A long, dark pause went by as he fought off black memories, until Dana said, her voice gentle, "It must be lonely."
"I have my work. I have my co-workers" He smiled slightly. "I have women, though usually not for long." Glimpsing Dana's appalled expression, Archer grimaced. "Quit believing everything you see in bad movies. There's something like two gallons of blood in the human body; I couldn't drink it all in one sitting if I tried. On the other hand, I can give someone a good case of anemia over time, so I tend to go for one night stands."
"No girlfriends? Couldn't you..." She gestured. "...Not bite? At least not every time?"
"Yeah, I could. And I do. Or rather, don't." Archer shook his head. "But it's best not to form close relationships with my partners. It's not fair, it's not practical, and after awhile, it becomes painful." His eyes caught on the delicate curve of her face. "I outlive people, Dana. I'm tired of grieving."
She glanced away. "Yes, I can see how you would be"
"Besides," Archer added wickedly. "There are so many more interesting things to do..."
Dana groaned as he started describing them.
By the time they pulled into the long, winding driveway. Dana
had her legs tightly crossed against the wet ache between them.
Archer had spent the rest of the trip into Charleston describing the things he'd done to eager female victims, recounting acts of sensual decadence in that deep, drawling velvet voice of his until she was squirming and dry-mouthed.
Still feeling dazed, she looked across the darkened expanse of lawn to see a sprawling brick mansion with thick square columns and wide wings stretching out to either side.
"My father built it," Archer told her as he parked the car in a spacious garage. "Of course, I've made some additions." As he opened the driver's door, he flashed her a wicked smile that showed his fangs. "Manacles in the bedroom."
"Daddy would have been shocked," Dana said as he came around to open her door and unbuckle her seatbelt.
"Not really," Archer said, pulling her out of the seat and into his arms with easy strength. Another flash of those teeth. "We owned slaves."
Dana stared at him, so caught between fascination and revulsion that she forgot to protest as he picked her up. "You're kidding."
"Nope" He straightened, cradling her. "Don't look so self-righteous. I freed them all after the war ended." He shrugged. "It didn't feel right, keeping slaves after we'd just fought the British over natural rights. But God, it pissed the neighbors off."
Archer turned and started across the garage, still carrying her like a child. For a moment the novel sensation stunned her, and she froze in his arms, feeling the warm power of his body, breathing his exotic scent. He smelled faintly of sandalwood and spice, male and tempting. Too tempting.
Sudden panic rose, and she kicked out, trying to squirm her way from his powerful grip. "I can walk!"
"Only if I put you down." He ducked his shoulders so he could open the door without turning her loose, then swept her inside. She subsided reluctantly. "You are such a high-handed bastard" He shrugged. "Comes with the territory."
Curiosity overcoming her desire to struggle, Dana peered around the darkened house as he carried her through it. The kitchen was spacious and modern, likely a recent addition, with gleaming white appliances and a surprising array of copper pots hanging over a central island.
As they walked into a hallway, Dana glimpsed a painting of a sailing ship rolling against the sunset in the aftermath of a storm. Archer's booted feet clicked against slate-tile flooring, then they headed up a broad, curving stairway. Toward a bedroom, no doubt. She clasped her hands in the handcuffs, feeling intensely vulnerable.
Just as Dana expected, Archer ducked into a huge bedroom at the top of the stairs, where he put her down at the foot of a gleaming mahogany bed, canopied in what looked like navy brocade and spread with a matching comforter.
Nervously she looked around as he stepped away from her and began to rummage in a drawer. The room was flooded with a golden glow from countless white candles that sat on the mahogany dresser and bureau. The floor was polished hardwood, set here and there with thick woven rugs.
"Who lit the candles?"
"Called the caretaker before we left." Returning, Archer reached for her wrists. There was a coil of gleaming rope in his hand that looked like silk. He smiled into her eyes. "I commit my best sins in candlelight."
`Archer!" Dana pulled away, but he was already backing her against the side of the bed and pulling her arms over her head. "What the hell are you doing?"
