As Shadows Fade (The Gardella Vampire Hunters 5)

She was gone.

Unbelievably gone.

The control, the power over him waned… released. He breathed on his own. He smelled ash and roses and… blood.

Still, the blood.

The craving hadn’t eased. No, it pounded just as fiercely.

“Sebastian. ” Victoria’s voice penetrated the haze, just a bit. She twisted and moved, and he saw that she was trying to free her manacled hand while she kept her eyes on him. She had a stake in her hand.

A stake that, he realized, could kill him now.

He didn’t remember moving, but then he was on her, his hands holding her delicate shoulder to the pillows stained with her blood, knocking the stake from her hand. His weight pressed her into the softness as he’d done before, and he smelled her… She surrounded him, her blood, her scent, her skin.

She fought against him with one hand; he heard her say his name, urgent… pleading. Victoria, pleading.

But he didn’t care. He couldn’t stop himself… The red haze blazed through him as he covered her mouth, tasting her, smelling the blood that would soon ease his craving. He crushed her lips, his hands sliding over her skin even as she arched and twisted, her stake just out of reach, his weight and vampire strength… and the manacle… holding her in place.

Overcome by unbounded craving, he needed to taste, to kiss, to fuck, to possess, to control …

“Sebastian. ” Her voice was sharp, a bit thready, in his ear as she yanked her face away.

The blood was there, beneath her ear, there in front of him. He lost everything else, everything but that beckoning red streak.

It was there… teasing, taunting… he shouldn’t. There was a reason… He shouldn’t, he couldn’t… but saliva pooled in his mouth, and the blood coursed from the wounds in her neck, the distended vein that swelled, teasing him, even as he watched, as she writhed beneath him.

“Giulia,” she gasped. “Sebastian, remember Giulia. ”

She moved sharply, knocking him askew, and he felt her hand moving toward that stake.

No.

He grabbed her wrist, but she twisted and yanked, forcing him to release her grip. He moved forward, into her throat. His lips brushed against her hot, salty skin, and the blood… He touched it, warm and sleek, with his mouth.

Pleasure, lust, craving blasted through him at the faint iron sense on his lips. More. More.

He opened his mouth, his fangs, still so odd, slipping out, sliding against

her skin.

And then he felt something in his back. Sharp.

“Sebastian. ” Her voice, low, gasping, pleading. “You cannot. ”

He scraped his fang over her skin, sliding over the saltiness, a bit of that luscious blood slipping with it. The stake pushed harder-how had she gotten it?-but she said, “I’ll do it. I don’t want to, but… I’ll do it. ”

He needed this… He couldn’t see, think, conceive of anything but this… The blood on his lips touched his tongue. Pleasure burst inside him, and he nearly shoved his fangs in right then. Nearly.

“Sebastian, think of Giulia. You can’t. Please. Don’t. You’re stronger than this. ” Her breasts moved against him as she drew in the breaths to plead. “You wear the vis bulla . ”

The vis bulla that burned every time he touched it now; it annoyed the skin at his belly when it touched, a constant burn. But he wore it…

Wayren. Her face popped into his confused, red, blazing mind. The heavy silver ring on his left hand.

His head felt heavy, but… Giulia .

He didn’t care. He cared about nothing, nothing but the blood. The need, the driving pull.