“The better to fuck you with,” he said, and drew her down to take her mouth. His lips felt like heated silk as they met hers, tongues circling, stroking. With a sigh, she leaned into him, burying the tips of her nipples in the tickling ruff of his chest hair. His erection nudged the arm she’d slid around his waist, as if begging for attention. She obliged, wrapping her fingers around its hot, thick width.
Cade purred in approval, one hand drifting down the line of her spine to dip between her thighs. When they parted the lush folds of her sex, she moaned.
“Hmmmm,” he purred. “‘The children of the night -- what music they make.’”
Val laughed softly, recognizing a Dracula quote. “And how long have you been waiting to use that joke?”
“Too damn long.” He caught her ass in both hands and rolled her atop him. “In fact, let’s see what kind of notes I can make you sing.”
“I definitely feel an aria coming on.” She tightened her grip on his cock, trapped now between their bodies. Stroked slowly.
He grinned and pulled her higher up his body until he was eye-level with her nipples. “Keep that up and we’ll be doing a duet.”
As his mouth closed over one tight peak, Val threw back her head and moaned. Pleasure rolled through her like heated honey as he suckled lazily, then raked the tip with his teeth. The sensation of his fangs dimpling her breast sent a wicked little jolt through her. “Cade!”
“Val,” he purred back, reaching down between their bodies for her pussy. His fingers slipped between her vaginal lips and found the eager jut of her clit. He stroked and circled it as he suckled her nipple in long pulls.
The velvet pleasure made her eyes roll back in her head as she fisted both hands in his hair. His cock jerked against her belly, making her imagine its demanding thrust.
“Cade,” she gasped, her voice ragged. “Cade, I need… Please…”
He released her nipple and looked up at her, a wicked grin curving his mouth. “Please, what?”
“Fuck me!” she panted. “Please!”
“Wellll,” Cade drawled, “since you’re so polite…” His hands closed around her hips, lifting her off him. She rose on her knees, positioning herself over his cock as he angled it upward for her. They both groaned as she impaled herself, the long velvet shaft stretching her with a sweet, hot sting. “Oh God, you feel so good,” he growled through his fangs.
“Yeah, you… you… Oh, Cade!” Digging her nails into his broad shoulders, she clung to him as his big body rolled upward, surged between her thighs to meet her downward thrusts.
Throwing her head back, she jogged on him, riding hard, circling her hips. He slid a hand into position to tease her clit so that every move they made sent another hot spark of pleasure up her spine. He reached his free hand up to her breast, cupping her, squeezing the stone-hard nipple, pinching and milking it. Pleasure piled on pleasure -- from her nipple, her clit, the erotic burn of his cock buried in her cunt, and she keened at the storm of sensation.
With a feral growl, he released his hold on her breast and clit to fist both hands in her hair, dragging her down to stretch out along his body. As he rolled hard under her, he dragged her head down until he could sink his fangs into the underside of her jaw. Sharing the erotic taste of her own blood in his mouth, she convulsed and came in a long, rolling orgasm.
Still drinking in deep swallows, Cade continued his ruthless, driving possession as she writhed helplessly against him.
* * *
They lay tangled together on the bed, Cade’s big body curled around hers, his head resting on her breast, both muscled arms wrapped around her body. It was, Val thought, a distinctly possessive pose. Not that she objected as she stroked one hand through the thick silk of his dark hair.
But despite the atmosphere of sated peace, when she touched his mind, she found Cade was brooding. Val debated whether to let him hash it out on his own, then decided a little discussion couldn’t hurt. “This thing with Ridgemont bothers you,” she said.
Cade rubbed his chin back and forth over her breast. “He beat me, Val. I would rather have defeated him on my own -- using my own body, I mean.”
“You have to admit though, that wouldn’t have pissed him off nearly as much,” she pointed out, grinning. “Ridgemont was outraged at being killed by a woman.”
He shrugged. “For a twelfth-century man, that was the ultimate humiliation.”
“More like the ultimate irony, considering all the women he’s tortured.”
