Jeliyah scooted back off the bed and away from him. Once on her feet, she said, “Don’t get all cocky just because I took some of your blood, vampire. I told you that was a one-time thing and not to get ideas.”
“Yeah, I heard you but,” he hopped the bed and crowded her against the wall, “here’s the thing. You could have gotten the same results by asking me to open a vein. A simple prick to the finger for a few drops of blood would have sufficed. You kissed me, necromancer.”
“It was a split-second decision. Back off.” She clutched the necrome at her throat and said, “Shield.”
Teaghan laughed as the shield expanded to include him. “Forget something important, did you? Your necromes recognize me now. I’m not a threat.”
Shit. She’d forgotten one of the major side effects of Recognize. Her necromes—and any others made from her blood—no longer worked against Teaghan. There was no way to deactivate Recognize either, just like an invitation once given.
She shoved at his chest but he kept leaning forward until his lips were close to hers.
He said, “Let’s talk about that kiss.”
“It was spur of the moment. It meant nothing.”
“Care to test that theory?”
“You can’t. I haven’t invited you.”
“Kissing is the one thing I don’t need an invitation to do.” He pushed his lips against hers as he forced her hands over her head and pressed his body closer.
Jeliyah couldn’t turn from the kiss, though she tried. This wasn’t fair. Vampires needed permission to enter a person’s body. Why didn’t that extend to kissing? And why was she giving in to his kiss?
Her body was betraying her. She didn’t find Teaghan attractive in the least, with his wannabe lifestyle, yet she couldn’t deny the heat making her nipples tighten and the low, needy moan that left her lips.
Teaghan pulled back and edged her feet apart with a few light kicks. He raised his knee between her legs until it pressed against the growing wet spot on her panties, then he smiled at her. “What were you saying about it meaning nothing?” He wiggled his knee side to side. “Is this nothing too?”
“Stop,” Jeliyah rasped. A pitiful whimper escaped her lips when Teaghan’s mind filled with graphic images of what he planned to do to her when she invited him.
When?
If. If, damn it. And not even that. She had no intention of inviting him.
The fiction books had gotten it partially right. It wasn’t a living person’s domicile to which a vampire needed an invitation. It was a living person’s body. A vampire couldn’t enter a human—that meant no biting, no sex, no penetration of any kind—without permission. Why kissing was exempt from that, Jeliyah didn’t know and wanted to file a complaint with the person who had made the rules.
Teaghan bombarded her with his intentions, taking advantage of their one-way link and her inability to block his thoughts. Close to her ear, he said, “You’re being a tease, Jeliyah. I smell your lust and your juices are soaking through my jeans. Just invite me.”
Her denial died on her lips when he cupped one of her breasts and kneaded. This shouldn’t be allowed either but it didn’t qualify as penetration. Squirming to get out of his hold only rubbed her panty-clad clit over his knee, which made her shiver with need.
He chuckled and licked her neck. “Invite me.”
Jeliyah bit her lower lip to keep from speaking, from giving in. This was a vampire’s nature. That pesky invitation clause hadn’t stopped them from getting blood and sex over the centuries, because vampires were masters of seduction. She wouldn’t be a notch on Teaghan’s belt.
He sucked at her neck while thinking about lifting her dress to suck at her nipples in like manner. And then he moved to do it. He stopped kneading her breast long enough to lift the dress up so it covered her head and bared her from the neck down. She couldn’t see.
Teaghan unsnapped her bra. He imagined flicking one of her nipples with his tongue while rolling the other between his thumb and forefinger before doing both. Next came the image of him sucking her nipples in rapid succession and then he did it. The show and act had Jeliyah panting with pleasure and the need for more.
Her mental coaching to stay strong crumbled as her body begged for release. “Teaghan.”
He stilled his motions and she got the picture of him smiling. He whispered in a low, seductive tone, “Say it, Jeliyah.”
