Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
Warren
We left the Tombeau des morts-vivants not long after Levy fed on me, my body highly strung and ready to be alone with him.
My anger was still below the surface, desperate to break free, but I was trying to keep it at bay.
Levette had tried his best to distract me, to pull me out of my sadness, and I wanted to embrace that.
I held onto the cross as we walked home.
Levette truly believed I would find my way back to redemption, and I hoped that was true.
Already, I had killed and injured humans in my need to feed.
I could not imagine multiple lifetimes of that.
Yet, I could not bring myself to call out to God and beg for a forgiveness I did not feel I deserved.
“You are letting yourself be claimed by those dark thoughts again,” Levette warned as he unlocked the door to our apartment. “Do not become a shell before the night is over.”
“Then distract me,” I said, hoping my voice was as tempting as I tried to make it sound. “Allow me no space to think of anything other than you—us.”
Levy closed the door behind us and then let his eyes roam over my body. I could not deny how alive it made me feel when he unleashed himself on me, his need only for me.
I walked backward, knowing my way to the bedroom without having to look. Levette watched me, his eyes darkening like the hunter I knew he was. I was his willing prey, ready to be devoured by the monster I was so in love with.
That was the confusing thing about how I felt.
Even though I was furious at him, my heart hardened by what he had done, my love for him always seemed to win out.
Levette had shown me kindness when the world had thrown me out and made me feel like I was worthy of love, even when I felt like I was not.
He had consistently tried to be better for me, to help me and prove himself, and I could not ignore that dedication.
So, while the resentment clawed at my insides, I swallowed it down.
I would worry about balancing the two later.
“When you look at me like that,” Levy said, his voice low and dangerous, “it makes me want to claim every part of you.”
I tilted my head, kicking my boots off and untucking my shirt as he watched. “I am yours to claim. Remind me why I chose you.”
Levette prowled towards me, growling low as he bared his fangs. He was a predator, a true being of the night, and I could not help but be enthralled by him.
I turned my back to him and went over to the phonograph, setting up a record to play. The sound of piano keys kicked in, the instrumental music creating a delightful background melody for us. I felt Levette behind me before he even touched me, my body slowly becoming attuned to his.
“Are you trying to seduce me, love?” Levette asked, his hands raking down my arms. His touch was featherlight, just enough to tease me and make my skin tingle.
“Seduce you?” I repeated, shaking my head. “Nonsense. I already know you are mine.”
Levette chuckled, his breath hot on the back of my neck. I stayed still as he moved his lips to the shell of my ear, tracing his fangs over the soft skin just below it. “And you are mine?”
I blew out a sharp breath when he kissed the place where his teeth were, so slowly that it felt as though my skin was burning. “What kind of question is that?” I replied in shock, albeit a little breathlessly. “You know I am.”
“Do I?” Levette retorted, a delicious danger laced in his voice.
He trailed kisses up the side of my neck and along my jaw as he reached around me.
At a torturous pace, he drifted his fingertips across my exposed chest, drifting slowly downward until he began to unbutton my shirt.
“You seemed to enjoy the stray gaze from the bartender. Do you wish it was him touching you?”
A small gasp escaped me as Levette ripped my shirt from me, completely exposing my torso as it fell to the floor between us. He placed a hand on my stomach, pulling me further into him so I could feel his hardness pressed against me. It momentarily short-circuited my brain as I fumbled for words.
“No, no. Of course I do not.”
Levy hummed, moving his lips to my shoulders, pressing his lips across all of my exposed skin like he had to mark me everywhere. With each kiss, his free hand moved lower down my front, reaching to undo my pants.
“Are you sure, cher?” He lowered his voice and it made me melt, knowing the intention behind it.
I held my breath as he let my pants also drop to the floor, bundling at my ankles.
“You do not wish to feel two pairs of hands on you? You did not wonder, even for a second, what it would be like to feel his mouth wrapped around you and my lips on yours?”
