Mating Fever by Susan Hayes
Leta
Leta’s neck throbbed where Carnage—no, she corrected herself—where Alaric had bitten her. There was a strange, searing heat coming from the bite that slowly seeped deeper into her body. It was a disturbing sensation, and it helped snap her out of the blissful fugue she had been enjoying.
“What the fuck did you do to me, asshole?” she demanded, pushing at his head until she could look into his glowing, amber eyes.
“Mine now.” His voice was gruff, the accent thicker, and fangs peeked out from behind his blood-tinted lips.
“You can keep saying that all you want; it won’t make it true. I don’t belong to anyone, Alaric. I can’t.”
His lips curled into an irritated snarl. “Denying what’s going on between us doesn’t make it any less real, either. Trust me, this isn’t the way I usually handle retrievals.”
She laughed. “So, I’m an exception? You don’t bring every woman you go after here for a quick fuck before you hand them over to your buddy, Luc?”
For a moment, glittering flames flared deep in the glow of his eyes. “I never bring anyone here. Not women. Not men. Anyone.”
“Then why am I here?” she demanded, not sure she wanted to hear the answer. Her life had been one long, lonely struggle. She wasn’t sure she could deal with having anything more offered to her. Not now, when it was too late.
He stared into her eyes, and she saw confusion lurking in those strangely glowing depths. “Fuck if I know. It seemed like a good idea at the time. I needed you. I needed to have you more than I needed my next breath. I’ve already taken you once, and I still fucking need you. I don’t know what this is, but it’s not going away.”
“You’re crazy, and apparently, so am I. I don’t know what’s pulling us together either, but if this is my last chance to grab a few moments of pleasure and happiness, I’m taking it.” If the rest of her life could be measured in hours and minutes, this was the best way she could think of to spend that time.
“I’m keeping you for more than a few minutes.”
“You can’t. I know how this works. You’re bound to obey Lucifer, right? He wants me in Hell. There’s nothing either one of us can do about that, except postpone it as long as we can.”
Alaric growled and for a moment she thought he was going to say something, but instead he simply kissed her.
Their lips were still mated when she felt the familiar tingle that accompanied a teleportation, and the next thing she knew she was stretched out beneath him on a bed piled high with thick furs. She got a brief impression of dark wood, tapestries, and a wall full of weapons, but then all her attention turned to the man looming over her, kissing her with more passion than she had ever known.
She wouldn’t say the words. But in her heart, she knew that for this one, brief moment in time, he was right.
She was his.
