Page 9 of The Surrender

Jinx tilts his head to the side and licks his snout, giving Merikh a blank response. After scratching his ears, I nudge him to the floor. Trembling, I turn back to the vampire.

There’s little point in asking where the others are. If they were here, they would hold Merikh back, but I remember what he said after Kyan healed me with his feather and bonded with me. Merikh will have his way with me. Will punish me for bonding with Kyan first and not him. Shivers of fear feather up my spine, but I don’t turn tail and run. I know better.

But it doesn’t mean I’m without all power.

I skim my hands along his clothed chest, flinching when the muscles tense beneath my fingers. At the collar, I pause, pressing harder, seeking the pulse, my curiosity getting ahead of me. Ink teases the barest edge of skin beneath that collar, but the moment I try to peel it back, Merikh snaps.

One second, we’re in the chair. The next, he’s plucked me from it and carried me to the door of the adjoining balcony of Kyan’s tower suite. My heart spins, and I don’t know whether to struggle or surrender.

A simple thrust upon the door handle, and we’re outside.

I gasp from the downpour drenching me, licking a bone-cold chill into my flesh. Within moments, Kyan’s soaked shirt clings to every inch of my body, and my prediction about Merikh taking me somewhere dark has come true. No amount of light could penetrate the storm tearing across the mountains—as if it has some deep-seated grudge against the rocks.

At first, Merikh sets me down with his chest to my back and shoves me roughly against the stony ledge of the balcony. Hard enough to knock the wind out of me. My teeth chatter from the icy wind battering my body. On both sides of me are high turrets with iron fixings used to hold torches.

Not even the thunder crashing upon the mountains can drown out the sound of Merikh removing his belt. I startle from him snapping the leather at my side.

“Are you going to hold onto the ledge and take your punishment like a good, dirty little dove? Or must I bind you?”

Squeezing my eyes shut and sucking in a deep breath, I force myself to bend my upper half over that balcony. A tender sweep of the belt along my spine and to my backside sends a tremor rippling through my whole body.

“Breathe, little dove. Don’t fight it. Or do,” he follows with a piqued breath. “Tonight, you will give me your fear, your darkness, and your pain. I own them. Most of all, you will give me yourblood.”

Crack!

The first strike lashes a white-hot, shock of fire against my backside. The pain is so great and deep, my nerves feel it all the way to the bone. Unlike Drago, who uses his hand, so he may appreciate the intimacy and control of the moment, Merikh doesn’t give a fuck. He doesn’t dominate. He doesn’t control.

He punishes.

All my muscles lock up. My mouth dries. I choke on my own gasps. And bite the insides of my cheeks until I’ve drawn blood. Fire and ice war upon my tender buttocks—fire from the bite of the belt and ice from the assault of the rain and wind. Clouds bruise the sky black and blue. Lightning and thunder punish in their own ways, mirroring the language Merikh strikes upon my flesh. Over and over, he beats the fuck out of me without tiring or stopping. Something oozes along my ass. Something thicker and warmer than the rain.

And just like before, I surrender to my senses. Arousal seeps into me from my erect nipples scraping against the stone. I let my body rock and grind my clit against the stone. Liquid heat gushes over my folds to trickle down my thighs. I’m in the eye of the storm now.

Until Merikh grips my wet hair and forces me back into the raging storm walls by spinning me around to face him. What I don’t expect is for the vampire god to grip the fabric of the shirt and shove it down and down till it bunches at my waist, leaving nothing coating my breasts. No thin barrier to protect me.

Through blurred, tear-stricken vision, I gaze up at him and not the belt dripping with my blood. Everything inside me wants to shield my breasts, protect them. But I focus on him, on his deadly beauty. With his dark hair drenched from the rain and fracturing his face like thin spills of ink, his body postured and still as an ancient statue in a temple, and his breath as serene as a tomb, Merikh is the embodiment of a death god. Though his eyes promise violence and punishment, the hunger in them gives me the strength to slowly bind my hands around my back. And hold my wrists as hard as shackles. While this may be a need for him, it’s also something he craves.

Pain and pleasure are what I’ve always craved. But there is something about tonight that is different about him. He’s giving me more—vulnerability lingering beneath all his layers of sadism.

So, I will give him my fear, my pain, my darkness. And my blood. I sink. I lower myself to my knees but refuse to bow my head to him. Instead, I thrust my chest out in full submission…and lock my eyes onto his in a deep deadpan.

At first, he parts his lips. Not in hesitation…but in want, in need, in awe. As raw as I am now, he’s never been more beautiful.

I cry out when he strikes my tits. My whole body quakes as he rains down blows upon them, alternating between each one. I give him my vulnerability, my trust, knowing he could destroy me. More tears spill, but I never take my eyes off his, showing him, proving that I know he won’t destroy me. He won’tbreakme.

In a split-second pause of the belt strap on my swollen breasts, I catch the bulge in his pants. Does inflicting pain get him off? Or is it the power of this moment? Fire takes power and destroys. What does blood do? I rattle my brain for the answer until I have it.

Blood becomes. It pierces, invades, and transfuses until it becomes one with its host.

Shadows seize me, sweep me into a suspended state. I’m floating inside a dark delirium—until the brutal blow to my clit comes. I thrust my chin up and scream through my clenched teeth, but I don’t lose his eyes. Eyes full of the extreme contrast between heart-crushing murder and unstoppable thirst.

He throws the belt to the ground. I crumble, about to curl onto the ground, but he advances to me in the prowl of a predator, thrusts me to my feet, then presses my back against the ledge. And drags his hot tongue across the line of my throat.

“So beautiful when you bleed for me, little dove. And whether you like it or not, this slut of a sweet, little cunt is fucking wet,” he says before stabbing two fingers into me. I clench my inner muscles so hard around him, desperate for more friction, imagining the cold kiss of his magic crosses inside my warm pussy.

My cry of pleasure turns to a whimper as he closes his warm, wet mouth around my breast, sucking and licking at the red stripes he wrought there. He knew the perfect amount of force to give me that would not break my skin.

His fingers dig into my sore bottom, and I moan from the pain spurring my adrenaline, driving me higher. He collects the blood from my ass and smears it across my breasts, then sucks hard on the nipple, stabbing his tongue at the pebbled bud.

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