by Kresley Cole
13
You doona seem to care that we had to stop tonight," Lachlain said over his shoulder as he triple-checked the blankets he'd strung over the hotel window.
After midnight, the skies had opened up, rain pouring, making their journey slow going. He'd said Kinevane was perhaps two hours away. Emma had known dawn was in three.
She tilted her head, aware that he was deeply disappointed. "I was game to go on," she reminded him. She had been, shocking herself. Emma didn't usually que sera, sera in matters solar.
After a final inspection of the blanket barrier, he allowed himself to sink down into the room's plush chair. In a bid to keep from staring at him, Emma sat on the edge of the bed, remote in hand, and began to scan the movie channels.
"You ken I would no' risk continuing." When he'd said he wouldn't let her be burned again, Emma supposed he'd meant it.
Still, she didn't understand how he'd prevented himself from rolling the dice with this one drive tonight. If she had been kept away from her home for one hundred and fifty years and she was within two hours' driving distance, she would have dragged the unwitting vampire along.
Lachlain had refused, instead finding them an inn, not of the caliber they'd enjoyed, he said, but he'd "sensed it was secure." He'd felt comfortable enough to get two adjoining rooms because he planned to sleep, and as he'd promised, he wouldn't do it around her. A quick calculation told her he'd gone nearly forty hours without.
Even so, he seemed uncomfortable having to divulge his need to sleep. In fact, it was only because his attention had wandered as he'd peered around them with narrowed eyes—which he'd been doing with increasing frequency—that he'd spoken of it. He'd absently admitted that he would have just gone without, but his injury was not healing as it should.
Injury, meaning his leg. The one that looked like a human's leg just after a six-year-long cast came off. The injury that she found herself thinking about, imagining scenarios for.
He had to have lost it. Her bite on his arm, which she'd caught him peering down at with an almost affectionate expression—an expression that she might prize even over a rare hug—was rapidly healing. Yet he continued to limp. He must be completely regenerating it.
She glanced up at him, realizing that as she'd been contemplating his leg, he'd clearly been doing the same to hers, staring at her thighs, getting that…that wolfish look in his eyes. She pinched the hem of her skirt, endeavoring to hop up and wiggle it down. His gaze was glued to her actions, a low, barely audible growl rumbling from him for long seconds. The sound made her shiver, irrationally made her want to exaggerate her movements so he'd enjoy them more.
When sane Emma blushed at her thoughts and tugged the corner of the cover over her, he gave her a brows-drawn expression of deep disappointment.
She looked away, picking up the remote once more as she cast about for a handle on this bizarre situation. She didn't need to be in a hotel room with this Lykae when both of them were lucid and when she was getting in the habit of falling asleep against his naked body in a bathtub each night. She cleared her throat and faced him. "I'm going to watch a movie. So I guess I'll see you at sunset."
"You're kicking me out of your room?"
"That about sums it up."
He shook his head—her desires ignored without even a thought. "I'll stay with you until dawn."
"I like spending time by myself, and for the last three days, you've allowed me none. Would it kill you to leave the room?"
He appeared confused, as if her wanting to be away from him was sheer craziness. "You will no' share this…movie with me?"
The way he'd phrased his question almost made her grin.
"Then after, you could finally drink again."
The urge to smile faded at his sexy, gravelly words, but she didn't look away, too fascinated by the heated way he studied her face.
He continued to ask her to drink, reinforcing her belief that he'd enjoyed it as much as she had. Though it had baffled her, she'd felt his erection—hard to miss, that—and had seen the desire in his eyes. Desire just like she saw right now…
The moment was broken by the sound of some woman screaming her way to ecstasy. Emma gasped, and swung her head around to the TV. She'd been inadvertently pressing the remote and had somehow wound up on Cinemax. This late at night, Cinemax meant Skinemax.
