by Kate Wendley
Harmony could steal his heart and make him weep for the loss of her… if he let her. Of course, he’d already let her under his skin, but how far she got was still up to him.
**
Harmony could see the wheels turning in Ethan’s head as he eyed her all over. He was excited by her, his erection and glowing eyes were a dead giveaway, but he’d stopped directing her and it didn’t look like he’d be taking charge again any time soon.
She slowly stepped closer and touched his bare chest. His moods alternated more whenever they started getting too intimate, and she knew it was because he struggled with memories of long gone times.
She admired that he was so steadfast in his love, but jealousy stubbornly seeped into her thoughts that even though Sonya was hundreds of years dead, he still couldn’t move on and give himself fully to Harmony, who was alive and well right in front of him.
But tonight was different. They’d gotten playful before, but tonight felt like he was finally giving in to her. He’d always treated her right, but he’d never stripped her down and run his determined hands all over her body like he just had. Was he trying to break down that wall he’d so stubbornly kept up between them?
She attempted to guide him back to his bedroom, and to her relief and excitement, he followed her lead. He even let her show him where she wanted him on the bed. As soon as she lie down beside him, though, he came alive and took control.
There was surety in his touch as his hands roamed her body and masterfully stroked her desires. The man knew how to tease and taunt her, and she couldn’t help how she responded. She didn’t bother trying to control her whimpers and writhing hips, but she also didn’t push for more from him.
He finally kissed her, and it very quickly turned anxiously frantic. They both moaned at the intensity between them, and she felt out of her mind with a need to have him inside her. He seemed just as anxious, his erection pressing against her as his body moved in time with hers. He made his way with kisses to her neck, and in a husky voice he whispered, “I need to taste your blood. I want to bite you.”
She sucked in a breath in needy anticipation, but the bite never came. With his mouth still close to her neck, he sounded vulnerable when he said, “Bite me Harmony. I want to feel the sharp prick of your fangs. I want to feel your mouth on me, swallowing my blood. I want to know I have a vampire in my bed.”
She breathily said, “Ethan, you know if I bite you I’ll−”
He jerked back enough to look her straight in the eye. His gaze was intense, freezing her in place, and his firm voice almost scared her. “I know what it means. Power is shared through blood.” His expression softened. “It’s your choice. I give myself to you. My heart’s in your hands.”
A shiver of emotion ran through her. That wall might just be tumbling down between them after all, and it made their situation seem much more serious. So was she ready for this?
What the hell. She’d lived over two hundred years constantly searching for something, or someone, to settle the confusing homesick feeling in her soul, and being here in Atlanta, with Ethan, was the closest she’d ever come to feeling like maybe this was the place for her. Maybe she’d finally found home…
She reached for him and his gaze went to her mouth. His eyes blazed brightly once her fangs were exposed, and she wondered how she’d forgotten that the first time they kissed was after he’d seen her fangs. He’d gotten totally turned on right before she fed from that shifter.
Here and now, his body turned supple as he let himself be pulled down on top of her. When he arched his neck without her nudging him, she realized just how serious he was about giving himself to her. He really wanted this and it floored her. She’d gain power from his blood, real power, and he desperately wanted her to have it.
A guilty thought occurred to her, though. He’d faced an incredibly emotional issue tonight. So was he in his right mind right now? Could she do this if he’d just regret it tomorrow?
His breathing was heavy as he nudged her again and she decided it didn’t matter. He was begging for this, and he felt so right in her arms…
She leaned in and delicately bit him, and he trembled and gasped out loud. She fought hard to keep calm as she swallowed his tremendously powerful blood. His arms grasped tighter and his body rocked against her. He moaned out loud when he finally bit into her neck, and she couldn’t help whimpering in response.
After just a few swallows of his blood, Harmony started to feel like she was in a dream. Every sound they made was loud in her ears. Everywhere Ethan’s body touched hers made her nerves tingle, and the masculine scent of his skin made her frantically crave more of him.
She released him from her bite in desperation. “Ethan, touch me. Make love to me. I need more.”
He pulled back and licked the bite on her neck. “What’s wrong, kitten? Are you ok?” His eyes were the brightest she’d ever seen them, but he looked worried.
She writhed as all her senses overwhelmed her in an increasingly erotic way. “Make love to me, Ethan. Right now.”
His face fell and he grabbed her hands. “You should rest. My blood was too much for you.”
She trembled in his firm grasp. “No! No, no, no.” She knew her pleading made her sound crazy, but she didn’t care.
Ethan leaned closer and released her hands before kissing her, but she pushed him back in frustration.
“Harmony, I can’t take advantage of you like this.”
Her hands shook as she cupped his cheeks and looked him straight in the eye. “Your blood is doing things to me, yes, but don’t take this experience away from me. Please just let me feel it. All of it. Touch me, make love to me, because you know it won’t feel the same next time, for either of us.” His blood was incredibly strong, but this was the first time he’d had her blood, too. The first time, no matter how powerful the blood, was still an intimate experience that would never feel the same way again.
