“Horseshit!” she ejected hotly. “None of them were Vampires. The Imprinting is all about love and passion and emotion, all of which you yourself have been quick to point out I am not capable of! Certainly not on the grand scale of your mushy, lovesick, disgusting Imprinting!”
Jasmine leapt away from him, turning and pushing off the outcropping, leaping into the whipping breezes.
In a wild act of instinct, Adam leapt right after her. He launched himself onto her back, circling her neck and waist with his massive arms, feeling the jolt of gravity as they began to fall toward earth. She was unable to adjust her flight to his weight because she was too busy indulging in her fury to compensate. She struggled against him, her strength quite remarkable.
But only moments before he was going to morph them both into mist, she reacted with an unexplainable instinct, her fangs stretching free and long just as she grabbed his wrist and sank her teeth into his forearm.
Adam roared in pain, reaching to grab her by her hair and thinking he was going to rip her free of him.
But then time drew long, ticking into slower and slower instants as their bodies fell toward the ground at breakneck speed. His fingers were full of her hair, but all desire to detach himself from her was gone by the time his fingertips touched her scalp. Just as her desire to flay his flesh apart with the savage rip of her teeth vanished the instant his blood washed over her tongue. Their joined minds locked as if in mutual seizure as she tasted what she could only describe as ambrosia, the food of the gods ... the most divine of forbidden fruits making good on its promise.
His blood, the essence of all that was Adam and all that was Adam’s power, slid to the back of her throat and she couldn’t even pretend to resist the urge to swallow. She groaned as the first mouthful burst down her throat as though she had swallowed fire, the overwhelming, sensuous burn rushing down the center of her body from throat to chest to belly and then onward into the lee of her hips and reproductive organs, burning a hot, wet path, it seemed, right back out of her body.
Water is my element. All that is liquid is mine to manipulate and harmonize with. Shall I tell you where you are wet, little Vamp?
Jasmine gasped for breath, removing her teeth from his flesh just before he was able to come to his senses enough to turn them into water, barely a second before they hit the ground. They dashed against the hard, cold earth, physics demanding their fluid forms spread far and fast over its surface.
But Adam defied those physics, instead rolling around with her and resolidifying their bodies once the initial danger of impact was past, sending them tumbling across the ground in a tangle of arms and legs. The Demon lay beneath the weight of the Vampire, both of them panting hard for breath. His blood was on her lips and he watched as a sensuous tongue came out to slowly bathe it away, felt his mind blossoming with pleasure as it exploded inside her senses. Her eyes rolled closed, her hands gripping his chest and shoulder where they lay. Her forehead dropped against him as if she didn’t have the strength to hold up her own head. And he realized it was because she was too weak with bliss.
Then the next moment her head snapped up, her eyes popping open like suddenly released window shades. Have her lashes always been so thick and so black? he found himself wondering. Was it his imagination, or was she growing more beautiful every time he laid eyes on her? The brown of her eyes had been so sultry and decadent, but now the green she had acquired seemed bottomless and seductively mysterious. And there was something satisfying, soul-deep satisfying, about seeing a part of himself in her.
She took a breath, lowered her head, and was suddenly gazing at him through her upper lashes like a prowling jaguar eyeing its prey.
“More,” she said in a voice that was far more growl than it was anything else.
He did not even pretend to mistake her meaning, nor did he pretend he didn’t want it just as badly as she did. He reached for the collar of his new shirt, yanking it away from his skin in a tear of popping fabric and buttons. There was no preamble as she opened her mouth and attacked his throat in a quick in-and-out puncture of her wicked sharp fangs. Then before his blood could so much as bead in the open wounds, she had sealed her lips over the damage she had done.
Jasmine began to drink.
By the third sucking draw of her lips and tongue against his neck, Adam was as hard as pristine diamonds. It was as much because he was experiencing her compounding pleasure with her every swallow as it was the way she was writhing against him with such incredibly wicked sensuousness and need. That devious little body of hers could have raised a dead man’s interest. And Adam was far from dead.
