Her lips parted with the first brush of his tongue over her neck and her eyes fell shut with the second caress. The fingers of his other hand wrapped around her left upper arm and his other thumb pressed into her jaw. He tilted her head back further and licked her throat again, sweeping his tongue along the length of the wound. His fingers trembled against her and his blood spoke to her, conveying the way his whole body quaked from the taste of her alone.
Amber frowned when his grip on her arm tightened.
He licked her neck harder, stepping into her at the same time. The fingers holding her jaw tensed and he no longer shook. He dragged her against him, his grip on her so tight that she flinched.
And then it tightened further, and she felt as though he would snap her arm. Her fingers numbed.
Kearn wrapped his lips around her throat and sucked. She gasped when her head spun and the wound stung. He wasn’t healing it. He was reopening it.
His hand left her arm and pressed into her back, crushing her against his body until she couldn’t breathe. His own breathing was rough in her ear, laboured and fast, an intermittent sound that broke the silence between his suckling. She felt his intent.
She felt it deep within her blood and she feared it.
She feared it for both of their sakes and the feeling wasn’t wholly her own.
“Kearn.” Amber tried to wriggle free but he held her tighter and sucked harder on her blood. Anger and fear collided inside her, exploding into panic, but she could feel other things too. Hatred. Self-loathing. Sorrow. Kearn’s feelings. Her head spun again. She had to make him stop. “You don’t want to do this. You’ll never forgive yourself.”
Nothing.
His lower teeth touched her neck and then he pressed his fangs against her flesh. It was the front of them, not the tips, but it was enough to make her fight him. She couldn’t let him do this. She could sense in her blood that he was torn about this. He wanted to bite her but hated himself for it at the same time. There was so much pain inside her, screaming in her veins, but so much need too. She couldn’t let him do this, not now, not like this. He lived in a world without love, where all those who had once been close to him now hated him, and if he did this, he would despise himself too.
“Kearn, no! You’ll hate yourself!”
He pulled back and laughed, his arm still around her and his fangs sharp in the light.
Amber put her hands against his chest, using the opportunity to restrain him.
“I already hate myself.” He grinned.
“I know that isn’t true,” she said. He met her words with another mirthless laugh. “I know you don’t want to do this.”
His red gaze bore into hers, his expression deadly serious all of a sudden. “Oh, I do. You cannot tell me that you did not see that vision of us… and that you did not like it.”
He tilted her head back again and appraised her throat. She had seen the vision of him at her neck, and she had liked it, but it had been nothing more than a dream. This was reality and it was beginning to scare her.
He grinned again, revealing his fangs.
“Your blood calls to me.” His voice was a low whisper that sent a shiver down her spine. She couldn’t deny that either. “It wants me to take it.”
This wasn’t like him. It wasn’t. She refused to believe it. He was acting just as he had done the night she had confronted him and discovered that he was a vampire. It had to be her blood that had changed him. He just needed to get control of himself again, as he had in the street after the club. She needed to gain some space between them. She was sure that if she did, he would fight the effects of her blood and be normal again.
He went to pull her back to him but she shoved him hard and broke free. She ran to the closed door and yanked it open. The kitchen. She skidded on the tiled floor and ran to her right. There was a set of stairs and nothing else. Amber bolted up them, aware of Kearn chasing her in the darkness and that she was heading towards a place where she wouldn’t easily be able to escape.
Her heart pounded and panic fuelled her. She turned this way and that through the dark winding hall, bumping into the walls and desperately trying to reach the other side of the house. There had to be another set of stairs that led down again. If she could reach them, she might be able to get out of the house. Had Kearn locked his car? It was her only hope. She wouldn’t be able to outrun him on open ground. She had to reach his Audi and lock herself in, giving him time to calm down.
She didn’t make it.
Kearn grabbed her arm, spun her and dragged her against him.
“Do not fear me,” he whispered against her throat and licked it.
She wasn’t afraid. It was a lie, but she told it to herself so she would remain calm and not drive Kearn into doing something he would regret. It was her blood making him like this, out of control and wild, like a beast. The conflict inside her grew, becoming a violent battle waged in her blood. Kearn’s battle. A fight that he would win given time. She needed to buy him that time. She had to do something to soothe him and help him.
He pressed into her and she stumbled backwards, falling through a door and into a room. She managed to keep her footing and slammed into something hard and cold. Her fingers groped it in the darkness. A sink.
She threw Kearn off balance and dived to her left, hoping that she was going the right way. She had to clear his head and there was only one method open to her. Her heart beat in relief when she hit a bath and she had one of the taps running before Kearn grabbed her again. She leaned forwards as his body touched her back, tipping him over her shoulder, and landed heavily on top of him in the bath.
He growled.
He actually growled like an animal.
Amber pressed down on him, trapping him beneath her, and fully opened the tap, thankful that the water was cold.
