Her heart rate increased. To his amazement, Jeliyah spread her legs and reached out, opening herself to him. He tore off the suit and joined her on the bed.
Jeliyah hugged him close with her legs wrapped around his waist and her arms around his shoulders. The slick, hot heat of her slit teased the tip of his erection. Teaghan held back the urge to enter her. Not yet.
He coaxed her to free her hold on him so he could get to her breasts. The twin beauties had been calling to him since Jeliyah bound them in the dress. Free now, her breasts lay bare for his perusal. He watched them sway and quiver with each breath she took and every beat of her heart.
A heart he would soon stop so the magic could restart it. Teaghan didn’t want to think about that in this moment. He latched on to one of Jeliyah’s pert nipples as a way to distract himself. She cooed beneath him and shifted. He had to lift his waist away to keep her from pulling his dick into that tight pussy of hers.
Jeliyah whimpered and tried to follow him. He pressed one hand to her belly and held her down.
“Teaghan,” she said in a breathy tone full of need.
He smiled around her nipple but didn’t give her what she wanted. Instead he slipped one finger between her lower lips so he could rub her clit. Jeliyah cried out as she arched, pressing her nipple farther into his mouth.
He sucked at the offering and enjoyed the way she moaned in reaction. Jeliyah had a sensitive body. Teaghan could see years of acclimation sex on the horizon for them before she grew accustomed to her heightened vampire senses.
Teaghan almost laughed at himself. Years. He’d never contemplated months with one woman let alone years. Jeliyah made him wish for decades, centuries. He wanted to indulge the sweet aroma of her aloe-and-cucumber-scented skin mixed with the musk of her lust for as long as he had the ability to smell it.
He inhaled as he switched to her other nipple and flicked it with his tongue. The bud grew stiff with the attention he gave it and Jeliyah moaned louder. When he slid his hand lower between her legs so he could fill her channel with two fingers, she wrapped her arms around his head and held him tight to her breast.
Her hips rose off the bed to meet his thrusting fingers. Her mind begged him for his dick, for a deeper penetration than his fingers could provide. Teaghan wanted to give in to the request but there was a method to the madness to which he subjected her.
Leaving her nipple, he trailed kisses down between her breasts and over her belly. He had to shift his position so he was beside her instead of between her legs but Jeliyah didn’t protest. She continued writhing as his fingers teased her inside.
He laid a kiss on her clit.
“Oh!” Jeliyah’s legs quaked.
Teaghan gave her tiny nub another kiss before lapping at it. It didn’t take many licks before Jeliyah vocalized her release loud enough that Teaghan was sure many, if not all, the vampires in the estate heard her.
He kept her trapped in the feeling with the fingers of one hand churning her pussy while the other hand rubbed her clit, distracting her from the pain of him pricking her inner thigh with his fangs. He pierced her femoral artery and drank deep before retreating from the wound so it bled freely.
This was the part Teaghan didn’t like. The death Jeliyah feared so much. He chose this way to make it as painless for her as possible. The rapid beat of her heart from their activity sped up her blood loss.
He stopped teasing her as her breathing slowed along with her heartbeat.
“Teaghan?” A little fear tinged her voice.
He stretched out along her side so she could feel his heat. “Right here, sweetness. Right here.”
“I…I…” She took several deep breaths before she sighed her last.
Teaghan clenched his fists, holding back the urge to shake her, to call her back. That wasn’t how it was done. He had to wait. The longest minutes of his life passed while he watched Jeliyah.
The waiting had never seemed so bad before this moment. It was a few minutes. No time at all and yet Teaghan struggled to keep his cool. Too soon and he would be making her a Renfield—alive, tied to his life and a slave. Too late and he would be making her a tombstone. It was all about timing.
Then he felt it. A tiny tickle across his senses. The spark of life. Jeliyah’s life. Her consciousness splitting from her body, preparing to move on to the hereafter, and the signal he’d been waiting for. He dragged a fingernail down his wrist before holding it over her mouth. With his free hand, he massaged her throat so she swallowed.
