A Scent of Longing Page 3

  His hardness. That too was pressed against her, and her abdominal muscles clenched in apprehensive excitement. Whispered snickers at VA meetings insinuated that vampire men outshone mortals, but no way in heaven or hell could they have anything on this man. His size caused her pussy weep with anticipation. Desire made her teeth ache. No one had warned her about that. She refused to consider the horrifying consequences if her fangs released in flagrante delicto.

  Like she weighed no more than a puff of down, he lifted her and wended his way through the darkened suite. She loved being cuddled and coddled by a man strong enough to do it. His heart pounded against her breast. Warmth seeped through her at his vulnerability. In the bedroom, he set her on her feet. Her vamp vision had kicked in, and she could see him in the dark room, but it was like peering through infrared night vision goggles. Clear, but eerie, the color distorted.

  “Je t'ai attendue toute ma vie.” He clicked on a bedside lamp. “I want to see you properly.”

  The low illumination righted the color. Her gaze met his intense one. His eyes glowed emerald, even brighter than the lamp. The bloodsong had grown louder, hers adding harmony to his melody. She inhaled. Lord, she could smell him—blood, arousal, and man, melding into one irresistible, maddening scent.

  He gripped the hem of his shirt to remove it, and she followed suit, divesting herself of the encumbrances of her clothing and shoes. She gaped at him as if viewing a nude man for the first time. All sleek lines and rippling muscle, Luc’s body hummed with restrained, coiled power. A Ferrari in a man’s skin.

  Biceps bulged as he stripped the bed of its satin dressing, leaving only the bottom sheet. He turned to her then, stroking her from head to toe with his gaze. How a man’s eyes could change color begged for an explanation, but her rising desire allowed only a passing consideration. She’d figure it out later. For now, she focused on committing him to memory, so she’d have his image along with her woolen socks for the cold, lonely nights ahead. A dark mat of hair covered Luc’s broad chest, narrowing down washboard abs to nest at the base of his cock.

  Thick and long, his erection thrust from his pelvis, the skin stretched taut, its shaft arrow-straight, the head large, satiny and weeping. In another flash of movement reminiscent of when he’d caught the falling wine bottle, he appeared in front of her. How does he do that?

  He kissed her, and she melted into the bliss of his nakedness, of his cock digging into her, of his body hair skimming like raw silk against her beaded nipples. She rocked from side to side to rub herself against his chest. Even better than she had imagined. Much better. Again, she felt that light, floating feeling—her head wanting to disconnect from her neck and shoulders.

  She blinked when she found herself flat on her back, the sheet cool and soft against her bare skin, and Luc, neither hot nor cold, but perfect against her side.

  “How do you do that?” she murmured, bemused.

  “How do I do what?” He licked her, his tongue a stroke of velvet against the hardness of her nipple.

  “Move so I hardly see it. You’re like Superman or Flash Gordon.”

  He curved his lips into a smile against her breast. “No, just a man.” He sucked on a nipple and she arched; he did indeed have super powers. Hot, sweet desire surged through her, enlivening her blood, filling the spaces in her marrow, until every cell vibrated. She curled her fingers into Luc’s crisp hair. It crackled with fire under her hands. Amazingly, something else to ponder another time, she could smell and almost taste its myriad of colorful strands like individual spices: cinnamon for umber, anise for ebony, and his ever-present nutmeg-allspice.

  She trailed her hands from his head to his chest and twisted the wiry hair around her fingers. He tensed as she journeyed lower, over his hard abs to his groin. She fisted his cock with both hands, and it throbbed against her palms, the blood filling the organ hot against her skin. Lily squeezed and stroked his erection. Luc’s growl resonated clear down to her clenching pussy.

  Her vampire yearning had risen to its full glory, and her sheathed fangs ached fiercely. Only the memory of what Phillip had stolen checked her bloodlust. She had been wronged in the worst possible way and had no sympathy for her ex-lover, but she understood his betrayal. It shocked her no longer that he’d bitten her, only that he’d held out as long as he did. Vamps and humans should not mix. Herself no exception, vampires couldn’t be trusted.

