Chapter 24

CHAPTER24

It’s still dark when I wake up and reach for Ashen, but his place is empty in the bed. I hear his heartbeat in the room, though. I smell his skin, his warm ink. But something else too. Another heartbeat, the scent of another man. And blood.

I push my hair from my face and sit up as I turn on the bedside lamp, my gaze colliding with the terrified eyes of a human.

Alberto.

“What the fuck?”

I clutch the sheets to my naked body as Ashen drops the man on the floor. Alberto’s form crumples as though already lifeless, but he whimpers when his head hits the rug. Ashen’s dagger is lodged into the back of his neck with expert precision. Alberto is conscious, but completely paralyzed.

“What the… what are you, a fucking cat bringing home birds now?”

Ashen lifts a shoulder. “I thought you’d be hungry.”

“So you went and got me takeout?.. And severed his spinal cord?..”

Ashen looks down at the crying man with about as much interest as if he were looking at a bug or a rock. “You said once that things got messy when you didn’t sing. I just thought I would make it a little… cleaner for you.”

“How the hell did you even find him?”

“I took Urtur. He was happy to oblige. The jackal has a fondness for you, it seems.”

My heart swells in my chest as I watch Ashen stare down at Alberto. No one has brought me a meal like this before. Not when I was with other vampires, not even in the days when I was first with my sisters on Anthemoessa, unsure of what I was or how to feed. Even Ediye, she brought me bowls and jugs of blood to nurse me back to health. She didn’t haul in actual douchebags. In so many centuries, no one has ever brought me prey the way that Ashen just did.

The Reaper senses my stasis and turns his gaze to me. “What?”

“That’s very thoughtful,” I say, and Ashen gives me an endearingly warm smile. I glance back down at the man on the floor and clutch the sheet a little higher to my chest. Alberto is looking up at me with his tear-streaked face, sniveling his pleas for help and mercy.

Ashen’s smile disappears as he realizes what the problem is. He mutters something about poking out eyes as he picks Alberto up enough to face him in the other direction. “He has a weird dick,” Ashen grumbles, and I let out a shocked laugh.

“You looked at his dick?”

“I had no choice. He pissed and shit himself and I was not about to bring him back to you like that. So I rinsed him off and got him changed.” Ashen glares down at Alberto with a repulsed sneer and turns his gaze back to me. “Small. Hooks to the left.”

I smack the bed with my open palm. “I knew it.”

We grin at one another. Now that Alberto isn’t looking up at me with fat tears in his eyes, I let the blanket fall away from my chest. Ashen’s gaze drifts down to my breasts and his pupils spark into flame.

“Vampire,” Ashen purrs, his voice low and dangerous as he prowls toward me.

A slow smile spreads across my face as I take in the wicked gleam in his eyes. “Reaper.”

Ashen uncovers one of my ankles and runs his fingers up my calf, gripping it to pull me closer. “Go and eat your little bird so I can lick you clean.”

“You are terrible. And insatiable.” I squeal in a fit of giggles as Ashen leans down and nips a ticklish spot near my knee. He runs his nose along the inside of my thigh, climbing higher until he presses a kiss to the soft skin at the top of my leg. Alberto cries out louder from the floor in a desperate plea for help that will never come.

“Go,” Ashen whispers, wrapping his arm around my leg and tugging me down the bed. “I don’t want to listen to his whimpering. Only yours.” He pulls me to my feet and holds my robe open, waiting for me to slip my arms into the sleeves before tying the belt. When he’s done, he places a lingering kiss on my cheek and then turns away, climbing onto the bed and settling a book across his lap.

I watch him for a long moment. He quickly becomes absorbed in the text, and presses his fingers to his bottom lip as he loses himself in thought. I think he doesn’t notice me watching until I see a little smile lift the corners of his mouth. “Go, vampire. Before I think of a way to punish you for taking so long to come back to bed.”

He glances over the edge of his book, and when our eyes meet, his features soften with warmth in the dim light. There’s not just love and affection there, but a bit of pride. Like he did something worthwhile by heading into the night and bringing this gift back for me. I give him a fleeting smile and turn away before he can read too much from my skin.

I kneel down next to Alberto. My fangs descend at the sound of his quiet sobs. Sweet venom coats my tongue.

“Hush now, little bird,” I whisper into his ear. He whines and begs until I place a gentle palm across his mouth, but there’s no real fight left in him. He’s like a deer that’s been outrun. He knows he’ll die, even if he’s not quite ready. “If you find your way to the afterlife, just remember. The only thing that made you special was that he brought you here for me.”

Alberto’s final pleas for mercy vibrate against my palm as my fangs slide into his skin. I pierce his jugular and sigh as his blood rushes down my throat. I suck in long draws of his juicy sweet life. It doesn’t feel like Ashen’s blood, not even close. Nothing does. But my hunger fades and the burn in my throat recedes.

