13. Tavia
Chapter 13
Tavia
T he next day, I found two brand new cell phones outside my bedroom door along with a brief note.
Tavi,
Enjoy. Bea will show you how to set these up. -C
I saved the note and stashed it in my room with the other one he’d left with the key. For some reason, I felt sentimental about his notes and often unfolded them to reread them before I went to sleep. During those weeks we didn’t speak, it felt like I held onto a part of him with these notes. A small, private piece of him that was just for me.
I would trace the indent of the words, imagining his hand moving across the page, or sometimes his lips moving with the words as he wrote them. I thought of his fingers and the firm grip he’d held on the pen.
The same fingers that skimmed over my back when he’d hugged me, and that had gripped my shoulders as he stepped away.
His reaction had been such an about-face that my head was still spinning. Before I hugged him, we’d been having a good time. He seemed genuinely impressed with my wine and eager to talk about it with me. No one, not even Amy, had shown half as much interest and curiosity as he had. I had been on cloud nine just over the fact that someone had wanted to hear me geek out just because it was something I loved.
When he set a date for me to visit Amy, my happiness overflowed so much that I didn’t know what to do with it. I hugged him, and that seemed to ruin everything. He’d said a quick goodbye and ran off like I had the plague.
I was still new to vampire culture, so maybe they didn’t touch to show affection or gratitude. He’d probably hugged me back to be nice but the whole experience might have been really strange to him. If I ever actually saw him before we made the trip to Sapien, I’d make sure to apologize.
Part of me hoped his number would have already been in my new phone, so I could just text him an apology, but no such luck.
Three more days passed, and I got the sense that he was avoiding me again. We were supposed to ride out to Sapien the following night, and I hadn’t seen him once since that day in the kitchen.
This time, there was no question in my mind that I had done something wrong. He apologized, we were getting along, I hugged him, and now we were strangers again. It was exhausting. I wished he’d just tell me if I was breaking some vampire taboo. Surely that would be better than days of silent treatment.
But on the bright side, I had plenty of wine and freshly ripened avocados to make guacamole with.
A few vampires were hanging around the great room when I entered around seven in the evening, although Cyan was not among them.
“Hey, Tavia.” Desmond and Laith sat across from each other at the kitchen island, two wine glasses in front of them and an empty bottle between them. “We didn’t mean to finish the whole bottle, but…you’re making more of this, right?”
It was my last bottle, but I couldn’t bring myself to feel even a tiny bit mad. I felt like a chef who had spent hours cooking a gourmet meal, and everyone I’d served it to had licked their plates clean and asked for seconds. That empty bottle was the highest compliment. Words of praise could never touch the hope in their eyes as they waited for my answer.
“Sure. Twist my arm, why don’tcha.” I grinned as I pulled out a cutting board. “But you’ll have to wait at least three weeks.”
“We live for over eight-hundred years. We’re a patient species.” Des pulled the bottle toward himself and turned it upward to get the last few drops.
“Hey, don’t be greedy.” Laith swiped it from him and turned away to drink.
“Fuck you. You poured the biggest glass for yourself.”
I chuckled at their antics as I began halving avocados for my highly-anticipated guacamole. They were like an adorable, always-bickering married couple.
Several vampires came and went through the great room as I focused on chopping my ingredients. Rhain and Thorne never stopped as they walked through, but gave me quick nods of greeting as they headed to the garage. I wasn’t sure where Bea was, so I texted her letting her know there would be plenty of guac if she wanted some.
My instincts prickled just as I finished dicing red onions, and I knew before I even looked up that Cyan had walked in. I nearly dropped my knife when I saw who he entered the room with.
Cyan had his arm around a stunningly beautiful woman who was definitely not human. She was tall, nearly the same height as him, with shiny black hair loosely braided over one shoulder. Her eyes weren’t red, but a fiery orange with slitted pupils. There also appeared to be scales shimmering on various parts of her body. I almost thought it was makeup, but the scales would disappear and reappear on different areas of skin. Her presence also seemed to heat up the room by a few degrees, like she had some kind of internal space heater. Or fire inside her.
