Except the sound wasn’t a drumbeat, Logan realized as he recognized it at last.
Heartbeats. Hers and his. He could hear their hearts beating, even over the sighing thunder of the ocean.
His hearing had become far more sensitive. All his senses had sharpened, which was why the night seemed so bright.
Wondering, Logan spread his fingers across the comforter. He could feel each fiber beneath his fingers. And the air smelled of salt and wind and . . . something delicious. Sex and magic and blood.
And woman.
Giada.
His limp cock stirred on his belly. Something else moved in his mouth. Frowning, Logan ran his tongue along his teeth. Fangs. He had fangs. They’d emerged at the scent of Giada on the wind.
Yeah, he thought. I’m a vampire.
He caught his breath as a sudden compulsion engulfed him—the need to touch Giada, to drink in her scent and taste her skin. He rolled over onto his hands and knees, felt the distinct tremble in his thighs, and decided he wasn’t up to standing.
So he crawled.
Still looking a little dazed, she watched him come. The closer he got, the stronger her seductive scent grew. When he reached her at last, he cuddled in against her side and buried his nose in her hair to drink in that intoxicating smell.
His cock, stone-hard again, nudged her hip. He shuddered. Her skin felt impossibly fine-grained against his body, like sun-warmed silk.
Almost as intrigued as he was aroused, Logan touched her, stroking his fingertips over her delicate nipples, across the jut of her hip and the soft flesh between her thighs. The beat of her heart picked up speed, taking on urgency with every thump. The perfume of her body intensified, his cock jerking in reaction.
And his fangs ached, as demanding as his erection. Hungry for her.
Giada caught her breath as Logan stroked her, his gaze wondering, as if he’d never touched a woman before. Amazement softened his dark eyes and the line of his mouth. His nostrils flared, as if to drink in the smell of her skin, her hair. He lowered his head and licked one nipple, then sighed in pleasure at the taste.
“You remind me of a cat in catnip,” Giada told him, and giggled as he found a particularly sensitive spot with his fingers.
“I feel like one, too.” He nuzzled her breast, then cupped it. “The way you smell. The way you taste. I’ve never experienced anything like it.” He took her nipple into his mouth and began to suck. His eyelids drifted shut, his expression one of pure delight.
After the physical storm of his transition, she’d have thought herself too drained for arousal. Yet each touch, each flick of his tongue, each caress sent another hot little flame licking along her nerves. Giada squirmed at the growing heat. “Logan . . .” She reached for him.
His hands snapped around her wrists, pinning them to the comforter as he reared over her. A low, feral growl sounded, more like Smoke’s than anything human. His gaze burned into hers as he settled between her legs. With a moan of helpless arousal, she hooked her ankles over his butt, opening herself for him.
He drove into her, the thrust jolting her. Giada caught her breath. He filled her so mercilessly full. His cock felt hot within her, and his big body surrounded her in heat and strength.
Logan began to stroke, long, deep, hard. Still holding her wrists pinned, he settled against her, so close she could feel his breath on her throat. His lips opened, and she felt the prick of fangs. He’s going to bite me, she thought, surprised when the idea brought only a thrill of arousal. She threw back her head, inviting him to do whatever he wanted. “Yes,” she whispered. “Do it. Do it now.”
And he was gone.
Startled, Giada lifted her head, feeling suddenly cold without his heat. The sea wind raised goose bumps across her naked body. “Logan?”
It took her a moment to spot him. He stood at the edge of the water, wavelets foaming around his ankles. His shoulders looked tight as bridge cables, and his hands were fisted at his sides.
She sat up and flipped one corner of the comforter over her body, seeking its warmth as she frowned at him. “What’s the matter?”
“I almost bit you.” He sounded shaken.
“Uh, yeah. You’re a vampire. It comes with the territory.”
He turned, and she frowned at the torment on his face. “What if I hurt you?”
“You won’t. Besides, I’m a Maja.” She grinned, trying to lighten the moment. “If you do something I don’t like, I can turn you into a frog.”
