Her mind rioted and her body pulsed. She was exposed to him, vulnerable and needy. She wanted to think of something clever, something flirty, something sophisticated to say. “Okay,” she breathed.

He settled between her legs, driving her thighs apart to make room for his wide shoulders. “One taste,” he murmured, as if to himself. His left hand planted itself on her thigh and he turned his head, striking with the speed of a true predator.

His fangs sliced deep into her thigh, and pain erupted through her lower half. She cried out, crashing both hands down on the bedspread and digging deep with her nails, her mouth opening in shock. Her body froze and then drifted into a warm numbness, followed by acute pleasure, sharp and direct, right to her core.

Oh, God. It was too much.

He drank her blood, and she felt the demanding pull deep in her sex.

Live wires uncoiled and sparked out, throwing her into an orgasm that had her crying out his name this time. In one smooth motion, he retracted his fangs and turned his head, sucking her clit into his heated mouth. The orgasm built in intensity, shooting sparks of pure white light behind her closed eyelids.

She whimpered, swelling and surging through a cyclone of battering pleasure that he increased by sliding one finger through her wetness and curling up, somehow caressing her clit from inside her. Her mind shut down as the ecstasy became too much, and she let it take her, until finally she came down and went limp.

Her breath panted, hard and fast.

He released her and gently pulled her panties back up, kissing her once right above her clit. His rough tongue then scraped over the wound in her thigh. To heal it? She remembered something about how that worked.

Then he looked up and licked a spot of blood off his lip.

She couldn’t speak. Her body was satiated and on fire at the same time, and no words would come. What had just happened?

He reached for her discarded shirt and handed it to her, sliding back on the bed to stand. An obvious erection showed behind his jeans.

“Wh—what about you?” she asked, her voice barely coming out.

His smile was as gentle as it was rueful. “I’m fine—will take a quick run. It has to be this way.” He turned, still shirtless, showing the black shield beneath the skin of his back where his torso had been made impenetrable during the Seven ritual. The words he spoke as he left were quiet but clear. “Thank you, Grace.”

Then he was gone.

Chapter 11

Chapter 11