“My love,” I leaned my forehead against hers as my chest swelled to bursting. She was still with me. She would live.
She ducked her head and struck at my throat, her fangs sinking deep as she drank. Fuck yes. Just as she’d risked her life to save mine, now it was my life pouring back into her with every greedy gulp and sigh of pleasure.
Heat licked up my spine and my cock leaped against her thigh. I needed her with a ferocity I’d never felt before. Every pull of her mouth at my neck sent a jolt of pleasure through my nerves and the hunger that had held me captive for the last—who fucking cares how long—was now pure, primal lust for my mate.
“God, Lyric,” I groaned.
She flipped me onto my back like I was nothing but a rag doll, and I let her. She could do whatever the fuck she wanted with me. She could drain me dry and my only thought would be for her health, her life.
The bloodlust was easing slightly, but she still feasted at my neck as her hands worked between us, unbuttoning my pants and taking me in hand.
“Fuck!” I gripped the exquisite curves of her hips as she stroked me from root to tip, groaning at my neck as she kicked something—her shoes—from the bed. Damn, the woman had just survived an abduction and beating, and then I’d almost drained her dry. She needed a little recovery time. “Lyric, my love, we don’t have to—”
“Alek, please,” she whimpered at my throat, her hands shoving at her jeans as she continued to suck, the wet sound managing to make me even harder.
A growl rumbled up from deep within my chest as she wiggled her ass out of those jeans, taking her panties with her. I used my powers to strip the cloth from her body, then did the same with my own.
“Let me ease you.” I speared one hand through the silk of her hair and sent the other between her thighs as she straddled me. “Fuck, Lyric. You’re already slick for me.” My fingers teased her opening, then circled her clit. Go gently, my conscience begged. I had no clue how severe her injuries had been at the hands of the humans.
“Get inside me,” she ordered against my throat, then struck again as she angled her hips and sank down onto my cock, sheathing me in one roll of her hips.
“Lyric,” I groaned at the feel of her. Her pussy gripped me hot and tight as she rose up and fell again.
“Alek!” she cried out, breaking her bite. “God, I need you. I need this. Please.” She lifted her head and looked down at me just as she slammed her hips down again. My fingers bit into her hips and ass. She hadn’t taken enough yet. Her heart was still unsteady and she was pale as fuck.
But she was right. We both needed this. Needed to connect in the most primal way, to not only know, but feel that the other lived. I kissed her, tasting the spice of my blood and the sweetness that could only be Lyric.
Then I angled my neck and drew her mouth back down to it. “You feed. I’ll fuck you.”
She groaned in agreement, sinking back into a bite and drinking as I gripped her hips and shifted onto my knees so I could take her deeper.
“Oh, God, yes!” I shouted, pulling her into my thrusts, driving up into her with abandon again and again.
She moaned at my neck, taking her fill as I took mine below. Pleasure wrapping around us both as we strained for the other. I adjusted my hips, grinding over her clit with each thrust. Her breaths were shallow again, but this time it was for the right reason, and her pulse was strong and galloping as she licked over the wound in my throat and rose above me, her hair falling in a cascade around her breasts as she balanced her hands on my chest and took what she wanted.
My queen was resplendent.
I worked her clit with my thumb and she drew tight, losing her rhythm as I drove us onward. She trembled, her eyes finding mine as she came, crying my name, the bond between us golden and bright.
Her pussy was still fluttering around my cock when I drove her back, pinning her to our bed. Then I fucked her like I needed to, swinging my hips with abandon. Each thrust was better, sweeter, hotter than the last, and yet I drove on until her first orgasm stumbled into a second.
“Alek!” Her nails raked my shoulders and back as she came for me in shuddering pants and sighs, pulling me right over with her until my orgasm consumed me and I emptied everything I had within her. My heart. My soul. My life. She could have it all.
I kissed her gently, rolling us both to the side as exhaustion pulled at us. I could feel hers as strongly as my own, yet she battled it, forcing her lids open.
“I was so scared I’d lost you,” she whispered, her fingers tracing the lines of my face.
“I was scared I’d never find you,” I admitted, kissing her fingers as they passed over my lips. “There is no me without you, Lyric. Not now. Not ever.”
Her mouth trembled and she nodded. “What do we do now?”
“Now, we sleep.” I moved us until we were under our covers, then drew her into the curve of my body. “Now we sleep,” I whispered again, my arms locked around her as welcoming, restful darkness pulled us under.
“I always wondered what it looked like inside the boys’ clubhouse,” Olivia said two days later as she glanced around the inside of the war room.
“It’s a war room,” Benedict corrected her with a shake of his head from where he sat across the table.
“With an Xbox?” She nodded back toward the living area.
“They use it for training. Can’t you see the games from here? Call of Duty,” Avi teased, spinning in her chair like this wasn’t the most sophisticated battle strategy room in the country. She just leaned her head against the high back and giggled. “I bet they even play Modern Warfare.”
Hawke snorted at the foot of the table and went back to polishing his knives.
“That’s the same game,” Ransom lectured with a roll of his eyes.
The door beeped, and Serge showed Julian into the space. “Sorry I’m late,” the scholar apologized, placing a case on the table as he took the only open seat, which happened to be next to Gabriel. Neither males looked particularly comfortable in their surroundings.
Everyone who mattered was here in this room. I cleared my throat once, and the table fell silent as Lyric reached for my hand under the table, lacing her fingers with mine in steady support.
Lachlan sat to my left, brooding like the fucker had only been practicing to brood up until this point. Avi and Olivia were next, then Ransom. Hawke held down the end of the table, which was also the seat closest to the door, which he’d angled himself to see. Gabriel and Julian stared at the metal case with something akin to fear, while Benedict sat at Lyric’s other side, completing our council.
“I’ve brought you here because the information I’m about to give you doesn’t leave this room, or circulate beyond the people in it.” I leveled each vampire with a stare.
There was a collective mutter of agreement.
“The Sons of Honor have returned. The nobility knows it. We know it. There’s no hiding the threat of that from them. We are about to enter into a new era of war.”
Lyric squeezed my hand in support.
“Xavier called this evening at rising and told me he’d finally cracked his prisoner. It’s not just the Moorehouse family we need to worry about.”
Lachlan shifted in his seat, his jaw flexing.