Crave (6 page)

She continued to stare at him in silence.

He sighed again.

“I never meant to make you feel like a whore. Give me another chance and I’ll say things right this time.” Callum took hold of her hand and she didn’t pull away. She tilted her knees towards him and lifted her eyes to his, and he couldn’t miss the expectant look in them. “I have a week left in Paris, and last night was incredible, and I don’t want it to be a ‘one time thing’, as you put it. It went beyond just a little fun for me... and I can’t stop thinking about you. I know the odds are against us... but I can’t ignore how good it felt to be with you and I want to feel that again. I want to see if this thing between us is more than fleeting... Yes, I’m aware how crazy that sounds and I’ll point you back to my earlier statement. I have lost my mind. I lost it the moment I kissed you—and the smell of your blood is driving me crazy too.”

She looked down at her bleeding wrist, turning it upwards to reveal the three ragged red lines scoring her pale skin. He was thankful that the cuts were shallow, more like scratches, and he hadn’t reached any veins.

He hadn’t meant to end on talking about her blood. A bolt of panic had forced his mind to leap to another subject when the words had lined up on his tongue and he had found them to be shocking. If they shocked him then they would send her running and he didn’t want that. He wanted her to stay right here.

With him.

Callum stared into her eyes, waiting to hear her answer, aware of the knot in his chest and what it meant.

Kristina picked up her glass of whisky, sipped it demurely, as though she was enjoying keeping him teetering on the edge, desperate to hear whether she was going to stay, and then set it down on her knee. She looked right into his eyes, her hazel ones no longer cold or dark, and stared into them for the longest time. He was close to demanding an answer by the time she finally spoke.

“You’re serious about this?” She took another sip of whisky. Did she need it to boost her courage? If it would do the same for him rather than going straight to his head, knocking him flat and leaving him needing more blood than usual, he would be downing the two fingers he had poured for himself. “You know whatever friends you have back where you came from would tear you a new one if they found out about me.”

He was well aware of that. Antoine would do more than tear him a new one. Javier’s murder of Lilah’s master and consequent claiming and turning of her had left their leader in a foul mood and with a lot on his plate. It had taken a monumental amount of effort on the aristocrat’s part to smooth things over with the pureblood community and convince them to continue pledging their money to and attending the performances at Vampirerotique. If word reached Antoine that Callum had been sleeping with what most vampires saw as the enemy, he would have his head, after he had made him suffer first.

And yet Callum still found himself opening his mouth and saying, “I’ve never been more serious... and I don’t care what people think. I want you, and that is all that matters to me.”

She shook her head, an incredulous look in her eyes, and set her whisky glass down on the coffee table.

“Just as long as you’re aware of what we’re doing here.” Her gaze met his again.

“Are you?” he countered and she blinked, dropped her eyes back to the glass and shrugged.

“I gave up caring about things a long time ago, and I don’t have any friends. In fact... it could only be a good thing for me if word that I had slept with a vampire filtered down the vine to my pack.”

Callum had to wonder why that was. Her pack would likely disown her and never associate with her again. Was that something she wanted? Come to think of it. She was definitely British like he was, and based on the fact that no one seemed familiar with her in the clubs, she was new to Paris.

“Where is your pack based?” he said and the warmth in her eyes evaporated in an instant, turning cold as her guard went up and shut him out.

“No questions,” she snapped and stood. “If we’re going to do this, you don’t go probing into my personal life and I don’t go asking about yours. Got it?”

The pack was definitely a sour subject for her. Her reaction only increased his curiosity about it. Had she parted with them on bad terms? His eyebrows rose. Was she on the run? She had panicked and he had sensed fear in her the whole time she had been with the werewolf last night. Afraid that the man would know her pack from her scent and contact them? He wanted to ask about it but held his tongue. The fire now blazing in her eyes warned him not to even dare to disagree with her. She would be out of the door again if he did, and he didn’t want that. As much as he wanted to know her past, he wanted her more fiercely.

Callum nodded.

