Page 29 of All's Hell That Ends Well

I wanted to mark him, to make him my own for all to see. Wanted to possess him, body and soul, until his every breath whispered my name.

Such hunger roared inside me, a deep, savage need to take, to claim, to bind him to me.

Nothing should ever come between us again.

An unfamiliar ache punched through my gums, and the next instant, a sharp pain pierced my lips and I tasted blood. Halfdazed, I ran my tongue over my unnaturally long canines—which had just accidentally sliced open my own lips.

Azazel lifted his head from where he’d been kissing my neck, and his thrusts slowed as he beheld my shiny new fangs. A roguish grin stole onto his face, just before he leaned in and took my mouth again, sliding his tongue over the points of my canines.

I groaned at the intense shot of arousal that arrowed down from that touch.

“I want to bite you,” I ground out, surprised at that admission. “Is that even possible?”

He stilled, his gaze intent on mine. “It’s a way to bond.”

“As in…?”

“Linking souls by blood and pleasure.”

“What?”

His thumb grazed my lips. “We don’t usually do that because most of us don’t want that kind of union. It’s very intimate and permanent.”

I gripped his hair. “Are you telling me there’s a demon-marriage type thing?”

One corner of his mouth quirked up. “Yes. But we don’t call it that. It goes beyond the concept of marriage.”

I sucked in a sharp breath. “Our bond. The one from when we got married. It’s gone, isn’t it? My death severed it.”

His expression darkened, his voice rumbling when he said, “Yes.”

I gripped his hair tighter and pulled him closer. “I want a new bond.”

His eyes flashed, and he wrapped his hand around my throat, his thumb caressing my carotid artery. “If you want to spill my blood, you can just say so. I’m not squeamish.”

“Bite me,” I said with a wicked smile.

A glint of humor in his eyes, eclipsed only by the fierce hunger on his face. “You need to be sure,” he murmured. “I will gladly bind myself to you for eternity, in soul and heart and mind. But I need you to be sure it’s what you want. We’ll be bonded on the deepest level, feeling what the other feels. It’s irrevocable. Once we do this, there’s no turning back from this.”

“Good,” I said with conviction steeling my voice. “I don’t ever want to lose that kind of connection to you again.”

Emotion played over his face, deep and harsh and gentle all at once. “Then I claim you as mine.”

Tilting my head to the side, he leaned down to lick over my throat—and then he bit.

I jerked at the twinge of pain lancing out from where his fangs punctured my flesh. The next second, though, a hot, heady wave of pleasure rolled through me as he sucked hard. I moaned, my legs twitching as I canted my hips to push against him. Need pulsed in my core.

With a groan of his own, he started thrusting again, and the combined sensation of his hard cock pumping into me and the pull of his mouth as he sucked my blood sent me hurtling over into the most exquisite orgasm. My thoughts dissolved, all feelings wiped away except for how he filled me while he took from me, how my soul stretched to meet his, my heart reaching out.

He released me long enough to give a rough command. “Now you.”

“I claim you as mine,” I murmured, and then I arched up and buried my fangs in his throat.

Underneath my hands, his muscles turned to stone, his entire body vibrating as if close to combustion. His blood hit my tongue, and I groaned at the taste. Lush, heavy, intoxicating, his essence poured down my throat, fusing with mine in a way thatstripped me bare, tore me apart, and bound me back together at the same time.

And his power…oh, my God.

I’d gotten a sliver of it when we’d bonded through marriage. This, here, eclipsed it all.

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