of his jeans and underwear. What a mess, but his dick remained steel hard.
Cradling her in his arms, he picked her up and sat on the wide chair, positioning her to straddle him. To open herself fully to him. Before she could change her mind, he grabbed her hips and pulled her down on his ridged cock as he flexed his hips up, impaling her full on his length. They both groaned from the sensation of him inside her. Her body cradled him so damn tightly, he almost came again. He threw his head back and squeezed his eyes shut to fight for some form of control, before beginning to stir. They moved up and down a few times, finding their rhythm. He stilled to savor the feel of her flesh surrounding his while he pulsed deep inside of her. Every nerve ending strained with the need to move, for release.
Yet for all the intensity of their lovemaking, something remained missing, and instinctively he knew what had to happen. “Bite me,” he managed to gasp.
Samuel only had time to register her fangs, feel them sink into the vein at the side of his neck and the rush of his blood flowing into her mouth. He roared in triumph, in the throes of his ejaculation. Thalya’s answering cry vibrated to him while fire raced through his veins and he continued to pump his life essence, his blood, part of his soul into her. They were connected in every way.
He finally understood some of the text he’d been reading on how the soulless got their souls back. They took their lovers. Because let God bear witness, a part of his soul was now permanently ingrained in her. And through it all, even after he came, the emotional and physical pleasure reached heights he’d never known as he continued to rock inside her haven, nev
er wanting to leave.
Chapter Nineteen
Thalya opened her eyes to find herself on her bed wrapped in the fortified hold of the last man she’d ever expect to want her. Then it all came rushing back to her. She’d taken his blood. My God! He’d taken hers! Okay, so he took a taste while she, she—
Alarmed, she rolled over and sat up to look at him. He had to be okay. His chest rose and fell. Alive. He was alive. The relief to her heart overwhelmed her. “Huh?”
She pressed her hand to her breast. Her heart had always beaten. She wasn’t dead, but now she could actually feel its rhythm. Feel the heat against her palm as her blood pumped through her veins. Elation and desire coursed through her body for Samuel, and the emotions were all her own. “Oh, my God!”
“Mmm, what is it?” Samuel said in a sleepy voice. “You okay?”
“Samuel, Samuel! Wake up! What have you done to me?”
He opened those beautiful green eyes, still cloudy from sleep and stared at her before winking. “I rocked your world, babe. I rocked your world.”
“You don’t understand. That’s not what I’m talking about. I feel. Samuel, I feel emotion. Not—not just yours, but my own.” Yes, she rubbed her hand over her heart again. The emotions were real and they were hers. All somehow because of the man at her side. “How can this be?”
Then Thalya did something else she’d never thought to be able to do—she cried. Really cried. Not just a lone teardrop. She put her hand up to the tears falling from her face, and cried even harder.
Samuel shifted and wrapped her in his arms. “Shhh, it’s okay, let it out,” he said. “There was a lot of emotion stored up in there waiting to get out.”
“But how can this be? How can I cry? I’d need to have a soul.”
He pushed the hair back falling across her face. “And don’t you?”
“I would have to have found redemption first,” she wailed, rubbing at her eyes.
“Don’t you get it?” He shook his head. “Understand yet, babe?”
She hung her head down. Not daring to look at him or believe.
Samuel tilted her chin up until she looked directly at him. He wouldn’t let her hide. She lost herself in the image of herself in his eyes.
“I’m your redemption, Thalya…”
His voice seemed to come from far away but still she heard him.
“…I never believed such a thing could be possible, but from the first moment I met you, I knew you were different. That together…we would be different. As my mother was my father’s, I’m yours.” He kissed her. Rolling her onto her back, he covered her.
Couldn’t be so simple, just taking blood? Exchanging blood? No, otherwise, the soulless who’d always taken blood would have also been redeemed and they were far from it.
When he released her mouth, she spoke, “I still don’t understand. How could my taking your blood give me my soul back?”
“Because I think, part of my soul has always belonged to you and you just claimed it back.”
Then he kissed her again and all thoughts of souls and redemption took a jet across the ocean. No room remained in her consciousness for anything else other than the emotion Samuel evoked in her and drew from her. Want for him sounded in every beat of her pulse. Every nerve ending reached out to him and he met her needs.
Samuel touched every part of her body with his hands, lips or tongue. He turned her over and did the same thing to her back. No part of her existed he didn’t explore.
But she wanted to do the same for him. She sat up and pushing on his shoulders, indicated she wanted him to lie down. He did, placing his arms over his head. She wanted to try something she’d never done with any other man. Never wanted to, except with him. Her gaze roamed from his thick smooth chest with the rings pieced through his nipples, past his tight abs to the nest of dark curls at the junction of his thighs. As she watched, the part of him that made him male lengthened and thickened before her hungry gaze.
He placed his hand between his legs to touch his heavy sacs, and then wrapped his hand around the base of himself. “Do you like what you see?”
