Chapter 17
Sam
Raf helped me yesterday and I couldn’t figure out why. His blood felt amazing in my body, even though the surge of power under my skin was overwhelming. I was still torn between staying fed and reverting back to my diet. It was hard to believe that having more magic made it easier to control, but the jury was still out on the whole thing.
This connection between us felt strange and I hadn’t quite figured out how it worked. One thing I did know was that he wasn’t being completely forthcoming. Even though he didn’t kill me when he had an open opportunity, he was still planning to. I didn’t know if the obsequium thing stopped him or something else, nor did I know if I was happy about it or not.
Last night, I’d been intent on letting him end it for me. If even my greatest enemy wouldn’t kill me, I was shit out of luck. Either I’d have to do it myself or actually try to figure all of this out.
The town hadn’t gone up in flames yet, so that was good. I was more worried about getting emotional. Lock was bound to piss me off soon enough, especially since he had to be around Raf. That was another thing I felt weird about.
Lock didn’t trust him one bit and I didn’t blame him. With my own confliction about Raf’s intentions, I hated asking my volatile mate to put aside his hatred, but I didn’t know what else to do. At the moment, I felt like this connection between us was the only thing holding me together.
After showering, I threw on a pair of shorts, which felt weird in November, but the cold no longer bothered me, so it didn’t really matter. I was still tying my hair in a bun on top of my head when I walked into the main room. What I saw there made me come to an abrupt halt.
Lock was leaning back against the counter with a cup of coffee in one hand and his phone in the other. He appeared to be reading something, but it was the state of him that had me feeling like I’d start sweating. He was wearing low slung black pants with no shirt, putting his perfectly chiseled body on display. His hair was still damp from his shower, falling over his forehead.
When he raised his pale blue eyes to look at me through the strands of his dark hair, I had to refrain from clenching my thighs together. He didn’t move, just continued to watch me like a predator waiting for its prey to make its next move. The corner of his mouth raised slightly and I thought I might pass out.
He licked his lips, then rolled them. That was clear and present danger. I felt trapped and breathless under his gaze.
Casually, I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a coffee cup. When I saw that he’d bought my favorite coffee creamer, warmth flooded my body. The guy hadn’t even flinched when his mother was brutally beaten, raped, and killed in front of him, but he brought me to this place when I was completely losing myself and he made sure I had my favorite things. I would never tame the monster and I had no desire to, but I’d somehow become the thing he put above everything else.
“Why are you crying?” he asked, wrapping his arms around me from behind.
“You do so much for me and I’ve been such a problem.”
“You’ve been a pain in the ass,” he agreed with a laugh. “But you don’t need to be upset.”
“I’m sorry.”
He turned me around, pressing me back against the counter. “Never apologize to me, Sam. We are partners in everything. We are mates.”
Without giving me a chance to respond, he gripped the side of my neck and kissed me. For the first time since changing, I completely gave myself to him. He felt the difference and tightened his grip on me. A sound came from his throat, making me feel desperate for him.
I put my hands on his stomach, reveling in the sharp plains of his abs. The first time I’d caught a glimpse of them in the park, I’d almost thrown up from how nervous it made me. It was hard to believe he belonged to me, the man that had always belonged to nobody but himself and only ever craved power.
Feeling up his chest, I settled my hands on his shoulders. He gripped under my thighs and lifted me onto the counter. When I wrapped my legs around him, he pressed his hard dick against me. I gasped at the contact. Even through our clothes, my heightened senses made me feel so much from his touch.
Pushing my hands through his hair, I pulled him closer. He took my lip between his teeth and I moaned. The sound made him pull back and look at me, the ferocity in his eyes filling me with excitement.
“Belladonna,” he said slowly, brushing his knuckles over my cheekbone. “Tell me we’re past all of your stubborn attempts to restrain yourself.”
I bit my lip, making him narrow his eyes. He rushed us to the bedroom, dropping me on the bed within half a second. A moment later, he had me stripped bare and wrapped his arms around my thighs.
“Lock.”
He licked the length of me and I swore. His tongue pushed inside of me, then traveled up to my clit. I gripped his hair tightly as he sucked it into his mouth and inserted two fingers.
“I already know you have a million concerns to voice,” he murmured against me. “So, you might as well start rattling them off.”
“You expect me to form a coherent thought while you’re- oh, god.”
I felt him smile. “Truthfully, I couldn’t care less if you’re making any sense. I’m only trying to be considerate so you don’t smite me.”
“Smite you,” I repeated with a laugh.
“Yes, darling. You are divine.”
“I’m not going to develop a god complex, you know.”
“It’s not about a complex. Seraphim called you Iraivan, which Mark told me translates to god.”
I sat up and looked at him. “God? In what language?”
“Tamil.”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“It’s one of the oldest spoken languages of record, which implies that your kind came before.”
“Jesus.”
“So, Belladonna, let me be the first to fuck a deity in a thousand years.”
“I mean, I’m sure Seraphim-”
“If you say his name again while I have you in this position, I will make kebabs out of his eyes.”
Biting my lip on a smile, I leaned back. He pushed his fingers deeper and curled them, making me squirm. I locked my ankles around his neck and brought myself closer to his face.
He trailed his other hand up my abdomen, caressing my skin. His touch felt so intense, like he was leaving a trail of fire. I was panting and trembling by the time electricity exploded in my core. My body shuddered and my thighs clamped around Lock’s head. He breathed a laugh as I began to relax, then kissed each of my legs.
In a flash, he had me on top of him on the bed. I backed up and licked the length of his dick. He arched up, but I moved with him so he couldn’t push into my mouth. Closing my lips around the tip, I met his eyes, my skin feeling hot as I got lost in them.
