Bonfire of the Vampires

by Bonfire Of The Vampires (lit)

  “I fought Garvey.” Jake’s reply was breathless. “I won.”

  Abby blinked. She slid her arm under Jake’s and tried to coax him to stand.

  “You killed him?”

  “I had to. They made it clear it was him or me and the winner ... got you. I couldn’t let him ... did Gideon--”

  “Gideon didn’t touch me.” She hoisted Jake up. He lurched unsteadily and together they staggered to the bed. She rolled him onto the dark sheets and spread the remains of his shirt so she could fully assess the damage. The wounds were jagged and random but they were all in the proximity of his heart. “These will heal, won’t they?”

  He nodded and licked his lips. His eyes fluttered closed.

  “They’re going to make you fight Gideon next, aren’t they?”

  “If he wins.”

  “Somehow, I think he will. Jake, I think Gideon is the Client.”

  Jake’s eyes flew open. He tried to say something and coughed instead. Abby’s hands fluttered to his shoulders to settle him back on the bed as he struggled to sit up.

  “How--”

  “It was something he said to me. He used a phrase the Client uses a lot. Maybe I’m jumping to conclusions, but it makes sense to me that Gideon might resort to murder to win the succession. I need to talk to Gregori. Maybe his people can help prove it.”

  Jake shook his head. “Stay away from Gregori. The only reason you’re still alive is because Gideon wants you. Gregori won’t listen to you.”

  Abby deflated. She wasn’t even sure she could prove her accusation. It was just a gut feeling, and considering all she’d learned about her own past in the last few hours, could she really even trust her own instincts anymore?

  There was more she needed to remember, but she couldn’t sift through the layers of fog that still remained. Gideon had unlocked so much for her, but not everything. It was those still hidden memories she feared the most. Something told her all the proof she needed was locked in her mind.

  “Jake, you’ll never recover by midnight. You need to feed in order to have the strength to fight.”

  “No, Abby.”

  “Jake, please. If Gideon wins, what happens to me? You’ll be dead. Please let me help you.”

  “I never wanted--”

  “You never wanted me to know. But I do. And it’s okay.” As she spoke she locked eyes with him. Without breaking eye contact she moved from the bed and stripped off the flannel shirt, the T-shirt and finally shimmied out of the jeans Jake had given her. “I’m willing, Jake. Use me to save both of us.”

  * * * *

  Jake’s mouth had never felt so dry. With Abby standing naked before him, he would have expected to be salivating but all he could do was wallow in his own exhaustion. Mick Garvey had beaten him to a pulp. The former Australian was a personal trainer and his vampire strength had been formidable. Only Jake’s speed had helped him survive, but even so, he could barely lift his head from the mound of pillows Abby had arranged behind him.

  His vision swam as Abby climbed back onto the bed. He followed the sway of her hips hungrily. Too sore to move more than his eyes, his hands ached to touch her full, firm breasts and silky thighs.

  He moaned involuntarily as she climbed over him and threw one long leg over his hips. She straddled him and settled herself over the hard ridge of his erection. At least that part of his anatomy still worked.

  The sudden rush of blood to that area seemed to staunch the flow to his wounds. He felt her heat right through his jeans and for once in his life he enjoyed being helpless to resist.

  When she arched her back and lowered herself down to him, he drew in a jagged breath. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He’d fantasized so many times about having her, loving her, even drinking from her, though he would never have admitted the last. In all his most fevered dreams he’d never been too weak to move or too hungry to crave the taste of her blood more than the feel of her flesh on his.

  “Abby.”

  “Shhh.” She hushed him with a finger across his lips. Then she swept her hair aside and offered him her throat. He didn’t have to move. She positioned her throbbing pulse at his lips. Her thighs closed on his hips exerting a sweet, sexual pressure that drove the last dregs of his strength up from his groin. Hunger and desire met in his chest with an explosion of primal need. Without thought, and finally without remorse, he sank his teeth into her skin.

  * * * *

  Abby made no sound when Jake’s teeth penetrated her flesh. She held back the cry of pain and passion for his sake so that he wouldn’t hold back. He didn’t.