Ethan’s expression turned sure and confident, and the hunger she’d seen earlier in his eyes was back in full force. She wasted no time pointing to places on her body and commanding, “Kiss me here. Now here.” Ethan amazingly obeyed and gave her everything she asked for as his careful control over his emotions quickly crumbled and he became more and more focused on both of their pleasures.
His blood was stronger than anything she’d ever experienced in her life. It made it hard to think straight, so Harmony stopped trying. Instead, she writhed as he wickedly teased every inch of her body, then cried out in shock and intense pleasure when he bit her. The sharp prick of his fangs followed by his sensual suckling made her nearly insane with need.
He became frantic as he tasted her blood all over her body and insisted she bite him all over as well. She smiled deviously to herself when she realized she now knew his on switch, but didn’t get much time to savor her newfound knowledge. Ethan became like a man possessed as he firmly held her and slid inside her anxious body, and she wasted no time biting him again as they desperately rocked against each other, neither taking very long to find their heaven.
Harmony whimpered as she came, still suckling on Ethan’s blood. Ethan roared his own release.
She stopped swallowing his blood as her body calmed down, and was surprised to realize Ethan was patiently holding himself still, allowing her to feed from him as long as she wanted. When she finally let him go, he kissed her neck and slowly rolled over to lie by her side.
He looked into her eyes, and his own weren’t glowing as brightly anymore. The heady passion was subsiding, but there was a different emotion there now. It was a tenderness she didn’t always see in him.
He asked, “Are you all right?”
She quietly chuckled and he didn’t seem to know what to make of that.
“You make incredible love to me and ask me if I’m all right?”
He reluctantly smiled. “You had my blood…”
“And you had mine.”
He lightly scoffed, but was still smiling whe
n she snuggled into him.
“I’m all right. Everything’s all right.”
**
Anthony hovered worriedly over Dr. Williams as he tended to Kaia. When he actually bumped into the doctor because he was too close, he reluctantly stepped back and let him do his job.
Talking to either Anthony or his assistant, Anthony wasn’t sure which, Dr. Williams said, “She’s out cold but she’s responding well to stimuli. And this cut on her head doesn’t appear too deep. I don’t think she’ll need stitches, but let’s keep an eye on it.”
The tension went out of his shoulders at those words.
“Anna, we need to brace her neck and back so we can move her. Go gather supplies, please. And take a couple strong fellows to help bring a gurney back with you. We should get her to a patient bed for the night.”
“No. She’ll stay in my bed.”
The doctor finally looked up at him, and there was a challenge in the old man’s eyes. “She needs to be monitored closely for several hours. I’ll feel better once she regains consciousness and I can talk to her.”
“You can monitor her in my bed.”
“When the sun rises…”
“You will monitor her in my bed.”
The doctor’s eyes still held a challenge in them, but he stopped arguing, nodded, and went back to caring for Kaia.
A hand on Anthony’s shoulder made him jerk in irritation.
“Son, I’m sorry about the woman.”
Anthony stepped sharply out of his father’s reach as he looked daggers at him. Anger for what he’d done to Kaia threatened to turn to rage in the blink of an eye, but he finally realized he might have a bigger problem on his hands when he got a look at what was going on in the club. Ethan might have decided his fight with Anthony and Isaiah was over, but his vampire family hadn’t. They looked ready to tear Isaiah apart.
Anthony kept his eye on the crowd as he said, “Zach, show my father to a room downstairs, and please be quick about it.”
Isaiah added, “My whole group, if you don’t mind.”
Anthony didn’t look at him as he nodded and snapped, “Go.”
“What about you, son?”
Anthony turned spitefully on him. “I don’t think I’m the one they’re upset with. And besides, I’m Master here.”
His father flinched, took a quick look back at the club, then hurried away.
As furious as Anthony was with his father right now, Isaiah was family in every way that mattered, which meant Anthony would protect him with his dying breath if needed. He only wished he knew if the crazed man that he appeared to be tonight was the new him, or if the man he knew him to be years ago was still there somewhere under the surface of his disheveled visage. Either way, he hated to admit that the familiar feel of his father’s energy was reluctantly comforting as he stepped past Anthony and hurried down the vampire hall with his friends.
Ethan’s vampires watched his father’s group closely, some looking ready to bolt down the hall after him.
Anthony stepped in front of the hall, silently hoping another fight didn’t break out tonight. This whole night made it crystal clear how vulnerable Kaia was in his home, no matter how much he liked to pretend she was safe just because most people knew she was his.
George stepped forward and Anthony locked eyes with the usually mild mannered old man. He didn’t say anything as he stopped about ten feet from Anthony, face red with rage.
“I make no apologies for my father’s actions, George, and I take no claim in them either. But he is my family, so if you want to get to him, you’ll have to go through me. All of you will.”
George glared at him, his eyes quickly dropping to the bloody, tattered remains of Anthony’s shirt as if to remind him that he’d almost died tonight, by his family’s hand.
Anthony didn’t need the reminder, but he also didn’t hold their anger at his father against them. Sonya seemed to have been an important person to many of them, and he’d be a fool to belittle their pain.
