“I’ve been asking around,” Rumy said, “as casually as I can, about the weapon. If you do head up there, you need to see Sebastien. You know him, right?”
“I do. He’s a good man.”
“Word is, he was on the Council of Ancestrals fifty years ago when they shut the whole thing down. Unfortunately, that’s all I’ve got for you right now. But if I catch wind of anything, I’ll let you know. Is it true you’ve got a woman with you, a human, a tracker, and you’re blood-chain-bound?”
“No one’s business.”
“Understood. But there’s one more thing. You might have trouble with our fanatic element. A couple of my spies tell me those rumors are making the rounds as well—that there’s a hit out on you.”
No shit.
Adrien didn’t see any point in telling Rumy about the assassin who had already visited his apartment. Besides, the less real information out there, about him or about Lily, the better.
“Unless there’s anything else…” He let the words hang.
“Take care of that soft hide of yours, vampire.”
Adrien chuckled as he ended the call, returning his phone to his pants pocket.
“Soft hide?” Lily asked.
He glanced at her. “Wait, did you hear the entire phone call?”
“Sure. He was talking loud enough.”
“No. He wasn’t. Not for human ears.” Absently, he touched the chain at his neck. “How’s your vision?”
She glanced around. “Huh. There are no lights on but I can see everything, like there’s a soft glow in the room. Well, Kiernan warned me that I might siphon some of your powers. I guess your hearing and being able to see in the dark are coming along nicely for me.”
“You want the chains off? Hardesty isn’t the only one who can do it.”
“You mentioned that before, but the truth is as much as I’d love to be rid of this unwelcome connection to you, I want to fulfill my mission more. To get the extinction weapon, then to get the hell out of your world.”
He felt it again, something she held back, something big. “What’s going on, Lily? What aren’t you telling me?”
She shifted her gaze back to him, more glaring. “None of your goddamn business, vampire. Need-to-know, remember?”
He settled his forearms on the bar and slid forward in her direction, getting up in her face. “You ever going to trust me?”
Her eyes widened. “Hell, no. You’re a vampire. You going to trust me?”
He snorted and drew back. “Not in a million years.”
“I’ll be dead in about sixty, so it would never really be an issue for you, even if we were stuck for life.”
“No, I guess not.” He leaned back. He felt a tremor go through him, and his stomach cramped, so he turned away from the bar.
Shit, he’d be needing blood again soon. The starvation level demanded that he refill several times in the coming hours. Once his body had gotten a taste, and knew a supply was near, the cravings would demand replenishment often, especially given current stress levels.
He drew air in through his nose and shuddered. He could smell her blood now, maybe because of the chains they shared, maybe because he’d taken a hit so recently. And she could donate again. Her complexion had warmed up.
He sipped his wine and stared at her over the rim of the glass.
“What’s going on?”
“I’ll need blood again soon.”
“What? But you just had some.”
“It’s a result of starvation and nothing I can help.”
She put a hand to her throat, her gaze shifting around, almost frantic. “But I just gave you some blood. You’ll end up depleting my supply, probably killing me.”
“That won’t happen.” Should he tell her the truth, what he’d already done to her, that his kind had the ability to prompt speedy blood reproduction by releasing chemicals into his donor’s vein?
“You’re not the one giving it up. How do you know?”
He just looked at her.
She sought his gaze, scowling. “You’re able to build up my supply, aren’t you?”
He waited for a moment, then nodded.
She snorted. “I’m your blood cow, is that it?”
“If the vein fits, human.”
“Not gonna happen a second time tonight.”
“Fine. I’ll get a donor over here.”
“Looks like you’d better.”
He made his phone call.
While he waited for the donor to arrive, Lily sat on her stool staring straight ahead. Her jaw moved a few times, but she said nothing.
He felt the tension in her like a slow crawl over the surface of his skin, and beneath that tension her desire for him. He stayed put as well, waiting for the knock on his front door, the chain almost a thump against his neck.
When the donor arrived, Adrien headed toward the door to let her in, forgetting again the short leash he was on.
When he reached the middle of the living room, he halted mid-stride as the chain pulled on him. He didn’t look back at Lily; he was too aggravated by the whole situation.
He heard her slide off the stool, then the sound of her shoes on the hardwood floor. He crossed to the door and looked through the peephole. He extended his senses, seeking anything in the hall that might be out of the ordinary, but he saw only a woman he’d used a dozen times in the past.
Maybe he shouldn’t have called this particular female, but Lily had caused rage to flood his head.
He opened the door and the vampire-donor, a professional by the name of Night Candy with a high price tag, entered his house, levitated into the air, and threw herself around him so that his face was buried between her large and suddenly very bare breasts.
“Adrien, my love. How I’ve missed you. I couldn’t believe it when I got your call. How long have you been out of jail?”
Several things happened at once.
His blood-hunger rose to a maddening level.
His cock responded.
He started to throw Night Candy on her back, but movement in the air stopped him.
