by Devyn Quinn
So close.
All it needed to emerge, to break free, was a taste . . .
Even as she fought against the dangers of falling so deeply into the chasm of complete surrender, Jesse responded to his command. Maddox slid his hand beneath her hips to raise her, bracing her more firmly against the wall. His hips ground into hers, drenching her in ripple after ripple of pleasure. Jesse felt the tide of climax begin to swell inside her, close to bursting forth in scalding waves of ecstasy.
A low growl tore from her throat as she raked her nails across his chest, harder and deeper than before. Driven by the desperation to feed, her demon lent her a strength she wouldn’t have otherwise possessed. Several deep scratches appeared, releasing a trickle onto skin already scarred by a lifetime of strife and battle. Her fingertips were stained with crimson temptation. The scent of blood and sweat heated by the intensity of sex scalded her senses. She wasn’t human anymore.
Maddox hammered her harder. Jesse’s nerves thrashed as she soared through peak after peak of rapture, each one sharper, hotter, and more intense than the one before.
Maddox leaned in closer. “Share it with me,” he begged. “Become one with me.” Each slam of his hips into hers intensified the deep throbbing friction boiling inside her core.
Having lost all awareness of herself as a human being, Jesse lifted a trembling hand. Eager to taste the succulent temptation, she smeared his blood across his lips. At the same instant, his mouth moved forcefully over hers, bringing them together and solidifying their connection in a way no other could.
But it wasn’t enough.
Fingers curling into the damp curls covering his head, Jesse wrenched back his head. The demon begged for more.
Driven to complete their joining, Jesse used her teeth to tear at Maddox’s jugular. At the cloying scent of blood, she eagerly sucked at the heated skin beneath her lips.
Maddox’s entire body tensed. Catching her by the wrists, he slammed her arms back against the wall even as a moan of elation tore past his lips. There was nothing she could do but endure the last solid thrusts of his penetration.
Trapped beneath his weight, Jesse writhed against him. Pulsating contractions closed around her even as a stream of white-hot heat poured from his body into hers. Locked down by the strength and dominance of the predatory male, she felt her pleasure splinter into a million fiery shards, spiraling through her until she was utterly consumed—body, mind, and spirit.
It took a few minutes for the heat and intensity of the moment to fade away.
Jesse slowly opened her eyes. It didn’t take her long to realize she was still pressed against the wall, her body contoured to fit the shape Maddox had molded it into. Below the waist they were still firmly joined.
He drew a deep breath. “Damn, that was intense.” Big hands brushed clinging tendrils of hair away from her forehead. “Totally awesome.”
His words and the emotion behind them prompted Jesse to blink hard, clearing away the haze floating in front of her eyes. She uttered a tiny gasp of dismay as her vision focused. Not only were Maddox’s shoulders and chest covered with a raw mass of scratches, but his mouth was also smeared with flecks of crimson. And though she hadn’t managed to break the skin, an imprint of her teeth marred his neck. Her own hands were stained with his blood.
The pleasure of the past few minutes evaporated. As she gained full use of her senses, a gasp rolled past her lips. Her heart seized in her chest. “Oh no.” The sound of her dismay echoed off the water-dampened walls of the bathroom. “I didn’t mean . . . Did I hurt you?”
Maddox’s hands clasped her waist. “I’m okay.” Guiding their bodies apart, he stepped out of the tub and lifted her after him. “You didn’t hurt me.”
Jesse glanced from her hands to the scratches in his skin. The sight wasn’t kind on her composure. Snippets of his words, spoken in the heat of passion, echoed in her mind.
Take what you want, he’d urged.
She stood motionless, frozen with shock. On the outside her skin burned, while inside she felt as if a thousand icicles had just been shoved straight through her heart. Disgust caused her stomach to roll over. “You wanted me to drink your blood.” Her words were blunt and grating against her ears. “While we were having sex.”
Guilt flared in his gaze as he fumbled to pull up and rezip his jeans. “I’m sorry,” he said, refusing to look her in the eyes. He took a deep breath and released it. “I didn’t mean for things to get that intense.”
