Soul? A self-deprecating laugh tore free of him. To lose half my soul, I must first possess one.
It had taken him the greater part of an hour for the fact that his mate was a shifter to sink in. The idea as an abstract had sickened him, but he thought about shunning Kelly, forever keeping her at arm’s length regardless of the reality she was his true mate. That sobered him instantly. There was no way Yates could go on without her. Not when he’d spent so many centuries waiting for her to arrive. He also knew he had to be thankful for the saving grace of Kelly having shifter blood. She would have died had she not been. He couldn’t have brought her back by siring her after what he’d done and he knew it.
Setting aside everything else, Yates couldn’t deny the knowledge that Kelly was captivating in either of her forms. As shocked as he’d been when she shifted into a black panther, claiming she was anything less than exotically beautiful would be a lie. In panther form, her lavender eyes swirled with various purples and black. Though he suspected the black came from having been partially turned by him, not the shifter blood in her. The sound of her purr was forever locked in his mind as was the look of shame etched on her face just prior to shifting. He’d caused that pain and couldn’t bear to dwell on it anymore.
His internal clock alerted him that sunrise wasn’t far off. Being caught out in it would mean his death. Living without Kelly wasn’t living so he took the chance and stood his ground. If the sun wanted to claim him, he would accept. Kelly meant that much and more to him.
Catching the telltale scent of a shifter—the scent he had idiotically failed to recognize in Kelly upon first meeting her—Yates spotted a large man with shorn hair entering Kelly’s building. He knew without being told that the man was headed to Kelly’s apartment. He also knew he’d rip the man in two if he dared touch his mate.
He hurried across the street but didn’t bother with the stairs. Yates did something he hadn’t done in centuries. He tapped into one of his darker gifts—levitation.
* * * * *
Kelly opened the thick wooden door and exhaled as she found Jax, her longtime friend, standing there. The militant yet oddly fashionable lack of hair on his head always made her smile. He was one of those men who came dangerously close to being too muscular. Somehow, Jax always managed to stay just this side of too much. He also always managed to know when she needed a friend. She’d carefully avoided his calls since she’d returned, knowing she wouldn’t be able to hide the truth of what transpired at Yates’ house from him. She also knew Jax’s temper. He could and would attack Yates in full force, regardless of how much Yates meant to her.
But you repulse him.
Her inner thoughts rushed over her and she tried to bury the hurt.
“You haven’t answered your cell all damn night.” Jax pushed past her and made himself right at home, heading toward her living room windows and scanning the night sky. He was prone to odd bursts of overprotectiveness but she had little doubt he sensed she was troubled. She shut the door. “You told me you were going to a photo shoot but didn’t bother telling me where or when you’d be done?”
“Jax, lecture me another night, okay?” She touched her stomach and did her best to ignore the hunger. She’d eaten—or rather, attempted to eat—only to find her body rejecting the food she put in it. She knew what she needed now, and she had no yearning to give in to the lust.
Blood.
Jax’s light blue eyes showed his concern. “Kelly? What’s wrong?”
She went toward the sofa and a second before she would have sat down, she lost her footing. Jax caught hold of her and pulled her against his steely chest. Sniffing the air, he growled. “Vampire! I smell vampire on you!”
Tears streamed down her cheeks as she saw the anger in her friend’s eyes. He swallowed hard and stretched his neck, calming down as best as he could. “What happened?”
“A-at the shoot, I met a man.” Her breath was short and measured.
His nostrils flared as his eyes swirled slightly. Anger bristled off his skin, his energy filling the room. “You mean a vampire.”
She nodded. “I didn’t know he was one at first, Jax. And to be honest, I don’t think it would have mattered. I had to go to him. The minute I heard his voice on my answering machine, I had to go. I needed to see him, touch him, be touched by him.”
The cords in Jax’s thick neck popped. “You fucked a vampire? A corpse?”
Lancing her heart would have hurt less than hearing Yates referred to as a corpse even though he’d had no qualms about calling her an animal. The prejudices between their kinds had gone too far.