She swallowed. All her training and the warnings came to mind. Never give in to their allure. Vampires are dangerous. She knew it all and yet she’d already ignored one necromancer edict—a major one. Jeliyah hadn’t learned Recognize in the classroom and the book where she’d gotten it had named it a forbidden spell not to be taught or used—ever. Teaghan was immune to her necro-metal but his only concern had been to seduce rather than hurt her.
This was stupid. She was riding an adrenaline high after being attacked twice and she felt grateful to Teaghan for saving her both times. That’s all this was. She shouldn’t compound the issue and make her situation worse.
“I invite you,” she whispered.
Teaghan pulled her dress off and deposited her on the bed with a speed that made her gasp. He made good on his earlier mental threat of yanking off her panties but didn’t dive between her legs as he’d shown he would. Instead he held her legs open at the knees and lowered himself so his face was close to her exposed pussy.
“Very pretty.” His breath tickled her hot, slick flesh.
He opened his mouth wide and she gasped, twitching her legs and jutting toward his mouth. Teaghan grinned at her. “I haven’t done anything yet, necromancer. Eager?”
She wanted to kick him. “Let go. I changed my mind.”
“You know invitations don’t work like that.” He laid a kiss on her clit, which made Jeliyah yelp with need. “And your mind might be changed but the rest of you is begging me to continue. This part, for instance.”
He spread her legs more and then licked around the edge of her pussy entrance. Her hips rocked as she huffed in reaction to that simple contact. Something so small had her close to the edge.
She covered her face, trying to block the reality of what she was doing even as she enjoyed the way Teaghan’s tongue danced between her core and her clit. A sharp cry of pleasure left her when he puckered his lips over her nub and sucked—a quick pull before letting go with a loud pop.
Her panting filled the room before she realized the sound was coming from her. Teaghan returned and sucked at her clit again. This time longer, harder. He drew on her nub while flicking his tongue over the hood.
She tried to close her legs against the delicious sensation but Teaghan held her open with ease. He slid his hands to her thighs and kneaded as he continued sending bolts of delight through her body from her clit.
The orgasm that claimed Jeliyah arched her back almost in half as she screamed her release. The person in the room next door pounded on the wall several times but Jeliyah didn’t quiet until Teaghan lifted his mouth. She sagged, panting and whimpering. The twitching of her oversensitized clit sent tingles down the insides of her thighs.
The sound of a zipper rasping open preceded Teaghan crawling over Jeliyah so he could smile down at her. “Foreplay time is over. Now for the real fun.” His smile grew larger when his canines started elongating.
Jeliyah’s heart rate sped up. What had she done? She braced her hands on Teaghan’s chest, tangling in his gold chains, but knew that wouldn’t hold him back. Not now. Not after inviting him. “I didn’t say you could feed on me.” It was a pitiful attempt to stop the inevitable and she knew it.
Teaghan captured her wrists and moved her hands above her head again. “You gave an open invitation, Jeliyah. You’re a necromancer. You should know better than to simply invite a vampire without ground rules.” He lowered his head. “Too late now.”
He rested his fangs on her neck but didn’t bite her. What was he waiting for? She was at his mercy through her own stupidity. His fangs
grazed her skin as he moved his head back and forth. He was toying with her. Jeliyah squeezed her eyes shut, preparing for the pain she knew was coming.
A babbling brook complete with tweeting birds and chirping insects played through Teaghan’s mind. He said in a low voice, “I’m not a punishment, Jeliyah. This isn’t the campus.”
“I know where I am,” she snapped, yanking on her hands to get them free.
Teaghan’s hold remained firm. “Then you know I’m not trying to hurt you.” He slipped one hand down her side and under her, positioning it at her lower back. After splaying his fingers, he urged her up so her pussy nudged the tip of his dick. “There’s no time limit. No one telling me to make you sorry for being bad.”
A little shimmy eased his dick past her pussy lips. Teaghan moved his lower body in a scooping motion that seated his hard length inside her to the base. Jeliyah keened low in her throat and squirmed beneath him at how right he felt.