  She prayed she’d last the evening without biting Luc.

  Luc prayed Lily wouldn’t hate him. He’d erred by not informing her of his mixed race. Bloodlust compelled vampires to bite one another when they mated. Though Lily didn’t sense what he was now, his blood would unveil the truth. She would know instantly what he was—a Half Breed shunned by vampire society.

  Would she be revolted at having mated with him, fed from a Half Breed?

  He should halt their coupling, confess his sin now, but he couldn’t. Not when the woman for whom he’d waited his entire life—many lifetimes by human standards—lay in his bed, her hands gripping his engorged cock, her soft lips kissing his chest. Would fate be so cruel as to send him his life mate, only to rip her out of his arms before night succumbed to dawn?

  If so, he needed to make the evening count for an eternity.

  He covered her mouth, licked her lips, then swept inside to savor her taste. He flicked his tongue over her teeth and found only a hint of sharpness. Strange that she hadn’t released her fangs. Only a rare Fledgling employed that much control. Much as he dreaded the revelation of truth, he yearned for her biting kiss, to have her draw sustenance from him, for her to climax around his cock as she did so. He ached to bite her in return, achieve its resulting release.

  He kissed her hard, licked a trail from her mouth to her neck, and realized his mistake. Her blood played like symphony in his ears, her pulse a timpani against his lips, undermining his attenuating control. His fangs descended.

  Dieu. Too soon. She would know, and it would end. He wrenched away from temptation.

  He moved lower and sought her cunt. She shaved, something human girls did these days. Vampire women didn’t groom in that manner, but she was newly turned. The bareness of her mons entranced him. Envisioning nothing between them but skin and sensation caused the base of his cock to contract, and he had to fight for control again. Desire swelled the petals of her pussy to plump folds, engorged the bud of her clit. Her fragrance, like fertile earth, spring rain and sweet blossom, filled his nostrils. He bent his head, curled his tongue, and licked her clit.

  Lily gasped and jerked her hips under his touch. She lifted her head from the pillow. Her unfocused gaze sharpened. “Your eyes are so green,” she murmured.

  “That’s because I want you so much.” He took a long lick from her creaming cunt to her pulsing clit. Her taste flooded his mouth, igniting a ravenous hunger, and he couldn’t get enough of her sweetness. He needed her to unravel beneath his mouth and hands to match the way he was coming undone. He licked and sucked and fucked her with his tongue until she thrashed, her hips levitated off the bed, and she yanked his hair.

  “Luc! Now. Now!”

  He scrambled to his knees and positioned his cock at her entrance. He’d never forgive himself if he hurt her. As carefully as his desperation would allow, he eased inside.

  In God’s name, why didn’t he move faster? Lily mewled with frustration and thrust her hips upward, but Luc continued to rock, impaling her one teasing inch at a time, as if he feared crushing a fragile flower. Or maybe he intended to torture her with pleasure. He’d brought her to the brink of orgasm a couple of times with his mouth, only to retreat before she’d achieved ultimate satisfaction.

  When he pressed forward to give her more cock, she gasped with surprised gratification. She’d fisted his erection and noticed her fingers didn’t meet around his girth, but she’d failed to consider how he would feel pushing into her cunt.

  Deliciously enormous. Burying himself in her pussy, he grew even larger, harder, a massi
ve piston gloved in satiny skin, filling and stretching. Claiming.

  She was being turned again, only this time into something better and greater than herself. Something she wanted to be. Luc’s lover.

  Her extended fangs pricked at the inside of her lip, and a poisonous awareness spilled over her. She would betray him; she could no more avoid biting him than she could keep the morning sun from rising.

  She clenched her fists in the sheet, tense with self-loathing.

  He froze. Emeralds blazed, lit from within. “Am I hurting you?”

  “No.” She locked her heels around his ass to urge him deeper. She couldn’t resist her need for him.

  Luc groaned. His cock throbbed, stroking her internal walls with each thrust, and she clamped her muscles around him to hold him captive. He braced on his forearms, his face mere inches from hers. Potent spice oozed through his pores to mark her with his scent.

