by Mary Hughes
“Nice nap?”
“A bit more than a nap.” He rolled onto his back, a soft groan escaping. “Sorry if I overstayed my welcome. Give me a minute to get myself going, and I’ll be out of your hair.” He sat up, rubbing the back of his neck.
“You didn’t overstay. You needed me.”
His cheeks went ruddy. Poor king. After his childhood, he didn’t like needing anyone.
I was hoping to change that. But I had to be smart about it. If I just told him, he’d never believe me, not where it counted, not in that deep, vulnerable place of need.
But if I showed him… “And I need you. Take off your shirt.”
His fingers stopped mid-massage. “Um, did I hear you right?”
“What, should I have said ‘get naked’?”
Ryker was never good at following directions, but this time, he stripped off his damaged knit so fast it smoked.
Smiling, I got to my knees behind him. “You’re pretty tense. Let me help.” As I dug my fingers into the knots that were his shoulders, I kissed the top of his neck. The short hairs tickled my lips.
He groaned aloud. “Is this a massage or…?”
“Or.” I pressed my lips to his smooth, warm skin. “But you need to relax first.”
He managed a laugh. “Shouldn’t I be seducing you?”
“Who said anything about seduction?”
His bronze skin flushed. “I’m so sorry—”
“Don’t be. We’re doing it, not talking about it. Lie on your back now.”
Hesitantly, he flipped on the bed. Good. As long as he was confused, he wasn’t worried about being needy and vulnerable.
And anyway, this wasn’t a seduction. This was making love.
I straddled him, gripping his muscular waist with my thighs. His proud chest was displayed before me in all its glory, and I had to work not to just clap hands to those massive mounds and squeeze.
Instead I leaned over and took a long, delicate lick of one collarbone.
He reacted as if I’d sucked flesh, bucking hips against me. His hands came to grip my waist, anchoring me from falling. His rippling body was a giddy ride that sent my pulse racing.
Once he stilled, I licked down onto one pectoral, his skin smooth warm cream over the boulder of his muscle. A quiet groan escaped me. “You really are too beautiful.”
“You want me.” His voice was a whisper, dusted with surprise.
“All of you,” I agreed, though I didn’t explain “all.” Words wouldn’t convince him I accepted him, loving even the parts he couldn’t. Showing him, though…
Dipping my head, I licked and kissed and nibbled his strong chest. I teased his nipples with my tongue, delighting in the flick of their tight nubs.
Hesitantly, his hands slid from my waist along my back, raising a trail of heat. The first sign of his own need, so deeply denied as a weakness. My heart soared.
I rewarded him with a gentle bite of one nipple. His hands flew to the mattress and he arched like a bucking horse. I stayed on but only by clamping my thighs tight and grabbing his rib cage. His heart hammered beneath my palms.
And beneath me, a sign of his physical need rose taut and urgent.
I slid down his body, my lips landing on the feathery trail of black hair, my fingers finding his waistband. The pants were thin. One good tug uncovered him.
His erection sprang free, perfectly shaped and lusciously large.
“All of you.” Satisfaction warmed me as I wrapped both hands around the hot shaft.
“Wait.” His voice was hoarse, strained. “Give me time to catch you up.”
I straightened and, meeting his eyes, unzipped my catsuit, baring my breasts. “Does this look like I need catching up?”
No words came. His black gaze was glued to my naked breasts, his eyes blazing. He reached for me.
Hesitated.
It broke my heart. He’d met rejection so often when it really mattered, wounding him to the core. Despite our growing intimacy as we argued, fought, and nearly died together, he was still afraid to let me in.
Or maybe he had let me in, just a little bit, and he was terrified my rejection would devastate him.
I showed him acceptance the only way I could. I seized his hands and smacked them onto my chest.
My nipples rubbed against his hot masculine palms. Twinges of desire rolled from the tips straight to my groin.
We both groaned.
I began to caress his hard length, squeezing over the end. His erection jerked in my hands, releasing dewdrops of desire.
An answering desire shivered through me.
“Wait,” he rasped again, pinching my nipples until I keened. “I want to arouse you. Keep your body smoldering for hours then push you to a climax that destroys us both.”
“Yeah?” I hit him with a hot, needy gaze. “Gonna have to wait your turn, bubby.” Pulling out of his hands, I dropped my head and took him in my mouth.
He roared. His body bucked under me, but I grabbed his hips and rolled with it. My sex dampened as I stroked my mouth over him. Aroused, not just by the smooth sensation of him on my lips and tongue.
But electrified because he’d finally let go. Opened himself to me. That was a turn-on more powerful than anything.
“Kat, Kat… I want you so much.” He repeated it, head jerking from side to side, eyes tightly shut.
He was ready.
“Then take me.”
His eyes slit open, belly rapidly rising and falling with his panted breaths. His erection was so full it made me ache.
I jumped off the bed to strip naked. He didn’t move a muscle the whole time. My own heart pounded in response. My king, usually Mr. I-Lead, was so enamored of me that he didn’t argue, didn’t try to slow things down.
I’d reward him.
Smiling, I climbed back onto the bed. Onto him. With one hand, I placed his length at my entrance.