Jesse refused to accept his words. It was a lie, outright and bald-faced. “Why would you do that to me?” she demanded. “You know how hard I fight to keep this thing from taking over.”
Even as she asked the question, she felt a stab of self-recrimination. She never would have had intercourse with him if she’d known he was going to drag her down into something so vile and tainted. But she’d wanted him and had opened herself up to the greedy, wanton desires burning in her soul.
Didn’t Maddox realize she could have, by all rules of demonic logic, ripped out his throat and saturated herself in his blood? It was true he was more than a mortal man, strong and quite capable of taking care of himself. But what he’d done was dangerous, on several levels. Like a child sneaking into the lion’s cage on a dare to pet the dangerous animal, he’d deliberately tried to bring out her inner beast. Though she’d briefly reveled in the excitement of being taken in such a primitive and painful manner, she couldn’t reconcile a moment’s pleasure with the danger in which he’d placed both of them.
It had been a stupid, reckless thing to do. But the creature inside her thankfully remained unfed. That was a small blessing, but a blessing nevertheless.
Clearly ill at ease, Maddox ran his hands through the tangled mass of damp curls brushing his shoulders. “Calm down,” he said. “You’re okay. Whatever little taste you had wasn’t enough to turn you.”
“But I don’t feel okay!” she spluttered, shocked anew. “Do you know how close I came to giving in?”
Maddox’s gaze cleared, and he smiled crookedly in an attempt to blunt the seriousness of the moment. “Nothing happened, Jesse.” His smile straightened a bit. “Well, nothing except for your coming like a wild woman.”
His reply hit like a bucketful of icy water dashed in her face. The chill inside her deepened and spread.
Despite his claim to the contrary, something had happened. Something very deep and intimate and—dare she admit it?—exciting. Their lovemaking had stirred the ashes of the night she was taken, rekindling the dormant embers of the forbidden rites involving sex and blood, darkly sensual yet soul-numbingly terrifying to undergo. An image of herself sprawled naked and wildly aroused as a dozen mouths suckled at her chilled flesh flashed through her mind.
Jesse quickly thrust the haunting memory away. Though her knees trembled, she forced herself to keep steady and standing. “I don’t want to be a beast that feeds on men as I make love to them,” she said through half-clenched teeth. “I just want to be me, a human woman with a woman’s feelings and desires.”
A strange look crept across Maddox’s face, an expression akin to sorrow or perhaps grief. He lifted a hand, pressing his palm against her cheek. His touch, so warm and solid, should have offered some reassurance. Oddly, it did not.
“Human is something you’ll never be again,” he said softly. “And until you come to terms with what’s inside you, you’ll never be whole.”
Jesse was immediately taken aback. “That’s a hell of a thing to say.”
Maddox paused. “What I’m trying to say is that you do the best you can with what you’ve got. You’ve been touched by evil, but that doesn’t mean the rest of your life has to be misery and damnation. If you think of it that way, all misery and damnation, it’ll just grind your soul down to dust.”
As if she didn’t already feel that way. All of a sudden she didn’t want to touch him or look at him.
“I really don’t need you to remind me.”
Madd
ox shifted his weight forward. A hand sliding under her chin tilted her head back with ease. “I didn’t mean to be an asshole,” he said in the gentlest voice.
She shook her head, clutching her arms tighter against her bare breasts.
Stepping incrementally closer, he slipped his hands around her hips. “I want you to know that I see you. I know what you are. And I’ll help you figure it out every step of the way.” Tightening his grip, he refused to let her wriggle away.
Jesse tried to avoid his mouth as his came down over hers, but his hold was tight and his lips forceful. His tongue efficiently parried with hers, reminding her how futile resistance might be. He was still bigger than she was—and stronger.
She allowed her own tongue to join the fray, tasting the lingering flecks of blood still clinging to his lips. The demon’s appetite flared again, hotter and hungrier than before.
