Chapter Sixteen
Seb instructed Brie to wait in their room while he went to hide the bike. His thoughts and emotions were in turmoil, which was a damned poor way to work a case, much less protect her. He reached for his discipline to push away the boiling emotions.
It was harder than it should have been.
Hell, he’d structured his life just so shit like this didn’t happen. So he could do the job, save lives—without all the emotional baggage.
Finding out Cleomenes was a Soul Stealer, nearly dying himself…that was a bad enough hit to his equilibrium. What he hadn’t prepared for was the sheer terror and rage that had burned through him when the greedy old bastard threatened Brie. Seb had used every bit of his preternatural speed to get her out of there, not a fucking care for the masquerade.
Still shuddering with the aftershocks of his terror, it hit him hard that the masquerade, secrecy, detachment—driving forces all his life—didn’t matter for shit now.
Wiped out in an instant by a threat to a single human female.
No. To Brie.
He gripped the handlebars so tightly they nearly broke. Pain. Fear. They’d flooded him, things he hadn’t had to deal with for a long, long time. He had to make sure this never happened again. Stopping a vampire war was important, yes. But somehow, keeping Brie safe had become more important.
He had to figure out a way to capture or kill the Soul Stealer—or die trying.
First things first. Make certain Brie was safe.
Only one way he could think of to do that—tell the Alliance what was going on and let them protect her. They had resources within their own territory Seb couldn’t touch.
Revealing himself to Emerson. Seb shook his head to himself. After duping the male, he’d probably try to kill him.
Normally nothing Seb would worry about, except he remembered the Alliance had made some seriously scary advances in vampire medicine. Hopefully they wouldn’t kill him before he either averted the war, killed Cleomenes, or both. He muscled the bike onto the grass and parked it in the bushes beneath their room.
Lotta hopefullys.
Lotta damned if he dids, damned if he didn’ts, too.
There were only a few ways to win, several ways to lose, and, for the first time, a real possibility of dying the final death.
Heading back into the hotel, he forced himself to make a decision and deal with the consequences.
Call Emerson to pave the way. Shower off the violence. Meet with Emerson and hand over Brie to the Alliance’s advanced protection.
Embed himself in Brie’s memory by giving her an orgasm she’d never forget.
He startled. Where had that idea come from? He mounted the stairs, musing. Hell, back at the beginning, her too-colorful, too-loud self had irritated him.
When had her bright jangling gone from being annoying to making him feel alive?
Don’t question it. Especially don’t ask why she’s so important.
He had a suspicion it would dredge up more messy, painful feelings. He only knew if this was how he was going out, he wanted to taste the joy that was Brie Lark one last time.
No, not one last time. Surprise filtered through him.
He wanted Brie one real time.
…
I was dealing with my stress by sketching jagged pictures of Cleomenes and Seb in full vampire mode when Seb let himself into our room.
Closing the pad, I stuffed it into my pack. “Let me get this straight. We’re returning to Meiers Corners?”
“Yes. You’ll be safe with the Alliance vampires. But I need to prepare the ground first.”
“We stopped here to make phone calls? Won’t Cleomenes find us?”
“Maybe. And I dread to think of what will happen if he does. I’m—we’re—between a rock and a hard place. We can’t fly out. We could drive out, maybe, but we’d leave the murder unsolved, and I don’t know how long until Lorenzo and his New York Cadre finds out.”
“Triggering a vampire war. I don’t want that.”
“Yeah. Me either, but if it comes to it, that’s what we do. Still, I can’t just show up on Emerson’s doorstep, smelling of violence, announce I’m a vampire from New York, I’ve been one all along, and sorry I invaded your town without proper clearance.”
“He’ll get the wrong idea.”
“Exactly. Hopefully some sweet talk will get us a meet, and a shower will keep him from trying to hollow out my chest the minute we get there.”
I nodded, then spoke the question my pounding heart had been asking since O’Hare. “What if Cleomenes followed us?”
