“Rip it off,” she whispered against his lips.
“No.”
“Sebastian! Rip it off!” She demanded, angrily.
Pulling back, he stared down at her for a second before his lips curved into a smile.
“What are you smiling about?”
“Your eyes; they're purple.”
She blinked. “What?”
“They're purple. Now let me undo these buttons. I've waited a hell of a long time to get you in this thing to just go and rip it off you again.” Pressing his lips to her mute ones, he began to undo the buttons again.
Her eyes were purple? Purple? “Why are they purple?”
“You keep asking me why mine go that icy blue colour? It's when I feel intense emotion. Mine go blue, yours go purple.”
Charlotte fell silent as she went through the numerous times she'd seen him with those icy blue eyes and realised he was telling the truth.
The slide of fabric followed by warm air against her skin brought her back to the present and she blinked Sebastian back into focus. He grinned triumphantly at managing to get the buttons undone and then his gaze fastened on the body he'd revealed. He swore under his breath, “You're beautiful.” She smiled flirtatiously and heard a low growl leave him before he bent his head and kissed her hungrily.
Charlotte wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back with just as much passion.
Things heated up quickly then and before she realised they were both naked and on the bed.
Sebastian's lips ran down her throat, his tongue teasing the pulse that beat just below the surface as his hands skimmed down her waist to grip her hips. A purr of pleasure built in her throat as he continued to nibble on her neck and she gripped a handful of his hair in her fist to hold him in place while her other hand roamed down his chest and abs to circle his erection. He hissed in a breath at the contact and nipped harder at her neck causing her body to quake with a different kind of need.
“Oh God,” she breathed as the need for him to take her blood roared through her, almost like a physical pain. Tilting her head back and to the side, she bared her throat to him.
Charlotte felt the brush of his nose against her skin and then the light skim of his lips against her ear. “Not yet,” he whispered.
His body moved down hers and straddled her knees. His eyes ran over her naked body hungrily, causing liquid heat to run through her veins. “Touch me.”
Sebastian's gaze met hers as he got up on his knees and moved Charlotte's legs from under him, pushing them up towards her chest and then spreading them wide open.
If she'd still been human, she was sure she'd have been humiliated beyond belief at the wanton pose but right then, as a vampire, she was so turned on, she didn’t care.
Moving his body back between her spread thighs, he lowered his body into contact with hers and the weight of him and feel of him was amazing. Her legs wrapped around his waist and she hooked her ankles together. He wasn’t going anywhere any-time soon.
Her action had brought his pelvis close to hers and his impressive erection was pressed into her stomach. Charlotte flexed her hips as best she could in her current position, to try and get a little friction going between their bodies but it was proving impossible.
Sebastian moved his body a little lower and she felt him slide against her. She gasped as her hips flexed at the same time creating the friction she'd been after. “Yes...” she moaned, and let her head drop to the side as he continued to roll his hips, teasing her.
His wrist was right beside her head and she could see his vein clearly. Her fangs throbbed with the urge to pierce his skin and taste the blood underneath. She was so very tempted to lean across the small distance separating his hand and her mouth and do just that.
“Charlie?”
The sound of her name on his lips had her head turning to meet his gorgeous blue eyes. And then she felt him pushing into her and clawed at the man above her, wanting to go a little wild with him.
Grabbing his neck she pulled Sebastian's mouth to hers and kissed him hungrily. He returned it and cupped her cheek in a gentle caress. Charlotte almost snorted, wanting, needing fire and lust not love and rainbows. Her hips bucked beneath him trying to set the rhythm and after several seconds Sebastian stopped her movement with his hands and stared at her questioningly, “I've waited way too long for this to let it happen fast, Charlie. I want to savour it; savour you. Don’t rush me. Please?”
Staring into his eyes, she was mesmerised by the emotion in them and nodded. She would probably have agreed to anything he asked of her in that moment.
Sebastian kissed her then and rolled his hips, going deep. A breathy sound of pleasure left her, her fingers scraping down his back with each deep thrust. The tingling pleasure flowed through her body like a rising tide, and with everything heightened beyond belief she wasn’t sure if she'd live long enough for it to peak. Her body twitched and pulsed.
“Breathe, Charlie. We're almost there,” warm, guttural words spoken into her ear every few minutes as she bowed and twisted beneath him. Then she felt his warm panting breath against the dewy skin of her throat. A soft kiss, then the pinch of fangs in her skin and slight suction.
Then she screamed his name as she orgasmed.
Chapter Ten
Charlotte felt lovely and warm, snuggling even deeper under the covers.
A groan rumbled in her ear and goosebumps erupted all over her body as the sound did naughty things to her. “That's a great way to wake me up,” Sebastian drawled huskily in her ear. “Do it often, won't you?”
She couldn’t help but laugh and turned in his arms to place her hands on his chest and rest her chin on them, a grin still on her face as she glanced up at him.
Sebastian reached down to brush a stray lock of hair from her cheek in a tender move, “There's no way I'm giving you up.”
