Arik
“I have to go out.”
Kat startled at my words, reaching for the button to pause the treadmill. “Out?”
The workout room mirrors reflected her frown as I jammed my shoulder into the doorframe. I tried a reassuring smile but had little doubt my body posture proclaimed it a lie. It was. Frustration—mental, but mostly sexual—was riding me hard. Being stuck in this place, without intel, with her… I was about to lose my fucking mind and every last ounce of control I possessed.
I couldn’t risk that. I’d worked hard to build trust with Kat. I wouldn’t risk it all going down in a big blaze of insanity-induced lust.
A couple hours of fresh air, that’s all I needed. Besides, there really were things I had to take care of. “I need to feed.”
The blush that stained Kat’s cheeks tempted me to find a blood source in this room instead of out on the street. But I couldn’t, not yet. Trust, remember? You’re establishing trust. Slowly…
And doing a damn good job of it. Sooner rather than later, Kat would be beneath me. I could see the act splayed across the backs of my eyelids every time I blinked: Kat naked, aroused, lifting quivering breasts and that creamy throat to me. My fangs lengthened at the sight, as did other parts of my body. I had to force my eyes to stay closed until I could cool the aroused glow I knew must be evident. But it was my resolve that suffered the most damage.
Yeah, like it or not, I had to leave.
When my eyes opened, I found Kat watching me, an uncertain frown tugging on her lips. Her conflict over what I needed was written in the tightness around her eyes and the white teeth slipping out to grip her bottom lip. I’d been sure she’d never find the idea of my bite arousing given what happened to her, but the wavering I saw in her expression said I might be wrong.
I allowed my gaze to go hot again as I focused on that lip. Let her wonder. Let her imagine what feeding would be like. Because eventually she would find out—I could only wait so long before I tasted her.
“Okay,” Kat said, voice husky, drawing me back to our conversation.
“I shouldn’t be more than a few hours. You get your workout done and start practice on the bo kata I taught you yesterday.”
Her frown had nothing to do with uncertainty this time. “I still don’t get why I have to use a treadmill. What happened to immortality?”
“Longevity,” I corrected, “and it gets eaten if it doesn’t learn to move its pretty little ass.”
Kat rolled her eyes. “All right, all right.” She continued to grumble as she started the treadmill moving again. “I’m going.”
The machine hit a steady jogging speed, making Kat’s full breasts bounce lightly under her T-shirt. I coughed away the needy sound that rose in my throat. “I’ll be back soon.”
I didn’t look back as desperation hurried me across the lair and out the door. The minute I stepped into the night, I pulled out my phone and texted Risk.
You free?
I had the low-slung car Risk had found for me cranked and heading toward town before my phone buzzed in response. I glanced at the screen.
You know it, baby. Where?
Relief slashed through the weight on my shoulders, and I accelerated down the empty road. The usual. We typically met at a bar on the outskirts of town.
Be there in no time, Risk responded. Then, a couple minutes later, Missed you.
I typed in one last message before traffic took over my attention: Hurry.
At the bar I seated myself in the far corner, gathering the familiar cloak of dark and isolation around me. Away from the lair and Kat, I could let Mr. Nice Guy fade away and the predator step forward. My prey would be here any minute, bringing with her blood and sex, and though I hadn’t run her down and overpowered her, the satisfaction of the hunt was still there. I called; she came. Exactly what my animal needed, if not the prey I would have chosen.
The barstool next to mine squeaked as it received a visitor. I didn’t have to look; I breathed Risk in on a rough inhale. She smelled like hot female flesh, the way she always smelled around me. Her long, blue-tipped fingers came to rest on the bar centimeters from my arm. Her desire was so strong I could taste it on my tongue. The tang of it filled my neglected erection, but it was the scent of blood rushing like a river just beneath that vulnerable skin that lengthened my thirsty fangs. Awareness pulsed between us, heavy and sweet, but my chest remained cold.
I’d work with what I could get.
Reaching out, I ran a single hard finger up the back of her hand, along the smooth ink of the tattooed sleeve that covered one arm, up to her bare shoulder. The leather dress lovingly cupping her body hung from thin straps that left her skin unprotected—and accessible. As my touch rose higher, I shifted, my body brushing hers, until we were squared off and her turned head brought our lips within air-mingling distance.
“Arik,” she whispered, something vulnerable, tremulous twisting the word between us. I ignored it.
“Come with me,” I commanded and watched her eyelids close in response. With a shaky hand Risk reached up, pulling her long black hair over her shoulder, an unconscious invitation that wasn’t lost on my fangs, and held herself still, waiting.
I closed the last couple of inches between us, allowed my lips to barely brush that silken skin, and growled, “Now.”
Risk shivered, swallowed hard, and stood. I abandoned my near-empty beer on the bar to trail her out the back hallway, my gaze shifting from her high, round, leather-covered ass to the area behind us, confirming that no one followed.
The dark alley running behind the building stank of trash and urine. Both of us ignored the smell as Risk led me toward our second dark corner of the night. Some remote part of my mind wondered why I wasn’t more eager as I came up against Risk there in the shadows. With her mouth hot on mine, I told my mind to shut the hell up and thrust my tongue forward.