A shrieking sounded from two female voices at once since Lily had landed on Night Candy’s back.
And from all the unexpected movement, Adrien fell on his ass.
He stared up as mad midair whirling ensued, Lily hissing in a strangely vampire way, Night Candy grabbing at her arms while screaming and spinning.
Adrien feared that the human would get hurt once Night Candy got serious about the catfight. One hard vampire slam against a wall and Lily would be dead.
Just as Night Candy threw her arms wide and started to launch backward, Adrien whipped into the air, grabbed Lily, and pulled her off the woman.
He hovered above the floor, holding Lily in a tight grip as she flailed, arms and legs thrashing wildly. “I’ll strangle her. Let me go, Adrien. I’ll kill her for touching you like that!”
By now Night Candy stood by the door, shaking as she put her top back on. Her red wig was askew so that her fake hair covered one eye. “What gives, Adrien? Oh, my God, she’s bound to you. What the hell did you call me for when you’ve basically got your own permanent donor?”
Lily had started to settle down, though she released a hiss now and then. “Sorry, Candy, my sweet. Send me the bill, double the usual fee, but you’d better leave. She’s winding up again.”
Night Candy smirked. “’Cuz you called me ‘my sweet.’” She laughed as she blew him a kiss. “Au revoir, my sweet.”
As soon as the door closed, Adrien crossed the room with Lily now hanging from his arms, still facing away from him, and panting hard. He reset the alarm then turned to lean his back against the door.
This was not what he’d expected. He’d thought to punish Lily a little; instead he’d set off some kind of crisis that involved Lily taking on more of a vampire persona than he would have ever predicted.
She’d acted like a jealous girlfriend, ready to fight any woman who dared to get near her m
an. Very vampire.
And the whole damn thing turned him. He looked down at the back of her head and knew exactly what he was going to do. “You’d better get ready for me, human.”
CHAPTER 5
Lily sat on the floor, her body on fire. Heat coursed through her veins, and her temple throbbed. She couldn’t blink. She could only sit and stare at nothing, her body a cauldron, her vein thumping in her neck as though, despite every human protest her mind threw at her, nothing mattered right now, not one damn thing, except feeding Adrien, in any way he needed to be fed.
He grabbed her beneath her arms and jerked her to her feet, then whirled her to face him. He started ripping her clothes off.
She grunted and helped, tearing at his shirt and sinking her teeth into his shoulder as he worked his pants down.
Once they were both sufficiently undressed, he pushed her up against the wall, shoved her legs wide, then penetrated her. She took him in, as hungry as he was, needing him deep, needing the sex, and needing it now.
He thrust to seat himself and once he fit inside her, she bared her neck. He licked the skin over her vein in long, wet sensual swipes. She didn’t think she could ache more than she did right now.
“Do it.”
He ground his hips against her and she groaned.
His fangs struck, and he drank her down while he thrust into her, moving his hips faster and faster as he sucked on her neck. His speed, vampire-fast, caused her to cry out. She threw her arms around his neck and held on as ecstasy grabbed her and took her on a ride, her body writhing against his, pleasure sweeping through and taking her into the stratosphere.
She hated him, who he was, but she needed him, needed this, because she was bound to him, because she felt the depth of his starvation and need, and she wanted to be the one to satisfy him.
Though the rational part of her brain told her this made no sense, this giving of her blood, this allowing his body to possess her, she couldn’t blame the chains alone for what she was experiencing, the bald nature of her need, the depth of her desire. From the first, even before she’d put the chain on him, she’d experienced a profound attraction to the man.
He slowed his movements, and that’s when she felt that he trembled from head to foot and drank from her unsteadily. He was still hard. He hadn’t come.
Your blood. Lily, your blood. My God.
Had she heard him? Was that his voice, his words, in her head?
Adrien? she responded with her mind, wondering if she was just hearing things.
His body stilled completely and he drew away from her, his lips red-rimmed, his brows drawn into a tight frown.
He met her gaze, his hips quiet though he remained inside her.
What did you say? His mind to hers. Did you say my name?
She hadn’t been mistaken then. I spoke your name because you called to me. You said, ‘Your blood. Lily, your blood.’ I heard you. Aloud, she said, “I heard all of that. Say it out loud so that I know we’re talking about the same thing, that I’m not just imagining this.”
“From my mind to yours, I said, ‘Lily, your blood, My God.’”
“Yes, you did.”
“You shouldn’t be able to do this telepathically.”
“It’s the blood-chain. It has to be.”
He nodded. His gaze fell to her mouth and she forgot her animosity. She just wanted him, wanted Adrien.
“Kiss me,” she whispered.
He leaned down to her and touched his lips to hers, tenderly, the way a man would normally kiss a woman if he liked her.
He began to surge into her once more, but this time he kissed her while he thrust and it felt like heaven, like more than she had ever expected it could be with him.
She didn’t understand what was happening to her, why she was feeling so much for Adrien whom she didn’t know, why her arms snaked around him, feeling the muscles of his back, her hands rising until she drove her fingers into his hair.
