by Pam Godwin
My heart slammed against my ribs, and my mind screamed vampire. Of course, vampires didn’t exist, but given this world I was in now—with insectile creatures and winged men who came back from the dead—would vampires really be that strange?
“The glands are located in the hollowed grooves.” His tongue glided over a fang, and his voice reverberated in smooth, heated tones, a mesmerizing melody of sensuality and power. “I can extend and retract the teeth at will.”
“Put them away,” I said hoarsely.
He wrenched my head back with a hard jerk and exposed my throat, his breath dragging over my skin. His chest crushed my back, his lips moved to the curve of my neck, and as his face moved closer to mine, his eyes…fuck. They lured me in, and it was so very, very dark in there. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe.
His entire being transformed into a seductive command. One look controlled the tightening of my gut. A single touch gripped my spine. And the curl of his lips opened the vast, hungry reaches of my sexuality.
“Michio.” I twisted my arms in the binds and scraped my boots over the roof shingles, panic rising with my voice. “This is not okay.”
With his chest pressed against my back, he replaced his lips with his teeth and dragged the sharp points down the side of my neck. “I can bite without releasing the spider pathogen.”
He could draw blood without injecting me with the toxins? I shuddered against the stinging scrape, my muscles locked with fear and an unnerving amount of arousal. He terrified me, and I still wanted him, which scared me even more. He was so beautifully and intellectually compelling I felt hooked by a wire. A wire of unbreakable energy, pulling me to him.
“Are you bewitching me? This…this”—Magnetism. Allure. Possession—“whatever this is. Are you doing this?”
He leaned back and studied my face, his eyes cutting through me like amber glass. Then he shoved a hand around the curve of my hips, finding the button at my waist, releasing it. The zipper followed, and his finger found my center, slipping through the slick evidence of my desire.
“Oh, Evie,” he breathed against my neck. “This is all you.”
I had a millisecond to squeak an incoherent objection before he breached my opening, sinking two fingers to the knuckles.
Sharp, tingling pleasure electrified my inner muscles. “Ahhhh, fuck.”
His touch, this connection…I wanted it, needed more.
I trust you to say no.
I bore down against the diabolical curl of his fingers and clenched my legs. “Stop it.” My voice was breathy, unconvincing. “Remove your hand.” Still fucking breathy.
In a blur of urgency, he yanked my jeans to my boots and released the belt from my arms. Suddenly free of his weight and restraints, I flipped over and snapped up my hands to punch him.
He caught my wrists an inch from his face and slammed them against the shingles above my head. But it was the pained look on his face that knocked the wind from my lungs. “I’m leaving, Evie. This is our last night.”
My head swam through the fog of arousal, trying to catch up yet still stuck on the fact I was naked from the waist down, vulnerable against his will.
With one hand, he held my arms above my head. The other fumbled with the fly on his pants.
He was going to give me what I needed, and that realization heated my skin with equal measures of relief and alarm. “You can’t leave.”
He shoved his hips between my legs, which were restrained by the fabric around my ankles, and the head of his cock pressed against my opening.
What was I doing? There would be consequences, something.
I grabbed hold of the first repulsive image that popped in my head. “Are there venom glands in your cock?”
“What?” His eyes widened. “Fuck no.” He pressed his erection closer, perfect alignment. “Now shut up.”
“We shouldn’t—”
He thrust.
The invasion sparked a cascade of bliss through every cell in my body. He didn’t give me time to adjust, seating himself to the hilt, pulling out, and pounding inch after vicious inch of his length inside me. Hard as steel, he fucked me with vigor, endless stamina, and dominating skill.
Was it better than all the previous times because his body was stronger, more potent? Or because the danger and risk felt so insanely right? Or maybe it was because he’d threatened this would be our last night together?
The reason didn’t matter. I loved it, needed it, and never wanted it to end.
Then my thoughts hurdled to Jesse, his hands around my throat, strangling me with his rage. Maybe I didn’t tell Michio no because he’d explained how the venom was transferred. Maybe I let him in my body because I thought it would make him want to stay. Or maybe it was simply because I loved this man and would do anything to hold onto him.
