by Lola Gabriel
That first kiss had been so amazing, so unbelievable. It had set Ellen on fire, which was the complete opposite of what she had imagined would happen. Maddox’s skin was cold, yes, but when they’d kissed, she had only felt warmth emanating from him.
Stopping to put away their things had been almost torture; her skin itched, like she had some sort of rash, like her body was too small for her, like she was a piece of a puzzle forcefully pushed into a place where she wasn’t meant to be. Touching Maddox, even just holding his hand, brought her back to herself, brought her to where she belonged.
They reached her room, and after fumbling with her keys for a moment, Ellen finally managed to open the door. Once inside her room, she turned around to face Maddox, intending to reach out and pull him to her, but Maddox beat her to it, immediately cupping her jaw to press his mouth against hers and slip his tongue between her parted lips.
Ellen wrapped her arms around him, groaning into the kiss. He was only two or three inches taller than her, which meant that Ellen didn’t have to strain all that much to meet his mouth, but she still wanted to pull him closer, closer, closer, beyond the capabilities of their physical bodies and the laws stating that the two of them couldn’t possibly share the same space. She wanted to merge herself to him, to breathe through him, to feel his heartbeat against hers—
“Hold on,” Maddox mumbled, and before Ellen knew what was happening, he was grabbing her waist and lifting her up so she could wrap her arms and legs around him and cling to him.
Hot damn, she thought. She didn’t know Maddox was so goddamn strong.
She looked over her shoulder at her bed. Following her gaze, Maddox nodded his head and walked them closer to it. When he was standing in front of it, he gently lowered Ellen down before climbing up on the mattress himself.
Ellen didn’t give him any time to hesitate or wonder if she still wanted to be as close to him as she could. She wrapped all of her limbs around him, pulling his body against hers. Maddox took her invitation and pushed a leg between hers, letting her feel how aroused he was, and Ellen gasped in surprise, the sound becoming a whine when Maddox started to kiss down her jaw, his elongated fangs grazing the skin of her neck.
Ellen’s hands gripped his hips, and she suddenly couldn’t stand the layers of clothing between them. She wanted to feel his skin, to feel him, and she couldn’t do it with all these stupid clothes in the way.
“Off,” she demanded, tugging at the hem of Maddox’s shirt, at the waistband of his jeans. “Take these off—”
Maddox sat up on his knees, first pulling off his shirt and then maneuvering his pants off his legs. Ellen took this time to remove her own clothes, throwing them haphazardly on the ground.
Soon, they were both naked, and Ellen had to stop for a moment to stare at Maddox in his full glory. She gently ran her fingers down his chest, caressing his dark nipples, relishing his shiver. There was a trail of soft hair starting at his navel and going all the way down to the hardness between his legs that Ellen longed to touch, so she followed that trail with her hand.
Maddox groaned out loud when she wrapped her fingers around him and stroked him, burying his face in the crook of her neck, biting the skin and yet making sure that his fangs didn’t sink in.
Ellen kind of wanted him to bite her with them. She knew he wouldn’t hurt her, of course, that there was nothing for her to be worried about. But Maddox had always drunk bagged blood, and it had always been human blood. Neither of them knew what would happen if he drank blood from another immortal, especially an angel. That was a conversation that should be had at another time, not when they were in the throes of passion.
One of Maddox’s hands rested gently on her stomach.
“Can I touch you?” he asked, his breathing ragged, and Ellen nodded her head furiously.
“Yes, please,” she begged, and no sooner had she finished speaking than Maddox reached between her legs and softly touched his fingertips to her sex.
Ellen cried out, grinding her hips up into his hand, seeking more of his touch, and Maddox had mercy on her and pushed a finger inside her, his palm cupping her mound as he pleasured her. His mouth traced a path of kisses down her neck, to her collarbones, between her breasts, to her breasts, to her belly, and then her bellybutton and then the patch of dark hair above her sex and then—
“Oh, my god,” Ellen moaned as Maddox’s lips wrapped around her little bundle of nerves. But rather than using only his mouth, he kept his hand exactly where it was, aiding him in bringing her closer to her peak.
