Between the Moon and Her Night (Between Life and Death #3)

Chapter 17

Aurelia

A slick sheen of sweat coated my body as Death had me pinned up against the bathroom wall, my one leg hitched over his hip, held there by his hand. His eyes were on mine as he weaved his wicked magic into me—it came in the form of deep, long strokes and unbroken eye contact. His pace was a dangerous, dangerous thing.

“Just like that,” he rasped in his deep baritone. “Just like that.” His hand was placed at the base of my neck as he dominated me so thoroughly, I knew I’d be ruined from ever wanting to ride another again.

He wasn’t just having sex with me—he was possessing my soul .

My body trembled as I tracked towards my third orgasm. The last one felt like it had shattered me at the seams. And judging by the way I was feeling right now, this one was going to destroy me completely .

My hips rolled with his, absorbing each thrust—the contact between our skin never breaking. Not once.

“Come for me,” he purred, his voice smooth leather and oxygen-stealing smoke.

His command, the feel of him —they worked in tandem, shoving me over the edge of a mountainous cliff and plunging me into the abysmal depths of oblivion.

“Death,” I cried out his name, my head tipped back, my eyes rolling towards the heavens like the possessed thing I was.

“Uh-uh.” His hand clasped my chin and he pulled my face to his. “Eyes on me, Kitten. I want to watch your soul leave your body as you come on my cock.”

Eyes on his, I let him watch. Let him watch what he did to me as the world was swept out from underneath my feet and I floated amongst the stars.

At the same time, his hand crushed the wall beside my head, bits of shattered rock raining down to the floor. He climaxed right along with me as he angled his hips, his molten seed filling me, my greedy sex draining him of every drop.

After, when we both started to come down from the ecstasy of our joining, he said, “The next time you come, I want you to call me by my name.”

“Draevon?” I asked, my voice breathy.

“No, baby girl.” He grinned in such a way it made my knees wobble. “Von.”

“Von,” I murmured, tasting his name on my swollen lips. It was the first time I had ever said it.

. . . It was the first time I had ever said my mate’s name.

My eyes rounded at the corners as realization hit me square and center. Days ago, I had been running away from him, and now, I couldn’t get enough of him. Literally. I needed him everywhere. What had changed between then and now?

The bond. That’s what.

“Pull out,” I told him, pushing against his broad chest.

Thick black brows knitted in concern. “What’s wrong?”

He did as I asked, the evidence of us all over his huge length, roped in thick, prominent veins, tattooed with my lips. My core throbbed at the sight of him—he was already getting hard again. The Blood King’s appetite was insatiable.

And apparently, mine was no better.

I was tempted to jump back on him—to ride him again.

No . That wasn’t me.

Sure, I had a healthy sexual appetite, but it had never been like this before, which meant—

“Is the bond making me like this ?” I asked, the words rushing out of my mouth at the same time I strung the thought together.

“I mean, I like to think it’s because I’m, well—” the dark god gave me an arrogant grin as he motioned to himself, his frame stacked with enough muscle and ink that I momentarily lost my train of thought, “—me. But to answer your question, yes, it is partly to do with the bond. It’s not uncommon for mates to stay locked up in each other for weeks after the bond is forged. Sometimes months.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “So then how do I know that I even want this and it’s not the bond making me like this?”

“You don’t.” He shrugged those big shoulders of his and then walked over to a shelf housing a stack of folded black towels. He snagged two and then strode over to the bath. The view of his muscular backside—forged for endless thrusting—spawned a dozen unholy thoughts. “Come, Little Goddess. Let me clean you.”

I shoved my thoughts and his offer to the side.

“How can you be so nonchalant about this?” I snipped, chasing after him.

He hung the towels on separate hooks. “Because I knew what I was getting myself into.”

“You knew what you were getting yourself into?” I repeated with a degree of question. And then it hit me like a potato sack chock-full of bricks. I stumbled backwards. “You bastard! You knew! You knew we were mates, and you consummated the bond while knowing that I had no idea. You forced me into this.”

With feline speed, he turned to face me, his expression animalistic. “Yes, I knew. And I’d do it again if given the choice. If forging the bond is what keeps you locked to my side, where you have always belonged, then so be it. Besides . . . you seemed more than willing yesterday.”

“I was willing to have sex with you, yes. I was not willing to pledge myself to you for all of eternity,” I snarled back—my power yearning to be unleashed, my hand aching for a weapon. One that I could ram right through the deceitful jerk.

