Chapter Thirty-Three
THIRTY-THREE
Eleonore looked down into Ben’s smiling brown eyes.
She was glad they were doing this. Not just because sex was fun, but because this was different from the other times she’d had sex. It wasn’t just the give and take of bodies—it was an expression of trust.
She trusted him and she trusted herself. Not the small, paranoid creature that spoke doubts in her head, but the self she was becoming. The one who could offer without worrying someone might take too much. They were going into battle together, and she couldn’t do that if she entertained any remaining doubt about his motives or their future.
Not that her motives at the moment were all so lofty or poetic. She was hungry for him, and why should she deny herself that pleasure? Her werewolf was brimming with passion, he smelled delicious, and he deserved to be ridden until neither of them could see straight.
So—sex.
Or as he’d called it, making love.
Eleonore rocked against him, enjoying both the spark of sensation at her clit and the way he hissed and gripped her tighter. Her heart felt too full, like it might burst.
She leaned forward to kiss her way from his eager mouth to his neck, hips moving in waves. Ben’s hands traced long sweeps over her back and buttocks, stroking and massaging as he mirrored her movements. He thrust up against her, and she sighed at the feel of that thick, pretty cock rubbing over her. It would feel exquisite inside, stretching her perfectly.
She wanted to taste it first, so she shifted down his body, hair trailing over his chest. He had a lovely penis, thick and ruddy, and when she smoothed his foreskin down, the cap leaked a drop of precum. She lapped it up, swirling her tongue around the crown.
Ben groaned, and she looked up. “You’re still wearing your glasses,” she pointed out.
“You think I want to miss any details?” he asked, brows rising. His head was pillowed on his left arm while his right hand toyed with her hair.
Eleonore hummed, then tapped his dick against her cheek before turning to press a kiss to the side of it. “I need your help with something.”
“Anything.”
She twisted her loose hair into a coil, then wound it around and around at the crown of her head. “Hold this, please.”
“Fuck.” He grabbed the makeshift bun in his right hand, and Eleonore felt a rush of delight at both his firm grip and having prompted him into profanity.
“Good wolf,” she said. Then she lowered her head and sucked him into her mouth.
Ben jerked and his hand clenched, eliciting a delicious sting at her scalp. Eleonore hummed on the upstroke, swirling her tongue as much as she was able. She toyed with his testicles with one hand, and with the other she reached up to drag her fingernails lightly over his chest.
She loved the way he was made. Strong in a sturdy way—not a man with a chiseled abdomen that had been built at the gym, but one whose body had been formed through hard work in business and life. A broad, hair-roughened chest; shoulders strong enough to carry other people’s burdens in addition to his own.
And an absolute delight of a dick, of course. Eleonore sucked it with appreciation, letting saliva pool in her mouth for extra lubrication. She played with him: fondling his balls before squeezing the base of his shaft, mixing deep sucks with dabs of her tongue. He was going wild, grunting and twitching and muttering broken strings of words.
She paused for breath, jerking him with her hand while she did so. “I’d like to drink from here sometime,” she said, tracing the tip of one fang oh so gently over the delicate skin of his shaft.
“Holy shit,” he said, hips jerking upward. Another curse word; she was doing well. “That sounds…” He cleared his throat. “Way hotter than it has any right to be.”
He liked the idea? Eleonore’s predatory instincts sharpened. “I wouldn’t want to sink my fangs all the way in right now,” she purred, following the words with a long, slow lick. “Vampire bites heal quickly, but maybe not as quickly as I would like for the rest of what I have planned.” She squeezed him at the base of his cock, which elicited a gasp and an answering clench of his hand in her hair. “But a little scratch…that would heal in no time at all.”
“Do it,” he said instantly, thrusting upward again. Then his eyes widened. “Wait, that’s not an order. Please do it, but only if you want to. Please.”
Ben remembered his promise even in the throes of passion, which was exactly why she trusted him. Her fangs lengthened at the promise of blood, even if it wouldn’t be more than a taste. She grinned, flashing them. “I do want to.”
She cocked her head and ran the tip of one fang in a line up his shaft, using incrementally more pressure than she had before. Blood beaded in her wake, a tiny flow she’d need to savor quickly. Still, she took a moment to admire the sight of blood trailing down the side of his cock. Then she opened her mouth over him, took him to the root, and sucked.
“Oh, fuck ,” he shouted. “Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh my God .” He kept babbling, praise and curses falling from his lips while he thrust into her mouth. Eleonore gloried in the roughness, delighted at having shattered her proper wolf’s control. His blood sang on her tongue, rich crimson notes she swallowed eagerly.
He came with a shout, and she drank that down, too, the flavor taking on extra dimensions as it mixed with the remnants of blood in her mouth. Ben shook beneath her, powerful thighs quaking.