He would wait until her guard was down and then do a little digging. It wasn’t just her safety at risk. If she was running from her pack and they were after her, he could end up caught in the crossfire. She had said that he would start a war by killing the three werewolves from last night. She would start one herself if her pack discovered she had chosen a vampire over her own kind. They would want vengeance. His death would be the start of another bloodbath between vampires and werewolves.

“Fine.” Callum rose to his feet. He brushed the backs of his fingers across her cheek and her armour fell away again, lowering to reveal a touch of warmth in her eyes that he was growing to like seeing. “I won’t ask why you’re running.”

A flicker of steel in her gaze and the twitch of her body as she tensed told him that he had presumed right. She was on the run from her pack. Why?

Kristina stepped up to him and rested her hands on his chest. Her fingertips caressed him through the silky grey material, teasing and pushing the thought out of his mind as his body responded to her touch. He slid his hand around the nape of her neck and tipped her head back so her eyes met his. The rosy gloss on her lips still tempted him with its scent but it was the lingering fragrance of her blood in the air that had saliva pooling in his mouth and his fangs itching to taste her. He clamped down on the desire, forcing it deep inside him and keeping it there. She was already on edge as it was. Transforming in front of her again would probably send her dashing for the door. As much as he desired her, as fiercely as his hunger for her rode him, he would keep himself under control.

He wouldn’t bite her until she asked.

She hesitated and so did he. The hunger that had given him confidence last night was little more than a fizzling ember, reduced to ashes by everything that had passed between them in the past half an hour. He wasn’t sure what to do to bring it back or how to move past this awkward silence. He wanted to kiss her again, craved the flavour of her on his tongue, but wasn’t sure if she wanted it too.

“This is stupid,” she muttered under her breath, leapt up and wrapped her legs around his hips and her arms around his shoulders. It caught him off balance and sent him tripping backwards across the room, desperately clutching her bottom to support her. He hit the door hard, the brass knob jabbing him in the back and pushing the air from his lungs in a harsh grunt. She beamed at him. “Wow... I had thought you would have been able to handle that.”

“A little warning wouldn’t go amiss,” he grumbled and straightened his back, grimacing as the area that had collided with the door knob throbbed and ached.

“Clearly you’re not as strong as I thought you were.” She grinned.

Callum stared at her, feeling as though she had mentally cast him out of the role of male vampire and onto the reject pile labelled ‘human’. Not as strong as she thought? Well. If she had thought to challenge his masculinity, she had chosen the perfect words for it, and he would respond with the perfect counter argument.

Still holding her, he strode across the room, tossed her onto the bed, and before she had stopped bouncing in the middle of it, was on her. His fingers clamped tightly around her wrists and pinned them hard to the soft striped dark blue and gold covers. Her smile fell away and her pupils dilated when he growled down at her, his hips against hers, holding her immobile and powerless beneath him.

Her fingers flexed and she struggled, a wicked glint in her eyes commanding him to stop her. Vixen. She liked it. He shifted his grip, interlocked their fingers, and pressed her hands down harder, until his muscles tensed, his body went taut, and the urge to snarl tore through him. The scent of her arousal hit him hard. The black chasms of her pupils ate the colour in her irises, confirming her hunger.

Callum snarled and kissed her, forcing her mouth open with his tongue. She moaned and writhed against him, her hands pushing up into his. She almost managed to get the back of her hands off the quilt. Almost. He pressed more of his weight onto her slender hands, stopping her before she managed it, and she groaned and kissed him harder, her teeth clashing with his as their mouths met in short desperate bursts. He wanted to touch her, slide his hands over her supple body and reacquaint himself with her breasts, stomach and groin, but that meant surrendering his grip on her. He was sure the moment he did such a thing, she would have him flat on his back, pinned beneath her, showing him he wasn’t in control and that she could match his strength.

She couldn’t.

Werewolves were weaker than vampires, and he was fairly certain that he was much older than her too.