“Yeah, I guess there was a certain justice in your killing him.”
Frowning, Val eyed him. “Cade, we killed him. Yeah, the hands were mine, but he’d have chopped me in two if you hadn’t entered me to amplify my strength. Something that never occurred to the sexist creep you’d do.”
His arms tightened around her as he met her eyes with a hard look. “Which brings up a very good point -- what the hell did you think you were doing?”
“You didn’t honestly expect me to sit there and watch you die?”
Cade smiled dryly at that. “Not after spending as much time in your head as I have, no.”
He was leaning down to kiss her when the smell of peppermint filled the air. They both jerked and looked around. Abigail floated beside the bed, watching them with solemn eyes. “Jeez, Ghost Brat, don’t you ever knock?” Val demanded.
“On what?”
“She’s got a point,” Cade said. Then he sobered, studying the little ghost’s transparent face. “I’m glad you’re here. This is as much your victory as ours. Without you staying with me all these years, I don’t know what I would have done. You could have found your reward, but you gave that up for me. I wouldn’t have survived without you.”
“But you did survive, Cade. You’re free.” The glow of the little ghost’s face began to intensify. “And so am I. I just had to see you one last time.”
Cade’s eyes widened. “Wait, you’re leaving? Permanently? But --”
“You have Valerie now. She’ll take care of you, just as I knew she would.” The ghost’s smile was luminous. “Your future is so beautiful.”
“So share it with us. Please…”
“I can’t, Cade. I can hear the Light calling,” Abigail said, a soft wonder filling her eyes. “It’s like music. I’ve waited so long…”
Val felt Cade’s broad shoulders slump. “Then go to it, darlin’. And remember I love you.”
“As I love you, Cade. I always will.” Her little face lifted, took on such an expression of transcendent joy that Val felt her heart catch. “Yes. Yes, I hear you. I’m coming!”
The ghost’s brightness flared, intensified until it flooded the room. Val’s eyes filled with tears, and she heard Cade’s breath roughen.
Slowly, slowly, the light faded away, along with the scent of peppermint. But as they looked at the spot where she’d been, they heard music, a long, rolling peal of it, high and so joyous, not even Cade’s grief could withstand it.
When the last note faded, his strong arms tightened around Val, and they lay together in a sweet cocoon of peace.
“She’s right, you know,” Val told him softly. “The future is going to be beautiful.”
He gave her a slow smile. “Of course. I’ll be spending it with you.”
Beth’s Kiss
Angela Knight
Beth Chase has survived the murder of her parents and her abduction by the inhuman killer who used her as a bargaining chip against her sister, Valerie. Since then, she’s put her life back together and made a successful career as an artist. But her world comes crashing down when she’s kidnapped by another deadly immortal. Joaquin Ramirez partially Turns her, meaning to use her in a plot to kill a pair of handsome vamps.
Morgan Axton and his cousin, Garret, are determined to avenge themselves on Beth’s captor, who murdered the woman they loved. The two rescue Beth and complete her transformation, saving her from the vampire virus raging through her system. In the process, the trio must form a
psychic union that teaches the two men Beth is more than a wounded victim. She, in turn, is fascinated by their loyalty to each other and their relentless quest for justice.
But even as their mental bond grows into love, they discover Ramirez has targeted Cade and Valerie. If Beth is to have a future with her two vampires, they must settle accounts with the ancient, powerful killer and his army of mercenaries. Will they live to enjoy the fragile happiness they’ve found?
Prologue
Beth Chase leaned close to the canvas to add a dot of gold highlight to one painted brown eye. Stepping back, she tilted her head and studied the portrait she’d been working on for the past two weeks.
Her sister sat in a spill of white lace and seed pearls, her tall, handsome groom standing behind her in a dark and elegant suit. Valerie’s big gray eyes glowed with happiness, and Cade looked downright besotted as he gazed down at her.
Beth decided she’d caught both likenesses pretty well. Except… the painting still needed something.
