Chapter 17 Bleeding Out
Bleeding Out
How could I be worth all this effort? I was a clumsy waitress who’d spilled a little blood—not even as a euphemism for violence, I’d literally dropped a tray of flutes filled with blood—and that was somehow worthy of the Premier himself tracking me down.
Was he mad because they’d discovered I’d let Nellie into the party? Was that my crime?
“Don’t hurt her anymore, please,” I begged. My knees wobbled as I put my bags on the floor, showing my empty hands. “I’m the one who broke the rules and sneaked her in, so it’s my fault. Whatever punishment is left to be had, I’ll take it.”
Nellie whimpered behind me. Okay, maybe it was also her fault since it had been her idea, but it looked like she’d already taken a beating.
His head tilted slightly, his eye contact never breaking. “Punishment? What are you talking about?” He took a step closer to me, his scent overwhelming. It was herbal and strong, with a base note of something metallic that lingered and settled in the air.
My stomach cramped again, my breasts tingling and my underwear becoming wet. A low growl rumbled through the Premier’s chest, and my eyes widened in horrible recognition.
Oh Hecara, I was going into heat.
How? Why? I took medicine to prevent this, and I took it like clockwork.
“Merfolk, leave us!” he commanded, and Nellie bolted through the lobby and out the front door. I followed her with my eyes, terrified of what would happen now that I was alone and going into heat while the vampire Premier stood six feet away, ready to kill me.
This certainly wasn’t how I’d imagined dying, but at least Nellie would live to tell the tale. Would it be considered epic or embarrassing?
Knowing Nellie, she’d definitely spin it to be epic. I mean, it was the least she could do, considering she’d led me straight to my end.
Once the front door locked back into place, I was slammed into the wall behind me. He moved so fast I barely had time to register the pain before his nose was buried in my neck, his body caging me in.
“Yes,” he hissed. “Yes, this is it. Jasmine… It’s subtle, but it’s there. It’s really you, I can’t believe it.”
His fangs scraped against the delicate skin of my neck and I swallowed nervously. I had a charm on my bracelet that made my blood taste sour, a necessary deterrent in a city full of vampires who occasionally fell to bloodlust.
But the Premier’s body was flush with mine, and I couldn’t snake my hand between us to get to my other wrist.
“I’ve been looking for you for so long, and I had you wrong this whole time.”
What the hell was he talking about? It had been an hour and a half tops since I’d run from his party.
Another cramp seized my muscles and I winced, my heat ramping up at an alarming rate.
The Premier growled again, and began… wait, was he humping me?
I knew most alphas were hard-wired to respond almost immediately to an omega in heat, but he’d wanted to kill me. And he was the Premier of vampires, so he was probably on a rut suppressant himself.
The growing erection that rocked against my stomach, though, spoke otherwise.
Could… could I use this in my favor? Yes, I could blame my heat for my clumsiness!
It was infantilizing, but if I could take advantage of how little faith people had in my designation, maybe I’d get out of this alive.
Surely I could blame the dropped tray on a debilitating stomach cramp.
And the Premier’s cock was proof I wasn’t making this up.
Then I could claim “heat insanity” and hopefully get off with a slap on the wrist.
Never mind my earlier doubts, Hecara, you’re a genius!
But I couldn’t spend my heat with the Premier. One, he was, well, the Premier. Two, he was a powerful vampire and I was a middling witch. He could easily lose control and drain me, fucking my corpse for hours until he snapped out of it.
Yeah, I’d read horror stories.
I needed to get to an Omega Center, find someone nice and safe to ride this out with. Someone who wouldn’t accidentally kill me. Or maybe they’d even let me call Kaleb. He was the elf beta who’d invited me onto his “crew” for the game Starlight Dominion, and just recently we’d started dating.
The Premier grabbed my hair and tilted my face up into his, his pupils fully blown as his rut began to take over. “My car is outside,” he hissed. “You’re coming with me.”
Then his mouth slammed violently against mine, swallowing my shocked gasp.
I felt him everywhere, his hands moving along my body as though he were studying every inch of me by touch alone.
He forced his tongue through the seal of my lips, invading my mouth with the need to be inside me, however he could.
Slick pooled in my underwear, running down my thighs and preparing my body for an alpha’s intrusion.
I finally broke from his kiss, turning my head to the side so I could speak. “You… you don’t want to do this with me, think about it. Just drop me off at the center and…”
Hands slammed into the wall on either side of my head and he growled in warning. “You think I don’t want to fuck my mate? That I would drop you off at the center to be rutted by some other man?”
The lights in my lobby began to flicker in warning, the ground threatening to split open.
“M-mate?” I squeaked.
He’d called me… his mate?
No. No, no, no. There was no way we were mates. I… well, yes, I felt attracted to him. He was a beautiful, powerful alpha, and I was an omega. I’d always, on some level, appreciate men like him, even if my mind wasn’t interested.
But finding your mate wasn’t something you questioned.
People said smelling your mate for the first time was like having your brain rewired.
Like from that moment on, all you could think about was how to live your life around and for this one person, chosen by the gods themselves to be your perfect partner.
The only thing the Premier made me feel was terror and confusion.