  She clung to him while he drank, and as he drew her life into him, she felt something unexpected. Her need grew. Her desire increased. Maybe it was because it was Jake, finally Jake--but she felt invigorated. With Gideon she’d felt the draining immediately but this was different. Jake was different.

  As he drank from her, she felt his strength returning. His body hardened beneath her and with it the intensity of his feeding increased as well.

  Finally his arms came around her, locking her to him. One hand slid down her back and cupped her bottom, pulling her hard against the granite bulge beneath his fly.

  Every muscle in her body went taut at the marvelous friction as he ground her hips against his. The rough texture of the denim against her moist folds made her gasp. Liquid heat pooled there and an urgent longing began. She shifted her hips and rubbed against him to heighten the ache. He tightened his grip and the pressure caused a sensuous ache in her lower body.

  She moaned and the sound seemed to galvanize him. Renewed enough to take command, Jake rolled her onto her back.

  She cried out when his razor sharp fangs tore at her delicate flesh, but now he was undaunted. A vampire in the throes of blood lust could not be stopped.

  Jake pulled back and licked his lips. He looked down at Abby, his gaze hooded and so, so dark. He pulled off the remains of his bloody shirt and while she writhed beneath him, he tore open his jeans and freed his erection.

  She arched expectantly when his thick cock bobbed up. She would have thrown him back down and climbed on top to take him in, but he wouldn’t have allowed it. A vampire lover was always the dominant partner--and Abby didn’t mind at all.

  Jake lowered himself between her thighs, his cock straining. When the tip nudged her warm center, the blood lust hit him again like a hot wave. He’d wanted control. He’d planned a gentle union between them, something sweet and loving, but his very essence denied him that.

  Blinded by insatiable hunger and dark desire he’d denied too long, he plunged inside her. He hated the fact that he was eager for the startled cry that escaped her parted lips. He loved the sound of her rasping breath as she took his hard length inside her.

  Her supple body curled around his, enveloping him in warmth and the enticing scent of sex. He came down on her hard, pushing her into the satiny lake of the bed and lowered his teeth to her neck again as he embedded his body to the hilt within hers.

  She moaned in his ear and reached up to caress his face but he would have none of the tenderness he didn’t deserve. He grabbed her wrist and trapped her hand above her head as the rhythm of his thrusts increased. Her breathing became ragged as he drank more from her and her cries of passion quieted, though her hips moved eagerly beneath his. She met each thrust with her head thrown back and her eyes squeezed shut. Her free hand clutched the sheets and he tilted his gaze to admire the graceful curve of her hips as she bucked beneath him, arching toward her release.

  He fought the urge to bite deeper so he could feel the pulsing of her heart in his mouth. He lost the fight. She whimpered but at the same time her slick sheath tightened around his cock.

  When she came he’d be able to taste it--the adrenalin and the surge of hormones would flavor her blood and give him a dangerous burst of carnal energy.

  He swallowed her. Tightening his grip on her wrist, he slid his other arm beneath the small of her back to raise her hips. Her legs
curved around his thighs and she stiffened with a cry that came from deep within her.

  Her climax hit hard. He felt the already tight muscles that held him contracting violently. Her blood flowed hot and her body hummed with the electric spark of her orgasm. He held her while she shuddered and he pumped deep, the tremors of his tortured muscles setting off his own climax.

  There was no seed to spill, though. Vampires merely pulsed their ejaculations--strong and insistent, but sterile. Nevertheless, Jake remembered the feel of spilling himself into a woman and he recreated the sensation for Abby so they could both feel the satisfaction as he claimed her with his scent and his stain.

  His climax marked her, rocked her. He swallowed one last draught of her sex-sweetened blood and broke away, licking his lips before he sought her mouth to kiss her. Her eyes were open now, pupils wide. Her skin had gone pale and translucent.

  Still locked within her, he felt the last pulses of her orgasm keeping time with his own.