He stared at the wound he’d given her, willing it to close. A relieved smile curved his lips when the twin holes on her inner thigh grew skin as they healed. His bite left behind two sunken scars. The only remnants of the wound he’d made to change her. The last scars she would ever carry.
Cupping her head, Teaghan kissed Jeliyah’s lips. Soft at first. A simple reassurance she was coming back to him. Her mouth moved beneath his and he deepened the kiss, slipping his tongue over hers. Jeliyah inhaled as she circled her arms around his shoulders and returned his kiss.
“Welcome back,” he whispered.
Jeliyah blinked at him, confusion playing across her features. “Back?”
“Don’t worry if you don’t remember. Most don’t.” He kissed her again so she wouldn’t dwell on it. There was no need to remember death when he wanted to revel in life.
He rolled so he was on his back and Jeliyah was on top of him.
She still appeared confused. “Teaghan, did you do it? Am I—” She winced and touched her lip. A drop of blood appeared there before the wound closed. She’d bitten her lip with her new canines. “I…” She trailed off and touched one of her fangs.
Teaghan pulled her hand away. “Worry about that later. I’ve got something else for you to poke yourself with.” He rolled his hips, sliding his dick low across her belly.
Jeliyah’s eyes widened and darkened as hunger overtook her uncertainty. It was a hunger Teaghan shared, so he rubbed his arousal against her mons to whet her appetite.
She let her legs fall open, straddled him then slid back. Her hot pussy enveloped Teaghan’s erection and a deep rumbling growl of satisfaction left her throat. She covered her mouth.
“Yeah, that was you. Now get over it and move.” He bucked, driving to her depths in one stroke.
He wasn’t trying to be insensitive to her new situation. Okay, he was. He was hurting. The soft heat surrounding his dick made him want to roll Jeliyah over and pound her sweet slit until they were both growling their pleasure. He stayed on his back with her on top so she could control the encounter. It was his one concession to the fact that she had changed and sex would be more acute for her.
He thrust again. Jeliyah used the momentum to lift up, away from him until only his tip was treated to her softness. As though entering a boiling tub of water, Jeliyah lowered herself slowly, hesitantly. Her breath came in hitches as she took his length back into her pussy.
The long sigh that left her lips once she had him inside her again feathered across Teaghan’s chest. He was glad she could relax because he was ready to snap. When she moved again, clenching her inner muscles, squeezing his dick as she lifted up, he dug his fingers into the bed to keep from grabbing her and forcing her to go faster.
Jeliyah returned quicker than she left. The third time, her pace increased again. She panted with her face pressed against his chest as she rocked her hips. Each motion was slow. Testing. Teasing. Driving him crazy, but he took it. All the while he thought of the babbling brook he used to keep Jeliyah calm, sharing the thought with her though it was mostly for him.
He sucked in a breath when she trailed light kisses over the scar on his chest. She moved her mouth to his neck. Her new fangs scraped his skin, lingering over the throbbing vein there. His dick jumped, making Jeliyah squeak, at the thought of her biting him. A nibble made sex better for vampires. She continued her kisses to his ear and he figured she might not be ready for that just yet.
She brushe
d her lips across the edge of his mouth on her way to pressing her cheek against his. Fisting her hands where they rested on his chest, she rolled her lower body. A loud whimper of pleasure left her lips and she shuddered before she did it again. Teaghan stayed still, liking this new torture. Except it didn’t stay torture for long.
Jeliyah caught this rhythm quicker. She circled her hips as she rocked her body, riding his dick. He couldn’t help moving with her until the entire bed shook side to side with the force of their combined motions.
Faster and harder. Harder and faster. Jeliyah alternated between panting moans and hungry growling. Her nails raked along his chest, which Teaghan loved. Her momentum kept building until Teaghan had to rest a hand on the small of her back. He pressed her down, while lifting himself up, to slow her. She was tapping into her vampiric speed at the wrong time. And that was a lesson for later.
He turned his head to capture her lips as he took control of the pace, bouncing beneath her. Jeliyah whimpered into his mouth. Her whole body tightened, squeezing his dick, as she came.
