Haunted by the King of Death

by Heaton, Felicity

He was torn between two cravings—one for her blood and one for her love.

  He needed this soft touch and that look in her blue eyes that warmed even the coldest reaches of his heart.

  He needed it more than blood.

  Now he understood why Snow loved Aurora so damned much.

  He thought he had loved others, but Isla had made him see that he had never loved someone, not the way he loved her. He loved her like crazy, a man gone mad when he was with her and insane when they were apart for even a second. She was everything to him, filling his world with light that had given way to a terrible darkness when she had left him, a black void that had given his bloodlust a fiercer hold over him, for one reason.

  She was the only one he had ever given enough of himself to, who had ever had enough of him to break his heart.

  “I know,” she murmured softly. “You do not need to say anything… but I know you also showed me those things to punish me… and I deserved it.”

  He caught her wrist and drew her hand away from his mouth, and whispered, “Isla.”

  She shook her head. “Let me finish. I deserved it. I never should have turned my back on you… and I do not expect you to forgive me… but I need you to know it hurt me as much as it hurt you… I wish…”

  She lowered her eyes to his chest and he hovered on the brink of demanding to know what she wished, because he wasn’t sure he could bear her silence and not knowing.

  Her eyes slipped shut.

  “I wish I had not done it… I wish I had not left you, Grave.”

  The moment her blue eyes opened, seeking his, he tugged her back down to him and kissed her, unable to deny the need for her that had always burned so brightly in his heart but now blazed like an inferno, given new life by her words and the feelings that had been in her eyes, emotions that flowed through their mating mark too and echoed his own.

  He couldn’t play their vicious game anymore either.

  Life seemed too short to waste it taking pot shots at each other’s heart when all they really wanted was to erase the years they had been apart and forget they had ever happened.

  She moaned and sank against him, and he kissed along her jaw, teased her left earlobe with the tip of his tongue and shivered as her breath skated over his neck and her hands shook against his shoulders.

  “Grave,” she whispered, the tremble in her voice his undoing, shattering his control.

  He would take them back to the start, to where it had all began, and this time they would do it right.

  He brushed his lips across her neck.

  Opened his mouth.

  Sank his fangs in deep.

  CHAPTER 16

  Sweet gods.

  Isla’s cry of pleasure was almost too much for Grave. Combined with the way she trembled in his arms, the bliss he could feel in her through their bond and the taste of her on his tongue, he was on the verge of release already and they were only just getting started. He was damned if his first time with her in close to a century was going to end with him climaxing in his trousers.

  But the taste of her.

  Sweet gods, the taste of her.

  He thought he had remembered it clearly, but the reality was far more intoxicating than his memory of it. Her blood had a taste like the fragrance of honeysuckle and night dew, with a rich undernote of smokiness like morning mist that curled through his senses as he fed from her vein. He couldn’t get enough of her or the way she writhed against him, rubbing his aching cock through his trousers. It strained against his fly, even the slightest brush too much for him to bear, sending hot shivers tripping through his entire body.

  Isla moaned into his ear.

  Too much.

  He tore his fangs from her throat and kissed her, pouring the need coursing through him into it, needing her to feel what she did to him. What only she did to him. No other female had made him feel the way she did, had made him lose control with only a press of her body against his or even a single sultry bloody glance in his direction.

  Isla had total power over him, and he was a willing slave to her, a male who couldn’t get enough of her.

  Would never get enough of her.

  They could have a thousand years and he would still crave a thousand more with her.

  He swallowed her gasp as he rolled her over, ending up wedged between her leather-clad thighs. The material was soft and smooth beneath his fingers as he palmed her backside with his left hand, his thoughts leaping ahead to touching her in the same place when she was naked and he was inside her, holding her backside off the bed so he could drive deep into her just the way she loved it.

  “Grave,” she murmured against his lips, a husky plea for more.

  He growled and kissed her harder, silencing her with his tongue. She fought him with hers, battled him for control in a way that had always stoked his need to startling heights. Her hands pressed against his shoulders and he snarled again, grabbed her shoulders with both of his hands and then her arms. He pinned them to the dirty grey bedclothes above her head and she moaned and writhed beneath him, her chest lifting to press her breasts against his chest.

  Gods.

  Grave gathered both of her wrists into one hand, leaned away from her and yanked hard on the bottom of her blue leather corset. Her breasts sprang free of the top and he groaned at the sight of them and the way her dusky nipples puckered in the cool air.

  Isla moaned again and arched her back, raising her breasts towards him.

  As if he would refuse such an invitation.

  He snarled as he swooped on her left breast, pulling the taut bead into his mouth, and groaned as she cried out, the sound of her pleasure filling the room. He drank every whispered moan and sweet cry, teased her nipple with his teeth to elicit more for him to devour and savour.

  His sweet Isla.

  She responded to him so beautifully, her pleasure mastering him even as he mastered her body.

  Her moans only grew louder as he skimmed his hand down the flat of her belly to the waist of her trousers. She raised her hips, rocking against his touch as he pulled at the leather laces to undo them and then tugged at them, loosening them enough for him to slip his hand inside.

