Chapter 16 – Elliot
ELLIOT
The hostile vampire guard didn’t seem particularly pleased about having to take care of me. But I felt clean and well fed, so I didn’t really care what he thought. Dragging my chain up the stairs, I limped as I followed him, hating just how badly my leg hurt.
Two other guards followed behind me, shoving me along every time they seemed to think I was going too slow. I bit down on every threat that leapt to my lips. I had a plan to get out of here. The last thing I needed to do was complicate things.
When I was shoved into the Shade’s room, she rose from her bed and eyed me and the guard for a moment before saying, “Leave him untethered to the ground.”
The guard’s brows rise. “My lady—“
“I don’t fear him,” she says, and there’s a flash of something dangerous in her eyes.
The vampire bows. “As you will,” he says, then leaves the room, closing the door behind him.
I have one moment of triumph before I look back at the shade and immediately realize something is wrong. Her face is pale, and the fire is no longer in her eyes.
“Are you alright?”
She draws her knees to her chest. “I don’t know.”
Carefully, I walk toward her, my ankles still bound with just enough give to walk, and my wrists still bound to my feet by a long chain. I sit at the edge of her bed, hoping that I’m not crossing any lines. Although, I guess I already have.
“What happened?”
She doesn’t meet my gaze. “I went to look for the magical object that’s keeping you in your human form. I found it exactly where I thought I would, in Lord Drac’s bedroom.”
“That’s good, right?”
Her arms tighten around her legs. “I guess.”
“Shade?” I say her name as gently as I can.
Her gaze rises and meets mine. “He kissed me.”
There was no way I could have expected the way my body reacted.
A roar filled my ears, and every muscle in my body tightened.
My teeth clenched together, and my heart pounded so hard that for a minute all I could see was red.
But I forced myself to take deep breaths, to calm myself down.
The vampire kissing the shade should mean nothing to me.
It certainly shouldn’t make me feel this way.
But as much as I tried to apply logic to the way I felt, there was nothing logical about it. A fact that bothered me to my core. Logic I understood. Feelings? Not so much.
“Did you,” I struggled to spit out the words, “like it?”
She frowns. “No. Not at all.”
Relief, pure and simple, flowed through me. “Good.”
“Is it good?” she asks me, those big eyes of hers filled with doubt. “Life would be simpler if I liked his kiss. Wouldn’t it? If I liked him, this place could be my home. My forever home. But if I hate when he kisses me, how long can I remain here?”
I hate that I can’t think of anything to say to comfort her. “I guess that would be simpler.”
She stares at me, troubled. “Wait. What if I just don’t like being kissed? Then it wouldn’t matter if it was him kissing me or someone else, and then I could stay.”
“I don’t think it works like that,” I say, feeling awkward.
She drops her arms from around her legs. “I should kiss you!”
I stiffen. “What?”
“Yes, then I would know if I just didn’t like kissing. I find you attractive, so if I didn’t like it with you either, I could stay here and just kiss him as little as I could.”
I swear. “Shade—“
“Please,” she begs me.
And I hate that I want to give her anything when she says the word. And I hate even more that I desperately want to kiss her and erase any memory she has of that asshole vampire.
“Please.”
Slowly, I nod. One kiss means nothing. It would help her, and she’d be more willing to help me escape. That’s all this was.
She moves closer to me on the bed, and I freeze, watching her carefully. When she comes so close that her knees are touching the side of my leg, she rises up a little and places a hand on my cheek.
I’m spellbound by her uncertain movements. So spellbound that I can’t seem to find the words to tell her that I’ve never kissed a woman before. That I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it either.
And then she leans in and kisses me.
The world spins away as her soft slips mold with mine. I can do nothing but feel the beautiful shade’s lips on my own. I can do nothing but let myself be kissed harder and harder.
I feel my dick harden beneath my loincloth, and I raise my chained hands to dig my fingers into her hair and tilt her so that I have better access to her mouth.
When I sweep my tongue into her mouth, a moan slips from her lips, and my dick throbs.
Her tongue tangles with my own, and she pulls closer to me, as if just as eager for my kiss.
Something snaps inside of me, and my hand drifts to her ass. I lift her and place her onto my lap, straddling my aching dick. For a half a second I think she’ll pull back, but instead she rubs against me.
