by Elisa Adams
“Yeah. I know what you mean.”
“Are you okay?” She raised her head a little to look at him but found it was too much effort. She flopped back down against the soft pillow and sighed.
He laughed. “I don’t know. Are you?”
“Yes.” She was okay, but that odd sensation hadn’t gone away. It had lessened with orgasm, but it hadn’t gone away. It was a dull throb low in her belly, a little like desire but not quite. She would have said it was similar to what she’d felt at lunch that afternoon when she’d thought about Robby’s blood, but it was too creepy to connect what she had with Marco to anything about Robby.
Still, the feeling was there and it wasn’t going away.
“Amara?”
“Mmm.” Talking was still an effort.
“We need to talk.”
His sentence broke through her sensual fog. “What’s the matter?”
“There’s something I need to tell you. It’s not exactly good news.”
Chapter 14
She reared up on the bed, ready to strangle him. “You’re not gay, are you?”
He laughed, but his expression was disbelief warring with horror. “Are you nuts? After what just happened, how can you have any doubts?”
“Okay, sorry. I just seem to have a problem with that lately.”
He sighed. “I’m not you're ex.”
No, he most certainly was not. “What is it you want to talk about?” If he wasn’t gay—which was a very good thing—what could the problem possibly be? “You’re leaving me, aren’t you?”
“No.” He looked just a hair beyond irritated. “Will you just listen to me for a minute?” She nodded. He took a deep breath before he continued. “You haven’t been feeling any better, have you?”
She wanted to deny it, to tell him she was feeling like her old self, but it wasn’t true. She couldn’t lie to him when he was staring at her with such a concerned expression.
“I’m feeling…actually, I’m feeling worse.”
“This shouldn’t be happening. Damn it. Why did I let this happen?”
“You sound like Royce. Are you going to explain to me what the problem is?”
He sat up in bed, leaning against the headboard. “It’s a really long, complicated explanation.”
She blinked. “An explanation you owe me, complicated or not.”
“Okay, I’ll try my best. What I told you before about blood sharing wasn’t completely true. A vampire is someone with a genetic mutation in their blood. It’s not sharing blood that causes it. It isn’t a disease, exactly, but I guess in a way it is.”
“What the hell are you trying to say? You’ve got me more confused than ever.”
He shook his head. “Just listen. I’m trying to tell you something here. Blood doesn’t need to be exchanged. A lot of times that’s what happens, but it’s not necessary. If a human’s blood is infected with blood that contains the mutated gene, they can become a vampire.”
“It’s an infection?”
“I suppose you could look at it that way. But it’s not one that can be cured.”
“And you’re telling me this why?”
“You asked me before for an explanation.”
She had. But now she wasn’t so certain she wanted to know. “Let me see if I’ve got this right. A human can become a vampire if their blood is exposed to vampire blood. So it’s like a blood-born pathogen?”
He nodded. “Exactly.”
Her blood chilled when she realized where he was going with this. It wasn’t an innocent explanation at all. She licked her lips. “How easy is it for someone’s blood to become infected?”
He spoke carefully, very slowly. “It depends on the amount of blood and the condition of the human’s immune system. With a drop of blood the chances of the mutation occurring are pretty slim.”
“But it’s possible.”
He let out a breath. “Yeah. It’s possible.”
“This is about when I bit your lip.”
He nodded.
“You don’t think...that I’m…”
He nodded again, very slowly. He reached out to touch her, but she scooted away, shaking her head. “You’re wrong. I’m fine. I would know if my blood was mutating, wouldn’t I?”
“Don’t you?”
She said nothing. She didn’t know what to say. What he was telling her wasn’t possible. It just couldn’t happen to her. This had to be another bad dream. No, not a bad dream. A nightmare.
“There’s got to be something we can do to return me to normal.”
“It’s not like there’s a medication for it or anything. Once you’re infected, it’s for life.”
She shook her head, hoping somehow what he was saying would go away. “No. There’s got to be a way.”
“There is. Learn to live with it.”
She looked at him, still shaking her head around like some stupid bobble head doll. “I’m still human, right?”
“You’ll have to use that description loosely from now on.”
Okay, this was so a nightmare. “If I wait out whatever it is, will it go away?”
“You don’t get it. It isn’t a virus, it’s a genetic mutation.”
“So now I’m…”
“Consider yourself mutated.”
“No. I don’t want this. All I want is my old life back.” Or her lack thereof, as the case was. She wanted to go back to being a nice, semi-normal, unemployed girl. This was nuts. “What can I do to make it go away?”
“There’s more.” He reached for her, but she swatted at his hands.
“You did not just tell me that I’m a vampire, and you’re not going to give me any more bad news tonight.” She put her hands over her ears and started to hum.
“Amara?”
“I’m sorry. I can’t hear you!”
He lifted her hands off her ears and her humming stopped. She blinked a few times, fat tears welling in her eyes for the second time tonight. This wasn’t like her. She never cried.
