In the Arms of the King

by Heather Killough-Walden

  All at once, a familiar portal swirled to life around them. Jack stepped back, slid one arm under her knees, and the other around her back, and lifted her into his arms. Sam shuddered against him, once more laying her head against him. She felt light and empty, and in that moment, she didn’t want to think.

  So as the portal whisked them from a back alley behind a dance club on the west coast to a destination only Jack was aware of, Sam closed her eyes and let it happen.

  Time passed, short and indistinct, then Sam heard Jack’s shoes walking across a hardwood floor. She opened her eyes just as he placed one knee on a bed she’d never seen before and laid her down atop cream colored satin sheets. She felt them cool and sensual against her naked flesh, and goose bumps flushed her skin.

  Jack stood beside his bed and stared down at her. She gazed back up at him as well, in all of his dark, powerful beauty, and not for the first time, she felt a stab of guilt for what she’d done to him all those years ago. That black strip of leather over his eye….

  Jack cocked his head slightly to the side and smiled a small, knowing smile. “I got used to it, Firebird,” he said. She realized he was talking about the eye patch – and the missing eye beneath it. He must have been able to see the emotion on her face, and he was that good at reading her. “You were only doing what you thought you had to do,” he said. And then he laughed softly and placed his knee on the bed again to lean over her.

  His form shadowed her. His gaze slipped from her face to her body, raking over it as if he was trying to memorize it. His hand followed suit, its electric touch running up the length of her leg to curve over her hip, touching her like only a lover could. “I honestly should have known better than to underestimate you,” he finished.

  Jack lingered on her hip bone and shook his head as if in wonder. “My only regret is that I can’t now behold this beauty with both eyes. And that’s the truth of it.”

  A flush of new heat washed over Sam. His nearness, his words, his incredible touch and absolute magnitude were overwhelming. She was laid out before him on sheets of satin, not a strip of clothing to protect her… and her gums were aching once more, matching the slightly sore and intimate pulse between her legs.

  Jack’s knowing smile turned dark, and that blue eye of his lit up from within once more. He leaned over her, capturing her chin with his hand and claiming her lips with his own.

  In the back of Sam’s head, the very, very back, she knew they had things they needed to talk about. She knew shit was going down and the world was not going to wait for them. But it was a mess back there in the recesses of her thoughts, and she’d never been good at cleaning house. Right now, her body was lighting up, Jack Colton was once again taking control, and there was nothing else in the universe she cared about.

  The Nightmare King,

  The Kings, Book Eleven

  Most of the world was blacked out, fading into the sidelines of her consciousness, but Nicholas was dead center, in focus, and larger than life. His transformation had been awe-inspiring, horrifying, and absolutely wondrous. She’d imagined beings like him, somewhere in some other universe, reigning from dark heaven, but even in her dreams, they’d never looked quite as magnificent, quite as forbidding, not nearly as menacing as the Nightmare King who now bent low over her and whispered words across her lips.

  His skin was the color of night, his eyes glowed like a red giant sun, thick black horns spiraled up from his head, and bright white fangs pressed on his lower lip with teasing, terrible promise. He carried the scent of night with him, of the very dreams she remembered. It was an indescribable thing, like a memory, sultry and faint and tantalizing. He loomed over her with wings twice as large as the wings he’d worn before. They spread out behind him like the cover of night, shielding her from the Cosmos. With him above her, she felt enveloped and somehow both endangered and safe, despite the bindings he was meticulously wrapping around her limbs.

  Hard, relentless heat spread through her, taunting, teasing. She was on fire at her core, burning with a need that she was sure would drive her mad. She tried to move, tried to assuage the driving desire, but he took her arms and legs, trapping them in bindings she could not escape, inhibiting her movement. She fought, not because she didn’t want him to do what he was doing, but because she couldn’t help it. She needed to move, she needed to touch, she needed….

  Oh God! she thought hopelessly. What is this?! What is this pain?!

