CHAPTER 11
C lose your eyes. Close your eyes , Lara screamed in her head. She didn’t listen to her own warnings, she couldn’t. She was too mesmerized with how his fangs were growing. They gleamed wet and the points looked so much sharper than she had first thought.
Yes, close your eyes and let yourself feel.
Was that her thought? It didn’t matter; she shut her eyes. She had to, the sight of his fangs making this all too real, all too frightening.
Her whole body locked in fright when his fangs skimmed lightly along her neck. The sharp points tickled her skin, sending goosebumps running along it. She jumped when he nipped the flesh near her shoulder and then ran his sharp teeth back up her neck again.
Her whole body quivered at the startling sensation, and she grew wet between her legs.
He either sensed her reaction or caught her damp scent, for in the next second, he moved down her, yanking her bottoms off her hips as he went until he completely discarded them. Then his fangs settled against the soft inner flesh of her thighs.
She would have bolted off the couch if he hadn’t held her firm, and when he nipped gently along her flesh, her hands dug into the sofa cushion, looking somehow to anchor herself and stop the spiraling passion she felt herself falling into.
His hand went to rest on her stomach and in the next instant she understood why. He brushed his fang over her clitoris, and she thought she’d shoot right off the couch like an exploding firework.
He held her firm as he continued to torment her with his fangs and tongue, and she feared that given time she would beg him to bite her, and she didn’t know if she really wanted that.
“Enough, Michael, you’ve proven your point.”
He raised his head, his eyes red glowing orbs and his tongue dripping saliva or did he drip with her wetness? The thought shivered her senseless.
“You’re ready to come, I can feel it.”
“Not this way, not because you want to prove a point,” she said and tried to squirm her way out from beneath him. “A point you have obviously proved without a shadow of a doubt.”
He held her firm, stopping her from squirming. “Yet somehow has annoyed you. We can talk about that later, but for now let me satisfy the lust that is ready to burst inside you.”
“No,” she said, “now let me go.”
He turned his head away for a moment and when he turned back his fangs were gone and his eyes normal. “I can’t let you go with your need so great.” His finger whispered across her sensitive nub, and she groaned, pure pleasure racing through her.
“You want to come, I can feel it with each touch,” he said, his finger teasing her some more. “And I want to make you come. I want to taste you when you come. Say yes, Lara, say yes.”
She stubbornly wanted to scream no, but her body was screaming yes, yes, yes, and so she caved and shouted, “Yes, damn you, yes!”
Within minutes she was screaming again, only this time in the throes of another mind-blowing climax. It took her a while to finally regain her sanity and when she did, she got annoyed at herself.
Michael must have felt it, since he moved off her and with knitted brow said, “You’re upset.”
She was quick to jump off the couch, snatch her flannel bottoms off the floor, and slip them on. “There’s no point in denying it, since you know everything I think and feel and, of course, you can make me come without any effort at all,” —her eyes turned wide— “oh, but that isn’t enough. Let’s now add to that how your fangs can send me over the edge into oblivion, and I won’t even give a damn!”
She turned to hurry off.
“Lara—”
“No,” she shouted and turned, shaking a finger at him. “Don’t you dare say a word. You’ve made me feel things I’ve never felt before. And now you’re telling me I can feel even more, but at what cost to me? And I’m the only one who can protect me, so I need to step back and?—”
“No!” He bolted up off the sofa, though didn’t approach her. “Don’t step away from me. And you don’t need to protect yourself; I will protect you.”
“And who protects me from you?” She shook her head. “I need some time alone. I’m going to take a bath and you’re to leave me to my thought, so stay out of them.”
“That may be difficult.”
“I don’t care how difficult it is, stay out of my head.” She hurried to the open doorway.
“I will make love to you again, Lara, you’ll want me to.”
She turned. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Lara rushed into the large foyer and up the stairs to her room, locking the door behind her, not that it would do any good. But she had to believe that Michael would respect her wishes and give her this time alone. She needed it.
She was glad there was a bathtub as well as a shower stall in the bathroom. She wanted to soak away her worries. She adjusted the water to a temperature that suited her and added some vanilla bath salts from the jar on the shelf. She then returned to the bedroom and collected some clothes. She had brought her long, gray knit skirt that worked well for any occasion, including wearing it around the house to relax in, and she needed something comfy like that today. She paired it with thick black socks and a long-sleeved, black knit top. She seldom wore shoes when home for the day. She added undergarments to her pile and carted the bundle to the bathroom.
She planned on washing her hair, so she left it free, stripped off her clothes, and sunk into the water that was just hot enough to ease her muscles and relax her worries. She slid down along the back curve of the tub until the water framed her face, then she closed her eyes and let her thoughts float away.