Then he let out a trembling groan and relaxed, head hitting the pillow with an audible thump. “Holy shit,” he said dazedly as the hand in her hair loosened.
Eleonore finished cleaning him up with her tongue, gently lingering over the cut. Vampire saliva sped healing, and the wound had been so shallow she expected it to vanish in a minute or two.
Ben cleared his throat. “Sorry. I was a bit rough.”
“Don’t apologize. I loved every second of that.” She was buzzing from the psychic energy of his orgasm, and pride swelled in her breast at knowing she was the reason he’d come undone.
“I did, too.” He ran a shaking hand over his face. “That was unbelievable, Eleonore.”
She sat up, tossing the unraveling coil of hair over her shoulder. “I agree.”
His chuckle turned into another groan. “I was not intending to come just yet.”
“So? I like when you orgasm.”
“Yes, but I want to be up to the task, so to speak.”
It took Eleonore a moment to parse the innuendo, and then she smiled. “I’m sure we can find something for you to do until you can manage a second orgasm.”
“Damn right we can,” Ben growled. He tossed his glasses onto the nightstand, then surged upright, grabbed her waist, and threw her onto her back in a thrilling display of strength.
Eleonore shrieked as she hit the mattress, and then a surprised laugh bubbled out of her. But a moment later Ben buried his face between her thighs, and there was nothing to laugh about there.
“Oh!” Her back arched as she plunged her hands into his hair. He was ravenous, kissing her with open-mouthed passion. His tongue played along her folds, and then he pushed it into her. It didn’t slide deep, but the pressure was enough to send a shivering thrill up her spine, particularly when his nose nudged her clit in tandem.
Ben didn’t pause seemingly even for breath. He fucked her with his tongue, then replaced it with a questing finger as he licked back up to her clitoris. One finger was joined by two, and Eleonore moaned, holding his head tighter against her.
“You,” he said, words rumbling against her, “are delicious .”
She tipped her head back, staring blindly at the ceiling. This was the passion she’d always known was inside him, the one she’d tasted in his blood that first day. Ben Rosewood was a gentleman, but he fucked .
Heat and tension coiled in her belly, and her toes pointed as she strained toward the summit. Perhaps sensing she was close, Ben pumped his fingers, then crooked them while he intensified his attentions to her clitoris.
“Oui!” she gasped.
The orgasm swelled, a tidal wave that broke over her. Heat washed from her core to the tips of her fingers and toes, and she jerked against his face, crying out wordlessly as she rode the spasms.
Then it was her turn to collapse, bones seemingly melted. Her head spun, and her lips were stretched in a giddy smile.
Ben moved to lie next to her, head propped on a fist as he surveyed her flushed face with obvious pride. “Good?” he asked.
Eleonore nodded. Her head felt like it was somewhere up in the branches of the trees, about to float off into the night sky.
Ben stroked a hand down her body, pausing to play with her breasts and circle her navel. He swirled his fingertips in her damp pubic hair, then squeezed her thigh. “I don’t suppose you’re ready to go again?”
She blinked, surprised. “You can go again already?” Ben was in his prime—if he’d been a whiskey, he would have been top-shelf—but rapid-fire orgasms were normally harder to attain after the intense sexual chaos of youth.
He gestured down to his crotch, where his cock had, indeed, swelled again. The fang mark on his penis was nothing but a faint pink line now, the skin healed over. “I don’t think you understand how inspiring eating your pussy is.”
Eleonore broke into peals of laughter at the blunt compliment. She felt drunk on the magic they made together. “Engrave that on a trophy for me,” she said. Then she pushed herself into a seated position, arms still weak from the orgasm. “I’m ready.”
Ben grabbed a condom from the nightstand and rolled it on. “How would you like to do this?” he asked.
He always asked. If her nipples were sensitive, how she liked her clitoris to be touched, how she wanted to have him. Eleonore appreciated it. She surveyed his strong, broad body and decided she liked the view. “I’ll be on top.”
Ben grinned and flopped onto his back, then patted his thigh. “Then feel free to hop on at your leisure, sweetheart.”
This playful, roguish Ben was a new iteration she liked very much. She liked all the versions of him—the serious business owner, the tenderhearted knitter, the considerate breakfast-maker. A complex man, endlessly interesting to explore.
She straddled his lap, then reached between them. She notched him at her entrance, then started bearing down.
Ben sucked in a hissed breath, gripping her hips as she took him in one smooth, wet slide. He filled her just as perfectly as she’d known he would, a stretch that had her lingering to absorb the feel. Then she lifted up and sank down again.
