The Hunters Series

by Shiloh Walker

  She lifted confused looking eyes to Declan and asked, “Why would she tell me to eat?”

  Declan worried his lip with his teeth while listening to her speak. Eat, eh? Why the bloody hell is that so important?

  While he was pondering this, she absently rubbed her belly and said, “Speaking of food, can I get hungry? I am hungry. I want food. Can I want food?”

  Declan had heard bits and pieces of such things, but he had always attributed them to legend. Stories of vampires who were aided by forces not of this world, of a special sort of vampire immune to the dangers of the sun, who could walk among humans and convince all that they were human—eating, drinking, taking the sun.

  Vampires didn’t eat. They could drink, as long as they avoided dairy—the proteins in any sort of dairy or even that soy shit made them sick as hell, but other than that, they could drink whatever they wanted. But he’d never met a vampire who could eat.

  And new vampires simply couldn’t walk in daylight. It was one of the few things that helped control them, natural selection to keep the stronger, more vicious species under control.

  Of course, sometime nature needed extra help. And that would explain Tori.

  The pieces of the puzzle were falling into place. He roughly guessed it was nearing sunrise. And figured this was the only way to know for certain. “Do you trust me, Tori McAdams?” he asked, taking a shirt from the back of the door and buttoning her into it.

  “Trust you?”

  “Aye. Do you trust me?”

  A tiny smile curved her mouth, sad and bittersweet, as she lifted her hands, palms up, asking, “If I didn’t trust you, why would I have come here? I knew that if I could get to you, you could help me. Would protect me.”

  “I will. Come with me now. We’ve something we need to be doing,” he said, guiding her down the stairs and to the large eastern window.

  She sensed what he was doing and she hesitated. “I’m newly changed, Declan. She said the sun could kill the newly changed. And even if I’m not happy with my new diet, I’m not ready to die yet.”

  Stroking a reassuring hand down her back, he held her in place. “It takes more than a few seconds, darlin’ girl. It takes being thrown out into the sunlight and chained in place while the sun chars the flesh from your bones over a period of time—it takes hours, not seconds. If this hurts even a bit, I’ll get you away.”

  “Declan, what…”

  He shushed her, pressing his lips to her mouth, and cuddling her against him. “You’re going to be fine.”

  “You mean, you don’t think the sun is going to hurt me?” she asked, fear in her voice. Her neat nails bit into his arm while she stared out the window into the lightening horizon.

  “No,” he said honestly. “Most vamps, even a Master, are in their lairs by now, tired, ready to rest. You don’t look weakened or in need of rest.”

  “So no need to rush out and buy a coffin, huh?” she quipped. “This doesn’t make any sense. He bit me, and he made me drink. After that, my body felt like it was going to explode every time my heart beat. If Masters need to take their rest by now—whatever a Master is—then why am I still awake? Why don’t I need to crawl into a pile of graveyard dirt and sleep?”

  Resting his chin on her crown, Declan laughed. “A myth. They don’t need graveyard dirt or a coffin. Just someplace safe from sunlight. And they can cross running water, and they have a reflection.”

  “So I can still see what I look like on a bad hair day? Oh, joy,” she said, laughing a little to herself. Nerves. She was strung tightly now. Declan could feel the nerves singing in her body, feel the tension in her tautly coiled muscles.

  Nuzzling said hair, Declan murmured, “You always look beautiful. Sexy. Touchable.” He stroked his hand under the shirt to cup her breasts as he lowered his head to whisper, “When the sun rises, I’m going to make love to you here, with the sun shining down around us. I’ve wanted to see you like that, with the sun painting your skin gold. I want to taste you again.” Her nipples, hard and hot, stabbed into his palms as he rolled and pinched them. Her ass was pressing back against Declan’s cock and her hips were rocking in a hungry, fevered motion.