He had one hand gripping her hair so tightly it should have squeaked. The other had fallen to her hip, or rather the rise of her backside on the right side, and was mindlessly guiding the tease of her body more tightly and accurately against himself. It was utter torture, and absolute perfection. He could not possibly have wanted more. They did not need to be sexually joined just then because one of them had already penetrated the other. Now it was all about sensation and elation and the miraculous feel of things building stronger and stronger with every second that passed. She was moaning against him, her left hand rushing relentlessly up over her body and gripping at her breast through her shirt. Then she was pulling the fabric away from her skin, trying to free herself, trying to expose herself for her needs and pleasure.
Adam reached quickly up under the hem of her shirt and grabbed hold of the lace lying close to her skin. It took only a twist of his large hand to snap the thing free of her body, allowing him to discard the lace and boning. Quickly after, her breast was filling his hand, the soft heat of it divine and pleasurable. His fingertip found that metal ring she had lanced through the tip of her nipple and he toyed with it relentlessly, feeling her get as rigid and hard as he was.
Orgasm raced through her blood because of his, the power of it extraordinary, skipping from her and into him. Their bodies seized with awesome pleasure, liquid release throbbing from both of them. Adam felt light-headed as he fed her body in all ways at once, taking satisfaction in the idea that it went way beyond the sexual. The second thrust of her fangs into him was unexpected and ought to have been painful after he had been so wrung out. It was anything but. If anything, it kicked him back up into the wave of ecstasy she had swept him away with. They were both gasping for breath and groaning repetitively with pleasures no one else in the world could ever comprehend or perhaps even experience.
How sad for them, he thought as her mouth fell away from his skin at last. Adam recalled that a Vampire always bit twice. The first time to open a wound, the second time to inject the host with clotting factors and antibodies intended to close the wound and facilitate healing. But his technical understanding of it had never given him any idea what the experience would feel like. That there would be such bliss. Such overwhelming bliss.
“Because it is not supposed to feel like that,” she told him on a soft, sleepy murmur near his ear. “I don’t think any Vampire has ever felt like that during a ... a ...”
“Feed,” he supplied for her.
“I cannot even call it that,” she whispered fiercely against the rim of his ear, her hands gripping him with that impressive Vampire strength. “I cannot ever call it that. That was so far from being something so basic and rudimentary as a feed. Adam ... Adam, it was amazing,” she breathed. She lifted her head and looked down on him with starry jade eyes. “My God, is this what Damien feels when he loves his little Lycanthrope ?” she wondered. “Well, then no wonder ... no wonder ...”
She sighed and rested her cheek on his chest, her ear against his heart even though her Vampire senses could easily make out the wild beat of his pulse. It was what she always supposed being stoned would feel like. It was the most amazing high anyone could imagine. Was this the way it felt for any Vampire taking any other Nightwalker’s blood? If so, then she could see why some would be compelled to go rogue and want to feed on a plethora of Nightwalkers, if o
nly to see what each tasted like ... to see what it felt like.
But she was not so naïve as to believe that. She knew this experience was wholly different. This was special beyond even the Imprinting. Had she been afraid of this? Had she been resisting it?
“Yes, little Vamp. And you might again once you come down from your euphoria.”
“Perhaps,” she agreed with a nod. “Perhaps not. I am not as foolish as you think I am. Nor as stubborn.”
He made a rude noise.
“Very well,” she conceded good-naturedly, a smile spreading over her lips. “I am quite stubborn. But I am not an idiot.” She lifted her head and moved to look down into his eyes, her hands brushing up over his face. “Do you think I like being so cold and so emotionally bland? Can you imagine what life begins to look like when year after year there is nothing to interest you? Nothing to stimulate you?” She touched a finger to his lips, tracing their generous shape. “All I can feel is physical pleasures ... pleasures of the senses ... and perhaps intellectual challenges. But my heart is cold. There is no true light for me. No joie de vivre.