“You don’t understand.” Despite his obvious worry, his cock bobbed, still fully erect. When he spoke, she saw the tips of his fangs. “I don’t just want you. Giada, I hunger for you.”
“Good. I hunger for you right back.”
Logan whirled to face the ocean as if he didn’t trust himself to look at her any longer. “For God’s sake, put on some clothes. My control isn’t that good.” His voice dropped. “And you’re too damned beautiful.”
Giada blinked, impossibly flattered. There was no doubt he meant every word. She opened her mouth to say something flip, then frowned and shut it again. His hands were shaking, and it looked as if every muscle in his body was drawn tight in his battle for control.
By all rights, she should be afraid. After all, he was a big, powerful man even for a human. As a vampire, he had superhuman strength he hadn’t yet learned to control. Between that and the fact that the hunger of new vampires was powerful enough to drive some of them mad . . .
She really should be afraid.
But she wasn’t. Now all she had to do was convince him to trust himself as much as she did. Which was more than a little ironic, since she’d told him not an hour ago that she didn’t trust him.
Seems she’d lied to both of them.
“Logan.” Giada moved up behind him and touched his strong, naked back. He trembled under her hand.
“Giada, please.” He gritted the words through set teeth. “Gate out. Gate out now. I don’t want to hurt you, dammit.”
“You won’t.”
He shot a tormented look over his shoulder at her. “I could.” His eyes caught the moonlight, flashing red.
“Yeah, you could. But you won’t.” Giada looked up at him, hoping her serene certainty showed on her face. “I know you, Logan. You’re a strong man, a good man, and you won’t lose control.”
He stared at her. “You sound so damned sure.”
“Because I am. Your body may have changed, but Merlin’s Gift didn’t touch your soul. You’re still the same man you’ve always been. Just like your father.”
As she spoke, his gaze dropped to her throat and lingered there, hunger flashing nakedly across his face. He dragged his eyes away. “I’m not my father. I’ve never been that strong.”
“Oh, bullshit.”
He blinked, startled at the uncharacteristic curse, and looked at her just as she’d intended.
“You just transformed, Logan. You’re hungry because your body needs blood.”
“I’ll go to the Lords’ Club.” A muscle flexed in his jaw, and he turned to stare at the horizon again. “They’ve got bottled blood there.”
“Bottled blood won’t work for your first time. You don’t just need blood, you need the magic you’ll get from me. You know that.” She took a step closer until one bare breast brushed his arm. “Just as you know Majae need to donate blood as much as vampires need to drink it. I haven’t donated in weeks.”
He frowned, dragged out of his absorption with his own transformed body. “Giada, that’s dangerous. You’ve got to at least bottle it every couple of weeks, or you could end up having a stroke.”
“Exactly.” Deliberately, she laid a hand on his shoulder. His skin felt almost hot enough to burn, blazing with a fever of need. “That’s why I want to give it to you. Now.”
Logan had never felt such hunger. His hands shook with the driving need to take her, to press his fangs into her throat and feel her blood fill his mouth. To gulp hot red life from her veins.
He thought of the junkies he’d met in his law enforcement career—people willing to whore or steal or kill for whatever drug held them in thrall. He’d always felt nothing but contempt for those people.
Now he understood. And he realized the only difference between them and him was he’d never known that kind of razor-blade need.
Now he did.
He thought about all the debased things he’d seen junkies do—the lies, the casual betrayals of family and friends and lovers. A junkie’s drug was a jealous god that permitted no love of anyone or anything else.
Which was why he had to get the hell away from Giada and her soft, tempting throat. He turned and started to walk away, ignoring his body’s frustrated howl of need.
“Damn you, Logan MacRoy.” He’d never heard her sound so furious, not even when she’d thrown him out of her house.
He kept going.
The spell hit him in an explosion of sparks. The next thing he knew, he lay spread-eagled in the middle of the comforter. He tried to roll to his feet again, only to find himself pinned.