  “Abby....” Jake was back. The animal he’d become sank back into the darkness, sated for now. Fear contracted his chest as he brushed errant strands of damp hair from her face and skimmed her cold cheeks with his knuckles. “Abby?” Had he taken too much? He shook her and her eyelids fluttered. Her languid gaze turned to his.

  “I love you, Jake.”

  He gathered her in his arms and placed one hand between her breasts. Her heartbeat was slow and irregular. Her skin was sticky from the blood of his wounds. She looked like she’d been through a worse ordeal than he had, yet her lips curved in a seductive smile.

  “Abby. I took too much. I’m sorry.” He cradled her and gathered the cool satin sheets around her body, cursing himself for only being able to produce the illusion of body heat.

  “Let me sleep a while, Jake.” She sighed and clung to him even as she released her inner hold on him. He rained kisses on her closed eyelids and her pale lips. “I’ll be okay, Jake. I promise.”

  “I love you, Abby,” he said. What was left of his heart contracted with the fierceness of it. He loved her too much to do this to her again. Whatever strength he had gained from this one fevered coupling would have to be enough to fight Gideon and win.

  Chapter Nine

  Abby came again in her dreams. The swirling mists of her subconscious wrapped her aching body like a shroud and tightened sensually around her. She felt Jake’s long, skillful fingers between her legs, teasing and gently caressing the swollen folds until a pulsing orgasm brought her awake in his arms.

  He held her, but not with any sexual intentions. His dark eyes scanned her face and his lips were tight with worry.

  “What?” Her throat felt like sandpaper.

  “You need to eat something,” he told her as she contemplated the position of his hands. One arm propped her up, the other held a steaming cup of broth. He’d been attempting to feed her and while the thought warmed her, she felt a pang of regret that her shuddering release had been brought on only by her own fevered imagination.

  The black sheets were tucked chastely around her body and the flowery scent of soap lingered on her skin. He’d bathed her, too.

  That thought made her blush. How silly, she thought, to feel modest after what she’d let him do.

  She sipped from the cup he held to her lips and let the soothing warmth of the soup fill the void in her stomach.

  When she’d drained half the cup, she raised one hand to push it away. “We still need to get out of here, Jake.”

  The hard set of his mouth told her that wasn’t an option.

  “What time is it?” she asked suddenly panicked. A royal blue darkness had descended outside.

  “Almost 11:00.”

  She tried to rise but he held her back. “I’ve been asleep all day?”

  “You needed the rest. You need a lot more that just some soup. I was wrong to do ... what I did. It will take you longer to recover now because you weren’t ready.”

  “But how are you? Are you strong enough?” She ran her fingers into the open neck of the clean shirt he now wore searching for the cuts and bruises she remembered. Only smooth skin met her explorations.

  “I’m fine. I’ll be able to fight.”

  “You could be stronger, if you took more.” They still had time. If he drank more now, he could boost his strength to the upper limits.

  “No, Abby. Even if I thought it would make a difference, I won’t risk your life.”

  She sat up and reached for the soup again. He held it to her lips while she drank in hesitant sips. “I’ll be all right. If you don’t win, Jake, my life won’t matter.”

  “Abby.” Jake’s voice was steely. He lifted her chin and looked into her eyes. “I never wanted you to be my feeder.”

  For some reason that revelation saddened her, but she wouldn’t let it show. “Then make love to me, Jake.”

  “You know what would happen if I did.” He shook his head. They both knew he wouldn’t be able to resist the blood lust now that he’d sampled more than just her body. “Eat now. Get your strength back. You’re going to need it.”

  Abby felt bereft when Jake rose from the bed and disappeared into the bathroom. She finished the soup and slid across the bed to investigate the rest of the food on the tray that Marabel and the vampire guards had brought. She ate slowly, savoring every bite. She felt the strength returning to her body as she ate, but each moment Jake spent away from her seemed to drain her resolve.

  She heard the shower and figured Jake needed it as a distraction to avoid what now lay between them. She realized she’d heard reluctance in his voice when he’d told her he loved her. It wasn’t love at all but the blood lust that had taken over. The sex act was so closely linked with feeding for vampires that they were known to consider both equally important to buoy their strength. He’d taken her by instinct, nothing more, and now he couldn’t face her.