“Not a corpse. Stop it, Jax!”
He sniffed the air once more and jerked away from her. “You did more than fuck him, Kelly, you let him mark you.” His face was a mask of rage. “You let him try to turn you!”
She kept the fact that she had little choice on the matter to herself, opting instead to put her hand on his chest. “Jax, please. What’s done is done. I have bigger problems to deal with right now.”
“What kind of problems?” he asked, sliding his hand over hers. Staying mad at one another was difficult, especially with their past. It had been a long bumpy road that they’d walked together. Jax’s ability to forgive her for almost anything didn’t surprise her. She would do the same for him.
“Remember what the bloodlust felt like the first time you shifted?” Kelly knew she wouldn’t have to go into any more detail. She’d been there the night Jax first shifted. It was she he’d fed from. It was she he’d brutally used to satisfy all of the burning hunger. Her blood he’d spilled without thought. Her pound of flesh he’d taken. Her innocence lost.
Jax hadn’t meant to hurt her but the beast he carried was too powerful that first night. She’d lain there, pinned beneath him as he fed from her, his cock buried in her, snarling and narrowly managing to avoid doing serious damage. Jax had never forgiven himself for his inability to control his beast that night. There was nothing to forgive as far as Kelly was concerned. He could no more have controlled the beast within him than she could have controlled her attraction to Yates. It was fate.
He grabbed her to him and cupped her chin, forcing her gaze to meet his. His eyes were troubled. “How can I help you?”
“Don’t let me hurt any humans, please.” The very idea of becoming a monster, one who preyed upon innocents, terrified her. She’d seen too many of own their kind have to be put down to protect humans, and though she’d never experienced that kind of loss of control, she had no way of knowing what she would become with the addition of vampire traits. She herself had delivered more than one killing judgment on a supernatural who was unable or unwilling to seek help during their bloodlust. She refused to be one of them.
The static buzz of cool energy surrounded her. It was familiar and reminded her of Yates. Closing her eyes, she tipped her head, allowing the power to circle her. It was comforting yet full of rage—and hate. Confused, she looked around and pushed Jax to the side in time to see Yates floating about six inches off the floor. The window behind him was open and his black hair blew with the night breeze at his back. His obsidian eyes swirled with flecks of gray.
“You can help by getting away from my mate,” he said, each word clipped. His fists clenched and the cords in his neck popped.
Jax snarled and in an instant was charging Yates. Kelly screamed as they clashed with a thundering rumble. They crashed into a chair, causing it to splinter to pieces before they struck the brick wall. Had it been drywall they would have gone straight through. As luck had it, the brick stopped their momentum, causing them to bounce off it. Blood streaked the floor where they landed. The room seemed to shake and their snarls and growls were deafening.
Jax did a partial shift and unsheathed his claws from his fingertips. He pressed them to Yates’ throat and Kelly gasped.
“No!”
Yates glanced at the claw to his throat and smiled, flashing fang, seemingly unconcerned with the situation. He appeared amused by
the challenge, as if he welcomed the opportunity to have a serious go at Jax. He took hold of Jax’s wrist and twisted, jerking the hand away from him.
The fight continued, each man taking the lead for a moment before losing it. They struck an end table, breaking the lamp that had been on it. Each took turns assuming the upper hand as they spun about her tiny apartment, trashing it along the way. Their clothing was tattered and torn and blood oozed from a number of places on each of them. The rational side of her mind was furious and terrified by the actions occurring around her. The side that wasn’t human, that longed for danger, excited her, making her nipples hard and her breaths skip. She licked her lips, her gaze locked on a trickle of blood sliding down Yates’ chest. It disappeared behind what remained of his shirt and she mentally envisioned it making its way down the front of his pants. She wanted to follow its path with her tongue.
A vicious blow to the face of Jax ripped her thoughts of blood play to the here and now. She shook her head and called out to them. “Stop!”
