Elise let out a small sigh. "I'm sorry. I saw how he was with you. If he left, don't think it's a question of whether or not he cares for you. It was plain to me - to everyone - that he does." Tavia shrugged, managed a faint smile. "I can't stay now either."
The female's expression went a bit cautious. "Perhaps you should talk with Lucan first." "Is that a polite way of telling me I'm not allowed to leave?" She exhaled a soft apology. "When Chase comes back - if he comes back - I don't want to make things harder for him. He needs the Order.">In its wake, there was hunger.
She hadn't fed since the first time with him. Now, with her every nerve ending alive and electrified, she craved his blood with a ferocity that bordered on madness. She couldn't keep her eyes from the throbbing pulse at the side of his strong neck.
Her mouth was tinder dry. Her gums pounded at the base of her extended fangs. She wet her parched lips, gazing up at him from under the thirst-heavy droop of her eyelids.
He understood her need. His amber irises flared brighter, pupils thinning to slivers as he watched her home in on his drumming heartbeat.
"Christ," he whispered, reverence and profanity all in the same breath.
She lifted up from the bed, bracing her palm against his chest and shoving him onto his back. His lungs sawed as she crawled up onto him, his body hot and powerful beneath her. She bent forward, licked a slow path along the taut column of his throat, playing the tip of her tongue over the fat vein that ticked so deliciously below the surface of his smooth skin.
She teased it with the sharp tips of her fangs, wringing a strangled groan from him in the instant before she sank her teeth deep into his flesh.
She moaned as his blood gushed over her tongue, hot and tingly and dark. She swallowed it greedily, relishing the spicy, exotic taste of him. As she fed, he lay rigid beneath her and stroked her back and unbound hair. She didn't know if her feeding brought him the same contentment it did her. All she knew was the thrumming beat of his pulse against her lips and in her ears, the drowning roar of his blood as it flowed into her muscles, bones, and cells. It quelled the savage pound of her senses. Nourished her as though she'd been starving for it all her life.
When she'd had her fill, reluctantly she swept her tongue over the punctures to seal them. She didn't realize his anguish until she dragged her sated gaze up to his face. His lips were bloodless, drawn back from his teeth and fangs in a tortured grimace. He rolled away from her on a rough curse, his big body shuddering as he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and raked his trembling fingers into his damp hair.
His hunger owned him. It raked through her now, the savagery of his blood thirst eclipsing all the pleasure and comfort she'd taken so selfishly from his vein. It tore her open inside, bringing with it a cold, empty ache in the pit of her soul.
God, how he suffered now.
She didn't know how he could withstand such agony. Just the echo of it in her own blood was enough to suck the air from her lungs.
She gasped, clutching at her abdomen as his pain knocked her down onto the bed. She writhed with it, her body jackknifing as the anguish of his hunger swam through her like black, burning acid.
HE WAS HURTING HER.
The thought slammed into his hungered mind even before he pivoted to find Tavia's naked body constricted in an anguished ball in the middle of the bed.
Ah, Christ.
"Tavia?"
It killed him to see her in such pain, to know that it was his agony clawing at her. His affliction transferred to her through the blood connection of Tavia's bond to him. Because of that bond, his suffering was hers.
And his regret for that was fathomless.
"Tavia, look at me," he murmured, moving back toward her on the bed. He smoothed his hand over her head, hissing as he felt the fevered heat of her skin when he brushed his fingertips across her sweat-sheened brow. "Tell me you're all right."
She moaned as another wave of hunger burned through him like wildfire. When she opened her eyes, he saw pure misery in the bright amber pools of her irises. Her dermaglyphs were churning furiously, steeped in the same angry hues as his own skin.
His choked curse was ash on his tongue. He'd never felt so helpless, so full of hatred for himself and the disease he knew would one day destroy him. But not even Bloodlust compared to the agony of seeing Tavia in distress. Knowing he was causing it.
He had to feed.
The reality arrowed through him, cold and undeniable.
He needed blood to ease the pain - for her. His own pain meant nothing except for the hurt it was delivering to the woman he cared about more than life itself.
The woman he loved.
Tears streaked Tavia's cheeks as she looked up at him from her tight fetal position on the bed. Her breath rushed between her parted lips in rapid pants, her body shuddering and writhing. Goddamn it. And damn him as well.
He couldn't leave her like this to go and hunt. There was no telling how long he'd have to run before he found prey, and meanwhile Tavia would be suffering alone.
"Help me, Chase." Her voice was a threadbare whisper, frayed and fragile. So naked and trusting. She reached out to him, letting her hand fall open before him on the bed. "Please ... do it. Make this pain go away."