"What do you think?" Quickly, efficiently, he tied the rope around the handcuff chain and the overhead canopy support, reaching underneath the canopy to lash them together with a few smooth turns.
She watched him, dizzy with a combination of outrage and desire. "I can't believe I'm letting you get away with this."
"Could you stop me?" Feral eyes locking on hers, he grabbed the front of her shirt between his big hands and gave it an easy tug. Buttons popped, bouncing on the polished wooden floor with a salvo of tiny clicks. Dana looked down to see the white flesh of her breasts swelling in the pretty lace cups of her bra.
Archer made a pleased purring sound in his throat and took hold
of the fabric that held the cups together between her breast. He tore it like paper, then snapped the shoulder straps one by one nd threw the ripped bra aside.
Dana tried to swallow the moan. Her knees shook.
Archer stepped close, looking into her eyes. She felt his big hands at her waist, heard a snap, the hiss of her zipper. "Actually.' he said, pushing the jeans off her hips, "you could stop me. All you have to do.." The fabric slid down her thighs. She could feel his warm hands brushing her legs. "...is say no"
He went to one knee to slip off her running shoes and socks, then tossed them and the jeans aside. His hair brushed her belly in a stroke of cool silk that made her shiver. Then his mouth vas there, pressing a soft kiss to her stomach just before his hands came up to grip the thin silk of her panties. He looked up at her, his eyes pale and hypnotic in the candlelight. "Do you want to say no, Dana?"
She licked her lips, swallowed. "Would you really stop?"
"Yes"
She should say it. She knew she should say it. Her parents would have been appalled that she even hesitated.
She didn't say it.
He smiled. Silk ripped
Chapter Four
Wrists bound over her head, her heart pounding, Dana looked down at Archer as he tossed aside the remnants of her panties. Then, slowly, he leaned forward until his face was barely an inch from her wet, aching sex. His broad chest lifted and fell as he inhaled, scenting her. She quivered.
He brought a hand up, stroked one long finger over the delicate flesh of her outer lips and the blonde fluff that covered them. "Such pale, pretty curls."
Archer leaned forward, extending his tongue. She could see it, pointed and pink in the instant before it slipped between her lips in a single hot, searing stroke.
"Oh, God!" Unable to help herself, she rose on her toes and rolled her hips forward to give him better access.
"You're so wet," he said, his voice a dreamy drawl. "So ready to be fucked."
Slowly, skillfully, Archer licked at her wet folds, stopping occasionally to suckle her clit and set off a detonation of pleasure. Dana writhed in her bonds, tormented by delight, on the verge of climax. But each time she almost went over, he stopped, waiting for her to subside.
Only to begin again, licking and feasting, driving her higher. "Archer!" she screamed at last, unable to take any more. "God, now! Please!"
He surged to his feet, one hand at the snap of his jeans, the other catching her under the thigh to pull her legs apart as he stepped between them. The expression on his handsome face was feral, blue eyes narrow and hot, his lips pulled back from white fangs. Dana
gasped in a combination of fear and arousal.
"Shit!" Archer let her go and
spun away, jerking his black T-shirt over his head as he strode across the room.
"Don't stop!" She stared at his magnificent back and pressed her thighs together, burning to feel him between them. "Why are you stopping?"
"I don't want it over this quick," he growled, without turning around. "I want more."
Bewildered, aching in frustration, Dana watched as he stopped at the bureau, where a crystal decanter sat beside a pair of wine glasses on a silver tray. His hands shook with a fine tremor as he picked up the decanter and poured a stream of something dark into one of the glasses.
Archer took a sip as he turned to face her again, then shook his head. "Almost lost control. I never do that" He took another, deeper sip, then grabbed a wingback chair sitting in a corner and carried it across the room, where he put it down directly in front of her. Dropping into it, Archer eyed her broodingly. "How do you make me break all my rules?"