His pace picked up, centering my attention fully on him. Frantic and powerful, his body flexed above me in a massive ripple of strength, grinding my tailbone painfully yet ravishingly against the roof, the hot shingles burning my skin. I rocked with him, arching my back and widening my knees, proving I was still with him. He didn’t have to leave.
Our hands laced above my head, and his mouth slammed onto mine, his kiss feverish yet lacking the sharpness of over-sized teeth. Had he sheathed them? I didn’t care, kissing him back with greedy licks, tongues lashing and rubbing, our breaths melding.
He united our bodies in a fury of thrusts, his sweaty, hairless chest moving over me, and his growly moans in my ear. It was carnal, wild, free of barriers and scientific studies and harrowing premonitions.
I felt his need as if it were my own. His breaths, his heartbeat, his urgency, it was all mine. Like a molecular fusion, a binding of energy.
It didn’t take long for the ecstasy to build and peak. My legs shook, my ass burned against the shingles, and my nipples tightened into painful points against my shirt. “I’m there. Oh fuck, oh fuck, don’t stop.”
Groaning, he thrust harder, more frenzied and frantic than ever, his hands shifting to grip my waist and his brow dropping to mine. As I tumbled into that glorious place between the rise and fall of heaven, the drive of his hips lost rhythm, the noises in his throat deepened, and his body trembled violently.
He slammed to a stop, his cock buried as deeply as possible, and met my eyes. “Evieeeee.”
I watched him as he watched me, captivated, lost. Happy. His climax was the most beautifully human thing I’d ever witnessed.
As we came down, a sultry hush enveloped us, stirring with the heave of our breaths. Disoriented by the aftershocks of orgasm, my body deliciously crushed by the weight of his, I rested my gaze on his sweat-slicked face, half-mast eyes, and satisfied smile.
“You’re so exquisite and fierce. Raw perfection.” He looked me dead in the eyes, and I knew he meant it. It was there in the gentle stroke of his finger over my bruised cheek and in the worshiping kiss of his fang-less mouth. He was there, my doctor, the guardian of my body, the man I fell in love with.
“So are you.” But with those words, reality settled in. “Don’t leave. We’ll work this out.”
He pushed himself up, his lips flattened into an expression of resignation. He yanked my jeans into place with determination, tugging and pulling as he shoved them up my hips.
He adjusted his own pants, his face blanking, and his tone hollow. “I have to go after Aiman.”
I zipped and buttoned my jeans, my heart rate jumping back to hysteria. “He’ll kill you.”
He knelt between my legs and pulled me to him, chest-to-chest, my body mirroring his. “I can sense him. Not now but earlier tonight.”
Did that mean Michio could sense me? Because the connection I’d just felt during sex had gone beyond physical. Of course, we’d always connected on a deeper level, but this time left me profoundly shaken.
He brushed the hair from my face and tucked it behind my ear. “I can’t explain it, but I…” He closed his eyes, opened them. “I have to go to him.
” His head snapped up, his gaze narrowing on the ladder on the backside of the roof. “They’re coming.”
Jesse and Roark? I focused, listening, hearing nothing. How did Michio hear them? Some weird spidey sense? I moved to put some distance between us, but he grabbed my hips and held me in place.
My palm rested on his face, my thumb moving over his soft upper lip. No fangs. “Let me talk to them first. I’ll explain—”
Footsteps landed on the roof, then Jesse’s arrow was there, bow stretched, the sharp point touching Michio’s temple. From the other side, Roark’s sword appeared beneath Michio’s chin, pressing against his throat. Both Jesse and Roark were still naked above the waist, a reminder that they’d stripped their shirts in their urgency to stanch Michio’s gunshot wound.
Given the stiffness of his scruffy, blond jawline and the give-me-a-reason-to-throw-down creases around his eyes, Roark wanted to finish this with his fists. "Let her go, Doc."
I caught Michio’s eyes, silently begging him to release his grip on my hips, but my words were for Jesse and Roark. “You don’t need the weapons. If he was a threat, he would’ve attacked you before you made it to the roof. But you can see, he’s here, on his knees, making himself vulnerable.”
