Chapter 15
fifteen
BLAIR
On the way home, Damian proposed getting rid of the pillow between us in our bed, but I shot that down. He didn’t seem surprised by my refusal.
The next day was Wednesday, so he was supposed to feed on me again, but I didn’t think he’d go through with it. Considering he’d fed the night before, I figured he deserved a free pass for that one.
I wasn’t quite sure how to act around him, given the change between us, so I woke up early the way I had been. After a long swim, I headed down to join my sisters at breakfast. Without my hunger forcing my magic to radiate everywhere, I could interact with the vampires again without having to fight or worry.
That was nice, even if my uncertainty wasn’t.
I put in my breakfast order and sat down next to Zora. She was the only one up and moving yet, as far as I could tell, but that didn’t surprise me. She was always the first awake, and used to make breakfast for everyone.
We’d reopened our online stores over the past few days as our new equipment came in, so we’d stayed pretty busy, which was nice.
But I couldn’t focus on the shops, or what I needed to work on that day.
Everything I’d done the night before kept running through my mind, keeping me wide awake.
My heart beat irrationally fast every time I thought about the way Damian’s mouth had felt between my thighs.
“You look cheerful,” Zora remarked, as my phone buzzed.
I ignored the device, biting back a smile. “We figured things out last night.”
She sighed. “So he’s really here to stay?”
“Mmhm. No getting rid of this.” I tapped the band around my neck lightly, and she studied it for a moment before nodding.
“I’ll try not to hate him so much.”
My lips curved. “Don’t try to pretend that gorgeous pool hasn’t already softened you toward him.”
“I will admit to nothing,” she vowed, though I could see a touch of humor in her gaze.
Her immediate hatred for him had faded around the time I explained my plan to force him to drink my blood regularly. Learning that he’d been starving for so long to prevent himself from accidentally killing people humanized him to my sisters, I guess.
They still hadn’t fully integrated with the vampires, but they were trying. And I appreciated that.
My phone buzzed again, and I finally flipped it over so I could see the screen.
Damian
Where are you?
I woke up wanting to sink my teeth into you, little siren
My toes curled.
My body warmed, too.
Zora read the texts over my shoulder, just as snoopy as always.
She was still reading when the third message came in.
Damian
Remember my promise in the throne room? I think it’s fair for that to apply every time you hide from me like this
Excitement made my abdomen tense.
“What did he promise?” she asked.
“That he was going to bite me whenever he wanted.”
Her eyebrows lifted.
“He’s turning it into a game,” I said, rising to my feet. “I have to find somewhere to hide. Can you watch my food for me? I probably won’t be back before it?—”
I felt the man’s presence before I saw him.
My gaze met his across the room a heartbeat before his hands were on my waist, walking me backward until my ass met the edge of the table. His teeth slid into my throat, and I gripped the collar of his button-down desperately as I fought the lust flooding through me with his magic.
He was so much more powerful when he bit me after feeding the day before.
His magic was nearly impossible to ignore.
“Fuck you,” I breathed, gripping his shirt even harder.
Eyes all around the room were on us.
There was a reason vampires were provided with private rooms when out in public. Watching one feed could most definitely trigger other people’s predatorial instincts. Seeing him bite me would push others to want to do exactly the same.
But considering his power level, I didn’t imagine anyone would actually lose control of themselves to that level.
Hopefully.
Fingers and toes crossed.
He didn’t drink from me for nearly as long as he had the night before when his fangs finally retracted.
My chest rose and fell quickly, pressed against his.
“Everyone’s staring at us, huh?” I whispered.
“Yup,” Zora said from beside me. She was still sitting down, sprawled out, but there was something bright in her eyes that made me smile.
She was exactly the kind of woman who would love a game like the one Damian had just started.
And it was a game. Because he’d just drank from me in the middle of the damn dining room, and I wasn’t going to let him get away with that easily.
“Good morning, little siren,” Damian said, his eyes bright and his gaze victorious. “Don’t leave my bed without waking me up again.”