“But this,” she breathed as she touched her mouth to his in a ghost of a kiss, “this is life at its fullest. This is intense flavor and full-blown sensuality and ... oh my God ...” She gave a little groan before she caught his mouth in a deep kiss. Adam let her design the thing, let her set the pace and intensity. He understood that this was the first kiss she had initiated in decades. Perhaps even the better part of a century.
More than that. I will kiss Damien with warmth and affection, but no one else. I have not kissed with passion ... until I kissed you.
That satisfies me greatly, he thought back to her.
She broke from his mouth to laugh.
“You see? You are such a Neanderthal.”
“What I am is hungry. For you.” He sank a big hand into her hair and pulled her down to his mouth. This time he was in complete command of the kiss, heat exploding like a bomb between them, the impact sweet and painful and so very full of fire. He reveled in the taste of her on his tongue as he played with hers. He kissed her until she was moaning in a sweet chain of sounds that, admittedly, revitalized his ego. Because even though he had been just as unsure about this thing between them as she was, her rejection had still hurt. Somewhere in his spirit he bore the bruise. But he knew she was equally wounded. She had hurt herself when she hurt him.
But all it had taken was a taste of blood to chase all opposition away. That exchange had done in an instant what might have taken days and a volatile Samhain moon to convince them of otherwise.
“Mmm ... no. No!” She pulled back from him. “Bitch to hunt. Must hunt the bitch.” She tried to sit up, but he only followed her, making sure she understood he was diametrically opposed to that course of action. For the immediate future, anyway. He did this by grabbing hold of her shoulders and dragging her back up against his mouth.
“The bitch has waited this long. Surely a little while longer will not make such a dramatic difference.”
Jasmine sighed, a long, sweet sound, her entire body melting back against him as her arms wrapped around his neck. She succumbed to the workings of his mouth, telling herself she would only do so for a moment or two.
“There she is,” Corrine whispered softly to the Demon by her side. She touched a hand of comfort to his shoulder, the action triggering him to breathe.
The redheaded Druid and the tawny-haired Demon named Aaron looked through the nursery glass at the squalling half-Asian, half-Hispanic infant, her tuft of black hair standing all askew in reflection of her obvious outrage at the world.
“Poor thing,” Corrine said with empathy. “Such a hard start in life.”
“This is such a difficult concept for me,” Aaron confessed as he looked at the helpless human creature. “We take such care and thought before producing children in the Demon world. They are so precious to us, our offspring. It hurts and angers me to think a mother would poison herself with drugs while carrying a babe, knowing full well how that babe will suffer once born.”
“Unfortunately drugs remove all manner of logic. With this particular drug, some of the mothers don’t even realize they are pregnant for most of their term ... or they simply don’t care.”
“And so she cries. My future mate. A female you say will be a powerful Druid one day if she survives this withdrawal. And I will see that she does.”
Aaron moved to find entrance into the nursery, but Corrine held him back by his arm.
“You can’t touch her, Aaron. Even as young as she is, you will very likely trigger those changes that will make her Druid, causing her to become dependent on you for the rest of her life.”
“So? Is that not how it should be?”
“Perhaps. Or perhaps she should be allowed to form a life as an individual first, before she feels the urge to become part of a pair.”
Corrine could tell by the darkness flooding his handsome visage that Aaron didn’t like the idea at all.
“Look what leaving her in the care of humans has done for her so far,” he said bitterly. “And you cannot dangle her in front of me like bait, she who will be my salvation, and then force me to leave her unprotected amongst—” He came short of calling humans “savages,” but the unspoken word hung in the air. “I am sorry,” Aaron said quickly. “I know you are human.”
“No offense is taken, Aaron. Your arguments are strong, unfortunately. We are very thoughtless and sometimes cruel with our own. And I don’t suggest you leave her here abandoned and unprotected as she is.”
