by Michele Hauf
“Fuck yes,” she said on a shuddering tone.
He sucked roughly, taking what he could from the area that was not rich in veins, but did serve him a taste. What he really needed was the vein, a nice thick one, like that on the inside of her thigh.
Biting into that one could kill her, the whispers cackled. But she’s a hunter, so...
“Domingos...” Just his name, as she reached orgasm and her body shuddered beneath his command.
Blood quenched his desires. Sweat meshed his body to her skin. The smells of spice and champagne and her brightness dizzied his senses as he, too, fell into the swoon. A delirious place of rightness and dark, courtesy of taking blood. And he free-fell, high-fiving the whispers, giving the finger to the yowling cats and manic violins and soaring into a sweet oblivion that no one could take away from him.
Blood on his tongue, metallic and bittersweet, Domingos swallowed and sighed against Lark’s breast.
More. You need more.
He closed his eyes to the irritating whispers and glided on the swoon, reaching to curl his fingers about the ends of her silky hair.
Don’t deny the hunger! Fight for survival. Without blood, you die, vampire. Do you want to die in a cage? Surrounded by idiot dogs?
He curled his fingers tightly.
Lark tugged at her hair. “That hurts, lover. Be careful.”
Careful? Careful is for the dead. And dead vampires are tossed in the Seine, a pile of ashes!
Gliding down Lark’s belly, Domingos licked her skin, already missing the taste of blood, and seeking a pulsing vein to renew the delicious swoon. An abrupt draw of the bow across the violin string screeched through his nervous system. His fingers twitched against Lark’s hip.
She reached for his hand, still panting and sighing from the tremendous orgasm she’d experienced. He pulled away from her seeking touch.
There, over her mons, which smelled of sex, champagne and heat, he then moved to her thigh, where the scent of blood racing through an artery drew him like a heat-seeking missile.
Without a second thought, Domingos jammed his fangs into the artery and swallowed the gush of hot blood.
“No!”
Lark’s other leg slammed against his skull, but the hit did not silence the insistent whispers. He growled, pulling out his teeth and lapping at the spurting artery. “Mine. I will not be defeated.”
“Oh, hell, it’s the madness. Domingos!” Her fist crashed against his temple. The hunter struggled for freedom. “Focus. Don’t let the blood—hell, it’s the blood. He can’t see beyond that.”
The woman suddenly slammed her thighs together, crushing his head between them, and with a deft shift of her hips managed to flip him to his back and kick away to freedom.
Domingos, empowered by the blood, scrambled after her across the bed, grabbing her by the leg. He swiped his fingers across his tongue.
“Not going to get away from me, hunter.”
Her heel landed on his shoulder, and she pushed away, which sent her reeling off the bed, to land in a catlike roll that ended in her pounced upon her feet and hands.
She studied her thigh. “Shit, I have to bandage this, or it’ll bleed out. Or if you could lick it to seal the wound—”
“I’m going to suck you dry.”
Domingos jumped from the bed and landed beside her, using an elbow to put her down and rolling on top of her. He struggled to get her hands in his, to pin her, but she was strong.
They’d danced this dance before, and they’d called it a draw. No one defeats you, idiot vampire pet.
“No one,” he growled.
A kick to his stomach hurt, and he hadn’t been prepared for such force. Domingos’s back and shoulders hit the bed. Lark managed to get up on her feet and raced into the bathroom, slamming and locking the door behind her.
Licking the blood from his lips, Domingos reveled in the sweet treat. A violent rage of noise clattered within him, begging for more. He banged his head against the mattress and gripped his fingers through his hair, tugging.
“Can’t let you win!” he shouted at the madness inside him. He shouldn’t have bitten her.
It’s what you do! You are vampire!
“Yes,” he mumbled in response to the demanding whispers.
Heaving, he felt his energy wane and he collapsed into a weary acceptance. No. Don’t give up.
