Page 40 of Newly Undead in Dark River

I burst through the exit doors into the back alley just as someone wrapped an arm around my waist from behind. I tried to spin in the hold, hissing as the predator finally got loose. And she was pissed.

“Hey, it’s me. It’s okay,” Walker’s soothing voice was beside my ear, and I shuddered with relief. But I was still so fucking hungry.

I spun in his grasp and latched onto his neck before he had a chance to move. The warm flow of his blood across my tongue made me moan so loudly it echoed down the alleyway. He let me push him back against the rough brick wall and press my self so hard against him, I could feel every inch of his body as if it were an extension of my own. I had no doubt that if he didn’t want what was happening right now, he could have stopped me without a thought. Instead, he tilted his head a little more to the side and let me drink deep.

He tasted different to Judge, like a wine that was grown in a different region of France. Still amazing, but more subtle. Judge’s blood was like a punch to the heart. But Walker was like a soaking warmth that you could drown in. I lifted my leg up so I could grind myself against his denim-clad thigh, almost the perfect height in these ridiculously high heels. The bottom of my dress rode up over my scant lace underwear, but before the cold night air could even kiss my asscheeks, Walker had turned us both, pressing me back against the wall, preventing the world at large from seeing how badly I was soaking my panties. He groaned as he ground himself at the apex of my thighs, and then he slid a finger between my lips, released the sucking of my mouth at his neck and jumped away as if my vagina was electrified.

His chest was heaving, and I was basically panting like a bitch in heat too. “Are you okay?” I asked.

I rubbed my bottom lip with my finger, pulling away to stare at the remnants of his blood on my skin. Then I stuck it in my mouth and sucked hard. Waste not want not, right?

Walker looked physically pained and judging by the massive bulge in his pants, perhaps he was. Though he was also wobbling a little on his feet. Shit. I’d taken too much.

“Crap, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” Well, that was a lie. I definitely did mean to suck on him like a straw. I cocked my head to the side, offering him my own neck and resisting the urge to rub myself on him at the same time.

Walker pushed me away another few inches. “If I take blood from you now, I’m going to fuck you against that wall like a rabid animal.” He dragged in a shuddering breath. “Just stay over there, okay? I’m fine.”

But his eyes were glowing, so I knew he was worked up. I resisted the urge to throw caution to the wind and insist he follow through with his promise, err, warning, and I couldn’t even blame the now happy and sated inner predator for that. That was one hundred percent horny ass Raine right there.

But I knew Walker would hate himself for defiling me in a filthy back alley. I could resist to save his White Knight sensibilities.

I sighed heavily, cocking my hip against the wall.

“I want to go home, but I don’t want the girls to cut their night short.”

Home. Dark River was home now, even if a part of me still longed for my childhood bedroom with pictures of One Direction on the walls because all my friends had loved them.

Walker pulled his phone from his back pocket and swiftly texted someone, probably Angeline. Then he looked at his watch and nodded to himself. “We have time to run home.”

I blinked at him. Then blinked again. “Excuse me? Are you suggesting we run fifty miles home? Is now the time I should tell you I failed gym class?”

He laughed, and I couldn’t help but grin back, the high of his blood still coursing through me. “Relax, Raine. I’m not going to make you run in six-inch heels. I don’t have to be a woman to know that is torture. I’ll carry you.”

Obviously, I was hard of hearing all of a sudden. “You want to carry me all the way back to Dark River. Are you insane?”

Walker stilled, checking out the dark pools in the alleyway. I went on alert too, waiting for an Enforcer or someone from the Vamp Nation to pop out and stab me in the heart with a stake for giving the guy on the dancefloor a killer hickey.

Eventually, he shrugged and refocused on me. “You say that like you weigh anything at all. I can jump small buildings in a single bound. You’re barely more than a sack of potatoes to me. Now get on.”

He showed me his back, and I laughed. Taking a running leap, I jumped on his back, wrapping my legs around his waist. “Okay, Superman. I give you ten minutes before you’re out of puff and need to call a cab from carrying my jelly ass. Just FYI, comparing a girl to a sack of anything is not hot.”

“What do I get if you’re wrong and I can carry you all the way back to your apartment?”

I leaned forward, so my lips brushed the shell of his ear. “Whatever you want.”

Wrapped around him as I was, I felt the small shiver that ran through his body. “Dangerous offer, Raine. You might not like what I want to take.”

I chuckled and nipped the back of his neck. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to love whatever you have to offer, Walker Walton. Especially if you use the handcuffs.”

He shook his head and took off at a speed I wouldn’t have thought possible on two legs. In the back of mind, I thought we’d be constrained by the basics of biology. We are only designed to go a certain speed, right? Like you can treat your crappy Honda like a Ferrari, but eventually, the thing is going to blow up in a cloud of smoke.

Apparently, that didn’t apply to vampires and their former human anatomy. We went from crappy Honda to F1 Fighter Jet. We were out of the city faster than would have been possible in a car even without traffic and fled into the darkness of the wild Canadian beauty. Apart from the frosting of my eyelashes, neither the speed nor the cold affected me, and the low heat of Walker’s body shielded me from most of the oncoming wind. However, even with our superior hearing, the wind whipping by was too loud for us to talk, so I just rested my head on his shoulder and held on tight.

After an hour of running, Walker slowed and rolled to a stop. He let me down, and I stood on jelly legs. We might be able to run fast, but having my legs wrapped around Walker’s waist for that long was hell on my thighs. I can definitely think of better reasons for having my legs wrapped around Walker for over an hour, and it had nothing to do with running breakneck speed back to Dark River. I shook out my legs, and Walker rolled his shoulders. “Carrying me like a baby possum getting to you, Sheriff?” I teased, and he quirked a brow.

“Pretty sure it was more than ten minutes, Newbie, so looks like I win our bet.” He stalked toward me, looking every bit the predator in that moment.

“Oh yeah? And what do you want as a prize?” I purred back. The friction of the steady roll of his body as he ran had been pure torture. I was so revved, I was probably going to have to call Judge and see how fast he could get back into town.

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