  It hurt. He’d told her it would, and he was right. It already hurt and he hadn’t even done anything. She needed him so badly, it was too much. Do something! she pleaded with him wordlessly – wordlessly because she could not form words, she couldn’t speak. Her mind was muttering incoherently, and her mouth could do nothing but part its lips and breathe.

  She fixed her gaze on his teeth; his eyes were too intense, too beautiful – they saw into her soul, and she damned well knew it. And his teeth were so sharp, and he was smiling so… promisingly.

  When she was completely tied down and he’d managed to do away with her shoes as well, she pulled against her restraints, testing their strength. They held her fast, and she knew they would continue to do so no matter how hard she fought. She closed her eyes. A sensation swept over Adelaide. For once in her life, she didn’t have to be in control – because she couldn’t be in control. It was freeing, exhilarating, and wonderfully frightening.

  She felt him move above her, and she opened her eyes again. Nicholas sat back and straightened, rising over her like the devil himself, and his eyes raked over her form. She was still clothed, as was he, but his muscles now strained beautifully against the fibers of his clothing as if they would break at any moment. And his gaze burned through her, searing her as though she wasn’t wearing a single thread.

  Her pulse quickened impossibly when he leaned over and curled the claws of his fingers into the material of her shirt at her collar. Sharpness pricked at her skin, threatening to pierce through. She held her breath, and Nick’s fanged smile broadened wickedly. Slowly, he ran the make-shift blade down the cloth, and the shirt split in two, revealing her flesh beneath inch by teasing inch. The cool air touched her newly exposed skin, and she had an idea of the reality of the situation.

  The shirt fell open, and Addie closed her eyes. The lace of her bra rubbed stiffly against her tightening, lengthening nipples. Her breasts heaved, heavy and swollen, flushed with helpless need.

  He chuckled, low and cruel above her, and she gasped, arching her back when those same claws he’d used to destroy her shirt now curled over the top of her bra. They scraped along the flesh of her breasts, pricking her nipples as they curled downward, gripping the material tight. The sensation coursed through her entire body, nearly too much for her to bear.

  He paused only a moment, possibly to allow her to suffer, then ripped the bra in two with one quick tearing motion. The material didn’t have a chance to cut into her before it was in tatters.

  Now the air hit her and his eyes scorched her, and Adelaide pulled at her bindings, flexing everything she possibly could in an attempt to stop the pulsing pain that was her lust. His laughter followed her into that madness as he moved down her body, and his breath burned every inch of flesh his lips passed over. He slowed over her breast, and Addie bucked.

  His mouth closed over her nipple, impossibly hot. He was burning her! It was delicious and sizzling, but impossible to bear. Then his teeth pricked the sensitive flesh. She cried out with the intense surprise of it, but she had almost no time to adjust to the sensation before he lifted his head and said, “I did warn you.”

  His voice was a growl in the candle-lit darkness. She managed to look down the length of her body at him, barely catching his menacing form in focus – the devil in the dark – before he lowered his head again, and his lips once more closed over her nipple.

  She threw back her head – and screamed into the night as his teeth pierced the tender skin of her breast, sinking deep. The pain was incomprehensible, be
cause lacing it like ice on crackling fire, was a pleasure that shoved her toward a precipice and left her dangling helplessly over it.

  Then he pulled against that fresh, deep wound, and she tumbled over the edge head over heel.

  An orgasm ripped through her, stealing the breath from her lungs so her scream died into an agonized silence. Nicholas Wargrave continued his torture, finished drinking, and pulled his teeth from her wound. He laughed again, low and evil. “Gods, you taste good,” he told her as she rode out the waves of pleasure rippling through her. Sweat broke out along her body, and her legs pulled ever stronger at their bonds.

  But he wasn’t finished, she knew. Not by a long shot. Which he proved when he moved over her again and his breath touched her other breast. His muscles rippled, his wings flicking like the disturbed wings of a dragon behind him, and once again, his hot mouth closed over her breast.