He thrust upward again and I put my hands on his thighs to hold him in place. It shocked me that I managed to have any control over him. I saw the fight in his eyes, mixed with a level of lust I hadn’t seen in him before.
As a human, Lock had been a serial killer. I imagined he’d never let anybody beat him at anything. When he woke as a vampire, he was the strongest in existence. Nobody could stand against him. This was the first time in either of his lives that someone had any power over him and that filled me with a sense of pride and excitement.
I didn’t know if I was physically stronger than him, but with my other abilities, there was no doubt I could beat him someday. Miraculously, that didn’t seem to bother him. Before I changed, he told me that wanting me and wanting power were one and the same. He wanted power with me. At the time, I didn’t understand that, but I thought I was starting to.
Keeping eye contact, I took him down to the base, watching the way his face changed. His lips parted and his brows drew down slightly. He made a sound that would have been too quiet for my human ears to catch and it made me feel feral. I took him a few more times before he suddenly grabbed my hair and pulled me off of him.
He sat up, holding me against his lips firmly. Flipping me onto my back, he deepened the kiss and pushed his tongue into my mouth. Holding his hand against my throat, he applied pressure without taking away my breath. His dick brushed against me and I tensed.
“You’re still afraid, Belladonna.”
“Yes,” I breathed.
“When you were weak and human, you gave yourself to me. I gave you my blood and told you I would ruin you, but you did not back down.”
“That was different.”
Dipping down to take my nipple in his mouth, he moved his dick along my slit.
“Tell me how it was different.”
“I couldn’t hurt you then.”
Pressing his forehead to my chest, he shook his head. “I told you-”
“I can hurt you, Lock. Mates kill each other purposefully. It’s entirely possible I’ll hurt you without meaning to.”
Coming up to my lips again, he kissed me agonizingly slowly. “What else are you afraid of?”
“The bond,” I admitted. “I don’t know if it’ll make things worse.”
“It might make it easier.”
“I’m not ready to find out.”
“We don’t have to complete the bond to have sex, Sam.”
“What?”
He pulled back a little, stroking my face. “We must drink each other’s blood to solidify it. If we don’t do that, it’s just sex.”
“Oh. I didn’t know that.”
“You should have asked.”
I stared up at him, weighing the cost of my decisions. When he went down on me the first time, I burned him and the sheets. This time, though, I didn’t do that. Even so, I was filled with a visceral fear that I would lose control.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” I whispered.
“Ruin me, Samara.”
As soon as he saw the decision in my eyes, he sunk himself inside me. The sensation was blinding. I dropped my head back, clutching his shoulder blades tightly as it radiated over every part of me.
“Fuck,” he breathed, looking just as lost in the feeling as I was.
My fingers felt cold and when I looked at his shoulders, I saw ice spreading out from where I touched him. He pressed his forehead against mine and I knew it was him putting his trust in me. My eyes burned, but I drew strength from him and tried to focus on the two of us. I thought about everything that had happened over the past four months and all the things we’d beat together.
The ice receded, but it was replaced by orange smoke that began to seep out of my hands. I was getting desperate, ready to end this whole thing, but then my chest pulsed. After a moment, I felt an outside energy reaching for my own, settling it down.
When our eyes met, he flashed me that crooked grin. He gripped under my thigh, pulling my leg up as he thrust inside of me again. Each time he moved, I felt myself contract around him. Every inch of him felt like it stroked me so thoroughly and I already knew it was going to be a struggle to get any training done now that we’d experienced this.
He circled my nipple with his tongue, then moved to the other one. As soon as he used his thumb to stimulate my clit, I fell apart. The sensation wasn’t just in my core. It was everywhere.
“Samara,” Lock groaned.
As he began to fall apart, everything I was feeling multiplied. I wasn’t just experiencing my own pleasure, but his as well.
“Lock,” I whimpered.
“Say my name, baby.”
Another wave crashed over me, making me cry out. “Fuck, Hemlock.”
His nails dug into my hip, puncturing the skin. The smell of my blood must’ve reignited his lust because he grew hard inside me again. I flipped us over, planting my hands on his chest as I rode him. When he rose up, I pushed him back down, putting a hand at his throat.
His canines lengthened as he smiled up at me. He gripped my ass, then he was standing, pressing me up against the wall as he continued to fuck me. I pressed my lips against his neck and tasted his skin. It was so recognizable to me now and just having it in my senses ignited a possessiveness inside me.
My fangs pushed through my gums and I immediately sunk them into his neck. He groaned and increased his pace as I fed from him. His blood burned through my veins, awakening my magic more than any human’s could. When he dipped his face and grazed me with his teeth, I started to pull away.
“Don’t stop,” he said. “I’m not going to feed from you.”
I relaxed again, trusting his words. When I contracted around him, he bit down on my shoulder, but didn’t puncture my skin. He moved his lips to my neck, brushing them up and down my skin as he released a shuddering breath with his orgasm.
“See, Sam? Nobody died.”
“I think I might have,” I laughed.
“If that’s death, I will kill you every day, Belladonna. Every hour.”
He kissed me sweetly and I melted into him. All of this took a weight off my shoulders. I would not, however, tell Lock what had actually kept me from turning him into a vampire candle. He’d kill Raf for sure. I was inclined to be pissed about him getting involved in our intimate moment, but I was starting to wonder if I was the one reaching for him when that happened, along with all the other times.
Whatever it was, it had given me this experience with Lock and I felt as if I would have better control over it next time. At least, I hoped so because Raf would not become a regular part of our sex lives. Blech.