Although puzzled by his words she smiled, then she grimaced when her stomach pinched painfully. She moved into a more comfortable position on his body but it didn’t help one bit. It felt ten times worse than any period pain she'd ever had and that had been painful. “Ow,” she mewled.
“What is it?” Sebastian asked immediately, pushing up on his elbows.
A burning fire was working its way through her body, leaving an almost unbearable pain in its wake. Her fingers clawed at her throat, chest and stomach, going deep enough to draw blood. She felt no pain from the self inflicted wounds.
“Shit!” Seconds later she was cradled in Sebastian's arms, leaning against his chest as he held something to her lips. She turned her head and pushed it away. “Charlie,” he said softly, his lips pressed to her ear, “this is your body telling you it needs blood. You need to drink this.” She shook her head slowly, silent tears coursing down her cheeks. “I know how you must be feeling; I didn’t want my first taste of blood either but you have to drink this.” He tensed at her back before continuing, “You'll go mad if you don’t, like Lucien when he killed your family.” Charlotte stiffened in his hold, holding herself rigid at his suggestion she would end up like that monster. “You'll only want human blood and the people on the other side of that door are your friends, Charlie. You need to drink this.”
With great reluctance, she took the bag of blood from his hand and eyed it with disgust. It felt slightly warm in her fingers and she had to suppress a shiver.
“Pierce the bag with your fang and tilt it. As soon as the blood hits your fangs your body will know what to do and before you realise, it'll have gone.”
She raised a brow dubiously but did as he directed, letting her sharp fang pierce the bag cleanly and then tilted it until she felt the liquid against her fang. The rational side of her brain shut down and she was all animal, gripping the plastic in needy hands and slurping at the blood like it was water on a hot day.
When it was all gone, and she'd gotten herself back under control, she pulled away from Sebastian and dropped the blood bag like it was infected with the plague. Char
lotte could feel something dripping down her chin and wiped at it with the back of her hand and stared in horror at the dark blood smeared across her skin.
“Charlie...”
She half turned and met his gaze. “I'm a monster.”
“No!”
Charlotte ignored him.
Last night everything had seemed fine, like she could handle being a vampire. That had been before the realities of having to drink blood to survive had sunk in properly. Now she wasn’t so sure. Knowing that it had come from a human...she shuddered. “I can't do this.”
Sebastian's hands caught her face, “Yes, you can. You can do this. You have to do this; for me. I can't give you up now I've had you in my arms; in my bed. Please don’t ask that of me because I can't do it.”
Struggling with her conscience, she rested her forehead against his and drew in a shaky breath.
His hands rubbed up and down her arms in a comforting manner. “Do you feel better now?” Charlotte nodded and stood upright to meet his gaze. “Then we need to start training you. I told the Director what happened while you were out of it, during the transition between human and vampire, and he's fine with you still working here. You just have to show him you have control over the more feral side of your nature before you can go on any more assignments.”
“That's fine,” she told him calmly. She understood perfectly. The Director couldn’t have a blood thirsty vampire on the payroll when the job of the Agency was to take down creatures like her.
The loud clomping footfalls of heeled boots came closer to their location and she saw Sebastian wince. “One more thing. Your friend doesn’t believe me about turning you into a vampire and thinks I have you locked away for...nefarious reasons and insists on seeing you for herself.”
“Nefarious reasons?” She asked, curious.
“Blood and sex.”
“Oh.” Her cheeks flushed with the blood she'd recently consumed as she realised that was more or less what they'd been doing. Only she was a vampire now, not human, and it was her that had drunk some blood, not him.
A loud, insistent knocking started at the door, “Open up, leech! If you've harmed one hair on Charlotte's head I swear I will turn you into ash so quick...”
Frowning at her friend's threat, she crossed the room quickly and pulled open the door. Sarah blinked at seeing her and then scanned her from head to toe, her eyes taking in every detail. Her face went pale and she took a step back. “He was telling the truth; you are a vampire.”
Raising a hand to try and calm Sarah, she was upset to see her friend stumble away from the touch and lowered her hand back to her side. “I was dying. He gave me the option to continue living and, maybe selfishly, I agreed.”
“You chose this?”
She dropped her gaze to the floor, unable to look at the disgust on the other woman's face. A woman she'd once considered her friend. “I'd hardly say I had a choice. Life or death? Not much of a choice,” she pointed out. “I'm sure that most people in that position would have done the same and chosen to live.”
Sarah took an angry step forward and Charlotte glanced up to meet her gaze, her senses flaring at the hint of danger in the air. “Not if they knew they'd have to kill innocent people to survive, they wouldn’t!”
Letting out a sigh of nonchalance, she leant against the door frame with her hip and crossed her arms over her chest. “If you want to believe that I won't argue with you.”
The other woman let out a snort and pointed her finger in Charlotte's face. “Stay the fuck away from me now, Charlotte.”
She focused on the finger in her face and the anger radiating from its owner and felt her control slipping. This woman wanted to hurt her, she could sense it like a flavour on her tongue. Charlotte's body was tense and ready, despite her casual pose, for whatever this woman might have planned.
