Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Sorcha went to the kitchen to get a cup of coffee. As a cat, Trinket slept on top of the armchair, next to the wall. Luke was asleep on the couch, in his dog form, with Helly curled up at the other end, softly snoring. The urge to pet Luke on the head was hard to resist. He was so cute as a dog.
Unlike his mother, he preferred the form of a huge black German shepherd. She wasn’t sure why, but it made him even more adorable.
It didn’t help that she loved dogs and that her favorite pet as a child had been a perfect tan-and-black shepherd named Jax.
I really miss that dog. She’d loved him so much that she’d never had the heart to adopt another dog after he’d passed.
She couldn’t replace him and she didn’t want to try. And after the death of her sister, she was done with burying the ones she loved. It might be selfish, but she couldn’t go through the grief again. She was done.
As quietly as possible, Sorcha made a cup of coffee and headed back to the bedroom to dress.
By the time she finished and returned to the living room, Helly was awake, but still on the couch under a red plush UGA blanket. Luke sat where he’d been, except now he was sipping his own cup of coffee with his hair tousled and those glorious dark whiskers dusting his cheeks.
Damn, he was gorgeous. It was all she could do not to cross the room and straddle that long, lean body. Run her tongue over his inviting stubble and play a tune across that washboard stomach.
How could any man be so scrumptious?
A smile toyed at the edges of her lips as she imagined the look on his face if she gave in to those thoughts in her head.
Would he welcome it?
That was a question she wasn’t sure she wanted answered.
But it might be fun to find out.
Or it would be truly humiliating if he pushed her aside. That was what made her head toward the kitchen for another cup of coffee and not in the direction of the living embodiment of masculine beauty sitting churlishly on the couch. “Good morning, sunshine.”
Luke growled, making her laugh. He hated mornings and he really didn’t appreciate her cheerfulness in it. “How can you smile before noon?”
“It’s easy.” She gave him a big grin.
He made a sound of supreme disgust. “If I ever go home, I now have a new torture in Hell. Sticking chipper morning people with those of us who hate mornings.”
She moved to sit in the chair Trinket had vacated. “Glad I could help.”
Luke yawned.
Waiting until he finished, she took a sip. “What’s on the agenda for the day?”
“Murder, mayhem, and merriment. You know? The usual.”
She loved his sense of humor. It was another reason she needed to keep her distance, even if she did want to kiss—stop!
She hoped he wasn’t reading her mind right now.
She loved their banter and didn’t want to do anything to alter their back-and-forth.
“That’s good for the first half hour. What’ll we do for an encore? ”
An odd look darkened that amber gaze.
“What?”
“Oh, you don’t even want to know where my wicked thoughts went. They’d have me hauled into HR.”
She swallowed thickly at the implication, but kept her tone light and that distance between them. “We don’t have an HR.”
“We’d get one if I said what thoughts are in my head.” He flashed a devastating grin at her.
Okay, then. She wouldn’t press the issue since her own thoughts were extremely risqué. She had a feeling he liked to make her blush.
Luke scratched rapidly through his hair, which only tousled it more. “If I ask you something weird, will you promise you’ll still talk to me after it?”
Sorcha froze as all kinds of thoughts went through her head. Most were inappropriate and the rest were frightening. “Every molecule in my body just cringed in terror of that. I want to say yes, but… How weird are we talking?”
“On a scale of one to ten…nine thousand.”
That wasn’t helpful.
At all.
Sadly, it kicked her curiosity into high gear. “I have a horrible feeling I’m going to regret this, but sure. I promise.”
Helly tsked from under the blanket she’d pulled over her head. “And here I thought she could be taught. Girl…didn’t anyone ever tell you not to knock on the devil’s door unless you want him to answer?”
Luke playfully slapped at Helly’s feet. “Don’t scare her, Imp.”
“I’m not the one she needs to fear. And she knows it. Stop being vague and ask the question before she wets the chair.”
Sorcha clung to the weird subject change in self-defense. “And I’m getting close. I don’t know how long my bladder will last.”
Luke rolled his eyes. “Fine. Can I bite you?”
Sorcha blinked slowly. Then, she blinked again. Was he serious? Had she heard him correctly?
Surely not.
“Beg your pardon?”
“I need to know your ancestry. One bite is all I need.”
“Or try . Better yet, a DNA test. There are a lot more sanitary ways to go about it nowadays. Are you insane?” She spoke so rapidly that she wasn’t sure if he could understand her. Plus, all the images it conjured in her head were definitely not healthy.
Her head tilted back, his teeth grazing the pulse at her throat. Heat crawled through her body, starting at her fingertips and ending low in her gut. She banished the image—mostly successfully.
