This close to her fluttering pulse, Elias’s fangs descended with a vengeance. She alone sustained him. Made his existence possible. And he infused every ounce of his utter hero worship into the bite, brushing her hair back once, twice, before puncturing her skin with a moan and allowing the flow of life to spread through his limbs.
Her taste couldn’t be believed. It was singular. With no description because the flavor existed to him alone. The gnawing hunger in his stomach shrieked with victory, then slowly started to ebb, allowing the rest of Elias to regain sensation. Beneath him, Roksana’s body was still, but their connection allowed him to feel the gradual loss of tension in her muscles, to feel her relief. Here was the proof.
I am her mate. She is mine.
I can’t live without her and she can’t live without me.
Jesus, he was caught between triumph so heady he couldn’t bear the weight and utter devastation on her behalf. Just when he thought he couldn’t make her life any worse, he was tethering this woman to him as long as they both walked the earth. And goddammit, Elias hated himself for wanting that. Wanting Roksana with him forever more than he wanted his own humanity back.
A shiver passed through Roksana and her nipples peaked against his chest. Heat bloomed along her flesh and he could hear her lungs expanding with oxygen.
Thank God. Thank God.
There was an unruly beast inside of Elias demanding he continue to drink. To drink until there was nothing left. The taste of her was that magnificent. That fucking essential. But once a vampire drained a human of their liquid life force, it caused something beastly to awaken inside the immortal, bringing forth the venom that could Silence a human. The process had been illegal so long that it had gone unperfected, though. It was a risk. Even if Roksana agreed to become like him—which she never would—he didn’t take chances with her.
Elias forced himself to release his hold on her neck, his eyes roaming over her greedily to make sure his senses hadn’t deceived him and she was truly healed.
Miracle of miracle, she was.
By my bite.
Those three words whispering through his mind made Elias’s cock throb. Her skin glowed like a beacon, her breath warming his shoulder, pulse delicate. Her lithe body was pinned beneath his on the bed, and without his fangs preventing her from moving, Roksana’s legs seemed to lift instinctively around his hips, her pussy cushioning the strained fly of his jeans.
Was it an invitation or did she seek comfort?
Though it nearly killed him, the lack of clarity she was able to provide forced Elias to climb off her sweet body, wincing when her thigh brushed against the uncomfortable swell trapped inside his pants. “Are you well now, mate?” he choked out.
For several beats, she said nothing. But just before he could start to worry, she shocked him to the very core by rolling up against his chest. Her face pressed into the hollow of his throat, her arms creeping around his neck slowly. She clung to him, her embrace tightening gradually. Not letting go.
And after years of being confined to hell, he was allowed to roam free in heaven.
Roksana trusted him enough to hold her in his arms.
Savor it.
“Rest,” he managed around the lump in his throat. “There is no safer place than where you are right now.”
Just before her breath turned even, he felt a drop of moisture fall from her eye and travel down the center of his chest, and he pulled her closer.
Roksana woke up winded.
Her hair follicles stood on end, vim whipping in her blood.
An ache pulsated between her thighs so severely that she immediately reached for it, not sure if the pain came by way of an injury or something else. A gasp popped her lips open when, in their downward journey, the back of her knuckles brushed smooth, hard, hair-covered flesh. The lower she got, the denser the hair became until she could sift her fingers through it and the ache heightened all the more, nearly making her dizzy.
Cool fingertips trailed along the slope of her shoulder, massaging her tense, fevered skin and the possessiveness, the familiarity of that caress brought awareness crashing to the fore.
Elias.
She was in bed with Elias. In every sense.
They weren’t just sharing the space for comfort, either. The hard ridge of his erection was wedged between their bellies, nothing but a worn-in layer of denim between them, and Roksana’s hand was paused in animation just above that distended male part. There was no way to reach her own discomfited flesh without touching Elias there, and if she hadn’t woken up, there was no doubt it would be wrapped in her fist by now.
In other words, she kind of wished she hadn’t woken up.