by Mandi Casey
I would call my alcoholic mother, the same mother who raised me who kept it from me that I was the Selected my whole life. Okay, so I was definitely a grudge holder.
Picking up my cell phone off the bathroom counter, I tapped in her number.
“Mom, it’s Sydney. Brianna’s here, and we’ve got things going down tonight, as in things she shouldn’t be around.”
“What? Sydney? What are you talking about?” Her words were too long, like she was focusing on saying every one of them. My anger raised about three notches on the angry-at-my-mother meter.
“Mom, don’t you think it’s too early in the morning for you to be drinking? Where’s Dad?”
“What? Oh. Your dad’s outside, honey. I think he’s doing some yard work or something. You know how he can’t stand those weeds we just can’t seem to get rid of, so he’s doing that pre-summer treatment. What did you say about Brianna and this weekend?”
“Mom, I need you to listen to me very closely. There’s a vampire ball tonight. We have it on good assumption that it might be attacked by rogue vampires and werewolves. So you need to call Brianna in a little bit, tell her you want her to come home.”
“How am I supposed to make her do that?” my mom’s voice slurred into the phone. Either she was already throwing them back, or she was really hung over from the night before.
“I don’t know, Mom, figure something out. Be the Mom.”
“Sydney, are you in some kind of trouble? I knew this would happen. Can’t your aunt keep you girls out of trouble?”
“Don’t you dare talk bad about Aunt Judith, Mother. I can’t believe you’d even bring her into this. She wasn’t the first-born daughter of the Selected who decided to have children, female children. You made that decision all by yourself.” I didn’t disguise or even try to hide the venom I felt toward her. I had to wipe the spit bubble that unceremoniously landed on my bottom lip.
My mom wasn’t the most supportive mother in the world. Don’t get me wrong, I loved her and always would. She was my mother. But I didn’t think I’d ever be able to forgive her for keeping such a huge secret from me, about what I am.
The biggest beef I had with her about the whole situation was that somewhere down the line, a vampire or werewolf could have murdered me or kept me prisoner because they knew what I was, while I didn’t. Even worse, they could have gone after my baby sister. I wouldn’t have had any knowledge I had enemies that hated me without even knowing me, just because of what I was. My sister and I were completely vulnerable our entire lives. My mother did nothing to make the situation any safer for either of us. Moving down to Chicago wasn’t the answer. She moved us away from Grandma, who was the Selected, and Aunt Judith, one of the smartest, levelheaded people I knew.
She obviously thought living in Chicago would provide better cover being in a bigger city in which to hide my identity. Maybe because there were so many people in the city she thought I would blend in better and not be noticed by those that wished to do me harm. It must have been dumb luck Cian didn’t come looking for me. Now that he knew who I was and where I was living, he wanted me. He’d made it clear to the Elders that it should be him in charge of my daily activities, my ability to walk around of my own free will. He argued that Kieran was not a fit protector of the Selected, and he was much more capable of doing the job than his own brother. Cian’s sadistic and bloody tastes gave me the dry heaves every time I thought about it too much.
My mom didn’t respond to my rant, making me instantly feel horrible for yelling at her. I took a deep breath to calm myself down. “No, Mom, I’m not in any trouble. But the big heads-of-state are going to be at the ball tonight. They’ll all be right here in Kenosha. There’s rogues roaming around the city, and I won’t be available to watch over Brianna. So I need you to do something about that, make her go home to Chicago.”
“Well, isn’t your aunt or Michael around? I’m sure they’d spend some time with your sister.”
I felt my mom’s emotions coming out through the phone. She felt put out by my request, bothered that she was being called to step up to do her motherly duty and protect her child.
My mother continued to do nothing but disappoint me. “Mom, you’re not listening to a word I’m saying. I need you to do this for me. It’s for Brianna’s safety. Plus, Michael is part of the security detail with the other wolves. So Brianna won’t be protected by any of us. Besides, Aunt Judith needs to focus on keeping herself safe.”
“Sydney, I think you’re overreacting a little, don’t you?” The nasally tone in her voice irritated me.
I focused on unclenching my jaw and took another deep breath, trying not to focus on the painful pulsation beating inside my head. I was a victim of tension headaches, and I could feel a whopper coming on.
Lately, talking to my mother was like talking to a child, a very dense, selfish child. The last time I saw her, she had taken the time to sober up enough to drive to Kenosha to confront me about refusing to talk to her or take her calls. When I found out I was the Selected, I had nothing to say to her for weeks. She took it upon herself to give me the opportunity to scream, yell, and cry at the injustice she caused me by keeping me in the dark while I was growing up.
She let me scream. We both cried. Then I yelled some more.
We hadn’t spoken since, until now.
I didn’t want to yell at her again. She was my mom. Moms deserved to be treated with respect, for the most part. But growing up, I’ve met some pretty rotten adults. I’ve come to realize it didn’t matter if they were family or not. A person could only take so much before they called a stop to the abuse they unnecessarily suffered due to some self-inflicted obligatory feelings they put upon themselves because of a ‘family’ member. I’ve seen too many people hurt by family members. I’ve watched while the victims let the abusers squash their souls. I wouldn’t let my own mother walk all over me anymore. I wasn’t going to let her play the part as a victim, either. She was going to be held accountable for the actions she took and the choices she made.
