“Ivy,” I heaved, a new fear slicing through the ecstasy. “Wait…”

“But I thought…” she whispered, her voice a dark heat, and her hand went unmoving.

“You said the blood was enough,” I continued, hovering near panic, trying to focus but finding it hard to open my eyes. My heart was pounding. I couldn’t get enough air, and I couldn’t find the desire to push her away. I blinked, wavering when I realized she was entirely supporting my weight. “I…can’t….”

“I misunderstood,” she said, cradling my head against the hollow between her shoulder and her neck. The touch of her hand upon my neck grew firmer, losing its gentle feeling, to become dominating. “I’m sorry. Do you want me to stop entirely?”

A hundred thoughts dropped through me, of how stupid I was, of how vulnerable I had made myself, of the risk I was taking, of the future I was mapping for myself, of the glorious adrenaline rush she was taking me on. “No,” I breathed, lost in the thought of what it would feel like to bury my face in the hollow between her ear and neck and return the favor.

A low sigh of pleasure rose soft and almost unheard, and her hand slid from my shoulder to find my back. Pressing me closer, she pulled on me again. I gasped, my hands clutching at her as I imagined the warmth of my blood filling her, knowing how it would taste, knowing how it filled the terrible hollow her future as an undead bestowed upon her.

I jerked wire-tight as teeth drove into me again. The desire to respond in kind and the need to hold back touched every part of me alight. Oh God, the twin emotions of denial and desire were going to kill me, so intense I couldn’t tell if they were pain or pleasure.

Ivy’s breath on my skin grew ragged, and my muscles loosened when the last of my fear slipped from me, and like the ting of a bell faded to nothing. She held me upright, her grip now devoid of any tenderness while her teeth dug deeper and the hunger pooled into her, filling old chasms, pulling on me to take the blood I willingly gave her.

I took a shuddering breath, feeling the vamp pheromones soak into me, soothing, luring, promising a high like no other. It was addictive, but I was beyond caring. I could give Ivy this. I could accept what she gave in return. And as she held me upright and filled her body with my blood and her soul with my aura, tears slipped from me. “Ivy?” I whispered breathlessly as the room spun with vertigo. “I’m sorry I took so long to listen.”

She didn’t answer, and I groaned when she jerked me against her, her mouth becoming deliciously savage, sending jolts through me as she searched for more, both of us lost in a haze of fulfillment. But faint in the back of my thoughts a warning stirred. Something had changed. Her touch wasn’t careful. It had become…harsh.