“They won’t tell me what I need. assumes you know who all your people are. It’s not as reliable as you think. DNA testing won’t show if you have a lineage outside of the human realm. That’s what I need to know. More to the point, it’s what you need to know.”
She wasn’t really sure if she was ready to know that.
What if he was right?
And that was followed by an even scarier thought. “You think this had something to do with my sister’s death, don’t you?”
“I don’t know. And I mean that. It would explain some things, but you know what I do…people are crazy. They do vicious things to each other all the time. Her death could be random. What concerns me are the creatures after you, and the Aztec priest who tried to kill you. I need to know why.”
“I have no Aztec in me. I’m English, Welsh, and a whole lot of Irish.
On both sides. My mother’s people came here in the mid-1800s.
My father’s family immigrated in the 1930s and 1950s.
” Her conversation with Acheron flashed through her mind.
Were her parents actually her parents? She didn’t know.
And if they weren’t, she wasn’t sure she wanted to find out.
Luke scratched his chin. “That’s a lot of time to marry someone who had something in them that they didn’t know.”
Great. Another chilling thought.
Luke’s gaze intensified. “Ever wonder why your grandfather became a spiritual warrior? What pulled him to that?”
She hated the fact that she had no idea. It was something she’d known about him, but for some reason, she’d never asked. Just taken it on faith.
Pun intended.
Sorcha chalked it up to all the things children accepted about their family without ever being curious enough to ask the most basic questions.
Don’t you want to know the truth?
Yes. But… “Do you have to bite me?”
“It’s the best, easiest way.”
Of course it was.
And she couldn’t believe she was even considering what she was considering. She’d lost her mind.
But he’d struck the one nerve that wouldn’t give her peace. What if he was right and this was why her sister had died?
It sounded stupid. Maybe it was. Yet if it could give them a new clue or new direction, she owed it to Siobhan to find out. Because what hurt most was the fact that her sister’s death seemed so meaningless.
Having a reason wouldn’t make it right or hurt less. But mentally…
Maybe it might help.
“Will it hurt?”
Luke shook his head.
That was comforting, sort of. “Okay. Just know that if it hurts, I’m going to kick you really hard in a very uncomfortable place.”
“Noted.” He stood up.
Sorcha didn’t move. “How do we do this?”
Luke held his hand out to her.
She hesitated. This was a scary thought for her.
Terrifying, really.
Do you trust me? That warm, deep voice whispered in her thoughts.
It was so easy to trust him. Temptation…as the devil’s son, it made sense that he was irresistible. Why wouldn’t he be?
With a deep breath for courage, she reached up and took that large, callused hand in hers. Luke pulled her gently to her feet until she stood in front of him.
Her heart began to pound. While she knew he was insanely large, she’d grown used to his unorthodox size and she tended to forget about it until times like this. His size was overwhelming.
Just like his warmth.
He pulled her against him and dipped his head low. “Are you all right?” he whispered in her ear.
That gave her goosebumps.
She instinctively sucked her breath in as he nuzzled the nape of her neck. His warm breath fell against her skin, searing it. Every part of her wanted to clutch his head against her neck. Wrap her arms and legs around him.
So, so many things.
He’s your partner.
It terrified her that she didn’t really care. Not when she was overwhelmed by the feel of being in his arms.
Don’t be scared or nervous. His voice hypnotized her and caused her to instantly relax.
She surrendered her weight to him.
Luke tilted her head aside ever so slightly as his lips brushed against the flesh of her neck. Weak and breathless, she had no ability to move.
Was this what it felt like to be bitten by a vampire? If it was, she well understood how they were able to claim victims.
Suddenly, Luke sank his teeth into her neck.
Sorcha gasped, but he’d been right. There was no pain. Instead, it was a surge of euphoria that went through her. Orgasmic.
Crying out, she held him even closer.
Luke gave one long, languid lick to her neck before he pulled away.
She still couldn’t stand on her own. Luke picked her up as if she weighed nothing at all, then set her gently back in her spot in the chair.
Sorcha still couldn’t move. She was boneless, sated, and more than a little turned on.
A wicked smile curved his lips as he wiped the blood away with the back of his hand. “You are divine.”
“Thank you.” She rolled her head toward him as she tried to focus her gaze.
He laughed. “Glad it flattered you. But that’s not what I meant. You do have ancient blood in your veins.”
That snapped her out of her trance and she lifted her head. “What?”
“There’s no denying it. You’re part Aztec and the blood of their gods is in you. I think we know what happened with Siobhan.”