  She finished her meal and set the dishes aside. Clutching the sheet to her, she retrieved the jeans and T-shirt Jake had given her and put them back on.

  By the time she tucked in the hem of the shirt and buttoned the jeans, the shower was silent. Jake appeared a moment later toweling off his wet hair and torso. He wore nothing but his own jeans.

  “You look better,” he said. “How do you feel?”

  “I’ll be fine.” Engaged in the pointless exercise of folding the discarded bed sheet, she tried to keep her thoughts on the problem at hand.

  “What are we going to do about Gideon? I want to prove to Gregori that he’s the Client.”

  Jake shrugged. Abby caught the movement out of the corner of her eye and admonished herself fiercely for admiring the ripple of muscles as he turned his back to toss the wet towel into the bathroom. “I don’t think it matters to Gregori anymore. The ones who are dead are dead. They don’t mean anything to him.”

  “I guess that doesn’t surprise me.” Abby climbed on the bed and sat cross-legged in the center of the lake of black satin. Her heart leapt when Jake joined her. He sat at the edge of the bed and reached over to touch her hair. She leaned into his touch and closed her eyes.

  “I meant what I said, Jake. No matter what, I love you.” She silenced his response with a lingering kiss. “Take from me. You have to do anything you can to win.”

  For a moment, Jake considered it. The memory of her body stretched beneath him, her arms and legs wrapped around him, made him dizzy with desire. She was the closest he would ever get to being alive. When he was inside her, he lived and breathed. His heart beat with the rhythm of her pulse and blood flowed hot in his veins. It was so much more than love he felt for her, and despite his need to protect her from himself, he found he wanted her even more than before.

  Maybe if he just took a little more. Before he could reach for her, the door burst open.

  Claude and Marabel appeared with the guards behind them. “It’s time,” Gregori’s assistant announced.

  “It’s not midnight yet,” Jake retorted. He slithered off the bed and plac
ed himself between Abby and Gregori’s entourage.

  “We start now. The decision will be made at midnight.” Claude made a motion and Marabel skirted the bed with a shy smile at Jake. She clamped her long fingers over Abby’s wrist and hauled her to her feet.

  “You get to watch,” she said. “But you have to change.”

  The guards advanced and flanked Jake. They dragged him into the hallway. He didn’t flinch until he heard Abby scream. They held him at the threshold and he watched while Marabel cut Abby’s T-shirt off with a gold-bladed dagger. She brandished the blade and pointed it at the waistband of Abby’s borrowed jeans. “Take them off, too.”

  “All you had to do was ask.” Abby spat the words. Beneath the blade, she removed her clothes. Jake strained against the guards when Claude walked around Abby’s naked form, his black eyes glittering.

  “She may wear red tonight,” he said after a three-sixty degree view.

  Marabel went to the closet and pulled out a barely-there gown in a brilliant vermilion. She took it off the hangar with exaggerated care and held it out to Abby. “I like this one.”

  “What if I don’t?”

  No, Jake mouthed. This wasn’t the time to become defiant.

  Claude laughed. He raised a hand to Abby’s neck and caressed the just visible teeth marks that remained.

  “I see he’s fed. Good.” With one fingernail, he tore open the partially healed wounds. Abby winced. “He’ll need to again before the night is over. The smell of your blood will make him stronger.”

  Claude turned his back to Abby and gave Jake a dark grin as he licked his fingertip. “I’ve never tasted sweeter. If you loose, I may just take her for my own.”

  Marabel bristled at that and gave Abby a scathing look even as she held up the gown like an obedient sales girl for Abby to try on.

  The two women regarded each other with feral glares as Abby slipped the silky fabric over her body. The gown did little to hide her curves from Claude’s leering gaze and Jake’s jealousy peaked with a barely audible growl. She was his. Claude was just a lackey of Gregori’s. He would never get his hands on Abby, no matter who won the right of succession.