“I was backtracking and watching for tails. Other traffic will overlay the smell of our exhaust—we won’t be tracked that way. We’ll eventually be spotted by Cleomenes’s spies and informants, but as long as we don’t stay here too long, we should be okay.”
“Oh. Good.” I managed to take my first deep breath in twenty minutes. Another two and I was steady enough to take in our surroundings.
Our room was a standard guest room—bath off the entrance, mini-fridge/microwave station, dresser with big television, and two full-size beds. It was hard not to look at their crisp white sheets and spread and think this might be the last time I saw Seb for a while.
Maybe, if things didn’t go well, forever.
Pain skewered me at the thought. Yeah, mistaking sex for love, then having my heart trampled, had hurt.
Less than this. Less than never taking the chance and losing the choice.
Extracting his phone, Seb voiced commands to get Emerson’s phone number then dial. As he waited for the call to connect, he walked around the beds, eyeing them.
Was he thinking the same thing I was?
My phone rang. I dug it out of my backpack and answered.
Sera started in on me immediately, not even a hi. “Brie, what is going on? Otto said you guys left with luggage without a word. I can’t believe you did that. Did you really leave without saying good-bye to me?”
“Um…it was a last-minute decision. I meant to text. And it turns out we’re coming back.”
“What? Why? What’s going on?”
Words flooded my mouth, all my anxieties, hopes, fears. I bit them back at the last moment. Seb needed to tell Julian first. And all the rest would take too long. “I can’t tell you everything yet. As soon as I can, I will.”
“Damn,” Sera breathed. “Where are you? Are you safe?”
“Safe-ish. We’re at a hotel.” I eyed Seb, still on the phone with Julian Emerson. Still giving the mattresses a considering look. “That doesn’t mean what you think.”
“He’s a vampire. It means exactly what I think.”
“No. I mean, well maybe. But…” I lowered my voice to murmur, “You know what happened with Derek.”
I expected sympathy. What I got was a disgusted, “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Brie. Not every v-guy is a Duh-Wreck.”
Ouch. “Well, there’s only one Thor Thorsson, and you’ve got him.”
“Gabriella Lark, don’t change the subject.”
I winced. Seb tapped me on the shoulder. He’d finished his phone conversation. He mouthed, “I’m going to take a quick shower.”
I nodded and smiled at him while Sera continued to blister my ear. “Yes, Duh-wreck was a disaster, and you were hurt. I hoped you’d get over it on your own. That was before you met Seb. Do you know what everyone was talking about in the bar? You two. How you made such a cute couple touring the city. How sweet on you he seemed. How happy you looked with him. Happy.”
“Stupid gossip,” I muttered.
“Brie, you haven’t been truly happy for a long time. And if Seb gives that gift to you, well, I can’t just stand by and let you take a pass on it because of Derek. You can’t tar all v-guys with his brush. V-guys are as different as regular guys. Some are playboys, some are sweethearts, some are lazy, and some are industrious. The only thing they have in common is that they’re all stunningly good-looking and well-built.”
“What’s your point?”
“You’re asking yourself how much Seb is like Derek. That’s the wrong question. What you should be asking is, is Seb the kind of guy you’d like to get to know better?” She paused. “Gotta go. Thor’s talking to Julian.”
She hung up.
I sat there, smarting.
Was Seb the kind of man I’d want to get to know better?
He was brave and smart and caring in his own way. He was also as sexy as hell.
The shower stopped.
Did I want to try for a relationship? I’d have shouted an unqualified yes from day one, except for the fact that, with his vampire bite, he could give me an orgasm that would make me forget about brave and smart and caring. I had nothing against great sex—except when it was so great, I got it confused with love.
I’d grown to love Derek, but what I’d thought was his loving me back was merely vampire tricks. I don’t know. Maybe I’d only loved my image of Derek, my feelings colored by spectacular sex fueled by orgasmic bites.
If I fell in love with Seb, I wanted it to be for who he really was. And I wanted him to truly care for me in return.
Except I might not have the leisure to wait. This might be my only chance to connect.
Did I take this chance? Or play it safe?
