King of Darkness (14 page)

He seemed to rather like that.

Just barely, she managed to sweep her tongue across the punctures in his skin before her head dropped to the pillow. His forehead pressed against hers. One hand rested lightly on her hip, so warm against her chilly skin. Just as she had started to float on a blissful cloud of sleepiness, a harsh shiver shocked her back to reality.

She had just drunk Thad’s blood. The
king’s
blood. What on earth was she thinking? Only hours before, she’d been intent on putting distance between them, and now she had helped to bind them together.

Nice
one, Isabel.

And the kicker, if she were being totally honest with herself, was that she had never been more content. No matter how they moved, their bodies fused together seamlessly like an ocean against the shore. His golden skin heated hers and chased away the chill. His breath fell in a warm, sweet mist on her mouth. If she allowed herself to, she could almost see staying forever this way.

Until he spoke again.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

Okay, Thad, let’s review the plan. The plan was to give her a little space and then to find a way to convince her to be at your side. To talk. To encourage. Not… not to jump right into sex again, fresh on the heels of her friend getting hurt, and risk that she would treat this like some random hookup. Not doing so well with the plan, are you, Thad?

Clearly, he needed a new plan. At least she couldn’t blow it all off as the effects of the wine this time, right?

Her forehead shook back and forth against his. “Don’t be sorry,” she said. “Don’t you dare be sorry.”

Thad propped himself on his elbows so his eyes could meet Isabel’s. She was so lovely with her skin flushed and her auburn hair damp against the pillow. Her lids were heavy, but her eyes were sharp and assessing. Fierce. In another life, she could have been a warrior. She reached to caress his jaw. He closed his eyes and leaned into the touch.

“Isabel, we shouldn’t—”

The sharp smack that landed across Thad’s mouth nearly made his head spin.
WTF?
Blood welled on his stinging lower lip, courtesy of a large mood-ring on her right hand. How had he not noticed
that
little accessory before now? Fucking hell, no one had ever slapped him before. Ever.

Isabel pointed an accusatory finger in his face, and her stare held his, narrow and unyielding. The emerald sparkle he’d noticed before now took on a darker cast, especially in her scarred eye. Her nostrils flared, and her chest rose and fell visibly with each deep, hard breath she took. She sure as hell didn’t look like she was about to apologize.

“Screw
shouldn’t
, Thad. It’s too late for that.”

Thad’s jaw hardened, but he wasn’t sure how to respond. He was a little pissed off. And, according to the lower half of him, still more than a little turned on. This fiery, passionate side of her was exciting. As he considered her, his tongue peeked out to lick off the small smear of blood on his lip.

It was that same glimpse of that fire he’d seen in her from across the VIP room, just before they had met. He loved this take-no-shit willingness to stand up to him, even in the face of everything they were dealing with. His queen would need that.

The offending hand rubbed his jaw, the thumb gently sliding over his split lip. “Did I give you some indication that I was an unwilling participant in what we just did?”

“No.” Suddenly his throat was raw, and his voice was raspy.

“Good.”

The corners of Isabel’s full mouth turned up slightly. Her eyes seemed to soften. Thad was struck again by how impossibly beautiful she was when she smiled. If he could, he would make her smile every day for eternity.

“Ill advised or not, it was what it was. And I, for one, was very willing. As far as I could tell, so were you.”

He nodded. “Willing” was an understatement.

“So let’s not screw it up with a bunch of awkwardness and regret. See…” Her head came up, and the hand still grasping his jaw pulled downward until their lips were separated by only a few molecules of air. “I was so cold, but I feel much better now.” She captured his lower lip between hers, suckling gently at the already healing cut. “Much.” She licked inside his mouth, going harder and deeper. “Better.”