With an agreeing nod, he crept up to his feet and made a run for the bathroom door. It was solid and did not give.
“I’m not coming out until you settle down,” she called. “Don’t let it win, Domingos!”
“Come out and play with me, hunter. What happened to your desire to stake me?”
“I love you, Domingos.”
“So she says.” She loves to tease you and tempt you with her blood. But she won’t give it all? “I won’t hurt you, I just want to make it all better.”
“Bullshit.”
He banged a fist against the door, clawing his nails down the wood. “Come out here!”
Silence pounded in his heartbeat. The air, heavy with blood and sex, taunted him, prodding up the voices, the maniacal screams and clatter and music. Why had he let back in the music?
Domingos slammed his head against the door. It hurt, so he did it again.
And the third time he aimed for the door, it suddenly opened to reveal a shivering woman. She stood there before him, arms crossed over her bare stomach and breasts. Tousled hair hung over one side of her face, and the other side revealed a wide, frightened eye.
Frightened? His mighty hunter feared nothing but falling.
You just pushed her over the edge. She’s fallen into your madness.
Heh.
And there, at her leg, she’d tied a white towel, yet already it bloomed with crimson. It would continue to bleed if he did not seal the wound. She would die.
“No, you can’t— Not you,” he gasped. “Not Lark. I... Lark?”
A tilt of her head and her lips, plumped from his kisses, parted.
“No, I didn’t want to do this.” He gripped his hands before him, unsure how to touch her, to make it better. The whispers had ceased. The cold reality of seeing his lover standing defeated before him shoved back the insanity. “No.”
He pulled her to him and wrapped his arms about her body. She hung lax in his embrace, her head falling to his shoulder, her body so warm and trusting against his.
“I’m so sorry. I—the voices—they wanted more. Oh, hell, Lark.”
He pushed her away and strode to the other side of the bed, where her blood spattered the thick white carpet. Falling to his knees, he bent to the blood droplets and let out an agonizing moan that scraped from his insides and forced up all the pain he’d felt since that first night of captivity.
The first time the cage bars had clanked behind him had stiffened his spine. The first fight, another blood-starved vampire stalking toward him had opened his veins and carved up his soul. Many fights to follow. So much blood. And the agonizing death screams. Until finally he had felt nothing. And each time the cage bars clanked he’d moved as if a machine, going for the veins to survive.
Domingos pressed his face against the carpet and clawed with his fingers as yowls of agony birthed from his core. And the music shattered the frail cage about his soul. Falling, falling away from sanity, and landing...
A bare foot appeared near his head. The touch of soft fingers upon his scarred back. She fell, more than knelt, beside him. Weak from blood loss, Lark leaned over his back and wrapped herself upon him.
“I’m here, lover. I’m ever here.”
Domingos sniffed away tears and turned to catch her limbs in his arms. Her eyelids fluttered. Her head fell heavily upon his shoulder.
“Screw my damaged soul,” he said. “If you die, I’ll never rise above this insanity.”
He tugged the towel free from her leg and bent to lick away the blood that had slowed to an ooze. And he licked the wound to seal it and stop the bleeding. It w
as different than his tongue pressing to the skin while he drank blood; this was a purposeful act that delivered his saliva over the wound until the blood stopped flowing. And he took no pleasure in the taste of it; he could not.
Lark’s fingers fell upon his hair and he moved with them to lie down beside her on the floor. Tears stained his lover’s pinkened cheeks.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “That was close.”
“Sorry.”
He nuzzled up against her chest, seeking the comfort that only she had offered him. A hunter had seen that he possessed light within a vast darkness. And he’d just punished her for that blind trust.
She would accept his apology and tell him she loved him. But was it so easy as that? Could he trust himself around her to never again go into a manic rage in quest for her blood? Next time he might kill her.
He couldn’t conceive of hurting the one good thing he had in his life.
Must he walk away from her to keep her safe?
“Never leave me,” she whispered, as if reading his mind. “We’ll survive this.”
