Tempted by a Rogue Prince (24 page)

She moaned in her sleep, her hands shoving at thin air, fitful movements edged with desperation that he could feel in her.

Nightmares haunted her.

He blinked and leaned towards her, reaching with his bare left hand, and paused with his fingers close to her forehead. What was he doing?

He stared at his dirty fingers, so close to brushing her fair skin, to what? Soothe her? Chase her nightmares away?

He was probably the cause of them.

He had caught the way she looked at him whenever he killed. She thought him a monster.

He forced himself to lean back again, the action taking effort, his body refusing to comply with his mind’s commands.

Or perhaps it was the part of him that longed to gently lay his fingers on her and stroke her cheek, to ease her while she slept and give her good dreams.

That longing was both foreign and familiar, as if the capability for good and kindness had always remained within him and hadn’t been purged as he had thought.

Had he not sought his brother’s ki’ara as an act of kindness to him?

Had he not fought Kordula’s commands to kill Loren and had disobeyed her to protect him?

Was there good within him still?

He cast his eyes away from Rosalind and picked at the dirt again, focusing on it and seeking nature. She was still buried deep, held far away from him, but she felt closer now.

His gaze roamed back to the witch and studied her, absorbing her beauty and fairness. She twitched again, thrashing against an invisible foe. Her right arm shot up, smacked off the wall as she rolled onto her back, and jerked her left with it as the chain between them snapped tight.

She lashed out with her legs, whimpering as she clawed at thin air.

A tear cut down the side of her face.

Vail was across the cave in an instant, kneeling beside her and clutching her restraints, his heart pounding wildly against his chest. He held her manacles, ridiculous fear clawing at him again, stopping him from doing as he wanted and holding her wrists instead. She fought him, her struggle increasing along with the fear he sensed in her.

“Little Wild Rose,” he said and held her tighter, stopping her from hitting him. “Wake now.”

She didn’t. Tears streamed down her temples and she gasped for air, sending him into a spin, a whirlwind of emotions he wasn’t equipped to deal with.

Concern. Compassion. Fear. Anxiety.

He leaned closer, locked her hands to his chest with one of his arms and lowered his free hand towards her. It trembled, the shaking growing violent as it neared her cheek. Her warmth seeped into his palm and her legs thrashed against his side. She kneed him in the ribs and cried out, her fear a sharp pain in his heart.

Vail sucked down a breath and pressed his bare palm against her cheek.

A shiver bolted up his arm, a thousand volts that jolted him and left his mind reeling.

She was warm and soft beneath his calloused fingers.

“Little Wild Rose… wake up,” he murmured softly, lost in the feel of touching her and fascinated by it.

Her eyelids fluttered and he snatched his hand back, afraid of how she would react if she found him touching her.

She would punish him.

He dropped her hands and shuffled backwards, his heart clenching. When her eyes opened and fell to him, he averted his and bowed his head.

He waited for her to berate him.

Punish him.

He shouldn’t have touched her. He didn’t have permission to touch. He had to behave himself or bad things happened.
Bad things
. She would punish him because he had been insolent and unruly. He had dared to touch her.

“What happened?” she whispered, her voice hoarse and thick. “Are we in a cave?”

He nodded but kept his eyes averted. He couldn’t speak. He wasn’t allowed to speak. If he spoke, she punished him.

He flexed his fingers, forming his black serrated claws from his armour, and raked them across the black stone floor of the cave on either side of his knees, etching lines in the hard basalt.

“I fell asleep?” She sat up and rubbed her eyes.

He nodded again, but remembered what she did to him whenever he lied to her, and quickly shook his head instead.

“I did fall asleep or didn’t?” She brushed her hair back, working on some of the knots with her fingers.

He wasn’t sure how he could answer that without speaking. She didn’t like it when he spoke. She didn’t like that he would snarl things at her in a voice that dripped with venom and deadly intent.

He stared at the worn smooth ground in front of his knees and reached for it. His hand shook but he couldn’t stop it from trembling. She might punish him for this. She had punished him when he had done such a thing before, breaking her command not to communicate with Loren’s ki’ara.

