Eternal Beast: Mark of the Vampire (29 page)

He leaned in and kissed her. One soft, hungry kiss. And when he pulled back, he said, “You deserve it.”

His words cut her. He could see it in her eyes, her face. She shook her head. She looked exhausted, and for the first time strangely vulnerable. He didn’t want to care, but that was bullshit—he cared. He cared like a foolish, head-up-his-ass male.

“Why do you think this happened?” she whispered.

“The true mates thing?” he asked.

She nodded. “It’s so unfair, so wrong. I don’t know what to do with it.”

He frowned, his guts tightening, but he said with a thread of dark humor, “Nothing in the world that disgusts you more than to be bound to me, huh?”

“Yes.”

His frown deepened. “Christ.” He started to move away, but she grabbed his hand, the hand that bore her mark.

Her eyes caught his and held. They were desperate, miserable. “I would rather be bound to anyone else.”

“Stop,” he snarled brutally. “Just stop talking now.”

But she wouldn’t. “Being bound to someone you love is the worst fate in the world for someone like me,” she cried out.

Gray stilled with shock. “What?”

She shook her head.

Blood pounded in his ears and his cock was hard as steel. He wasn’t having any more of this horseshit. He gathered her up and held her to him. “What did you just say? And for fuck’s sake, say it loud because I can’t tell if it’s just me hearing shit or you just told me you loved me.”

Seawater dripped from her shoulders, her neck, the
tips of her nipples, but what glistened in her eyes came from a very different place. “I love you, Gray. I do.”

He went completely and utterly mad with hunger. Crushing her to him, he stole her mouth and kissed her hard and deep. She moaned against him and gave him her tongue to suckle. He drew it in and savored it. She tasted like the ocean, like tears, and he drank from her, his arms pressing her sides, his hands raking up into her hair to hold her scalp.

He tipped her chin back and kissed her neck, her jaw, one side of her mouth, then the other. Her eyes opened and she stared at him through dark, wet lashes. Her gaze was searching, intensely vulnerable, as though she were asking herself if she’d done the right thing admitting her true feelings to him. Gray offered her a small smile of gratitude, and instantly her expression changed, softened, and she surged toward him and captured his mouth again.

It was like a rush of honey, and his fingers fisted in her wet hair as he sucked her tongue into his mouth. She moaned and pressed her core against his hip. Steam rose up all around them like a screen, protecting them, encasing them in heat and scent and hunger.

As he kissed her, he moved, dragged her to the other side of the spring. He was lost in the headiness of the moment, felt like a drugged human who would die if he didn’t get his fix. When his back hit the bank, he gripped her waist and lifted her so he could see her breasts in the shaft of moonlight. Nostrils flaring, he stared. She was so goddamn perfect. Full and round with a hint of slope that would lead him straight to
heaven. He growled, calling out to her jaguar, warning the protective feline that her true mate was hungry and would be fed.

He lowered his head and took as much of the soft flesh of her breast into his mouth as possible. She gripped his shoulders, her nails digging into his skin, and keened into the cold air. He released her and just nuzzled the wet, heavy globe until he heard the cat purr. A grin hit his mouth and he flicked the bud with his nose once before suckling it again, first with his tongue, then gently scraping at the tip with his fangs. Above him, Dillon moaned and bucked her hips, and the steam around them began to scent of her, wet heat and hungry
veana
.

Gray’s cock pulsed against his belly, ached, begged him to lower Dillon right onto his shaft, but he wasn’t ready for dessert yet.

Shit, he hadn’t even had dinner.

With a snarl of demonlike possessiveness, Gray whirled around and placed her on the very edge of the bank.

“Open up for me, D,” he commanded with rough hunger. “As wide as you can.”

Dillon whimpered from her perch and slowly spread her thighs. They shook. Goddamn, she shook.

“Not nearly enough,” he uttered wickedly. “My tongue aches and my throat is so dry, baby. I need to drink you down.”

She tore in a breath, wiggled her backside.

“Feet up now, baby, knees bent. That’s right.” When she was completely exposed to him, he reached around and grabbed her ass, slid her forward. “This is how I
like it.” He watched, his skin on fire, as pearly moisture leaked from her cunt. “Baby, you’re crying for me.”