An idea struck, inspiring a wicked grin. She dropped her brush in the jar of turpentine and chose a sable one that was even finer. Humming under her breath, Beth leaned forward and added a tiny, delicate shape between the groom’s smiling lips -- the barest hint of a fang. Not enough for a casual observer to notice, but her brother-in-law would spot it immediately.
And Cade McKinnon, Texas Ranger-turned-vampire, would probably laugh his ass off.
What better gift for the couple’s fifth wedding anniversary?
Her portable phone rang from amid the litter of paint tubes and brushes on her art table, jolting Beth from her artistic haze. She gave it a wary glance and picked up, hoping it wasn’t Joaquin Ramirez again. She really wasn’t up to another fight. “Hello?”
“What’s wrong?” Val’s creamy Atlanta drawl rang with instant alarm.
Beth winced. She’d set off her sister’s Mommy alarm. “Nothing.”
“Don’t give me that -- I know that tone. Something’s bothering you.”
Oh, hell, might as well come clean. Besides, she might need the help. “I’ve got an ex- boyfriend who’s pushing a little hard.”
“Are you saying you’re being stalked?” Val’s voice took on that God help anybody who threatens my baby sister tone. “What’s going on? What’s he been doing?”
Now she was beginning to feel like an idiot. “Look, it’s not that big a deal, really. I broke it off with this guy, and he’s not happy about it. I can handle it.”
The line clicked as Cade picked up the other phone. “You want me to come to Atlanta and have a word with him?”
It was a tempting thought. Five minutes with Cade and his psychic powers, and Joaquin would forget he even knew Beth.
On the other hand, she hated the idea of turning to her vampire relatives to solve her problems. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I’m a big girl now. I can take care of myself.”
“We didn’t say you couldn’t, babe,” Val said. “But back when I was a reporter --”
“You wrote a story about a stalker who ended up killing his ex.” No matter what the topic of conversation, Val had usually written a story about it.
“Not a story -- more like ten or fifteen. This kind of thing is nothing to screw around with.”
“Look, Beth, just humor us,” Cade said. “Tell us about this guy.”
Well, Joaquin had gotten a little scary lately. “Not much to tell.” Brooding, she rubbed at a spot of wet Cadmium Red on her jeans. “I met him at my gallery showing last month. He seemed charming enough at first -- tall, good looking, had this kind of Antonio Banderas thing going…”
“Let me guess -- he’s married,” Val said.
“I wish. I could just call his wife and have her drop-kick his ass. Anyway, after we went out a few times, I started getting the feeling there was something nasty under all that charm.” Needing to move, she began to pace her studio restlessly. “So a couple of days ago, I told him to get lost.”
“Good,” Val said. “When you get a psychic impression that strong, you need to listen to it.”
Beth frowned. She’d never been comfortable with the idea she might share her sister’s mental abilities. “I don’t know about the psychic impression thing, but he definitely creeped me out.”
“Are you sure this guy isn’t a vampire?” Cade was beginning to sound seriously worried.
“Joaquin?” Oh, now there was a nasty thought. She shook her head. “Can’t be. We went out five or six times, and he never gave any indication he was anything more than just a guy. A really creepy guy, but still…”
“If he is a vampire, who knows what kind of game he’s playing?” Cade said. “You’re Kith, Beth. That makes you damn rare. There are vamps who’d go to any length to get their hands on a Kith female.” Few people could survive being infected by the virus that caused vampirism. Vamps called those who could the Kith, as in “kith and kin.”
Reluctantly, Beth considered the idea. “Come to think of it, I haven’t seen him during the day. That might be coincidence, though.”
“Or it might not.” There was a long, chilly pause. “I think I should come to Atlanta.”
She sighed. “Maybe that wouldn’t be a bad idea. I…” The doorbell rang, cutting her off. “Hold on a minute, there’s somebody at the door.”
“Beth…”
Carrying the phone, Beth walked out of her studio and down the hall to the apartment’s front door. Automatically, she checked the peephole. “Oh, hell.”