The bathroom door clicked open. “That was quick…” My voice thickened and petered out.
Seb emerged from the bathroom’s billowing steam wearing only a towel slung low around his hips, all fluid muscle. My artist eye would have noticed the texture of the towel or the play of light on his taut skin. FBI special agent. Vampire. Ancient.
At that moment, I saw Seb, and only Seb.
Yeah, I was done with playing it safe.
He paused in the doorway, his gaze on my face. Extraordinarily perceptive, reading my expression and body language as if he were in my head.
Two long-legged strides brought him to me. Seizing me, he planted a fiery kiss on my mouth.
Flames immediately engulfed me, my heart pounding harder. This wasn’t the human man and vanilla love.
This was the master vampire kissing me.
His embrace brooked no escape, his tongue demanded entry. His lips commanded my response.
And, oh, did I respond. I clung to him, pressing my body into his as if I could glue every inch together, and I kissed him back with all the hunger in me.
He chuffed a laugh, and his kiss gentled.
Demand became beguilement; his driving tongue became many light, small kisses. Teasing, coaxing.
As if he’d half expected me to have second thoughts. As if his demand for response had been born out of fear I wouldn’t, or couldn’t, really accept him, not the real him.
As if learning that I wanted him as badly as he wanted me had made him happy.
Stunning revelation, and when I had the space to process it, I would. We were being hunted. Time was not on our side. I didn’t want slow, and I didn’t want careful.
I wanted him. Now.
Opening my eyes, I wiggled out of his embrace and stripped naked to the waist.
His gaze dropped to my breasts. His black eyes flared red then flicked up to me. “Are you sure?”
“Very sure.”
With a smile, he let his fangs slide from between his lips. Strong, sharp. Ready to pierce the ache in me.
My breasts were full and heavy, my hips churning with need. I was ready, too.
Breathing fast, he extended his hands for me—and paused without touching.
Asking, silently, frmission.
Here’s your permission, bud. I arched my back, thrusting my naked breasts into his hands. Not just showing my boiling yearning for his touch, but demanding it.
And now that I’d accepted him in all his vampire glory, at least for this moment, the bastard deliberately misread me.
He touched me, but not taking hot, ripe possession. No, his fingers skimmed lightly, teasingly, along the curve of my breast. The only thing that saved him from a garlic hypodermic was the almost worshipful way he brushed fingertips along my skin.
But the light touch ramped up my desire rather than satisfied it. As he circled the curves of my breasts, need built, layer by layer, tighter and tighter until my nipples were anguished pebbles.
“More,” I rasped.
In response, he gently cupped one breast. The awe on his face was clear and honest and perfect as he ran a warm thumb over my nipple. Gentle. Reverent.
Fuck that. I wanted more, and I wanted it now.
I grabbed both his wrists and planted his hands on me. “More.”
He smiled in response to my demands and finally began fondling both breasts, hefting and teasing and kneading and at fucking last pinching. By now it was less a zing of pleasure than the twisting of sparking, snapping firecrackers.
“More.” I grabbed his ears and pulled.
With a chuckle, damn him, he bent and suckled. And glory of glories, his fangs touched my skin—but only the flats, sliding long and smooth along my skin, skimming the curve of my breast as he tugged a nipple into his hot mouth. Holding my breasts in both hands he suckled me, drawing hot threads of need through my sex to my taut, wet nipple until I moaned.
With him, fangs didn’t need to penetrate to be arousing. With Seb, I arched into his hot hands, hotter mouth, and the cool slide of his fangs a counterpoint that cranked me past ten, past eleven, toward the very stars of heaven.
His hands began to be everywhere, touching everything all at once. Every inch of my bare torso was soon both shivering and flushed with heat.
I petted down his hard muscles, delighting in their strength. The landscape of his body became my playground. I glided my palms over the smooth planes of his lats, the hillocks of his abs, the mountains of his pecs.
A rumble started beneath my hands. I recognized it as a vampire’s purr of pleasure, but Seb’s was dark, a lion’s bass, the sound more beast than man. Shocking, exciting, and urging me to pet other beastly noises out of him.