Oh,
hell
yeah. Thad buried his confusion and guilt, and just gave in. Let his tongue play and dance with Isabel’s. His skin was slicked with sweat from their first go-round, making easy work of sliding down the length of her body. He stopped to kiss and nuzzle the creamy skin around her perfect little navel, trailing downward to her hipbone, her thigh, her knee, and then her calf.

Curling upon himself, he moved down just a little farther to kiss the top of her foot. Isabel had such sexy feet, her toenails polished beautifully with a sensuous mauve that seemed very “her.” After taking a few moments to kiss and revere her toes, he lifted each leg onto his shoulders and slid back up between her legs.

His tongue flicked a couple of times over her clit in a playful gesture before deepening into longer strokes with the flat of it. Licking. Worshiping. Her thighs tightened around the sides of his head, but even though his ears were partly covered, Thad could hear her whimpers of pleasure loud and clear. A rumble of accomplishment came from his throat when her hands grasped the back of his head, pressing and guiding him until her whimpers turned into moans and groans, and eventually the throaty cry of another orgasm.

They were both sweating profusely now, as wet as if they’d both just stepped out of the shower. He stroked an idle finger over the sheen of moisture on her abdomen. They’d been going at it pretty hard, but still. Wow.

Isabel shifted beneath him, bringing her legs down off his shoulders and onto the bed. Thad slid toward her lips, but before he finished the journey, she had shimmied from underneath him. Kissing against his chest, pressing until he was flat on the bed. Her tongue twirled around his nipple. Playful bites made a trail down to his groin. A gentle nuzzle warmed the thatch of hair at the base of his still hard penis before more nips and—
oh, yeah
—her mouth engulfed one testicle at a time, followed by more little bites on his inner thigh.

“My turn,” she murmured.

Motherfucker!

Thad moaned when Isabel’s mouth closed around his shaft. She took him to the back of her throat and up again, sliding her tongue along the length while she made the slow, steady glide. The hot suction of her mouth was gentle but firm, and fucked if he didn’t seem to have a hair trigger where this female was concerned because he was already on the verge again and fighting to hold back.

“Damn,” he breathed.

She swirled her tongue around the head of his cock and scraped a fang along the length. Had she drawn blood? Was she sipping it from there? The thought of it only got him hotter. Harder. And how had he never known about
that
kink before?

“Isabel.” The vibrations of her mumbled “mm-hmm” around his dick went straight to his balls. So, so close. “Isabel, you might wanna stop.”

She pulled off just long enough to ask, “Do you want me to stop?”

Holy shit, there was an option? Most females he’d been with didn’t—

Oh, hell yes.
Isabel seemed to have taken his lack of response as an invitation to continue. As well she should have. Thad’s fists squeezed shut and punched into the bed. His balls drew up in anticipation of his coming orgasm. He thrust his hands into her hair, massaging and guiding her head as she had done with him moments ago. His spine tingled. “Oh, damn.” His fingers brushed over more scar tissue at the base of her skull, and for the briefest second he lost his focus.

Getting it back wasn’t hard.

Seconds later, she took him deep into her throat and swallowed. His hoarse shout bounced around the room as the head of his cock blew and his upper body came off the bed almost of its own accord. His fangs crowded his mouth, and at the sight of her delectable arm across his hip, he couldn’t stop himself. Before his cock had stopped twitching, Thad had her hand in both of his, and his fangs buried deep in her wrist. Something hot and sharp burned in his forearm just like the last time they’d fucked, but the first taste of her blood washed away any questions he might have had about it.

Her blood was even better than he’d imagined. Rich and flowery and sweet. Like dark cherries and honeysuckle. It was so intense that his mind’s eye could practically see a kaleidoscope of colors flowing down the back of his throat. With the first swallow, a warm glow filled his body and spread throughout his limbs. A hundred years and who knew how many hosts, and he suddenly couldn’t recall a single one that had come before.

But he would never forget the taste of Isabel.