Ellen gasped and hissed and whined, chasing Maddox’s touch, chasing her pleasure, and she threw her head back and clutched the back of Maddox’s head as he licked and sucked and lapped at the arousal making her legs damp and soaking his hand.
“Maddox,” she gasped, feeling the heat inside her escalating. “Maddox—”
He pulled away from her sex and looked up at her.
Ellen didn’t know how to tell him this, though she wanted to be straightforward with him. She wanted to reach the peak of her pleasure, but she wanted to reach it with Maddox, and she wanted them to reach it with him inside her.
“I want you in me,” she said, and she couldn’t help shivering herself when she saw Maddox’s eyes widen with a raw, primal hunger before he moved up to kiss her and slowly, gently, carefully—giving her time to adjust to him and back out if she didn’t like it—slipped his hardness inside her core.
Ellen closed her eyes and sighed in what felt like relief at finally feeling Maddox completely within her. She tightened her hold on him, urging him to move so they could reach their climax together, their bodies entwined like vines as he bracketed her head with his elbows and thrust his hips, hitting the spot that made Ellen see stars behind her closed eyelids.
“Yes, just like that,” she moaned, wrapping her arms around Maddox’s neck to pull him even closer.
“Ellen,” he muttered, his breath ghosting over her mouth. “Ellen, I’m—I can’t—”
“C’mon,” Ellen urged him. “C’mon, Maddox, together.”
Maddox pushed his forehead against hers and thrust his hips once, twice, three times, each time driving Ellen closer to the edge until he had pushed her over it, and Ellen curled her fingers on the back of Maddox’s head and screamed her release. Maddox let out a groan, and then his body tensed, his back arched, and he spent himself inside her.
They collapsed together in a heap of limbs, their breaths coming out in short, ragged puffs of breath. Maddox waited a few seconds before he carefully pulled away from her. Ellen’s knees were pressed to Maddox’s sides, keeping him in place, afraid that he would just stand up and leave, but Maddox didn’t seem too keen to move any further. In fact, he was running his fingers through her hair, gently caressing her curls, like he was touching a piece of art.
He was not just cute and adorable, he was downright gorgeous, beautiful, stunningly so. His gaze was soft and sweet, and his mouth was curled in a smile that was almost unconscious, like he wasn’t entirely aware he was doing it. The coldness of his skin was the perfect contrast to Ellen’s flushed body, the summer breeze on a hot, sunny afternoon.
Ellen touched her fingertips to his cracked lips and cupped his jaw in her palm, and Maddox leaned into the touch, pressing a kiss to her thumb.
Now that the high was gone and Ellen could think more clearly, her thoughts returned to the doubts she’d had when she’d talked to the twins, the reasons her mind had come up with as to why she and Maddox wouldn’t work out.
“Hey, hey,” he said suddenly, his gaze growing concerned. “What’s wrong?”
Something must’ve changed in Ellen’s expression without her realizing it, and she wondered if perhaps it was better to shake her head and insist it was nothing, if Maddox would believe her.
“Do you…” Maddox began pulling away, the concern on his eyes shifting into alarm. “Did you…not want this?”
“What? No, no!” Ellen cried, and at the panic ov
ertaking Maddox’s expression, she grabbed his head and pulled him to her, kissing him hard on the mouth. “I mean, yes, yes, of course I wanted it! I want you so much that it’s kind of ridiculous,” she confessed, which made a blush bloom on her cheeks.
But Maddox didn’t laugh or make fun of her. Instead, he exhaled and smiled in relief.
“I feel the same way about you,” he said. He continued to thread his fingers through her hair, delicately so that he wouldn’t pull on her curls. “Then what is it?”