He struggled but she didn’t budge. She wouldn’t move until he had either calmed down or drowned. The icy water saturated her clothes. He coughed and spluttered beneath her, his struggle lifting her up and sending panic racing through her blood. He was too strong. She leaned over and pinned his shoulders, making sure to keep his arms trapped beneath her backside and legs, and prayed that she could hold him. The water drained the heat from her fingers and they stiffened and hurt as she gripped him. He growled again and lurched, almost throwing her off his chest, and kicked against the bathtub and the wall. The tiles splintered. Amber grabbed him by the jaw and forced his head further under the water.
With the lights off, she couldn’t tell if he was back to normal yet. She needed to see his eyes but couldn’t risk getting off him and trying to find the light switch.
“Kearn?”
His skin was freezing beneath her aching fingers now.
She could feel him breathing.
She hoped she wasn’t crushing him.
“Kearn?” Amber risked it and brought his head out from under the water.
“I am sorry.”
She could feel the depth of meaning behind his apology. His blood relayed jumbled thoughts and feelings to her. She couldn’t make sense of them but she could make sense of what he had said and his tone of voice.
Amber turned off the tap and leaned down. She pressed her forehead against his and felt his breath against her face.
“Apology accepted?” he whispered.
She nodded and pulled herself off him. She bumped into the sink and heard Kearn leave the bath. The light burst into life a moment later and she blinked against the suddenness of it. When she looked at Kearn, he was staring at his drenched black shirt. His silver hair hung in wet tendrils against his face and spiked out at the back near his neck.
His irises were green again at least. She took it as a positive sign.
“You didn’t really want to hurt me.”
His eyes rose to hers. They bled back into red. Instinct said to take a step backwards but she stood her ground.
“It was my blood making you like that.” She wanted to believe those words, bu
t the hungry way Kearn’s eyes bore into her throat made it impossible.
He laughed again.
“Do not cover the truth with lies, Amber. It will bleed through!” His eyes narrowed on her neck and his fingers curled into fists. “I did want to hurt you. I wanted to sink my fangs into your delicate beautiful throat and quench my thirst for you.”
Amber shook her head. “You would hate yourself.”
“I would.” He stepped towards her. She backed into the wall and wished she’d had the sense to go towards the door instead. There was no escape this way and Kearn had proven himself more powerful than her. If he wanted to bite her, she wouldn’t be able to stop him. “I would hate myself… you would hate me… but I would not care… not as long as I had you.”
Her eyes shot wide.
“Do I frighten you now? You should be scared.” He stared hard at her throat and reached a hand out to her. She tensed and shook when his fingertips stroked lines either side of the cut on her neck and his lips parted, exposing the tips of his fangs. “You should fear me… because I want your blood… I want you… and nothing on this Earth can stop me… nothing but myself.”
“Not even me?” she whispered, looking down at his hand. His touch was light, his fingers trembling and cold.
His eyes shifted and locked with hers, blood red and darkened by his dilated pupils.
“Not even you.”
His hand slid around the back of her neck and she was in his arms before she could blink. He grabbed her right hand and stared at the scab on her palm, and then at her throat. She kept still, afraid of pushing him over the edge again and forcing a reaction from him they could both regret.
Kearn licked the cut on her palm and then the one on her neck. He held her close to him, so gently that she almost relaxed. He kissed her throat and sighed against her skin.
“When the time comes… when I can no longer control my need… I will…” His tongue brushed her neck again and he shivered against her. He pressed his cheek to hers and whispered into her ear, “You will be mine.”
Amber stared over his shoulder at the white tiles covering the wall opposite her, absorbing those words and struggling to grasp them. His dominance didn’t surprise her, or even frighten her. Having seen the way the other male vampires acted towards women, and having felt the depth of Kearn’s need for her, she could accept his behaviour and his desire to make her belong to him. What she couldn’t accept was that he wouldn’t give her a choice.
Didn’t he care about what she wanted?
Her dreams of them together, of him biting her, had been erotic and tantalising, but reality was nothing like a dream. She had seen the turned women at the ball, and the way their men had treated them, and she didn’t want that. Part of her was willing to go through with becoming a vampire if it meant she could remain with Kearn, could be with the man she was falling for, and could put an end to his loneliness, but the rest needed reassurance. She needed a promise that she wasn’t making the same mistake those women had by giving herself to her Noble only for him to cast her aside and use her to populate the ranks of his servants.
She didn’t want to live eternity watching Kearn moving from woman to woman, creating a harem of slaves. She wanted him to be hers and hers alone.
“Does that frighten you?” he breathed against her neck.
“No.” Her voice shook and betrayed her turmoil. She wasn’t sure of her feelings yet, but she didn’t want to fear him or anything that might happen between them because she knew that it would hurt him.
“Liar,” he whispered and she shivered this time.
She couldn’t fear him because some part of her did want it too.
Amber wrapped her arms around his shoulders and held him close.
“You embrace me as though holding a lover, not a man who will destroy you.” He tried to pull away but she didn’t let him go.
“You won’t destroy me.” She placed a kiss on his neck, a sign that she could overcome this fear just as she had overcome her fear of him being a vampire.