Though it seemed he could drink forever, Thad forced himself to cease. After he licked and dropped to the bed, his breathing started to even out again. He closed his eyes and relaxed into the pillow, stroking his fingers through Isabel’s damp hair. He couldn’t remember a time when he’d felt more satiated, more satisfied, or more totally wrung out. Couldn’t think of much of anything, really, at the moment.

“God, Isabel, I think you literally blew my mind.”

***

Isabel closed her eyes and sighed, resting her head on the top of Thad’s thick thigh. For all of her resolve to distance herself from Thad, she was going in exactly the wrong direction. But she was content and she had bigger issues for the moment, starting with making sure Alexia was all right. She’d worry about the rest later.

“Isabel.”

“Hmm?”

“Isabel,” he said again, more insistently. “Open your eyes.”

“What’s wrong?” She blinked and focused her good eye. “Holy cow… Thad?”

A fine mist hung in the room, almost like a fog. A strange tingle in Isabel’s fingers prompted her to look down. Some sort of glow illuminated where her hand rested on Thad’s leg, and—whoa, was that
steam
coming from between them? She jerked back to look at Thad, whose blue eyes met hers.

“Yeah, this is pretty fucked up,” he breathed.

“What the hell is going on, Thad?” Everything was suddenly very surreal and floaty.

He ran his hand over his hair, which now stood up in wet spikes. Turning his hand palm up, he focused quietly until a tiny fuzzy, warm orange ball formed in his palm. “I think,” he said with a slow chuckle, “I have a power. Some kind of fire. Like my dad.” Pride shone brightly all over his face.

Isabel sat back on her heels, staring at that little glow with deep concentration. “Wow… that’s…” She forced a smile. Because holy, holy freaking cow. This scored a solid ten on her no-damn-way-o-meter.

“God, that’s amazing, Thad.” Suddenly her skin prickled all over. She couldn’t sit still. “You know, I’m going to go take a shower. We’ll talk later?” Heart slamming into her ribs, she speed-walked into the bathroom and closed the door without waiting for him to answer.

The night was bitterly cold, and Lee’s breath puffed out ahead of him as he quickly traversed the grounds on foot. The estate was divided roughly into four quadrants: the working farm on one, Thad’s home on another, the training center and barracks on a third. The last held homes for other residents of the estate, and that was where he was headed.

As Thad’s primary guard, Lee was the only member of the military branch not allowed a home of his own.

Siddoh lived in a cushy but oddly banal redbrick colonial with white shutters, a stone’s throw from the training area. Lee found the scruffy male in his bookshelf-lined office with a pair of granny glasses perched on his nose, bent studiously over a mass of papers spread out over what was probably an overpriced mahogany desk. He looked up at Lee with a cocky smile and threw his feet up on the desk, then leaned back in his leather swivel chair with his hands clasped behind his head.

Siddoh had the same arrogance that Lee’s father had once had, and Lee couldn’t stand the son of a bitch.

“Hey, man, welcome back. How was the big adventure?” Siddoh had been among the many who had thought the trip was a total waste and didn’t mind sharing his opinion. There was never any filter between the younger male’s brain and his mouth.

“Actually…” Lee stopped with his arms crossed, looking down on Siddoh from across the large desk. “We got a match.” He couldn’t hold back his satisfaction when Siddoh’s eyebrows shot up.

“No shit? Huh.” Siddoh straightened in his chair. “Well, that certainly is interesting.” He stroked his chin thoughtfully.

“Indeed. So you want to give me a status update?” He nodded to the papers on Siddoh’s desk. “What’s all this? And what the fuck is the deal with the glasses?”

Siddoh shot a glare, removed the glasses, and rubbed a red spot on the bridge of his nose. “Status? Everything has been quiet. Too quiet. No missing reports in the past two weeks, and our boys haven’t run into much. Except Xander, who’s convalescing in the barracks after his shoulder had a nasty run-in with a very large wizard knife. The knife was large. Not the wizard. The wizard was fairly average, actually. Anyway…”