Ellen let out a deep, thoughtful sigh. She supposed it was useless to lie to him, now that they had established their mutual desire to be with each other.
“I’m an angel,” she began.
“Yes,” Maddox said with a little nod.
“And you’re a vampire. Not only are you a vampire, you’re the Vampire Prince.”
“Yes?” he said, like he didn’t know where she was going.
“I…” Ellen ran her hand over her face in frustration. “Listen, I’ve never cared about what other people think of me. We angels are already weird to other immortals, so my parents taught me to just be myself and screw what the rest of the world had to say about it. And I’ve never had a problem with that, because I have been lucky enough to be surrounded by people who don’t have a problem with me. Like you guys.”
“Whoever has a problem with you is an idiot,” Maddox said with a certainty that Ellen had never heard in his voice before. “You’re amazing, and if anyone wants to miss out on knowing you just because you’re an angel, then that’s their problem.”
“But that’s the thing,” she said, pushing herself off the bed with her elbows. Maddox sat back on his knees so that she could also sit up.
It was strange, sitting in front of each other, completely naked, as if it were natural for them to be like this. And yet that was how it felt: natural. There was no self-consciousness, no shame—just the two of them.
“Maddox,” Ellen told him, “interspecies unions with angels are practically unheard of. It’s incredibly rare for us to have kids.”
Maddox frowned in confusion. “I’m sorry, are we still having the same conversation?”
“You’re a prince!” she yelled. “I might not know a lot about the royal heirs, but you must be expected to have at least one, right? What will your people—people in general—think when—”
She hadn’t meant to cut her question short, but there was a sudden knot in her throat, and her eyes were burning with unshed tears. Although she took a deep breath, her next words still came out shaky and wobbly.
“What will they think when they find out you’re with an angel?”
Maddox didn’t say anything. He was looking at her with a mixture of sadness and helplessness, his brow furrowed, and Ellen wanted nothing more than to go back to the soft, joyful looks they had exchanged just a few moments ago, when she hadn’t brought this up and ruined the mood of their first time together.
Then Maddox inhaled deeply and spoke.
“Ellen Williams,” he said, and hearing him call her by her full name sent a rush of excitement through her, almost identical to what she’d felt holding his hand. “You are the single most incredible person I have ever met. Not angel—person, period. No one could possibly hope to compare to you. You’re kind and funny, and you’re not afraid to call a prince out on his bullshit when he’s been a jerk.”
That pulled a chuckle out of Ellen. It was hard to believe that the same vampire who had embarrassedly apologized for running out on her was now telling her all of this with such confidence.
“No one’s ever explicitly told me this,” Maddox went on, “but yes, it’s kind of a given that I’ll eventually have an heir.” Just before Ellen told him that was where the problem lay, he continued. “That won’t be for at least a few hundred years, though! We can cross that bridge when we get there.”
“But—”
“People can say whatever they want about me,” he added. “They should be lucky to have a mate as wonderful as you.”
Mate.
The word resonated throughout Ellen’s mind, and she felt it ring true down to her core, to her essence, to her soul. That was why she had felt such a strong connection to Maddox, why she had agreed to start over with him, why they had become friends so quickly. They were mates, meant to be together, chosen by the universe itself to complement each other.
That calmed her racing thoughts, knowing that this was not just an infatuation or a crush that would eventually fade—knowing that they had fallen in love and would never fall out of love.
“We will have to cross that bridge at some point,” Ellen said, her voice lighter, the weight on her shoulders and chest slowly dissipating. “And probably some others, too, and we’ll most likely have to cross those a lot sooner.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” Maddox agreed, pushing a few curls behind her ear. Now it was he who cupped her cheek, and it was she who leaned into the touch, closing her eyes and relishing the contact between them. “But we’ll do it together. And hey.” He pressed a soft kiss to the space between her eyebrows. “If you don’t want anything to change, we don’t have to tell anyone we’re together. We can just go on like we always have.”