“Oh God, Gray, please,” she begged above him, dropping her hands behind her so he could have even more access.

Gray lowered his head and licked her.

Just once.

One lap from cunt to clit.

Dillon cried out.

The sound that echoed within him, rumbled through him was all pain, pleasure, and decadent torture. “You have the sweetest goddamn tears in the world, D.”

And then he buried his head between her legs and feasted on her sweet syrup. The taste of her went straight to his cock. The thing jumped and pulsed against his belly, beading with precum, but he told it to fuck off, to be patient, and he drank deep until her swollen clit called to him. Raking his tongue from the opening of her body straight up between her drenched pussy lips, he circled around the hot bud, then suckled it into his mouth.

Dillon quaked and writhed in his arms, but he held on, suckled until he felt her clit swell against his tongue. Then he released one hand from her buttocks and brought it to her clit. While his fingers feathered the pulsing bud, he fucked her with his tongue.

“Oh God, yes! Gray. Please. I can’t take any more.”

But even as she said it, he gave her more. His thumb working her clit, tugging at the swollen flesh, dragging it up and down as his tongue went so deep he had to open his mouth wider, let his fangs rest on the head of her pussy.

And then he pressed them down gently, the hard, sharp tips just piercing a millimeter of her flesh.

It was like an earthquake against his mouth, against his tongue, as the walls of her pussy clenched and soaked the back of his throat in cream. Fuck yes! God, this
veana
was his, every inch, every drop. Dillon bucked and cried out as she came, and Gray just let her ride his mouth and tongue until the waves of pleasure receded.

He could’ve stayed there all day, camped out between her trembling thighs, licking her nice and slow and gentle until she came again, but Dillon wasn’t having it. She wriggled down into the water, her skin pink and dusted with sweat. Or was it mist from the spring? Either way, he wanted a taste as she rode a different part of his anatomy.

But before he could get his hands around her waist, she turned and gave him her back. “Fuck me, Gray. Please.”

Gray tensed. Her hands were spread, her legs too, and she was leaning over, using the bank to hold her weight. All he had to do was slip inside and take what he wanted—what his dick was screaming for.

He took a step closer, his thighs against the backs of hers, his hands itching to wrap around the curves of her hips.

“What’s wrong?” she uttered, sudden tension in her voice. But she didn’t look at him, didn’t even glance over her shoulder. “You don’t want me.”

“Shit, D.” His voice was gravel rough. “You feel my cock against your back. It’s ready to explode. I’m ready to explode. But this isn’t cutting it. You love me and I
love you, and yet you’ll only let me fuck you from behind.”

Her head dropped forward. “What’s wrong with that?” she nearly whimpered. “Most males would be very happy for a fuck—”

“Stop right there.” He grabbed her hips, but only to turn her around to face him. His rock-hard glare slammed into her soft, green one. “When are you going to get it? I’m not most males. I’m not looking to screw you and walk, fuck you, then watch you walk away.”

“I know that.”

But he didn’t believe she did. Hell, he was pretty sure she believed the opposite. His hands went to her face. “How do I get you to look at me?”

“Stop,” she uttered, trying to pull free.

As much as he hated seeing her struggle, both with him and with her insides, Gray knew this had to happen or they couldn’t be, couldn’t go any further than fucking like animals. “How do I get you to face me, let me hold you, let me look into your eyes as I kiss you, as I move inside of you?”

Her eyes were wide; her fangs scraped at her lower lip. “You don’t.”

“I want to look at you, goddamn it!”

“And I just want you to fuck me!”

“What is it? What stops you from having even the smallest bit of intimacy?”

“I let you into my body,” she cried. “That’s pretty damn intimate.”

He put one hand, the very one that held her mark, on her left breast. “I want to get into your heart, not just your cunt, Dillon. Christ.”

Her lips trembled. “I can’t.”

“Why?” he rasped, his guts ripping apart inside him.

“I can’t. I won’t be able to…It won’t work…”

He had a pretty good idea what was going on here, the fear inside her, the past creeping between them. He wasn’t going to allow it. “What won’t work?”

She tried to turn toward the bank. “I’m done here.”

“No.” He wouldn’t let her go. This was it. They gave themselves over to each other or they gave up.

