Chapter Twenty
TWENTY
It was two a.m. when the Scooby gang finally left Ben’s house. They’d convened an emergency meeting to discuss what to do next. While Astaroth, Oz, and Eleonore had discussed various means of retribution and Calladia had paced furiously, muttering about how she’d known her mother was corrupt but not that corrupt, Ben had made hot chocolate and cookies for everyone. Mariel and Themmie had eventually talked Eleonore and the demons down from their more dramatic suggestions, and ultimately they’d decided to release a statement condemning the attack on democracy. Gigi would make the rounds, checking on the injured, and they would hire more security for future events.
“We don’t back down,” Gigi had said, clutching her mug to her chest. It had upset Ben to see his sister so shaken, but she was tough, and his concern had warred with pride as she’d vowed to keep fighting the good fight.
Ben had tried to honor that courage with his own, keeping his shaking fear locked up until he could let it out in private.
Astaroth and Calladia had offered to escort Gigi home. Ben waved from the doorway as they piled into Calladia’s red truck. As soon as the taillights disappeared around the corner, Ben exhaled shakily and sagged against the doorframe, pressing a hand to his heart. His finger brushed the edges of a singe mark that had melted the fibers of his sweater vest. His favorite sweater vest, he thought deliriously. Blue-and-gray argyle. He’d worn it to impress Eleonore, and now it was ruined.
Eleonore was at his side in an instant. “Sit down,” she ordered, grabbing his elbow.
Ben let her lead him back inside. She shoved him onto the couch, wrapped him in a blanket with efficient, aggressive movements, and disappeared into the kitchen. A few minutes later she was back with a mug of tea on a saucer, which she planted on the coffee table in front of him. Then she crossed her arms and stared at him with unblinking intensity.
Ben blinked bleary eyes, looking between her and the steaming tea. She’d bundled him up so tightly he couldn’t move his arms. “Um?”
“Drink,” she ordered. “You are distressed.”
As a nursemaid, she lacked a delicate touch, but Ben smiled for the first time since the disastrous rally. Eleonore approached life like a general facing a battlefield, and now she was deploying her forces—tea and a blanket—to comfort him.
His rigid control over his emotions unraveled and he started crying.
Eleonore’s eyes widened. She sat next to him and patted his shoulder. “There, there,” she said. “We will defeat the enemy.”
Ben couldn’t help it—he laughed wetly at her attempt to be soothing, sniffling through his tears. “Sorry,” he said, wiping his eyes. “I was trying not to freak out in front of Gigi.” Gigi had been freaked out enough—she hadn’t needed Ben falling apart in front of her. Now that she was gone, though, he was free to cry out the fear of seeing his sister narrowly escape danger.
Ben had always been a crier. At sad movies, when his family and friends were upset, when he was overwhelmed…He’d been bullied for it at school, but he didn’t mind so much now. This was who he was, and he’d rather love deeply and cry than feel anything less for his family.
Eleonore looked consternated at his distress. She hadn’t cried once about her situation, he realized, and he wondered if she ever did. Her eyes darted between his teary face and the tea, and she nudged the saucer closer.
Taking the hint, Ben extricated his arms from the blanket and grabbed the mug. There were five tea bags in it. Maybe Eleonore thought the bigger the distress, the bigger the ammunition needed to combat it. He sipped the almost unbearably pepperminty brew and made an appreciative noise. “Very nice,” he choked out. “Thank you.”
She nodded, still watching him like a hawk. Under that piercing green gaze, Ben choked down the rest of the tea as quickly as possible. Then he set the mug back on the saucer. “Delicious,” he said, wondering if his taste buds would ever recover. At least the tea had shocked him out of his tears.
“You were very good with Gigi,” Eleonore said, surprising him. “She was afraid, but you stayed calm, and it made her feel better.”
“Only on the outside,” he said. “Inside I’ve been screaming incoherently for a few hours.”
“Are you still screaming internally?” she asked, auburn brows drawing closer together. “I can procure more tea—”
“No,” he said forcefully. “No more tea, thank you.” At her continued expression of concern, he fumbled for something else that might make her feel like she was being helpful. “There’s whiskey in the cabinet over the stove.”
