Page 64 of Dancing With Demons

Grasping my wrist, Santino snapped me to his chest, and planted one on me.

“Hmpf!”

Radu swallowed my cry and stole his chance, slipping past my lips.

He kissed me with fierce and reckless abandon—sweeping up my desire and blowing it through my body, waking up every nerve and sensor, and ravaging my nervous system with an explosion of fireworks bursting behind my eyes.

Cupping the back of my head, Radu lifted my leg and dipped me backwards—the windswept brooding hero fresh from the moors—ready and willing to have his way with the princess.

Tongues battling, lips swelling, core melting—my cries of protest faded into moans so quickly, I forgot what I was protesting about.

We broke apart gasping. The room was spinning again, but this time the knot in my stomach wasn’t motion sickness.

Hand moving of its own accord, I grasped Radu’s chin with my thumb and forefinger, and drew his lips back down for—

“Feed me.”

Heavy lids tossed off the weight, and I snapped my eyes open. “Wow.” I shook him off and fell, plopping down on the chaise. “Way to kill the mood, Prof! I can’t believe you’re trying to seduce me for my blood. I’ve had a lot of guys pull a lot of crap to get something from me, but that’s a first.”

Santino’s smile went nowhere. Dropping to his knees, he grasped my thighs—sending ripples up my body.

I hated that my resolve was already breaking, and all he did was draw my knees together and rest his chin on them.

“Feed me, my sweet, my honey, my love,” he whispered—a grin dancing on his perfect, pale lips. His strange color-changing eyes had settled on an oddly enchanting gray. The man and the monster—yin and yang—in perfect harmony. “I want you in my mouth. Sliding down my throat. Filling my body, my veins, the hole that was once my soul.”

I swallowed hard.

“I want to be all you, Charlotte Hunter. I want to be the black rose you pollinate. I want to survive on your mercy and whims alone. If you deny me your blood, then I deny my existence,” he murmured, dropping kisses on my bare, sensitive thighs. “For I only want to live if you allow me to.”

“I— I—” Gods, help me, why is this working?! “But I can’t,” I stammered out. “Ronin did this to me.” I showed him my shoulder. “He said he doesn’t want me having anything to do with you, and then he said a little something about killing you when he removed the fang marks from my thighs.

“I know we have a deal, but that bastard can make my life”—I shook my head—“he can make Dora’s life very difficult if I go against him. I can’t put her at risk to save myself. I just can’t.”

“You also can’t protect her if something happens to you,” he said softly, stopping my arguments before they left my lips. “It’s not just my kind who are a threat to you. Just the other day you were almost killed by the shade. If your life is lost down here, Ronin Belphe will have no reason to continue extending his protection to your sister.”

I shook, nails pricking my palms. I wanted to deny it so badly, but not a single thing Radu was saying was untrue.

“Do you know how I knew of their plot to take you, even though they went to great pains to hide it?” He flapped a hand at the headless corpses. “It’s because after weeks of sharing your blood, I’m once again at full strength. Every single other vampire is weakened and slowed by three hundred years of hunger. Not me. I am now the strongest and fastest that I’ve ever been. Without the screams for blood ringing in my ears day and night, I hear more and farther than I ever have.

“I can and I will protect you from all threats, my sweet honey.” Gray orbs sucked me in, and drowned me. “And you know this because you see it when you look into these eyes that frighten and arouse you in equal measure. You know that you are the most important thing in my afterlife. There is and never will be anything that I desire and cherish more than you.”

“But that’s... that’s...” My voice was a thin rasp. “That’s not me you want. It’s my blood. You’re only so obsessed with me because I keep you alive. Your reasons are shallow,” I cried. “They’re self-serving.”

His smile widened. “And isn’t that exactly what love is? Isn’t that why we desire it? Because it sustains us. Because it gives us the means and the reason... to live.”

Why couldn’t I disagree with him? Why did this happen every time?

My jaw worked, but nothing would come out.

“Feed me.”

“If— If he sees a mark on me, I’ll pay the price,” I forced out. “I’ve been punished by the sub bond before. I never want to experience that pain again.”

Again, Radu did not look deterred. “If you’ll indulge me, sweetie, I have an idea to get around that...”

LATER THAT EVENING after classes, I carried my and Dora’s dinner back to our room. The two of us were done eating in the mess hall for the time being. Even though the other demons put their heads down and walked in the opposite direction when I came in, Ronin had too much of a love for making an example of people in public, and I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction.

“Nik was telling me all about the dryads, Rosacea.”