Calm and composed, Michio held my gaze. “I’m a possessive man, Evie.” His hands tightened, fingers digging into my waist. “But I trust them with your life. Enough to leave you with them, to do whatever makes you happy.”
There was unspoken meaning there. A willingness to compromise, to share me with them. Which really meant jack shit, considering he meant to leave me with a celibate priest and spirit walker bound by a vision.
My hands curled into fists. “Don’t you dare leave.”
“What’s he talking about?” Jesse said, his eyes tapering into slits.
Michio turned his head toward Jesse, as much as the nocked arrow would allow. “I owe you my life. Both of you.” He glanced at Roark and back at Jesse.
Roark leaned down and clamped a hand on Michio’s shoulder. The gesture might’ve been touching if he’d lowered the sword. But it remained lethally angled at Michio’s jugular. “Ye referring to the dungeon? I den’ think Evie would’ve let us leave ye there.”
Jesse shifted his weight, confusion etching his face.
Michio looked at Jesse with something akin to compassion softening his eyes. “I owe you my gratitude and my respect. You carried the burden of Annie’s predictions quietly and alone, saved Evie’s life time and time again. And the hardest tribulation of all, you love her as deeply as Roark and I do, yet you selflessly prevent yourself from bedding her.”
My chest tightened against the truth of his words and the sadness in his tone. “Michio—”
A brush of lips warmed mine, there and gone like a breath. Like the man himself. With a whisper of displaced air, Michio vanished from the spot before me, from the roof, and several anguished heart beats later, I felt him leave the property.
I ran to the edge of the roof, willing him to appear in the dark field, to see him running back to me. But the landscape held still. Lifeless. Empty. He’d left, to go who knew where and how far, on foot, without me.
Intense, helpless grief ruptured behind my ribs, and my chest collapsed in agony. With the pain, came the events of the night, crashing into me, each one punching that painful spot, over and over. The bullet in Michio’s chest, the intimate moment with Jesse, Annie’s premonition, the Drone’s survival, the evolving aphids. And the final punch…I might never see Michio again. Never feel his arms around me again. Never taste his lips. Hear his voice.
I buckled at the waist and gripped the concrete ledge, my mind shutting down as if trying to evade the painful reality. He’d left to kill Aiman. To protect me. Because he loved me. Everything else blurred into one giant Fuck.
Jesse and Roark stood on either side of me, their eyes gentle and watchful, and their weapons now sheathed. They remained quiet, giving me time to compose myself. But worry radiated from their taut postures. They needed answers.
I sucked in a few breaths, pulled myself together, and shared what Michio had told me. As I spoke, Roark offered me his hand, and I twined my fingers with his. Then I braced myself as I finished the recitation with, “We had sex.”
Jesse grew deadly still beside me, as if everything from his chin down had been forgotten in lieu of whatever was crashing and burning inside his head. He just stood there, expressionless, his eyes on me but not really looking at me. He didn’t blink. Didn’t speak.
I wasn’t sure he was breathing. “Say something.”
That got me a blink. His eyes cleared, focusing on mine, his voice in a state of suspended feeling. “I’m processing.”
I shot Roark a look. “Then you say something.”
His eyelids half-shuttered, framed by a tangle of blond dreads, and his mouth crooked up as if he were on the verge of a colorful insult. But the jade of his eyes became harder, unsmiling, consumed by some internal decision and darkened by a ruminating brow.
Then a somber line replaced the sarcastic smirk. “He didn’t bite ye. Didn’t take ye off the property. And didn’t force ye to have sex.” He rolled a broad shoulder. “Fair play.”
Roark was the epitome of agreeable. He was the wisecracker, the counselor, the roll-with-the-punches guy. So it was easy to forget that when he did strike, it was with lethal decapitation. And beneath that happy-go-lucky exterior, he nurtured some serious passions, one of them being a fierce protection of my heart.