Jesse thrust the beast toward the darker recesses of her mind.
It wouldn’t feed today.
For now the only thing she wanted was to satisfy the urges of a body too long neglected.
Chapter 11
Several hours passed before Jesse was to waken from her pleasure-induced sleep. She’d spent the day in bed with Maddox. Stripping off every stitch, they lay entwined together on the bed, drifting in and out of lovemaking as the day passed. To cool the narrow, stuffy rooms, he’d extinguished the heat-producing oil lamps, plunging the windowless refuge into complete darkness. The air around them had grown markedly cooler as the sun arced toward the western edge of the sky. By the time the shadows of dusk had begun to creep in, the underground lair was positively chilly.
Feeling goose bumps spread across her skin, Jesse sighed and snuggled closer to Maddox. No nightmares had disturbed her rest. No dreams of any kind had intruded.
He stirred, laying a familiar hand on her bare hip. “You awake?”
She nodded. “Yeah.” A yawn followed. “What time is it?”
“No idea,” he mumbled. “But I can find out.”
Rolling out of her arms, he fumbled in the darkness. A lighter flared soon after, and a lamp was lit. The cloak of gloom crept away, dissolving into shadows that waltzed across the walls.
Jesse slowly sat up. Her knees, back, and rear felt chafed and raw. The whiteness of her skin was mottled with noticeable bruises. The area between her thighs throbbed, but not unpleasantly so. He’d taken her with no restraint.
“It’s just after seven thirty.”
Her brows rose. “At night?”
“Sure is.” Maddox started rummaging for his discarded clothing. Ignoring the need for underwear, he stepped into a pair of jeans and hitched them up over his narrow hips.
She spread her fingers through her tangled hair, trying to tame some of the rats. “The day went away.”
He pulled on a T-shirt. “Yes,” he said flatly, and pulled it down to cover the scratches in his skin. “Sure did.”
Jesse sat motionless, watching him dress. The earlier intimacy they’d shared seemed to have vanished, replaced by a huge empty void of disinterest. Now that sex was over, he appeared intent on putting some distance between them.
Slipping off the bed, she began to sort through the pile of her own clothing. Each small movement she made emphasized the empty ache inside her. Though she wouldn’t dare tell him, he was only the second man she’d ever had sex with. While he probably had a ton of experience, she could still count on one hand the number of times she’d made love.
What did I do wrong? she thought.
Had he been untouched by the lust they’d unleashed together? Could a man honestly do all he had done to her and not be transformed in some way? While she wasn’t expecting him to fall down on his knees and declare his undying devotion, a little acknowledgment would have been nice. He could have offered a nice peck on the cheek before he’d gotten out of bed. As it stood, he was practically giving her the cold shoulder.
Jesse shivered as she pulled on her clothes. Maddox deValois had centuries of training to harden himself against needing anyone or anything. She was but an infant in this respect.
You’d better toughen up, she warned herself. It’s probably not going to get any easier.
It was the best advice she could give herself. People were born alone, and they died alone. Expecting anyone to be available in the interim was obviously a pipe dream. When push came to shove, a girl had to depend on her own wits. She’d gotten along fine without him. Hell, they’d barely known each other two days. If he told her to hit the road, well, she supposed she’d start walking. While he’d said he’d be there to see her through, she didn’t have to be an old or wise woman to know men often lost the ability to think when the blood in their heads rushed to their dicks. In the heat of the moment people often said things they didn’t mean.
She should have known better. Listening to a guy whispering sweet nothings in her ear as he’d groped under her prom dress was part of the reason she’d lost her virginity.
Of course, Maddox was a hell of a lot more than a clumsy teenager. The things he’d done to her had taken her breath away—and then some.
Sneaking a glance his way, she felt her breath lodge in her throat. It sure would be hard as hell not to look back, though. His touch had been possessive, his cock like a red-hot iron searing her insides. When he’d taken her, he’d branded her as his own.