“Well, darling, it’s a bit late for that,” he said with enough sarcasm to last me a lifetime.

Anger shredded through me, but before I accidentally killed the big oaf, I beckoned my light to take me from here—away from this Creator-forsaken realm.

But it didn’t answer.

I tried again.

Nothing. Nothing.

I didn’t understand. The wards that surrounded the castle—the ones I had seen the first time I came here when I had asked for Von’s aid in freeing the children of the Old Gods— prevented light walking. But after Von had agreed to help, I was able to light walk back to the Immortal Realm, as I was no longer considered an enemy of the realm, or so he had said at the time. But now, that part of my power was as dormant as a seed buried in frozen grounds, under five feet of snow.

Had he done something to the wards to make it so I could not light walk at all?

Von’s knowing eyes met mine and he smirked. “Like I said, Little Goddess, I’ll do anything to keep you.” The towering predator stepped into me as he grabbed my chin roughly. Ancient, lethal power crackled as he growled dominantly, “You are mine .”

His. I was his. My knees buckled and my core ached—

No!

It was the damn horny-ass bond again.

The insufferable bastard had just admitted that he’d neutered my ability to light walk. I held on to that, feeding it like coal to my fiery anger.

I slapped his hand away from my face as I stepped away from his intoxicating presence. “What did you do?” I demanded, forging as much venom as possible into those four words. “Did you do something to the wards? ”

“It is not the wards, no. I might have been the catalyst, but I’m not entirely to blame.” His arrogance was unfathomable. “Now that your divinity has found its equal, it has no desire to aid you in running from me at the moment. In fact, it has other plans.”

“Meaning?” I snarled, my molars ground so tight my jaw began to ache.

He continued, “The bond increases sexual appetite between newly formed mates, and then periodically at other times. Nature has made it that way to ensure a successful breeding. That is why your divinity won’t allow you to light walk away from me. And that is why your body craves mine so intensely. It is no different than a feline in heat.”

“The bond wants me pregnant so that’s why I can’t light walk?” Fury, potent and raw, coursed through my veins. “Shit,” I gasped, thinking of all the times we had had sex over the past so many hours. With Aurelius, I had never been able to conceive because of Von’s curse, but there was one little caveat to it that I had all but forgotten these past few days—

I could get pregnant, but only with his seed.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Why had I not thought of that earlier? I knew the answer—it was the damn bond pulling the proverbial wool over my eyes.

“Is that what you have been trying to do?” I hissed.

His lips thinned. “No. Whenever I have spent my seed inside of you, it has been null and void. One of the perks of being the God of Death.” His eyes darkened. “I will never treat you like breeding stock, Little Goddess. I am not him.”

If he thought that was enough to redeem himself, he was sorely mistaken.

“Says the deceitful male who forged the bond between us and took my choice away. No, you might not be him, but there are similarities.” Done with this conversation, I strode out of the bathing room.

Death followed. “Where are you going?”

“I’m getting away from you,” I snarled over my bare shoulder. “Clothe me.”

“Good luck with that,” he said, not bothering to do as I requested.

I raised my hand, flipped my middle finger at him, and then walked out the door into the hallway, making sure to slam it behind me. At the same time, a simple but elegant black dress wrapped around my body, trailing to the floor. It was a lovely bit of black silk that hugged my curves and plunged perilously low between my breasts—which were no longer smeared with my ichor.

Party tricks, indeed.

I took a step forward and walked straight into a wall of unyielding steel.

“Leave me alone!” I shoved against Von.

Except, it wasn’ t him.

It was the smoke-yielding, pierced version of him—Folkoln.

Although I didn’t know him, I knew of him, at least what gossip had trickled through the rumor mill. None of which painted him in a very good light. People feared him just as much as they feared his brother.

Folkoln had one hand tucked in his pocket and a bottle in the other. He leaned in, inhaled a deep breath, and then he flashed his sparkling-white canines at me like a dog with a bone. “Have you tired of my brother so soon, little dove?” His sinister grin grew. “Perhaps you’d like something a bit more . . . chaotic.”

“Ugh,” I said, repulsed— did he just sniff me ? I darted around him.

“Ouch,” he snickered.

I didn’t bother to wait for him to say something else as I raced down the hallway, eager to get away from Von and his pierced lookalike.