“No one knows what you’ve done but me. It’s going to stay that way so I can take full advantage of the situation. Agreed?” He punctuated his question by grinding against her, stirring her inside.
Jeliyah nodded quickly as she looped her legs around his back.
“Good. That’s settled.” Teaghan’s thoughts shifted from the babbling brook to a raging waterfall that beat the rocks on the shore below. He shifted back and then returned, sliding in and out of her. Each thrust was faster than the last until Teaghan pounded into her with the force the waterfall he showed her.
She barely registered the feel of his fangs as he bit her neck and fed. He didn’t take more than a few sips before kissing his way down to one of her breasts.
He circled her nipple with the tip of his tongue. “Love your breasts.” He released her wrists and then cupped the twin mounds and wiggled his fingers, making her breasts jiggle. That got a pleased laugh from him as he watched. Jeliyah couldn’t help joining him since it did feel a little funny.
Before he could go back to toying her breasts with his tongue, if that was his plan, Jeliyah grabbed his gold chains and yanked them off. He didn’t stop her. She tossed them aside. “Better.”
“I’d rather have you around my neck anyway.” He reared back and then positioned her legs so they hung over his shoulders. Holding her steady as he leaned forward once more, he continued treating her pussy to the full length of his dick in quick, even strokes. “Flexible. I like that.”
Jeliyah had no answer to give since she was too busy moaning loud enough to have their neighbor banging on the wall again. She crossed her ankles behind Teaghan’s neck since the position didn’t allow her to hug him.
He felt so right and filled every part of her, but she wanted more. So much more. She hadn’t felt anything this good in years. Many long years, so the second orgasm creeping over her so soon after the first didn’t surprise her in the least. She tried to hold it back, to hold out so she could enjoy Teaghan more.
The man didn’t make it easy. He stuffed his dick deep and stirred his hips against hers so his tip teased her core and triggered her release. She bucked beneath him, calling his name.
Teaghan grinned and resumed thrusting, riding her through the orgasm. “We’re not done yet, necromancer. Not by a long shot.” He paused so he could flip her onto her stomach and pull her to her knees.
The man had skills, since he did all that without his dick leaving her pussy. With one hand palming one of her breasts and the other rubbing her clit, he resumed pounding into her.
Jeliyah balled the bedding in her fists but that didn’t help anchor her to reality. Teaghan swept her along at his pace as he’d been doing since she met him. Her body craved his attention and she cried out, “Please. Oh please.”
“Right here, Jeliyah. All you could want. Just tell me how much.” Teaghan rolled her clit between two fingers.
Her arms collapsed beneath her. She whimpered, unsure if it was a sound meant to tell him to stop or give her more. Nothing made since except the pleasure.
Fine shivers shook her and her muscles tensed as another orgasm grabbed hold of her. This one froze her movements, leaving her only the ability to shudder and pant.
Teaghan grunted and braced his hands on her waist as he came with her, spilling himself in her depths. He pulled free once he was spent. “Damn good.”
Jeliyah sagged onto the bed with her face buried in the sheets to cover her shame. It didn’t help. The afterglow didn’t cover up everything she’d done wrong—sharing blood, an open invitation and sex with a vampire. How had her life gone so totally out of control in such a short amount of time?
Of her three transgressions, sharing blood was the worst. She was one step away from being a Renfield.
“Chill.” Teaghan lay down beside her and pulled her against his side so her head rested on his shoulder. “You’re not a Renfield. It takes more than sharing a little blood for that to happen.”
She touched her head and then gasped softly. “I forgot you can hear my thoughts now.”
“Part of sharing blood. Enough with the self-recrimination. You got laid, not committed treason.”
“It might as well be treason.” Jeliyah’s memory flashed to the tour of the necro-metal factory all trainees had to take. It was a scare tactic more than an educational visit. The trainers had made sure their charges saw a punished necromancer being bled. A warning.