Risk moaned around my invasion. The sound, so full of temptation the last time we’d had sex, now sent cold chills down my spine. There was something off about it, something off about her touch as she cupped my face and pulled me closer, rubbed her body against mine. My dick responded to the stimulation, but even as my cock grew rigid, my urgent need to fuck died.
Desperate, I let my animal rise, let the wild out. I shoved Risk back against the brick wall, knowing the rougher I was, the quicker she got off on it. I watched as if from outside myself, detached, erect but uninvolved, until the thought of her blood quickened my breath. I gripped her thick hair in a tight fist and tilted her head, my fangs aching, my tongue sliding down the delicate slope of her neck. At the taste of her, my stomach cramped with hunger. Tilting her head farther, I scraped my sharp canines along the vulnerable line of her throat, found the perfect spot, and tapped down harder than I normally would to open her vein.
The sharp taste of A positive filled my mouth, drowning me with need. Feeding was carnal, wholly physical, and for the recipient, often sexual. Done right, the donor might never realize what occurred. Risk did. She writhed against me, cries echoing as the suction of my mouth on the sensitive curve of her neck drove her higher and higher. I pushed her toward the edge but not over, wanting, needing the satiation of both hungers, physical and sexual, after the frustration that had filled my body this week.
A week filled with Kat.
The moment her name entered my mind, I couldn’t shake it. The feel of her, the scent and taste of her saturated my thoughts. I broke off the feeding, licking up the trickle of blood that made its way across Risk’s collarbone before pressing my thumb hard over the punctures to stop the bleeding.
Risk’s breasts were flattened against my chest, nipples hardened into sharp points of desire, reminding me there was more than one reason I’d come here tonight. I dropped down to mouth those hard tips, to push us both farther. Risk’s pelvis tilted to rub my hard-on just right, catching that sensitive ridge under the head with every thrust of my hips, and yet with Kat filling my mind…nothing. Only when I surrendered to the images of a smaller body, fuller breasts, and red, curly tangles did my pulse speed up and my heart begin to pound with something other than the need for blood. Risk moaned, but it was Kat’s needy cries I heard. Risk ran long fingernails beneath the hem of my shirt, along my spine, but all I felt was Kat’s grip when I’d kissed her.
Frustration roughened my touch even more. I pounded the female into the wall, and Risk took it, arching her back to get closer. “God, Arik, do it.”
But I couldn’t take her. Not with Kat consuming every molecule of my brain. Even I wasn’t that much of a bastard.
Groaning with frustrated hunger, I slipped my hand between us, lifted her short skirt by the hem, and sought out the moist center of her heat with my fingers. I filled her roughly, plunging deep, once, twice, then again. Risk tightened around my penetration and went over the edge with a keening cry.
Coming down didn’t take her long; Risk shoved me away, turning her back as she struggled to straighten her clothes. Strangled breathing filled the silence between us. Leaning a hand that visibly shook, even in the dark, on the wall I’d just forced her to climax against, she fought for calm. Long moments passed before she finally spoke, her husky voice more mangled than ever. “Who is she?”
I clamped down on my instinctive need to protest. “Why would there be a she?”
Risk laughed, the sound tinged with a bitter flare. She straightened enough to look at me over a bare shoulder. “Because before tonight you were hot enough for me that you’d jump my bones without any encouragement whatsoever.” Her gaze dropped to my crotch, cocking a brow at my waning hardness. “Now you’re a cold fish.” She turned to lean against the wall, her position a mocking reminder of the one I’d had her in just minutes before. “Only one thing does that to a man.”
“Really?”
“Really.” Pushing off the wall, she walked toward me, her eyes dark pools I could no longer decipher. “Don’t worry, baby,” she said, her words harder than a slap to the face, “I won’t tell. Wouldn’t want to ruin your hard-ass reputation, would we?”
I deserved that. Worse, probably, though I refused to let her see it. She wouldn’t thank me for not taking her when my mind had been on someone else, and an orgasm was obviously inadequate recompense. I knew, because the blood I’d taken had done nothing to ease my own dissatisfaction.
Risk’s shoulder knocked into mine as she slipped by. Each step contained an obvious wobble I refrained from commenting on, just as I refrained from arguing. Risk knew the score between us. An off night didn’t mean Kat had any hold on me.
Jealousy wasn’t an emotion I would’ve associated with the street-savvy Risk, but she was a female, after all.
That wobble replayed in my mind. I was a hard-ass; she was right about that. Still… “Risk—”
She turned to face me, the light from the alley’s opening outlining her strong body. “Let me know if you need anything, Arik,” she called back to me. “Of course, I think the price just went up.”
My eyes narrowed. “Making me pay, Risk?”
A wry smile tilted the corner of her kiss-swollen mouth. “Shoulda thought of that before you used your hand instead of your cock.” And then she was gone, leaving me alone in a dirty alley, relief even farther away than it had been at the start of this night.