Her face was hot with embarrassment as she frantically worked the remote, but even the regular channels seemed to delight in showing Unfaithful or Eyes Wide Shut. Finally, she landed on something without sex—
Oh, shite. An American Werewolf in Paris.
In full gory attack scene.
Before she could change it, he shot to his feet. "Is this how…is this how humans see us?" He sounded aghast.
She thought about other werewolf movies—Dog Soldiers, The Beast Within, The Howling, the oh-so-subtly-titled The Beast Must Die—and nodded. He was going to see these things sooner or later and he would learn the truth. "Yes, they do."
"Do they see all the Lore like this?"
"No, um, not really."
"Why?"
She bit her lip. "Well, I've heard the Lykae never concern themselves with PR, while the vampires and the witches, for instance, throw money at it."
"PR?"
"Public relations."
"And this PR works for them?" he asked, still watching with a sickened look on his face.
"Let's put it this way—witches are viewed as powerless Wiccans. Vampires are seen as sexy…myths."
"My God," he murmured, sinking onto the bed with a long exhalation.
His reaction was so strong, she wanted to delve. But delving meant being subject to the same. Just then, she didn't care. "So the werewolf appearance there…it was all wrong."
He rubbed his bad leg, looking weary. "Damn it, Emma, can you no' just ask me what I look like when I change?"
She tilted her head at him. His leg clearly hurt him, and she hated to see anything suffering. Apparently even crude and rude Lykae, because to take his mind from his pain, she asked, "So, Lachlain, what do you look like when you change?"
His expression was surprised, and then he seemed not to know how to answer. Finally, he said, "Have you ever seen a phantom mask a human?"
"Of course I have," she answered. She did live in the most Lore-rich city in the world.
"You know how you can still see the human, but the phantom is clear, too? That's what it's like. You still see me, but you see something stronger, wilder, with me."
She turned toward him on the bed, lay on her front, and bent her elbows to prop her chin up, ready to hear more.
When she waved him on, he leaned back against the headboard, stretching his long legs in front of him. "Ask me."
She rolled her eyes. "Very well. Do you grow fangs?" When he nodded, she said, "And fur?"
He raised his eyebrows. "Christ, no."
She had many befurred friends and took offense at his tone, but decided to let it go. "I know your eyes turn blue."
He nodded. "And my body gets bigger, while the shape of my face changes, becomes more…lupine."
She grimaced. "Snout?"
He actually chuckled at that. "No. No' like you're thinking."
"Then it doesn't sound that different from you now."
"But it is." He grew serious. "We call it saorachadh ainmhidh bho a cliabhan…letting the beast out of its cage."
"Would it scare me?"
"Even older, powerful vampires cower."
She bit her lip, contemplating all he'd said. Try as she might, she couldn't imagine him as anything other than hot.
He ran a hand over his mouth. "It's getting late. Do you no' want to drink again before dawn?"
Embarrassed by how badly she wanted to, she shrugged and studied her finger tracing the bedcover's paisley design.
"We're both thinking about it. We both want to."
She murmured, "I might, but I don't want what comes with it."
"What if I vowed
no' to touch you?"
"But what if…" She trailed off, her face heating. "What if I forget…myself?" If he kissed her and stroked her as he had before, she had no doubt she'd soon be begging for him to bend her over the bed, as he'd put it.
"It would no' matter because I'd put my hands on this cover and I would no' move them."
She frowned at his hands, then nibbled her lip. "Put them behind your back."
He clearly didn't like that. "I would put my hands"—he glanced around, then spread his arms over the top of the headboard, palms down—"here, and I would no' move them. No matter what occurs."
"You promise?"
"Aye. I vow it."
She could try to convince herself that mere hunger compelled her to walk on her knees over to him. But it was so much more than that. She needed to experience the sensuality of the act, the warmth, the taste of his skin beneath her tongue, the feel of his heartbeat speeding up as though she'd pleasured him by drawing greedily.
When she knelt before him, he leaned his head away, exposing his neck, beckoning her.
