Reaver (24 page)

Harrowgates. It’s only a matter of time before your father’s forces find us, and if darkmen are on our

trail, we need to get out of Sheoul. Now.”

“No.” This time her refusal carried less resolve, and even as she formed an argument—a pathetic

one—her fangs lengthened and throbbed, and all the starved cells in her body started to quiver.

“Feeding does strange things to me.”

He barked out a husky laugh. “It does strange things to me, too. You need this, angel.” Casually,

gracefully, he relaxed his long body and crossed his legs at the ankles. “Come on. I’m right here. It’s

just blood. No big deal. Just like last time.”

It’s just blood. No big deal.
Except it was a big deal. It was a huge deal for her to turn into an ugly

beast, and Reaver was all,
Go ahead, stick your fangs in me
. And wait… he’d said
angel
. Usually he

called her
fallen
.

It was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to her. Warmth spread through her and emotion she

couldn’t identify bubbled up inside her. It overflowed from the sealed container she’d kept all her

touchy-feely feelings inside since she’d fallen, and while her inner demon wanted to blow her stack

and rip Reaver apart for being nice and tapping into that container, she couldn’t.

She needed to feed, she needed to build her strength, and as much as she hated to admit it, she

needed Reaver. Like it or not, he was her lifeline, and she had to grab hold and not let go. Otherwise, if

they got caught, his sacrifice would have been for naught.

“Seriously?” he asked, in a gravelly voice that told her how tired he was. “Do I have to force you?”

She snorted. “As if you could.”

With a flick of his fingernail, he opened a vein in his throat the way he had last time. The heady,

intoxicating scent of blood hit her like a blow, short-circuiting every thought that didn’t revolve

around feeding.

She locked on to the crimson stream dripping down his neck, following the tendons that stood out

starkly under his bronzed, perfect skin.

“Take it.” His eyes were heavy lidded now, his body relaxed, and her mouth watered.

He didn’t have to tell her again. In a heartbeat she was on him. Straddling his thighs, she opened her

mouth over the cut. She wasn’t going to use her fangs, not this time. With her fangs, blood flowed too

fast. She took too much. If she could drink slowly and limit her intake, she should be able to control

her renegade Satanic DNA.

The first drops of blood hit her tongue, and she gasped as the sensation of grabbing a live wire

ripped through her. She could feel the bones in her back begin to knit and form more framework for

her wings and the ecstasy of angelic sex made her writhe. Images flashed in her head. Erotic images of

Reaver slipping his hand under her shirt and sliding his palm up her thigh. Of him kissing her breasts,

tonguing her nipples. Of him licking his way down her naked body to her sex.

“Verrine,” he whispered. “I want you. Damn… I remember you.”

Yes
. Reaver’s voice filtered through her ears and heat flamed across her skin as the fantasies played

out and his blood flowed over her tongue. But… no, this wasn’t right. The images in her head weren’t

part of a fantasy. They were memories, and while Yenrieth had said he wanted her, just that once, he

hadn’t said anything about remembering her.

And Reaver definitely wasn’t the angel who had made her come three times
before
he took her

virginity.

Yenrieth
.

That son of a bitch. Leave it to him to interrupt her time with Reaver.

Fool. It was Reaver who interrupted the memories of Yenrieth
.

She jerked upright, so startled by that thought that she couldn’t focus on feeding. Reaver was

breathing hard and staring at her as if he’d seen a ghost, but if anything, she’d seen a phantom. A

phantom lover.

The memories of her night with Yenrieth had been with her for thousands of years, and other than

the fact that she couldn’t remember what he looked like, they had never altered or dimmed. But

somehow, today, they’d not just changed; they’d gotten better.

Or maybe Reaver’s blood running through her veins was messing with her head.

“Why did you stop feeding?” His voice carried a strange hitch to it, but as he threaded his fingers

through her hair, his touch was astonishingly tender. “What’s the matter?”

Oh, I’m picturing your head between my legs, your mouth at my sex while you fuck me with your

tongue. Why?

She probably shouldn’t lead with that. Still a little dazed from the trip down memory lane, she

murmured, “I don’t look like a demon, do I?”

He used his free hand to tilt her chin up and down and from side to side, making a big production of

deciding if she had gone all beastie. She tried to read him, to get a hint of what was running through

that handsome head, but his eyes gave nothing away.

Finally, his gaze met hers, and oh, she’d been wrong about his eyes giving nothing away. They were

filled with heat, longing, and the vaguest sense of… familiarity? Déjà vu? They hadn’t had sex before,

but they’d both seen each other naked. That could explain it.

Except that, back in the cavern, she’d felt that same familiarity. A rightness that didn’t make sense.

Frankly, the mystery was starting to piss her off.

“You don’t look like a demon,” Reaver said, his voice gravelly, and she wondered how he’d sound

after a long, hard night of sex. “You need to get some rest. Let my blood heal you.”

She shifted on his lap, nearly moaning at the feel of his hard shaft pushing against the fly of his

jeans. She loved that she could affect him that way. Perhaps it was time that she demanded what he

owed her.

Sex.

Erotic tension bloomed between them, thick and heavy, almost as if he’d read her thoughts. Maybe

she didn’t need to invoke their deal. Maybe he’d sleep with her willingly.

And maybe she was a big idiot. Just because he’d rescued her didn’t mean he’d lower his lofty

standards to screw a fallen angel. So yes, she could demand that he fulfill his end of their bargain…

except that all of a sudden, forcing him to pleasure her seemed like a real shitty thing to do.

Huh. Looked like her moral compass was starting to point more and more toward Heavenly north.