But that didn’t mean he was going to roll over and let them tear his family apart because of a past mistake.
He let a little of his power flow free through him, careful not to release too much and actually hurt someone. George bared his teeth and hissed in fury as he took angry steps away from Anthony.
The stare down between Ethan’s vampires and Anthony lasted a few hours before the last of them finally left the club, glaring, angry, and frustrated at their lack of justice.
The two vampires that arrived with his father remained, however. Anthony was anxious to get downstairs to see how Kaia was doing, but unfair as it was, he was Master and needed to protect everyone, not just his lover. So he stayed where he was on a barstool at the end of the bar closest to the vampire hall.
The couple cautiously approached, and the closer they got, the stranger the woman’s energy felt to him. He couldn’t put his finger on what was so different about it. She just felt… odd.
The man and woman were both quite striking, the man for his heavily Native American looks, and the woman for her dark eyes and pale beauty along with her long, platinum blonde hair. They bowed their heads as they stood in front of him, then dropped to one knee.
The man spoke for both of them. “Master Foster. We traveled here with your father because of the rumors about this city. We seek a peaceful life and beg for your mercy in our situation.”
Anthony frowned and put a sound barrier around all of them. The handsome couple flinched and looked nervously about.
He sharply said, “It’s a sound barrier. What’s the ‘situation’ you’re in?”
They both gave him a look like he was missing something. “We’re Ethan’s old friends. Ethan and Sonya. The woman who was… killed. We had no idea Ethan was in Atlanta, or that…”
The man looked uncomfortably at him.
Anthony supplied, “Or that my father was the one that killed your friend.”
The man sighed and slowly nodded. The woman looked just as worried, and he frustratingly didn’t want to deal with this right now.
“What are your names?”
“Seth and Nala, Master.”
**
Anthony showed Seth and Nala to a room in the vampire sub-basement, then introduced them to the shifter guards that would be on them while they were here. Since they hadn’t talked to Ethan yet to know where they stood with him, if they wanted to stay in Anthony’s home, they’d have to earn his trust before he allowed them free rein.
He left them as quickly as he could and went back to his own place to check on Kaia.
Sebastian and Jade sat in the living room looking worried, which alarmed him. He flew into his bedroom, scaring the doctor and his assistant with his sudden appearance.
“What’s going on? How is she?”
As the two calmed down, Dr. Williams said, “She’s doing all right. We woke her about thirty minutes ago, and she was able to tell me her name and answer other questions she should know the answers to. That’s a very good sign, Mr. Foster. Very good.”
“So she’ll be ok?”
The doctor said in mild irritation, “It doesn’t help that she’s still recovering from the flu. She’s exhausted and needs to sleep, but I want to keep waking her every hour for the next couple hours to check on her. A possible brain injury is nothing to take lightly.”
“Of course. You’re welcome to stay here as long as you need to. I will, however, need to go to sleep in a few hours.”
The doctor nodded. “Is Kaia taking those vitamins we talked about?”
Anthony stilled. “She hasn’t been taking them while she’s been sick. They upset her stomach.”
Dr. Williams’ jaw tensed. “She is human, Mr. Foster. She needs to keep her strength up around people like us.”
If Anthony didn’t feel so guilty for her getting hurt here again, he’d be angry at the doctor for scolding him in his own home. As it was, though, he was right.
“She won’t take them wh
ile she’s sick. I’ve tried to talk her into it.”
“Then try another brand. She may just be sensitive to the preservatives in the ones you bought.”
He nodded as he looked Kaia over. She slept soundly in his bed, though her face was flushed and she had dried blood on her clothes and in her hair.
“Thank you for bringing her down here. Do either of you need anything? For her or yourselves?”
The doctor said, “A cup of coffee and something to eat would be much appreciated.”
Anthony looked to the doctor’s assistant. “And you, Anna?”
“Yes sir. That sounds good to me, too.”
Anthony asked Sebastian and Jade to get the coffee and food and anything else they wanted to keep them here and keep Kaia well tended to. The last time Kaia had been attacked in his home was right after they’d had their first fight. He’d been so mad and jealous at the time that he’d let her be taken to her own home, only for her to wake up and wonder why he wasn’t there for her. This time he wanted to make it clear that he’d always be there for her, no matter what.
Right now, though, he needed to see to his father, so he headed to his room next. He knocked and announced himself, then opened the door to him sitting on the bed with his arm around his shifter lover. His wolf guards took up the rest of the small room.
Anthony wasn’t sure why it bothered him so much to see his father with a woman. Maybe it was just this woman. She had an unimpressed look in her eyes where there should have been worry or concern for those that were hurt, including Isaiah. Combined with the way she held herself, as if everything here was too filthy for her tastes, Anthony immediately disliked her.
But his father was at ease with this woman. She was the kind of person Isaiah had always preferred to associate with, and had always tried to get Anthony to socialize with as well. That was a big difference between them. Anthony looked for moral character in people while his father seemed to care more about how if they used proper social etiquette and had an appearance of wealth and expensive tastes.
