Eternal Seduction (9 page)

“It was only fair,” he laughed as he nipped at her lips.

She smiled back at him. “It was your shirt.”

Clinging to his muscular biceps, she shivered as his thumbs drew slow circles around each erect nipple before he ducked his head and pulled one into his mouth. Hot and wet, his tongue retraced the same path his fingers had blazed. She tipped her head back, giving in to the exquisite tension building inside her as he fanged one taut peak to a nearly painful state, then the other.

The man definitely knew what he was doing.

As he trailed a searing line of kisses up to her neck, she slid her hands down his chest, delighting in every dip and curve of lean, sculpted muscle on the way down to the deep grooves between his abs. He had a body to die for, nothing but firm skin and hard lines.

Logan shivered as Kerestyan’s fangs scraped her throat. Her entire body was on fire, burning hotter everywhere his mouth touched her. His deep moan vibrated against her throat, urging her on as she found the lone button nestled between them.

After undoing his pants, she wrapped her fingers around the thick base of his cock and smiled. Unless he’d changed his clothes while she slept, he’d been commando since the moment she met him. She stroked the hard, throbbing length of him before he claimed her mouth again. Hot tendrils of excitement wound down her spine. Tightening her grip, she savored the animalistic growl that rumbled its way through his chest, straight into hers.

“I want you, Logan,” he breathed against her mouth. He pinned her with those sultry black eyes as his thumbs resumed their assault on her nipples. “I want to taste you.” She moaned as he bit at her lips. “Fuck you…feel you come.”

She smiled. There was that word again, rolling off his talented tongue in a way that made every muscle in her body quiver with excitement.

Who’d have thought Mr. Prim and Proper would be such a dirty talker?

She tipped her head to the side as he nibbled his way down to where her neck and shoulder met. “I want you, too. Right here, right now.”

She stroked him again then rubbed the head of his cock against her swollen clit, reveling in the way he jerked and throbbed from the slick contact, loving how her body pulsed and contracted, silently begging for more.

She wanted to feel him hard inside her, wanted to writhe against his muscled body and drown in every drop of pleasure they could give each other. She wanted to scream until her voice gave out. Hear him moan as he slammed into her over and over again, until neither of them could move.

“Kerestyan Nelek!”

Both Logan and Kerestyan froze as an angry voice thundered through the room, rattling everything that wasn’t bolted down.

“Is this how you treat guests in your home?”

Logan gave an awkward smile when Kerestyan’s forehead smacked against her shoulder, unblocking her view of the pissed off psychologist standing a good ten feet behind them.

“What could you possibly want, Vouclade?” Kerestyan’s warm breath tickled her breast, but she didn’t dare smile.

Vouclade held up a syringe filled with a bright orange liquid. “I returned to offer you medication that would assist Logan through the coming days. However, considering your current state of affairs, you must not think her situation is very serious.”

“That is
not
what I think.” He ended the sentence with a scowl, and she knew because she could feel his lips burning against her skin.

Vouclade’s eyes narrowed on Kerestyan’s back. “Have the correct conversation with her immediately, Kerestyan, lest I have it for you.”

Logan shivered as an icy blast of wind tore through the room and yet another vampire somehow related to Kerestyan disappeared into thin air.

“I’m sorry, Logan. If I’d anticipated any kind of interruption, I would have stayed on my side of the kitchen.” There was a tinge of humor in his quiet voice, but he didn’t sound the least bit happy.

She carefully removed her fingers from around his penis. “It’s okay.” She blew out a disgruntled, unfulfilled breath. “But I suppose you should put me down and tell me whatever it is that pissed him off so bad. Why do I need medicine to help me through the next few days?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he brushed a light kiss across her lips then turned and set her on the stool she’d originally started out on. While a foreign part of her appreciated the soft gesture, the more dominant part of her didn’t like it at all.

It was too gentle, too personal.

Sex was sex, hot sex was even better, but the intimacy that single kiss created around them wasn’t what she’d been looking for.

At least, she didn’t think it was.