Which was why I wasn’t surprised when he shifted into my space, his muscled chest flexing and pushing around me. “But if he tells another spoof, I'll smash his bloody testicles until they turn square and fester.”
Spoof? “He didn’t really lie, per se.”
“He omitted. Same difference.”
My hackles went up, and I bit my bottom lip to keep from lashing out. Michio had kept his secrets to protect me.
“There was never any ill-intent,” I said.
“Hey, I get your need to defend him.” He looked down at me, his brogue warm and thick. “But he’s a risk.”
“It's not about the risk. It's about persevering, and shattering the boundaries we’re facing, and learning from it. Becoming better people for it.” I stared across the hush gloom of the valley, my skin dripping from the humidity. “Michio’s secrecy wasn’t acceptable. But he wasn’t the only one keeping secrets.” I glanced at the silent man at my side.
Jesse strode away, stopping at the far-side of the roof to collect my knives, his expression concealed by shadows.
Roark nodded at Jesse. “That one’s a risk, too. If he puts a child in ye, and that child takes your life, to hell with persevering. I wouldn’t want to.”
My womb tightened against his words. “I still have the IUD, and he’s…” I peeked at Jesse’s dark silhouette. “Determinedly abstinent.”
“And pissed.” Jesse marched back to us and handed me the knives. “I told you not to fuck him.”
The disgust in his voice made me feel dirty, cheap, and yeah, really fucking defensive.
I turned to face him, straightening to meet his furious gaze. “If it had been you instead of him, with your fertility taken away and a protective need to leave me, I would’ve done the same thing. I would’ve shown you I love you the best way I know how.”
Fire burned in his eyes as he said slowly and harshly, “I would never ask that of you.”
“You wouldn’t have to!”
“He’s afraid, love.” Roark locked eyes with Jesse. Something unspoken passed between them, something I didn’t understand, then Roark continued. “A little rivalry and jealousy is healthy. Jesse’s jealousy isn’t from greed but from love, and it’s nursed with worry.” His gaze lowered to mine. “Worry that he’ll lose you to a man who can offer you intimacy without killing you.”
Jesse glared at Roark like he wanted to throttle him but didn’t move a muscle. Nor did he deny what the priest had said.
The tu
rquoise stone lay against his bare chest, serving as a reminder that, not long ago, I was afraid to accept love or any kind of tenderness. I had needed time to learn how to trust again, and apparently, so did Jesse.
With a loss of what to say, I stepped into his space and wrapped my arms around his rigid torso. His hands remained stiffly at his sides, but his chest gave a gentle sigh against my cheek.
I didn’t know what I was doing trying to juggle the physical and emotional needs of three men. I had the experience of a fifteen-year marriage, but that was hardly the same thing. If Joel were here, he’d tell me to listen to the song, my tactile interpretation of love, like the tingles across the skin, the bounce in a step, and the involuntary pull of a smile.
Jesse remained stubbornly tense in my embrace, and I had a sudden urge to change that. I grabbed his waist, didn’t exactly dig my fingers in his sides, but I put some wriggling pressure there, right along his ribs.
He jumped around like crazy, trying to wrestle free of my tickling fingers. And there, shining on his face, was a shocked—but no less gorgeous—smile. “Why did you do that?”
I shrugged, smiling with him.
He brushed away the hair that had fallen across his forehead and stared at me like I’d lost my mind.
Roark’s hand found mine, drawing my focus to him and the memory of when I’d found his tickle spot. I smiled up at him. “Remember when we were in the bunker—”
“When ye dug your bloody toe in me ribs?”
We’d shared our first kiss that night. Not even a year had passed since then. It felt like an eternity ago.
His thumb stroked my knuckles. “Jaysus, ye were a temptress.”
“And you’re still a prude.”
He chuckled, though we both knew he’d been the one doing all the tempting.
As silence settled in, the three of us stood at the concrete ledge, watching the dark horizon. No one made a move to climb off the roof, each of us rooted in our thoughts.
Mine centered on Michio, agonizing over his lonely nights, his confrontation with Aiman, and his craving for blood. My blood. How long could he go without it? What were the ramifications?