Page 224 of Caelum

His fangs—they were there, and I didn’t even have it in me to question it—raked against my skin as I’d known they would. He tested the flesh for a second, then like a knife through butter on a summer’s day, he penetrated me twice over.

A whimper escaped me as he took from my vein, as he fed and nourished himself from my lifeblood. Then, as the heat from my palms grew to the temperature of an inferno, we both reached the summit. It wasn’t like before. Wasn’t as blissful, as delicious as the last time I’d experienced this. Instead, ithurtwith how good it was. As he took from me and gave to me, it was beyond anything I’d ever known, could ever think to know, and I was overcome with how ecstatic I felt.

Even as we came down from that high, and as his cock slipped from me,I felt another thick shaft at my entrance. With the slick seed that Samuel had granted me, Reed slid deep inside my core from behind with an ease that had tears falling from my eyes. I relaxed my back against his muscled chest as he moved inside me, and I let Samuel drink his fill.

That exquisite pain was still there, still tormenting me, torturing me as I was hurtled back up the summit once more. Never allowed to rest, only allowed to endure. As Reed fucked me, Samuel moaned into my neck as he hit his satiation point. I felt the click inside him as he went from hungry to satisfied, and the joy that whirled inside me from knowing that I’d done that to him added to the agonizing pleasure Reed was forcing me to endure.

When Reed slipped his fingers between Samuel and me, when he brushed the nub that made me take off like a rocket, I wasn’t sure if I could take it, if I could last much longer. Then he pinched me with those fingers, and with his other hand, the one pressed firmly between my breasts, holding me tightly against him, he raked his nails down my sides. The sensation was a trigger, and as I’d done earlier with Samuel, I sought the soul inside me that purred at Reed’s touch. Dragging that soul forward was no hardship since she was in charge today, but when I urged her to seek Reed’s? She leaped with eagerness into the fray.

The heavy thrusts into my body became short and choppy, and hoarse groans and grunts escaped Reed as I forced his Hell Hound to the surface, forced the beast to battle the others, to take command over what was his.

Though my Hell Hound recognized when it happened, my body was made fully aware of the change in my Chosen. The nails that had dragged down my sides? They were now claws. Reed could shift. Blood poured from the wounds as he tore into my side, but though the pain was there, it had me shutting down, had me hitting another stratosphere as the joy of the moment had me wide open.

This time, the climax had me sobbing as, spent from blood loss and weak with pleasure, I collapsed onto Samuel’s chest and was embraced in his loving arms as Reed’s beast sought his own ecstasy in my body, before finding his release and toppling onto me.

Seconds, minutes, hours later, we lay like that, and I began to ache from the weight on my back. Surprisingly, the wounds on my side and neck, where blood still steadily dripped down, was a pleasurable pain I enjoyed. However, Reed was a heavy presence atop my back, and God only knew how badly Samuel’s body was aching with the two of his on top of him.

I began to shuffle in place, my body urging me to move from the awkward position, and started to move my hands from his pecs, where they’d remained planted all this time—I had the pins and needles to proveit. He yelped as my fingers drifted from his skin, and Reed jolted upright, his body falling to the side as he swiftly rolled to his feet. Even in his still sleepy haze, he was ready to defend us against whatever had made us cry out.

“It’s nothing, Reed,” Samuel managed to grate out, but when I stared down at him, stared down at his chest, I realized why he hurt.

On his chest were my fingerprints. Branded into his flesh. It wasn't like the others’ ink, nor was it like mine. It looked like his blood had been seared into his skin in the shape of my prints. As I peered down, I saw that each tiny line that made up my unique identifying marker was forged of words. Tiny,tinywords I could only see because my vision was so good.

Even as I tilted my head to look at him, to declare that he was my Chosen, Reed grunted, “Well, that’s it for you, Samuel. You’re definitely Chosen now.”

I wasn’t sure why I found that hilarious, just that I did, and as laughter had me curling into a tight ball, I fell back onto the floor—ignoring the rug quickly growing saturated with my blood—and let my joy rush through me.

Who knew how many moments like these we’d get?

How many instances we’d be allowed to just be?

We needed to embrace each of them, hold them firmly in our grasp, and celebrate that we were, in truth, Pack.

SIX

SAMUEL

“Come on, Eve. Please. Try.”

She squinted at me then sought out the others for help. Of course, there was no helping her more than we were already doing. We weren’t about to let her weasel out of this, no matter how long she made puppy eyes at us. For a second, her teeth raked against my shoulder before she pushed me away in an explosive movement that jerked me in place.

“I don’t want to.”

My new fangs scraped against the inside of my lip as I gritted my teeth, trying not to lose my patience. “Your Vampire needs blood.”

“She can cope without it. I’ll just go nap again?—”

“No!” I burst out, not letting her finish. “She can’t. Not after all the blood you’ve lost recently,” I retorted; just remembering the state of the rug we’d been fucking on was enough to make me cringe.

And the state of her sides after Reed’s Hound had Claimed her in turn? I didn’t even want to go there.

Though the fact she was Vampire today reassured me that the wounds would be disappearing soon, they’d heal even faster if she’d just fucking feed from me.

Normally, a Vampire would feed from his Chosen and only her, but because she’d lost so much blood and was weak from the markings’ effect on her, I’d been relying on the Pack for sustenance. I needed her stronger, needed her to feed from me, just so that we could find an equilibrium.

After glowering at me, she spun around, and I saw her head tip and rockas she took in the scene before her and the very lack of support she had from her Chosen.

It was five days after she’d Chosen and Claimed me, and she was still weakened by the markings that glowed at random moments. Each burst of light had her shutting down like a faulty laptop while simultaneously scaring the shit out of us.

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