Well, it wasn’t exactly an everyday occurrence that her lover informed her she’d accidentally turned herself into a vampire.
“It’s going to be okay.”
Her hopes soared with that statement. Next he was going to tell her this was all some big, twisted joke. She was fine, just majorly stressed out. No mutated blood in this girl.
“You’re going to have to feed before you get sick.”
And then those hopes crashed to the ground. Not only crashed, but crashed and burned.
Crashed and burned, taking down the entire city of Los Angeles with them.
“I have to what?” Her voice escalated and she felt like throwing up or crying. Or maybe hitting something really hard.
Like Marco’s face.
“The mutation takes a long time to happen. It can take days, or even weeks, but once it’s complete, you’ll die if you don’t feed.”
“It was only a drop! I didn’t know this would happen.”
“I never should have touched you.” He snorted. “If I’d known what you were going to do, I would have stopped you.”
She didn’t doubt that. It was her own dumb fault for wanting to force him to let go and be himself with her. She shook her head. “It isn’t your fault, you know.”
He snorted. “Well, yeah, it is. If I’d just left you alone, then none of this ever would have happened.”
She blew out a breath. “I don’t even know what to say to you.”
“You’re in agony.”
Well, she wouldn’t exactly describe it as agony, but it wasn’t a day at the park either.
“I can help you with that.”
“How?” She was almost afraid to ask.
“By helping you feed.”
“Oh, no. I’m not going to have you bringing strangers into the house so I can suck on their necks.”
This time he actually laughed. “I wouldn’t want you drinking from some stranger. I meant me.”
“Really?” She bli
nked. “I could do that?”
His smile was purely wicked. “I would love you to do it. I’ve wanted that for a long time.”
She swallowed hard. “Um, I don’t know. Will it help?”
“Well, it couldn’t hurt. Besides, you need to eat. At this rate you’re going to waste away before you’ve had a chance to get used to this.”
She could see from the look on his face that he didn’t want that to happen. Damnit, neither did she. Whatever happened to her, however much this vampire and living on blood crap affected her life, she wasn’t ready to die.
She couldn’t forget the fascination she’d had with Marco’s blood. Now she understood why. She hadn’t been going crazy; she’d been turning into a mutant freak.
It didn’t matter, not when she could practically feel that hot blood pounding in his veins. She wanted that blood. She wanted to taste it, let it flow into her mouth…
Licking her lips, she realized it was becoming something of a need. Her pulse kicked up a couple of notches and she was surprised that she was becoming sexually aroused even though she’d just been sated more times than she could count.
“Tell me something, Marco. Does your kind always feed off each other when they make love?”
He shrugged, but something sparked in his eyes. “It’s common practice.”
“How do you handle it? I got so dizzy.”
“It will be different. I promise.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
He laughed. “Please, hurt me.”
She ran her tongue over her teeth. Her nice, normal humanoid teeth. “How am I supposed to…?”
“It will be okay. Trust me on this.”
* * * * *
Marco waited for an eternity, watching every emotion from desire to fear to denial and indecision war in Amara’s eyes. His cock was already hard with anticipation of what she was about to do.
Or what he hoped she was about to do.
She was afraid, and he understood that fear. His own turning had been very different, because he’d been bleeding out at the time. With not much of his own blood left in his body, the mutation had taken effect almost immediately.
And he’d wanted it. He’d practically begged for it. He’d been dying. Amara was young and full of life. She still didn’t understand that this life could be the most amazing thing that had ever happened to her.
He had another reason for asking her to feed off of him. It would increase the bond between them that he knew was already stronger than it should be. When she’d left, it had been torture. This was a way to bind them for life, so he wouldn’t be able to push her away again.
He snorted. Now there was no reason to push her away. He didn’t have to fear losing control and turning her without her permission. Her ingestion of his blood had been a terrible accident, but something good had come out of it. He would have his woman for life.
He just hoped she’d be as understanding when she’d had time to let the enormity of the situation sink in. She might be fine with all of this now, but tomorrow or the next day, when she finally understood what she now was, she would probably have a few choice words for him.
That was why he fully intended to make the most out of tonight. If he could show her just how incredible her life could be, maybe she wouldn’t turn away from him when she finally understood what he’d done to her.
“Come here, Amara.”
He half expected her to turn away from him, but she didn’t. She crawled across the bed and straddled his lap. That was all it took to drive him completely mad. He fought the urge to thrust against her, thrust into her. Whatever she needed, he’d have to let her take it on her own.
“I want you, Marco.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, but it sent shivers through his body. He’d been waiting for a woman like her all his life. Considering the length of his life that was saying a lot.
He decided to lighten the moment when he saw the abject fear in her eyes.
“Do with me what you will, woman.” He let his head drop back, offering his neck to her in mock-surrender. “I am yours for the taking.”
She laughed. He loved the sound of her laughter.
“Do you know how beautiful you look tonight?”
She raised an eyebrow. “You’re a little biased.”