  Luc’s buttocks bunched as he withdrew until only his cockhead remained in her channel then eased forward to bury himself again, repeating the action with a deliberation that drove from her head all thoughts of anything except fucking. He moved like he intended their coupling to last for an eternity.

  Whatever had made her think slow was bad? Sex never had been so intensely sensate, a flurry of feeling, smell, and taste. Her pussy registered every inch of his shaft, the thick vein that pulsed along the underside, the heavy ridge encircling the smooth head. Pre-cum wept from the tip; like a hormone-laced shot, it fueled her lust and hunger.

  Luc slid deep and dipped his head to brush his face against her cheek. Whiskers scraped across her skin. The seductive melody of his blood filled her ears. The pulsing vessels in his neck beckoned. Her fangs throbbed from root to point. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Lily clenched her teeth and averted her face in a vain attempt to stave off the inevitable.

  Another inward stroke, another raspy caress. Luc curled a hand behind her head and cradled her against the crook of his neck and shoulder. Shuddering with need, she squeezed her pussy around his cock.

  “Take what you need,” he growled.

  She whipped her head back, ripping out strands of her hair caught in his fingers. “You don’t know what you’re asking!”

  His green eyes radiated an indecipherable emotion. “I do.”

  Lily dug her fingernails into her palms until they bled. She thrashed her head on the pillow. “I won’t do it.” Her lie scarred her conscience like acid.

  “You must.” He twisted his fingers in her hair and guided her face to his neck. His skin brushed her lips. His blood filled her ears. Her mouth opened. Like an alcoholic staring into a pint of whiskey, she lunged for courage that did not exist, slipped, and fell.

  She sank her fangs into his vein.

  Chapter Six

  As his blood flowed into her mouth, she fractured into two selves. Good Lily silently stormed and railed in self-disgust and loathing. Evil Lily gulped greedily, moaning in ecstasy as she gorged on her lover. As she drank, wave after wave of orgasmic bliss turned her muscles rigid down her to curling toes.

  Luc drove his cock into her, his rapturous growls mingling with her cries. That her feeding gave him pleasure did not assuage her horrified conscience. Convulsing, he shot his cum deep into her core, into her womb, its very essence acting like a pleasure-inducing drug to ignite new spasms of ecstasy. One orgasm arced into two, then three, rippling through her with increasing force.

  As she drank, truth crept in at first like a discordant lullaby hummed too soft to name. Then came the rush—a clattering, clamoring crash of cymbals that slammed into her brain, assaulting her with Luc’s duplicity. His eerie eyes, his lightning speed, his unique scent. His taste. Oh God, the taste of him.

  Vampire. Not entirely, but in every way that counted. She jerked her mouth from his neck.

  Sorrow and feral desire contorted his face. “Forgive me.” He threw back his head and roared. Fangs flashed. How had she not noticed them before? Before she could blink, he dove and plunged his fangs deep into her neck.

  Heaven fell from the sky as hell rose to greet it. Sight, sound, smell, and taste merged into one singular sensation. Lily howled and thrashed beneath him in a convulsive dance of rapture. Surely she couldn’t burn like this and survive.

  Luc came again, filling her with his cum as he drank from her neck. He pounded into her with such force he would have driven her into the headboard had his weight not pinned her to the mattress. He dug bruising fingers into her arms. She bucked and writhed as he stole his pleasure but delivered it back tenfold.

  Finally, he yanked his head back, pumped his last, and collapsed. Released from ecstatic torment, Lily lay spent beneath him. His weight was no burden, but the scent of cum, blood, and male musk blanketed her in memories she had wished never to relive.

  At least she couldn’t be turned twice.

  Luc rolled off her, but retained a grip on her wrist, sensing perhaps she’d planned to leap from the bed. He sat up, his spine rigid.

  “You know what I am now.” A muscle twitched near his eyes, blue again like her pendant.

  “You should have told me.” Suppressed tears thickened her voice. “It was the decent thing to do.”