Alberto gradually goes quiet and soon slips from consciousness as his heart slows. The last beats pump his life into my mouth and I still hang on, sucking all the drops I can from his paling, cooling flesh. When I’m done, I pull the blade from his spine and wipe it on his shirt. I turn toward the bed and find Ashen watching me.

“Better?” Ashen says. I nod. His eyes track my every move as he closes his book and lays it on the side table.

I hold both Ashen’s blade and his gaze as I pull the tie from my robe and let it drift from my shoulders to fall to the floor. Ashen’s pupils turn bright with sparks as I climb onto the bed and stalk toward him. I crawl up his body until I’m straddling his stomach and his warm palms heat my thighs.

“You look a little nervous, Reaper,” I say through a wicked smile as I draw his blade up to his chest and edge the tip of it beneath one of the black buttons of his shirt. His gaze darts down and back up to my eyes again. When I raise the tip of the knife, the button snaps free of the fabric, pinging into the shadows.

“So I should be,” he replies.

I nick the next button and it hits the headboard before skittering across the floor. “I’m sure you’ll be more watchful this time,” I say as I strip another button from its threads. “I think I got you good in Cairo, but I’m pretty sure you let me and Ediye kill you before that.”

“I thought if I did that you would get some of your anger out of your system. I was hoping it would get old.”

“It never gets old.”

Another button flies into the shadows, then another, and another, until they’re all gone. I use the tip of Ashen’s blade to push the edges of his shirt open, raking it over his skin just enough to make him shiver but not enough to make him bleed. I draw the tip back across his chest and let the dagger hover over the tattooed lines of the jackal’s face. I can imagine pushing the blade between his bones and striking his heart. Life could change forever, if I went about it the right way. I could leave my mark and wear a scar of my own. He would be mine, for real. For immortal time. And I would be his.

I flip the knife and offer it to him by the handle.

Not tonight. Maybe not ever.

Ashen takes the blade but watches me closely. I see the most subtle brightening of flame in his eyes. Relief settles into my breath as he sets the dagger on the side table and runs his hands up my sides. But the engine has definitely sparked to life. He knows I was thinking of mating, if only for a moment. And he might leave it alone for now, but I doubt he’ll leave it for good.

So I guess I’ll just need to distract him.

I move down to Ashen’s legs and undo his belt, then the hook and zipper. He lifts his hips and I pull the last of his clothes off to drop them on the floor. Ashen’s breath hitches as I climb back up his legs and take the base of his erection in a firm grip. The silken tip glistens with precum and I glide my tongue across it, watching as he closes his eyes and tilts his head back.

I suck hard on the tip and slide him into my mouth, just enough to make him shudder. I roll my tongue over the crown as I start slowly working the base of his cock with my hand. I take him deeper with each stroke until he hits the back of my throat. He moans and threads his fingers through my hair, guiding my tempo. I swirl my tongue across the underside of his tip and then suck him in hard, over and over. Ashen’s grip tightens on my hair and my eyes water, but I love it, the feeling of my lips bruised and swollen around his length, the way I’m driving him into madness. I tease him, pushing him close to the edge and then slowing my rhythm when I feel him nearly ready to explode. When I rake my fingernails over his balls he growls and drives deeper into my throat.

“Vampire,” he hisses. “The things I am going to do to you.”

I let him free of my mouth and drag his hard length down my chin, down my throat, down the center of my chest and across my breast. I skim the tip of his erection around my hardened nipple. “You’re not allowed to make promises, Reaper.”

“I will keep them,” he says, breathing hard as he holds his wrist out to me. He wiggles his fingers. “Drink and I will tell you what they are.”

I watch his wrist and try to quell the rising sense of need as I run my tongue in a languid stroke across the tip of his sex. “If I don’t, are you going to do them anyway?”

“Definitely,” he says, moaning as I suck his length back into my mouth. “But I like it when you drink.”

“Hmmm,” I say, letting the sound vibrate through his cock until I pull away. “You didn’t specify what I should be drinking, exactly.” I give Ashen a wicked smile before taking him as deep as he’ll go, working my mouth over his length and scraping my nails across his balls as he says my name like a desperate prayer, over and over. His cock thickens and pulses and his cum shoots down my throat. Even this sets something off inside me. Not the same as his blood, but I feel him. With everything I take, he becomes more a part of me, and I wonder if he feels the same about everything I give.

When I’ve swallowed the last pulses from his sex, I let Ashen go and he pulls me up onto his chest, wrapping his strength around my back. I think for a moment that’s it, we’ll rest and maybe I’ll go back to sleep in this warmth with a full belly and a body on the floor. Which, as if. We’re immortals. We have next-level stamina. Ashen rolls us over and pins my wrists above my head and I know he has every intention of keeping his word.

