The Dark Vampire: Last True Vampire 3 (23 page)

“No,” Bria choked. “You’re wrong. She wouldn’t. . . . William is dead. My uncle said he was killed.”

“He was. And your mother couldn’t let him go. William serves Astrid. He’s a wendigo. Your mother cheated the necromancer and your uncle fled with you after she was killed. For centuries Astrid has hunted you in order to claim what was promised to her.”

Realization slammed into Bria’s gut and she buckled. All of these years . . .
centuries
as a prisoner! All because her mother had traded Bria’s life for her father’s and refused to pay up when things hadn’t turned out the way she’d expected they would.

Bria’s stomach heaved and she swallowed down the
bile that churned with an acidic burn. “It’s not true.” Her heart hammered in her chest, thundered in her ears. Her vision darkened at the periphery and Bria swayed on her feet as realization quickly turned to shock. “My uncle told you this?” she screeched. “It’s a lie!”

Jenner caught her against his massive frame and held her tight to him. He spoke the truth. His scent was clean and masculine, musky from the workout but without the sour edge that would betray the lie. “I’m so sorry, Bria.” Jenner cupped the back of her head as he held her against him. “I wish to the gods it was a lie.”

“I wish she’d given me to the necromancer,” Bria whispered. She thought back to that moment when she’d bled out in her uncle’s arms at the gates of Mikhail’s property. “I wish she’d let me go.”

Fear gripped at Jenner’s heart with sharp claws. Bria’s calm resolve shook him to his foundation. “Don’t say that,” he murmured against her hair. He held her tighter until his arms encircled her narrow torso. “Don’t
ever
say it again.”

“This is why you’ve been teaching me how to fight, isn’t it? Why you won’t let me go out alone.”

Bria pushed herself away from Jenner’s embrace and fixed him with her cool amethyst stare. The accusation in her tone shredded him as guilt settled on his chest like a stone. But Jenner knew something of Thomas Fairchild’s obsession. Like her uncle he couldn’t bear the thought of losing Bria, and so he’d done the only thing he thought he could do. He’d made her a kept thing.

“I can’t lose you, Bria.” He did nothing to soften his words. “I won’t.”

Her low, disbelieving laughter echoed through the gym and brought chills to Jenner’s flesh. “I’m sure you could find a new sparring partner with ease, Jenner.”

It was obvious she egged him on to coax him into a fight, and Jenner was enough of a hotheaded asshole to take the bait. “You know you mean more than that to me.”

“Do I?” Bria scoffed. “You have your soul back and the vein at my
wrist
when your thirst mounts. Aside from that, I don’t see that you have any other use for me.”

“Is that what you want from me, Bria? To
use
you?”

Her glare burned through him. “Someone should, don’t you think?”

The threat inherent in her words caused Jenner’s blood to boil. When had this ceased to be about the threat to her life? He leaned in close, a snarl gathering in his chest. “I told you what would happen if another male ever put his hands on you.”

“You don’t seem all that interested in my body. What would you care if I gave it to someone else?”

Bria’s goading slowly pushed Jenner to a very dark place. Visions of her naked beneath that bastard Lucas materialized in his imagination. “Careful, Bria.” Jenner bit the words off before he’d say something he’d regret. Something that would push her away forever. The more she pushed, the more frantic he became.

Bria brought her wrist to her mouth and bit down, tearing the flesh. Jenner flinched as the scent of her blood hit his nostrils and his bloodlust cranked from one to a million in a split second. Gods, the scent of her drove him mad with thirst.

“I could drain it into a glass for you,” she suggested with a sneer. Blood dripped from the punctures in her wrist, landing on the mat below with a
tap, tap, tap
that Jenner felt with the force of a sledgehammer to his gut. “That way you wouldn’t have to put your mouth on me at all.”

A vicious snarl tore from Jenner’s throat. He rushed at her, mindless, overcome with need and lust and desper
ate to satisfy that part of him that had gone unfulfilled for too gods-damned long. Bria held up her hand to stay his progress and crimson rivulets of blood ran down her forearm in a swirling pattern that hypnotized him.

“Be mindful, Jenner. You wouldn’t want to soil my virginal skin with your mouth.”

Jenner snatched Bria by the wrist and hauled her to him. He ran the flat of his tongue up her arm to the punctures in her wrist, taking in his mouth every drop of the blood she’d wantonly spilled. “This is
mine,
” he growled, fangs bared. “You are
mine
.”