  As she caught her breath, and more yearning followed too fast on the tail of her exquisite release, she moaned low, a helpless sound that foretold of her intimate demise. He sucked hard, and his teeth teased, nicking small pinpricks that divulged droplets of precious blood and had her yanking madly at her restraints.

  The leather was beginning to dig into her wrists. She knew it would bruise, but she couldn’t have cared less. She was in agony, her core on fire.

  Nick’s strong hands were suddenly on her upper arms, grasping them tight and holding them still. He lifted from her body long enough to gaze threateningly up at her. “Only I’m allowed to mark my queen,” he told her.

  Then, as if to prove it, he lowered his head and in one fluid, painful movement, he sank his fangs once more into her tender waiting body. Just as he had with her first breast, he sank deep – and she screamed. He pulled hard, harder than he had before, and it hurt more. The climax that came over her a second later was all the more powerful. She arched her back and tossed her head, her voice piercing the heavens.

  He sucked and he drank, and she could not fight him – and her body burned a bonfire of continuous need and release. Without releasing her from his bite, he let go of her arms to slide his hands down her sides, gripping her body tightly as he went. He marked her there too, leaving small bruises that made her mind spin. She was becoming his in every way.

  He continued to drink while his claws were once more curling over an article of her clothing, digging into the waistband of her jeans and gripping tight. A blink – it was all she did – and the material was disintegrated beneath his onslaught, ripped to a hundred different pieces and left to decorate the bed with its remnants.

  *****

  Nicholas released her breast from his torturous attack and lifted his head. He needed to see her, needed to see her like this, to imprint her on his mind. His cock was killing him; it had never been this hard for this long, had never been this fucking on fire. But if he didn’t see her now, he never would, because he was nearly blind with need.

  So he rose, and his eyes blazed as they scorched over the valleys and plains of her body.

  Hell, he thought lowly, his own words a rumble in his mind. She was painfully exquisite. She was tied down for him, bleeding for him, and still wanted more. Her need almost mirrored his own and radiated from her body like an aura of its own.

  He wrapped his hands around her ankles and slowly ran them up the long length of her legs. Goose bumps rose on her flesh under his touch, and her knees bent as she tried to get away from him. It was useless, of course. Those bindings would never give; mortals had no hope of escaping them.

  Even though she wouldn’t be mortal for long.

  Already, he could sense a transfer taking place inside her. As he pulled her old being out of her, he replaced it with the carnal pleasure that was a Nightmare’s makeup. And he had so much further, so many more delicious bites to take.

  “Sweet Adelaide,” he said, whispering her name low into the room. “You’ve given so much.” He smiled and his fangs ached, throbbing with their need to dig once more into her. “But you have so much more to give.”

  He laughed and then moved over her, running his hands up underneath the material of her panties before brutally ripping them from her body. She gave the smallest gasp, a tiny sound of protest amidst the moans and sighs his power was racking from her form. He did away with his own clothes with a simple incubus thought, and the night wrapped around him with welcoming arms, lending him its power.

  Now she was bared completely, writhing madly, and slick with wet need, waiting for him. The scent of her washed over him, and he went insane. A roar filled the chamber, shaking the walls as his claws dug into the taut skin of her thighs, holding them far apart.

  He lunged forward with all of his strength. His cock crashed ruthlessly past her slick but tight opening, pressing inch by brutal inch into her channel without mercy. Her scream filled the room, coupling with his roar of pleasure.

  Every tiny bit of entry he gained was flawless agony and blessed relief. Though it quenched his thirst, it also made him want more. She was a drug in his system, feeding him and killing him at once.

  Take her, his monster told him. Take all of her.

  It was the only thing that would stop this pain.

  He leaned in, pitilessly pressing deeper, and Adelaide cried out again hoarsely, her voice now tested to its limits. His body covered hers, loomed over it in complete possession, and his hands released their nail-deep grip on her thighs to cup her face. “Look at me, Adelaide,” he commanded, his tone a demand from the depths of hell. “Look at me now.”