When Kerestyan zipped and buttoned his pants then plucked hers from the floor and held them out towards her, Logan slid them back on and tied her shirt closed before settling back on the stool.

Was her body pleased with the decision? Oh, hell no. But something about the concern etched into the fine lines around his eyes told her she was missing a vital piece of information.

She frowned. “What’s going on, Kerestyan?”

He raked a hand through his slightly tussled hair, fangs no longer showing. “Your days of captivity are soon to be over.”

She sat up a little straighter. “Really? You’re letting me go?”

The muscles in his jaw worked hard. “No. Your fate is no longer mine to judge. My Father, the man who made me a vampire, will now be doing the honors.”

She tipped her head to the side as mild disappointment, which she refused to acknowledge, settled in her stomach. She wasn’t sure if his father judging her was a bad thing or not, but now it was his strained voice that concerned her. “You don’t expect it to go well?”

For the first time since she’d met him, he lowered his eyes. “I don’t know…but your body has to be free of heroin before I can take you to him. He does not, in any way, approve of self destruction. And that’s exactly how he’ll view your habitual drug use. If I take you to him as you are now, he’ll destroy you and punish me for offending him.”

Panic tightened every muscle in Logan’s already trembling body. She braced her hands between her legs and gripped the edge of the stool. All she could feel was the fear churning her stomach, the acid burning the back of her throat.

She’d been through withdrawal once before; and there wasn’t a single moment while in its throes she didn’t believe or feel as though she’d die at any moment.

The thought of going through it again scared her more than any vampire ever could.

She looked up at Kerestyan. “I can’t do it again. I won’t do it.”

His face hardened, his eyes almost demanding. “You’ll die for certain if you don’t.”

She jumped off the stool as rage exploded in her stomach, its fiery shards tearing apart her insides. “Who the hell is your father to decide what I have to do to keep breathing? What the hell makes him so important? What is it with you vampires acting like you’re the only ones with say over my life?” She struggled to suck oxygen into her lungs as the white walls drew closer. “I won’t do it!”

“Logan, I don’t think you understand the gravity of your situation.”

“My situation? My situation!” She smacked a hand down on the countertop. “Then why don’t you explain my situation to me? I’m only here because of you.” She jabbed a finger at him. “You put me in this fucking situation.”

Something strange flashed behind his eyes. “I may have helped put you in this situation,” his fangs elongated as he slammed a fist against his chest, “but I don’t have any more choice in this than you do!”

“You expect me to believe that? You’re the Lord of New York, and you don’t have a choice? You killed three vampires without even touching them and you don’t have a choice?”

“No, I don’t. I won’t even spin your feeble human mind with how old my Father is. But I’m still a Child in his eyes. I have no choice but to obey him.
He
created
me
. The cost of his blood, which I accepted the day he turned me, was to abide by his rules. The only way you’ll live is if I do that very thing.”

The man wasn’t making any sense. “What the hell do his rules have to do with me?”

He gnashed his teeth together, as if he couldn’t believe she didn’t understand. “His rules dictate I obey the laws the Eldest of my species have set forth. The most important being the Veil. We hide from the humans, Logan. There’s a reason why you’ve lived the majority of your life unaware of vampires. A reason why the human population as a whole doesn’t know we exist.”

Is that all?
She shrugged. “So what if I know? What the hell do you think I’m going to do, run off and tell everyone? For your information, aside from going to the cops the first time, who literally threw me out of the station – I’ve never told anyone about anything I saw. Not that they’d believe me if I did.” She closed her eyes as a dull ache pulsed beneath her temples. “You know what, as much as I don’t like the thought of you poking around my brain, maybe you should just try to make me forget all this. Then we can both go on with our lives.”

“It’s not that simple anymore. You know
too
much about vampires. Manipulating the human mind to forget even a brief encounter with a vampire takes a great deal of precision. To remove and reconstruct what you know, especially now, could very well damage your brain in an irreparable fashion. Your only options at this point are to become a vampire, or a
Servio
, which is a servant to a vampire. Either way, that involves Nelek blood, which I can’t offer you without my Father’s approval.”