“Love you,” she said, panting. “Love you.”
The hum of her necromes startled Teaghan and threw off his pace. She hadn’t taken them off when she changed to meet Niccolo. Teaghan didn’t know why they were activating now, possibly something to do with her new existence as a vampire. Since they wouldn’t sap the magic from his body and turn him into a lifeless lump, he ignored the sound to focus on Jeliyah and to make sure her first moments as a vampire were memorable. That meant multiple orgasms.
She rose to a sitting position with her hands braced on his chest and met his thrusts. Teaghan cupped her ass, kneading and guiding her. He could feel her heading toward another climax while he neared his first.
The necromes hummed louder. The vibration of the metal echoed through him from Jeliyah. Whatever it was, it felt fantastic. Teaghan had never known a necromancer’s power could create pleasure.
He opened his mouth to say so. Instead he said in unison with Jeliyah, “Resonate.”
Their gazes locked. Teaghan couldn’t look away and didn’t want to. The force of the spell weaving around them kept him and Jeliyah moving, satisfying each other until they peaked together. He lifted his hips off the bed as the force of his release seemed to drain all his strength into Jeliyah.
She shook and her inner muscles clenched around him, trying to milk more of what he didn’t have. As though her pussy realized there was nothing left and Teaghan had given all he could, Jeliyah relaxed. She collapsed against his chest with a satisfied purr.
Teaghan held her there as he eased out of her. After a little adjusting, he situated Jeliyah so she curved around his side. He liked her in that position. She hugged his waist and kissed his chest with a contented sigh that Teaghan echoed.
The hard part was over. Everything that followed was adjustment.
Chapter Ten
Jeliyah didn’t feel right. And by right, she meant the way she had gotten used to feeling for the last twenty-seven years.
“You’ll adjust. You have to relearn how to move,” Teaghan said.
“Joy,” she bit out, almost biting her tongue. Her new canines took some getting used to as well. She had to learn to talk around them without sounding as if she had a mouth full of cotton. “I don’t like that you can still hear my thoughts. I’m a vampire, not a Renfield.”
“Blame yourself for that. As soon as you changed, the connection should have closed. This is all necromancer. Probably something to do with Resonate.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know what that is or how I knew how to cast it.”
“We’ll ask Niccolo.”
After sleeping the day away, they were on their way to Niccolo’s office to show Jeliyah’s choice. It was a few hours before the deadline but neither she nor Teaghan wanted to delay, given the strange things that had been happening since her change.
One of Niccolo’s Renfields opened the door before they could knock. Niccolo sat at his desk wearing a knowing grin. “How do you feel, my dear?”
“Weird.”
He nodded and gestured to the empty chairs. “That’s to be expected. You need to learn how your body has changed—and hasn’t.”
Jeliyah sat before asking, “What’s Resonate? Have you heard of it?”
“Resonate. Why would you want to know about such an old, banned spell?”
She and Teaghan exchanged a look. He shrugged. She turned her attention back to Niccolo and said, “I cast it without meaning to after Teaghan turned me. Actually we both cast it.”
Niccolo’s eyes widened. “Why would you do that?”
“We didn’t do it on purpose.” She gestured to her rings. “I was still wearing them and we…” She shifted as her thoughts turned to her first experience as a vampire. “I was still wearing them when the change happened. I cast before I knew what I was saying.”
“Resonate is a rare spell and shouldn’t be anything to worry about. It doesn’t work unless used on a vampire on whom the necromancer has already used Recognize.”
“I have,” Jeliyah said.
At the same time, Teaghan said, “She has.”
Niccolo pulled back. “Excuse me?”
Jeliyah said, “The day I took Teaghan’s blood, I cast Recognize. It was the only way I could think to help him from afar without hitting him.”
“You cast Recognize after taking his blood?”
She didn’t know why he emphasized it the way he did but she nodded. “Yes. Why? That’s how Recognize is cast.”
Niccolo chuckled. “I doubt your campus taught you Recognize. How did you learn of it?”
