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Gerrod, what are you doing to me? And please, you are hurting my arm. Vampires were strong.
The pressure diminished but his expression hardened. You are speaking to me telepathically and you are experiencing my personal frequency, my realm vibration. No one can do that except when I allow it, but you accessed it freely. And you are…human. This cannot not be happening.
She was struggling to breathe. But his touch, and the flowing waves, had her trapped. She strained toward him, but he kept a grip on her arm, holding her away from him. He squeezed his eyes shut. This is impossible. You can’t be what you seem to be. You can’t be. You’re human. This is unacceptable.
Abigail slid her hand up his chest and reached his mouth. She ran her thumb over his lips.
How inappropriate and thank goodness they were standing at the back of the crowd. In the distance, she could hear another groomsman making a toast. Though it was nighttime, the floodlights lit mostly the band, the bridal table, and the dance floor. This far back, she stood in the shadows.
Time came to a swift stumbling halt.
Abigail looked at Gerrod as if for the first time. She felt a call so deep in her soul, driving her toward him, that to not respond, not to say ‘yes’, felt like a crime for which she would be punished if she didn’t obey. She needed this vampire, craved him. For the first time, her vein began to rise in her throat, because that’s the only way she could describe what she experienced. She needed him to take her blood because that would complete something essential between them, as essential as the nature of a kiss, as critical as the fulfillment of lovemaking.
Yet, she was human and didn’t truly belong in the realm world. She belonged in Flagstaff, the nearest access point to the Merhaine Realm.
The tip of his tongue teased her thumb. You taste of the sweetest herbs. Dear Goddess, please forgive me.
Before she knew what he meant by sending that particular message, he took hold of her arm, swung her in the direction of the forest, and led her twenty yards into the dark, a good distance from the crowd that now applauded. Music began at the same time, a lively folk song made for dancing.
He dragged her behind a tree and hauled her into his arms.
She fell against him, limp, her body in full surrender and not caring that this was so inappropriate and doomed to cause all kinds of problems.
For some strange reason as she stared up at him, though the forest was dark, his face was lit in a glow. Vampire magic? He was incredibly beautiful, his black brows thick and arched, his clear blue eyes thickly fringed, his nose straight, his lips full, his cheeks pronounced.
He leaned close, his lips trembling over hers.
“Do I have permission to kiss you?”
God, yes.
“Yes,” she whispered, panting against him, her fingers grasping the soft cloth of his loose Guard’s shirt. She dug deeper until her fingers found purchase in the hard muscles of his arms. His lips touched hers and the previous waves began to flow, heavier now.
She parted her lips and his tongue entered her, piercing her, plunging in and out.
She connected her hips low and felt the long rope of him. Her knees weakened further.
She suckled his tongue and he groaned again. The waves came faster now and seemed to pluck at every part of her body at once. She wanted to fall on the ground, but in gentle stages he eased back. But by then she was in agony and breathed hard. She pressed her forehead into his shoulder.
What is happening? she asked.
I fear it is something that will alter your life forever, unless you are wise, and choose to leave Merhaine. You would be wise, Abigail, not to come back and I’m begging you to do just that. You are not realm. You don’t understand our customs. My people would have great difficulty accepting you.
But beyond that, the Invictus have grown active again. A polite euphemism for death and destruction.
She drew back, but in her heels the uneven ground put her off-balance. She started to fall.
He caught her, righting her, then held her steady.
“Just tell me one thing,” she said. “What are the waves that you send through my body. They almost undo me. I…that is…you could have…I wouldn’t have objected.”
She met his gaze but she was blushing.
A soft strange growl left his lips. So vampires growled at such moments. He wasn’t human, but why didn’t that seem to matter to her? And why could she speak with him mind to mind? She should have cared, it should have been paramount. And her vein still throbbed, begging for him to take her very life-force.
“I swear you’ve enthralled me,” he said, a deep furrow now between his brows. “This must be your doing, Abigail. It was there from the first.”
“Gerrod are you saying that you’ve been attracted to me since that first day?”
“I won’t deny it.”
“I thought you disapproved of me.”
“I’m frustrated, even distressed, that I’m drawn to you, a very different thing.”
She put her finger in the furrow between his brows and rubbed. He let loose with a sigh, closing his eyes. She added, “You’re worried all the time.”
“Yes.” His voice was always little more than a deep, gravelly growl.
“One of the fae told me that there are a million realm in Merhaine. Is this true?”
He nodded.
“You have charge of a million souls then?”
“I do.”
“No wonder you rarely laugh.” She had meant to tease him but when he didn’t even smile, when he looked away from her, she finally understood his most essential self. He was responsible and he put those responsibilities above everything else in his life including his own happiness.
“No wonder your people thrive,” she said.
His gaze snapped back to her. “Why do you say that?” Again that deep furrow appeared.
“You’ve laid your life down for your people, no doubt for decades. Why wouldn’t they thrive? But what of you, Gerrod? What of your own happiness?”
He stared down at her with a stunned look in his eye as though she had asked something never heard of before. Then he just looked confused. But as other thoughts intruded, his face hardened. He looked like a vampire who had been standing in a strong wind for a very long time, centuries perhaps.
“We should get back.”
She nodded. The moment had passed. The only understanding that had been reached was that she desired him and he desired her, and that the realm world had no place for a human female in a mastyr vampire’s life.
As he turned to offer his arm, however, a strange keening sound broke through the forest, a sound that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.