He stopped breathing.
Instead of taking him in, though, I stretched myself along his muscular torso, dewed with his urgency.
“All my vast experience,” he whispered. “With you, I’m as light-headed as a virgin.” His hand slid down my back to grip one hip. His own twitched, as if he’d impale me from below.
With my thighs, I clamped him still. “Not yet.”
His eyes came to mine, hurt. He’d taken it as a rejection.
I let him read the truth in my gaze. This was no rejection, but the opposite—a marking of this moment, a beat to underline its importance, as vital as the forever gaze that had changed both our lives.
Wonder shimmered in his eyes. You accept me.
More than that. I throbbed with need for him. In my breasts. Between my legs.
In the large vein pulsing in my neck.
I accept all of you.
Clasping his head in my hands, his hair threading my fingers, I said the words. “Love me, Ryker. Love all of me.”
I kicked up my chin, exposing my throat.
He went utterly still. “You can’t mean that.” Yet his fangs slowly descended from between his lips. Long, sleek.
Sharp.
Tilting my hips, I took him an inch deeper into me. He spread me with luscious heat, and I trembled. “I mean exactly that.”
With both hands, I pulled his head toward me, bringing those sleek, sharp fangs closer to my hammering pulse.
“I…I wanted more for you,” he panted against my skin, his lips sending electrical jolts of delight shivering through me. “Exotic positions, decadent techniques, everything humanly possible—”
“I want you. All of you. Human and vampire.”
He sucked in a shocked breath. But he swelled bigger inside me.
“Love me, Ryker.” I rubbed my neck against the flat of his fangs. “Bite me.”
“I want you, Kat. Badly. Want.” His hips jerked, only his iron control keeping him from plunging inside. “But I won’t bite. You hate my kind—”
“I don’t hate you. I love you, all of you. I accept you, all of you.” I offered my aching throat. “Take me as you truly are, or not at all.”
A moment. Two. My heart, on the cusp of happiness and true fulfillment, paused.
He turned his head from my neck. He wasn’t going to do it.
My heart fell. His fear of rejection had stopped him, or maybe I hadn’t convinced him by words or action that I was sincere. Either way, I’d have to give up.
Give. Up. Two words I never put together. Not while I still had life and breath and strength to convince him.
Stroking my hips down another two inches, I clenched my muscles around him, saying hello, glad you’re here. He gasped, his mouth opening, fangs extended into space.
I wrapped my lips around one and sucked.
Every cell in his body went alert beneath me. A deep, anguished groan emerged from his chest as he fought to stay in control of his vampire.
Curling my tongue around the sharp tip, I pushed. Nicked my flesh.
A sting. A metallic, salty taste. I pressed my mouth against his, kissing him as deeply as I could. Kissing him with my whole being. Wanting, no, needing his whole being in return.
Blood welling from my tongue.
His fingers tightened on me. His panted breath came in gasps as he evidently called on his last bits of self-control to stop himself from tasting my blood…and he failed.
Roaring, he flipped us. My back hit the mattress as he began to pump into me, our soaring desire slicking my thighs. I was so ready I’d come within moments.
His fangs came to rest lightly on my neck.
I gasped. My blood sang with anticipation. I waited, breath held, while he rasped my name—and three words.
“Kat. I love you.”
He bit.
I blasted into a million shattering pieces. Pressing his beloved head to my neck with both hands, my only anchor in the brilliant explosion of climax, I gasped, “I love you, too.”
…
Kat was perfect, tight and hot and wet, almost more than Ryker could bear. He’d had ten thousand years of sex.
Never once in ten thousand years had he made love to his mate.
He’d wanted to give her a climax to blow her mind, but it was no longer enough. He focused on loving her, loving her with all of him. Even the parts he kept hidden from others, hidden from pain.
He’d bare himself to her.
“Kat,” he rasped. “I love you.”
He loved her with his whole self, with body and words—and fangs. He bit. She shuddered in pleasure, her sex clutching at him…and suddenly she released, a wave that hit him to his toes. A second contraction followed tight on the first. Her hard waves of climax tugged at his—no, demanded his.
What was coming was huge, big enough to destroy him.
Breath left him. They hadn’t spent hours making love. He wasn’t ratcheted to dizzying heights.
It would destroy him, all the same, because this climax was at ground zero.
His heart.
Exposed, naked, utterly vulnerable. With her, he gloried in it. “Kat,” he whispered, every muscle in his body primed. “I…”
Orgasm overtook him, a detonation from his sex outward through every cell in his body. “I love you.” He roared it, completely losing control.
Wrapping arms around his neck, she pressed a flurry of kisses to the top of his head, a tsunami of passion so spontaneous it could only be real. His heart burst at the honesty, the beauty of it.
Her love remade him. He licked and kissed and whispered words of love, overflowing with joy.
The intense waves subsided. His limbs were trembling dangerously. He’d fall, and he didn’t want to crush her. Though she was strong, he was a lot bigger.
Licking the bite marks closed, he barely managed to flop down beside her. Lying on his back, a sense of wonder filled him.
He was…happy. Pulling her to him, he cuddled her with a sigh.
