I had never lived in my life.
I knew that for sure.
The minute James pressed his cold lips to mine my entire life flashed before my eyes and nothing as sweet had ever happened to me.
Nothing.
He pulled back and his cool breath struck my heated lips.
I wanted more.
I had never felt so alive.
I had never felt so aware of my heartbeat or the breath in my lungs.
The throbbing between my thighs that began to match my body’s rhythms.
It was electric.
So intense my heart skipped a beat and I had to suck in a deep breath.
With closed eyes, I reached out, pulling him back to me—back for more. I pressed my mouth against his and a strange sensation I’d never known worked its way down my back and into my lower stomach. It was pleasant and warm as it spread deep into the rest of me.
My cheeks heated when I accidentally let a little noise slip past my lips. I’d never felt more vulnerable and the noises I heard myself make were embarrassing. I prided myself on not being a soft girl. I had to be hard in the world I survived in, but James was turning all my muscles to liquid.
At that point he could have fed on me until my eyes closed, never to open again, and I wouldn’t have cared. I would have given him all of me with just a simple request.
I had heard of kissing before. My mother and father had talked about their first kiss with happy smiles on their faces, but I’d always thought of the sweet kisses on the cheek that my little brother used to give me every time they mentioned it. I had never been more wrong, and now I understood those smiles and why I had felt like an intruder every time they shared one in front of me.
A kiss from James was nothing like those innocent brotherly kisses. They heated me from the inside out and made me want things I didn’t understand. I pressed myself against him, rising from the couch a bit, and that movement seemed to somehow give me relief.
My arms wrapped around his neck on their own, his frigid skin stinging the soft inner skin of my forearms. I was pleased when he pressed his hard stone-like body against me, pushing me back into the cushions of the couch as he moved over me.
I was running out of breath so I broke the kiss to breathe. The feelings I was experiencing weren’t normal. He had to be using some form of vampire coercion on me. Maybe I was under one of his mythical vampire spells. Maybe this was how they killed their prey, but I knew that wasn’t the case.
James was different.
I didn’t need anyone to tell me that. I had seen it with my own two eyes and felt it in his touches.
“What are you doing to me?” I whispered.
I looked up into his eyes and tried to test my theory of whether or not I was under some kind of compulsion. He was looking at me differently. Like it was the first time he’d ever seen me. Like I was one of his prized possessions—like I was the sunrise.
A cloudless sky.
The sun.
Heat.
Joy.
All the things he had once told me he missed about his human life.
Reaching up, he tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and a set of chills worked their way down the side of my neck and onto my shoulder.
“I think I should ask you the same question,” he said breathlessly as if he too was human and out of breath from our kiss.
I didn’t have time to respond before he started to kiss me again. I looked at his closed lids before closing my eyes and letting his cool lips take control of mine. This time his hands were in my hair and his kiss deepened.
I gasped when his tongue entered my mouth and even newer sensations took hold.
He tasted like the waters of a fresh spring I’d once found outside of Savannah with a hint of something sweet.
Clean and clear.
Cold and moist, with his own unique flavoring coated in sugar.
I followed him move for move. If he was doing it, then it had to be the correct way. I refused to believe he was bad at anything he did. He was sure and confident, so relaxed with everything that was swirling around us. I allowed myself to relax into him, as well.
He moved and his hips pressed into mine, making me hiss in pleasure. Chills tumbled across my skin, dotting my arms and making the hairs stand on end. It was the strangest thing. My body was hot all over and his body pressing against me cooled me.
Hot and cold.
Hard and soft.
Fast and slow.
“I need to feel you against me,” he whispered against my lips.
Reaching down, he pulled his shirt up and broke the kiss to pull it over his head. I looked down at his perfectly sculpted chest as I ran my fingers across his shoulders.
He was pale perfection.
Tiny bits of ink were etched into his chest and over his shoulder and I let my fingers follow the inked paths eliciting a quiet growl of pleasure from the back of this throat.
He was cold to the touch, but warm—warmth that was one-hundred percent mental— a warmth that spread from his mind to mine and drew me out of hiding and into his dark shadows.