He scratched two words into the rock with his claws.

“Passed out?” she said and he felt her eyes on him.

He flinched away, quickly withdrawing his hand and curled up. Waiting. She would strike him for sure. Or worse. Not worse. He shook his head and flexed his claws. He didn’t want worse.

“Vail? What’s wrong?” She reached for him and he flinched again, jerking his head backwards. “Did something happen while I was out?”

He shook his head, and then nodded. Couldn’t lie to her. She always knew when he lied.

“Look at me.”

He had to obey. If he didn’t, she would do bad things. He lifted his head and looked across at her, the pace of his heart sickening him together with the memories that collided in his head.

Blue eyes held his, soft and sparkling with stars. Blonde hair swayed across her chest as she leaned forwards, planting one hand on the black ground for support, drawing closer to him.

“What’s wrong?” she said, her voice a sweet melody, filled with warmth and light.

Little Wild Rose.

His Little Wild Rose.

“Tell me.”

That was right. He could speak to her. He had spoken to her and she had seemed to enjoy it at times, but hated it at others. She didn’t like it when he cursed at her or threatened her, or ordered her around, but she had never punished him for it.

“Nightmare.” He pushed that word out, testing the waters.

Her shoulders slumped and she rubbed the back of her neck. “I hate them.”

He frowned and edged closer, compelled to offer her comfort. “Woke you.”

She smiled. “Thanks. Did something happen while I was asleep?”

He hesitated, icy claws gripping and squeezing his heart, knowing she was asking what had happened to him to make him like this, a weak male, twisted by his past and controlled by it.

“Vail?” She spoke his name so softly that warmth curled through him.

He had never known his mother, she had died giving birth to him, but knew if he had met her that she would have said his name with as much love and tenderness.

“Woke you,” he said to his knees and exhaled a hard breath before adding, “Touched you.”

Her shock rippled through their link.

“Oh. Did you shake me awake?” she said and he shook his head, cursing her for presuming he would use a violent touch to rouse her. “How then?”

Vail kept his eyes pinned on the floor, lifted his left hand and mentally commanded his armour to recede from it. He drew in a steadying breath and brought his hand close to her cheek. Her warm breath skated across it, making his skin tingle and his whole body ache with a need to press his palm against her cheek again.

He wanted to feel her softness and her warmth.

“I see.” She ghosted her right hand over the back of his, the action causing her hair to shift towards him and sweep across his skin.

A shiver went through him, heightening every need that consumed him and drove him to touch her. Even her hair was as soft and smooth as silk against his skin.

His breathing quickened, his chest heaving with each one, and he risked looking at her. She met his gaze the moment he did, her delicate features set in a placid expression but one that held warmth and understanding.

“You can touch again… if you want.” Those words were tempting, a spell without magic that bewitched him into complying with her suggestion.

Gods, he wanted to.

She pressed her hand closer to his, so they almost touched.

His stomach squirmed and he snatched his hand back.

Her face fell, a hint of sorrow darkening her eyes and turning them stormy, and she lowered her hand into her lap. “At least you didn’t bare your fangs at me this time. I guess that’s progress.”

He ignored that remark and shuffled back to his side of the cave.

Her stomach growled, the grumbling noise loud in the tense silence.

Her cheeks blazed and she dropped her eyes to her stomach, idly rubbing it through her black dress and causing the fabric to tighten across her breasts.

Vail tried not to stare.

His mouth turned dry, he swallowed hard, and dragged his gaze away. It fell on his right forearm and he frowned. There was a form of sustenance he could offer her.

His black armour peeled back from his forearm, he raised it to his mouth and sank his fangs into his flesh close to the marks he had made for her before.

Rosalind gasped. “What are you doing?”

He released his arm and offered it to her. “Drink.”

She shook her head.

Vail growled. “Drink. Female.”

“You need it. If I take that, it will make me stronger but it will weaken you. You need to feed too. What will you eat?”

