Biting her lip, she walked to the bathroom on legs that felt as weak as a newborn colt’s. The air felt chill on her naked skin, and she shivered as she reached for the knob. Pushing the door open, Val hesitated, listening to the water pounding the porcelain tiles. His body looked like a misty tan silhouette moving behind the shower stall’s thin plastic curtain. Licking her dry lips, she walked across the tiny room and pushed the thin barrier aside.
As the rings rang on the metal rod, Cade’s head snapped up and around like a wolf’s, dark eyes meeting hers. They seemed to burn with such hunger she felt her heart leap into her throat. “Hi,” she croaked, and tried a weak smile.
“Hi.” But he didn’t smile back. Instead, his eyes dropped to her nudity with blatant possessiveness. Val sucked in a breath. She’d never had a man look at her that way. Not even him.
There was the Hunger, of course. She’d expected that, knowing what healing that shoulder wound would do to him. But the expression in his eyes was even darker and more ancient than vampire lust, more thoroughly male, more fiercely triumphant. As if he’d… won her. As if she was his.
Because I am.
Val could only stand there, immobilized by the sheer predatory intensity of his stare. He’d been in the middle of shampooing his hair, and now the lather rolled down the dark seal-slick strands, gliding along the strong cords of his throat to the broad, muscled planes of his chest. Half-hypnotized, she tracked the flow of foam down the bas-relief shapes of his abdomen to the thick, hungry jut of his cock.
“You’re getting water all over the bathroom floor,” Cade rumbled at last. His nostrils flared. His hungry gaze flicked from her nipples to the delta of soft hair between her thighs, then up to her eyes. “Why don’t you get in?”
Val nodded jerkily and started to step into the tub. But before she could even complete the motion, strong hands closed around her upper arms, lifted her as if she weighed nothing at all, and plastered her against the wet, hard length of his body. His mouth crashed down on hers, sealing in her gasp of need. The shower pounded over their heads in a hot spray.
Her senses were suddenly full of him: his size, his heat, his strength. His tongue glided smoothly between her lips, tasting and stroking the length of hers, seducing her into yielding even more. Long fingers fisted into her hair, holding her still as he fed on her mouth. His free hand glided along the curve of her spine, discovered her bottom. Curled possessively into the taut flesh, lifting her to fit her body against his. As her feet left the tub floor, she made a startled little sound and caught at his shoulders. Wrapping both legs around his narrow male hips, she drew in a breath at the feeling of his massive cock pressing against her soft belly. Cade purred in pure, dark satisfaction. He pivoted, pressing her back against the cool, wet tile wall, then braced her there with his body, setting his hands free to possess and explore.
“I love your nipples,” he said against her mouth as he plucked and stroked one of them. “Such sweet, pink little tips.” His other hand slid down their bodies to glide between soft vaginal lips. In seconds, he caressed her into losing her nervousness in desire. She could feel his thick shaft pressing against her all the way to the navel. Soon he’d thrust it into her… Val caught her breath and closed her eyes, imagining the searing delight of that moment. Wet heat began to melt and trickle deep in her sex.
“Yeah, that’s it,” Cade breathed, and bit gently at her lower lip. “Cream for me, sweetheart. Drench my fingers. Get ready for me, because I’m going to fuck you deep and hard.”
Those crude, blunt words would have been a turnoff coming from any other man, but from Cade it was the pure, unvarnished truth. She shuddered. “God, you make me so…”
“Yeah,” he rasped over the hiss of the shower, driving his fingers into the slick opening of her sex. “You’re mine, darlin’. I’m going to take you. I’m going to take your blood, and I’m going to take your cunt, and I’m going to make you drink from me. And then I’ll be in your mind, and you’ll be in mine, and you’ll belong to me. Jesus, I’ve loved you so long…”
Love? Her heart leaped. His tone was so hot and sure, she had no doubt he meant it, but how much of that emotion was born of guilt and his driving sense of duty?
Bracing her in place, he started kissing and nibbling down the length of her throat, pausing a moment against the driving throb of her pulse until she quivered, waiting for his teeth.
