Chapter Sixty-Two
Lorkan
Lorkan lost all sense. The crackling fire in his office was swallowed by howling winds, and he braced against storm and sage, answering Blair’s need.
Moons, her body melted against Lorkan’s as he pushed her into the bookshelf. He drank her moan by opening her lips and gaining access to sweep his tongue across hers. Lorkan dug his hands into her curls, reveling in their softness as they tangled around his fingers.
This is what he’d wanted. Not the desperation or sorrow-laden kiss in the valley, but to have Blair’s sweetness amongst books with the warmth of a fire, untethered during the late hours of the night.
His hands dropped to her waist, and he lifted her into the air and—
A low growl rumbled through his chest. Blair wrapped her legs around his waist. So fucking responsive. She gasped, breaking away from their kiss. She rested the back of her head against the books, midnight stare studying him as he repositioned himself between her legs.
“Blasted books,” she breathed as he pressed into her core.
Their stares locked, ensnared by the promise separated by the thin layers of their clothes.
Blair’s eyes darkened, and her heady scent of want entered the air. Lorkan’s manhood twitched, swearing he felt her wetness despite both their trousers. Moons, he wasn’t certain they’d leave his office with them on.
But he stilled, caution washing over him. Above all else, he respected Blair’s need in this, and he’d gladly let her push him away again, if she wished. Yet, Blair’s legs tightened around his waist, drawing him closer, and Lorkan’s body answered, rolling his hips in a circle, letting her feel him.
“Do you see the power you have over me?” he whispered, lips brushing against hers. “Even after all this time.”
“Show me,” she breathed. “Please, Lorkan.”
Blair’s plea unleashed years of restraint. He crashed his lips back to hers and Blair leaned into what he gave and demanded more. They were fervent for one another, desperate for just a single taste, and once they started to drink, they couldn’t stop.
As their lips molded against the other, Lorkan’s free hand skirted under Blair’s sweater, and he found her breast swollen inside the silk of her bralette. He ripped the fabric away and ran his thumb over her hard nipple. Blair cursed and Lorkan smiled through their kiss.
He dropped his hand to her wool trousers and fumbled with the buttons. “Tell me to stop.”
“No.” Blair’s hand grasped his wrist, urging her his hand down.
Lorkan’s fingers dipped past her undergarments, and he found Blair slick and ready, his wolf growling with hunger.
He kissed her jawline as his fingers explored for her pleasure, and unlike the fumbling touch of a seventeen-year-old boy, his fingers were deliberate, methodical, drawing slow, tentative circles.
He increased his speed as he studied Blair beneath him, listening, feeling, watching her unravel as he worked her. This was for her as much as it was for him, and if he could paint a portrait of her like this—parted lips, flushed cheeks, and molten stare—he’d hang the art above his fireplace.
“Don’t stop,” she whispered. “I’m . . .”
Lorkan did. He removed his fingers from her clit, and Blair whimpered with protest, but it was cut short as he plunged two fingers into her ready sex.
She cried out, and the sound outmatched all his fantasies. Lorkan pumped his fingers inside her as his thumb found her clit again, and he pressed.
Blair dipped her head back, granting him access to her neck.
Lorkan accepted her invitation. He trailed kisses across her collarbone, up her neck, and right over the vein that pulsed.
Hunger of a different sort reared to life, but Lorkan was so drunk off Blair’s mounting pleasure, he ignored it.
Her sex squeezed his fingers, and the sight of her shattering was almost his undoing.
She screamed out, and as she slumped into his arm, Lorkan rested his forehead against her shoulder.
He smiled, triumphant, but he lost all sense and reason.
Her racing heart echoed beneath him and reached his baser instinct.
A red haze of hunger flashed across his eyelids.
The curse reared to life, his wolf snuffed by insatiable hunger for one thing, and one thing only.
Blood.
His fangs ached, and Lorkan palmed his hand against the bookshelf to keep steady.
No, this couldn’t be happening. Not with her, the woman he loved.
Lorkan fought for control, but it was like reaching for a rope coated in oil.
