Chapter 21
Afew weeks had passed since everyone in Sebastian’s life became an immortal. He was used to it by now. They traveled as a pack at night while he slept to feed, and Charlotte and Victor had even arranged a partnership with local hospitals and blood banks. It was beneficial to everyone. Nobody got murdered, the banks got generous donations and funding, and they were supplied with blood regularly. Leona had told him her favorite was AB-, which both amused him and grossed him out.
The Labasques were very well-known in the community; Sebastian had no clue how they were going to swing their ‘deaths’ eventually. Piper suggested they just move away after several years and come back when everyone was dead. That’s what they usually did. Then nobody would know them. They certainly had enough wealth to last an eternity.
Christmas and the new year had come and gone, and everything was quiet as far as Gideon went. His stress consumed him sometimes, and he found it hard to sleep; luckily, Leona was always there to comfort him and keep him company when his insomnia spread through him. They stayed awake talking about all sorts: his childhood, some of his favorite memories in the city, her favorite places she’s visited or lived over the last few centuries, and their plans for the future. Sometimes the conversation was difficult, especially when they were faced with the fact that one day, Sebastian would be gone and Leona would be left alone. It was difficult for him to reassure her because there was no getting around it.
Though, in the time he’d spent getting to know Leona, taking her out, making love to her, his resolve was slowly crumbling. His friends seemed to be adjusting to this new lease on life well, and he didn’t necessarily have to kill humans if they kept this deal with the hospitals.
Leona still wore his blood pendant all the time. She never took it off. He had come close to letting her taste him several days ago, but he’d stopped himself. She had been respectful about it, and only her repetition of asking for consent made him come to his senses. He appreciated that she always triple-checked if he wanted something, instead of just going for it and asking for forgiveness later.
They had discussed possible contingency plans for if Gideon showed up out of the blue and wanted to cause trouble. Charlotte and Victor had been training with the girls, honing their skills and becoming comfortable in their new bodies. Sebastian often watched their sessions, which took place in the courtyard of Labasque Manor. They would spar, use their magical abilities, and test each other’s limits. None of them possessed the great power Gideon did, but Leona, Whitney, and Piper were intimately familiar with what he brought to a battle. All they could do was bring a good defense, because they would fail in offense.
Sebastian sat on his porch, the sun beginning to set as he scrolled through his phone. Often, he would spend time alone in the sun or during the day while Leona rested or occupied herself in other ways. She had reassured him to continue enjoying parts of his human life, even though she couldn’t.
She certainly relished in parts of her immortal life while he needed sleep.
“Coming in soon?”
At the sound of Leona’s voice, Sebastian tore his eyes from his phone to glance at her. As he answered, he did a double take and sat up straighter. She was completely naked, showing off her flawless form. He almost dropped his phone. Her body was mouthwatering, and he was completely helpless to her womanly wiles every time she decided to distract him. He started to stand but was interrupted by a rather alarmed, high-pitched noise from nearby. His head shot to his neighbor’s porch, where an elderly woman had her jaw dropped wide open, her dog beginning to bark.
“Go inside,” Sebastian hissed as he gently pushed Leona behind the threshold. He lifted his hand in an apologetic wave to the woman next door. “Sorry, Mrs. Sodeko. Tell Pookie I said hello.”
As he scrambled inside, Leona had her eyebrow raised. “Pookie?”
“I didn’t name her dog!” he snapped, shutting the door behind him. He wasn’t angry with her — because that would be impossible in her current outfit. “I’m not complaining about your choice of attire at all, but we need to remember that things like that can send my seventy-five-year-old neighbor into cardiac arrest,” he said with a laugh.
Leona rolled her eyes and pressed her body against his. “Perhaps I want to send you into cardiac arrest, Mr. Beliveau,” she purred, moving her teeth to tug at his earlobe.
He let out a shuddered breath and grabbed her hips, before pushing her up against his bookcase nearby. She didn’t miss a beat and hopped into his arms, her legs looping around his waist. Their kiss was animalistic and passionate, with tongues and teeth gnashing everywhere.
They varied back and forth on who dominated whom when it came to sex. Obviously, Leona was the stronger one of the pair, but she liked to put him in charge just as much as she liked being in charge. Sebastian was happy to let her take over when she wanted — in fact, he preferred it. She was always nervous in the back of her mind about hurting him, but as he’d told her, he was sturdy. He enjoyed the marks — he always told her it was the best reminder of her.
“Tell me what you want,” Sebastian breathed against her, his lips brushing against her cheek and down to her neck.
“Fuck me,” she barely managed, tilting her head back against the books. Were she a human, this would be vastly uncomfortable. But as a vampire, she hardly noticed it. Her nails dug into his neck as his hands fumbled below them to undo his jeans. Sebastian wasted no time and in a moment, he was sheathed deep inside her. Leona let out a guttural moan as she bit down on his shoulder, careful not to draw blood. She wasn’t sure she would be able to control herself otherwise.