  His fingers found her moist core and slipped between her plush petals to tease the tight bud of nerves there as his teeth teased her left nipple.

  Isla jacked off the bed and shuddered, and her keening cry drove him over the edge of control, deep into the fierce desire that had always ruled them both, a wicked hunger that was never sated and never controlled. Both of them could only hold it at bay for a short time, neither ever able to master it. It was consuming, powerful and intoxicating.

  It was love.

  Love in its deepest, purest and wildest form.

  It blazed inside him, burned so ferociously he could only hope to leash it enough to retain some sense of self, so he didn’t become a complete slave to sensation and need, to the hunger that raged so beautifully within him, a tempest of love and passion.

  He squeezed the sensitive bud between his fingers and Isla tried to wrestle free of his grip, arched her hips and moaned for more. She didn’t need to rush. He would see to it that she found release, the most powerful one he could give to her.

  She stilled when he released her nipple and kissed across to her other one, teased it with a flick of his tongue, and then eased down her body. Her hands slipped free of his grip and he skimmed his fingers down one arm and under the curve of her breast as he stepped off the bed.

  Gods, she was beautiful like that, her arms held above her head, white hair spilling across the sheets, and her rosy lips swollen from his kisses and her breasts on show. He growled, caught her hips and shoved her up the bed, so her head hit the pillow. Her little gasp was music to his ears, driving him on together with the way her eyes darkened a full shade, her pupils devouring the blue as they dilated.

  He stroked his hands over her waist and slowly lowered them to her hips again, and her eyes dropped to follow them, her lips par
ting as he slipped his fingers into the waist of her blue leather trousers.

  Her breath hitched.

  Grave eased her leathers down, torn between looking at her face and watching the beautiful way desire flared across her delicate features, and watching as he revealed her body to his hungry eyes.

  When she lifted her bottom from the bed and he pulled her leathers past it, he couldn’t stop himself from looking.

  He groaned as his eyes found Heaven at the apex of her thighs, a soft neat thatch of white curls that glistened with the evidence of her desire, need for him.

  Need he would fulfil for her.

  He yanked at her trousers until they hit her boots, and growled at the cursed obstruction.

  Isla was on them immediately, sitting up and tearing into her left boot. Grave smiled at her enthusiasm and then attacked her right boot. He tossed it away a second after she threw her one across the room. She shoved at her trousers and he pulled them free of her legs and turned slightly to throw them onto the chair.

  When he turned back, he stilled, his heart hammering against his chest and cock going painfully hard in his trousers.

  Isla crawled up the bed away from him, her pert backside on show.

  A feral snarl escaped him as his control snapped and she gasped as he grabbed her ankle and pulled her back to him, dragging her to the edge of the bed. She tried to turn but he snagged her around the waist and pulled her up to him, pinning her back to his chest. She stilled and pressed back against him, and he kissed her shoulder as he caressed her stomach and then down her hips.

  A moan trembled on her lips.

  He shifted his hands forwards and she shook as he eased one between her thighs and tugged them apart. Her breath came quicker as he lowered his other hand between them and found her bundle of nerves again, starting a slow teasing stroke that took his fingers from there to her core and back again.

  “Grave,” Isla murmured, need echoing in her voice and his veins.

  He lifted his free hand and tugged her hair away from her back, twisting it into his fist. The intricate mark on her back shimmered, pulsing with faint light. A mark that matched his. He groaned and kissed it, ran his tongue over it to trace each line, and savoured the way Isla reacted, little breathless moans escaping her as she spiralled towards her climax.

  She never had been able to handle him doing this.

  Her mark was more sensitive than his, especially when she was aroused.

  Her moans deepened and she rocked her hips into his hand.

  He stilled.

  Growled as need went through him, a hunger he could no longer deny.

  He tore at his trousers, shoved them down and groaned when his cock sprang free. He had it wedged between her buttocks before she could even gasp and rubbed between them, his moans joining hers as he held her in place, one fist in her hair and the other between her thighs. Gods. She was cool against him, but the touch of her flesh against his still seemed to warm him. He shuddered, need wracking him, riding him harder.

  Isla shoved him back over the edge.

  She pressed her hips back against his.

  Grave snarled, grabbed his cock and the back of her neck and pushed her forwards. He dipped his body, rubbed the blunt head of his length down the seam of her backside and found her hot core. He groaned and shook as he felt how wet she was for him and smelled the scent of her need. Isla trembled, body quivering around his as he eased into her, too lost in the feel of her gloving him to rush when he had wanted to drive hard and deep before.

  He grunted as he hit as deep as he could go and pulled her back up to him, so her back was flush against his front.

  Sweet gods.

  It had been a long time since he had been with her, but he hadn’t been prepared for this. She was so tight around him, clutching his cock, her juices seeping down his rigid length to his balls.

  “Grave,” she moaned and rotated her hips.

  Too much.

  He snarled against her shoulder, grabbed her thighs with both hands and pulled them apart, so he could go deeper again, so she would feel all of him and know what she did to him.

  She cried out as he thrust hard into her, making her take every inch.

