AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Somewhere through the sharp and keen desire to tackle and bite, I notice that Celeste actually looks quite pleased.
“You like being carried around?” I ask, my voice labored.
“I could certainly get used to it.”
Running my hand over my face as I battle with my self-control, trying to calm my hammering heart, I say, “Maybe we should get you one of those carriage things that are lugged around by people.”
She chuckles. “A palanquin?”
“Yeah, that.” I hug myself, trying to keep my fingers from cramping into claws and just reaching out to grab her.
Taking me by the shoulders, she says, “Are you alright?”
I shake my head, suppressing a growl. Why won’t it stop?
She lifts her hand to my hair, brushing aside the strands that have fallen into my face. Her body is so close that I can feel her heat. “What is it?”
My muscles react before my brain does, one hand reaching for her delicate wrist. I press my lips to her skin, feeling the pulse beating beneath it. She left her coat hanging over her chair, so she’s wearing only her evening dress. My other hand reaches around her waist, pulling her close. Her perfume envelops me.
“Deni!” Her voice has a warning undertone to it.
It takes everything I have to let go of her wrist but the rebound is even worse. Before I even realize I’m doing it, I have her pinned to the wall, hand in her hair. Briefly, I struggle with myself to slow down, to be gentle, but the hunger has taken full control of me.
My lips wander from her shoulder to the crook of her neck. I breathe deeply, inhaling the scent of her hair and her skin. My lips trail over the gentle swell of her artery.
Her breathing is heavy and quick, chest rising notably against my own – though not, I think, from fear.
“Deni!” she repeats, more breathless this time.
I follow her neck to her jaw and then her jawline to her chin, brimming withwantandneed.
What is happening to me?
My lips find the corner of her mouth. Too late I realize that the overwhelming hunger is not hunger at all. By the time it dawns on me what my stupid, impulsive, useless vampire brain is doing, I’m already kissing her.
Why?I don’t even like her. She’s arrogant and stuffed full of money and literally hates all of my kind… and she smells so, so nice.
For a brief moment, I can feel her stiffen with surprise – and then very quickly, I’m the one with my back to the wall. She grips my chin with one hand and slips the other behind my back, pulling me close to her. Even if I weren’t weakened from my sprint, I’d be amazed by the force she pins me to the wall with. Her mouth is hungry and demanding. She bites my lower lip, making me gasp involuntarily.
The repeated, angry beep of a car horn interrupts us. Celeste pulls back and turns to look in the direction of the sound, leaving me to watch her curlstumble over her shoulders, mesmerized by the delicacy of her neck.
Another loud honk pulls me away from my thoughts. Looking into the street, I spot Mel’s car, with Mel sitting in the driver’s seat. Though I can’t hear what she’s saying, her expression makes it clear that it’s somewhere along the lines of ‘what the fuck?’
Celeste looks at me with a strange fire in her eyes, her chest still heaving.
“Sorry,” I say, catching my breath.What the hell was that?“I… When I drink blood, it’s like I lose control… I didn’t meant to do that.”
“You should get a grip on that,” she says. Then she clears her throat. “We need to go, just in case they start searching the streets.”
But you kissed me back.
I straighten out my clothes, tugging down the seam of my jumper where she inadvertently pushed it up. “Yeah,” I agree, flustered.
To avoid awkwardness and steer the conversation away from anything relating to the past few minutes, as we get into the car, I say, “How did you get out so fast, Mel?”
Mel looks like she’s not sure whether she’s lost her mind or not.After throwing both of us a couple of desbelieving glances, she seems to decide not to bring it up. Instead, she replies, “Actually, the siren who was singing saved me. She went full scream mode.”
I shudder. I’ve only ever heard of the effects of a siren’s scream and I’m not keen to experience it. They say some people never regain their sanity.