"The same way you make me break mine." She licked her lips. His chest was a tight, curving sculpture of brawn that shifted in the candlelight as he lifted his hand to drink from the cut crystal glass. The snap of his black jeans was undone, and his cock formed a long, thick ridge under the denim. As she watched, the zipper began inching downward on its own, yielding to the strain of that powerful erection. Dana squirmed, imagining how it would feel driving into her.
Any minute now, she was going to start begging.
Archer had played this scene so many times it should have lost its ability to move him. Hell, just yesterday he'd thought he was getting bored with it all—with the women and the dominance games they so often wanted, with the act he'd always thought was light years from his true personality.
But that was before he'd tied Dana Ivory to his bed in nothing but an open shirt that framed her pert centerfold breasts and the tempting moonlit curls of her sex. Below the shirt, her legs looked
as long as his life. The way she kept pressing those sweetly muscled thighs together was slowly driving him insane.
Her gray eyes looked huge in her small face, staring at him with a kind of erotic panic as her tongue slipped out to wet her carnal mouth.
Archer drew in a deep breath, trying for control, but the scent of blood and wet woman mingling in the air almost snapped his grip. He burned to jam himself inside her, sink his aching fangs into the delicate column of her throat and ride her without mercy.
But he couldn't give into that lust, no matter how it tormented him. He had to make her so hungry for what he could do to her that she'd agree to anything if he'd only give her more.
Even if it meant becoming a vampire.
A quick, driving fuck wouldn't force her to that level of desperation. He had to keep building her hunger until she was enslaved by it. And him.
If only he could avoid losing control of his own demanding appetite for her...
Dana pulled at the rope that held her handcuffs, less to get free than to express some of the tension she felt under Archer's devouring stare.
Those crystalline eyes kept flicking from her hard nipples to her sex, then up to her face, then back to her nipples again, around and around while he sprawled there in that chair, his cock thick as a truncheon.
"Are you going to do something?" she blurted. "Or just look?" He took a sip of his wine, lids shuttering over his glowing eyes. "I like to look."
Dana's gaze slid helplessly to his erection. "I can tell."
"Are you feeling... neglected?" Archer bent over and put the wine glass down with a click on the hardwood flood. He stood up in an entrancing display of bare chest and long legs. One corner of his pirate's mouth curled. "Can't have that. A good host keeps his guests satisfied."
She bit her lip, watching in helpless need as he stalked toward her until his broad shoulders were blocking the candlelight. He
loomed there, wolf-pale eyes locked on her face, his features sharp with hunger.
Slowly, Archer knelt, first on one knee, then the other. And slowly, so slowly, he lifted his hands to her breasts and put his face to her sex again.
Dana felt the long stroke of his tongue just as his fingers took her tight nipples and began to gently pinch.
She almost screamed. Not again.
Oh, yes. Again.
Her head fell back, too heavy for her neck, and her eyes slid closed as his skilled tongue savored her, explored her lips, slipped inside, circled delicately over her clit. The sensation was heart-stopping, hot, maddening, like the feeling of his hands squeezing her flesh, rolling and thumbing her nipples until they sent waves of pleasure to her helpless brain.
"God, Archer!" She instinctively ground her hips, pushing against his face as he licked and bit.
One hand abandoned her throbbing breasts, lowered to slip between her legs. A long finger slid into her. "You're tight as a virgin," he whispered, his voice rough velvet. His eyes glinted red as he tilted back his head to look up at her. "It's been a long time for you, hasn't it?"
"College" She shuddered, eyes closing, refusing to think about the callow, greedy young men who hadn't had a tenth of Archer's sorcery. "Once, twice. Too much guilt, not enough pleasure. It was never, never like this... Archer, please..."
A second finger, and she writhed. He was focused on her clit now, circling his tongue until she strained against his mouth.
A third finger, stretching her. Dana imagined what it would feel like when he drove that big, satin-slick cock into her. Her hands fisted in the handcuffs. "Archer!"
He twisted his wrist, pressing his fingers hard up inside her, stuffing her, almost lifting her off the floor as his tongue fluttered over her clit. Pleasure roared over her in a great, burning wave, about to surge into climax...