“I want to.” His hands settled against her lower back and then he rested his head on her shoulder and sorrow filled her.
“No, you only want to end your loneliness. I can understand that.” Her fear faded as she held him, her blood feeding his feelings to hers. They were clearer now. He wasn’t lying to her. He did want to make her forever his and it was becoming difficult for him to resist.
She stroked his wet hair, running her fingers though it, feeling calm inside now. Could he feel that in her? Did he know that she wasn’t really frightened of him?
“It will not save you.” He pulled her closer to him and rested his head more heavily on her shoulder. He sounded tired and felt it too. Not normal tiredness but a deep weariness. Was he weary of being lonely? Was that why he so desperately wanted to keep her with him? He didn’t want her to leave and he feared that she would. “Your belief in me… it will not save you. I am a slave to my instincts… you make me a beast and I cannot fight it. I want you.”
Amber closed her eyes and tilted her head so her cheek brushed his jaw.
“So take me,” she whispered.
Kearn tensed.
Amber remembered saying that to him through her blood the night he had healed her neck.
Stay with me forever.
She didn’t say it aloud but sent the message through her blood and her body to him.
If it would ease his pain for only a moment, she would give herself to him. All she would ask in return was that he didn’t discard her as the other Nobles did when they turned a human, but rather cherished her as Duke Montagu had said she would be by her Noble.
Amber pushed Kearn back and looked deep into his eyes. She touched his cheek, stroked his jaw, and caressed his lower lip, all the while thinking about what it would be like to be with him forever. She sent the message to him again, expressing without words that it had been her desire she had uttered that night, not his.
His lips parted.
She dipped her thumb in and her heart beat so hard against her chest that it felt as though it would smash through her ribs. He became very still and opened his mouth to her. She stared at his fangs, scared but excited, and ran her index finger down one, from the root to the tip. She was careful not to cut herself. He wouldn’t want it to happen that way.
He needed to bite her neck, to do it that way, not by accident. It had to be special to him.
He shook beneath her wandering fingers, his red eyes fixed on her mouth. She swept her fingertip along his lower lip again and his breath shuddered against it.
“You do not know what you do to me,” he whispered. “How hard this is for me.”
“I know.” She saw it in his eyes and felt it in his blood. His need ran through her, so deep and strong that it stirred her own, and she knew that it was the reason he had become so possessive and dominant. It wasn’t about her blood. It wasn’t just what she made him feel or want to do. It was that she had ended his loneliness and he was afraid to go back there. He needed her, and his blood whispered that he couldn’t live without her. He didn’t have to.
Amber leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to his lips, reassuring him without words that she understood and could come to accept this too. She wouldn’t fight him if he gave her the reassurance she craved.
He returned the kiss, his mouth moving slowly against hers, and she smiled when their tongues met and she realised his fangs had receded. His tongue brushed hers, soft and sensual, his gentle kiss brimming with love and warming her heart. Her whole body lightened, her fear melting away, leaving only deep affection flowing through her. Not only her feelings, but his too, joined within their blood, leaving them open to each other. The strength of them gave her a sliver of the reassurance she needed from him, but it still wasn’t enough to convince her to step into his world. She needed more from him. She needed to know that his heart belonged to her before she gave hers in return.
The kiss ended too soon. He drew back,
his green eyes full of the mixture of awe, gratitude and love that she could feel within his blood.
“I must go out.” His tone was distant as though he didn’t want to and she nodded.
She had known the moment he had brought her here that he was going to do this. It seemed as though he couldn’t hide anything from her anymore. His blood had made it clear to her, relaying his thoughts throughout their journey and some he’d had at the house. It had told her that he wanted to keep her here, where it was safe.
“You will be fine here. I will lock the doors.” He placed another kiss on her lips and then he was gone.
Amber stared at the empty room in front of her.
Her fingers stroked her neck.
The thought of becoming a vampire frightened her.
But not as much as the thought of being parted from Kearn.
If she was going to be with him, she had to walk in his world and leave her own behind.
She had to become like him, give herself to him, and trust that he would surrender his heart to her in exchange.
She had to.
She loved him.
CHAPTER 21
It was a delicious dream. Each detail of it slipped through Amber’s fingers the moment it had passed but she knew Kearn was in it and that he had bitten her again. She smiled at him and he returned it, full of brilliant warmth and happiness. Would he smile like that for her when she was like him? She was insane to be considering it but the marks on her throat were always there in her dreams. She wanted it or she wouldn’t keep dreaming it.
A sense of awareness rolled through her followed by an unsettled feeling.
She fluttered her eyes open and frowned across the bright sunlit room to Kearn where he stood in the doorway, bare-chested and watching her.
Amber sat up, holding the covers to her naked body with her right arm and propping herself up with the other.
He looked irresistible like that, wearing only his black trousers and leaning back so every muscle on his pale torso was on show. Her gaze trailed over his body, the sight of it stirring arousal in her as much as her dream had.
Forbidden Blood (Vampire Venators Romance Series) Page 23