Instead, he went on kissing his way lower, lifting her until he could reach her pebbled nipples. His mouth closed over one tight point, sending sweet, stinging pulses of pleasure through her breasts. Raking his teeth gently over it, he suckled.
She gasped, fisting her hands in his wet hair, throwing her head back as she gloried in the honeyed delight.
Hungry to touch him, feel all that strong, rolling muscle, she slid her hands down to caress the hard muscles of his chest, glorying in his heat and strength. Leaning down, she pressed kisses to the sweep of his shoulders, fingers finding his small, hard nipples. She started teasing them with flicks of her nails, then with delicate pinches.
Cade growled in lust and lowered her until her feet hit the tub floor. As she braced herself against the shower wall, he dropped to his knees, parted her pussy lips, and leaned in to give her sex a long, hot lick.
“Cade!” She grabbed for his shoulders as his tongue flicked and circled her clit, each pass shooting darts of pleasure through her. The sensation was so overwhelming, she found herself raking his back with her nails and rolling her hips against his skillful mouth. Her first orgasm rolled over her in a burning wave, making her writhe, cries ringing on the tile.
She was barely over the crest when he surged to his feet. Val caught a glimpse of dark eyes and the tips of his fangs. Then he snatched her off her feet again.
“Yes, oh God…” She wrapped her legs around his waist, bowing up against the shower wall so he could enter her. The head of that thick cock brushed between her lips, found her opening, and slid in. Val gasped at the raking, delicious friction as he hilted himself with a ruthless twist of his hips. Throwing back her head, she yowled. The shower pounded against her face as she wrapped both arms around his wide back and hung on for dear life.
Cade began to thrust, bracing one hand against the tile as he rolled his hips, driving deep inside her. He felt thicker than anything she’d ever known, even bigger than he’d seemed before. She wanted to howl in pleasure.
“Mine,” Cade growled in her ear. “Say you’re mine.”
Her inner feminist rebelled, but something much deeper, much older had a different opinion. “Yours,” she breathed. “I’m yours.”
“And I’m yours.” He deepened his strokes until he was pounding into her in a rolling, masculine storm of lust. Pleasure jolting along her nerves, she could only tighten the grip of her thighs and cling to his wet, hard body.
“Ridgemont’s never gonna touch you,” Cade whispered savagely, his grip tightening on her hips as he ground deep. “I’m going to kill the son of a bitch. I swear to you, I’ll protect you.”
“I know!” she hissed between her teeth as her awareness began to splinter again under the onslaught of another white-hot orgasm.
“God, Val, I love you!” Cade lowered his head to her pulse. She felt a prick of pain as the tips of his fangs pressed flesh. She waited for the bite, but it didn’t come.
“Cade, do it! Bite! I need…”
“Do you love me?” he demanded against her skin.
“Yes! Please!”
“Yes!” His teeth sank into her skin as he slammed his cock to the balls, stuffing her almost brutally. She convulsed in stunned ecstasy, kicked over the edge of pleasure by the ruthless double penetration of fangs and shaft. The orgasm burned like a wave of fire crashing over her head, and she twisted against him, screaming as she came. His cock pulsed inside her, and he groaned against her throat. Coming.
When it was finally over, she hung limp in his arms, sated and boneless, aware of his mouth working as he fed i
n deep swallows. The room was spinning, and she wasn’t sure if it was from blood loss or raw pleasure. She tilted her face into the shower spray, hoping the warm, stinging water would clear her head.
Finally, still buried in her, he straightened. As she watched with a vague, floating kind of interest, he lifted one hand and dug his thumbnail into the skin over his neck, raking a thin cut that instantly began to bleed. He caught the back of her head and pulled her face to the tiny wound. “Drink,” he said hoarsely. “Taste me.”
Dreamily, she obeyed, licking at the blood.
“More,” Cade ordered. “Suck it.”
With a muffled, giddy giggle, she obeyed. His blood had a strange taste, fiery and intoxicating, more like cognac than the prosaic salty copper she knew from childhood paper cuts.