“After it was found that I couldn’t get pregnant, I had a lot of free time for self-study. I spent my days in the library. That was how I learned about the Van Helsings—or what the books say about your family—and random spells not taught in class.”
“Such as?”
“Ghost Status, Recognize and a few others. Given what the spells do, it didn’t surprise me they were never taught. The books where I found them were in the old language, which isn’t taught either. I spent a lot of time self-teaching it so I could read the books. I also didn’t let on what all I learned.”
“Smart girl. It seems you broke your mind control earlier than I thought. Perhaps if they hadn’t cast you aside after finding out you couldn’t reproduce, you might not be here today.”
Jeliyah shrugged. “I’m not one to speculate different pasts and how they would change the future.”
Niccolo stood and came around the desk. Taking one of Jeliyah’s hands in his, he said, “Let me educate you, my dear. Recognize and Resonate are from the days when necromancers and vampires weren’t enemies.”
“When the fuck was that? I’m almost three hundred and don’t remember anything like that,” Teaghan said.
Niccolo nodded. “It’s older than that, enforcer. I told you already. Necromancers and vampires are two sides of the same magical coin. Almost like siblings. There was a time when we didn’t hate each other. Near the beginning when spells like Recognize and Resonate were used freely.” He smiled at them in turn. “Between mates.”
“What?” Jeliyah and Teaghan said in unison.
Their shocked synchronization set Niccolo laughing. He indulged his mirth for a few minutes before pulling in a deep breath and calming himself to talk. “Forgive me. Had I known you had cast Recognize after tasting Teaghan’s blood, I wouldn’t have forced vampirism on you, Jeliyah.”
Jeliyah asked in a chilled tone, “What?”
“You tied yourself to Teaghan that day.”
“But that…the spell is so my necromes can’t harm him.”
“True, but blood isn’t needed to do that.”
“What? But the book…the book said blood…” Her mind raced as she tried to remember what she had read. Had she overlooked something or mistranslated?
A familiar babbling brook coursed through her mind. She looked at Teaghan, who gave her a sad smile. “
Calm down, Jeliyah. Listen to Niccolo.”
She pulled in several deep breaths. To Niccolo, she said, “Explain, please.”
Niccolo said, “What you wanted to do—your necromes bringing no harm to Teaghan—didn’t require blood. Recognize is two different spells by the same name. Without blood, it gives the target vampire immunity from all necromes made with your blood. With blood, it does the same but also forges a bond between the two of you. A bond you completed when you cast Resonate.”
“A bond,” she said in a monotone.
“Yes. Your sexual relationship started shortly after Recognize, did it not?”
She nodded.
“I’ve heard Teaghan can be quite persuasive to the opposite sex but a campus-raised necromancer should have been able to resist. Am I right? Were you even remotely interested in him prior to Recognize?”
“Watch it,” Teaghan snapped.
Jeliyah thought back. She’d cast Recognize the second day. The first day, she hadn’t cared if her spells took out Teaghan and the rogue at the same time. Only her life being in danger had changed that. She said, “Not really.”
Niccolo shrugged. “Don’t feel too bad.”
“But…” She glanced at Teaghan. Was their whole relationship because of some spell?
“Recognize after blood doesn’t work on just any necromancer and vampire. In case you’re wondering. I’ve spent long years studying the old texts from the days of unity—that’s what I call it. A necromancer and a vampire wishing to forge the bond of Recognize and Resonate have to have an existing connection.”
“I just met him five days ago.”
“The connection I speak of is spiritual. A meeting of souls, if you will. Humans call it love at first sight.”
“I hated him the second I laid eyes on him.”
Teaghan snorted.
Niccolo said, “There’s a thin line between love and hate. That line gave you the ability to cast Recognize after tasting his blood and forced you to cast Resonate when your feelings aligned.”
Jeliyah found that vampires could blush when her cheeks heated. The memory of her love confession came to mind. If that wasn’t feelings aligning, she didn’t know what was. “So we’re bonded now because of Resonate?”
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