We spoke with our bodies and hands, give and take, thundering toward ecstasy. But some words were vital. Like…
“Bed,” I muttered.
With another chuffed laugh, he picked me up, my insides swooping as he laid me on the nearest white spread.
Then, at last, he showed his own urgency, climbing immediately on top of me. His big body was heavy, pressing me into the mattress. I could feel every hard inch, including the monster of an erection pressing through his towel against my fly. He began to nuzzle my neck, the long slide of fang against my throat leaving me in no doubt as to how much he wanted me.
My belly exploded in bright hunger in response. I toed off my shoes then struggled beneath his weight to get rid of my pants.
He spoke one word then.
“Wait.”
He slid his body down mine, a long, slow slide of muscular belly followed by fang-tortured kisses and rough tracings of his tongue. When he reached my waist, he opened my pants and slid them down my hips, just far enough to expose my panties.
I expected him to yank them down, too.
Instead, he kissed my panty-covered mound, each press of lips darker and deeper, pushing my ache for him to my core. I groaned, palming his head, shoving him toward where I hungered most. It took some insisting, but he finally began to tongue my silk-covered slit.
The first touch of his tongue, dampening the cloth over my hood, made me shriek. I hooked my panties and yanked down awkwardly but got them far enough, because his hot tongue rasped against naked flesh. I shouted.
Beneath his hot kisses, my pussy blossomed, until he was licking my clitoris. With every lick I got more and more excited. Licking over and over until I couldn’t stand it anymore.
I grabbed his head and lifted. His gaze, filled with fire, rose to mine, and for a second, my breath stuck in my throat.
Fanged and red-eyed, fully vampire.
I swallowed, a whole long slide of need spinning down to my gut. “You,” I panted. “In.”
A lazy, masculine smile tipped his lips. He rose onto his knees above me. As he did, I stripped off my pants and panties and threw them aside. With a toss of his towel, he was buck naked and gorgeous, his erection jutting proudly.
Seeing him, straining for me, triggered an answering yearning deep inside me. I reached for him.
At the same moment, he came to me. Flesh touched flesh. We fused in heat and shimmering perspiration. My heart leaped at how right his body felt against mine. I ran my hands over his gleaming muscles, enjoying the hard planes and bold contours.
Our eyes met. His pupils dilated, reflexive, unfakeable. I thrilled to this proof he was truly attracted to me.
He settled his weight on me, his arms coming around me, and nuzzled my neck.
His cock pulsed hard and insistent against my belly.
It electrified me. I wanted him, and I wanted him now. I spread my legs to capture all that masculine glory.
His shaft kissed my wet lips. A shock of recognition pulsed from my thighs to my brain. He’s the one for me. Now, if only I was the one for him, too.
At the touch, he stiffened with a hiss, agonized pleasure.
That hiss was more wondrous than a thousand words. I affected him as strongly as he affected me. Wrapping my legs around his hips, I wriggled, trying to lock him in place. He was long enough that he had to raise himself to seat the head. An aching hollow yearned in me, one only he could satisfy.
A single, hard thrust, and he filled me completely.
I shouted. His groan twined in harmony.
He began to move inside me. Joy and urgency sang through me in equal measure. His body sheened as he moved faster, his muscles bunching and extending in a glorious dance between my thighs.
A show I could watch forever, but in watching, I got too excited to not join in. I grabbed his arms and used the leverage to meet him thrust for thrust. Shocks of primal lust flashed through me with each impact, need spiraling ever higher…
I met his fevered eyes. Lust became more.
His gaze was tethered to mine, as if I was his only lifeline in our savage, needy dance. Wordless, but not silent. When had I ever thought no words meant no connection? Our gazes spoke volumes.
And without the stumbling block of words, we spoke heart to heart.
Bending, he nuzzled the crook of my neck. I arched my head back, exposing my throat. Giving him implicit permission to bite.
He spoke then. “Brie.” My name was a prayer.
