I did. I wanted it more than oxygen.
I remained silent.
He inched up what felt like a millimeter and I felt my lids slowly close in rapture. Then he stopped and my eyes shot open.
“Beg me, pet,” he whispered, his voice now tortured.
I had no voice so I shook my head.
“Beg me,” he ordered harshly.
“No,” I breathed.
“You want me,” he stated.
I stared at him then I nodded.
“Then beg me.”
Finding a strength inside me that I didn’t even know was there, I pulled up against his hands, my body straining against my brain’s demands and I couldn’t believe it, he let me.
I felt the small but hard and thick and unbelievably magnificent piece of him that I had slide out of me.
It felt like I’d lost a piece of me, not him, when I pulled free.
Regardless, stubborn to the last (and now hating myself for it), my eyes locked on his and I declared, “You won’t break me.”
His arms wrapped around me, crushing me to him, I was hoping in defeat so he’d give me what my body was aching for.
Instead, he rolled us to our sides, his arms still holding me close and into the top of my hair, he said, “You’ve forced my hand, Leah.”
Fear pierced through me because, without any attempt to hide it, his voice was filled with regret and I didn’t know why. What was worse, even though I didn’t know what he regretted, I had a feeling whatever it was, was something I’d regret more.
He kept talking. “I’m leaving and when I return, if I find you’ve touched yourself, you’ll have a week of what you just had and you can beg me until you’re hoarse to make me let you come but I won’t do it. Am I understood?”
“You’re understood,” I mumbled into his chest where he’d pressed my face.
He tensed as if to move and I didn’t want him to go. Not because I forgot he disgusted and terrified me and I detested him, I only could forget those when his mouth was between my legs and other times besides, but because any movement made my body feel like it was going to shatter.
I felt his body relax right before he sighed.
Then he asked, “Why do you fight me, sweetheart?”
I didn’t answer. To answer was to trust him with a piece of me and after all that he’d done to me and what he’d done to his f**king wife, I knew he was not someone I could trust.
Ever.
No matter how gentle he could seem.
Like right now.
Or when he called me sweetheart. Or when he laughed like I was the funniest person he’d ever met in his centuries upon centuries of life.
He went on, “You must know it will be good.”
Oh, I knew that.
I still didn’t answer.
He sighed again before he murmured, “You don’t understand.”
No.
I.
Did.
Not.
And I didn’t want to.
I still didn’t speak.
“My pet, it’ll be so much better when you submit to me. That, I can promise. Not just here, in bed, but all of it, everything that will be you and me. I promise you, Leah, I’m trying to give you something beautiful. I can’t explain it, you have to feel it. But to feel it, you must trust me.”
Fat chance of that.
I still didn’t speak.
For a while, he didn’t either.
Then, as if he wasn’t talking to me (which he wasn’t), he muttered, “I’m the one who wanted a challenge. I need to get my f**king head examined.”
I didn’t understand that either.
There was a lot that I didn’t understand.
But I didn’t ask.
And I was never going to. Never, never, never.
Gently he pulled away from me. The loss of his hard warmth meant the cold hit my sensitive nudity like a slap. He adjusted his jeans and had me beneath the sheet in a blur of motion, faster than he’d been before even when he was being Speedy Vamp.
Obviously, he’d been holding out on me.
He pulled my hair away from my shoulder and I shoved my face in the pillow to escape his action even though I allowed his touch.
“Stubborn,” he murmured but I could swear there was pride mixed with the frustration in his voice.
And I didn’t understand that either.
Then he was gone but within five minutes he was back, this time dressed in a suit.
He sat on the edge of the bed and I glared up at him as he gazed down at me.
“It’s been a long time that, on some level, I didn’t look forward to attending A Feast,” he informed me and my body grew rock solid.
He was going to A Feast.
Unbidden, unwanted but undeniable anguish scorched through me, hot and biting.
He bent forward, brushing my cheek with his lips. “Have a good day, pet, and sleep well.”
Oh my God!
He wasn’t even coming home.
Even though my mind screamed, my mouth nor body moved.
He did. In an instant, he was gone.
I hate you, my brain whispered.
I heard you, sweetheart, he whispered back.
His endearment burned into me like a brand.
I know, I told him.
Stubborn, he told me.
I turned off my mind, turned my face in my pillow and put every effort into making absolutely certain I didn’t cry.
After a long struggle, at last, I finally succeeded at something.
It was an empty victory.
Chapter Eleven
The Betrayal
Lucien’s eyes scanned the heaving dance floor and he saw her.
Although he didn’t often attend this particular Feast, he’d seen her before. Each time she’d enticed him, long, dark blonde hair, blue eyes, curvy body, alluring scent.
Tonight, she did especially as she was wearing a black dress almost like the one Leah had worn last night. Not the same quality but close enough.
Everything about her was not the same quality but close enough.
He knew she captured his attention because she reminded him of Leah. It had been the reason he’d never taken her. He was anticipating the real thing, not an oft-used imitation.
But tonight, she’d do.
Her eyes caught his and she smiled beguilingly, an open and eager invitation. It was clear she was his to do with as he wished and this Feast, as he wished, had very few boundaries.
He looked away, allowing his aversion to show.
Eager and willing were not what he wanted. Spirit, personality, passion, defiance, fear, challenge, those were what he wanted.
After centuries he finally had all of that, a great deal of it. It was just that he was finding it maddening to an extreme.
And excruciatingly frustrating.
Lucien attended Feasts often, even if he particularly liked the taste of his concubine and, it went without saying, he particularly liked the taste of Leah. He was a vampire with a healthy appetite and Feasts allowed him diversity in that appetite.