17. Juliette #2
“Yeah, but just because I’m annoying doesn’t mean I’m not right,” he whispers in my ear.
A new feeling suddenly floods my senses, overriding my judgment.
My body awakens for the first time, and now all I can think about is Scotty.
Scotty without his clothes on. Scotty between my legs, soothing the ache that I cannot reach myself because it is buried deep within my soul.
This madness … it is a craving.
Before I can get swept away in the madness, I recoil from his grasp and punch him in the shoulder. “Enough. Tell me the rest of your sad story so we can go find someone to eat. The night is young, but at this rate, we will go to sleep starving.”
Scotty stares down at me, his expression blank and unreadable again. He rubs the spot on his arm that I hit, and for a second, I feel guilty for my reaction. Perhaps I was too harsh with him. But in typical Scotty fashion, he simply smiles at me as though I just told the world’s funniest joke.
“What?” I narrow my eyes at him, simultaneously wanting to run away and kiss every inch of his bare skin.
His eyes shift from red to a deep azure, and a strange haze clouds them. One I haven’t seen before. A look of hunger, yes, but not for blood.
“Nothing,” he murmurs, leaning in closer until his lips are practically brushing against mine. “I would just really like to kiss you right now, Jules.”
I swallow thickly. Oh, gods. Why does he want to kiss me? Doesn’t he know what I am? What I look like? Why would he want to—
“May I? Kiss you, that is,” he whispers, and his eyelashes flutter like curtains in a breeze. His eyes … he has the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen on a man. Every girl in my village would have killed to have those eyelashes.
Before I have time to even think about the consequences, I blurt out, “Please.”
His lips are on mine in an instant, and every single thought still rattling around inside my skull dissolves.
Though I may have forgotten what it felt like to have a man’s lips on mine, my fingers, at least, remember what to do.
They run through Scotty’s hair, groping for purchase.
Scotty groans from my needy movements. My greedy grabbing of his hair.
The way I deepen the kiss with my tongue until the ache between my legs becomes unbearable.
Oh, to have his lips and tongue between my legs.
If only I could go back in time. Back to the stables when the boy who worked in them would visit me during those sweltering summer afternoons.
He’d press my back into the yellow straw and bury himself deep, drawing out the gasps and moans from my lips like a compulsion.
I would do anything to be under Scotty’s compulsion now. A vampire his age could never, should never, be able to enthrall me. And yet.
Oh, and yet.
“Scotty,” I moan against his chapped lips. He brushes his thumbs across my face, tracing my cheekbones like he’s trying to draw himself a memory. “I need you to touch me.”
Scotty snickers softly before kissing my forehead. “I am touching you, silly.”
“No,” I say too quickly, and snatch his wrists in my hands. His eyes widen. Not out of concern but curiosity. He tilts his head and smiles. “Not like this. I need more.”
Scotty nods in understanding, and he pushes me back against the grassy knoll.
Fortunately, the cloak of darkness gives us a layer of privacy against any potential prying eyes.
But the couples in the cars pay us no mind anyway, too fixated on the movie screen or their own dates.
His fingers travel along my navel, dancing across my skin.
I let out a soft sigh, and he smiles at me again with his dog-like exuberance.
“You’re impatient,” he says, then winks at me.
I puff out my cheeks.
“Hah! Yeah, look at you! Who knew you had such a naughty side, eh?”
I smack him in the arm. “Don’t you dare mock me when I’m being this vulnerable with you.”
Scotty positions himself over me and places his forearms down in the grass on either side of my head.
“I would never,” he breathes, then kisses my forehead again.
It’s sweet, but not what I need right now.
He’s right; I am impatient. I’ve waited centuries for someone to look past my disfigurement.
“But are you sure this is what you really want?” he asks as he drags the tip of his nose in the crook of my neck, which only makes the ache worse.
He’s torturing me. He has to know that. “Because we could always go get something to eat and go back home. Get some rest. There’s no rush, Jules. ”
I know that. But there’s also no reason to delay anything, either.
“Yes, I’m sure,” I say, nodding. “I meant what I said before. Unless you don’t want to. If you don’t, then we can—”
“Oh, I want to,” he interrupts, and captures my mouth with his a second time.
This time, however, feels most unholy. Our lips and tongues come together like two dancers in a ballroom, with Scotty doing most of the leading, of course.
The man is a good kisser. No, not just good.
He’s exquisite. As we kiss, one of his hands runs down my collarbone over top of my hoodie, which I am now cursing myself for wearing.
“I also want to taste you,” he murmurs, and I shudder against his body.
Yes, my body says. Yes, yes. More.
His hand finally finds the spot below my navel and strokes along the soft curvature of my thighs.
Damn these skirts. Damn these clothes entirely.
He continues to kiss me as he moves my skirts up my thighs, exposing my legs to the night air.
But vampires can’t get cold. We’re dead.
All things considered, we shouldn’t be able to feel anything, but the gods gave us all the ability to feel pleasure and pain in equal measure.
“You already tasted me,” I say, but he presses his fingers against my lips and shakes his head.
“Not what I meant, Jules.”
Oh. Oh.
I swallow again, and he sends his hand up between my legs.
His grip is firm but gentle, and his fingers are clearly on a mission.
They’re greedy, too, like mine, only more focused as he brings them to the seam of my panties.
The thought of him seeing my underwear fills me with shame.
Not because I’m ashamed of sex, of course, but because I haven’t anything nice to wear.
My creator always made sure I had pretty things to wear, but everything I owned went up in flames.
The bits of cloth I wear are things I’ve sewn myself.
Scotty strokes my cleft over the fabric, and murmurs something sweet in my ear. But I’m too distracted by the sensations between my thighs that I don’t hear what he says.
“Jules, try to relax,” he murmurs. “It’s just me.”
It’s just him. He says that as though we’ve known one another for centuries instead of mere days.
“And if you don’t want to continue, we don’t have to,” he whispers before tugging on my earlobe with his teeth. Heat spreads down from my core to the tips of my toes, making them curl inside my boots. But I want to continue. I want to go as far as one can possibly go, and then some.