Ignoring her, they continued pummeling one another, their blows deafening and meant to kill. Desperate to break them apart, Kelly rushed forward and tried to shove between them. They ceased fighting long enough to gingerly brush her aside and returned to trying to rip one another’s heads off.
Men.
Kelly jerked and went to split them up again, this time with the intent of kicking both their asses if need be but the hunger pangs crippled her, taking her to the floor quickly. Clawing at the floor, she tried but failed to focus on something other than the pain. Her mouth opened and closed, no sound coming out as she writhed. She felt her eyes swirling and then her jaw flexed, her teeth lengthening and then receding rapidly. Something was wrong. Shifting was never excruciatingly painful before. Kelly finally managed to cry out as she curled into the fetal position.
Yates was suddenly next to her, moving to lift her into his arms. There was a blur and then Jax replaced Yates, neither of them getting her off the floor but merely staring down at her with dual distressed expressions. Desperation left Kelly reaching out for Jax. He was familiar.
“She must feed,” Yates said, his voice low and tinged with a hint of shame.
Jax brushed her hair away from her face. It was something he’d done many times over the course of their lives. It held the same comfort for her now as it used to. “She won’t feed off a human. It goes against everything she stands for. Being like one of you isn’t something Kelly would have ever asked for!” he growled. “You forced her, didn’t you?”
She clung to Jax’s arm and shook her head. The last thing she wanted was another fight to break out. “No… No more, Jax.”
“He did this to you, Kelly.” Jax’s face twisted in anguish as he continued to caress her. “You hurt because of him.”
As she stared into his light blue eyes she saw his recollection of past events surface. She’d suffered greatly after he’d lost control long ago as well. His eyelids fluttered shut as he turned his head to face Yates. “Truce?”
Yates’ cool hand touched her forehead and she forced an obligatory smile to her face through the pain. “Go. I repulse you,” she said straining. “I don’t want you here.”
“No,” he whispered, his voice soothing. “I was shocked, ma petite. You are my true mate and there is no other I would choose above you. Of this, you have my word. Let me ease your pain.”
Still hurt by his earlier reaction to her, Kelly shook her head and held tightly to Jax as her stomach cramped. Jax pulled her closer, comforting her as best he could. The pain remained, crippling her. It felt as if her insides were spiraling in on themselves.
“Oh gods, Kelly, let him help you,” Jax pleaded. “Your skin is turning gray. Let him fix this.”
She held her resolve. Yates didn’t really want her. Guilt was his driving factor. She wouldn’t allow him to do any more for her. “No.”
“Kelly,” Jax pressed.
“No.” She held firm.
Jax looked lost for a moment before rolling up his white dress sleeve. “Then let me help you. I owe you this, Kelly. Let me repay the debt.”
“Non.” Yates touched her cheek. “Kelly, you are newly formed in regards to your vampire traits. I have no idea if you will require sex while you feed and I will not permit you to—”
Paying no heed to Yates, Kelly stared up at Jax and nodded. He pressed his wrist to her mouth and she let her mouth shift slightly. As she bit into his wrist and his warm, sweet blood slid down her throat the cramping stopped. It was replaced almost instantly with another need—the one Yates had feared and one she’d never experienced before. Shifters were known to experience bloodlust from time to time, but nowhere near the level or frequency vampires suffered from it.
Her pussy clenched and her nipples peaked as she continued to suck gently on Jax’s wrist. He sniffed the air and the growl he let out was one a male panther did when sexually aroused. The cat shifter in her recognized it and responded with a purr.
Cool hands slid up and under her shirt, cupping her breasts and tweaking her already hard nipples. Her gaze flickered downward and she found Yates there, caressing her and then tearing her shirt open. He planted tiny kisses on the swells of her breasts, driving her already sex-starved body into a state of unrelenting need.
He worked his way down her body, kissing a path to the top of her lightweight pajama bottoms. Yates lifted his index finger and she watched as his fingernail lengthened. He skillfully sliced the material from her body and buried his head in her slit. The moment his tongue slid over her swollen bud, Kelly arched her back as she continued to suck lightly on Jax’s wrist, his powerful blood filling her, rejuvenating her.