A short while later they were both slightly tipsy and wearing pajamas, watching an episode of Star Trek together. Eleonore’s pajamas consisted of one of his shirts and a pair of his flannel pants rolled up at the waist. Ben knew he should probably get her something that fit better, but after the first time seeing her swimming in his clothes, he’d been too delighted to offer anything else. It touched a strange, possessive place in his heart. She was here, wearing his clothes, watching her favorite show on his TV, looking relaxed and content.
He didn’t think Eleonore had much experience being relaxed.
“I don’t think Q does enough interesting things with omnipotence,” she said.
“Hm?” Ben realized he hadn’t been watching TNG for a few minutes, instead letting his eyes trace the pale curve of neck that had been revealed when she’d tied her hair up in a messy bun.
“I mean, he does interesting things,” she said, gesturing at the TV, where Q was playing the trumpet as part of a mariachi band on the bridge of the Enterprise , “but he’s very focused on the crew of the Enterprise when he could be shaping the fate of the universe.”
“Maybe he’s tired of shaping the fate of the universe,” Ben said. “Maybe he wants to feel accepted by normal people.”
Eleonore’s head whipped around. She looked struck by the thought. “He’s lonely.”
“Maybe.” Ben’s eyes were still stuck on Eleonore’s neck. The whiskey had softened the edges of the world, but he wasn’t drunk yet, just loose enough to ask a question he’d been wondering. “Does being bitten by a vampire hurt much?”
Eleonore’s spine went rigid. Her pupils dilated so fast her eyes turned from green to black in an instant. “What?”
Ben tapped his neck with the tips of two fingers. “Being bitten. You said it feels good for the, ah, prey, but…does it hurt, too? I thought vampires preferred drinking that way.”
Her lips parted. Though she was sitting perfectly still, the air around her seemed to vibrate. “We do like drinking that way, yes,” she said, her accent stronger than he’d ever heard it. “It is intimate.” Her fangs had lengthened as they did whenever she drank, and she dug one into her lower lip, indenting the plush surface. “I have never been bitten, obviously, but I hear it doesn’t hurt. Our saliva numbs the skin. There’s a slight pinch, and then the greatest pleasure.”
The greatest pleasure sounded…interesting. Ben shifted on the couch, making room for his growing erection. “Do you drain people when you bite them?” he asked. He’d never been so aware of his own pulse before.
“No, we drink only until we are sated.”
Ben shivered at the word sated in her French accent. If Eleonore rarely relaxed, he imagined she was truly sated even less frequently. “Do you want to?” he asked.
She stiffened even further, but now he could see fine tremors racing over her limbs. “Ben, are you offering your neck?” she asked quietly.
Was he? He thought of the bagged blood in his fridge. Even heated up on the stove, it couldn’t taste as good as fresh blood. She hadn’t drunk deeply in nearly a week; she must be thirsty.
She was sitting on his couch, in his clothes, watching his TV. He wanted her sated and sleepy on his blood, too.
Ben sat up straight, running a hand through his hair. “Are you drunk?” he asked. “I’m not, just a little tipsy, but I don’t want to do this if you’re drunk—”
In a flash, Eleonore was straddling his lap. She cupped his cheeks in her palms. “I’m not drunk,” she said. “So tell me—do you want this?”
Oh God.
She felt incredible on top of him, strong thighs squeezing him as he gripped her waist. Ben’s heart raced. He felt alive, invigorated— desperate . To have her lips on him even in this way…
He nodded. “Yes,” he said, tipping his head to the side to expose his jugular. “I do.”
A shuddering breath escaped her red lips. Ben braced himself, expecting her to strike like a snake, but instead she leaned in until her breath ghosted over his pulse. Then came the soft, wet stroke of her tongue dragging over his skin.
Ben groaned. He was hard from nothing but anticipation and her weight in his lap.
Eleonore must have felt it. Must have sensed it with whatever succubus instincts she had, too, because she settled further into his lap and gently rocked her hips, moving over his erection in slow, incremental movements that were going to drive him mad. Her tongue dabbed his skin again, and he squeezed her waist, nearly out of his mind from anticipation.