She glared at him. “I’m a hundred times stronger than you, Gray! I could snap you like a fucking twig!”

He held her firm. “Do what you gotta do, baby.”

“You won’t hold me against my will!” she screamed. “EVER!”

Pure misery and purer love wrapped around Gray in that moment. She wasn’t perfect, and shit, he was far from perfect, but there was love there, a long-term and consistent fight within both of them that kept this flame alive.

Slowly, gently, he eased a wayward hair from her face and curled it around her ear. “If you need to beat the shit out of me to release some of what’s holding you hostage, then do it.”

She broke then. Crumpling in his arms, she cried, “Why are you doing this? Why won’t you just run like everyone else in my sorry motherfucking life?”

He was really going to make the male responsible for this scream in agony. He kissed her cheek, the crease of her eye where one sad tear tried to escape. “No one ran from you, D. Take a good look back and you’ll see it was you—you who did all the running.” His eyebrow lifted
a fraction. “I’m not saying there wasn’t a good reason. But it’s done. No one is ever going to hurt you again. Stop running, baby, and stand still with me.”

“Oh, Gray…”

He picked her up and gently placed her down on his shaft, but instead of pumping inside her, he pulled her against his chest and just held her to him. Held her strong and supportive until he felt her limbs relax, until her breathing slowed.

Dillon felt as though she were being carried. Not by his body or his arms, but by his love for her and his unflinching belief in them as a couple. Her insides warmed and her cunt squeezed around his shaft and she held on tight. God, she wanted to believe in them too, so much. If she could just let go now, right now, and trust that this male she loved wouldn’t let her fall.

Leaving the safety of his warm chest and steady heartbeat wasn’t easy, but she lifted her head and looked into his eyes.

He smiled. “There’s my baby.”

One of his hands remained around her while the other traveled down to cup her backside. It was the most difficult, most wonderful, most gut-wrenching feeling to look into Gray’s eyes while he began to slowly thrust inside of her.

She felt impaled, both in her core and in her unbeating heart. Dillon, the Beast, the
mutore
, the one who survived on shame, loved and was loved.

“Don’t close your eyes, D,” he said with fierce, possessive hunger. “Not for this ride.”

She nodded, quivering in his arms as heat spread within her.

“Keep looking at me. Even when you come.” He kissed her, suckled her lower lip. “Especially when you come.”

His words sent another shock of heat to her core, and her cunt clenched mercilessly. She wanted to come so badly, and yet she didn’t want this intimacy, this intensity between them to end.

Water jumped and sprayed around them as Gray ground his cock inside her, circling his hips, pistoning inside her. But his eyes never left hers and his arms remained strong around her.

“You belong to me now,” he growled possessively. “Never forget that.” His nostrils flared and he looked like he could eat her raw.

He bent his knees and thrust deeply, battering her cunt again and again until Dillon lost her breath completely and gripped his back, his shoulders, her nails digging into his flesh.

“Oh God, Dillon,” he uttered, his gaze fierce and his voice strained. “Baby, you’re sucking me so deep, from the head to the base of my cock—I’m drenched in your cream.”

Shaking, on the verge of exploding, Dillon wrapped her legs tighter around his waist and bucked her hips, moving with him, taking blow after blow as she held his gaze and tears spilled down her cheeks.

“I love you, D,” he whispered, so pained. “I love you so fucking much I think I’ll die from it.”

“No,” she whispered. “You’ll live. Just like me, with me—over me, night after night, your eyes on mine.”

Gray grabbed her hips, settled his cock deep inside her, then executed a series of wondrous, breath-shattering,
earth-shaking blows to her cunt. One, two, three—until Dillon cried out. Shaking uncontrollably, her eyes wide, she lifted her chin and howled her release. Then Gray too fell, delivering one final thrust before he answered her call with one of his own.

It wasn’t her first fuck, Dillon thought through the haze, through the heat.

But it was the first time she’d ever made love.

A
s Gray carried her out of the water and up to the house, one emotion after another slammed through Dillon. Love, connection, anxiety, questions, doom. She hated the onslaught, wanted to run from it, but she wasn’t going to do that anymore. She’d made a promise—to him and to herself—when she’d looked into his eyes and allowed herself to be taken.