Which scared the shit out of her. She wanted to be good. She did. But wouldn’t that mean lowering

her guard? She’d lowered her guard with Yenrieth, and he’d nearly destroyed her.

But maybe she could start small, like magnanimously telling Reaver she’d let him out of the

bargain.

“Reaver—” She spoke at the same time he said, “Harvester,” and because she was feeling all

unselfish and good, she patted him on his chest and said, “You first.”

Dear Lord, his chest was firm. She patted a little longer than she should have, but hey, she still had

a long way to go to be a totally upstanding person.

To her heart-stopping, mouth-dropping shock, he placed his hand over hers. “Why did you kiss me

back at the cavern?”

Too flustered to form a clever response, she said simply, “To annoy you.”

He laughed, a hearty, soul-deep sound. “You do that a lot. You always have.”

Always have?
He made it sound like they’d known each other for centuries. “Did it work?”

“Oh, yeah.” He shifted, lifting his hips, and the motion put his erection fully against her sex as she

straddled him. “It annoyed me. It would annoy me if you did it again.”

She inhaled sharply. Was this a challenge? Or was he issuing an invitation? Harvester didn’t like

invitations. Invitations were commands veiled in the pretense of having a choice.

So she’d take this as a challenge. She never turned those down.

Drawing on rusty seduction skills she hadn’t used in what seemed like forever, she leaned in,

angling her face toward his. She paused when only a whisper of air separated their lips. His eyes

darkened and grew heavy-lidded, and she felt an abrupt sense of relief. He wasn’t pushing her away.

He wasn’t making her feel like an idiot for wanting to kiss him.

It shocked her how much that mattered to her.

Reaver’s heartbeat thrummed rapidly against her palm, speeding up as her mouth hovered over his.

But she wouldn’t give him what he expected. At least, not yet. Reaver had taken the lead for most of

the journey so far, and it was time she took control. And kept it.

Lowering her head, she dragged her mouth on a lazy path from his throat to his jaw, where she

nipped him hard enough to make him hiss. His hands dropped to her waist, gripping hard when she

soothed her little bite with her tongue before moving on to his mouth. His lips met hers eagerly, and

she started to think that maybe taking the upper hand wouldn’t be as easy as she’d thought.

He licked at her, forcing her lips open. With a groan, he rolled her under him so he was pinning her,

moving between her legs in a slow, sinuous motion that made her writhe to get him even closer.

“Damn,” he whispered against her lips. “Just like I remember. You feel… perfect. Beautiful.”

A wave of heat washed over her with so much force she didn’t bother asking what he remembered.

She knew he appreciated her body… hell, he’d always gone for the females who dressed on the trashy

side, so she used to dress as provocatively as possible just to mess with him. What better way to drive

him crazy than to make him hot and bothered for a female he detested?

But she hadn’t ever believed he thought she was beautiful.

Reaver shifted so they were both on their sides. His hands gripped her hips, guiding her as she

ground against him, the weird gel mattress moving with them. It was as if they were in the sky, mating

on air currents, angel style.

She wedged her hand between them and palmed his arousal, and his harsh, ragged breath vibrated

her all the way to her bones. Even with the thick barrier of his jeans she could feel the hardness of

him, the impressive size, the heat that radiated into her skin.

Enough playing. She didn’t do foreplay. Yenrieth had set the bar, and even though he’d destroyed

her emotionally after it was over, she hadn’t been able to take her time with anyone since.

And it wasn’t like they had all the time in the world to have sex anyway. No, this had to be a

quickie. Maybe once she fucked him she’d be over whatever it was about him that made her crazy.

Since the very first time she met him on his first day of Watcher duty, she’d been drawn to him like a

scissor moth to an open eye, which had never made sense. It still didn’t. This was too hot, too intense.

Her skin shrank at the thought. This kind of intensity was bad. She was too involved, and Reaver

had to know it. Knowledge was power.

She would never allow any male to wield the kind of power over her that Yenrieth had.

Too late
.

Panic built in her chest even as desire bloomed between her legs. His hand drifted to her butt, and

her desire flared hotter, edging out panic and roaring to victory.

Well played, Reaver. Well played
.

Sex could be just sex. That’s all it ever had been for her. She wasn’t a young, stupid angel giving

her virginity to the male she loved.

She was quite capable of separating her emotions from her physical needs.

Telling herself all the lies she needed to believe, she dragged her fingernails up his length, smiling

at his combined hiss and moan of pleasure. At the button at the top of his fly, she stopped, letting

herself toy with the brass disc for a heartbeat.

Yes
.
This was going to be good.

She flicked the button and tugged on the denim, and the fly opened with a series of muffled pops.

Reaver’s cock sprang free, a broad, dusky column pulsing with thick veins. Finally, after all these

years of curiosity, she took him in her palm.

He gasped, followed by a soft curse that was more of a moan. Oh, she loved those sounds—there

was nothing hotter than a male in the throes of pleasure, nothing more beautiful than Reaver as he

threw his head back and panted, his parted lips glistening from their kiss. In her hand he was rock hard

under velvety-smooth skin, and as much as she wanted to pump her fist and take him higher, she

wanted to savor this moment more.

She supposed she could take a
little
time for foreplay.

A desperate craving unfurled in her belly and reached into places she’d forgotten she had,

awakening a beast she wasn’t sure could be put back in its cage. No, she was sure. She’d always been

able to have casual sex… in fact, she preferred a no-strings roll in the hay.

But the desire she felt right now was nothing like what she’d felt for those casual flings.

Squeezing lightly, she swept her thumb back and forth at the silky tip of him, loving how his entire

body jerked with each slow pass. She threw her leg over his and got even closer, so ready to take him