She saw he was already hard and grew nervous. "Hands stay put?"
"Aye."
Unable to stop herself, she eased forward, took his shirt with her fists, and sank her fangs into his skin. Rich warmth and pleasure exploded within her, and she moaned against him. She felt his groan reverberating beneath her lips. When she almost toppled over from the rush of sensation, he bit out, "Straddle…me."
Never taking her lips away, she did, gladly, better able to relax and revel in the taste and feeling. Though he never removed his hands from the headboard, he thrust his hips up against her. Then, with another groan, he seemed to make an effort to stop.
But she liked the sounds he'd made, liked that she could feel them, and wanted to hear more. So she lowered herself fully to his lap, uncaring that her skirt was slipping up her thighs. The heat that met her made her ache. Thoughts grew dim. So hard… Gone nearly mindless, she rubbed against him to ease it.
14
Release me from my vow, Emmaline."
She didn't respond, wouldn't release him, and damn it, it had begun to matter to him if he broke his word to her. Her only answer was spreading her knees wider over him, then slowly, sensuously rubbing his length between her legs, with only his trews and her silk between them. "Ah, God, yes, Emma," he grated, shuddering with need, disbelieving that she was doing this to him.
He would use this against her, he thought hazily. If his blood on her tongue made her lose control like this, he would force her to drink him until she surrendered everything…
Force a vampire to drink him…what was happening to him?
She put her hands on the headboard between his and held on as she ground against him, making his head fall back. The scent of her hair, flowing just before him, the feel of her bite, and her own obvious pleasure were sending him over the edge. "You're going tae make me come like this. If you doona stop…"
She didn't. She continued grinding against him as if she couldn't stop. The frustration was like nothing he'd ever known. To not be able to touch her, or put his mouth to her flesh…She brushed her breasts against his chest and back again. The headboard began to crack under his hands.
The throbbing pressure built up inside him, had been building all night from her first taking. Now his breaths grew ragged as she moved faster, riding his length. Just when he perceived she'd stopped drinking, she whispered in his ear, "I could drink you forever."
You will…
"Taste so good," she said, moaning the last.
"You drive me mad," he grated, then threw his head back and yelled out as he came hotly under her movements, forced by the firm bucking of her hips against him. The wood beneath his hands disintegrated to splinters and dust.
When he finally finished shuddering, he clenched his ragged fists beside her legs. She fell against his chest, clinging to him, her small body quivering.
"Emma, look at me."
She faced him, her silvery eyes mesmerizing. He knew her, she felt familiar, and yet he knew he'd never seen anything like the stunning creature she was. She tilted her head, regarding him with an unsure expression.
"I want to touch you. I want to bring you to come."
She glanced at his torn hands with raised eyebrows.
"Then I'll kiss you. Pull your undergarments aside and kneel up right here."
She shook her head slowly.
"Why?"
She whispered, "Because these things keep escalating."
"I dinna break my vow now." Hands still clenched, he lowered his voice to say, "I ache, I want to pleasure you so much."
He saw her eyes grow soft just before she put her forehead to his. As if she couldn't help herself, she leaned in to lick and tease at his lips. Her hair fell forward, brushing his neck. Her exquisite scent washed over him, and he felt himself growing hard again.
Between her kisses, he rasped, "Why can this no' go further?"
"This isn't me," she murmured. "I'm not like this. I barely even know you."
Sheer frustration welled in him at her ridiculous assertions, said between tonguing his lips. He believed they were sentiments she felt she ought to be saying. "Yet you've taken my blood directly from my body? That's as intimate an act as two can have."
In an instant, she stiffened and drew back. "That's true and regrettable. But I couldn't share myself so completely with someone I don't trust." She rose and then curled up in the chair. "Someone who's been so unkind…"
"Emma, I—"
"You know you have been. And just three nights ago, you frightened me more than I've ever been in my entire life. Yet now you want something from me?" She was trembling. "Just leave. Please? For once?"