Bea had told me about dragon shifters, including that a few lived in Sanguine, but this was my first time seeing one in person. I didn’t know how to picture one when she’d said they were inhumanly beautiful with reptilian eyes, and even in human form, would let their dragon shift come through just enough to show off their scales.
This woman put the human super models I’d seen in magazines to shame. Every vampire turned to look at her, and I knew I was staring too. Just being in the same room with her made me feel like a lesser being. And the fact that Cyan had his arm around her, his smile cocky at all the attention, made me feel even worse.
He didn’t even look at me, just led the dragon woman to one of the couches across the room and invited her to sit down, which she did.
I forced my gaze down to my cutting board, trying to figure out why this was affecting me so much. Cyan had told me he didn’t want to settle down with anyone. I knew this, objectively. He was doing us both a favor, not forcing the blood pet commitment on me or himself. And not limiting himself to one source of blood must have also meant by extension, not limiting himself to one sexual partner.
I just never expected him to flaunt his partner right in front of me. It had to be considered disrespectful, right? I was still his blood pet, under his protection even if he took no blood from me.
Ignoring him was like trying to ignore a blaring siren. I heard his laugh across the room, the sound of his voice and hers, though I couldn’t make out the words.
A presence came up beside me, but I didn’t dare look up on the chance that my eyes would fill with tears.
“You alright, Tavia?” It was Desmond checking on me. So the awkwardness wasn’t all in my head, but obvious to everyone else. Great.
“Mm-hm.” If I used actual words, my voice might choke.
Laith came up to my other side, blocking my view of Cyan and the dragon woman. “It’s dickish, what he’s doing,” the other vampire muttered. “Even if your relationship is platonic, you don’t bring someone new to the clan home for everyone to see. It’s just messy and fucked up.”
“He’s looking this way.” Desmond sounded amused. “Mind if we stick close to you, Tavi?” He said my nickname loud enough for Cyan to hear. “Cy’s looking tense. I daresay he might be jealous.”
“Doubt it,” I muttered, still focused on my chopping. “But sure.” Honestly, it was nice to have two vampires in my corner when Cyan clearly wasn’t.
“Oh, he’s fuming.” Desmond laughed louder, his head bent toward me like I had made a joke. “Can I tuck your hair behind your ear? I think it’ll make his head explode.”
That actually made me chuckle a little. “Sure.”
“I can feel his eyes like fucking daggers in my back.” Laith leaned his forearm on the counter, slouching his upper body to become eye level with me. “So what human food are you making, Tavi? Smells…interesting.”
“It’s—ow, fuck!”
Desmond had chosen then to touch me, and the graze of his fingers on my ear made me startle. At the same time, I’d been pitting one of the firmer avocados and the knife slipped, the blade sinking into the thumb of my opposite hand.
Blood immediately welled at the cut, and I barely had time to consider the two vampires hovering over me when chaos erupted.
There was hissing, snarling, and commotion all around that was too fast for me to track. Desmond flew backwards, his back slamming into the refrigerator across the kitchen. I turned to see Laith getting up from the floor, like someone had knocked him down. He was all the way in the middle of the great room, closer to the couches than the counter where we’d been standing.
The same couches where the dragon shifter woman sat wide-eyed, but Cyan wasn’t with her.
“Tavi.” His low voice sounded rough, if even pained. And so close. “Tavi, you’re hurt.”
Gentle hands directed me to turn around, and there he was. Cyan was shaking and breathing harshly like he was running a marathon. His fangs were the longest I’d ever seen them, and he looked not just pained, but tormented. Tortured.
“Let me see.”
Faster than I could comprehend, he grabbed my hands and pulled them apart. The cut I’d been applying pressure to continued to bleed, dripping over my wrist, palm, and onto the floor.