He nodded against her body but couldn’t bring himself to speak the truth he knew without doubt—the vampire must leave the hunter.
* * *
When Lark woke on the bed, she spied Domingos sitting in the easy chair near the patio door, naked but for a pillow clutched on his lap. The curtains were pulled against the rising sun, yet his goggles sat on the glass-topped table, within reach.
Yawning and stretching, she inspected the wound on the inside of her thigh. It was ugly and ragged, but it would heal. Probably scar, but that mattered little to her.
He’d almost killed her. Yet she could summon no reason to run away from him in fear. She’d feared him for moments last night when she’d struggled to stanch the bleeding behind the closed bathroom door. And then when she’d opened the door, and she had looked into his tormented gaze, she’d seen him, the man who had promised never to hurt her.
He might fight the madness forever. She was strangely okay with standing alongside him for that fight. Because she had seen into his soul, and knew it was good.
Sliding off the bed, she tiptoed into the bathroom and turned on the shower. He’d didn’t join her, and she was sad about that. Space was probably what he needed. Because she suspected he was fighting his inner voices and his own morals right now. She twisted off the water.
Forgoing a shower for now, she answered the urge for distance and food. Dressing in the same clothes she’d worn yesterday, and wishing she had something different, she pulled her hair back into a ponytail, then padded out into the room and tucked her feet into her shoes.
“I need a decent breakfast, maybe something savory,” she said as Domingos strolled past her into the bathroom. “I’m going to head out and find a pastry shop. I know there’s a fancy one in the shopping center not too far away.”
“Yes, good. I’m going to shower.”
“I love you,” she tried, but the vampire closed the bathroom door without responding. “I really do.”
Closing the room door behind her, she headed out, wishing he’d answered with I love you back.
Exhaling deeply, she took a moment to get her bearings. Her body ached in that sweet way it did after a night of lovemaking, yet her thigh pulsed with real pain. She looked a mess. This would be a quick run for sustenance, a few breaths of fresh air, then back to face her lover.
They had plenty to talk about.
Lark didn’t get farther than ten steps from the hotel entrance when a sleek black limo swerved before her, blocking her from walking forward. From out of the backseat swung two knights outfitted in Order gear. They worked efficiently. One wrangled her arm behind her back while the other injected her with what she knew was a tranquilizer at the side of her neck.
Her eyelids fluttered, and she caught a glimpse of Rook sitting in the backseat before blacking out.
Chapter 20
Domingos stepped out of the shower and dried off, afterward using the towel to wipe away the fog from the mirror. It was a habitual action that he couldn’t seem to drop. Wasn’t as though he could actually see himself in the mirror.
Tossing the towel aside and staring at his clothes piled on the floor, he wished he had something clean to change into. Lark’s blood had spattered his shirt when he’d attacked her last night.
What kind of animal had he become? He’d violently attacked the woman he loved. And she could have bled to death had he not settled and gotten the insanity under control.
Had she not touched you and called you back to sanity. She always does that for you. She is your savior.
And he had to protect her now by walking away from her. It was the right thing to do.
He didn’t hear her out in the room, so she must still be out eating breakfast. It had been a while since he’d gone into the bathroom. Maybe she needed some time away from him? But she would return eventually. And he thought it best if he was not here when she did.
“Really?”
He stared hard at the mirror, thinking if he looked long enough he might see a glimmer of a reflection. Yet he was no longer worthy of a reflection.
“Can I leave her?” he wondered. “I love her.”
And what kind of man told a woman he loved her and then took a hike? If she loved him as much as he believed, then returning to an empty hotel room could devastate her. He didn’t want to hurt her that way.
“Much better than killing her.”
And that was it. He must choose the lesser of two evils to save Lark.
He strode out into the room and tugged on his shirt and pants. He’d guessed at the time wrong. It had been an hour since Lark had gone out. Where was she? It was closer to noon than breakfast time. Had she decided to do a little shopping? Linger over some food?