“ Your bed?” I drawled, though I wasn’t offended in the slightest.
I was too damn excited.
“Our bed,” he corrected himself, finally taking a step back and sitting down in the chair on the other side of mine.
Our food got there just as I took my seat again, and Damian put in a breakfast order of his own. His hand landed on my thigh under the table, and I bit my lip to hide my stupid smile.
My phone buzzed again, and a glance at the screen made me snort.
The Vamp Manor Homies chat was exploding, but I didn’t bother opening it. It would just have more Big Daddy Hale and Big Mama B shit.
Those weren’t the messages that I tapped on.
Zora read over my shoulder again as I opened my conversation with Kara and Lou.
Kara
Looks like Operation Feed a Starving Vampire is a raging success
Victoryyy
Lou
He looks so healthy, Blair
You’re my new favorite sibling 3
Zora snorted, and I swiped the messages off the screen before Damian could read them.
So, he plucked my phone from my hand and typed the code in to open the messages himself.
“Who told you my password?” I asked.
“I watched you type it in one day. You’re not sneaky,” he said, going back through my messages with Kara and Lou and shaking his head as he did. “I should tear into them.”
“But you won’t.” I let him have my phone, figuring he couldn’t do any real damage as I finally started to eat.
He gave it back a minute later, relaxing in his chair as Zora asked him,
“Any updates on the Curtis situation?”
“Nothing concrete. I’m trying to get in touch with an old friend who could help, but he hasn’t gotten back to me yet. Curtis still wants Clementine, but the rest of the leaders are on our side. Publicly and politically, there’s nothing he can do to get her back.”
“But…” Zora prodded.
“But our people have found far too many of his wolves around the grounds of our wing of the Manor to think he’s given up. He’s waiting for an opportunity to strike. We have to move against him first.”
“He definitely didn’t seem like he was going to give up yesterday,” I agreed.
Zora asked what I meant, and I gave her a rundown of my meeting with the rest of the leaders.
As we were finishing up breakfast, Clementine finally made it into the room, bleary-eyed but smiling. She plopped down in the seat beside Zora’s and leaned over.
“Are we feeding on people in the dining hall now?” she teased, showing me a picture someone had sent in the Homies group.
“If we’re the strongest vampire in the room, we are,” Damian said, glancing at the photo. He looked a little annoyed, but I knew he didn’t appreciate the group conversation or whoever ran it.
Though he didn’t like it, even I had realized that it changed the vibes in Vamp Manor. People could talk without hiding that they were gossiping, and it made everyone feel more comfortable.
And Big Daddy Hale wasn’t the most respectful of names, but it was overwhelmingly clear that everyone who lived there did respect him.
“What if you’re the strongest siren in the room?” Zora countered.
“You’d have to have a way to prove it,” Damian said with a shrug. “And something tells me you’re not about to fight each other for the top ranking.”
Zora eyed us like she was considering it, and I snorted. Clementine laughed.
Damian’s food arrived, and Clem eyed it hungrily.
He noticed, and after a moment, pushed it across the table for her. “I’ll take yours.”
“If Blair hadn’t already taken you off the market, I’d totally mate you for this,” she promised, cutting into the food immediately.
I rolled my eyes, and Zora snorted.
Damian’s hand lingered on my thigh as Zora told Clem about my meeting with the leaders.
I listened a little, but mostly, I focused on fighting like hell not to let myself feel way too good about how our morning was going.
I was not going to develop feelings for my vampire.
Waking up with Damian the following day wasn’t nearly as weird as I’d imagined. It was actually nice.
…especially when he went down on me to keep me in bed a little longer.
I was still dazed from the orgasms he’d given me, without letting me reciprocate, when we made our way down to breakfast together.
The day after that was another feeding day.
I considered getting up early again to continue our game, but decided to wait and see if he brought it up. Because if he was offering to bite me after he had his tongue on me again, I’d abandon the game in a heartbeat.
He ate me out in our bed again that morning, but his fangs didn’t make an appearance when he did.
And he got me off too many times to be disappointed about the lack of teeth.