He wanted to stay like this, always.
Just a few tumultuous days had gone by, yet he could no longer live without her. He’d already considered asking her to join him in marriage, the human rite of forever. Now he had to, really. This love deserved nothing less.
Though it scared the skheid out of him. Once he asked, she only had two options. “Yes” would keep him deliriously happy—until she finally rejected him.
Or she could say the “no” that would immediately kill him.
…
After our amazing sex, my king cuddled me to him.
I propped my chin on his chest and gazed at him. His face was relaxed, expression sated. Even his devilish eyebrows were relaxed. My own satisfaction fizzed through me. “Say it again.”
“Didn’t you hear it the first and second time?”
“Yeah. I want to hear it again.” And again, and again. Until I was tired of hearing it.
Which would be never.
He gave me that entirely edible quirk of lips that was his version of a smile. “I love you, Kat.”
“I love you, too, Ryker.” I loved a vampire. Maybe someday I’d regret it, but for now it was absolutely right. If nothing else, it would keep my life interesting. I snuggled happily into him, so relaxed that I started to drift off.
When I woke, he was gone.
Epilogue
Ryker returned to Kat’s flat that evening after a wearying day tromping around Meiers Corners and greater Chicago searching desperately for the things he wanted.
He stood on her stoop, trying to keep his thumping heart under control, but his pulse raced, and he was short of breath.
Was this utter terror what other besotted fellows went through, asking the light of his life to share the rest of time with him?
Suddenly he wanted to back out. Do it later. Do it differently, with candles and soft music and a diamond ring, its center rock big enough to dazzle her into saying yes, forever.
There was no forever. Everyone rejected him. Might as well get it over with.
Before he could knock, a light tread approached inside. She sensed I was here. Was the mating bond so strong already? Leaning the two white, ribbon-wrapped boxes he’d brought beside the door, he waited.
The door flew open before him, revealing her pale face. Her anger was obvious, the fear hidden beneath less so, but it leaped out to him.
“I’m sorry,” he began, the same moment she snapped, “Where have you been?”
She clenched her eyes shut a moment, took a deep breath, and opened them again. “Sorry. It’s not like we’re married or have made a commitment or anything.”
The slightly sour tone to her voice, as if maybe she wanted marriage or a commitment or anything, raised his spirits.
“Odd that you should say that. I have a question to ask you. May I come in?”
“Depends on the question.” Studying his face, she frowned. “Your eyebrow isn’t doing its sarcastic thing. That scares me.”
It tickled a laugh out of him. Life with her, whether eternity or only the next two minutes on this stoop, would never be dull. “I’m sorry I left. I had to get a few things.” He picked up the two boxes.
She eyed them. “White boxes, red satin ribbons. One a yard or so long, and the other the size of a pillow. Red roses and candy? Romantic.” Disappointment dusted her features. “Oh, well, it’s the thought that counts. Come on in.”
His heart thumped faster. Tucking the boxes under one arm, he followed her inside. “Why don’t you sit?”
“Why? Oh. That question.” Reluctance dragged her steps to the couch. But she sat.
Stomach queasy, still holding the boxes, he started, “So, the thing that ties
us.”
He’d put this off, not wanting to scare her with the mating bond. A vampire hunter, tied for life to a vampire? It would be her worst nightmare.
But her reaction might help him decide how best to pop the real question.
“It’s a bond that can extend your life. Vampires heal almost anything; the older the vampire, the faster the healing. The thing that ties us will let me share some of that with you.”
She straightened, her mouth puckered like she’d sucked a lemon. “I have to drink your blood?”
“No. That’s a myth. Human blood is an emetic and you’d just throw it up. But there’s a way, because of our bond, that I can extend your life. Give you plenty of time to kill all the vampires you want.”
“Except you, then.” Her face, her tone, gave him no clue as to how she meant that.
He sighed, glancing down at the boxes. He’d been far too optimistic. “The last thing you want is a bond to a vampire, but I think you’ll be happy with this one. It’s a mating bond.”
“Mating—?”
“You wanted to kill me. The mating bond is a vampire’s lifeline. Literally. Break it—and I die.” He laughed, without humor. “Now you have the easiest, best way possible to destroy me. All you have to do is walk away. I’ll die. More effective than the sun.”
He braced himself. She’d reject him now or later—everyone always did—but he suddenly hoped it was now. He couldn’t imagine living with her, sleeping blissfully beside her, loving her as he had, being radiantly happy for days or weeks or years and then being thrown aside. The pain when his family did it was excruciating. The pain if she did it?
It would tear him apart, piece by piece, then send him to hell. Even death would not end his torture.
But she didn’t say anything. Merely glanced again at the boxes.
So he had no clue how to proceed after all.
He went down on one knee on the floor beside her. It put their eyes level. Hers were wary.
“Kat Kean—will you marry me?”
He smiled hopefully into her blue eyes. Warrior’s eyes, because he couldn’t read them, like enigmatic mirrors.
“Ryker…” She hesitated.
His smile remained frozen, but inside, his heart withered. Fitting. In some cultures, saving a life meant owning the life. He only had his heart because of her.