“You said something about things you were going to do?.. To me?..” I ask. One side of Ashen’s mouth kicks up in a sinful smile and his eyes rake over my face. I bite down on my grin and give him my best innocent doe eyes. His pupils flare with fire in response. “You look like you might gobble me right up, you heathenous creature.”

Ashen’s smile flashes and he kisses down my breastbone, sweeping his tongue across my flesh until he pulls my nipple into his mouth. My back arches and his grip on my wrists tightens.

“That is exactly what I am going to do,” he says when he lets go. “Then I am going to bury myself so deep inside you that you won’t know where I end and you begin. And when I have made you climax so many times that my cum is running in rivulets down your legs, I am going to flip you over and fit my cock inside that tight little ass and fuck you until I’ve filled you up.”

I gasp in mock horror and try not to giggle as I squirm. “Filthy demon. Unhand me. The power of Christ compels you.”

“No one is listening but me, vampire.” Ashen lets go of my wrists but clamps his hand around my throat, keeping me in place as he kisses his way down my stomach. “There won’t be a moment between now and sunrise when one part of me isn’t inside a part of you.”

“Salacious. Release me from your clutches, for I am a pious and holy damsel.”

Ashen stills, giving a pointed look toward the body on the floor and then back to me before nipping the soft flesh next to my belly button. I squeal and laugh, and a rumbling growl of desire tumbles from his chest. “And you will drink my blood as you ride my cock, moaning my name.”

“So demanding.”

“The demands haven’t even begun, my vampire,” he says as he nudges my thighs open and uses his free hand to pin one of my knees to the mattress. He drags his tongue across my pussy and circles my clit. “Besides, you love my demands. I can taste it on you.”

My marrow turns to lava. My back arches as he devours my flesh. I twist and writhe but Ashen keeps me pinned with a strong grip on my throat. He scrapes his teeth over my clit and pushes his tongue into my opening and swirls and sucks and feasts on me.

“Are you going to behave yourself this time?” he asks when he pulls away. His gaze rakes up my body and he watches my eyes with the acuity of a predator as he pushes a finger into me and then another.

I don’t say anything as he slides his fingers in and out with beckoning strokes. Ashen’s expression darkens. A wicked smile flashes across his lips. He keeps his eyes on mine as he takes my clit between his teeth and bites. I squeak and then gasp as he sucks away the edge of pain, leaving only pleasure behind.

“I asked you a question,” he demands, increasing the rhythm and stroking deeper with his two fingers.

“I don’t know how to be good,” I say, my voice breathless. I don’t take my eyes from Ashen’s as he looks up at me from between my legs. The desire and approval I see in his expression is magnetic.

“That’s my vampire. Now I want you to grind that sweet pussy on my face and ride my hand until you come undone.”

My heart feels like it’s imploding and exploding at the same time.

Ashen descends on me like a starving man. He pumps his fingers into my pussy. He laps the flat of his tongue through my folds and drinks my arousal. He circles my clit and every once in a while he bites, but always kisses the pain away. And then he sucks on that sensitive, swollen bundle of nerves, not letting go as I come. My hips buck from the mattress and he keeps my throat pinned down. He wrings every second out of my orgasm until I’m panting and boneless.

But true to his word, no sooner has he removed his fingers than his cock is sliding in. He brings his glistening fingers up to my mouth.

“Lick it off,” he demands as he pistons in and out with long, steady strokes.

“I’ll do you one better,” I reply with a devious grin before I suck his fingers into my mouth and bite him with my fangs. Ashen hisses in both pain and pleasure and I hold on, clamping down and drawing in his blood.

Ashen rails into me with punishing thrusts. His palm is still hot around my throat and his grip tightens. I feel the tension straining into my skin, constricting my air. I smile around his fingers and press my teeth in a little harder. I drink in my sweet arousal and honeyed venom and his smoky skin and coppery, tingling blood and I feel all my pain and loss fall away.

The whole realm seems to shift in his grip and in mine. There’s only this man and this feeling and this taste. There’s only the way he looks at me. There’s only his hand around my throat and my body stretching around his. My trust in my heart. My trust in his. How I ended up here I just don’t know. But in the absence of noise and thought, of sorrow and pain, there is only what I want. What I really, truly want. And right now I want only this, to feel Ashen in every part of me. In my body. In my veins. In my soul.

Ashen pulls his fingers from my mouth. My fangs rake through his skin, tearing it open in twin, clean lines, razor points gliding across his joints and one slicing through his nail. He growls but I know he likes it, he likes a bit of pain and punishment, he likes seeing his blood fill my mouth. I can tell by the way his body nearly vibrates with need. The way the ridges of his abs ripple. He slides to the very tip of his erection and slams into me.

“Hold out your tongue for me,” Ashen says, his voice like gravel, his hand as hot as a brand across my neck.