We had breakfast, then parted ways again so we could work separately. An idea struck me, and I couldn’t fight my grin throughout the day as I handled our online store stuff with my sisters.
They noticed, and when I told them my plan, had various reactions of amusement.
None of them were as excited as I was, but that didn’t bug me. They weren’t the ones going head-to-head with a big, gorgeous vampire.
I had dinner with Damian like usual that night, and told him I had a little more work to do afterward. His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t try to stop me as I headed back in the direction of the room my sisters and I had been given for our online store things.
He'd promised to hunt me down if I wasn’t in our room when he went to bed, and I was totally going to use that.
As soon as I was out of his sight, I headed in the opposite direction from our workroom, hurrying straight for the pool.
There were a few vampires floating and swimming, but that would work in my favor.
I stripped off all my clothes—ignoring the catcalls and whistles—and called out, “If anyone tells Hale where I am before he finds me himself, I’m hiding my underwear in your room and setting him loose on you.”
Grins and laughter followed the promise.
I didn’t know them individually, but I trusted them to keep it a secret just until Damian found me himself. Messages had already gone around about our game after someone overheard me telling Zora about it the other morning.
Diving in, I swam to the bottom of the pool and tucked myself away in a little cove as far from the surface as you could get. I knew Damian could hold his breath long enough to get to the bottom—but if he didn’t see me right away, I could totally win the game.
If there really was a winner.
Was it even a game if no one won?
I decided I didn’t care. It was fun, regardless.
So, I relaxed in the pool, and waited.
My excitement rose higher the more time passed.
Two or three hours must’ve gone by when I finally saw a familiar pair of thick arms—and a set of electric blue eyes.
Damian was just as naked as I was.
The bastard must’ve cleared out the pool. I couldn’t help but grin at the realization.
He darted toward my cove, and at the last moment, I shot away.
Laughter cut through me as he chased me for a minute, but had to go back to the surface for air.
Oh, the man was going to be furious .
My smile stretched wider.
I watched the surface of the water, frowning when I didn’t see him dive back down again. He actually got out of the pool for some reason.
My eyes tracked the surface.
A solid minute had gone by when I realized there was another entrance. It was on the other side of a massive rock wall that connected to the main part with a tunnel. He could go through that, and?—
I screeched into the water when he grabbed me from behind, his victorious laughter bubbling up to my ears as he carried me back to the surface. We’d barely broken through the water when his teeth were in my throat, one of his hands on the ledge behind me and the other grabbing one of my thighs. He opened me up and drove into me as he drank.
I held onto his shoulders for dear life as he screwed me in the pool, bringing new sensations to life for me.
Water was just blissful.
And Damian was really, really good at sex.
I was coming hard by the time his fangs retracted and he lost control with me, filling me with his pleasure.
My bare chest rose and fell against his as we recovered, and for once, he didn’t lecture me about getting naked in public.
He just kissed me.
And fucked me again, slower and sweeter, while his tongue moved with mine.
It was surreal.
And so, so good.
When we came together again, I pressed my face against his neck, and he held me close. His hand moved slowly over my back, and I fought a sigh at how amazing it felt.
“You’re not going to yell at me for stripping?” I teased, my voice soft after the intimacy of the moments we’d shared.
Sex in the water was definitely a new favorite.
“Nah. I figure I’ll just start walking around naked whenever you do.”
My eyes widened against his neck. “What?”
“You know I get texts when you strip, right? I might be an asshole, but I’m a good leader. My people report that shit to me.”
“I guess that makes sense…”
“So, next time I get a text that my mate has stripped, I’ll just drop my clothes wherever I’m at so we can both be walking around naked.”
My eyes widened further.
I couldn’t help but imagine Damian stripping down in the dining room, while Missy and everyone else who lusted after the big, sexy bastard drooled.
I couldn’t stop myself from growling a little. “No.”
“No?” He feigned surprise. “You love public nudity, little siren.”
“You’re not stripping in front of anyone but me,” I grumbled. “I’ll stop swimming naked.”