Through the glass a plume of dark smoke suddenly appeared, the suddenness of it and the no doubt painful change in air pressure setting every single infant in the room to screaming. Kane reached out to touch the child in question, and before anyone could see him, he disappeared with her.
“There,” she soothed the Demon beside her, who was itching to protect the girl child. “Kane is taking her somewhere safe where she will be raised by Demon parents in the Demon world until such time as you feel it is wise to introduce yourself to her. Perhaps in about twenty years or so.”
“That is not long at all,” Aaron said with a sigh of marked relief.
That made Corrine chuckle. Humans and Demons saw the passing of time so differently.
The lights in the hospital had been flickering angrily ever since their arrival, and were now fluctuating so wildly it looked as though they would lose power at any moment.
“Come on. Let’s go,” Corrine encouraged him. “Between your influence on the technology around us and the fact that a baby is now missing from the nursery, we had best leave.”
“Of course.”
Aaron reached out to take Corrine’s hand, and in a burst of dust they disappeared from the hospital corridor.
Sometime later Aaron left Corrine in downtown Tokyo, where her husband had promised to take her out for a genuine Japanese dinner. Aaron the Earth Demon had agreed with her decision to keep the baby girl’s foster family a mystery for now so he would not be tempted to interfere with her upbringing. But Corrine had a feeling he would be on her doorstep soon, fussing at her for the information. It really wouldn’t matter too much. The foster parents she had chosen were powerful and strong-willed, and Aaron would have his hands full trying to get past them before they felt the time was appropriate for her to meet her would-be mate.
She felt compassion for Aaron. He had come to Corrine as Noah’s new laws demanded of him, to have the Matchmaker seek his mate. Corrine had been learning the hard way that she would not always be successful in her search for specific Druids, however. Perhaps the Druid mate for the Demon in question had died or perhaps the mate had not been born yet. And then there were a number of other things that could go wrong or throw up an obstacle in the seeking process. Often it was the mental complexity of the Demon in question, the Demon’s subconscious working against itself. And more recently she had realized that perhaps that Demon was not meant to find a Druid mate. Perha
ps that Demon’s soul mate was another type of Nightwalker breed completely. She did not have the power to find those mates. At least she didn’t have that power yet. She was stretching herself, trying to see if she could do it ... if she could figure out the path to that kind of ability. If she could find that power within herself, then she would be a true Matchmaker, with no obstacles in her way and no limitations to the mates she could find.
How beautiful that would be.
And that was why, after dinner, she was going to visit the Queen, Kestra. Kestra had a remarkable power that allowed her not only to map out the current abilities of a Nightwalker, but also to see that person’s future abilities, and perhaps even guide them toward new powers. The one constant in the Demon and Druid races, as Corrine understood it, was that they never stopped growing in power and ability. Even Gideon, the Ancient, who was over a thousand years old, had learned the way to a new ability. And this was thanks to Kestra. Oh, he would have likely found the way on his own over many, many years of testing and practicing, but Kestra had dramatically cut down that learning curve.
Corrine was excited and nervous at the same time. What if Kestra saw nothing in her abilities that could lead her where she wanted to go? How could she truly call herself a Matchmaker if she could only make Demon/Druid matches? And if she could go beyond Demon and Druid, did that mean other Nightwalkers would come to her door seeking for a mate?
“Oh my God. It’ll be a full-time job.”
And protecting her had already become Kane’s full-time job, it seemed. All of her consultations were now conducted with Kane right outside the door, making sure everyone inside was behaving themselves. If she cried out for him, he was always a quick teleport away. Ever since the fiasco with Noah losing control in his mad efforts to obtain Kestra, Kane refused to take any chances with her safety. Perhaps he wasn’t as old and as strong as some of the Demons that came to her, and perhaps he might not win against them in a head-to-head, but he was damn well going to give it his all.
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