It slipped from his grasp, and his mind only registered blood rushing through Blair’s veins and his need to feed—
“Lorkan,“ Alvin’s voice hissed from behind.
Blair and Lorkan sprang apart. Hair amiss and panting, there was no hiding what they’d done, and embarrassment bloomed across Blair’s cheeks.
“I should leave,” she whispered.
Lorkan tremored, gritting his teeth, and fought with all his might not to reach out to her and unravel the scant bit of control he’d found. Blair discovering he was a vampyr was one thing, but hurting her was an entirely different horror Lorkan couldn’t live with.
He didn’t object to her retreat, letting her walk away. Blair gathered a few books, and rushed out of his office. Lorkan released a sigh of relief as the door clicked shut. In the absence of her racing heart, silence rang in his office, and he blinked away the haze of hunger.
“You nearly bit her,” his friend whispered.
Lorkan seethed, but there was no denying it.
His fangs pierced his bottom lip. He hadn’t been prepared for how the scent of her need had heightened his hunger, and the whole study thickened with the promise of a rainstorm.
And now he felt wretched. The curse had almost driven him to feed from the woman he loved.
“You’re the one who told me to tell her what I am.
” Heat flushed across Lorkan’s skin, and he abandoned his spot and reached for the decanter of whiskey near the fire place.
His fangs and manhood ached as he poured himself a glass, and the first sip of liquor added more pain as it burned down his throat.
“Did you or was your plan to explain after your fangs sank into her neck?“ Alvin snatched the bottle of whiskey from his hand.
Lorkan growled. “Watch yourself.”
Alvin poured himself a glass and chuckled. “Look who’s talking. If Blair is what I suspect, you know feeding goes hand in hand with that sort of territory. We’ve seen it in our own pack. It is inevitable.”
Cold washed over Lorkan, and he stared into the dying fire, its dwindling embers a reflection of his hope to have anything with Blair.
Alvin was right. Vampyr mates fed from one another, and Lorkan’s insatiable need to feed from Blair wasn’t the first sign that she was his mate.
He’d known because of the thread that had formed long before he turned into a vampyr.
Blair was the first thought he had every morning and the last before he fell asleep.
Lorkan suspected Blair knew what they were to each other, too, but that didn’t ease his worry.
Lorkan was still a vampyr, and starting down this path shackled her to the curse alongside him.
“She’ll never accept it.” Lorkan downed the rest of his drink, reaching for another.
Alvin relented, filling his glass. “For someone who has dedicated their life around research, you state an adamant claim with no facts to back it.”
Lorkan shook his head, an animalistic hiss wheezing through his gritted teeth. “You don’t know Blair. Vampyrs killed her parents. I abandoned her because of what I turned into it. Her sister is destined to defeat the curse running through my veins. She has plenty of reason to reject me.”
“I think the witch might surprise you.”
“What proof do you have to support that statement?” Lorkan asked.
Alvin snorted. “Pure observation. Not of Blair, but of you. How can you trust anyone will accept you’re a vampyr, Lorkan, if you haven’t accepted it yourself?”
Lorkan’s hold on his glass threatened to shatter the material.
He set it down on the mantel, flexing his hands at his sides.
His inner wolf paced, ruffled by the truth of Alvin’s words.
Damn his friend for being right. Again. Perhaps he was so used to hiding what he was from others, he’d hidden from himself, too.
Lorkan stared down at the whiskey decanter, but there wasn’t enough drink to drown out that sad realization.
He sighed, his reeling thoughts too much to sort out.
He had to either come clean to Blair or walk away, and both prospects rooted him to the stone floor, chilling him to the bone.
“Why did you come to my office in the first place?” he asked, changing to subject.
The painting to the right of the fireplace was slightly ajar, and a cold draft escaped from the shadows. The hidden door led to the tunnels that reached deep under Vísdómr where their pack lived, out of sight from others and protected from the sun.
“I actually came with good news,” Alvin said.
Lorkan pushed Blair to the back of his mind and centered his focus elsewhere.
“What is it?” he asked.