And what about him? I wasn’t even his type! Maybe he’d confused my scent with Nellie’s?
“Yes,” he sighed, grinding against me harder. “Mate. Sage, you’re my mate. Listen to what your body is telling you. You’re mine.”
What was my body saying? It was saying it wanted to be bred, now. And I’d never spontaneously gone into a heat before. It couldn’t have been a coincidence that him thinking I was his mate and my biological need to make babies were happening right at the same time.
Oh no, what if he was my mate?
“Premier, please maybe we’re mistaken…”
“No!” he bellowed. The whole building began to shake, dust falling from the ceiling as a crack snaked up the wall. “Sage, I know you’re mine. I scented you years ago, and I’ve been looking for you ever since. I’m never letting you out of my sight again.”
With that, he slid his hands down my sides to my upper thighs, lifting them as he pinned me against the wall and wrapped my legs around his hips. His lips met mine again, and without looking, he turned around, taking us out the door to the town car waiting outside.
I had no idea what to do. My body’s reaction made sense if what he was saying was true, that he was my mate, and I couldn’t help but respond to him in kind. I’d never been with anyone like him before, and his touch was intoxicating.
The Premier of Noctis… my mate.
No, no, it didn’t make sense!
As soon as the car door closed, he slipped my shirt off over my head and then paused.
His rough panting quelled, and his eyes narrowed as he inspected the large, raised scar on my chest. Cool fingers traced lightly over the vertical line that started below my collarbone and went straight through the valley of my breasts.
“What’s this?” he whispered, his touch pebbling my skin and stealing my breath.
I swallowed nervously, frustrated and yet glad for the interruption.
Maybe this was the bucket of cold water that would help him see straight.
That would help him realize he was just an alpha responding to an omega in heat, so he could forget this “mate” nonsense and take me to the center like I’d asked.
“Surgery scar,” I replied. “I… I was born with a heart defect.”
I braced myself for him to clear his throat, to back up and tell his driver where to drop me off. Vampires idealized perfection in every sense of the word, so there was no way Premier Victor Corvane would want a damaged mate, or to have children with someone who might pass on their weak genes.
But instead, his eyes misted over. “I might have lost you…” He looked up at me, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “My little fighter. My warrior.”
He kissed me again, gently this time, as though he’d just considered I might be fragile. It was nice, it was sensual. His head tilted as his tongue found mine, working to find the best angle to reach me.
But that thought slipped his mind once I whimpered and a fresh cramp released more scented slick, his breathing turning into shallower pants as he worked his hand down my bra, pulling my breast and the runics I’d hidden free from the cup.
His lips left my mouth and suctioned my nipple, his fangs teasing the skin as he drew it into a stiff peak, sucking and licking until I felt I might come from that alone.
“P-Premier!” I gasped, my hands shaking at my sides. I was too afraid to touch him. To spur him on. Or was I just afraid that touching him would make this situation real? Like if I resisted long enough, I might wake up, and realize it had all been a strange dream.
He released my breast from his mouth, his red-rimmed black eyes staring up at me. “I’m your mate, so call me by my name.”
My throat closed. I just couldn’t; it felt wrong to cross that threshold with him. My omega instincts weren’t quite kicking in enough for me to submit to what he was asking, so I froze.
He had already unbuttoned my pants, and was sliding them down my hips when his gaze narrowed. “Say it.”
When I still couldn’t get my mouth to work, he grabbed my hair and pulled my head to the side, hissing in my ear. “Say my name, Sage. Call out the name of your mate.”
An alpha command—there was no resisting. “Victor,” I whispered, a single tear sliding down my cheek. He pulled off my underwear, and then began unbuttoning his shirt.
“Louder.”
“V-Victor,” I said again.
“Louder!” he demanded over the sound of his zipper.
“Victor!” I yelled as his cock pierced me.
My head slid up and slammed into the car door, but he had lost himself to the rut too much to care.
His hips thrust into me with wild abandon, snarling like a wild beast. His nails turned to claws, slashing the leather interior as he tried to find purchase, pounding into me harder and harder.
Maybe if we had the space or were in a bed, I could actually enjoy the experience, but the position was so awkward that my discomfort was all I could concentrate on.
And he was too strong, too focused on chasing his own pleasure to notice my suffering beneath him.
Before I could voice my pain, his fangs grew even longer, and he struck like a viper to my throat.
My mouth opened in a wordless scream. Pure, icy venom slithered through my veins as the magic of his claim branded me and bound me to him.
Merfolk, werewolf, witch, demon… alphas of all Magiks could claim someone, mate or not, as a partner.
But only vampires would stay latched, and my body seized like the good prey I was, letting him gulp his full while I lay still.
He took with his cock and he took with his mouth, everything my body had to give.
And give I did.
I tried to lift my hand to tap him, to tell him to stop. Stars, forming in the corners of my vision, began to spread, and my skin felt cold.
It was too much. He was taking too much.
He had fallen to bloodlust.
“Vic…tor…” I gasped. He finally detached from the wound, my blood running down his chin. His eyes widened in shock and horror.
“No… no, no, no, Sage. Hold on. Fuck, hold on Sage! Fuck!”
His voice became quieter as I retreated into my mind, the world turning black.