His mouth opened, his fangs denting the flesh of my throat. I waited for the zing of pleasure his bite would bring.
One more precious word came from him. “Please.” It was more growl than voice.
My whole body flushed hot, like a fever. My skin wasn’t sheening, it was wet. “Yes, Seb. Oh, yes.”
His fangs slid down to bite my shoulder.
My ballooning urgency, punctured by his sharp fangs, blew wide open. Explosive. I rocketed to the crest of orgasm’s cliff. And there…
I hung over a chasm, huge and terrifyingly high. I scrabbled to return to safety.
He responded by licking my shoulder where he’d bitten, soothing me, averting that demolisher of an orgasm—and then started driving his hips harder into me, pumping me higher.
I clutched him, cursing that wordless, intimate connection that let him give me exactly what I needed, whether I thought I could take it or not. He thrust into me, shoving me inch by inch back toward that huge dark abyss. This was the forceful vampire thrusting into me, over and over, pummeling us both to a lathered frenzy. My bracelets, my earrings, hell, my whole being rang with each hammering thrust.
Then his hard thrusts slowed. “Brie.” He groaned my name, trembling on the cusp of his own climax. His slit eyes glowed red and his fangs strained long and sleek. “Mri-jb. My mri-jb.”
In that moment, I felt he was as open and vulnerable to me as I was to him.
I stopped struggling. Embraced the destruction of that huge climax. Flying joyfully into the chasm, I kicked back my head, my throat exposed and equally vulnerable.
He thrust one last time, so deep he became part of me. Groaning my name, he bit my neck.
I exploded.
He was right there with me, shouting my name as he came.
Pleasure slammed me. Destroyed me, shattering me into every color of the rainbow. Every emotion from terror to joy flooded me, a torrential river sweeping away the shattered pieces.
Purring like mad, his tongue swept hot along my neck. His climax jetted inside me, each tug of his balls sending aftershocks through me. The waves wracked me, again and again, until my whole body rang with climax.
Gradually, my contractions eased. My hammering heart thudded, muffled, in my ears. I came out the other side with one color, a golden glow, and one emotion, a profound peace.
I opened my eyes and gazed up at him in wonder. His pleasure was stamped on his features as he gave one last, gentle lick to my throat. His fangs receded, and when he opened his eyes, they were black again and soft with contentment.
With casual strength, he turned us, still connected, me lying atop him. His powerful arms wrapped around me.
I relaxed in his arms, my ear pressed to his chest, listening to his heart slow.
Content, too.
I’d come to Meiers Corners, determined not to give into him, not to have sex with him. I’d caved. The first time I’d told myself I was overtired and had caved to his kindness.
An excuse.
I’d lied to myself.
No, I’d gone to bed with Seb Rikare, then and now, not because he was so damned sexy or my adrenaline was pumping or because he’d taken advantage of a moment of weakness, but because I’d come to care for him. I’d grown emotionally and physically closer to him during the intense hours we’d spent together.
Now that he’d loved me with everything he was, I knew the lie for what it was. This had definitely meant something to me.
This might even mean everything to me.
I raised my head, vulnerable and tentative, on the cusp of something scary but wonderful.
I tried to tell him. “Seb. That was amazing…”
His eyes slit open. A gleam of wariness made me pause.
Still, I stumbled on. “Look, I know we came into this as a work assignment, and that being lovers was a cover, but I’ve come to care for y—”
“What time is it? Fuck.” He scrambled out from under me and stood, looking anywhere but me. Immensely gorgeous, his bronzed, muscled body as perfect as before, but my gaze was riveted on the color flagging his high cheekbones. He was embarrassed.
By me?
“We’ve stayed here too long.” With quick, jerky motions, he snagged his clothes and gathered them into almost a shield against his chest. “Get dressed. We leave in five.”
He slammed into the bathroom without looking at me once.
Cutting me off before I could blurt what was in my heart. Because he didn’t want to hear it.
God. My worst nightmare. We’d had sex. For me, it had meant everything.
The way he’d just acted, for him, it might have meant nothing.