Page 37 of Reign of the Beast

He pushed up the left sleeve of his hoodie and held his wrist up. “Feed from me.”

Instantly, I shook my head. “No.”

“Lucian.”

“No. Like I’ve told you before, when I bite you in the throes of passion, I am already well fed and sated. In this instance, I am being tested to my breaking point by the scent of Immortal blood, I have not fed for being unconscious for a day either. This is a similar predicament to that day where you had me ingest your blood to heal myself after Cornelius' attack upon you.”

“Last time, we weren’t as connected as we now are. We were just starting this thing between us and we weren’t in love.”

“You made a vow to me.”

“I know and I’ll honor it. I won’t force you.Butyou need to get to the point of being able to feed from Mia and taste Immortal blood without succumbing to it and turning rabid.This, using me, is a good starting point. You love me. I really believe that will be enough for you to keep your control.”

I considered his words.

He’d certainly learned well how to argue with me during our time together.

I wanted to believe that my love for him would be enough to hold the dark part of me at bay. It was a beautiful notion and his faith in me and inusmeant a great deal to me.

Alas, we did not live in a perfect world. Nor had he ever met the true demon within, the aptly namedRavager.

“All right. I’m going to leave you to think it over,” he said when I failed to respond, so caught up was I in my stormy thoughts.

As he started toward the door, I called out, “Come to me.”

He stopped and turned. “You’re sure?” he asked, so worried was he about breaking his vow to me now that his idea was floating out there.

“We are out of options. Draco must be annihilated and all these months of our own research into the situation has proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we can’t do that without forming the Covenant.”

He walked back to me and perched on the edge of the bed right beside me.

His wrist was still exposed and as he held it out to me I could hear the beat of his pulse, strong and rapid.

“Closer,” I said, hating the inconvenience of the chains forcing me into subjugation. I had never fed in such a restrictive way before.

He climbed onto the bed, straddling me, then crawling up my body.

He cupped the back of my head, then took a steadying breath and pressed his wrist to my lips.

My vampiric nature did the rest, my features contorting, my fangs dropping.

“I did what had to be done,” I heard him say, just as my fangs pierced his skin, then clamped down, tearing into his wrist.

I didn’t know what he was getting at and the need to press him died quickly as I tasted his blood on my tongue.

I had thought his taste had been delectable the times I had fed from him before. But this time, it was beyond even that. It was… different. Enhanced, perhaps? It called to me in another way altogether, a whole other level.

Before I could gather my wits, I was clamping down on his wrist, burying my fangs deeper, drawing harder and gulping down mouthfuls of his blood.

“Fuck,” I heard him cry. I felt him grinding against me, his cock rock hard and rubbing frantically against mine. “Hell, yes,” he gasped.

Bliss consumed me, a bliss he was clearly lost to as well, given that he was dry humping me with an aggressive fervor.

Being bitten could be intoxicating to non-vampires, but that was only when they were bitten in therightway with pleasure in mind. The way I was feeding from him was a far cry from that, from what he was used to from me.

It meant he was taking pleasure in the pain, the roughness of it, the animalistic savageness of it.

“Lucian,” I was vaguely aware of him calling out.

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