It was his turn to laugh. She didn’t know how right she was. Even before he’d taken her, he’d seen what an incredible beauty she was. It wasn’t that she was stunning. Her features were more interesting than classically beautiful. Her beauty had a lot more to do with the chemistry between them, and quite a bit to do with the fact that she was the first woman in four hundred years who’d challenged him regularly and still turned him on.
He lifted his head a little. “What are you waiting for? Don’t leave me hanging over here.”
Her laugh this time was pure sin. She wrapped her hand around his cock and stroked him a few times. “It feels like you’re hanging pretty well to me.”
If she didn’t feed soon, he was going to flip her onto her back and fuck her. Then they wouldn’t get around to her feeding for a while, and he didn’t want to prolong it any longer. He wanted to give her a chance to find out what a rush feeding was. It might help her accept it better later on. But if she didn’t hurry up and—
His thoughts ended abruptly when she took his cock in her mouth. He moaned and thrust into her mouth, too far gone for anything else. At the last second he snapped back to his senses. He had to stop her before this really got out of hand. That first time was difficult, but with any luck he’d have her feeding regularly in no time. Lifting her by her shoulders, pulled her up and against him.
Her drenched labial lips pressed firmly against his cock and her hardened nipples were flush against his chest. He wasn’t going to last another second. “I need this from you, Amara. I do.”
With a hand on the back of her head, he guided her toward his throat. At first she just ran her tongue along the skin, driving him to the brink of madness. Then her teeth nipped. It wasn’t hard enough to break the skin, but his cock twitched against her. He couldn’t help it. He moaned, more from the anticipation than the actual sensations.
He’d only turned a human one time in his life, and the disastrous results of it was something he would rather forget, if only he could. Most of his knowledge of the subject came from Royce, who’d done a lot more studying on the subject. So, in a way, this was a new experience for both of them.
He expected a great deal of pain from her dull human teeth. He was surprised when the sting he felt was sharp but momentary. She was a lot further turned than he’d expected. Her blood must have been infected immediately. He’d have to keep her away from mirrors. If she saw the fangs he knew she now possessed, she’d go into shock.
The first lap of her tongue was tentative. Soon she grew bolder. Eventually she latched on and suckled him hard. He couldn’t take another second of this. Lifting her hips, he thrust his cock into her cunt. She gasped against him, but soon was riding him with abandon.
She cried out, her orgasm taking her by force. She bucked against him, her mouth sliding away from his neck. He pulled her in for a kiss, cleaning away the trickle of blood at the corner of her mouth with his tongue. Tasting himself on her only increased his pleasure.
Whether she knew it or not, Amara now belonged to him. Forever.
If she’d have him. They still had a lot of talking to do, and she had a lot of his transgressions to forgive. They knew each other in the physical sense, but if he thought about it, he didn’t really know her as well as he wanted to. He planned to change that. Soon. But for now, he’d be content with what she’d give him. If that was only physical, he’d accept that on a temporary basis.
The last thought was gone as his own orgasm took him. His thoughts shattered as he spurted himself inside her. Inside his woman. His woman. He never thought that phrase would enter his mind again, but it had snuck up on him when he’d least expected it.
If he had to admi
t it, he even kind of liked the sound of it.
Amara flopped back on the mattress, spreading her arms. “Wow.”
He couldn’t help the smugness he felt at her comment. “You think?”
“Oh, please. I know you felt it, too.”
“How do you know that?”
He settled in next to her, rubbing his hand up and down her thigh.
“This is going to sound strange, but I felt how you did when you came. I, um, could feel what you were feeling pretty much the whole time.” She furrowed her brow. “Then again, it probably doesn’t sound all that strange to you, does it?”
Strange didn’t even begin to describe it. As far as he knew, the only vampires who could read minds were the ones who were psychic as humans. He shrugged. What did he know? He’d spent the better part of four hundred years emotionally ignoring just about every vampire he’d met.
“In all honesty, this is pretty new to me, too.”
“How?”
“I’ve never let myself get attached before.” Mentally, he’d preferred to keep his distance. He hadn’t been able to do that with Amara, not from the start.
“Are you attached now?”
“You’d better believe it.”
He wasn’t about to tell her how cute she looked with her budding fangs.
She blinked hard and ran her tongue along her teeth. “My what? Oh, God. I can’t believe this.”
He just stared at her, not knowing what to think. He hadn’t spoken that thought out loud.
Her brow furrowed even further. “I thought you said vampires can’t read minds.”
He shook his head. “No. I said I can’t read minds. Some can, others can’t. It really depends on what they were as humans.” Then what she was saying hit him. “Are you telling me you read my mind?”
She nodded slowly. “I guess. It was more of sensing your thoughts than an actual reading. It wasn’t very in-depth, just a touch.”
“You sound like you know what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah. My grandmother was a fortune teller in one of those little shops back home. It was one of those tourist attraction things.” She rolled her eyes. “She did it for years. From what I’m told, she made some pretty good guesses, too.”