That did seem like a temporary solution, but deep down, Ellen didn’t want that either. They wouldn’t be able to keep this a secret forever, no matter how hard they tried to hide it. Eventually, the Vampire King would find out, and it’d be a lot better if Maddox told him himself rather than him hearing it from someone else.
Ellen shook her head, scolding herself. She shouldn’t start doubting herself now. So what if a union like theirs had never existed before? So what if they were the first vampire-angel couple in the world? Maddox was right; she was pretty great. She was a goddamn catch, and he was lucky to be her mate.
It would definitely not be easy, but she was confident that she and Maddox would be able to cross as many bridges as they had to, as long as they were together.
6
The thing was, basically, that Maddox had never expected this, or anything of the sort, to happen to him. Hell, he had never even imagined anything like this happening to him, because it was a ridiculously impossible scenario! It was something that only occurred in those stupid human movies, not in the human world, and definitely not in the immortal world.
He didn’t know what kind of relationships the other ‘royal kids’ had with their respective parents, but Maddox’s relationship with his father was very good, actually, if he might say so himself. The Vampire King had never berated him, not even when he was a nervous, awkward child barely able to hold a conversation with his fellow princes and princesses. His father had always been understanding and patient and supportive, and he had always trusted Maddox, which in turn meant that Maddox knew he could also trust him.
But that was exactly the problem. When you didn’t expect something, it was easy to be caught off-guard by it.
If he had to pinpoint where it had all started to go wrong, it had to be right after he and Ellen…well, after they had made their relationship official.
They didn’t make a big deal out of it or announce it with a grand demonstration. They were the same people they had been before, except that now Maddox could interlace his fingers with Ellen’s, and she could turn and press a butterfly kiss to his temple, and they knew that the gesture would always be welcome.
Really, the ones who made it seem like the biggest event in history were their friends.
Oliver had known that something important had happened between Maddox and Ellen on account of the prince not returning to their room and not sending any texts about his plans or whereabouts. When Maddox went back to their dorm the next morning, Oliver immediately cornered him and asked him one simple question.
“Did you make a move on her?”
Maddox sighed and gave his friend a devious smile. “I don’t kiss and tell, Oliver.”
“SON OF A BITCH!” Oliver shouted, grinning like a maniac as he pumped his
fists into the air. “You mad bastard, you did it! Okay, okay, but seriously, who made the first move?”
“Why are you so interested in that?” Maddox replied. To be honest, he’d thought his friend would want to know the more private details, not focus on who had taken the leap of faith first. Maddox wouldn’t have told him, of course, but he thought Oliver would at least ask him, considering how sure he’d been that Maddox and Ellen would eventually become a thing.
“Because I have a bet going on with the twins, and I’d like to know if I should go and claim my prize or prepare to suffer.”
Maddox narrowed his eyes at him. “Seriously, how come Ellen and I don’t notice whenever you guys talk about us, apparently? Or when you guys make bets about us?”
“You’re both always too busy pretending not to notice that you’re sitting too close to each other when you don’t actually need to,” Oliver answered. “I want to believe that our collective pain and torment are over, but more importantly, you still haven’t told me who made the first move!”
“Oh, my god, fine!” Maddox cried. “I guess I did!”
Honestly, he considered that it had been a sort of joint effort. It wasn’t like he had just kissed Ellen without asking her; he’d leaned in, and she’d leaned in, and then they’d kissed. But he had reached out to tuck her hair behind her ear, which was, in a way, the last straw.
Huh. Imagine if I hadn’t done that, Maddox thought. If I had been too much of a coward to dare do such a thing. The Maddox he’d been before meeting her would have stared at her in silence and fumbled with an excuse to get out of there before he embarrassed himself any further.
Oh. He hadn’t realized how much he’d changed after meeting Ellen. Oliver had always been his best (and only) friend, and yet they had immediately gotten along with Stella and Shauna without any awkwardness or missteps. Maddox felt more confident.