Cyan’s grip on my hand became crushing as he hissed a deep inhale through his nose. “Fuck.”
I was actively bleeding, my hand throbbing in pain, not to mention shocked and confused, and I still couldn’t ignore the sexual moan in Cyan’s voice as he said that word.
He brought my injured hand to his mouth and dragged his tongue along the trail of my blood. “Oh, fuck,” he said again, the curse sensual and reverent.
I almost said the same curse myself. His tongue was a hot caress on my skin, bringing a flush of heat to every part of my body and an aching need between my legs. He continued licking the spilled blood on my wrist and palm, and every stroke of his tongue might as well had been against my clit. My breaths grew shorter, tension and sensitivity winding up in every muscle as this vampire held my hand and licked the blood from my wound.
My confusion only heightened, but that didn’t diminish that I was more turned on than I’d ever been in my life. What was happening? Cyan looked like he was in a trance, or drugged. His eyelids were heavy, dark eyelashes fanning over his cheekbones as he turned my hand over, his incredibly soft mouth trapping every drop of blood that escaped my cut.
He reached the wound itself and sucked, sealing his lips over the cut in my skin. The pressure of his mouth drew a moan out of me, along with a full body shiver. I’d never felt anything so, so good. If his tongue on my skin started me toward an orgasm, he would get me there in no time now. Each draw of my blood into his mouth hit my clit with a stroke of pressure, the same sweet ache coiling in me tighter and tighter.
And he moaned against my skin as if answering me, as if this made him feel just as good as I did.
“Cyan…” I wanted him to hold me, maybe lie me down or press me against something, because I felt like I was floating away. I needed solidness and purchase, something to hold onto.
His soft, hooded gaze lifted at the sound of my voice. He looked at me as if I were lying in bed next to him, warm and sensual. I felt the flick of his tongue against the wound on my thumb and thrashed at the sensitivity coursing through me. When his mouth pulled away, I wanted to cry out at the abrupt loss of pleasure.
“Tavi.” My name came out a low moan as his hand cupped the back of my head.
And when his mouth crashed down to mine, my whole world exploded into new sensations.
The heat and pressure of his lips were intoxicating, an addictive fountain I wanted to sip on for eternity. His tongue swiped across mine and I tasted the coppery tang of my own blood. It didn’t bother me, but instead reminded me of the intense pleasure I felt from his drinking it.
This kiss sent pleasure through me in a similar, but different way. I understood it now, how sexual pleasure and blood-drinking were so intertwined. Cyan’s fangs added a hard pressure and thrill to the kiss, even though he never cut me. I trusted that he wouldn’t, trusted him to hold me here with his kiss and his embrace rather than let me float away.
When the kiss broke, the first thing I noticed was my thumb. The cut was sealed shut with only a small red line remaining.
“You…healed it.” I felt drunk and woozy from that kiss and his brief feeding. My pulse pounded in every sensitive spot in my body and I still buzzed with a need for release. If it felt like that from a tiny cut, how would it be if he actually bit and drank from my neck?
I didn’t even mind that Cyan had drank from me when he vowed not to, not when it felt that good.
“I’m…sorry.”
Cyan’s expression was unreadable. He looked angry but also in pain. His chest heaved with harsh breaths, fists clenched at his sides, and he wouldn’t look me in the eye.
“Don’t apologize, you healed my cut. And I’m not mad that you drank my blood. It actually…”
With each passing second, it became increasingly clear that mentioning how much I enjoyed it would be the wrong thing to say. Cyan’s grimace deepened, like every word I said was a silver knife digging deeper into him.
“Cyan, is something wrong?” I went toward him, because no one else was doing anything.
“Don’t!” The word was a harsh command, stopping me dead in my tracks.
He then left, running down the staircase leading to the lower level.
As I felt everyone’s eyes on me, the vampires in the room and the dragon shifter woman Cyan had left on the couch, confusion wasn’t the only thing swirling inside me.
I was humiliated.