Another thought suddenly occurred. Wasn’t he similarly marked? Hadn’t she ripped through his flesh with her nails, tasted his blood on his lips? It was true. She’d made the same impact on his body that he’d left on hers.
She quickly tamped down her emotions, as exposed and raw as an open wound. All this thinking was beginning to give her a headache, not to mention the empty space in her stomach gnawing on her backbone. It dimly occurred to her that she hadn’t eaten since yesterday. There wasn’t a morsel of food in the place, either.
Finished dressing, she straightened. “Everything okay?” She made an attempt to keep her tone light and noncommittal.
“Sure.” Something akin to a smile crept across his lips. “I have to go out for a while, though.”
That perked her interest. “Hunting?”
Maddox offered a weak smile. “Just some errands.” Digging into his hip pocket, he dug out his wallet and a twenty. “There’s no food in the place. You might want to get out, get yourself something to eat.”
Jesse shook her head. “Keep it. I still have most of what you gave me.”
He grunted and tucked the bill away. “I need to get out,” he said. “Get some air.”
She shrugged with pretend indifference. “Okay.”
“You don’t mind?”
Another shrug. “Why should I? You’re a grown man. I suppose you’re going to do what you want, whenever you want to.”
Clearly surprised by her refusal to cling like a vine, he looked at her with grudging respect. “Yeah,” he allowed. “I pretty much come and go as I want.”
She continued her air of nonchalance. “I’m sure I can find some way to entertain myself.” To make sure he understood she could be just as aloof, she pushed the proverbial thorn a little deeper into his side. “It’s not as if I need someone leading me around by the nose.”
Maddox stared at her a moment. “No,” he said finally. “I don’t suppose you do.” That said, he slipped on a plain black denim jacket and walked away.
Jesse had only a second to snag her own before heading after him. Passing through the ruined lounge, she caught up with him as he wrestled the grate away from the face of the small crawl space. Hefting himself up, he shimmied through the hole with the grace of a cat on the prowl.
His hand poked back through. “Come on, and I’ll give you a lift.”
Jesse refused. “I can do it myself.” Jumping up, she caught the edges of the crawl space. It took more than a minute for her to heft her weight through the opening, but she finally managed to work her way to the outside. By the time she climbed to her feet, she was a sweating, dirt
y mess.
“Thought you’d never make it,” he deadpanned.
She wiped her brow. “Shit. That’s harder than it looks.”
“You still need to work on building your strength. You have a good solid middle and legs, but your arms are like sticks.”
Frustration gushed past her lips. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
They walked toward the mouth of the alley. The sky was blocked out by a mass of rumbling gray clouds. Thunder boomed in the far distance. A flash of lightning warned of the storm to come. The last thing anyone living in New Orleans wanted to see was another catastrophic storm. The city had experienced enough hard knocks to last for the rest of the century.
In many ways, the cracked sidewalks and crumbling buildings resembled what she imagined a post-apocalyptic world would look like—barren, ruined, almost completely devoid of life. Squatters, the derelict dregs of society, holed up in old buildings. Some slept; some were passed out or too drugged to move. More than a few were caught in the grip of eternal rest, dead where they lay. It might be months before anyone thought to report the body, if at all.
By night the neighborhood began to change. Roused out of their stupor, the derelicts slipped out onto the disintegrating asphalt to peddle their wares and prey upon one another. Drugs, booze, flesh—all the temptations were there, ready to be plucked from the gnarled tree of society’s decay.
Jesse fought to quell a nervous shiver as they moved away from the safety of the old hotel. It wasn’t hard to imagine any one of the people loitering around on the street sneaking up behind her to slip an arm around her neck before dragging her off into the shadows. The men all looked mean, dirty, and definitely unwelcoming. And the women . . . Well, they looked trampy, trashy, and diseased.
Maddox laid a hand on her arm. “This isn’t the best place to be at night.” He reached into an inside pocket of his jacket, then pressed a smooth, slender object into her hand. “If anyone gives you trouble, you’re going to have to take care of yourself.”
