I needed to fill my muse. Only with this man had I been tempted to linger and fill my well with my own lust.
He waited, as though sensing my internal battle. And what had he done? At the last moment when I’d felt him pierce her skin, I’d also felt the bloom of an orgasm, so intense it had frightened me more than the thought he might have somehow wounded her.
I reached for my thin silky robe and shrugged my arms inside, cinched the belt around my waist, and approached the doors. My stomach clenched, my body trembled—I was afraid, but also filled with a sense that this was inevitable.
As I stepped closer, I straightened my shoulders—I wasn’t exactly without weapons of my own. The closer to the doors I drew, the more I gave myself over to the remnants of the simmering sensuality he’d fed me. My hips loosened and swayed, my breasts tightened, my thighs slid together and apart, building a frictional heat only one thing could assuage.
His shadow loomed, tall with broad shoulders and a narrow waist. I already knew how soft the skin was that stretched over his lean, muscled frame.
Closing my eyes for a brief moment, I turned the lock and opened the doors.
His hot, surly gaze swept over me, then locked with mine. “May I come in?” he whispered roughly.
He’d gotten me to comply with his demand, and yet he hesitated—he needed my permission to enter my room.
A soft rain fell, dampening his dark shirt and misting my face and the vee of skin exposed above the neckline of my robe.
I canted my head and stared at the hard edges of his face—the sharp, high cheekbones and square, stubbled jaw. His brows were furrowed, drawn in a fearsome frown as dark as the midnight hair brushing the shoulders of his cotton shirt.
Empowered by his need for me to obey, I was oddly unafraid. Staying just inside the doorframe, I leaned against the edge of the door, pretending a nonchalance I was far from feeling.
“How did you get here? Fly?” I asked, turning my gaze to the five-foot span between her balcony and mine.
The corners of his lips curved upward, slight and mocking.
A frisson of alarm made me shiver. Had he? I was something other—was he as well?
“Stop thinking,” he murmured, his hands reaching up to grip the top of the door frame. “You brought me here.”
I lifted my chin. I realized that was a mistake when his gaze dropped to my lips. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
As the moments stretched, my mouth grew dry, my nipples pebbled against the thin fabric sticking to my skin.
“You were with us,” he said softly. “Both times. You’re the only reason I returned.”
I didn’t pretend not to understand. “Are you angry because I peeked?”
“No…intrigued.” He leaned back his head and drew a deep breath, which lifted his well-defined chest.
I’d felt the weight of all that masculine mass crushing my breasts. I licked my lips and imagined how much more powerful the sensations would be without the filter of another’s body between us.
His lips twisted. “Are we going to do it out here?”
I cleared my throat. “Do what?” I asked after I’d pried my tongue loose from the roof of my dry mouth.
One dark, elegant eyebrow rose, his gaze kept its steady glare.
I straightened from the door. “Are you punishing me for intruding?”
“That’s an odd way to describe the kind of pleasure I bring. Perhaps you only get off sucking someone else’s pleasure.”
Christ! He knew what I was. “Better that than taking their blood.”
“We all do what we must to survive.” His expression grew impossibly darker. “Invite me in.”
My heart pounded harder, faster. Oh, he frightened me all right—but I was more frightened of myself. I’d learned to harness my curse, use it, control it. I lived a solitary life for a reason.
Maybe this was recompense for stubbornly distancing myself from others, letting in only what I needed, when I needed it—on my own terms.
I took a deep breath and stepped back. “Come in,” I whispered.
To give him credit, he didn’t immediately pounce. He let go of the door frame, shot me another all-encompassing glance and stepped past me, into my bedroom.
Once inside, he seemed to grow larger, darker. His movements, at once fluid and purposeful, drew my attention and robbed me of breath. Soon, I’d know his touch, his kisses, firsthand.
I moved to close the doors, but he glanced back and shook his head. “Let the storm inside.”
I already had. His eyes, so dark and fathomless, pulled me deeper into the room. “Stop it!” I said. “No tricks. You’re here—you have what you want.”
A harsh, rasping laugh lifted the hairs on the back of my neck. Then before I could make up my mind whether to step closer or flee, he moved—so quickly his movements were a blur. His hands slid around my waist and he lifted me off my feet, stepping forward until the wall behind me halted his progress.
He held me up, my body inches from his, but close enough to feel the heat of his skin and his sweet breath as it washed over my face. “Decide now, succubus. Will you feed me?”
“You have the advantage. Why even ask?”
“Because I’m going to ravage you, and I want you ready—committed. I want everything you’ve taken.”
Not just my blood? Would he take my strength as well? I trembled and leaned back against the wall, watching his mouth as it tightened.
I licked my lips, considering. I’d never shared the power of the passions I drew from others. I’d kept them, using them to fuel the stories I wove. What would it be like to release them, share them with another?
I closed my eyes for a moment. In all the months I’d lived here, no man had ever stepped inside this room. Except for a delivery boy every now and then, no one had even seen the inside of my apartment.
Yet here I was, trapped against a wall with a man towering over me, demanding I submit to his lust.
Damn, was there even a choice? I’d been lonely and alone for so long.
I made my decision, then lifted my hands to slide them over the damp cotton covering his hard chest. “So, you intend to ravage me?” I quipped softly.
Grim satisfaction filled his stark features. His chest rose beneath my palms. His heartbeat, just beneath my fingers, hammered against his chest. “Take off your robe.” But he didn’t move away, just let go of my waist while he waited for me to obey, challenging me to complain with his watchful gaze.
I scowled and wriggled, sandwiched between the wall of his chest and the plaster behind me, until the robe
