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Raw, aching…

…and fucking delicious.

Lucan’s shadowy tendrils curled around Elarian’s thighs. Flinching only for a moment, she sighed as the cool embrace eased the heat flushing her skin.

“Was it the countess? No, she would never stain herself with your presence. Caelen, perhaps?”

His words were nearly lost amidst the ruinous desires taking hold inside Elarian’s heart, starved for love. In his arms, fingers teasing her nipples until they hardened into stone, she found herself willing for more. She knew—knew that even if her blade buried itself in Lucan’s undead heart—she would never escape him.

Knew that a part of her didn’t want to escape him.

But she still had no intention of dying by his hand or of letting him ever know those eyes behind the mask belonged not to a half-blooded dhampir, but the blood of the very goddess he defiled with every breath.

“N-no, my prince,” Elarian choked out between gasping breaths. Her head was dizzy now, vision tumbling.

“No?”

Lucan dropped his mouth to her neck. Breathing out slowly, he hovered his lips just above her flushed skin. The shadows around her thighs slowly reached upward as she bucked against his hips.

Another twinge deep in her core. What am I doing? Goddess save me—why are you doing this?

“So it was you, then, pet?”

Lucan shifted his hands to either side of the deep slit in her bodice. He curled his fingers around the fabric, then tore it apart with ease. Beads flew across the room, clattering over the marble floor and disappearing into the plush carpets. Crimson fabric and frayed thread tore over her soft skin as Lucan wrenched the once-priceless dress down below her hips. It fell to the floor at her feet like blood gushing from a wound.

“Wished to get away so soon?” One hand grabbed at her stomach, pulling her back until Lucan’s stiff cock pressed against her backside. The hard metal at her exposed skin sent shivers down her spine. “Do not believe all the stories you hear about my bed. I can be very giving to those who please me.”

“I me-merely meant—ahh!”

Elarian gasped as Lucan pressed his lips against her neck. Soft—how could they be so godsdamned soft? Then came the scraping of fangs over flesh; her heart stuttered again, vision darkening for a breath.

“I care little about that. There are much better things you can use to plead your case, my sweet killer.”

If Elarian had not been so consumed by her warring desires, and if she had not quaked at the knees as the shadows now teased her wetness, she might have wondered what Lucan meant by sweet killer. But instead, her mind raced to contain her senses. Her hips bucked against the shadows as Lucan’s hand slid down.

Naked. She was naked in the arms of her bloodsworn enemy, each marked with each other’s century-old hatred.

And she relished every forbidden second.

Lucan’s roving fingers found the tender nub of her clit—throbbing, aching, begging. His free hand traced the length of her left ear, featherlight as if a lover’s kiss.

Touch me, fuck, please! I don’t care if it damns me! Ruin me as I taste what I can never have.

“Use me to your desire, Lucan,” Elarian murmured.

The words slipped from her lips before she even knew she had spoken. Through her daze, something registered that she had gone too far; that she had to turn back and run from the monster, not let him defile her.

“I always was.” The words rumbled from Lucan’s chest—a deep, guttural proclamation that assured Elarian, you never had a choice here tonight.

She shuddered even as a smile spread across her painted lips.

Without another word, Lucan began furiously teasing her clit, pinching it between his thumb and forefinger as a thick tendril of shadows thrust into Elarian’s quivering hole. Her squeals filled the chamber thick with incense smoke and the reek of bloodwine. The vampire growled against her neck. Ragged breaths tore through Elarian as ribbons of hot bliss wound around her core. She tried to pull away, but Lucan’s hand quickly found her throat and squeezed until her head tingled.

“Does your greedy cunt need more to keep you in place, whore?”

The shadows inside Elarian slithered out, leaving her gasping for air, blood hot in her veins, and her body somehow begging for more. Before she could draw another breath, Lucan picked her up by the hips and swung her around, then shoved her roughly onto the bed. She rolled to her back, eyes wide—yet was it terror or exhilaration that Lucan saw?

She didn’t know why she was doing this.