“Mom, quit thinking all about yourself for one minute. Brianna could be in some serious danger tonight. I need you to get her out of this city. We have to make sure she’s okay. Plus, I need to worry about what’s going down at the ball and not have to call the house every five minutes because I can’t stop wondering if my baby sister’s safe. Does that make sense to you? Do you see where I’m coming from?”
“You don’t have to be so dramatic, Sydney. The house isn’t on fire or anything. Fine, I’ll call her.”
I hung up the phone without saying goodbye. I had enough to deal with. I didn’t want my mind lingering on my mother who was not being much of a mother at the moment. That stunk, too, because my life was pretty sucky. I could really use her guidance and unconditional support with everything that was going on. Aunt Judith was a great replacement, was there whenever I needed her to be, but she still wasn’t my mom.
Morning Sun was quite busy through the earlier part of the day.
I was in the storeroom getting the stock out of the boxes just before lunch when the temperature in the room heated up. The chimes above the front door jingled, signaling a new arrival.
Blake.
“I’ll be right out,” I yelled, loud enough for him to hear.
I leaned over another box against the wall to read the label. I couldn’t remember where I’d put the books on King Arthur and the tales of how he heroically lead the Celts’ last battle—the battle in which they felt signified the end of civilization. I knew they were in a box, but couldn’t for the life of me remember which box that was. The Celtic knot resting on my wrist, held in place by a single strip of laced leather, warmed as Blake approached.
The unique piece of jewelry was a gift from my grandmother, the previous Selected. I wondered if she had Aunt Judith place some type of enc
hantment upon the bracelet before she gave it to me when I was little. Nothing would have surprised me. Well, I shouldn’t say that too hastily.
“Hey.”
“Hi, Blake. I’ll be right out.” He stood in the doorway while I picked through the items needing to be shelved.
I jumped at his touch. Wrapping an arm around my waist, he pressed the front part of his jeans against my backside. I stood, straight as a telephone pole.
“Blake.” I held my breath in anticipation.
Blake didn’t say a word. He held me firm against the front of his body while sliding his free hand around to the front of mine. He skimmed his fingers just under the brim of my waistband. Excited tingles shot straight to my already heated core. I still hadn’t completely calmed down from before, at Aunt Judith’s house, when he whispered into my ear about how he was going to be buried to the hilt inside of me.
“I don’t want to wait any longer. I have to have you. Now.”
I struggled against his hold on my waist, turning to face him. He didn’t release me.
“Blake, please ...”
Blake roughly pressed his lips against mine, parting them with his wandering tongue. He glided his tongue along the outer edges of my lips, and then he delved his tongue inside and ran it along the roof of my mouth.
The passion and possession he expressed through his kiss made me come undone. My resolve to resist melted when he grabbed me and rubbed the hard erection pressing through his jeans against me.
He answered with a growl from deep in his chest.
Shaking my head, I took a deep breath to clear my head. There was nothing but a haze of want clouding my mind. All senseless thought evaporated from my conscience. I could only think of one thing.
Blake.
Need.
I wanted him to touch me. Be inside of me.
Blake lifted my T-shirt up to my neck and put his warm mouth over my right nipple. He swirled his tongue over the crest, creating a dampness that only made my nipple ache with desire. I moaned with yearning and anticipation.
He pulled the white lacey material covering my breast and put his mouth on my flesh. He continued with the swirling of his tongue. Then he took the tip of my breast into his mouth and pulled and suckled, scraping the soft, sensitive peak with his teeth. When he grazed my other nipple with his teeth, I closed my eyes as my body clenched and swelled.
I wanted more.
“Take me, Blake. Take me right here.”
Blake lifted his head and assessed my reaction with his amber-bronzed eyes. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
That was all he needed to hear.
Chapter 11
I leaned back against the store’s safe that sat at hip-level where we kept the cash of the store’s sales in between bank runs. He got my meaning. Blake grabbed my hips and lifted me to a sitting position onto the cold metal top. I loved the way the muscles in his arms bulged as his T-shirt tightened around them with the strain of lifting me.
“Sydney,” he growled in my ear. The rumble of his passion-filled, deep voice sent an electrified thrill from my ear straight down to my groin. “This isn’t exactly what I had in mind for our first time together, but I’ll take what I can get.”
He busied himself undoing the black leather belt that held my jeans in place, and then the top button of my fly came undone. I put my hands in his lustrous dark-brown hair, closing my eyes at the feel of the soft, silky waves as I ran through my fingers through them.
He took an agonizingly long time with his two fingers as he pulled down the zipper of my pants, and then he took his sweet time undoing his own pants and dropping them to the floor of the storeroom. I ached for him to touch me. It was excruciatingly exquisite. I wanted his hands on me, all of me.