It was Ramirez, tall and elegant in a charcoal Seville Row suit, his gleaming dark hair flawlessly styled. She automatically checked the deadbolt. It was locked. Good. “Joaquin, go away or I’m calling the cops,” she called through the closed door. “I’ve told you I’m not interested.”
“The problem is, my dove,” he purred back in that thick Castilian accent, “I am.”
“Too bad.” Lifting the phone again, she turned to move away. “I’ve got to call the cops. Joaquin is at the --”
The door exploded inward with a crash. She whirled as Ramirez shouldered through its broken remains.
“What are you doing?” Beth glared at him, too furious and astonished to be afraid. “Get the hell out!”
“I don’t think so, my dove.” He looked more cruel than handsome now, his hawkish face stark with hunger and feral anticipation. Then he smiled, and her blood chilled.
He had fangs.
She whirled, but Ramirez grabbed her before she could take another step. His grip sent pain lancing through her arms. She dropped the phone and went for his eyes with her nails.
He hit her, a stunning backhand slap that snapped her head back on her shoulders. As her consciousness fell away, she heard Cade roaring her name over Val’s frantic voice. “Beth? Beth, what’s happening? Be --”
Chapter One
The rope’s coarse fibers had chewed her wrists raw, but Beth kept working at the knot. It was beginning to give. If she could just untie herself…
The basement door creaked, sending light lancing into her eyes. She cursed silently. It figured the bastard would come back just as she was making progress.
“Missed me, my dove?”
“Not really, no.” She squinted warily at the figure on the stairs. The liquid Castilian accent resembled Ramirez’s, but the voice itself was deeper, rougher. Too, the hulking silhouette looked more like one of her captor’s thugs -- the pack of blond brothers Ramirez treated like dogs.
Not that it really mattered which one of them it was. They were all vampires.
Cowboy boots rang on the wooden steps as the vamp started down into her makeshift cell. Like his brothers, the Swede was a big man, beefy and broad-faced, with a round knob of a nose and greasy, dishwater-blond hair hanging to his shoulders. In contrast to his master’s habitual suits, he wore jeans and a Budweiser T-shirt. He carried a length of white silk draped over one arm -- a nightgown?
She squinted at the fabric uneasily as the light from the doorway ma
de her temples throb.
“Headache?” the blond asked with sugared sweetness. Appraising blue eyes flicked across her face. “You seem to be in pain.”
“What do you care?” she growled, in no mood for false civility. The punctures in her throat were aching, and her mouth was sawdust dry. Ramirez had made her drink his blood.
He’d infected her with the vampire virus.
“A headache is one of the first signs of the Change,” the blond said in that liquid purr that sounded so much like his master. “In a few days, you’ll be one of us -- a child of the night. A vampire.” Fangs flashed. “And my slave.”
Her stomach clenched at the thought. “I won’t be your anything -- your master is the one who’s Turning me.”
He grinned, exposing those gleaming fangs again. “My dove, I am Ramirez.”
He stepped into a shaft of light from the door, and she realized he was right. That was definitely the master vampire looking out from his eyes, ancient and evil and supremely powerful. He’d possessed the Swede -- moved his consciousness into the man’s body so he could use it like his own.
Suddenly Beth could feel him in her mind -- a vibration in the skull, deep and grating. Every hair on her body rose in quivering atavistic reaction.
Val had told her once that master vampires could use the bodies of those they’d Turned because they shared a mental link with their fledglings. Five years ago, she and Cade had used a similar technique to defeat Cade’s sadistic sire, Ridgemont.
Beth’s eyes narrowed with sudden speculation. That kind of link wasn’t an easy thing to establish. Cade and Val had only resorted to it because they couldn’t defeat Ridgemont any other way. Why would Ramirez make the effort? Unless… “Are you expecting company?”
That chilling smile flashed again as he reached down and snapped the rope binding her wrists to a ring in the wall. “As a matter of fact, I am.”
Forever Kisses Volume 1 Page 30