Lord of the Vampires (Royal House of Shadows #1)(24)
Author: Gena Showalter

Now, however, she wanted to be perfect. The best. She wanted to please Nicolai the way he had pleased her in her fantasy.

She had enjoyed sex. And she had missed it, despite her lack of desire, all these months. Actually, nearly a year now. Mostly, she had loved and missed the afterglow, lying in a man’s arms, absorbing his heat, talking, laughing.

“I’ve lost you to your thoughts.” Nicolai cursed under his breath, but there was humor in the undercurrent. “I’m trying to resist you, Jane, and I’m failing. The challenge of engaging your attention isn’t helping.”

“Why?” A breathy entreaty. “I mean, why are you trying to resist?”

“You need time to recover. And there’s something I must tell you first. Something you will not like.”

Stomach cramp. “What is it?”

One heartbeat, two. “Without my memories, I can’t be sure…a woman could be waiting…”

Another cramp. “Oh, God. You’re married?”

“No. No, that much I know. Just before my appearance in the Sex Market, I was with a woman…a servant. Yes. I remember that. I would not have been with a servant if I were married. But I might have promised myself to another.”

Might have… No. Not possible. “You hadn’t.” This she said with a sudden surge of confidence. He was too possessive to sleep with a servant if a fiancée waited in the wings.

A glimmer of hope in his expression. “I mention this only as a possibility, not a reality. I could never want anyone as much as I want you right now.” He was looming over her a second later, his mouth poised just above hers. He was breathing shallowly, his hands anchored next to her temples, his erection pressed between her legs.

Finally. The contact she’d yearned for. He was hers, hers, only hers. She could believe nothing less. “You may not know yourself, but I think I know you,” she said. “Trust me, no one is waiting for you.”

She wasn’t being stubborn or blind about this. Discarding his possessive nature and the fact that any woman he committed to would have his full attention, he was vampire and vampires mated for life. Physically they couldn’t stray. Research had proven that. So, memory or not, he would not react to Jane if his heart belonged to another.

“Perhaps I am a horrible person, because I don’t care about a faceless stranger,” he said. “I can’t resist you. I won’t resist you. Don’t deny me, Jane. Must taste you, all of you. Please.” He didn’t wait for her reply but leaned the rest of the way down.

“Nicolai—” She meant to tell him that she couldn’t resist him, either, and she would never deny him, that he wasn’t a horrible person, but the words were lost in a scorching kiss as he meshed their lips together.

His tongue thrust past her teeth and rolled with hers. Hot, so hot.

He tasted of mint and…candy. Mmm. Yes, candy. Sugary sweet, the flavor all his own, consumed her.

Unable to stop herself, she glided her fingers into his hair.

“Yes. Please. Please,” she said, finally begging.

Her nails bit into his scalp, holding him to her. She needed more, had to have more, everything else forgotten. Her knees squeezed at his waist, and she rocked herself against him. A gasp of hungry joy escaped her. God! The feel of his erection against her was mind-blowing, shattering, necessary, better than anything she’d ever known. Maybe because she was so damn wet and ready. So she did it again, rocking, rubbing, gasping.

With a growl of approval, he thrust his tongue deeper. Their teeth scraped together. Dizzying friction, welcome but torturous as her need ratcheted up another level. Then he angled his head for even deeper contact, and she felt the graze of his fangs. No, this was need. True, undiluted need. She wanted to be bitten, again and again and again. To be everything to him. Lover, sustenance, breath.

Her blood was heating unbearably, her stomach quivering. On and on the kiss continued, until there was no more oxygen left in her lungs. Until Nicolai was her only lifeline.

“Please,” she rasped. “Do it.”

“Gods, Jane. You’re…you’re like fire. I want to be burned.”

“Yes.”

He licked his way to the pulse hammering at the base of her neck. Was he going to bite her at last? But no, he continued laving at her pulse, sucking on it as one of his hands cupped her breast and kneaded. He pinched the throbbing nipple, and a lance of delicious sensation shot through her entire body.

Heaven and hell, so sweetly offered…how close she was to falling over the edge. But when she did, if she did—please, let her—where would she land? The clouds, or the fiery pits?

Only one way to find out…

“Nicolai?”

“Yes, sweetheart.”

Sweetheart. His sweetheart. “Bite me.”

“Jane.” A groan. “You tempt me. I shouldn’t.”

Shouldn’t, because he still thought she needed to heal? Or because a part of him still believed another female was out there, waiting for him? If the impossible happened and he was committed… Why impossible? she wondered next. Jane was here, wasn’t she? Nothing was impossible.

The knowledge caused the first tendrils of doubt to surface. Jane despised cheaters, but she also hated stories that forced two people to remain together because of a sense of duty, rather than love. Nicolai wasn’t in love. And if he had a woman, why hadn’t she searched for him? Saved him? Again, that made Jane think he couldn’t possibly be committed. No girlfriend would have let this guy go. Therefore, Jane could still have him.

But, she didn’t want him resenting her. Or feeling pressured. Or regretting what they did. “All right. We won’t—”

“We will. Just don’t want to hurt you.”

Relief. So much relief, ecstasy shimmering, within reach. “You could never hurt me. Nicolai, please. Do it.”

“Yes, yes, please. I’ll beg if necessary. I must have more….” His fangs returned to her neck and grazed her sizzling skin. “Must taste, will die if I do not.”

“Do it.” She hissed out a breath and stiffened as she mentally prepared herself for the onslaught. Of pleasure or pain, she wasn’t sure. All she knew was that she needed this, too.

He dragged in a shaky breath. “You are sure? I don’t have to. I can stop.”

“Don’t stop. Please, don’t stop. I’m just wary of the unknown.”

Liiick. “Do not fear, little Jane. I’ll be careful with you. Will control myself.” Then, with agonizing slowness, he sank his fangs into her neck, sucked on her, swallowed her blood.