  She did. His power prevented her from doing anything else. But he didn’t fail to notice that she did so slowly. She was growing stronger, even now. Inch by inch, second by second, she was becoming. As if to teach her a lesson in resistance, he pulled out ever so slightly and shoved back in with brutal strength, bottoming out inside her, his larger than life girth filling her to the point of sweet, sweet hell.

  She screamed again, and he kissed her lips, violently claiming them with breathless abandon to swallow the sound of her torment. He parted her teeth, teased her tongue, and chuckled against her lips when his fangs pierced them, drawing more of her exquisite blood. He could have kissed her forever, but there were other things he needed to do to her, and that need was clawing at his insides.

  So he broke their kiss as he continued to ride her, moving inside her with driving fury as he reached up with one hand and ripped the leather bindings around one of her arms free from the bed post. Addie stilled just a little beneath him, clearly struck by the sheer strength of what he’d done, but when he raised her wrist to his lips, she began to fight again – she knew what he was going to do.

  All of her, his monster told him.

  He bared his fangs, holding her arm tight, and sank them deep into her vein. His magic poured into her, her blood poured into him, and a third orgasm ripped through Adelaide, rocking her to her core.

  Nicholas felt that climax squeeze the life out of him, and he lost a little of his sanity then and there. It was beyond bliss. It was the single most amazing thing he had ever felt. It went on forever, but not nearly long enough, and he knew he couldn’t afford to take too much blood.

  The muscles of her inner rings began to relax as she came down, and Nicholas looked up at her. Sweat dampened her forehead, locks of her hair sticking to her delicate features. Her cheeks and lips were so very flushed, her lips swollen from his demanding kisses and the tiny wounds he’d inflicted there. She tossed her head to one side, her eyes shut tight, her long black lashes brushing the apples of her cheeks. They, too, were wet.

  Fuck. He wanted to feel it again. Now.

  With zero patience remaining, Nicholas reached over and tore her other arm free from its bindings, making certain to protect her wrist and rip the metal buckles apart instead. His cock throbbed inside her, building, demanding, making his vision turn red. He brought her arm to his lips and bared his fangs.

  This time, Adelaide didn’t fight. Instead, she opened her eyes, and he
avily lidded irises gazed at him through an inner light that was beginning to glow.

  By the gods, he thought suddenly, literally stunned at the sheer beauty of that barely glowing gaze. It was the shade of honey amber, the hue of a setting sun. It was his new favorite color.

  But there was not a force on or off the planet that could have made him stop in that moment. So he placed a tender kiss upon the scarred flesh of her inner arm – and then bit down hard. His teeth sank deep, and at once her blood poured over his tongue, as heady and intoxicating as a strong sip of wine.

  He swallowed, the dizziness of bliss overtook him, and down below he drove his hardness into her… pulled out… drove back in.

  She shook beneath him, her beautiful body ravaged by his attack, a slight smile of pleasure claiming her bruised lips. A universe of tension was building within him. And he was only half way done.

  Completely. Claim her completely.

  He knew it was now or never, that he had to finish this now or he would lose himself inside her… and they would have to start all over again.

  That thought gave him a thrill of a pause, and the idea of doing this to her over and over and over for the rest of eternity flashed before his mind. But she was yet human. It would kill her.

  So he pulled out of her, both is teeth and his cock, and he moved over her body like the Nightmare that he was. Adelaide’s brow furrowed in disappointment and confusion as his muscles flexed and his wings stretched and he crawled down the bed to that sweet, precious, tender place between her legs.

  A soft sound escaped her lips as he lowered his head, and she no doubt figured out his intentions. She was so slick, so smooth, he was shaking by the time his mouth was inches from her opening. He inhaled slowly, then smiled. His tongue swept upward, parting her enflamed lips, and she bucked in his grip, crying out against the new, different onslaught.

  He knew she would do so, and he’d prepared for the struggle. His hands maintained their firm hold on her thighs, leaving small finger-shaped bruises. He took his time exploring her, teasing her and tempting her, and by the time he finished, it was only because he literally could not wait any longer.