His trembling settled down and power returned to his thighs and his arms. He surrounded her, holding her closer, bending his knees to angle up and into her. I want you to come for me. His voice in her head brought a deep groan from her throat.
Adrien, yes, she responded.
His hips pistoned faster and she fell into the quick rhythm, her body tightening deep within, her skin tingling over her chest and arms. So close.
Faster he moved. Come for me. Come for me.
Her body spasmed as ecstasy poured through, taking the fire in her veins and spreading it over every inch of her.
Adrien, now, do it now, release now and I’ll come again.
He groaned heavily against her mouth and his entire body shoved against her, his hips moving fast again, so very fast. She strapped her arms around his neck, holding on for the ride.
He moved quicker than a human and her body responded clenching hard. Then more pleasure streaked through her and she could feel or sense his own pleasure rising, so she rode it as he shouted into the air, pumping hard.
The experience reached into her chest, expanding her lungs. She could hardly breathe as so much feel-good passed through her, waves of lush sensation, of ecstasy peaking, falling, and peaking again, over and over. And he kept pounding her.
I’ll come again if you keep this up.
Oh, God, so will I.
Vampires could do that? There was so much Kiernan hadn’t told her.
Once more she exploded deep inside, screaming her pleasure, gasping for breath, savoring each pummeling of his hips against hers. He shouted with her, driving his cock deep.
At last he began to slow. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her face felt flushed with passion.
He drew back, sweat gleaming on his forehead, his lips swollen and parted as he drew in deep breaths as well. “It’s never been like this.”
“The chains,” she whispered, unable to catch her breath.
“I don’t know.” He searched her eyes.
She stared back wondering about him, who he was, why she could do this with him and not be repulsed, why she felt so much so quickly. The chain at her neck lay oddly still on her skin.
Slowly, he drew his hips back, sliding out of her, their combined fluids dripping down the insides of her thighs. He picked up his shirt and planted it between her legs.
“Thank you.”
He nodded, frowning. She could feel his uneasiness, almost a wariness, certainly his distrust. Her own doubts intruded.
She shaded her face with her hand.
Adrien was a vampire. She needed to remember that, to remind herself that very little about her current predicament could ever carry over into her real life, the one she would resume with her son as soon as she got herself out of this mess, as soon as she had the extinction weapon in hand, as soon as she could hire someone to get rid of these chains.
And the last thing she should ever do was start to care for Adrien. Damn sex, anyway, because it was so easy to get connected with a man through sex. She knew the science behind it. And the chain wasn’t helping.
“You’re humiliated?” he asked. “Because you had sex with me a second time, you’re ashamed?” He made a disgusted sound at the back of his throat.
She looked up at him. She opened her mouth to correct him, to reassure him that it wasn’t shame. But what was it, then, if not shame?
A pure hatred and distrust of his kind?
Or the knowledge that she could never make a life for herself in this world, so what was the point?
Maybe it was a little bit of everything.
She had to keep her distance, so what did it matter whether she regretted the moment because of shame or because she couldn’t risk trusting him. They were different species, and his kind had destroyed her family.
“Of course I’m ashamed.”
He picked up his pants and punched a foot through each leg, glaring at her in turns.
She drew a deep breath and found her clothes or what was left of them. She slipped on her
shirt just to be covered a little.
“Back to the bedroom,” he said, sounding weary.
“I’m not tired.”
“I wasn’t suggesting sleep. We have work to do, but you need to get cleaned up, and your clothes and things from India are in there now.”
She followed behind him, which suited her since her pants weren’t fit to wear anymore. He’d ripped them down the back all the way to the crotch.
Once in the bedroom, she unpacked a change of clothes. Because he barred the way to the bathroom, she moved to stand in front of him, refusing to make eye contact.
“I’m not evil, Lily, whatever you may think.”
She glanced up at him, her mouth ready to agree with him to say she knew at least that much, but what was the point? She needed to keep her focus, to remember that Josh waited for her, had been waiting for two years. My God, would her son even know her anymore?
“Please, Adrien. We just need to get through this, the quicker the better.”
He stepped aside and she went into the bathroom. She took a quick shower, hoping by the time she opened the door Adrien would have some idea where they should go next.
* * *
“We need to go see a man in the north?”
Adrien sat on the floor outside the bathroom, still in his jeans and nothing else. He stared up at Lily having forgotten how pretty she was, with her large haunted hazel eyes staring down at him. His chest squeezed up, making it hard to breathe.
“A vampire?” she asked.
“Actually, he’s a half-breed, and an Ancestral, rare in our world, but it happens.” Just like Adrien actually. His mother was human, but the vampire genetics were dominant in his father’s line and though he didn’t have Ancestral status, and never wanted it, he had the potential.
“Half-breeds? As in human and vampire?”
He rose to his feet and narrowed his eyes. “Sure. Has been throughout history. Where do you think all your lore came from? And men of wealth? A lot of them are half-breeds.”