***
Troy came back to himself in a rush of awareness the instant Cassie collapsed on top of him, and fear for her slammed into him head on. The wolf, the monster inside him, was silent while his vampire senses were not. He could barely hear Cassie’s weak heartbeat and he reacted instantly.
He rolled her to her back, taking in the paleness of her face, the certainty he’d taken too much of her blood. He had only seconds to consider his options or she would die. If he gave her his blood, he could heal her, but he might infect her with the virus that had made him whatever he’d become. The time he’d lose to make the call, even to Marcus, could be too long. He wasn’t willing to risk Cassie’s life. She had to have known she was risking hers by giving him her blood while he was in the state he’d been in. It mattered to him. She mattered to him.
Tormented by the potential of infecting her, Troy bit his wrist and held it to Cassie’s mouth, holding open her lips and forcing the blood down her throat. Praying his blood was still able to heal, despite the wolf he’d become.
After only a few drops, she licked her lips and relief flooded him at the response. He forced his arm more fully against her mouth, knowing she could swallow now, knowing his blood was working, that she was healing. Her hand went to his arm and she drank hungrily, and he grabbed her wrist and confirmed the wound there was all but gone.
When he was sure she’d had enough, he pried her mouth from his arm. “Enough,” he said softly, easing her mouth from his wrist with gentle insistence. He felt the wound on his wrist heal the instant she let him go and more relief flooded him. Every time he felt the qualities of a vampire alive within him, he was comforted with the hope that he wasn’t too far gone to be saved from the virus.
Cassie blinked him into focus. “Troy?”
Anger and relief collided, products of his fear for her. “What were you thinking?” He pressed his hands to the side of her face, fighting the desire to hold her to him and reassure himself he hadn’t really hurt her. “What if I hadn’t stopped drinking in time? What if I had drained you and killed you?”
“You didn’t.”
“I almost did.”
“But you didn’t.”
“Damn it, Cass, I don’t even know what the hell I am. I don’t trust me. You shouldn’t either.”
“And still you chained yourself to me?”
“I had to make sure you came with me.”
She studied him a long moment. “And yet, we both know I would have. I trust you, even if you don’t trust me.”
Blood—his blood—stained her lips, and heat surged through his limbs, but this time, the vampire, not the wolf, had control. And it was her blood, he realized, that of a wolf, that had calmed the beast in him, that could have so easily driven him over the edge to take too much. He could have killed her. He almost had.
He stared down at her. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to fuck her. He wanted to trust her. He wanted so many things with this woman, this wolf, he couldn’t have. He kissed her anyway.
CHAPTER SIX
She was the one thing that wolf, vampire, and man agreed on, wanted, needed. Burned for. The taste of Cassie’s blood, her passion, the forbidden fruit of everything she was, and might not be, swept through Troy with the brush of her tongue against his. She moaned, a soft, sexy, primal sound that ripped through him, and set him on fire, clouding his mind. Troy told himself to pull back, to stop, that he was headed to a deep, dark place where he’d lose control, where he’d forget how dangerous she was. And forget he did, and willingly, when she arched into him and twined her fingers in his hair, pressing her body against his. Troy groaned with the pleasure of her next to him, of her heat burning him alive.
Hungering for more of her, he deepened the kiss, drawing in more of her sweet, wild flavor. It wasn’t enough. He wasn’t sure it would ever be enough with her. He slid between her legs, shoving her skirt as high as he could, and she opened for him like a flower spreading in a new morning sun. He settled into the sweet V of her body, his cock thickening with the promise of finally being inside, finally feeling the wet tight heat of her surrounding him. He could smell her desire, almost taste it in the air, and it was clouding his logic, tearing down the wall he’d used to keep her at a distance.
“Do you have any idea how long I’ve wanted to do this?” he murmured against her lips, his voice rough, his confession falling from his lips into hers before he could stop it. Before he gave her the power of knowing how much he’d wanted her.
“Do you have any idea how much I hated your willpower?” she asked, nipping his lip and then licking it, before her tongue slid back into his mouth.
He didn’t even try to resist kissing her again, there was no point. Troy was her captive, she wasn’t his as intended, and he silently declared Cassie a drug far more potent than blood, more lethal than bloodlust. He couldn’t escape his desire for her, and right now he wasn’t sure why he’d even wanted to. It was why he’d never gone here with her, why he’d battled his need for her, for all those months working together. He could feel the rise of hunger growing in him, wild and unwilling to compromise, unwilling to let this end without satisfaction.
He touched her the way he’d always wanted to touch her. His hands traveled her body, sliding over her slender waist, molding her breasts. Impatiently, he fumbled with the buttons on her blouse, and ripped them away. They popped and flew off and he leaned up long enough to toss what was left of his shirt over his head.
She sat up, kissing his stomach, her lips hot, her hand on his waist soft. The fingers of her other hand traced his erection. He was hot and hard, his cock pulsing. Why in the hell had he not let her touch him like this before? He had no idea. He had no memory of anything but here and now and how much he wanted her mouth on his body.
Troy reached around her, unhooking her bra, then unzipping her skirt, caressing her back, her hair. She was soft all over, and he was so very hard inside, so very dark. She curved her shoulders forward and shrugged off the bra, pressing her bare breasts to his stomach, and looking up at him, a raw, open hunger in honey-colored eyes, before she kissed his stomach again.
Troy growled, tangling his hands in her hair, and pulled her mouth to his, kissing her wildly, ravishing her with the strokes of his tongue, just as he planned to do with his cock. Her hand slid between them, stroking him and unzipping his jeans.
Troy could feel the wolf coming to life in him, possessive and demanding, primal, oddly in sync with the vampire in him for perhaps the first time ever. It wanted her submission, every part of him wanted that, wanted control. Wanted them both naked. Wanted inside her, fucking her until neither of them could take anymore.
He pushed away from her and stood up, discarding his clothes, all but ripping what was left of them away. Cassie shoved down her skirt and he caught her ankles, dragging her down the mattress, her high, full breasts bouncing with the movement. He spread her legs, tearing her panties from her body.
She gasped and he dropped to his knees, placing her calves on his shoulders, urgent for a taste of her in every possible way. His mouth came down on the V of her body, suckling her delicate, swollen nub, before his teeth sunk into the sensitive flesh around it. Blood flooded his mouth, giving him control, even as it gave her immense pleasure. She came almost instantly, her fingers curling in the sheets. The taste of her pleasure mingled with blood, driving him wild. His tongue traced where he’d bitten her, sealing the puncture marks, before lapping at her clit, licking and suckling until she came again.