Thalya couldn’t take her eyes from him nor did she answer him. Instead, she pushed his hand aside and replaced it with her own. Lowering her head, she flicked the tip of her tongue across the blunt flared end of him. She sat back and watched a bit of moisture seep from the slit at its center. Again, she licked him, enjoying his taste, yet surprisingly not wanting any blood. Only his cum. Opening her mouth wider, she covered his head and slowly lowered her mouth over him until she had about half of him inside her. Only then, did she begin to pump up and down on him while keeping her hand wrapped around the base of his cock.
“Mmm, that’s it,” he purred. “Take me. Take all of me.” His hand fisted in her hair, holding her to him.
She relaxed her throat and swallowed even more of him into her eager mouth.
“God yes,” he hissed.
His body trembled around her and she continued to suck him, wanting to please him as he’d pleased her. To make him come for her.
But apparently, he had other plans. “Oh no, babe,” he said, placing his hand on her head to stop her. “Next time. Right now, I want to come in your sweetness. But next time, I promise you I’ll come in your mouth while you come in mine.”
The thought held pleasure, so she shifted slightly to try and position her body to make it a reality, but his hand on her leg stopped her. He grabbed himself and shifted her mouth off him. Pulling her body over his, he kissed her, rolling them both over, spreading her eagle under him and he slipped right into her waiting warmth.
He fit like she’d been made for him and he for her. She raised her legs and circled them around his waist to take him deeper into her. In truth, he already inhabited a part of her and always would, whether they were joined together like this or not. Her muscles contracted when he pulsed inside her.
“Mmm,” he groaned.
She smiled and nipped at his neck. But she felt no compulsion to bite his neck, only nip and no blinding need for his blood. No ache in her gums, no sign of any incisors elongating. Only the pleasure of their joining.
She kissed him and clenched around his hard flesh. He responded by flexing his hips and going deeper moving faster. In and out, his strokes increasing in intensity, raising her level of awareness of him as a male. Her male. In the middle of the storm of their creation, she clung to him for her life. Because he had in a sense, given her life. He’d restored her soul.
Samuel stopped the kiss but not his frenzied movement. “Open your eyes,” he said.
Her eyelids opened at the sound of his voice.
“I want to watch your beautiful eyes, look into them when we come. Together.”
She stared at him and saw herself reflected in the depths of his eyes. Those orbs were the windows to the soul and his burned bright.
“Come. Come now,” he gasped.
She had no choice but to obey. With the next beat of her heart, emotion flooded through her system filling her very soul, until like an erupting star, her body fragmented and exploded into the night. But Samuel held on to her, collecting the pieces, keeping her safe. His answering eruption echoed throughout her body, along with the sound of her name on his lips as his seed pumped into her. Filling her with life. With him.
The stars receded from her vision and the world around her came back into focus.
Samuel lay sprawled on her body, as though he had not the strength to move.
She’d done that to him.
With a moan, he rolled off her unto his back. “Give me a minute or five,” he said. “And we’ll do it again.”
So, she gave him a few minutes, then did what she’d started to do. She climbed on top of him, spreading his legs so she could lay on his chest with her legs between his. “You don’t have to do a thing, just stay as you are. I like to finish what I start.”
“Babe, I don’t think anything’s gonna happen for a while.”
She p
roved him wrong.
Thalya began with his nipples. Her long delicious tongue snaked out and moved back and forth over first one and then the other, playing briefly with his nipple rings before sucking on his areoles, making them pebble and peak.
He’d never thought himself all that sensitive there. The ring never bothered him, but it seemed wherever Thalya touched it became an erogenous zone. His body responded as she wished it to, any way she wished it. And why not? He belonged to her. He might as well have a stamp on his forehead stating Property of Thalya.
Slowly, agonizingly so, she made her way down his torso, licking him as she went.
His cock wasn’t as tired as he’d thought. Already it filled with need, twitching in anticipation of her touch. When she finally reached it, he swelled and hardened in her hand like he hadn’t had an orgasm in months. In reality, he’d had the mind blowing climaxes she’d given him in the living room and again in the bedroom were stronger than any he’d ever had in his life. Yet, Samuel needed her again, like he needed his next breath. It would always be this way between them. “Feed from me, baby, only me.”
When she took him into her mouth, all other consciousness deserted him. Immersed in a river of sensation, he never wanted to reach shore. So, he raised his knees and put his hands on them to hold himself open for her. He began to tilt his hips, pumping between her lush lips. He held nothing back from her skilled mouth. She took him to the edge more than once but continued to hold him back until he shook and ached with his desire to come. Unbelievable pleasure and agony assaulted his senses, but he hung on. For her, he would wait—hers to command.
Even if it killed him.
Then finally, blessedly, she grabbed his tight balls, milking them hard while she sucked him past the point of no return. He placed his hands flat on the bed for support as his hips rose completely off the sheet. Samuel flexed in and out hard and fast, again and again until his stomach muscles cramped. His balls squeezed till they hurt and he slammed into her as cum rushed through his shaft, at last, releasing into her waiting mouth. Only then did the air leave his lungs in triumph.
Angel Rising_Redemption Page 21