His kisses got deeper as he pressed my frame into the couch. I was a tall girl, but he was so much larger than me—so much more powerful. And while I should have been afraid for my life with a starving vampire ravishing me, I wasn’t. I could feel his restraint in his arms and back muscles. He was keeping me safe from himself, and I trusted that.
I trusted him.
Tiny thoughts dipped into my mind.
I wondered how my family would feel if they knew I was fraternizing with the enemy.
But James didn’t feel like the enemy. He felt different from the rest of them. I couldn’t help but wonder if there were more out there like him.
I knew there was a good share of bad vampires, but what if there were more like James?
It wasn’t like I’d sat around and gotten to know a vampire before.
Maybe they weren’t all bad.
Maybe they were civil beings just trying to survive like me.
My stomach sucked in and my abs flexed at his touch when he ran his hand down my side and gripped the back of my thigh. His frigid fingertips dipped into the crease of my leg and the warm part of me that was throbbing for his touch. He pulled my leg up onto his hip and adjusted himself between my legs. The pressure of his body against mine felt amazing.
Again, a noise I’d never made slipped from my throat. He softly hummed against my lips as if he liked it.
Pulling back, he looked down at me as his hips pumped against my center in a slow steady rhythm. My breath came in soft pants and I felt embarrassed that I couldn’t seem to get a deep enough breath. I tried, and every time the air was sucked from my lungs.
Something was stirring inside of me—something violent and beautiful—something that I wanted to grab a hold to and never let go of.
Something that I knew would push me to continue to survive my life.
“James,” I whispered his name.
There was so much I wanted to say, but I couldn’t seem to form any words. I wanted him to delve into my brain and thought processes and know everything there was to know about me. I wanted him to know what he was making me feel.
What started out as an innocent kiss was turning into something much more.
It was personal.
It was private.
I didn’t know if I wanted to keep going or stop immediately before something inside me broke and spilled over. I was drowning in him, dying a pleasurable death every second he kissed and touched me.
“Harley,” he whispered my name against my mouth as he went in for more. “Please tell me to stop.”
I didn’t.
The last thing I wanted him to do was stop.
Instead, I clung to him as if he weren’t the bringer of death—as if he were my savior.
Whatever was climbing inside of me moved higher and higher every time he pressed his body against mine. I felt something hard rub against me and it felt positively sinful and perfect.
The thin barrier of clothing between us needed to disappear.
I wanted it gone.
I wanted to feel him.
The cotton shorts I was wearing were warm and wet. The wetness had never happened before, but James seemed to like it as he reached down and slipped a finger in the leg of my shorts.
His finger brushed my secret place, moving against me and pulling strangled sounds from within me. I whined like I was in pain, but it wasn’t pain. It was so much more than hurt. It was an ache that was continuing to claw its way up my body.
My hips lifted from the couch as my body took control. My mind no longer made decisions. It shut down and enjoyed the freedom that I was able to give it.
James continued to kiss me—his kisses growing stronger with each movement. My panting became heated breaths against his mouth. I felt like I was about to slip over the edge and into a sea of amazement.
Instead, I felt a sharp pain against my lips.
The sting was so abrupt I shrieked. James moved away from me so fast I didn’t see him again until he was standing against the wall across the room from me.
All the warm and achy sensations were gone away just that fast.
I sat up quickly and the room spun.
Reaching for my mouth, I pressed my fingers against my lips. When I looked down at my fingers they were covered in blood. The acrid taste of my own blood and the sweetness of James’ kisses filled my mouth at the same time.
It took me a second to realize what happened.
I had been bitten.
James showed me freedom, and then he bit me.
When I looked at him again, he looked different. His confidence had disappeared and in its stead was fear. The only things that didn’t look scared and uncertain were his eyes. They were no longer soft in ecstasy, they were red and glowing.
Fangs pressed into his bottom lip, my blood dripped down his chin—the deep red standing out against his pale skin.
And then he was gone.
The slamming of his bedroom door echoed throughout the cabin.
I’d been kissed and bitten at the same time and instead of being disgusted like I was sure I should have been, the moisture between my legs thickened and the throbbing I had felt earlier was back. And not only was it back, it had intensified.
I wanted more.