  She whimpered, hardly aware that the sun had started to make an appearance on the horizon. The lavender light slowly shifted to pink, the clouds going gold while he whispered about how it had felt with his cock snug inside her body. Trailing one hand down to her center, Declan continued to eye the horizon while he started to slide his fingers in and out of her body. She gripped him tightly as he pushed back inside her channel and sought the little notch that would make her come.

  And the sun was indeed painting her skin gold. Urging her forward, he guided her hands to the broad windowsill and forced her to bend over, bracing her weight on her hands. The shadowed cleft opened a little, revealing a tight, pink rosette, and lower, dark curls that surrounded her sex, her lips pink and swollen and gleaming wet. Taking his cock in hand, he guided it inside her tight, swollen passage as he groaned with a mixture of relief and pleasure.

  Pleasure that he was inside her again.

  Relief that he wasn’t going to lose her to the darkness.

  And then he started to pump inside her, his hands gripping her hips and pulling her ass back to meet him. The pink rosette beckoned and he slid one hand around, catching some of her moisture before pressing the pad of his thumb against her anus. The tight ring of muscle resisted as he slowly worked it in, listening to her startled gasp, feeling the tightening in her sheath as he started to push a little inside her.

  The tight hole closed over him like silk and Declan shuddered, feeling Tori trembling under his hand, her butt quivering against his thighs as he pushed back inside her. “Do ya like that, now?”

  Tori moaned in answer, feeling the flared head of his cock as it pulsed deep inside her, as he pushed down and shifted so that it was rubbing against that spot inside her with every stroke. She clenched down around it and mewled, a hot hungry little sound. She quivered when Declan eased the tip of his thumb inside her virgin ass, his own breaths leaving his body in ragged pants. The tight hot walls of her ass closed around him like a silken glove and he groaned in pleasure as the sensation triggered an early orgasm in her body.

  Declan needed her too much, had needed her for too long. The feel of her going into spasms around his invading cock was incredible and he thrust himself inside her in short, furious digs as he started to come. She spasmed around his cock, her entire vagina clenching and quivering, as Declan flooded her with the heavy, warm wash of his semen.

  They collapsed—Declan catching their weight and guiding them to the window seat—so they could catch their breath. And watch the sun rise.

  “Fuck me,” he said, winded. “At some point, I’m going to be able to last more than five minutes inside you.”

  She laughed weakly. “I’m not sure I could take it. But I’m game if you are,” she said willingly.

  “Not right now,” he chided her, smoothing her tumbled ringlets from her face. “We’ve got some work to do.”

  “Work?” she repeated.

  “Hmm. Work,” he replied. “To find who did this to you, and kill him—slowly, painfully, and with great pleasure.” He was growling by the time he finished.

  “Sounds good. What else?” she said, lifting her face to study him.

  Looking down at her, he smiled. “Find out exactly what you are now, I’m thinking. But, for now we just need to watch the sun rise.”

  So they did. “Does it hurt at all?” he asked after five or ten minutes. By now, the sun was riding high in the sky and her cheeks were a little pink.

  “No,” she said slowly. “It…it itches. Like I’ve spent too much time in the sun, like sunburn feels after you’ve finally figured out you’re burned.”

  “I have a friend. He’s a vampire—one who was changed against his will. Like you. He’s more than three hundred years old. Now he can tolerate small amounts of the evening sun—enough to watch the su
n set again after three centuries of darkness—and it makes him itch. You already have the tolerance of a centuries old vampire.”

  “This is a friend?” she said, stiffening.

  “Yes. A good man, he is. He was friends with my grandfather, almost two hundred and fifty years ago. Not all vampires are like the one who changed you, Tori. I think you should meet him. His name is Elijah Crawford. If anybody has answers, it’s him.

  “And I trust him. He’s a friend, a good one. Eli has saved my life and my ass a time or two. It will be all right, Tori, I promise.”

  Chapter Three

  A couple of hours later she was eyeing the massive amount of food in front of her. “Should I really try to eat all of this?”

  He laughed. “Half of it is mine. I spent too much energy last night shifting back and forth so quickly. And I require more than the average human. A shifter tends to have a high metabolism. Vamps have slowed metabolism. I imagine yours will be somewhere in between.