There was a sudden sting, but the pain vanished instantly, replaced by a wave of heat that traveled from his neck over his entire body. Her fangs were in his neck, he realized hazily. Then she sucked for the first time, and he came utterly undone.
“Oh—my—” Ben couldn’t finish the sentence. Pleasure spun through him, hot and tingly and beyond anything he could have imagined. Goosebumps peppered his skin, then were soothed away by more waves of heat, and each draw of her mouth roused a new pulse of arousal. His fingers dug into her waist as he bucked, grinding against her without restraint. Distantly he wondered if he was bruising her with his hands and the force with which he was humping up against her, but Eleonore didn’t seem to mind. She ground against him just as hard, then moaned against his neck. The sound vibrated through his veins before setting up camp at the base of his skull.
“Lycaon, Hecate, Jesus, fuck —” Ben didn’t believe in any particular deity, but their names spilled from his tongue regardless. Pressure built in his dick, and his balls tightened. He was going to come from this.
Eleonore sucked one more time, hard enough to make his head swim, then drew back and licked the puncture wounds. “So good,” she moaned, continuing to rock against him. Her fingers dug into his hair, holding him in place so she could look into his eyes.
Ben had never seen anything sexier. Her lips were ruby-red with his blood, and a trickle dripped toward her chin. Her pale skin had grown flush with the life he’d poured into her, and her eyes were dark and hazy with desire. She panted as she rubbed her clit over his cock in short, sharp circles that told him she was getting close.
Then she tipped her head back and cried out, and that was all it took. Ben orgasmed in his pajama pants, a burst of sensation that had him shouting and clutching her closer. He crushed her to his chest as he thrust, riding out the spurts.
When he was spent, he collapsed back against the couch, chest heaving like a bellows. He forced himself to release his death grip on Eleonore, instead stroking gently up and down her back. She shivered, then tucked her face into his neck and licked the bite mark. Soothing him or savoring the last bit of flavor, he couldn’t say, but he adored it.
He adored her .
Dizziness swept over him, and he blinked up at the ceiling. It felt like he’d taken an axe to the trajectory of his life, splitting time into a before and an after. Before her mouth had been on him. After he’d known the mind-spinning, impossible pleasure of her bite.
“You drink from me from now on,” he said roughly. Then, realizing his error at the stiffening of her spine, he clarified. “Only if you want to, of course. It wasn’t an order. Sorry.”
It wasn’t in his nature to give orders, even without the curse making him extra cautious, but something primal and possessive had risen with her bite. He had the sudden thought that he would rip out the throat of anyone who tried to take Eleonore from him.
This primal need and fury…this wasn’t him. Not a version of him he recognized, anyway, but the alarm he should have felt was distant in the postorgasmic haze. He’d heard other werewolves talk about the instincts of the wolf, but he’d never understood what they meant before.
Now he did.
Eleonore had relaxed after his clarification, and now she lifted her head. He braced himself for her anger at being commanded, even inadvertently and with the order quickly rescinded, but she smiled lazily. Her cheeks were flushed, and her skin had the dewy glow it took on every time he masturbated in the shower. He’d fed her twice over tonight. “I would like to drink from you from now on,” she told him, accent still thick. Then her lashes fluttered and she yawned hugely.
Ben had orgasmed so intensely he shouldn’t have been capable of movement, but his brain had been overrun by animal instincts. He’d fed his mate, and now she was tired. He shifted her in his arms, then stood to carry her to the bedroom. His bedroom, because he wasn’t willing to let her sleep away from him after what they’d shared.
“Here,” he whispered, setting her down on his dark blue sheets. “Will you stay with me tonight? Please?”
Eleonore nodded, cheek moving over the pillow. Her eyes were closed, and as he watched, her breathing grew slow and even.
Something unbearably tender bloomed in his chest. He rubbed his breastbone, marveling at the sleeping vampire succubus in his bed. What trust it took to fall asleep next to him while he was still awake.
He made a brief detour to the restroom to clean up, then changed into fresh pajama pants, climbed into bed beside her, and turned out the light. Letting his instincts take the helm as his thoughts receded into the haze of sleep, he tucked her against his chest and curved his body around her, a bulwark against the world that had been so cruel to her.
She trusted him.
He would never violate that trust.