Yates slipped a finger into her pussy and she gave in to the pleasure, riding his hand as she kissed Jax’s wrist. He pushed it back toward her mouth.
“Drink more, mon petit chat,” Yates said, his voice strained.
Kelly shook her head. “I’ve taken enough.”
“Please, Kelly. Drink more.” Jax shifted awkwardly before giving in and adjusting his cock in his pants. It was then Kelly understood why he wanted her to take more blood—he was turned on by it all.
She glanced down the length of her body and found Yates staring up at her as he licked her clit, sending pleasure throughout her. The need for his approval was great. Every part of her wanted to be defiant, to march to her own beat. But the truth was, her body recognized his dominance and responded to it.
“Because I am,” he said, taking his mouth from her cunt long enough to look up at her and wink.
Stop reading my thoughts.
He licked his lips. Stop thinking so loud and I might.
He licked her clit and drew it into his mouth, sending pleasure throughout her lower region. Just this once, wife, you may give him what he desperately wants. A tiny taste of paradise.
She would have questioned Yates but her orgasm picked then to strike, leaving her crying out and bucking against his face. The manly chuckle that came from him told her just how much he enjoyed it all. He lapped up her cream and then pulled back. In the blink of an eye, Yates had her flipped over onto her hands and knees, facing Jax.
Jax hissed as her cheek accidentally grazed the hard length in his pants.
You may touch him, ma petite. Take him in your mouth. I want to watch as I sink my cock into your warm body. You will accept my seed, oui?
Yates’ words ran through her mind, coming at her with a force she’d not expected. Wife? Seed? Jax was right, Yates had marked her, claiming her as his mate. She should have been outraged to have a vampire for a mate—a husband—but she wasn’t.
“Yes, give me everything, Yates,” she said, reaching up with one hand and taking hold of the button on Jax’s jeans.
Jax helped her undo his pants and freed his ruddy cock. He fisted it, stroking slightly as he ran his other hand into her hair. Smiling, Kelly worked her mouth over the head of it as Yates aligned himself with her heated core. He thrust in at the sam
e moment Kelly took Jax into her mouth. She cried out, the fullness of Jax’s cock drowning out the sound.
The sounds of sex filled the room. Pulling. Grunting. Slick thrusts.
Yates ground his teeth as he slid his cock in and out of his mate’s tight little cunt. Beads of sweat formed on his brow and caught him off guard. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done something as mundane as sweat. Kelly’s channel clenched, taking hold of his shaft and drawing it back into her body as she hit her zenith.
His gaze traveled over her back and to her head. It moved up and down as she pleasured Jax. Pangs of jealously moved through him and Yates did his best to brush them aside. This was for her—his mate, his wife. This was his gift to her. From this day forward, she would know only his body, only his touch. Jax would be the last man, aside from himself, she would ever taste in any way. When two vampires were mated, they could drink from each other limitlessly. Kelly would feed from Yates and Yates alone for all of eternity.
He continued pumping, enjoying the feel of her channel wrapped around his cock. The more he watched her sucking Jax, the more aroused he became. She was an expert at the art, it was plain to see, and he would have his turn. Right now, he concerned himself with the paradise he’d found within her quim. So sweet. So tight. Made for him.
“Arrggh,” he growled out, pummeling her body. He held her hips tightly, jerking them back against his own. Kneading her ass, Yates stared down at the sight of his cock sliding in and out of her pussy. The lips of her core held fast to him, pulling out with him and taking him back with a slick welcoming. Her cream coated his cock and his gaze moved to her tiny rosette.
Thoughts of fucking her ass consumed him. He knew what a bounty she held and being in her cunt only proved she truly was perfect for him. Yates eased his thumb into her ass, sinking harder and faster into her body.
Kelly whimpered, the sound muffled by Jax’s cock, now deep in her mouth.
Jax held Kelly’s long hair back from her face and rocked his hips. “Right there. Mmm-hmm. There.”
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