Bria met him stare for stare. “Prove it.”

Jenner took her down to the mat in a blur of motion. When his fangs broke the skin at her throat Bria cried out, a sound that was as much relief as it was release. It tore at his composure until nothing remained but tattered shreds of want and need.

She demanded he prove to her that she was his? He’d prove that to her and more. Jenner seized both of her wrists. He gathered them into one hand and pinned them to the mat as he continued to drink. Bria squirmed beneath him; her breath came in sharp gasps that brushed the hair near his temple. He reached between them and shoved his free hand past the elastic waistband of her workout pants and into her underwear. She arched up as he cupped the heat of her pussy in his palm and a groan worked its way up his throat as he found her wet and ready for him.

Gods.
Withholding himself from her had been
torture
.

Jenner wanted Bria more than he’d ever wanted anything in his entire existence. Maybe it was gods-damned time that he took her down from the ivory tower he’d placed her in and finally claimed what was his. Bria didn’t care about her innocence. Her virginity. Or the fact that she’d been born well above Jenner’s station. She wanted
him
. Her scent, her slick sex, and her quickened breaths were all the proof he needed. The weeks spent keeping himself from her out of fear had worn him down to the point that his own damned lusts mastered him. It countered everything he’d been trying to prevent. He’d had her blood every night since their tethering and hadn’t lost himself to his thirst yet. He hadn’t once lost control with her. Why couldn’t he have her? What force on this earth save himself kept him from her?

He needed to fuck her now, before they both died from their want.

Jenner forced himself to disengage from Bria’s throat and closed the punctures. His brain buzzed from the high of taking her vein, and her body, soft and willing beneath him, overwhelmed his senses. Bria whimpered and thrust up to press her pussy tighter against his palm. “Damn it, Jenner,” she said from between clenched teeth. “Touch me.”

Jenner slipped a single finger in her tight channel. Bria moaned, the sound echoing around them in the small studio. He looked up at the mirrors that lined the walls and his breath caught at the multiple images of Bria reflected back at him, her head thrown back in ecstasy. Her tight heat squeezed him and Jenner couldn’t help but imagine the sweet torture of her inner walls clenching his cock. He moved his finger out slowly and plunged back in just as carefully. Bria writhed beneath him and he watched her many reflections, hypnotized by the erotic show.

“Deeper,” Bria panted. “Harder. Please.”

She thrust her hips up and Jenner pulled back. She gritted her teeth in frustration and her fangs pricked her bottom lip. Her hands clenched and unclenched in Jenner’s grip, but he kept her wrists pinned to the mats beneath her. Her quiet moans grew to frustrated whimpers and deep sobs of pleasure as he continued to ease his finger
in and out of her. If she felt frustrated by his gentleness it was nothing compared to what he felt throughout these weeks of celibacy.

“Stop treating me as though I’ll break.” Her sweet voice bit with an edge of anger. He looked down at her face to find her eyes bright silver and trained on his face. Bria’s head came up off the mat and her chest heaved with her agitation. “Take me, Jenner.”

This aggressive side of her personality drove him past the point of reason. Jenner’s cock throbbed in time with his pulse; it fucking
ached
with the need for release. He wanted to rip her flimsy cotton pants from her body and pound into her. He wanted to fuck her until the desperate ache that clawed at his chest evaporated under her cries. Needed to feel her pussy squeeze his shaft and milk him dry.

He drove his finger a little deeper, slightly harder, and Bria’s eyes rolled back as she let out a loud moan. Control became harder to maintain as he pulled out and thrust again, this time easing a second finger inside of her. Bria’s eyes went wide and she gasped at the intrusion. A rush of wetness coated his fingers as he continued to pump them in and out. Bria’s breaths grew shallow and she wriggled beneath him. “No,” she said. “I don’t want to come like this.” A crease cut into her delicate brow. “I want you inside of me, Jenner. I want you to fuck me.”

Gods,
those wanton words from her lips . . . Jenner resisted the urge to sink his fangs in her throat once again. To sink his cock deep inside of her. His hunger for her knew no satiation. His want of her body drove him to the brink of his sanity. If he took her now he’d hurt her. His own savage need would ruin them both and she’d hate him for it despite her pleas.
No.
He couldn’t give her what she wanted. Not until he had a better grip on himself. Instead, he put his mouth to hers to silence her and began to work
her clit with the pad of his thumb as he continued to thrust with his fingers. He could still pleasure her. He could still break her apart.