“I wouldn’t trust you to have my back any more, you're likely to want to stick your fangs in it now you're like that leech in there!” With another insult aimed at Sebastian leaving her lips, Sarah turned on her heel and stormed off down the corridor, her body stiff with her anger.
Charlotte watched her leave, her mind and body equally pissed at the woman who used to be her friend. The insults to herself she could deal with but Sebastian? He'd only done what she'd asked of him. He wasn’t a monster.
She felt his presence at her back and relaxed into his chest. His arms came around her immediately and she felt his lips at her crown, “You okay?”
A rush of air left her and she nodded. “Yeah. You mentioned training before?”
Sebastian grinned against her hair, she could sense it more than feel it, “Uh huh. If you're in the mood we can go right now.”
“Go where?” She asked with a frown.
“The roof of course. We aren’t likely to break gym equipment up there like we would if we tried what I have in mind in the actual gym.”
Her mind whirred with possibilities but came up blank. Just what did he have in mind?
Chapter Eleven
A strong breeze pulled at Charlotte's hair as they pushed through the door to the roof. She scanned her surroundings quickly but found nothing of interest. “Seb, what are we doing up here?”
He crossed the roof and beckoned for her to follow. She did so warily, not keen on how high up they were and the breeze that pushed at her body. He stopped at the very edge of the roof and held out a hand for her. She shook her head wildly. No way was she getting that close to the edge.
“I thought you trusted me?”
Her brow furrowed for several long seconds before she took a few steps closer to him. Sebastian grabbed her hand and twined their fingers together as he brought her closer to the sheer drop.
“You can't be afraid of heights as a vampire,” he told her gently. “We use them to our advantage; being able to take out an adversary by coming from above creates less trouble than a direct approach where they might see you coming and warn others. Look down, Charlie.”
Her eyes bugged at the request and she shook her head, even going so far as trying to take a step back but his grip on her wrist was uncompromising. “No way.”
Sebastian's eyes caught and held hers. “We're five floors up. A vampire can safely jump from roughly the eighth floor of a building without hurting themselves. If they jumped from higher they may break bones but those bones would heal within a few hours and the injury wouldn’t be severe enough that they couldn’t get away if in danger.”
“What has this got to do with us?” She asked, fairly certain she already knew the answer but needing him to confirm her thoughts.
“We're going to jump off,” he told her.
Charlotte's eyes widened at the easy way he spoke of it. “I've been a vampire less than a day and you want me to jump off buildings already?”
A rumble of laughter met her ears and she scowled at him. “Charlie, you'll be fine. I'll hold your hand the first time.”
The first time? He wanted her to do it more than once? Was he crazy?!
She didn’t get the chance to think anything else as he released her fingers, wrapped an arm around her waist and took the few steps needed to walk them off the edge of the building. Eyes widening, she squealed as they fell quickly. Her hands tightly gripped Sebastian's arm at her waist as the ground grew closer with every second. Her eyes closed when she could make out the individual tiles on the ground and she tensed, waiting for impact.
Only her body took over, bending her knees as her feet hit the floor which helped absorb the impact so she hardly felt it. Her face must have shown her disbelief at making the five storey drop unscathed because she heard Sebastian's chuckle and turned on him, pushing him away from her hard. “I can't believe you did that!”
He was still chuckling as he pulled her into his chest, “You survived, didn't you?”
A growl built in her chest and she brought her fist back and let it fly, punching him in the gut. He groaned and swore under his breath. “Okay. No more dragging you
off buildings,” he conceded.
Unable to hide her smug smirk, she turned away from him. “What else did you have in mind in regards to training?” She asked.
“We need to head back up to the roof.” Charlotte narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously and he grinned. “Come on. I promise, no more dropping off roofs today. We'll save that for tomorrow.” Turning on his heel he headed back for the glass double doors of the Agency and she followed reluctantly.
As she pushed through, she was suddenly hit with a sense of uneasiness. She could hear a deafening mixture of sounds; footsteps, conversations, rhythmic thudding and feel everyone's eyes on her. There was a tenseness in the air, like a bitter taste on her tongue. People didn’t seem to know what to do with her now she was vampire. Some seemed scared, while others seemed ready to hurt her.
Her eyes roamed the front entrance as she walked through, her eyes moving between people every second, looking for threats. Her animal side seemed eager for a fight and she curled her fists at her sides to try and keep herself under control.
“Leech!” Someone hissed as she passed and before she knew, Sebastian had the guy by the throat.
“Say it again, I dare you,” he said softly, his face close to the other man's, fangs showing. The guy's jaw clenched angrily but thankfully he kept it shut. Sebastian dropped him back to the floor and turned to address everyone in the room. “Charlotte may be a vampire now, but she's still the girl she once was. She hasn't done anything to earn your hatred so leave it for the vampire's out there that have.” Speech over, he grabbed Charlotte's elbow and urged her past the grumbling crowd and to the lifts. He pressed the button and the doors opened to admit them. Once inside he pushed the button for the second floor and she frowned across at him. “We need an assistant for what I have planned next.”
The lift arrived on the second floor in seconds and she followed him out, her steps slowing considerably when she saw him heading to the Director's office. He pushed the outer office door open and vanished inside.
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