I let out a long, slow groan as he slipped his hand around me, barely touching me yet setting me alight.
I tried to shake my head and say no, but the lewd image he was painting for me made me unable to speak.
It was ridiculous how easy I could lose myself in Levette, but I did not care.
He knew exactly how to tease me, to toy with me, and I knew that I would always allow it.
I would be his plaything for all of my immortal life, so long as he never stopped loving me as he did it.
“If you wanted to try it, I would consider it,” Levette said as he licked the column of my neck, tasting the beads of sweat forming there. All the while, his hand was wrapped around me, and he continued to move it slowly, teasing and torturing me at once.
I shook my head against him, knowing his words were lies. “You do not like to share,” I reminded him, my words coming out like a pant as he quickened his movements only to slow them down again. I wanted to punch him. I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to feel him everywhere.
Levette removed his hand, spinning me around and pushing me up against the dresser.
He crowded my space, smirking, before slamming his lips against mine.
I sighed into him, throwing my arms around his neck and kissing him as deeply as he would allow.
I almost whined when he pulled away, dropping to his knees before me.
“I do not share, but this would not be sharing,” he explained, tilting his head as he looked up at me.
My dark prince, kneeling before me. “I want you to experience everything you crave. If you want to know what it is like to have me and another, to feel all of you being adored at once, I would not deny you.”
I could see the honesty in his eyes, though his smirk was there, so I knew he was teasing me, too. He enjoyed seeing me flustered, knowing I was still getting used to the idea of him, never mind another added to the mix.
And yet, even though his obscene imagery made me feel hot all over, there came a crashing realization with it: I did not want anyone else.
Levette had both saved me and destroyed my life.
I loved him with as much of my twisted, sorrowful heart as I could, yet I knew a part of me also hated him for changing me forever.
But despite it all, I craved him like he was the air I needed to breathe.
Levette was the beginning and end of me, and I wanted it no other way.
Admitting that to myself changed something for us both in that moment. All of a sudden, dizziness overcame us, and I grabbed onto Levette’s shoulder, holding him upright as I leaned back against the dresser to steady myself.
Levette gasped as something clicked, pulling us together. An invisible tether snapped into place, bonding us.
I would allow him his joy of another, but they would not live afterward. No one alive will ever know the taste of him while I live. He is mine.
My eyes widened as I heard Levette’s voice in my head, clear as though he was speaking aloud, but his lips did not move.
“You will love me until the end?” he asked, a quiet shock in his voice.
I furrowed my brows in confusion. “I did not say that. How did you—”
Levette grabbed my hands, holding them against his heart as a dark tear slipped down his cheek. I had asked, but somehow I also knew without being told. I could feel it.
“You bonded us.”
“I—How?”
Levette smiled, the joy on his face so jubilant that it reminded me of a child’s innocent happiness. I wondered how long it had been since Levette had truly felt love, without strings or conditions attached.
“You love me. You said it and felt it before, but you were blocking yourself from truly accepting it,” he said quietly, as though he was remembering it with sadness.
“I would have been fine with that forever, only ever having part of you if that was all you could give me. But mon amour, you truly love me. I did not think it possible for someone to see all of me and not despise me for it.”
I let the heaviness of his words sit between us for a moment, the silence only broken by the sound of the music in the background.
He was looking at me with a reverence I did not deserve.
How it broke my heart to hear him confess that he did not think I would ever give myself to him, not completely.
If only he knew that I had been trying so desperately hard to do that since we had met.
“I know that now, cher.” He pressed a soft kiss to my stomach, smiling as he did so.
“You can hear my thoughts?”
And you can hear mine. “We can block them, but that will take time and practice. Vampiric bonds happen, but they are not common. I will inquire about it. ”
It was scary to think that Levette was in my head and could hear my every thought. It became scarier still when he was looking at me with a dark grin on his face. He was listening to me, and it creeped me out…and sent a delicious thrill through me.
I am going to reward him with my tongue and then my cock. He will love me even more after that, I am sure.