He had gone soft inside her, but as she drank, she felt him harden again. Slowly, carefully, Cade began to thrust. Clinging helplessly, she swallowed his blood as pleasure bloomed lazily under his gentle strokes.
“Mine,” he whispered again.
* * *
At last the storm of need passed, leaving Val wrapped in his arms, feeling as empty and limp as a wrung-out rag. “Damn,” she croaked. “If we’re supposed to do that all week, I’m not sure I’ll survive.”
“Neither am I,” he groaned, easing his shaft out of her, and letting her feet touch the tub floor. There were several inches of water around her ankles. “But God, what a way to go.”
Her knees gave, but he steadied her with a hand on her elbow.
“I drank your blood,” Val said in a small voice, clutching his shoulders. “And I liked it.” Hell, she’d never had such an erotic experience in her life.
“I’m glad.” He lifted a hand and slowly stroked her wet hair. She shivered. Frowning, Cade reached out a hand to shut off the shower taps. “We’d better get you dried off.”
He lifted her out of the tub, then stepped out himself and snagged a towel with a long, brawny arm. She met his gaze miserably as he began to dry her skin with brisk strokes. “Cade, I’m scared.”
“I know, baby. So am I.”
She licked her dry lips. “Did you mean what you said, about loving me?”
“Yes.” His gaze met hers steadily. “I’ve always loved you.”
She smiled, slow and brilliant, believing him. The knowledge was just there, bone-deep and total, as if she’d absorbed it with the taste of his blood.
Uncertainty flickered in his eyes. “Did you mean it?”
Her smile widened. “Yes.”
With a groan of pleasure, he lifted her into a bridal carry and swept her off to bed.
* * *
Val woke to the gentle sensation of Cade’s hands drifting over her skin. She moaned and stretched, then clung to him as her head went into a long, lazy spin. “Oh!”
Cade stopped stroking to hug her. She relaxed against him, savoring the warmth of his enveloping strength. He felt so big, so solid, so male. It was hard to believe anything could ever threaten him.
“When we made love that last time, I touched your thoughts,” he said softly, his chest rumbling under her ear. “I felt your fear. It’s natural, but you’re stronger than you think.”
“Am I? The Hunger --”
“Isn’t normally anything like what you saw in my mind during the attack on your parents.”
“I realize that, but what if somebody starves me the way Ridgemont did you? What if --”
“One, I would never place you under a compulsion to kill anybody, and two, even if someone did starve you, you could handle it. You’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever met.” He smiled slightly, combing his fingers through her hair. “Even as a child, you were so damn brave.”
Val snorted. “I was scared out of my mind.”
“Darlin’, you had a starving vampire at your heels, programed to kill. Any reasonable human would have run like hell, but you went to rescue the baby first.”
“Well, yeah,” she said. “I couldn’t abandon Beth.”
“Actually, you could have.” He coiled a lock of her hair around a big finger. “Most people would have.”
“Nobody but a sociopath would leave a baby with Ridgemont and Hirsch.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. You could have reasoned you’d be leading me to her, that if you just ran, we might not find her.”
“Oh.” She frowned, thinking about it. “That didn’t even occur to me.”
He snorted. “You knew we’d find her anyway. I doubt Beth would have been in danger from Ridgemont -- he has no interest in any female under the age of puberty -- but you had no way of knowing that. So going after her was pretty damn heroic.”
Val gave him such a skeptical look he had to grin. “Are you trying to get me into bed again, McKinnon?”
“If you’ll notice, we’re already in bed. And no, I’m not just flattering you. I was two feet taller and more than a hundred pounds heavier, never mind being a vampire. But you just looked at me with such defiant courage in those big gray eyes, I knew you’d grow up to be a hell of a woman. And I was right.”
“Because of you. Your guidance made all the difference when I was a kid, particularly given that my grandmother was too drunk most of the time to notice what I was into.”
He winced. “I wish I could have done something about that.”
“You did. Look at that time I was thirteen. I was letting my grades go to hell -- didn’t care about them, didn’t care about anything. And you showed up in that dream and raked me over the coals.” She laughed. “I straightened right up. Didn’t give a damn about what Grandma thought, but I couldn’t stand to disappoint my hero.”
