High Stakes (Vegas Vampires #1)(43)
Author: Erin McCarthy

"You taste delicious," he murmured, "fresh and sweet."

"You make me sound like fruit."

"I barely remember what fruit tastes like. Right now, thereis only you."

Damn, he was good at this. Alexis closed her eyes—suspended in the air, in time and space, and desire, as Ethan suckled her neck, the top of her breast.

Through the T-shirt she was wearing, he plucked at her nipple with his teeth. And when his hand slipped beneath the loose waist band of her sweatpants, she groaned.

"You’re not wearing any panties," he said, sounding scandalized.

"I haven’t been wearing any all night. Why start now?" Alexis arched into his touch, gripping his shoulders.

"It certainly makes this easier." His finger pressed inside her, stroking up and down.

"Oh, shit, that feels good." She was who the hell knew how many feet in the air, suspended by nothing more than the strength of Ethan’s vampire arms, and he was getting her off. This had to be the most unusual date she’d ever been on, by far, and that included the time a guy in college had taken her pig wrestling.

"Are you sure this is safe?" she asked between moans as her hips thrust forward onto him.

"Absolutely."He sucked her nipple through her shirt again, sending a jolt vibrating around her inner thighs. "Just whatever you do, don’t come."

"No?" She was about three seconds away from doing just that. The way he was sucking and stroking, plucking and pressing, she was spiraling quickly to the point of no return. With supreme willpower, she tried to scoot back away from him and his talented invasion, but there was nowhere to go. Her back was against the wall, literally.

His touch was relentless, a second finger sliding in with the first, and she pushed her feet against the steel wall, desperate to get away. Gravity kept pulling her down, settling his fingers deeper inside her, the base of his hand bumping against her vulva.

"Ethan, stop. I can’t "

"Can’t what?" he asked in a harsh whisper, pulling his fingers apart and stretching the swollen flesh. He was deep, just buried so far in there, his breath blasting across her cheek, her neck, his teeth plucking at her nipple.

"Oh!" This wasn’t going to work. Alexis bit her lip and knew she was about done. "You can’t and expect me not to "

Talking was too much effort. All her lung capacity was going to moaning, and her brain power was focused on keeping her eyes uncrossed.

"Don’t do it, Alexis," he said, even as he pinched her clitoris.

"Too late."Her head snapped back, and her whole body stilled for a split second, before she succumbed to a massive orgasm. It ripped through her, wracking her with shudders, convulsive waves of pleasure, and forcing a violent cry from her.

Feet scraping on the Sphinx, she rode it to the end, gripping the straining muscles of his forearms. When she was limp against him and panting, he finally removed his fingers from her with a triumphant smile.

"You wanted me to do that, didn’t you?" she asked, kissing the corners of his mouth.

"Yes, I really, really did." And he looked about as satisfied as she felt.

And as aroused.

Arms tight around her, he pulled them away from the building. "Now let’s move before we’re spotted."

Though Alexis couldn’t imagine anyone would guess the truth— floating vampire gives killer orgasm—if they saw a spot high on the Sphinx, she sure didn’t want any investigating.

"You’re a man with a plan. Take me wherever you want." Slack and satiated, she held weakly on to Ethan and let him fly her through the night.

Brittany couldn’t sleep. She had the prickling sensation that someone was watching her, and it was unsettling. Never one to be paranoid, she didn’t have trouble sleeping, not even after scary movies. And Alexis was the occasional insomniac, never Brittany. She had always fallen asleep practically before her head even hit the pillow.

Sunday night, she was lying on her bed beneath a gauzy thin white sheet, staring at the ceiling, her heart beating a little too fast. It was a safe apartment building in Summerlin , with bright floodlights, new windows, and a security entrance. All her doors and windows were locked. There was no reason to be feeling this sense of disquiet, this weird negative anticipation.

Maybe it was guilt. She shouldn’t have left The Ava. She shouldn’t have let Corbin walk away from her. She really needed to figure out a way to help him—surely he didn’t deserve banishment, no matter what he had done. Maybe she could talk to Ethan, discuss it with him, and see if there could be a better solution. Corbin was a tortured soul.

That stressed Brittany out, stirred her compassion. Brittany had never been tortured, in any sense of the word, and it broke her heart to see other people struggle. Her mother had been tortured. Alexis didn’t see that—maybe had been too hurt to realize it—but it was true. Their mother put her faith in all the wrong peo-ple and was burned over and over again, and the whole time she had desperately tried to grab on to happiness, seeking a higher thrill, through men, sex, drinking, dancing. Her eyes would light with that feverish desperation, and Brittany had felt sorry for her. Even at six years old, Brittany had seen her pain.

Punching, her pillow, she turned on her side. Why hadn’t she drawn the drapes? The linen sheers didn’t block out the moonlight, and it was fanning out across her legs. That was probably what was keeping her awake. She scissored her legs, kicking off the sheet. Either it was the moon, her shorty pajamas riding up, or she had just way too much on her mind.

Her sister Alexis was tortured, too, but in a different way. She had been hurt, felt rejected by their mother, and she marched through life ready to smack down anyone who dared to try to get close to her. Alexis couldn’t get intimate because she didn’t want to get hurt.

If Alexis had an affair with Ethan Carrick, it would be temporary, because at a certain point she would resist it going any further. Which was a shame, because Brittany liked Ethan, thought he was a good foil for hersister. Then again, he was a vampire, and that had the potential to be a bad thing.

Eyes wide open, Brittany hugged her shabby chic floral heart-shaped pillow, and wondered if she should just get up, get dressed, and drive back to The Ava. That tremor, like fingers walking up her spine, rippled through her again.

She wasn’t sure whether to take that as a yes or a no.

Corbin sat on the garage roof across from Brittany ‘s bedroom window and wrestled with himself. It was ridiculous, his behav ior . Why was he hanging out in the shadows again, watching this woman? Why did he not just take what he wanted?

Someblood, that was all he wanted.