Her hands move down my shoulders, then slide along the muscles of my chest. Goosebumps rise on my skin, and I’m shaking with a desire I’ve never felt before in my life. I’m grateful she stroked me off just a short time ago, because I know I’d have already spilled my seed if she hadn’t.
Suddenly, she pushes my loincloth aside, and I only have seconds to realize that she’s not wearing underwear beneath that gown of hers. She rubs herself against me, and the head of my cock slips into her wet folds, not yet entering her body, but slipping in the evidence of her desire.
I can’t seem to draw in enough air. My mouth tears from hers, then moves down to her throat. I suck my way down her soft skin, and her nails dig into my shoulders as my name slips from my lips.
She works herself harder against my cock, and my desire swells. I want to plunge into her tight channel more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life, but some voice in the back of my mind screams to go slow, that she’s innocent.
One of my hands leaves her hips and slides up to cup one of her breasts.
She gasps, and I draw back to watch her, completely transfixed, as I flick her nipple through the fabric of her dress. The woman’s eyes are closed, her mouth open in a silent moan of desire.
Her breast fills my hand perfectly, and I long to strip her and lavish her breasts the way I’ve always dreamed of doing. But I can’t. I know I need to follow her lead, not just use this beautiful woman to sate my own desires.
And then she slides my other hand between us. I don’t think. I just act on instinct. My thumb moves to play in her folds above my eager cock.
She moans and rubs against my thumb, harder and harder.
When she whimpers, I realize she wants more, but I’m not entirely sure how to give it to her. I allow one of my fingers to slip gently into her opening, and her entire body tenses for a moment before she begins to rub against me once more. My thumb circles her clit, then rubs the sensitive spot.
She cries out and begins to work herself against me harder and harder.
I watch her in complete shock as my dick throbs for release. And then I feel her orgasm against my fingers. She says my name. She rocks against me, tossing her head, and then collapses against me.
“That was…good.”
Hell, that was really good.
She suddenly pushes me back onto the bed, and I stare in wonder as she reaches between us, moving my hand away, grasping my hard shaft, and positioning me at her opening.
Strange thoughts swirl in my mind. I’m about to lose my virginity to a monster.
To a shade. And I don’t think I’ve ever been happier in my life.
And then I hear a light tapping at her door.
She springs away from me like a guilty teenager. I sit up, adjusting my loincloth, although it does little to hide my erection, then fold my hands above it.
A second later, a young woman with strawberry blond hair enters the room. She wears a white shirt and black slacks, with an apron covering both.
“My lady,” she says, giving a slight bow, but her calculating gaze snaps between us. “I apologize for my absence. My help was needed elsewhere.”
“It’s alright,” the shade says, not looking in my direction. “I’ve been busy with my prisoner.”
“Have you?” There’s a poorly hidden curiosity in her voice. “Many of the vampires were surprised to hear he still lives.”
She shrugs her shoulders, and my gaze is drawn to her breasts. The points of her hard nipples are visible beneath the thin material, and I instantly imagine drawing the hard peaks into my mouth.
“We all expected a shade to know just how to torture and kill an enemy…”
The shade moves to her vanity and begins to brush her fascinating hair, dark strands weaved with purple ones. “Vampires are too quick to kill and torture. They don’t understand that such things should be an art.”
“Well...” The woman draws out the word. “Lord Drac has determined who you should kill next.”
The shade freezes.
“There is a woman, not far from here, in a trailer in the woods.”
I stare in fascination as the shade closes her eyes. Her breathing quickens. “I don’t…wait…I feel her.”
“Kill the woman,” the maid says, her words barely louder than a whisper.
Suddenly, the shade is gone.
My heart races. Did I just kiss her? Touch her? Was I about to fuck the shade?
And now… now she’s going off to kill someone.
It was like a bucket of cold water. My father was right about me. I’m not meant for missions like this one, but I wouldn’t let myself fail. I couldn’t keep being distracted by the shade. I needed to focus on getting out, before I was the next death ordered.
The maid turns her eyes, ringed with red, onto me. A smile twists her lips. “You’re going to die here, gargoyle. And I’m going to enjoy the sounds of your death screams.”
A retort forms in my mind, but I bite down on it.
Damon would get angry. Jordon would kill her. Cody would be afraid.
I can be none of those things. I just had to be smart.