She set a smooth, slow rhythm at first, delighting in the merging and parting of their bodies. There was a poetry to this act, a series of questions asked and answered while their mouths hung open around panting breaths. He looked up at her with such adoration it caused a small, precious pain in her chest.
Had she ever been looked at like that?
No, she had not.
She hoped her own care for him shone in her eyes, that he could see how much he meant to her. How much this act of trust meant.
Soon slow wasn’t enough. She rode him more aggressively, nails pressing pink crescents into his chest. He met her motion and elaborated on it, hips surging while he thumbed at her clit. Eleonore tipped her head back until her hair brushed his thighs, abandoning herself to the pleasure.
Then a wicked idea came to her, and she smiled.
Snapping her head back upright, Eleonore pinned Ben’s shoulders to the bed and started moving faster and faster until she shifted into vampire warp speed, practically vibrating on top of him.
“Holy—” Ben choked out. One hand flew out to smack the mattress, and the tendons in his neck stood out as he gritted his teeth. “Going to—”
She felt his orgasm in her brain and body, a rush of glittering energy. Delighted, she reached down to rub her clit just as quickly. The buzz of her fingers sent her over the edge, flying into an expanse of pleasure as vast and sparkling as the night sky.
Afterward, she slumped on top of him, resting her head at the crook of his neck. They were both breathing hard.
“That was good, werewolf,” she said after a moment.
“Good?” His laugh sounded disbelieving. “Eleonore, you just blew my damn mind. I’m not sure I’ll ever recover.”
She nuzzled into his shoulder, eyes drifting closed. “That’s a shame,” she said sleepily. “Because I’d very much like to do that again.”
Eleonore woke all at once. One minute asleep, the next not, as seamlessly as every other vampire in history.
Unlike most other vampires in history, she woke to a fall of sunlight across her cheek, though the air was cool. Even with the windows shut, the November chill had infiltrated the room.
Under the covers was much warmer, though. She nestled closer to the source of that warmth, who lay naked and breathing deeply, one arm flung over his head.
What a lover her werewolf was. Diligent, detail-oriented, and always giving. But as much as Eleonore loved receiving his attentions, she loved returning them even more. He’d performed feats of heroism last night, making love to her three separate times, and she’d reciprocated his passion just as eagerly.
She traced the strong lines of his face with her eyes, remembering his astonished expression as she’d ridden him in warp speed. She’d felt like a queen. It was only one of many, many things she wanted to do with him.
Not that sex was the only thing she anticipated doing with him. She could envision their lives melding in all sorts of exciting ways—working together, traveling together, learning together. A bright future at Ben’s side beckoned, but first she needed to guarantee they could have that future.
The first step was breaking the binding spell. The next step would be the witch’s severed head so she could never harm another person.
Eleonore sat up, focus shifting and sharpening. Last night had been for passion and play; today was for violence and ensuring her future. Her pulse jumped as her muscles tensed in anticipation of a worthy battle. “Wake up,” she said, shaking Ben’s shoulder lightly.
Ben groaned. His lashes fluttered. “What time is it?” he asked blearily.
Apparently only one of them was ready for action. “Time to be awake.”
Ben fumbled at the nightstand and put on his spectacles, blinking a few times. When he didn’t move to get up, Eleonore whipped the covers off him.
He hissed in a breath, curling up on his side like a bug. “Cold!”
“It won’t be cold once you’re dressed,” Eleonore said matter-of-factly. She jumped out of bed herself, shivering as chill air brushed her naked skin. She reached for shower supplies and clean clothes, mind already sprinting the hours ahead to their confrontation with Isobel.
Ben sat up, running his hands through his untidy hair. “Should have brought a razor,” he said, rubbing his fingers over the stubble that had started growing in around the neat borders of his beard.
“You look lovely,” Eleonore said distractedly as she tested the edges of her knives. “A perfect picture.”
He gave her a dry look. “Thank you, but only one of us is the embodiment of perfection here, and it isn’t me.”
She clacked her fangs. “You’re perfect if I say you’re perfect.” She set aside her thigh holsters and knives, then selected pants with hidden pockets at the ankle to hide two additional small blades. Maybe she should have brought other tools, like a hammer or saw? Torture wasn’t something she was practiced in.
“My apologies,” Ben said. “I would never doubt your opinion.”
“Good,” she said, only half hearing him. Maybe she could bludgeon the witch’s fingers with a rock…
She bit her lip, feeling squeamish at the thought. Eleonore had always appreciated a dramatic threat, but the idea of actually torturing someone, rather than killing them quickly, made her feel ill. But there was no way Isobel would break the binding spell without significant incentive, and if killing her outright might result in Eleonore’s death as well…
She had been an unwilling monster for years. She could be a monster one more time if it meant ensuring her freedom.
She nodded decisively. “Let’s go torture and kill this witch.”