  Decent? Her conscience sneered at her. She’d waltzed into the Castillo Hotel intending to sleep with a human man with no intention of revealing her secret. She’d acted no differently than Phillip. Than Luc.

  No, there was no honor among vampires.

  He ran his free hand through his hair. She remembered how it had snapped with life under her mussing fingers, sparked with color she could smell. Not imagination. Vampire perception.

  Head tilted, he stared into space. His throat convulsed in a swallow. His fingers stroked the underside of her wrist. Lily tried to free her hand from the unwanted comfort, but he would not release her.

  His chest rose and fell in a breath and then he turned his head and sought her gaze. “I regret not telling you I’m the Half Breed offspring of a vampire mother and a human father. I had hoped you could overlook my mixed race.”

  Offspring? Human father? He sounded like he’d been born. Vampires weren’t conceived; they were sired. She remembered his taste. Vamp, but different. She had no frame of reference other than the wretched bagged human blood to which Luc couldn’t be compared. But she’d caught the hint of human. She frowned, unable to wrap her mind around the concept that he might have retained a portion of his humanness.

  How she wished she had. But that he might be part human didn’t acquit him of the crime of being a vampire. She couldn’t overlook that.

  She shook head. “I can’t.”

  “I understand.” Anguish flashed in his eyes then an expressionless mask dropped into place and he released her wrist.

  The glimpse of sadness and her own conscience pummeled her. Why didn’t he throw her own perfidious behavior back in her face? Why didn’t he defend himself? Lily wanted to weep. Too many emotions churned inside to view the situation clearly. She had to get away so she could think, could breathe.

  “I’m sorry. I have to go.” She jumped out of bed and quickly donned her clothing. She grabbed her shoes and, not bothering to put them on, turned to Luc.

  An odor like a despairing sea overpowered the aroma of spice. Aquamarine clouded to a dull sapphire, his jowls sagged, and an ashy gray seeped over his skin.

  “I’m sorry,” she repeated, turned, and exited the bedroom. She snagged her purse and fled the suite.

  Chapter Seven

  Six weeks later

  Lily awakened with a heavy heart and an unshakable fatigue. Not an evening passed that she didn’t regret her impetuous flight from the Castillo. She’d let fear and confusion overrule her heart, and she would pay for it for the rest of her short life. With each sunset, her chances to find Luc grew slimmer.

  She’d contacted Madame Eve, but her office claimed to have no record of him. With only his first name to go on and the scant information that he dealt in antiques, she’d searc
hed, emailing and phoning every importer and dealer in the greater Los Angeles area. She’d come up with nothing and had exhausted her leads. And run out of time.

  Lily was dying. She’d developed some weird vampire cancer. For several weeks, she’d sensed a tumor, still small, but growing larger and stronger, draining her energy. Despite everything she’d heard, vampires didn’t live forever.

  Night shrouded her bedroom in blackness, and a glance at the clock revealed evening had descended hours ago. That had been her first hint of illness; she fell asleep hours before sunrise, slept until well past sunset, and dragged through the hours in between.

  Get moving. There are still a couple of importers to check out. The tiny spark of hope propelled her out of bed. In her pink flannel jammies printed with puffy white sheep, she shuffled to the kitchen. She pulled a bag of blood from the fridge, poured some into a glass beaker, and set it to warm in a saucepan full of water on the stove.

  After drinking from Luc, she could barely stomach the bagged stuff. Even the thought of drinking it made her sick, but she had to maintain what little strength she had left. Only by heating it to a precise temperature did it become palatable.

  Leaving the pot, she headed for the bathroom, then halted when her phone rang.

  “Hi Roxie,” she answered. Her friend called to check on her every evening.

  “Anything pan out this time?”

  “No. I only have two places left.”

  “I came up with nothing, too.” Roxie had checked on the importers who kept bankers’ hours. Though she’d tried, Lily could not stay awake during the day to call. “I’m sorry. I never should have sent you to 1Night Stand.” Roxie sounded as dejected as Lily felt.

  “It’s not your fault. I’m the one who ran out and didn’t even get Luc’s last name.”