His eyes betrayed a direct order and slid down the smooth column of her throat, lingering on the curve he could see through her tangled blonde hair.

Her throat worked overtime on a hard swallow, cranking up his hunger, making his mouth water and his fangs itch. She tasted like sunshine and flowers, and everything good. Her hand shot up to cover the spot his gaze bore into and she gasped, and he realised he had growled.

“See, this really isn’t a good idea.”

“Drink.” He shoved his bleeding arm towards her.

She hesitated, her cheeks darkening. “Well… there’s sort of another reason this might be a bad idea… last time… you, um… liked it.”

He frowned, not following her.

She swallowed again and waggled a finger towards his groin. “
Liked
it, liked it.”

His eyes widened.

Blood dripped from his arm and fell in slow motion to the black ground.

He had grown hard for her?

That part of his anatomy seemed to recall it and twitched in response beneath his skin-tight black armour. He crossed his legs so she wouldn’t notice it and stared at his bleeding arm.

His need to provide for her and keep her strong warred with a need to shove her away and force her to keep her distance. He growled under his breath and battled his body at the same time as his mind kept conjuring images of her taking his blood, her hands on his flesh, clutching him to her mouth as she fed from his vein. His cock twitched again.

“Still want me to drink?” she said, sounding seductive in his addled mind.

Gods, did he. He couldn’t recall the last time he had grown hard of his own volition. It threatened to dredge up his dark and twisted memories, but something held them back. Desire for her. Need of her. It should have repulsed him, yet he found himself aching for it and for her.

“I guess we’re doing this then,” she muttered and got onto all fours, and his body jerked hard in response, sending a shiver straight down his shaft to his balls.

He focused to shut out his memories and hold them at bay, used all of his willpower to ignore the ache in his groin, and offered his arm to her.

The second her lips made contact with his flesh, he hissed and tipped his chin up, pressing the back of his head hard into the cragged wall of the cave. His fangs lengthened, aching with a need to pierce her flesh. She suckled softly, each pull like a shot of the most potent drug—liquid Heaven. Shivers, hot and fierce and electrifying, rushed in a constant stream from the point where her flesh met his, heating every inch of him and leaving him boneless, too addled by the pleasure to move and make her stop.

He couldn’t recall the last time he had felt pleasure either.

Never with the witch.

He stared at Little Wild Rose, seeing a witch and feeling a need to push her away. His body didn’t respond, his limbs too heavy to move. Only when she released him, giving one last flick of her tongue that shot down his hard cock too, did he find the strength to draw his arm away.

He leaned back into the wall, breathing hard, hazy with pleasure and feeling as if he was floating.

“Did I hurt you?” she whispered and he shook his head. The darkness commanded him to snarl and take her blood now, to make her pay for laying her hands on him, but he didn’t have the energy.

The pleasure and blood loss combined beautifully to mercifully leave him powerless to act on those dark hungers.

All he could manage was to lift his arm to his mouth and lick the puncture wounds. His skin tasted like her. He savoured it, taking her into him, satisfied that he had fed his ki’ara and she would be safe for now, until he could hunt for her and find her something nutritious to eat.

Her gaze bore into him and slowly lowered, drifting down his chest and then his stomach, and falling lower still. He flicked a glance at her and she quickly looked away, a rosy hue climbing her cheeks. He shifted his legs, keeping his erection concealed from her, knowing she had wanted to see whether she had affected him this time as she had the first time she had taken his blood.

Vail felt certain she would affect him like this every time.

“Come,” he said and she eyed him, a wary edge to her expression. He held his right hand out and called an object to it.

Rather than coming to him, she shrank back against the black wall of the cave. “Are you sure?”

He wasn’t, but he nodded anyway, hoping that he could handle feeling her powers and knowing now was probably the best time for them to do this, while he was too hazy to muster the strength to harm her.

He had forced her to trek across dangerous lands because of his fear of her powers, and she had shown great courage to do so without complaint and without asking him to release her. It was time he showed courage too, and treated his female the way she deserved to be treated.