“You can still swim naked,” he said, playing with my hair lightly. “After I’ve cleared the pool for you, and when there’s no one in here but me.”
“That’s fair, I guess.”
“Finally, she sees reason.”
I elbowed him in the gut, and he laughed, making his cock jerk where he was still buried inside me.
“You like our game, don’t you?” he asked me, his voice upbeat.
“It’s hard not to like it when it ends like this. Emphasis on hard .”
He grinned, thrusting his hips and making me bite back a groan. “I’d say we should enjoy it a little longer, but there’s supposed to be a movie night in here tonight. I already had them push back the start time, but they’re probably getting irritated out there.”
My eyes widened. “Shit, I didn’t realize.”
“I’ll buy a round of drinks as a thank you. They won’t care.”
We slipped out of the water and pulled our clothes back on, then opened the nearest door to let everyone in.
They were all friendly, and chatted normally as they filed into the room. The group was much bigger than I would’ve expected.
“Thanks for letting us take over tonight,” the final guy inside said with a grin. I thought he was talking to Damian at first, but realized after a minute that he was speaking to me. “I was worried we wouldn’t get approved for a minute.”
“Oh, you should thank Hale.” I patted him lightly on the chest. “It’s his pool.”
The guy snorted. “You’re the one feeding him—you can claim anything that’s his. You’ve got him by the balls, Blair.” He smacked Damian on the arm before jogging over to the pool and diving in.
“Hey, lovebirds,” a woman called out from the pool. When I looked over at her, I realized she was the woman I’d met the first time I went swimming. Missy’s sister. The one who was dating Roscoe. “Go put your swimsuits on and come join us! Movie starts in twenty minutes, after we get the drinks going around!”
“We’ll think about it,” I called back, irritation striking me with the title she’d used.
We weren’t lovebirds .
We were just two people who fed each other.
And screwed.
And shared a room.
And had a mate bond.
But that didn’t mean there were feelings involved.
Damian took my hand and led me down the hallway, toward the elevator that led up to our room.
He tucked me up against his chest, resting his chin on my head as the elevator carried us upward. After a moment of silence, he asked, “Do you want to go to the movie night?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never been to something like that.”
He was quiet, and I had the feeling he was considering it.
Finally, he said, “Do you think your sisters will ever take mates?”
The question caught me off guard. “I haven’t ever considered it.”
“They can’t meet anyone outside the Manor right now, but after we’ve figured out a way to make peace with Curtis, they’ll be free to come and go as they please. They’ll obviously still need to be careful, but I can’t imagine they’re going to stay here all the time.”
I frowned. “I guess if they could interact with the rest of society with vampires there to protect them, I can see a few of them eventually falling in love. I know Izzy’s already itching to get out of the Manor, so… yeah. I think they’ll eventually take mates, if just for the protection.”
“When that happens, you’ll have an easier time with it if you have friends here. Because I won’t let you go.” His arm was around my waist, his casual grip was so completely opposite of the certainty in his voice.
“I guess,” I admitted.
I was already friends with Lou and Kara, but they both had other friends. I’d need people to share meals with, other than Damian. People to swim with from time to time.
“Then I think we should go to the movie night,” he said. “It could be a good start to that.”
“Alright,” I agreed. “I’ll befriend a few vampires.”
“You’ve already got one.” He nudged the side of my throat with his nose.
“Lou?” I teased, as the elevator dinged with its arrival.
He whisked me off my feet and ran me to the bed, tossing me onto the mattress just to make me laugh.
“I’m picking your swimsuit,” he said, as he strode into the closet.
“Pick the pink bikini.” It was the skimpiest one I owned, though a few of my sisters had some far skimpier ones.
“I’d sooner burn it,” he called back.
I couldn’t fight my grin.
Damian picked out my bathing suit while I sent a message to my sisters to let them know about the movie night in case they were interested. I tossed my phone onto our bed when I was done, deciding to do my best to make some friends.
I was going to spend my life at Vamp Manor for better or worse, so it was time to make it a little better.