“Whoa!” She opened her eyes and stared hard at him. “What do you mean my only options are to become a vampire or a servant? That’s what you meant by exploring other avenues? What if I don’t want to? What if I want my life back?”

He stared back at her, his pale face a mask of disbelief and anger. “This isn’t about what you want. The life you knew ended when I found you in the alley. And to be bluntly honest, it should have ended the moment you learned about vampires. You don’t have any control over what you become, only whether you do. Your life has changed, forever. You need to accept that.”

Logan stiffened. She’d never felt so frustrated or angry in her entire life. How could he stand there and tell her she didn’t have any control over her own life? How could he expect she’d just accept it?

She folded her arms over her chest. “No.”

He moved to stand in front of her then leaned down so they were eye level. “Listen to me,” his breath was cool against her lips. “You’re a breach of the Veil. Vampires, regardless of age, do not openly act in any way that allows humans to learn of our existence. You should have never seen a vampire feed. You should have never witnessed vampires fighting. I killed the three Fledglings in the alley
because
they broke the Veil. They wore their fangs openly, and you saw them. Not only—”

“Enough with the stupid Veil already! I get it.” She pressed the heels of her palms to her temples. “Jesus Christ, if seeing vampires was so damn bad, where the hell were you all the other times I saw them chewing on people?”

When he let out an animalistic snarl, she took a few steps back. “There are almost a hundred vampires in the city of New York. Could you watch a hundred humans scattered across the city at the same time? Could you make sure every single one of them never ate without your permission? Never did what was in their nature to do?”

“The question was meant to be rhetorical, but since it seems to have pissed you off so much, no, I probably couldn’t.” She rested her hands on her hips. “But I also can’t disappear in a burst of wind or mess with people’s minds. I’m sure if I could, I’d be more than capable of watching a hundred people.”

His sinister rumble of laughter sent chills down her spine. “It’s not nearly as easy as it sounds. The more a vampire uses his or her powers, the more blood they require. The more blood they require, the more they need to feed. The more they feed, the more they risk breaking the Veil. To use the power my blood grants as often as you suggest, I’d be forced to drain five humans a day. Should I wish to spare their lives, I’d have to spend my entire night searching for twenty different vessels. At that rate, I’d never be able to rule a city.” His gaze fell to her lips then lingered on her neck. “As you so invitingly put it, I’d be too busy chewing on people.”

She swallowed the knot tightening in her throat as he extended to his full height and slowly stalked towards her. His ruined shirt hung open, allowing her to see every ripple of his hard, sculpted abdomen as he drew closer. He looked every bit the dark, deadly predator vampires were rumored to be as he ran his tongue over his fangs.

And something deep inside her was thrilled by the sight of him…

No. Don’t look.
Logan squeezed her eyes tight. She knew what he was trying to do, and she refused to back up and lose any more ground to him. She shivered when his hot breath touched her ear at the same time the heat from his body invaded her skin.

Why he was warm one time and cold the next, she didn’t know, but right now it felt like every inch of his hard body was on fire.

“I’m only going to explain this to you once, so I suggest you listen carefully. I may be powerful, but even I can’t be everywhere at once. Contrary to what you might think, I’m more than capable of guarding against accidents and have been since the night I took this city as my own. But what I can’t control, is someone like
you
. Someone who’s so detached you wear it in your eyes. You’re not in this situation solely because of me. You’re here right now because the Fledglings in the alley thought you were already a
Servio
. Why do you think they asked whose Puppet you were? ‘Puppet’ is the youth’s slang term for a servant.”

Logan opened her eyes and stepped back. “So now you think part of this is my fault?”

An eerie, almost superior smile spanned his mouth. “I don’t think, Logan. I know.”

She purposely fisted her hands as the urge to smack the fangs out of his mouth welled up inside her. “How the hell do you figure?”

He folded his thick arms over his chest. “Of all the times you stumbled upon a vampire feeding, how many times did you intercede on the human’s behalf?”