  “Just eat what appeals to you. We don’t have any answers yet. But your body already knows what it can and can’t tolerate. And you said you wanted food. Food—not blood.”

  Her cheeks flushed. Watching him move around the kitchen—relaxing the way you can only relax after good, hard sex with somebody you care about—she had started to forget. A little. And now she remembered. “I wasn’t trying to get you to feed me,” she said flatly. “I didn’t ask last night and wasn’t asking now.”

  “I know. But we need to know what your body needs to be at your strongest. If food will do the trick, which I doubt, it makes your existence easier.”

  “Easier?” she said through gritted teeth. “You call this easier?”

  “Aye. Easier than it will be if you require blood for sustenance. Do you know what that will do to you, preying on others to survive? I know,” he told her, turning and pinning her with glinting green eyes. “You’ve a soft heart, Tori McAdams, even if you keep it well hidden under that tough hide you show the world. Seeing other people as food will tear at you, and destroy you. Have you thought of that?”

  Yes. And that was why she felt so raw all of a sudden.

  Deflated, she asked, “Am I a monster now?”

  “Oh, Tori, you don’t have a monstrous bone in you.” Then he crossed over and hugged her from behind, resting his chin on her shoulder, cuddling his larger body against hers to comfort. “But don’t you think we should find out exactly what is in you?”

  She ate.

  A normal sized meal.

  But she still felt hungry.

  Her body didn’t want food though.

  She could smell him, sitting across the table, warm, sexy male. His blood throbbed in his veins and she could hear it, could hear the steady pounding of his heart, the soft whooshing as blood flowed through his body. Her eyesight— sonofabitch—had improved as well. She could have done without seeing the large vein in his neck that pulsed and fluttered and beckoned.

  Lifting the glass of water to her mouth, she sipped, desperate to wet her dry mouth.

  “What about orange juice?” she asked suddenly. Lowering the glass, she stared at him with a puzzled frown. “If the acid in it is what made my blood so distasteful, will it hurt me?”

  “Not likely—it was just altering the pH of your blood.” He shrugged, a thoughtful look on his face. “It’s possible if you gorged on it, it could bother you some, but I think your body would tell you to stop before that. Do you want to make sure?”

  She hesitated, wrinkling her nose and asked, “You sure it won’t hurt me?”

  “If I thought it would, I wouldn’t offer.” Then he grinned and said, “It’s just juice, Tori. It’s not holy water.”

  Horror rushed across her face. “Am I damned now?”

  Declan shook his head, his smile fading. “If you truly believe in God, then how can you ask? You didn’t ask for this, didn’t court it. You’ve done no evil, Tori. Would God punish somebody who is innocent, because of something that was forced on him?”

  She slumped in her chair. Rubbing her fingers across her brow, she said wearily, “This is too much. Too much has happened, too many things have changed.”

  “All right. I can always add some vodka to the orange juice,” he offered.

  A tired laugh escaped her lips. “A screwdriver sounds rather tempting,” she said. “Come on. Let’s get it over with.”

  It didn’t hurt. The juice slid down her throat easily, and she savored the sweet taste on her tongue. “Why is everything so much more vivid now?” she asked, draining the glass.

  “Vampires have enhanced senses,” he replied. “But that’s not what you want either.”

  She flushed. “You noticed.”

  “When you’re eyeing me like a bedtime snack, it’s hard not to notice,” he said, shrugging. “If it were only in the hedonistic sense, it would be flattering. Right now, it just is. We’ll handle it.

  “Can you sleep?”

  She frowned, trying to follow his rapid change of topic while she adjusted to just how well he could read her.

  Uncomfortable, she realized he’d probably always been able to read her that well. Without answering, she asked a question of her own. “Are your senses as heightened?”

  “Some are even more so,” he answered, a bit cautiously it seemed. “Why?”

  “Which ones?”