My skin is slick with sweat. I’m so close to coming undone that I can barely think or even process the strained demand that’s just passed through his lips. I let out a shuddering moan as I swallow the blood in my mouth.

“Pay attention, vampire.” The sound of his command is as thick and sweet as melted caramel. He thrusts into me with every word when he repeats his command. “Hold. Out. Your. Tongue.”

I’m too close to the edge of a chasm of pleasure to jab back against his demands, because he’s right, I love them. I fucking love them. So I do it. I hold out my tongue.

“That’s my vampire,” he says indulgently, and holds his torn fingers above my mouth. His hot blood drips down his skin in streams and tributaries and coats my tastebuds, slipping down my throat in a thread of fizzing heat. His strokes are long and steady and deep as he watches, riveted. I let out a whimpering cry as my muscles clench around his girth. “Now say my name and come.”

And holy shit, his words, his blood, his name passing my lips until I can’t even speak, his thick cock pushing as deep as he can go, just like he promised, and I lose myself, utterly and completely. I come in a blinding rush as bright and searing as an exploding star. It singes my veins and melts my bones and wipes my mind clean of everything except the feeling of my body gripping Ashen’s as he spills into me. I hear nothing but the sound of his desperate roar as he follows me into the abyss.

We collapse into one another, Ashen’s chest against mine, both of us breathing heavily, and my heart might tear itself out of my chest just to get closer to him. It’s pounding at my bones and in my ears and through my brain, taking over my thoughts in a gripping rhythm that tries to reconcile itself with the tempo of Ashen’s pulse. I can’t think of anything else, just the tingling, bubbling sensation beneath my skin and that thrumming whoosh of blood.

“I have felt your presence in me from the moment your blood first mixed with mine,” Ashen confesses, slowly, carefully, his breath still ragged across my skin. It’s like a voice in a dream, words that don’t make sense, my brain struggling to find a way out of this fog. His hand releases from my throat so he can brace himself on his arm and look down at me, watching as the words seep in and infiltrate my thoughts. He’s still inside me, still hard. My heart still rages, my flesh still tingles. Ashen looks into my eyes as though searching for me. I blink and notice only now that my pupils have been glowing in their bright vampire gleam, the red light reflecting in the sheen of sweat on Ashen’s face.

“I still feel you, when you feed from me. Like you awaken in my veins.” His other hand trails down my shoulder, flowing across my bicep, leaving a sticky trail of blood from his wounded fingers. He’s still focused on my eyes and every movement, every word, seems carefully constructed. “I know you must feel me in yours.”

Yes. I pull my bottom lip into my mouth and run my tongue across the blood smeared on my skin. I close my eyes. Even those few drops are like swallowing sparks. I nod and open my eyes.

Ashen’s hand passes my wrist then curls around my fist. “It has already started, vampire,” he says, his eyes still on mine, the look in them almost remorseful, pleading. He uncurls my hand from my grip around the handle of his dagger. I draw in a sharp breath and look over at my fingers that open like a flower to relinquish the blade.

The blade I took from the side table without even thinking.

The blade I would have used not to kill, but to mate.

I look back to Ashen in confusion and shock, and he keeps his eyes on mine as he tosses the dagger across the room. “It has already started. But we won’t finish it tonight. We will only finish it when you know what you’re choosing.”

I open my mouth to say something… about how this could still be a choice if it’s already started, or how I can decide anything if my body and my heart just do it before my brain can catch up, or just… anything. But nothing comes out.

“You will still have your choice,” Ashen says, and it comes out like a vow. It comes out sounding true, and Ashen traces his fingers across my cheekbone as though imprinting a promise into my skin. And with the knife lying somewhere in the shadows, I feel a little current of relief in this river of confusion. I watch him for a long moment, still coming back to myself from this fog of desire.

“What if I don’t choose you?” I ask. I try to find strength in it, but my voice comes out husky and rough, little more than a whisper. Ashen’s bloody hand paints a streak across my ribs as he raises it up to brace his weight on both forearms. His fingers trace a crimson line across my lips and he watches with flaming eyes as my tongue runs through that spicy sweetness.

“Maybe you won’t. Maybe you will kill me instead. But I will come back. I will keep coming back for you,” Ashen says, and slides within me, slowly gliding out to the tip of his erection and then back in as far as my body will take him. The fire in his eyes grows brighter when I moan and rake my fingernails up his back. His strokes start at a languid pace and I can already feel my desire twisting low in my core. “But you should know a secret, my vampire.”

I trap a fleeting breath in my chest. I try to keep my words steady, even though the rest of me is melting away. “What’s that?”

Ashen’s motion grows more powerful. The thrusts grow stronger and I know the pleasure will only build, and build, and build until it consumes me.

“I never said I’d make it easy to choose anything but me.”