Chapter 6
Chase’s underground suite was all dark wood and deep burgundy leather, books lining every wall, the air thick with the intellectual weight of centuries. Emmy curled up in his reading chair while he poured wine, both already naked from the initial feed-and-fuck.
They were past the point of ceremony now.
The initial bite had been quick and efficient, his fangs sliding into the soft curve where neck met shoulder while he took her against the wall, his dick in her ass.
And after, he’d fucked her hard and deep, the kind of claiming that left her knees weak and her body purring in lazy satisfaction.
No games. No power plays. Just the simple, honest exchange of hunger for hunger.
And so, she curled in the oversized reading chair, legs tucked under her, skin still flushed and tingling. Chase moved through the room with that deliberate vampire economy, pouring two glasses of deep red wine from a decanter that probably cost more than most people’s cars.
He handed one to her without a word, and she demanded, “Tell me about the eels again. I want details on his methods.”
He laughed and sat in a chair across from her. “Still fascinated by Albertus?”
“He believed dragons were real. Of course I’m fascinated.” She took a sip of the wine and savored the fruity notes before swallowing.
Chase leaned back, one arm draped along the chair’s armrest. “Albertus Magnus wrote De animalibus. A monster of a book, twenty-six volumes. He took Aristotle’s zoology, mixed in Avicenna and his own observations, and tried to make sense of the natural world without dismissing the impossible outright.
He described serpents in detail — venom, movement, reproduction.
Said their wombs were long like fish, that they laid eggs in a continuous stream during coitus. But the dragons…”
He paused, eyes glinting with amusement. “He didn’t call them myth. He treated them as a class of serpents. Large, fire-breathing, winged in some accounts, but fundamentally animals. Part of the great chain. Not devils, not metaphors, just one of nature’s many extremes.”
“Like the whales, the kraken, and t-rex.”
He shook his head and then leaned forward to run his fingers along her legs, slow and unhurried.
“He got a lot right. Dissected moles while they still twitched. Noticed the way eggs developed inside birds. He was empirical when everyone else was still quoting scripture or Aristotle without question. But the dragons…” He shrugged.
“He said he accepted the reports. Travelers’ tales, bestiaries, the old chronicles.
He didn’t mock them. He cataloged.” He met her gaze. “I always wondered if he’d seen one.”
“By then, there were only a handful of shifters left. It’s possible, but unlikely, since the three I’m aware of mostly went to Faerie to fly.”
She set her wine on the side table and moved to sit in his lap. Her fingers curled around the back of his neck, pulling him closer until their foreheads touched. “You’re such a nerd.”
“Takes one to know one, darling.”
They talked for an hour about medieval natural philosophy while Chase’s fingers traced idle patterns on her skin.
When he leaned close during a discourse on the things Da Vinci learned by dissecting humans, she took the opportunity to kiss him slow and deep, tasting the wine on his tongue, the faint metallic edge of her own blood still lingering in his mouth. He didn’t rush. Neither did she.
When he pulled back, she lifted herself and straddled him without preamble, knees bracketing his hips, the leather slick against her shins. His cock was already hard again, thick and cool between them. She wrapped her hand around him, stroking lazily, enjoying the way his eyes darkened.
She rose, guided him to her entrance, and sank down inch by slow inch.
The stretch was perfect. He filled her completely, his cool length pressing against every sensitive place inside her, and she let her head fall back on a long sigh.
His hands settled on her hips, and they moved together like people who knew each other’s rhythms. No frantic rutting. Not yet.
She rolled her hips in lazy circles, grinding down until her clit pressed against his pubic bone, sparks shooting up her spine. He thrust up to meet her, and one of his hands cupped her breast, thumb circling her nipple in slow, deliberate strokes.
Emmy leaned forward, braced her hands on his shoulders, and kissed him again.
Deeper this time, tongues sliding, breaths mingling.
She rocked faster, the wet slide of their bodies loud in the quiet room, the chair creaking under them.
Pleasure built low and steady, a slow burn rather than a wildfire.
She felt him thicken inside her, felt the subtle tremor in his thighs.
One hand slipped between them, fingers finding her clit, rubbing in tight, perfect circles. The pressure coiled tighter, hotter, until she shattered, her inner muscles fluttering around him in long, rolling waves.
He was close, but he must’ve decided he wasn’t ready quite yet, because the next thing she knew, she was on her knees before the chair she’d been sitting in earlier, her face in the seat, and his dick was going back into her ass.
She arched her back to give him a better angle, but he didn’t need it.
And just like that, they went from slow and easy to hard and fast. She screamed her way through three more orgasms before he finally came deep inside her, his hips jerking, hands gripping.
And, being the gentleman he is, there were soon baby wipes in his hands, cleaning her up before he lifted her, sat in the chair, and arranged her in his lap.
She rested her cheek against his shoulder, feeling the steady thrum of his contentment, the faint pulse of afterglow shared through the quiet intimacy they’d built. And the not-so-quiet.
“I wonder what the Renaissance scientists would think about our current understanding of genetics,” she mused.
He chuckled. “Some would argue with you, others would say they knew it all along. I do often wonder about Da Vinci, whether he was actually precognizant, with limited access to a future he tried to make sense of.” He stood with her in his arms and settled her back into the chair.
“If you can put whole sentences together, it’s time for more wine.”
“Wine is never going to get me drunk. Besides, you’re smart enough to know you don’t have to seduce me to fuck me.”
“And yet, a little seduction never hurts. I value the time we spend together, and I figure that time should be as enriched as I can make it. I don’t eat food; you don’t drink blood. Wine, however, is something we have in common.”
He moved across the room, selected a bottle, and asked, “Sweet, or something with a bite?”
“Sweet, I think.”
He returned with an opened bottle, filled their glasses, and sat in front of her once again.
One topic led to another, and an hour later they were discussing genetic buffers and theoretical ways to get out of a bottleneck.
Chase asked sharp questions, poked at her assumptions, and offered connections to medieval texts she hadn’t considered.
She challenged him back, teasing out details from centuries-old debates on natural magic and philosophy.
Hours passed. The wine bottle emptied, then another. Eventually she stretched and sat up.
“I should head upstairs.”
“Probably. You daywalkers never last much past around two in the morning.” He stood to help her up. “You’re on my schedule again in four days, but you never stay as long on school nights.”
She grinned. “All the more reason to convince Spence to slot me in on the weekends.”
He gave a slow, lingering kiss, and walked her up the steps, since she wasn’t authorized to be in this part of the underground by herself. Most vampires fed from her in the feeding rooms, but Chase was different. Not with all of the flock, just the ones he wanted to spend time with.
Or, as he put it, the ones who didn’t make him want to rip their tongues out to shut them up.
She cut two apples into a bowl, threw a handful of grapes into it, and carried it up to her room for some final calories before she fell asleep.
Felix was such a lovely submissive, an extreme masochist who craved the pain she needed to dole out.
But Chase gave her the other parts of what she needed — good sex from a dominant who didn’t require her submission and in fact respected her dominance, even if he was never going to submit.
And along with that, excellent conversation and zero emotional complication.
Just two friends who understand each other perfectly, in bed and out of it.