  “Ah, smell. Hearing. You, well, most vamps are a little stronger, but I am faster, more agile.”

  “Smell?”

  “Why are you asking?”

  Meeting his eyes, she said, “You read me a too little well for my own comfort. How?”

  He lifted his shoulders slowly. “Your expressions. Your heart rate picks up when you’re nervous. I know you are still hungry, because of the way you keep looking at me, then away. And you keep licking your lips, like you always did when I stopped by with something from Cinnabon,” he said, grinning faintly, the dimples in his cheeks deepening to slashes as his mouth curved up. “Your scent changes a little with your nerves, your anger, and your emotions.”

  “Changes?” Her voice squeaked a little. Clearing her throat, she asked, “Changes how?”

  Now his grin was wider, and wicked. He had figured out why she was asking. His soft green eyes didn’t look so soft now; more wild and dark and green—hungry and hot.

  “Changes.” He paced around her, much like a wolf circling his prey. Each circle brought him closer, until he was brushing her body with his every time he moved. “When you’re aroused, you smell…hot. I know that scent. I’ve smelled it on you nearly every time we seen each other. I heard it every time your breath caught in your throat, every time your heart kicked up, how you’d grow wet with wanting. I’ve wanted nothing more at times than to bury my face between your pretty legs and eat. But you always pushed me away.

  “It drove me mad, knowing you wanted me, knowing you didn’t want to.” Moving behind her, he gripped her hips and rocked his rigid cock against her ass—naked under the shirt.

  “It made me want to howl, made me want to take you down to the floor and fuck you until you couldn’t see straight. Until we collapsed—both of us.”

  His hands came up and caressed her aching breasts, fondling and tweaking the nipples while she whimpered and moved against him, thrusting her tits into his hands, and her bottom against his shaft. “And the nerves. When you are turned on and wanting me—like I want you—you get nervous, worried that I will see. And it smells sweet, and innocent, like rain in the spring. That was what kept me from pushing, knowing how nervous you were, how torn. I knew something kept you from letting me close, even though you wanted me.

  “And it hurt you, confused you. So I made myself not push,” he finished, jerking her shirt up and baring her ass. He smoothed his hands down the round curve, squeezing and stroking, feeling the tense muscles just below her skin. They quivered under his touch. Then he turned her around and lifted her naked butt onto the edge of the counter, moved between her thighs and freed h
is cock.

  “Look at you,” he muttered thickly while he spread her legs wide, exposing the wet folds of her body—pink and damp—the curls that covered her mound, her long torso, her breasts covered by the shirt and one button. With a jerk, the button popped off and her heaving chest was revealed—her white tits with dark pink nipples, already erect. “Such a pretty sight. You’re so wet,” he mused as he slid his hands behind her ankles, up her calves to her knees.

  Declan hooked her knees over his elbows, and forced her weight back. Tori fell back, catching her weight on her palms while he spread the lips of her pussy and slowly slid in, working the thick, hard length of his cock inside her swollen, wet tissues. She watched—watched as the flared head speared her entrance, cleaving through her sheath until he was lodged in, the head of his cock nudging against her womb. He pulled out until just the head rested inside her before he drove it back into her.

  She could hear herself whimpering, panting, as she watched him slide his flesh inside her. The thick column of flesh was ruddy, wet from her, smooth and perfectly formed. He surged back inside and Tori sobbed as she watched him, her belly and womb going into spasms at the erotic sight.

  Listened while he whispered about the scent her body gave off while he was inside her, and she felt the tension already coiling. He continued to whisper and croon to her as he buried himself to the hilt—the head of his penis, lodged against the mouth of her womb.

  “I’ve wondered, darlin’, how it would feel to be inside of your sweet body. No fantasy comes close, you’re so tight, and hot, and wet,” he crooned as he trailed one hand down the back of her thigh, lifting her hips just a little more and forcing her torso further back.

  She flinched when she felt his thumb probing her ass. And she flushed, remembering how fucking good it had felt when he had slid it just a little inside her earlier.