Every time they made love, the world seemed to stop on its axis. Sebastian always saw stars, his body lighting up with pleasure as her walls pulsed around him. She liked playing rough and as much as she marked him, he did his damnedest to return the favor. Of course, her skin healed quicker than the marks could even appear, but she liked the pressure of his teeth and fingers against her. It was always ‘harder, faster, more.’
“I love you,” Leona breathed, her words hitching slightly. “Right there,” she continued, books rattling behind her. “Please, please, please.”
Her demands rang in his ears, and he was a slave to her command. Pleasure shot through him like a bolt of electricity. This woman, who could splinter every bone in his body in an instant, was begging him for mercy in her ecstasy. His fingers curled around the back of her neck and he caught her lower lip between his teeth.
“You are mine, Leona Abrin. Mine,” he growled against her lips, his hips still working furiously against her. The only sounds in the room were their bodies meeting, his lusty declarations, and the wood of the shelves clattering against the wall. “You will be ruined for any other creature after me. If you ever decide to find something else, you’ll find yourself thinking of me. You’ll look up at him and exclaim to a God you don’t believe in wishing it were my name on your tongue. I will split you in half every time you ask and lick your wounds like a man starved. I’m yours and you’re mine.”
“Yes,” Leona cried out, tears streaming down her cheeks with the jolts coursing through her veins. She had never longed for flames so much before. “I was in a tomb before you, my love,” she said, sobbing with pleasure. “You resurrected me.”
“In life, death, and whatever comes after and between, I will find you. My soul is embedded in yours and one cannot exist without the other,” he breathed, feeling an eruption budding inside him. “Come for me, honey,” he whispered against her lips. “Please.”
That was all Leona needed for her orgasm to rip through her and turn her inside out. She dug her nails so deep into his back that she did break the skin this time, but her climax was so powerful that the scent of blood didn’t even register. She moved her hands over him, up into his hair, tugging slightly. Sebastian had spilled himself deep inside her, his forehead pressed against her shoulder. His body heaved with the weight of his breathing. Fearing his legs would give way, he slowly set her back down on the floor.
Leona had not been out of breath in dozens of decades, but right then, she felt light-headed. She sunk down to the floor and rested back against the bookcase, books open-faced and bent all around her. She kept her gaze on him, and only in the afterglow of their lovemaking did she smell it.
“Are you bleeding?” she asked softly, her eyes hooded.
Sebastian frowned and brought his hand around his side to touch his back. When he looked down at his palm, he saw crimson spread across it. “Oh. I’m okay, don’t worry. Are you—”
“I’m fine,” she said, looking away from him. It was extremely tempting, but she loved him far too much to risk anything. She also felt sated in ways she never had before after what they’d just done. If she could live off his cock alone, the world would be a merry place.
Against his better judgment, Sebastian sat down opposite her and held out his hand. “Here.”
“What?” Leona asked in confusion, lifting her head from its relaxed position. “No,” she said, pushing his hand away from her.
“I don’t mind. Maybe you won’t like it. But I know you’re curious,” he said. “I’m not AB-negative, but… O-positive might be so common it’s off-putting,” he laughed.
Leona mulled this over, wondering if he was testing her. She couldn’t find any sort of reason behind a trap other than that he’d just had a change of heart at the moment. “I’m not going to hurt you,” she reassured, scooting to sit behind him. She wrapped her arms around his stomach, her palms flattening against his chest. Slowly, her tongue licked up his back to the puncture wounds from her nails through the rips on his shirt, the blood wiping clean in her path. Her pupils dilated and she gripped him tighter. Her fangs extended and she felt her control wavering, but she was aware of every move she made. She would not harm him.
Well, permanently.
“Leona,” he breathed, feeling only slightly clammy. “Leona.”
She pulled back the second time. Her hands raked down his chest, then she ran her thumb over his cuts. “Thank you. You are delectable. I feel closer to you now,” she said. “I never think I can fall deeper in love with you and you prove me wrong every day. Every hour.”
“I draw the line at every minute and second,” he teased, turning around to face her. He took her face in his hands and kissed her. Their kiss was enough to make his toes curl. A metallic twang invaded their kiss, but it wasn’t anything new. He often got wisps of it when she came home from feeding and woke him up with a kiss. She was always horny after a hunt, which was both a good and bad thing for him. Good in that he got sex that made him unable to sit directly on his ass for a week, but bad because he was unable to sit directly on his ass for a week.
“Hopefully Pookie’s virgin ears didn’t hear any of that,” Leona said with a small giggle, causing Sebastian to chuckle. She pulled him by the neck for another kiss, and they collapsed to the floor to resume their last conversation.