Page 218 of A Vow of Blood and Tears

But that was a fear of my own that I couldn’t quite displace. A tender word, a bite… I couldn’t always hold back my tears, and I willingly gave him blood. All it took was a drop landing in the wrong place, and the entire Bloodgarden might rise up. The keep would become hostile to his very nature.

So for now, until I adjusted to the new reality, I chose a different setting for what I had in mind.

It’s not tears I’m planning to shed now. I took a small gulp of air, and began to unbutton my cloak.Only blood. I want to finish what we started.

I unfastened the brooch at my throat, and let the cloak slide from my shoulders. It slithered into the leaves around my feet, and I shivered once as the wind blew, slipping right through my spidersilk wedding gown.

I didn’t do it right the first time. I touched the bodice, where the three drops of blood still gleamed a fresh, bright scarlet.I ran from you then, butI will never run from you again.

Bane inhaled, a sharp sound in the quiet forest.

So let’s do it right this time. Make it the night it should’ve been.Body and blood, I want all of you,and for you to take all of me.

“Even after… what we tried?” he asked quietly.

I smiled at him enigmatically.Things are different now.

It was my hands that had given me the idea. Shattered beyond belief, and now perfectly whole. To a bloodwitch, my flesh was raw material to be shaped and molded, ever so slightly altered into something less… vulnerable.

Sit there. I pointed to the stone I’d chosen.

Bane obeyed, his pupils dilating despite the curiosity wrinkling his brow. He let out a low grumble as I stood before him, claws plucking at my gown, and I reached out to run my fingers over his beautiful, terrible face.

The only face I wanted to see every day for the rest of eternity, the one face I couldn’t live without.

He leaned his cheek into my palm, eyes closed, and I lowered myself into his lap, a mirror of our first real night together. I breathed in the scent that was home to me now, the smoky woods that made my skin tingle with desire.

I love you, I told him.By the Light, you are more than I ever could have asked for. I’m the luckiest woman in the world.

His breath was a rumble, vibrating through my bones. Already his fangs gleamed with the faintest hint of venom, and his tongue flicked out to stroke my throat, tickling the sensitive skin.

“Don’t make this into a contest,” he whispered huskily. “You’ll lose.”

I laughed silently, closed my eyes and leaned in. Kissing him was no longer strange or terrifying. My lips knew the contours of his mouth, the hardness of his teeth under the smoothness of his lips, where the point of every fang ended.

He was as familiar to me as my own hands. He was home.

As my lips moved over his, the kiss became deeper, his tongue snaking over mine, the tips twisting and stroking.

His hands moved over my hips, fingers rising to trace the line of my bared spine, his skin a warm shield against the cool air.

Now, I said, breathless.Paint me red, Bane.

He exhaled, tipping his head, the prongs of his tongue dancing over my cheek and jaw, down to the column of my throat once more. His arms wrapped around me, holding me close and tight as his fangs distended, grazing my flesh.

His tongue laved against the racing pulse in my throat—and then came the sweet-sharp pain of the bite, flesh parting like butter, the hot torrent of my own blood steaming in the cold air.

It flooded over my chest, tracing the contours of my clavicles and breasts, soaking into the glistening white fabric. Still hot, vital with life, staining through the silk in a billowing tide of crimson.

Bane took a deep draught, tongue lashing, his cock throbbing hard and ready against my wet core.

I exhaled at the pain of it, the sensation of blood being forcefully taken from my body, but the venom began to spread in a cloud through my veins, turning the sharpness to a pleasant tickle.

My heart pumped another gush of blood over my chest, the blood soaking further into the bodice, spattering the lap of my skirt and Bane’s white shirt.

As he lapped again, groaning at the taste, I unbuttoned his shirt, stroking the hard muscles of his abdomen, and my fingers moved down to untie his breeches.

Bane paused, making a movement like he meant to stop me—but I shook my head ever so slightly.

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