The man had been a high class who had decided to get too close to the vampires he worked with. A night of sex and blood sharing had led to him being strapped to a hospital bed with one IV in one arm draining blood while another IV in his other arm supplied nutrients for sustained life.
“Holy fucking shit,” Teaghan rasped as he pulled back and looked at her. “How old were you when you saw that?”
“Fourteen. I had nightmares for weeks after. Most of us did.”
“Vampires don’t dream but that shit’s going to give me nightmares. And you all call us monsters. Who does that to another human being?”
“Necromancers. We’re not human. Not completely.” She laughed without humor. “An extra letter in our blood type and our chromosomes that makes it easy for the government to find us but that science cannot explain. The same magic that animates you makes us, though not many will admit to it. Once a trainee enters the campus, they’re government property until retirement.”
Teaghan settled down beside her and cupped the back of her head, kneading in a soft, soothing manner. “After the shit you just showed me, I’m almost afraid to ask about retirement.”
“None of your previous partners told you?”
“We didn’t talk. We didn’t room together either. It’s code for something. What?”
“Freedom.” Jeliyah relaxed as the goal of retirement—assuming she could keep her transgression a secret until then—entered her mind. “The campus takes charge of necromancer potentials at age twelve. That care isn’t free. Every single thing has a price tag on it from the bandages to the food we eat. They give each child a limitless credit card. We’re allowed to buy whatever we want.” She laughed without humor. “It’s a trap, of course. We’re expected to pay back every cent after we graduate. Retirement is the debt paid in full. After that a necromancer can seek gainful employment away from the farm, usually with a high class who has a team in place guarding some rich person.”
“So that’s the big deal. But it’s not real freedom. If it was, you would stop being a necromancer.”
“Well, yeah. There is that. Once a necromancer, always a necromancer. We’re too rare. If a retiree doesn’t find a job fast enough, the higher-ups place him somewhere. The only way out of this gig is death.”
“At least I can quit being an enforcer when I feel like it. You necromancers are paid slaves.”
She didn’t like the direction of the conversation. Revealing so much about necromancer life to an outsider grated against her sense of responsibility. “Why are you an enforcer? You looked like you were having more fun at the club. You make a ton of m
oney each night. Maybe not as much as a rogue hunt but you wouldn’t be starving.”
“I like killing people. I became a vampire on the battlefield. After I got out from under my sire, I kept at it. Some legal killings. Some not. Got on the bad side of some vampire hunters before I became a bounty hunter.” He shrugged. “Pretending to be human costs and I got paid to kill people. It was a win-win. The cost of living has gone up since the outing, but then so have the bounties.”
“Even if you’re called enforcers now.”
He snorted. “Humans and their fucking sugarcoating.”
“It’s all about spinning it to the public. The head families and the higher-ups want everyone to think the world is still the same even though vampires are no longer fiction.”
“Hell, at least we didn’t get outed in Bram Stoker’s time. No coexisting back then. He got damn close with that book of his. The families almost sent a hunter after his head and the heads of the entire Van Helsing clan.”
“The necromancers’ guild of the time got to them first. No one has heard from the Van Helsings since. One of the campus books I read hinted that the whole family—most of them high class—ended up in the necro-metal vats. Another said they were just killed outright. Still another said the family was delivered to the vampires to deal with. Whatever the true story, they didn’t survive that book being published.”
“Snitches don’t get stitches in our world. They get dead.” His hand tangled in her hair and pulled so she met his gaze. “Your secret is safe, Jeliyah.”
“Thanks. Though how pathetic am I that I do something like this after two days in the field?”
“Based on the way you were begging for more, I would say you were due for a good lay.”
“You’re not wrong.” She rolled out of his hold and sat up. The date of the last time she’d had sex eluded her. It was well before she graduated the campus and joined Hirsch’s crew.
The trainees were encouraged to seek intimacy with each other. The coed sleeping arrangements all but guaranteed it. Necromancers gave birth to necromancers. The higher-ups wanted babies, recruits they could train from the cradle.
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