Wasn’t she afraid of what he had become?
Her eyes shot open. Michael had never answered the question about his grandmother. Had the snow diverted his attention, or had he purposely not answered? Was there something about his grandmother that he didn’t want her to know? He had mentioned that his grandmother held her age better than his grandfather. Was it only because of the many children she had or was it something else? Could his grandfather have made her a vampire? And had she wanted him to or had it been an accident? In his immaturity as a vampire could he have taken from the woman he loved something she hadn’t wanted to give? Or are sexual appetites of vampires so ravenous that there comes a point where they can’t control it?
She shook her head, slushing the water around her face. Michael would have told her, or would he? Should she trusted a vampire to tell her the truth? Was she that gullible? She thought about her blog and all the reasonable explanations she had come across for explaining the strange phenomenon she had investigated. She had never let herself be gullible before, but then she had never fallen in love with a vampire before.
Love.
What was she some romantic idiot?
This was nothing more than sex while stranded together in a snowstorm with a vampire.
She groaned and sunk beneath the water. Love. Sex. Vampire . Nothing made sense.
Except when making love with Michael, then everything seemed right.
That was the most difficult part of all this. She couldn’t wrap her head around her feelings for Michael. Was she falling in love with him? Was it only lust because she had finally experienced mind-blowing orgasms? Or was she simply intrigued by the vampire in him?
She started washing her hair, scrubbing her scalp quite vigorously, wishing she could scrub away her doubts and confusion and reach a sane conclusion. She hurried through the rest of her bath, the water growing cold.
It didn’t take her long to blow dry her hair with the dryer she found in the cabinet and slip into her clothes. She applied moisturizer to her face and a touch of gloss to her lips, nothing more. She preferred the natural look. It worked for her. She wrapped a slim white knit scarf around her neck, for warmth or to protect her neck from bites, she wasn’t sure.
She planned to spend an hour or so reading right here in her room when she caught sight of the old spell book on the mantel. It reminded her of how he had avoided speaking further about his grandmother, and she suddenly had the urge to know more about his ancestors who had turned the Valaines into vampires.
She grabbed the book off the mantel and made her way downstairs. He was in the first room she looked at...the library. He looked freshly washed himself, his hair a bit damp and his black sweatpants gone replaced by dark gray ones and a light gray knit top that hugged his muscles.
He raised his head from the book he was reading and smiled. “You are beautiful.”
His words fluttered her heart and naturally stirred her libido.
“I have some questions,” she said and approached him, though sat across from him in one of the overstuffed chairs.
She saw him glance at the book in her hand.
“My grandparents,” he said.
“I’m curious about your grandmother. How did she cope with loving a vampire?”
Looking for an answer to how you can love a vampire?
The distinct thought startled her. Was she looking for such an answer?
He held his hand out for the book, and she handed it over to him. He placed it on the table beside him. “As I mentioned my grandfather lived in turbulent and difficult times. Wars were more prevalent than peace. But there was a space of time when life had grown peaceful and farms prospered, people grew hopeful, though remained cautious.” Michael smiled. “As my grandfather likes to point out, it was around this time that he was a fine, strapping young man and all the women had an eye for him. He insists he could have had his choice of a wife, but one day changed all that.
“He was hunting in the woods and came across a beautiful woman bathing in a pond. He thought her an angel, smooth, pale skin, stark black hair, piercing dark eyes and a face so beautiful it robbed a man of his breath and his sanity. He knew then and there he would make her his wife. He waited until she finished, keeping his eyes off her, or so he claims, and followed her. He planned on finding out who she was, and then properly introducing himself to her family and seeking permission to wed her, having no doubt permission would be granted. You see my grandfather was of noble blood and being the oldest son, he would inherit the land and all on it, so he was quite a catch. Unfortunately, his dreams died in an instant when he saw that she arrived at a gypsy camp in the woods. Gypsies were not people nobles associated with or for that matter peasants didn’t associate with them either. They were pariahs in all areas of society.”
“And yet your grandfather didn’t give up.”
Michael laughed. “No, my grandfather’s expectations changed after that and he thought to have sex with the beautiful gypsy woman, never expecting love to strike him so hard, so my grandmother claims. Personally, I think love caught both by surprise. One thing they both agree on is that they had the best summer of their lives that year. They were young, falling in love, and fearless, until...”
“The gypsies found out and cursed him,” Lara said.
“No.” Michael shook his head, a hint of red sparking in his dark eyes, though fading fast.
Lara’s brow knitted in question. “What happened?”
“My grandmother told my grandfather that she was a vampire.”