“Don’t be too hard on your grandmother. Ninety percent of her problems were caused by Ridgemont’s screwing with her head. She drank because she knew what he made her do was wrong, yet she couldn’t control it.”
“Yeah, I realized that after Ridgemont talked about influencing her.” Val propped her chin on his shoulder and let her fingers play in his chest hair. “Her life was so damn tragic. Her son dead, her mind invaded and subverted. And on some level, she knew it. It was basically suicide by bottle.”
They lay together for a long moment, lost in their respective thoughts. “The year you turned eighteen, Ridgemont had your grandmother send him your picture. You’d stopped dreaming of me by then, and I hadn’t seen you in a long time. I was shocked by how you looked in that skimpy little cheerleader costume. The perverted things Ridgemont said about what he’d like to do to you… I punched him in the mouth.” Cade smiled, the dark pleasure of that well-deserved blow lighting his eyes. “I must have caught him by surprise. He paralyzed me and gave me the kind of beating I hadn’t had in years, but it was worth it.”
Val winced, remembering too well the other times she’d seen Ridgemont abuse Cade in Abigail’s memories. “You know, he told me he planned all that. It was all deliberate, designed to drive you into breaking his control. He may have told you he was punishing you for something else, but that was an excuse. It was all about throwing us together. In his own horrifying way, the creep was matchmaking.” She shuddered.
“Ridgemont always was the master of the long-range plan.” Cade drifted his fingers in circles over her bare shoulders. “And he had me pegged, as much as I hate to admit it. I worked my ass off breaking his control and building my strength so I could save you. I’d have done it anyway, but not with the same kind of single-minded obsession.” He met her eyes again and tilted his head, submerging her in the warm darkness of his stare. “You were a hell of an inspiration, even when the only contact between us was those dreams. Intelligent. Beautiful. Stubborn.” His sensuous mouth curled into a smile. “You made me fall in love with you.”
“You, on the other hand, are heroic, handsome, sexy, and disgustingly noble.”
Cade quirked a brow. “‘Disgustingly’?”
“Seems to fit, given your obsessive drive toward self-sacrifice.”
“Do I detect a note of imp
lied criticism?”
“That’s not a note, that’s an entire opera.” Val looked him in the eye, determined to return his honesty with her own. “I love you, but you scare the hell out of me. I get the impression you’re not just willing to sacrifice yourself to kill Ridgemont -- you’d prefer it that way. It’s like that’s the only thing that will erase whatever he did to your honor.”
Cade stiffened, the easy smile fading from his mouth. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. I have no intention of killing myself.”
“See that you don’t. Because I’m not putting myself through all this so I can watch you die.”
Chapter Seventeen
Dressed again, they walked across the parking lot to the motel diner, where Cade made her order a big breakfast and bullied her into eating it despite her lack of appetite. She didn’t have to be encouraged to drink, however. Her throat was so parched, she kept the waitress busy filling her glass every couple of minutes.
As the woman topped it off one more time, she looked up at Val. “You okay, honey? You sure are pale.”
“Yeah, I’m --” She broke off, distracted by a slow, deep pounding. “Somebody’s subwoofer is rattling my teeth.”
“What?” The waitress gave her a strange look as Cade glanced up sharply.
Val blinked and braced against the table as the room seemed to dip and spin. “How you can drive a car with a stereo that loud and not go deaf? That booming --”
“May I have a refill?” Cade interrupted, holding up his coffee cup.
“Sure, hon. Let me get my pot.” Giving her a last worried glance, the waitress hurried off.
“What’s her problem?”
Cade leaned across the table and lowered his voice. “That isn’t a subwoofer, Val. Those are heartbeats.”
“What?”
“That drumming. You were hearing her heart beating.”
“Get out.”
He shook his head. “I hear it too.”
A chill rolled over her. “But why do I hear it?”
“I think you know the answer to that.” He met her eyes in a long, steady stare.
Forever Kisses Volume 1 Page 23