“Are you going to be all day at this?” I asked, only partly teasing. The sexual tension between us was making my vision blur, my body hypersensitive to his touch. I’ve wanted him since that first day he walked into my store and I thought he was a crazy loon who believed in vampires, werewolves, and the Selected. Turns out, he wasn’t crazy because, unfortunately, vampires and werewolves did exist. Oh, and then there’s me, the Selected. That was the biggest kicker of them all.
I’d have to tell him that our having sex, in the back of my store, didn’t mean we were ‘mated’ for life, as he insisted. Nothing about us would change, but we’d have to talk about that. Later.
Blake laughed.
“I want to enjoy every second I have with you.”
“Blake, I don’t know how much longer I can take while you are enjoying my zipper.”
He finished teasing and toying with me. He tugged on my jeans while I lifted my bottom off the cold metal. The jeans were tossed to the floor without another thought.
Blake leaned over, grabbed the hem of my shirt, and pulled it over my head, leaving me in only my bra and panties. I grabbed the hem of his T-shirt and lifted it. He finished pulling it all the way off and threw it somewhere in the vicinity of my jeans. Warmth met my hands as I ran them slowly over his body.
Blake’s chest was perfect. The heat radiating from him intensified with more of his skin exposed. His torso was a sun-kissed, golden color.
He was perfect.
I pulled him to me and put his pert nipple in my mouth. I flicked it with my tongue. His groan of pleasure spurred my desire, giving me encouragement to continue administering the same type of torture he had me endure.
My body moistened in anticipation. Grabbing my thighs in his large hands, he pulled them apart. I wrapped my ankles around his mid-section. He rubbed his confined erection against me. The sensation grew more intense now that there was less fabric separating us.
Blake unhooked my ankles and knelt on the floor while putting his warm hands on my knees, slowly separating them farther apart. He wasn’t going to do what I thought he was going to do. He grabbed the scrap of material covering my center with the tip of his finger and pulled it to the side.
Oh my, he was really going to! Not one of the two lovers I’d had before ever bothered with pleasuring me. I didn’t really know what to think or say. Was there anything to say?
I grabbed his hair in my hands, gently trying to pull his head away from down there. “Blake, I, uh ...”
The tip of his warm tongue touched my swollen folds. To be honest, I’d never had anyone do that before. It was a little embarrassing to have someone so close to me down there, but I liked it. Wow, did I like that!
He started to move his warm, wet tongue up and down, making me feel like I might die from the pleasurable tension he was causing to build up inside of me, all of me. Then he started to swirl his tongue around my clit, mixing it with up and down motions. It only took a few seconds before the pressure and tension started to build, higher and higher. My body felt like a spring, coiled tight and compressed, ready to be let loose. Needing release.
“Blake, stop!”
He answered without completely removing his mouth from me with a growl. “No.”
Blake kept going around, up and down, with his tongue, until I tilted my head back while closing my eyes, trying to relax. He alternated his tongue, using just the tip, then flattening it out to run his tongue in long, slow strokes. What he did made me feel so good it was almost painful.
He brought a finger up to me and stroked the folds while he continued to lick. When he inserted one finger, I almost came right there on his hand. He was so good. I wanted, needed more.
He slowly pushed his finger in, and then pulled it back a few times. That’s when I shattered. Stars burst behind my eyelids. I grabbed his head by his ears, trying to push him away to stop him. He didn’t budge. I screamed from the orgasm until I panted from the consuming body shudders. My body continued to quake in aftershocks as he put his feet undern
eath his body.
Standing, Blake slowly removed his black boxer-briefs that hugged his thick thighs and accentuated the defined muscles lying beneath the fabric. His erection bobbed against the lower part of his abdomen, reaching his belly button. I was still trying to catch my breath. I didn’t think my body could take another onslaught of sensation.
The size of him had me in awe and a little nervous.
“Blake, I don’t know if I can, um, you know. Accommodate you?” I said, nodding to his very erect cock.
“Oh yes you will. Don’t worry. I have no doubt this part of me was made with that part of you in mind.” Blake smiled a sexy grin and winked at me.
I knew once we crossed the line of having intercourse that nothing was ever going to be the same. But nothing between us could change. We couldn’t have a relationship.
My heart wept with Fate’s treacherous decisions. I really had to have a word with her after everything was said and done, if she actually existed. I’d have to ask Blake about that someday, if we lived through the night at the Blood Rites Ball.
Once he was naked, Blake took the middle of my wet panties in both of his hands and ripped them down the center. I was fully exposed. I was a little self conscious that he could see everything I had to offer.
“Sydney, I’m going to explode if I don’t have you right now.”
In a quick movement, he grabbed me from underneath my hips and lifted me up against him. I felt so alive, yet safe at the same time in his arms. My entire body tingled with sexual desire.
The tension inside of me was building again.
He carried me, thankfully without any sign of struggle, over to the only bare wall in the storeroom. Leaning my back against it, he lifted me a little higher until the tip of his cock was touching my slick, swollen entrance.