Archer drew back. The wave began to die.
"No! Please, Archer, how do you want me?" Her voice spiraled into a scream. She had no idea what she was saying, and didn't care. "Whatever you want! Anything!"
He stood in a hard rush, his hands jerking down his zipper, then dragging at his jeans just enough to free his cock. She whimpered with need when she saw it jut out at her, an inch longer and twice as thick as anything she'd ever had.
Then Archer's strong hands were under her ass, lifting her, spreading her as he speared forward in one long, relentless thrust.
"God, you're so wet, so tight," he growled in her ear, forcing deeper. "It's like fucking my way into a peach."
Dana clenched her teeth, shuddering, her back arching, as he tightened his grip on her hips and dragged her down on his cock until she was utterly impaled. She felt stuffed with him, surrounded by his hard body, wrapped in his massive arms. Overwhelmed and helpless.
And God, she loved it.
She'd never felt like this—the strength and the heat and the power, the thick, greedy cock driven into her like a spike. She thought she could come just like this, just from having him inside her.
Then Archer began to move. His slow, slick glide out of her body sent curling spirals of heat up her spine. Then in, and in, and in, his muscled belly flexing against her softer one, his organ forcing her walls to spread around him. Dana twisted helplessly in his arms, wishing he'd grind, needing him to show her no mercy. Instinctively, she wrapped her legs around his waist and locked her feet together, squeezing him between her thighs.
"Oh, yeah," he purred. "Like that."
Archer picked up the pace, shortening his strokes, digging into her. Pleasure coiled tighter and tighter in Dana's belly. His powerful torso rolled against hers as he hunched, fucking her faster. His breath gusted hot in her ear. Spasms of delight rippled through her body.
"Look at me," he demanded in a harsh whisper.
Dazed, she opened her eyes. Archer's face was inches from hers, eyes glowing red in the candlelight. His teeth were bared, fangs fully extended.
"Offer me your throat," he growled. "I want to drink from you as you come."
The image seared her—the thought of his teeth piercing her as his cock tunneled deep. "Oh, God. Yes" Dana let her head fall back.
>
"Yeah, that's right." Archer gathered her closer, pumping even harder between her thighs, his glowing vampire eyes narrow as they focused on the arch of her throat. "Let me have it all!"
His head lowered. The silk of his hair brushed the underside of her jaw. His teeth pierced her skin, then slowly pressed deep, the sensation building to a deep, hot burn. His lips moved against her throat, warm and smooth, suckling in time to the long, driving thrusts of his cock. His torso stretched and rolled as she held him tight between her legs.
Her climax built, hot and cold at once, the contractions in her sex growing into a brutal pounding. Screaming, Dana convulsed as pleasure exploded through her in a long, fiery cascade down her nerves.
Archer's growl rumbled in her ears as he stiffened in climax, his cock jerking deep inside her, his mouth greedy on her throat.
Until finally she lay limp in his arms, exhausted from the power of her orgasm, unable to move, the vampire still buried deep.
Still feasting.
Finally Archer carefully released her throat and lowered her feet to the ground. Dana staggered and almost fell, but he caught her close. She could feel the muscles in his arms quivering and jumping. He was still breathing hard.
"Are you all right?" Archer asked, his voice a little hoarse. "I didn't hurt you, did I? I was... rough"
Dana shook her head. It spun, and she stopped. "No. You were .." She couldn't think of a word incredible enough. "I've never felt like that. Though I realize you've probably. . ." Driven thousands of women out of their minds. She let the sentence trail off, realizing it sounded like a plea for empty reassurance.
Archer lifted her chin with a gentle forefinger. "I've never felt like that either, Dana. You are not just the latest in a long line."
She gave him a quavering smile, knowing he had to be lying. A kind lie, but still, a lie. She'd never been the sort of woman that drove a man to that kind of passion. She had no intention of spoiling this lovely moment by saying so, though.
A Candidate For The Kiss Page 5