A spasm traveled through Bria’s body into Jenner’s as she came. Her pussy pulsed around his fingers, holding him tight. Her hips thrust wildly beneath him and he swallowed her desperate cries as he continued to kiss her. When he pulled away, Bria’s eyes were squeezed shut and she turned her head away. Through their tether, her anger and hurt funneled into Jenner’s chest and struck his sternum like a fist. He couldn’t give her what she wanted. Not yet. Not until he had a better handle on himself. How could he make her understand that he’d do anything to protect her? Even if that meant protecting her from himself?

“How much longer are you going to be?” A loud voice accompanied several loud bangs on the door. “We have an eight-thirty class and you’re putting us behind schedule.”

“In a minute!” Jenner’s deep, gravelly voice boomed through the quiet studio. He released his grip on Bria’s wrists and eased her underwear and pants back up. Her breaths heaved in her chest and her cheeks were flushed crimson with both passion and anger. She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. “Come on,
viaton,
” he said low. “Time to go.”

She looked up at him, her eyes narrowed with anger. “You can’t keep me at arm’s length forever, Jenner.”

He knew that. And he was terrified of what would happen when she’d finally had enough of his bullshit.

“A
necromancer, huh?” Naya let out a low whistle. “You’re hunting some pretty big game, Jenner.”

He let out a snort. Ronan’s mate was a powerful witch. She could track magic and magic users by following a trail of music only she could hear. Truth be told, Naya put Jenner on edge. She radiated power and it made his fangs twitch in his gums. After talking to Thomas, Jenner knew that he’d never be able to find this Astrid on his own. Hell, they couldn’t even pinpoint Gregor and he was without a doubt hiding somewhere in the city. If Jenner was going to free Bria from the prison her life had been the only way he could do it was with Naya’s help.

“If she’s in the city, could you find her?”

“No,” Ronan cut in with a low growl. “Absolutely not.”

Naya rolled her eyes at Ronan’s overprotectiveness. “Are you saying you don’t think I’m strong enough to take on a necromancer?”

Jenner waited for Ronan to take the bait. He raked his fingers through his tawny hair and blew out a breath. “I’m saying you’ll never get the chance to find out.”

“I don’t need Naya to fight the bitch,” Jenner interjected. “Just track her.”

Naya looked a little put out. She pursed her lips in a petulant pout and fixed Ronan with her dark-eyed stare. “You worry too much.”

“And with good reason.” Ronan began to pace the breadth of his perfectly decorated living room. “You’d chase her down and take her on single-handedly if you were given the chance.”

Naya smiled with pride and shrugged as if to say she couldn’t argue the matter with her mate. Jenner looked out the large picture window that overlooked the city. Myriad lights twinkled, a veritable universe beneath them. Though it was rumored that all vampires were descended from a god, they were far from infallible. Jenner’s gut clenched as he thought once again about Bria and his desperate desire to protect her.

“It’s not the tracking that’s the problem, Jenner. The only way to kill a necromancer is to cut out its heart. I don’t know anyone who’s ever gotten close enough to one to even try. Are you sure you want to take on that sort of power?”

It wasn’t a question of him being sure. If Jenner had any hope of salvaging any chance of a relationship with Bria it had to be done. His worry for her would only prompt him to make her more of a prisoner than she already was or ever had been. And she’d hate him for it. He already hated himself for it. “I’m not concerned,” Jenner said. “Black magic or not, if you can find her for me, I’ll kill her.”

“I don’t want Naya involved,” Ronan said again. “There has to be another way to find her.”

“Naya is the only one who can track magic,” Jenner said. “I need her, Ronan. You have my word that no harm will come to her.”

“Luz could do it,” Ronan suggested.

Another witch, Jenner suspected. And by Naya’s angry expression, one she didn’t want anywhere close to L.A. “Abso-freakin’-lutely not.”

Power sizzled in the air. Ronan’s eyes flashed with silver, but he didn’t challenge his mate on the matter. Jenner didn’t know what he found more frustrating. His inability to track the necromancer on his own or having to sit by and observe another tethered pair who’d obviously learned to balance their mate bond.