  She trembled, body flexing around his when he stilled, goading him into giving her more. Oh, he would give it to her and it wasn’t going to be gentle. They never had been very good at tender or sweet. Never. Their passion and need always slipped the leash and overwhelmed them.

  Right now, he had no control, not even a fraction of it to hold himself back. A century. A century of waiting for her. A century of needing her. It all rolled into this one moment.

  He twisted her hair into his left fist and held her hip with his right hand, and drove into her, lifting her knees off the bed each time he filled her. She moaned and sagged against him, her hands coming up to skim over her breasts as they bounced with each hard plunge of his cock into her core. He yanked her head back and sucked on her neck as he thrust into her, losing himself in the feel of her and the connection that sparked to life between them, growing stronger and running deeper in his veins, until he could feel every drop of her pleasure as it rolled through her, slowly building towards a crescendo.

  Her right hand dropped between her thighs and he grunted as she arched forwards, pulled her hair to keep her in place as he took her, sliding deeper still with each long hard stroke of his cock. She moaned and whimpered, and he almost joined her when her fingers teased his length as he pumped into her, dropped to his balls and tugged them.

  Sweet mercy.

  He grunted again, little more than a snarl in his throat as she fondled him and his balls tightened, release rising as he soared higher.

  Grave grabbed her right breast and pulled her shoulders back to him, lost himself in devouring her shoulder with wet kisses and blunt teeth as he drove into her and she played with his sac, rolling and tugging, stroking and teasing. Damn.

  His fangs ached and he sank them deep into her shoulder.

  Isla cried out and quivered, her body pulsing around his cock and hot release scalding him. Bliss flowed through their link, a fire that swept through his blood like an inferno, and he snarled into her shoulder as he pulled on her blood, drawing more of her into him. She cried out again, jerking in his arms, shaking so fiercely he could barely keep hold of her as she shattered, consumed by the release he had silently promised her.

  One that had her going boneless in his arms.

  He shuddered and managed a few more thrusts into her quivering core before stars exploded across his eyes and detonated in his blood, wildfire heat shooting through him. He trembled as fiercely as his cock as he spilled inside her, his entire body quaking and his knees becoming rubber beneath him.

  They hit the edge of the mattress, his cock slipping from her body, still pulsing with release, and he barely managed to land on the bed and not the floor.

  Grave stared at the ceiling, breathing hard, his whole being shaking from the force of his release—body and soul.

  Isla slumped onto the bed and rolled towards him, her soft breath teasing his bare skin. When she shuffled closer, her breasts pressing against his chest and her right leg coming to rest over his, heat stirred in his blood, born of the hunger for her that he could never sate.

  He groaned as his length twitched, already eager for more.

  Her soft hand dropped to it, fingers stroking upwards from his balls to the tip, and he shuddered and moaned as his eyes slipped shut and pleasure rolled through him.

  Gods, she would be the death of him.

  But that was a risk he was more than happy to take.

  He pulled her on top of him and claimed her mouth in a fierce kiss.

  CHAPTER 17

  Isla found it difficult to concentrate on the conversation between Grave and Snow as they stood in the cobbled street outside the small inn. Her body still buzzed from being with Grave, tingled in all the best places, and she couldn’t keep her eyes off him or her thoughts away f
rom tempting him into another encore, even when she knew she should be listening to the information Snow had gathered during his outing.

  Apparently he had gone to fetch blood for Grave. The immense white-haired male hadn’t seemed surprised when he had returned to find Grave fed though. He had simply slid a knowing look at her, even though she had bathed and her hair had been down, concealing the fresh sets of marks on her skin. Her cheeks heated again as his pale blue eyes settled on her briefly before shifting back to his cousin.

  Grave frowned and looked her way too. The second his eyes met hers, that frown melted away, his dark eyebrows smoothing and his pupils dilating as he stared at her. Her blush burned hotter and she looked away from him, casting her eyes down to her boots. The blue leather was a rich contrast against the black cobbles. Fascinating.

  Her mate’s eyes left her and he began talking with Snow again, and Isla tried to find her voice to participate in their conversation about the demon and where to look next.

  This was her mission too now. She wanted vengeance, and nothing would stop her from having it. She would make the demon pay for taking her family from her.

  Family.

  Her fingers traced the twined leather around her right wrist.

  She needed to report back to Frey and check on him. He was going to be disappointed when he discovered that she hadn’t been able to get the mage to cast a new spell on her to stop her from fading, but hopefully her new plan to save herself might give him some relief in a difficult time. She didn’t want him worrying about her when he had the weight of a kingdom on his shoulders.

  She was sure her plan would succeed.

  Melia had given her everything she needed to save herself but she had been too stubborn, and too afraid of getting her feelings for Grave trampled on, to walk that route. Now, she bravely trod it, determined to make it happen.

  Her sister had told her that the bond she had created needed periodic strengthening, a renewal of sorts, and that was exactly what she was going to do.

  Well, it was exactly what she was doing.

  Last night with Grave had only been the start, and she already felt stronger. Did Grave feel it too?