by Neha Yazmin
Chapter 13: Light
She gasped as my lips met hers and I thought I’d not been as gentle with her as I should have been. I pulled back a little. She was a human after all, and I was a million times stronger. I could crush her lips with mine, quite literally.
But then she tentatively kissed my upper lip and I realised she hadn’t been hurt at all – she had simply been surprised by the temperature of my icy skin. Quickly though, Ellie became accustomed to it and even warmed my lips with hers. Kissing me back eagerly, her fingers interlocked around my neck.
She truly wanted me.
The thought thrilled me to my core.
Twice, she tried to brush my tongue with hers but I kept mine as far back in my mouth as I could, protecting her from the venom it was coated in. To ensure her lips and tongue came nowhere near my sharp, venomous teeth, I took full control of the kiss, like taking the lead with a dance partner. It was incredibly difficult to maintain this restraint. To not hold her tighter than I was. To hold back when I wanted to let go.
But my desire to cause her no harm seemed to overpower everything else.
We kissed for what felt like hours. At times I felt like a novice, because, after becoming a vampire, I’d never kissed a human and the temperature and texture of her lips, her mouth, was so different to what I was used to.
But it felt so good.
The softness, the plumpness, the give of her skin. And the warmth, it seeped through my diamond hard skin. The heat of her body warmed mine.
I almost felt human again.
When her hands traced the line of my spine down to the bottom of my T-shirt, gently pulling it up, my mouth stopped working against hers for the briefest of moments. Opening my eyes, I saw her closed lids, lost in the passion, as she began to yank my shirt up slowly.
With absolute certainty that she was mine, my hands took on a life of their own and started flying around her, undressing her in less than a second and taking her to the bed the next instant. I undressed just as fast but let her pull my T-shirt over my head as she was still in the middle of trying to take it off.
Eyes still closed, lips still kissing mine, she was completely unaware of what I’d just done. What I shouldn’t have done. Not that fast anyway. We had been airborne, as I leaped from the doorstep to the bed with Ellie in my arms. What if she noticed, remembered later what she had barely acknowledged in the heat of the moment? How would I explain? And even if I could, could I trust her to not tell anyone, particularly her mother?
Then a little voice spoke in my mind. You’re not going to let her go, are you?
I don’t know, I answered.
I should know! I reprimanded myself. And I should know that of course I wasn’t letting her leave this room alive. Before I could scold myself further, Ellie turned away from the kiss, her cheek pressing against the pillow.
“Christian,” she breathed. “I’m not… I can’t… I don’t…”
As she stuttered nervously, I got that feeling again, that if I still had a heart that worked, it would have reacted to what she was trying to say. She didn’t want me anymore. Or wasn’t ready to do what we were very close to doing.
Stupidly, I thought that the reaction of my heart would have been to break.
Heartbroken because she wanted to stop? Really? I shook my head disapprovingly at that absurd thought and immediately realised what it would look like to Ellie. She’d think I was objecting to her attempts at holding back.
Thankfully, she hadn’t seen this.
“I’ve never…” She faced me, her cheeks flaming red. “Well, I’m not… this will be my… first time…” She turned her head away again, embarrassed. “If I do anything wrong then I’m… sorry?”
“You don’t have to say sorry,” I assured her, my voice a soft whisper.
“Will you tell me if I don’t… get it right?” she asked awkwardly.
It thrilled me that she wasn’t backing out. At the same time, the depth of the relief I felt over this concerned me.
Turning to me again, she waited for my answer in self-conscious silence. I felt like telling her that this would be my first time too… with a human, after becoming a vampire.
Suddenly, I was just as nervous as she looked.
Our first kiss had been intoxicating, lifting us up from reality, making us forget ourselves. And now, as we lay naked in bed, the gravity of the situation dawned on us. While she worried about her first time with someone more experienced than her, I asked myself if I really had the strength to control myself, be gentle with her, not hurt her in the process of loving her.
You’re going to kill her anyway, right? the little voice in my head tried to confirm.
This time I retorted with the words, Yes, but not like that! Not before or during, but after I knew what it was like to be with her. I wanted her so bad that I ached to kiss her again, feel her body close to me.
The ache was all in my head of course, but it was there.
An odd sort of clarity engulfed me in the final moments of our union. I was submerged into blinding white light. I’d never experienced that before, whatever it was. The voice that had invaded my mind earlier, spoke again. The words stunned me to my core. The light flashed inside me, reaching the area where my heart used to beat but now sat like a frozen stone.
A few moments later, I heard Ellie say something. From her tone, I suspected she was repeating herself. I forced myself to turn away from the blinding white light in my head to understand what she was asking me. I was still on top of her, my head buried in the bend of shoulders, the fragrance of her hair smothering me, my elbows resting on either side of her.
“Was it okay?” she repeated.
Realising exactly what she was enquiring about, I lifted my head to face her and nodded.
She gave me a small, shy smile. “I’m so relieved because I… that was… amazing.” She blushed deeply. “I was afraid I might ruin it for you…”
It was clear she had indeed been afraid and extremely nervous. I didn’t notice any of this during the time. She didn’t do anything wrong. She did everything right. She was… “Perfect,” I finished that thought out loud. She frowned, confused because she hadn’t heard the beginning of that sentence. So I clarified. “You were wonderfully perfect Ellie.” I don’t know why those words were a whisper, why I swallowed. “Wonderful and perfect.”
Before she could respond with words, though her lips twitched and the heat of her body increased, I began repeating what that voice had said to me in the blinding whiteness. I spoke so fast that to her, it sounded like a low buzzing sound, as though I was making a silly noise for a short second.
But I was telling her the truth. I had to tell her.
“You are my enemy Ellie. You will be the end of me, my kind, and I can’t let you do that. So I can’t let you leave this room alive. But I can’t be the end of you. I have no choice but to do what I will do next. I’m sorry but I can’t let you live. Forgive me.”
“What was that?” she chuckled when the short buzzing ceased.
“Moan of desire,” I answered dryly.
She laughed. “You made a few strange noises when we were… sort of like growling.”
I tried not to think about the noises she’d made, mostly how she said my name. It sounded so beautiful. I would never hear such sounds again.
If I had a heart, it really would have broken at this truth.
“What’s wrong?” Ellie asked, concerned.
“Just wondering what you’d say if I kissed you again.” I shrugged sombrely.
“Now you ask permission?” She grinned, rolling her eyes.
As her gaze settled on me again, I held it for what felt like a long time. She went from being amused to curious to confused to hungry. For a kiss. Yes, I was going to kiss her.
Then I was going to bite her.