He growled in frustration, but he did limp to the door. At the hallway adjoining the rooms, he turned and said, "You've bought yourself a few hours. The next time you drink, you're mine and we both know it." The door slammed behind him.
Emma lay in her nest on the floor, tossing in her blankets. When had her clothing become so textured? She seemed to feel every line of thread against her sensitive breasts and belly.
And she wore silk.
Just thinking about what she'd done to him made her hips undulate as if she could still feel him beneath her. She'd made him…have an orgasm, by riding him.
Her face burned hot. Was she becoming Emma the Wanton?
And she'd almost experienced one, too. When she'd bathed, she'd found herself wetter than she'd ever been. She was beginning to suspect that blood lust for her wasn't the craving to drink, it was sexual lust because of drinking.
He was right—the next time she took from him, he could make her his, because tonight, she'd temporarily lost her mind, forgetting why she couldn't sleep with him. Though she'd desperately wanted to convince herself otherwise, she wasn't the type of person who could give it up without some kind of bond or commitment.
She didn't think of herself as old-fashioned about sex—there was, after all, a reason for her familiarity with Skinemax—and she had a very healthy attitude about the whole subject, for all that she'd never had an orgasm. But she knew deep down that she would need something lasting—and that it could never be with him.
Besides the fact that he was a crude and menacing Lykae who delighted in her discomfort, she couldn't imagine taking him among her friends. She couldn't see him watching movies at the manor, eating the popcorn she always made just so she could smell it and throw it at anyone who stood in front of the screen. He wouldn't fit in with her family because they would be sickened at the very sight of "an animal" touching her. And because they would always be plotting to kill him and such.
Not to mention that in addition to all of their differences, he had another female out there who had some cosmic destiny to be his.
Emma was up for a little healthy competition, but against a Lykae's mate…?
Well. Now she was just being silly—
He knocked on the adjoining door, opening it
without a decent pause, but luckily she'd cut out all that lolling and petting her breasts business.
His hair was wet from a recent shower, and he leaned against the doorway in jeans that rode just a little below his waist and just a little loose—as they should. He wore no shirt and she noticed one of his palms had a knot of cloth around it. She swallowed. Injured from when he'd cracked her headboard as he came.
He crossed his arms over that muscled chest. Her appreciation for it bordered on idolatry. She would so give him another amen…
"Tell me one thing about you that I doona know," he demanded.
When able to force her gaze to his face, she debated, then finally said, "I went to college and got a degree in popular culture."
He appeared impressed, but of course he hadn't been around this time long enough to know that most people thought pop culture was a do-you-want-fries-with-that degree. He nodded, turning toward his room, and because he didn't expect her to, she said, "Tell me one thing."
When he faced her again, he did appear surprised she'd asked. His voice gravelly, he answered, "I think you're the most beautiful creature I've ever seen."
She was certain he heard her gasp before he closed the door.
He'd called her beautiful!
Before, she'd only felt a sad resignation, but now she was giddy. Oh, she was in a bad way. Her emotions were like a crazy compass dial, spinning wildly—
She narrowed her eyes, realizing what this was. Stockholm syndrome. Surely. Identifying with your bullying captor? Check. Forming an attachment to him? Check.
But in all fairness to herself, how many captors—actively acquiring—were six-and-a-half-foot-tall gods with delicious, sun-darkened skin, the coolest accent, and the warmest, hardest body she'd ever dreamed of? All this and the predilection to wrap that body around her? All this and he thought she was beautiful.
Not to mention the fact that he couldn't seem to give her enough of his luscious blood.
Was she becoming this Lykae's Patty Hearst?
Didn't matter. The bottom line was that she wasn't his mate, so even if he did seduce her and they had a little some-something going on, she'd be merely idling time until he found his true one. And if she got herself nailed and bailed by a man like Lachlain, she thought she might turn into one of those blubbery, weepy females. Which was not an option.