But I couldn’t root out the awful urge to drink blood the same way I could rip out the knots.
“Samara.” He wrapped my hand in his palm, stopping me from pulling anymore.
I loathed how out of control I felt. My reflection—the white-haired, red-eyed stranger. I hated her. “How do you handle it?” I spat the words.
“The thirst?”
I nodded, grinding my teeth. Something slammed into me, a cavern of thirst with depths I’d never felt before. It was gone a second later.
“I drink blood, viper. That’s the only thing that can work.”
I pulled my hand away. “It’s not enough. I drink, and I drink, and it doesn’t work.”
“It can work. But it needs to be the right blood.”
My fangs ached as I looked him up and down. “You mean yours?”
“I told you, you can have it. Any time.”
To be able to ease this thirst at any point . . . I tried to center myself on other sensations. The cool tile under my feet, the slight sea salt spicing the room. But instead, I drew in Raphael’s scent,calculated the exact number of inches between us. “I don’t need it.”
“Maybe not. Maybe you can survive without it. But you won’t be able to let your guard down as we meet with others over the next week. There’s a chance their blood will be more tempting and you’ll slip. This isn’t Damerel, where there’s mostly vampires. Here you’ll be surrounded by magical warm-blooded creatures.”
It hurt that he had so little faith in me.
Or maybe he had complete faith in my new nature. Maybe he knew exactly what I was now capable of.
“You can think of it as an extension of our deal. Living like a vampire means taking from the vein, not tormenting yourself with stale blood.”
I hesitated, and he leaned closer. “Samara, let me ease your ache.”
It’s wrong to drink blood,part of me recoiled. But I forced myself to hesitate, to analyze Raphael’s proposition. I couldn’t deny what I was. And he was right—we’d made a deal. Would a vampire without my hang-ups really refuse in this situation? Still be obstinate about drinking room-temperature blood from a bottle? But I could stop myself from the worst of it—from becoming the vicious beast that hunger made.
I nodded.
Raphael stepped forward, but he didn’t lean down like I expected. Instead, his hands came to my waist, and he hoisted me up onto the countertop.
The cosmetics Thea had packed for me spiraled across the white marble. Raphael stepped forward, wedging himself between my knees as his hands moved from my waist to the edge of the counter. We were eye level now, his gaze as hungry as I felt.
It was my turn to reach for him. I meant to brush his hair away as he leaned in, but I found myself caressing the tousled strands. “You’re sure?”
“I’m always sure about you.”
I didn’t allow myself to hesitate. I released his hair and pulled away the fabric at his neck. When I bit him, the taste didn’t take me by surprise the way it had in the past.
I knew he tasted good. Had expected him to be as good as he was, and yet somehow better than memory allowed.
Raphael let out a slight groan, but he didn’t move, his hands remaining pinned outside my knees. But I didn’t stay still. I leaned forward, angling my bite deeper as I gulped down the sweet copper in his veins.
The racing thoughts in my head finally ceased. Everything was so blissfully simple. So right.
Releasing him was easier this time too. Six, seven swallows. That’s all I allowed myself. All I needed. Where it took an entire pitcher of blood to begin to quench my thirst, a few swallows of Raphael left me feeling clearheaded.
My fangs released his neck with a wet sound, and I dabbed my tongue over the punctures.
Raphael didn’t move as I finally pried myself away. The look in his eyes—intense beyond words. It made me squeeze my thighs unconsciously, which was a mistake, because Raphael was still wedged between them. Widening my knees just made me knock into his hands.
Raphael was as frozen as the marble I sat on. His muscles were flexed, stiff, as if he wouldn’t allow himself to move as much as a finger.