“Callum,” she breathed into his mouth and he dropped his lips to her throat, kissing and licking, driven by the sound of his name falling so huskily from her lips. He wanted to hear her scream it, needed to be aware of her climax and feel the pleasure rippling through her, knowing that he had given it to her.

He nipped her collarbone with his blunt teeth and then snarled when he reached the black mac she still wore. He wanted it off her.

Kristina didn’t move when he sat back and released her hands. She laid on the bed beneath him, panting breathlessly, her breasts heaving delightfully. He made fast work of the belt on her coat and then pulled it open.

His breath stuttered.

Hell.

He wanted to devour her now.

She looked too delicious in the little dark red leather corset and short pleated black skirt. If he had known she was wearing this beneath her plain boring mac, he probably wouldn’t have let her out of the suite the first time. He probably wouldn’t have given her a chance to lash out at him. He would have been worshipping her with kisses the moment he had set eyes on her and plunging himself into her warm sheath just a heartbeat later.

“Christ... fuck me,” he whispered, at a loss as to what to do next. He wasn’t sure where to start.

“Okay.” She grabbed his shoulder and flipped him onto his back on the bed. He sank into it, not putting up a fight as she removed her mac and tossed it onto the bed beside her. The vision of her astride him, her smooth creamy thighs tight against his hips, the short black skirt that barely covered her crotch, and the wicked strapless leather corset that squashed her breasts into cleavage that took his breath away, rendered him dumb.

She wriggled her hips against him and he groaned at the feel of her heat seeping through his dark grey trousers and the exquisite friction of her pussy rubbing along his rigid cock.

Callum clutched her hips, breathing hard and struggling to form words. A compliment would do. He tried one but it came out garbled because she chose that moment to lean over him and blind him with the sight of her full breasts verging on spilling out of her corset. It was a miracle they stayed in.

He wished they hadn’t.

He wanted to swirl his tongue around each rosy button in turn and suckle them until she moaned for more.

“Did you say something?” She frowned at him and ran her hands over his chest, heading for the buttons of his silver shirt. She undid them slowly, her fingers brushing his skin as she popped each one and parted his shirt a little. When she had undone the final button, she eased the two sides apart to reveal his torso.

He swallowed and forced a single word out. “Beautiful.”

She ran an appraising glance over him and smiled. “Funny... I was just thinking the same thing.”

He groaned and bucked at the first touch of her hot mouth on his flesh. She trailed wet kisses over his chest, pausing to circle his left nipple with her tongue, and down to his stomach. She growled, the sound rumbling low in her throat, and his cock throbbed in response. He had never been with a woman who growled like he did when excited and aroused. It made him think of her biting him and he was surprised by how much he welcomed the thought.

Callum tipped his head back into the soft duvet, groaning as she lightly bit near his navel. He clutched the bedclothes, twisting them into his fists, and she giggled.

“You looked delicious enough when you weren’t tense,” she murmured in a heated way and lavished his stomach with kisses, licking and nipping at him. “Damn, you look irresistible now. I might have to eat you.”

Hell. He rolled his eyes closed and groaned again, every muscle going taut as she raked her nails over his chest, catching his nipples, and down his stomach to his belt. His breathing hitched with the tug of her hands on his belt and he exhaled all the air in his lungs as the sound of his zipper sliding down filled the silent room.

“Mmm,” she moaned and stroked his hard length through his boxers. He bucked against her palm, unable to control himself. She drove that ability away. Shattered all thought and left him with only instinct. His hips pumped, rubbing his hungry cock against her hand, leaving him aching for flesh-to-flesh contact between them. “Let’s see if you’re as damn beautiful as I remember.”

Callum bit his lower lip, her words swimming in his hazy mind, slowly working themselves into the right order to form her sentence.

She thought his cock was beautiful?

He was about to pursue an answer to that question when she shuffled his boxers down over his hips and ran her tongue along the length of his erection, from root to tip, shattering his ability to think again. He groaned instead, fingers tightening against the duvet. The first swirl of her soft pink tongue around the head of his cock sent his head spinning and he grunted.