He lifted his head to see bands of golden light binding his wrists and ankles. “What the fuck is this?”
Giada walked over to stand over him, her fists propped on her hips, irritation on her lovely face. “What does it look like, you big idiot?”
To his horror, she straddled his hips and coolly settled herself on top of him. Sweeping her hair aside with one hand, she positioned herself so that her throat touched his mouth. Every square inch of the rest of her lay spread over him—soft naked breasts pressing against his chest, her wet sex against his erect cock, her long legs clasping his hips.
His body roared. Fangs, cock, demon hunger all clamoring to take her now.
“Get off me!” He bore down hard, clinging to his self-control like a drowning man grasping a life preserver. He was not going to kill her, dammit.
Her only reply was a tempting little wriggle. The feel of her nipples brushing his chest, her mound rubbing his shaft—Sweet Jesu, it was pure, distilled torture. And the scent of her skin rolled over him with every breath he took, so exotic, so sweet, all sex and magic, begging him to sink his aching fangs deep.
No. I will not. Logan began to fight his magical bonds, trying to rip free, but they held him fast when solid steel would have ripped like paper.
Maybe he could reason with her. “Giada, I dreamed about this. Twice. Both times, you were tied up and . . .”
She lifted her head and looked at him, surprise on her face. “Was I lying on my stomach with my wrists bound behind me? And the second time you had an ostrich feather, and then you . . .”
He stared at her in horror. “And then I ripped out your throat.”
Her head rocked back. “No, you didn’t. God, what a revolting idea.”
“Giada, I had the same dream, the same vision. And I killed you both times.”
“Then it obviously couldn’t have been a vision, could it? Not even a Maja can die twice. Besides, vampires don’t have visions. Majae have visions, and the only thing I saw was both of us having one hell of an orgasm.”
He stared up at her. “Giada, I can’t take the risk.”
“It isn’t a risk, Logan. You’re not going to kill me.” She leaned down and kissed him, softly, with breathtaking tenderness.
He didn’t dare move. Images from the dream roared through his head in blood and horror.
“Logan,” Giada breathed against his mouth. “Sweetheart, it’s all right. Somehow we linked as we dreamed, but your mind turned it into a nightmare. You won’t hurt me.”
“But what if I do?” Another minute ticked by, savage in its torment. He clamped his teeth shut. Giada squirmed against him, sweet and merciless and delightfully naked.
Another minute. Another. He lost track of time, shaking in his bonds like a man in the grip of malaria.
Another minute. “Giada,” he gasped. “Giada, please!”
She made no response other than that luscious, vicious little wiggle.
Eternity ticked by like sand in an hourglass falling in slow motion.
“I can’t help but notice,” she said at last, sounding a little hoarse, “that I’m still alive. Shouldn’t you have ripped out my throat by now?”
He said a few words he’d never used to a woman in his entire life. Dad, who had never touched him in anger, would have beaten his ass with a sword sheath. He didn’t care.
“Wow, that was inventive.” Giada sounded amused, damn her. “You do realize I dropped the spell ten minutes ago. The only thing holding you still is you.”
Giada sat up. To his shock, her face was wet with tears. She stood, turned on her heel, and started to walk away. “Do whatever the hell you want. I’m done.”
Logan was on his feet before he realized it, so fast he stumbled. He caught himself and strode after her. Grabbing her by one delicate shoulder, he spun her around and hauled her into his arms. “Why did you do that?” he demanded into her hair. “I could have hurt you!”
“No, actually you couldn’t.” Her voice sounded stuffy with tears. “That was kind of the point, jackass. You don’t have it in you to hurt a woman. Vampire or not, you’re the strongest man I know.” She laughed, sounding a little watery. “Maybe not the smartest man I know, but definitely the strongest.”
She was right. Including the part about him being a bit dim.
The realization rolled over him, abrupt and startling. He wasn’t going to hurt Giada when he fed. If he’d lacked that kind of strength, he’d have lost it the minute she put her throat against his teeth.