Maybe she’d decided to take the same hike he was contemplating?
Domingos landed on the end of the bed and sat there, staring out through the pale sheers at the blurred image of the Eiffel Tower.
“She left me?” His heart thudded and his throat went dry. Something in his brain tittered and cackled that laughter he hated so much.
It made a hell of a lot of sense. And, since meeting each other, neither of them had been using much common sense. Had the hunter won over the woman who had fallen in love with the vampire? Perhaps she had returned home for a stake.
In which case, Domingos should get the hell out of here.
Yet it was daylight, and the sun was high. He fingered the goggles. They would only protect for so long. He couldn’t navigate the streets back to his home, clear across the city. Not unless he took the Metro. Still, he risked burns to his skin because he had no gloves or a hood.
He was stuck here. And maybe that was for the best. If Lark returned, they’d face each other with the truth. And if not, then he would know for certain that he’d lost her.
* * *
Lark stood before the marble-topped desk that mastered Rook’s office. The office was located beneath the chapel in the lower level of the cathedral. All the Order rooms were situated underground. The main floor was a front for tourists.
Beneath her feet stretched an Aubusson carpet that hailed from the seventeenth century. The walls were hung with weapons ranging from medieval-era maces and halberds to modern-day throwing stars and blades. The Mac—the only thing on the desk—flashed a screen saver that featured a Zen sand garden raked into a circle.
Rook was a yoga master, and had tried to instill in her the peaceful yet mind- and muscle-taxing practice of yoga. Who would have thought yoga could be so challenging? She’d never been able to concentrate beyond her busy thoughts to hold a pose for very long.
Woozy yet, she managed to hold her own and stand upright. She figured she must have been kept in the holding cell for three hours, because that was the usual wear-off time for the drug they’d injected into her vein.
Rook, clad in steel-gray Armani, stood but three feet from her, yet he leaned back on the edge
of the desk, his legs crossed casually at the ankle and his arms resting over his chest. It wasn’t a defensive pose, nor was it chastising. He often let long minutes pass without speaking. Allowing her to think about what she had done, as if she were a child who’d misbehaved. And always, his all-seeing gaze bored into her very soul. His still disposition freaked her sometimes.
But the jig was up; she knew that. Somehow, someone in the Order had learned about her involvement with Domingos. Hell, she knew who it was: Gunnar. After she’d knocked him out at her apartment, he’d likely returned to the fold and tattled on her. Which she had expected, but she’d thought to start figuring things out this morning, not to be whisked away from her lover’s arms before she even had a decent breakfast. And a shower.
Hell, she could guess what Rook was thinking about her appearance.
Her thigh ached. She should have been walking, exercising the muscle, but lying still for hours while sedated had allowed the muscles around the wound to swell.
“You know why you’re here,” Rook offered, standing now, approaching her and closing their distance to but a foot. He smelled like cloves, which reminded her of the rum pudding she and Domingos had shared so intimately last night. “I’m ashamed for you, Lark.”
“Don’t be. I’m a big girl. I can get in and out of trouble all by myself.”
The slap to her jaw would have been expected if she’d been all there, completely clear of the tranquilizer. Instead Lark lost her footing and stepped quickly not to fall over. She resumed calm, wincing at the sting of the strike. The man never held back his strength against her.
“You were my best knight,” he said, now standing so close she could head-butt him, but she thought better about doing that. “It was a simple assignment. How difficult can it be to take out one deranged vampire?”
“You don’t really want my answer, do you?”
Another slap, this one equally as hard. So, she would speak only when prompted.
“He’s infected you.”
No, she wanted to protest. Domingos might have bitten her, but he had been careful, sealing the wound with his saliva to ensure that the vampire taint did not transfer to her. And he’d done the same to the wound on her leg. Perhaps that was the reason she wasn’t feeling all there. Blood loss had weakened her.