Reclamation (The Ravening #3)(38)
Author: Erica Stevens

His eyes glimmered in the torchlight before he bent to kiss me again. Yes, I could definitely deal with a little craving for blood as long as he was holding me and kissing me with such reverence that the world slipped away and I forgot about everything else. His heated breath filled my mouth when his tongue slipped in to temptingly tangle with mine.

My fingers slid through his thick hair, I felt something within him rising up to enter into me. I pressed closer against him as the part of him that sought my soul coursed into my body with the flowing ease of a melody from a songbird. I felt when it latched onto a piece of me, and when something inside of me reached out and latched onto him in return.

A subtle growl escaped him and he pulled me more firmly against him. Before he’d been almost hesitant with me but after today he seemed to have realized that I wouldn’t break. That he could take from me as much as he needed and I would still be here and I would still be me. I felt my soul being pulled from me in forceful tugs that made my knees go weak and my bones turn to liquid.

I could feel pieces of his soul entering me and moving throughout my body. Heat pooled through my extremities, my body went limp as he blended and moved effortlessly through me. He invaded me completely as I brought him deeper into me, joining with him in an intimate way that went beyond sex, beyond anything I ever could have imagined as I felt him entwining with my soul.

He was panting as he broke away from me and his mouth fell to my neck. I clung to him as my body continued to float in a haze of bliss the likes of which I never could have imagined. "Dangerous," he murmured against my skin as his lips traveled over me.

"No," I assured him as I gently took hold of his hand and pressed it against the place where my heart beat so fiercely. "I can feel you here, inside me. It’s where you belong Cade, where you’ve always belonged."

His striking eyes searched my face as his hand slid around my back and he slipped the knife at my waistband free. "There’s something more you want though."

I didn’t want to admit it, didn’t want to look but a tingle of anticipation gripped me as he lifted the knife between us. His eyes never left mine as he unfolded the blade and drew it across the inside of his wrist. The smell of his blood was potent in the crisp air as he lifted it to me. I tried to pull away but his hand in the small of my back held me steady.

"Denying it will only make it worse and you more volatile. Drink from me tonight Bethany and tomorrow I’ll take you into the woods and teach you how to hunt so that you’ll be able to feed yourself if the situation becomes desperate."

His unspoken words caused my throat to clog. In case he didn’t return from the ship. In case he died. I couldn’t think about that now though I wasn’t sure I’d be able to function if I did.

The blood glistened on his wrist as he held it out to me. Something inside of me screamed to take it and drink it as saliva rushed into my mouth. The part of me that was still human, and repulsed by the notion cringed at the idea of doing such a thing. He lowered his head to look up at me before biting into his bottom lip. A low groan escaped me as a bead of blood swelled onto his lip.

I didn’t have time to protest as he pulled me against him and captured my mouth once more. My hands pressed against his chest as his tongue swirled into my mouth, along with his blood. Whatever fight I’d had in me vanished as I slumped against him. A low moan escaped me; I grasped hold of his biceps in an attempt to keep myself grounded. His blood was the most delicious thing I’d ever tasted as I nibbled at his lip.

Pleasure raged through my long denied body as his blood coalesced with mine. A small sound of discomfort escaped him when I bit down harder than I’d meant to on his lip. I recoiled, horrified that I’d hurt him and would continue to do so if it meant getting more of what I yearned for.

He didn’t give me a chance to get far though as he grabbed me and pulled me back against him. "Don’t fight it Bethany, as much as you wanted to do this for me, I want to do it for you. Don’t fight me, please."

It was the burning look in his eyes that made me cave to his wishes. "Cade…"

Before I could finish speaking he was kissing me again and then I just didn’t care, not anymore. I lost myself to the taste and feel of him as he broke away to offer me his wrist again. I brought his wrist to my mouth as his lips traveled over my neck and down to my collarbone. Even the distant flicker of firelight faded away as my entire world became focused on him and the pleasure that he so willingly gave.

Chapter 17

Cade pressed his finger against his mouth and gestured toward the mountain lion that had roamed into our path. Apprehension trickled through me at the same time that the electrical pulses in my brain fired with excitement and disbelief. He couldn’t possibly be planning to go after that animal; it weighed almost as much as he did. Not only that, its claws alone could carve a man open with just one swipe. It was a lot different from the deer he’d shown me how to catch and take down an hour ago before allowing it to go free.

‘Stay,’ he mouthed to me before slipping into the woods. The movement of the red and orange leaves was the only indication that he’d been there at all. No matter how many years I knew him, I knew I would never get over how fast and soundlessly he could move. I was just turning away from the place where he’d been when he launched himself from the woods and onto the animal.

The lion let out a guttural cry as Cade wrapped his arms around its neck and wrestled it to the ground as if it weighed no more than a house cat. He straddled the animal as he pressed its neck into the ground and sat on its shoulders. "You can come out," he called to me.

He was stroking the creature’s neck and talking reassuringly to it as I hesitatingly approached from the forest. I watched in amazement as the large animal’s legs stopped kicking and it began to relax beneath him. "What? Are you the lion whisperer now?" I asked in a hushed voice.

A small smile curved his full mouth as his eyes twinkled in the sunlight streaming through the trees. "We’re just predators that have a mutual understanding of each other."

Predator, that’s what I was now, but then I supposed that’s what I’d been all along, I’d just never had to hunt for my food before. "Don’t be afraid," Cade urged.

How could I not be a little afraid, he was sitting on a hundred and fifty pounds of pure muscle? The cat’s eyes rolled toward me but it remained calm beneath Cade. "Come," he said with a wave of his hand.

Despite my trepidation I was irresistibly drawn forth by him. He took hold of my hand and moved me away from the massive claws extended from a paw that was bigger than my hand. "It’s beautiful," I whispered as he pulled me close to its side.