Logan wasn’t Jimmy Cordino. He’d met others like Jimmy as a cop; he should have recognized the kid’s type long ago. Jimmy had been a twenty-one-year-old idiot with a psychopathic streak the Majae really should have sensed before they authorized his receipt of the Gift. And I’m none of those things. Not kid, not psychopath, and not out of control.
It was time to prove it. He caught Giada’s delicate chin and tilted her head up. Lowered his own. And bit, making it as fast and clean as he knew how.
She breathed a purr as his own senses exploded with the taste, the scent, the raw eroticism of possessing Giada. Blood filled his mouth, and he swallowed, shuddering at the searing intensity, the pumping, amazing pleasure. The beat of her heart was loud in his ears, a pounding throb. He realized he could monitor how much he took from the strength of the sound.
So he forced himself to slow down, spin it out, listening carefully, trying to keep his attention on the beat rather than his own rioting senses. It was hard—Merlin’s Cup, it was as hard as his cock—but after the lesson in self-control she’d just given him, he knew he was up to the job.
Feeling more confident, he cupped one exquisite breast. And began to drink in earnest.
Giada’s eyes widened in stunned delight as his lips moved on her throat, gently reverent.
It wasn’t the first time she’d fed a vampire. There’d been the Magus who’d given her the Gift—right now she couldn’t even remember his name—but that had been nothing like this exquisite worship.
Logan’s lips moved so softly on her skin as his fingers caressed her breast, teasing pleasure from her nipple with gentle little squeezes. His other hand slipped down her belly, found her lower lips, slid between. She arched, sucking in a breath as he started tracing lazy circles over her clit. The arousal that had chilled to guilty ash as she tormented him now flared hot enough to make her quiver.
His cock pressed hard against her belly. She wrapped one hand around its demanding width, began to stroke as she let her head fall back in surrender.
God, she loved the way he filled her hand, so feverishly hot, so hard, his skin like satin over a warm steel rod. A flick of magic slicked her hand with oil as she stroked him lazily. His fingers wove their own spells—runes of arousal and pleasure drawn over nipple and clit, pausing to dip between her nether lips to find her slick, tight core.
With a helpless moan, Giada sank against him, li
stening to his rough breathing over the sigh of the ocean and the distant song of mermaids worshipping the moon. His fingers thrust and teased, his mouth drew, and the orgasm gathered in the pit of her belly like a burning storm. Her stroking hand moved faster in time to his busy mouth. The pleasure built, hotter, more furious with every touch and stroke, until she wanted to writhe under its delicious lash.
Then it burst free, jerking her into a bow against his hands. She screamed, her hand tightening over his cock. He stiffened, and his shaft began to pulse in long liquid jets against her belly as he growled in dark pleasure.
Her knees gave, almost dumping her to the sand, but he gathered her against him and cradled her, releasing her throat at last. They leaned against each other, both breathing hard, as he began to lick the twin wounds in her throat.
At last he stirred, lifting his head to stare once again toward the horizon. “Sun’ll be coming up soon.”
“The sun . . . ? Oh, God, I’ve got to get you home.” She straightened away from him reluctantly. “You’ll need to go into the Daysleep.” A flick of her fingers opened a gate, and they stepped through together, leaning on each other like a pair of drunks.
The car pulled up in front of the sheriff’s office. Bill Jones grinned broadly and stepped forward to open the rear door. His grandson leaped out of the backseat and fell into an enthusiastic bear hug. Heather scooted out after her brother and gave her grandfather a hug. The kids gave their mother a good-bye wave and disappeared into the building with the sheriff.
Smoke stepped out of a gate into the shadows cast by the building’s manicured hedges. He paused just long enough to cast an invisibility shield around himself, then walked through the glass door as if it was no more substantial than mist.
This seemed like a perfect opportunity to check out what was going on at the sheriff’s office. That rogue Dire Wolf seemed to know entirely too much about the department, including such details as Logan’s work schedule. Smoke badly wanted to find out how she came by her information.
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