“Lyric,” Alek’s voice was a warning tone, but I ignored him, my eyes only for the tramp who’d had her hands all over my mate.
The thought brought me up short, cleared my mind. She had a tattoo too, maybe I wasn’t—
“Your Highness,” she said, her voice sickly sweet. “With all due respect, you should really learn to control your playthings.”
I hissed at her, but Alek was already tugging me the opposite direction. I jerked my arm out of his touch, not caring for a second that every set of eyes in the room were on us. Alek growled, low and brutal, and I felt it along every inch of my skin.
Traitorous body, reacting to him, wanting him, my heart already clenching at the idea that he’d wanted her, wanted Cassandra. Stupid. I’d been so stupid—
“Do you want to die?” he growled as he pushed us into a darkened room just off the ballroom. A wall of windows allowed silver moonlight inside, illuminating his blue-gray eyes like stars.
Bastard.
“Not particularly, no,” I snapped, folding my arms over my chest. His eyes tracked the movement, then slid over my body as he took in my dress. “Why? Are you offering?”
Another warning growl. He towered over me. “Cassandra is one of the oldest noble bloodlines—”
“I don’t give a shit who she is! She had her hands all over you. Baring her neck like—” I cut myself off, blinking out of my red anger haze. I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter, does it?” Tears welled in my eyes, and in that moment, I hated my emotions, the way they were so out of control around him. What happened to the girl who didn’t care about anything outside her thesis? Her research? Her book?
Alek happened.
I held up my wrist, and his eyes flared at the sight of the tattoo. As if it would burn him if I got too close.
So I did.
I took a step, and he retreated.
Something about that submission—to me—made me all sorts of hot and slick and downright crackly with need.
“Does every person who wants you get branded with your crest?” I hissed. “Does it mean nothing?”
“It means everything,” Alek said, his tone low and gravely. He stopped retreating, his hands on my shoulders, and I knew I should pull away, but I didn’t. Couldn’t. Not when he was looking at me like that—like I was the answer to every question he never knew he had. “Females get the tattoos of my crest and others in an attempt to win our affections,” he continued, his breathing rushed. “Cassandra doesn’t want me.” I rolled my eyes. “She wants my throne.”
I scrunched my nose. “Trash.”
The smallest of smiles cracked on his lips, something so rare and so beautiful I melted in his embrace. That easily, my anger turned to compassion, to the protective instincts roaring at me to put Cassandra in her place.
“Do you disagree?” he challenged. “A pairing with me comes with power, prestige, wealth—”
“I don’t care about any of those things,” I cut him off, and from the shock and amusement in his eyes, I doubted it was something that happened often. But I couldn’t control my mouth or my body around him, it seemed.
“What do you care about, Lyric?” His words were a whisper between us.
I held his gaze, searching for the right words. Words I’d come to terms with in the days he’d refused to return to me. “You,” I admitted on a breath. “I care about you. I can feel you every waking second, and even in my sleep, you’re there. I want to…protect you,” I said, biting my lower lip, so sure he’d laugh at the notion of a weak human protecting him.
But he didn’t. His eyes guttered as he hung on my every word.
“I wanted to kill her for touching you,” I said. “For offering to feed you.”
Another rare smile, one that made my heart skip. He smoothed a finger over my jaw and down the seam of my neck.
The breath in my lungs grew tight, my heart racing a wild rhythm that begged me to move, to crush my mouth against his—
“Lyric,” he sighed my name, spinning us as he backed me against the nearest wall.
I trembled, my body a livewire everywhere he touched. Still, he kept his mouth an inch from mine, so I planted him with a serious gaze. “Me,” I said, forcing power I didn’t feel into my voice. “You only feed from me,” I said as a command. The logical side of my mind knew it was likely an open invitation for death, demanding anything from the king. But I did it anyway.
His eyes flickered and churned, near glowing in the moonlight.
Then his fangs descended, and I whimpered at the sight of them.
7
Alek
“You only feed from me.”
At Lyric’s demand to feed, the roar of hunger in my veins was second only to the driving need to fuck her while I did it.
I cradled the back of her head and lowered my mouth to her neck, but instead of sinking deep into her vein, I skimmed my fangs over her delicate, pounding pulse, then kissed her soft skin. “I’d kill you.”
Her fingers speared into my hair. “You didn’t last time.”
The memory made my fangs throb.
“That’s not what I mean.” I kissed her jaw, then the area just beneath her ear. “It’s been a week.” The longest week of my life, actually.
“I know. I’ve been counting the days.” She sighed as my lips toyed with the shell of her ear.
“You’re not fully recovered—”
“I am,” she countered.
“—And I nearly killed you last time.” The thought locked my resolve in place. Her safety was my first concern. Always. I leaned my forehead against hers, breathing her in, then drew back slightly so I could see those incredible eyes.
“But you didn’t. Wait…” Hurt flashed over her face, and my stomach twisted. “Am I not…good? Has Cassandra fed you before? Can vampires do that? Is she…” Lyric shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut. “I cannot believe I’m asking if someone’s blood tastes better than mine. What the hell are you doing to me?”
“Lyric.” I braced my palm on the wall beside her head and gripped the sultry curve of her waist. This dress was going to be the death of me. “I have never fed from Cassandra.”
Her gaze flashed to mine.
“Yes, vampire blood is…” I searched for the words that wouldn’t piss her off. “…stronger than human blood, and while I can’t speak for other mates, my father always took enough from his own feedings to make sure he could sustain my mother.” The corner of my mouth lifted in a smirk. “Mated males can be a little…possessive.”
“Don’t underestimate the females.” She fisted the lapels of my jacket. “Your mother let him feed from other people?”
“It’s not always sexual,” I insisted, though my cock was in a thorough state of disagreement.
She scoffed.
I leaned into her so she could feel exactly how much I wanted her. “Do humans get a certain…pleasure out of it? Absolutely. How do you think we get them to agree? And I can block any sexual feelings the human might have so they only feel the high.”