And now she had Kellan with her again. Inside her.
His name was a ragged whisper on her lips as he increased his tempo, each long push going deeper, stoking the fire that was already roaring inside her. His mouth covered hers as the first broken cry of her climax curled up from the back of her throat.
He showed her no quarter, but then, she hadn't wanted any. Not like this. Not when her need for him was still so raw and unsated.
But her orgasm was building swiftly. It raced up on her with his every stroke and retreat, every kiss and caress carrying her higher, closer to the edge. Kellan drove into her with relentless purpose, pushing her mercilessly toward the cliff.
"Oh, God," she gasped as the first hot waves crashed into her. "Kellan."
Mira held on to him and tumbled headlong into the pleasure of the moment.
The pleasure of this reunion, no matter how fleeting her heart feared it might be.
Chapter Eleven
ONLY ONCE IN HIS LIFE HAD KELLAN FELT THE TIGHT, WET bliss of Mira's body sheathing him. Only once had he known the sweet clench of her womb around his cock, the tiny undulations of her climax milking him, wringing him out. He'd remembered that one time with vivid clarity - or so he'd thought, until the sight of Mira coming for him now, clinging to him and gasping his name in heated frenzy, made everything he thought he knew seem pale and dry as dust.
Christ, she was beautiful.
Her blond hair was a wild tangle on his pillow, her porcelain-perfect skin gone pink with the rush of blood to her cheeks and across the lovely mounds of her pert breasts. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, dark lashes at half-mast. She sucked in a sigh through parted lips that were bruised a dark red from his kiss, her rosebud mouth trembling with each rising pant of her breath. She clutched at him as another deep shudder racked her.
Transfixed, triumphant, Kellan watched her orgasm sweep over her. It gripped him in its hot fist as she trembled with the force of her release. His cock twitched, leapt, ready to explode, his own climax building to the point of torture.
But it was a delicious agony. A pain so good, he wanted to keep it going forever. Mira began to shatter again, her small body going tense beneath him, her breath racing, pulse thudding hard against him everywhere they touched. He coaxed her higher, rolling into her with deep, penetrating strokes, fanning the flames of her pleasure.
"Don't stop," she whispered brokenly. "Oh, God, Kellan . . . please . . . don't ever stop."
He growled in agreement, male pride swelling inside him like a tidal wave.
She was his.
Again.
Still.
Always . . .
It was that last thought, the lie of it, that stuck him like a barb. Always wasn't theirs anymore. No matter how much he wanted it to be true.
And it had been unfair of him to take this from Mira - her pleasure, her surrender, her undeserved fidelity and affection - knowing that it wouldn't last. It couldn't last, not with the grim future that awaited him.>Mira huffed out a harsh breath. "How convenient for you."
She meant it to sound sharp and uncaring, but there was no hiding the fact that she was wounded. She hated the rawness inside her, hated that he might hear it now, would certainly see it in her moist eyes. She shuttered herself with a downward glance, but Kellan wouldn't permit it.
Merciless, he lifted her face, then made the ache even worse by smoothing away the trail of one fat tear with a brush of his thumb across her cheek.
"Look at me, Mira. Tell me if you think there's anything more to what you saw back there than what I'm telling you it was." His voice was level yet intense. "Look at my eyes. They're still glowing. They're still inflamed with hunger, even though I drank my fill of Candice's blood. Look at my glyphs, Mira. Do you see satiation in them, or are they still livid and churning with hunger and with the dark colors of a different, deeper need when I'm standing here in front of you?"
Mira didn't want to look at him, but he gave her no choice. And as she obeyed his demands to see him - really see him, as a formidable man and a dangerous, preternatural creature both - she realized that everything he was saying now was the truth. While the edge of his blood thirst had been curbed, he was far from satisfied.
Kellan pressed into her, letting her feel the full, hard length of his body. He bent his head down next to hers, his voice a low growl against the sensitive shell of her ear. "Do I feel like a man who's taken what he wants from someone other than the one woman he craves above all others?"
Mira's breath caught in her throat, leaking out of her in a small moan. She felt his rigid arousal, felt his desire for her radiating out of him in palpable heat.
Kellan muttered a dark curse. "For eight years I've wished I could find someone to make me forget you. But there's been no one, Mira." His lips closed around her earlobe, suckling it gently between his teeth and fangs. His warm breath rasped against her ear, reaching down into her, making her pulse race and her thighs tremble. "There's been no one since you, Mira."
He took her face in his hands and kissed her. Not the gentle nip and brush of his mouth just a moment ago, but a fierce claiming. Possessive and hot, his kiss invaded her without patience or mercy. It was a demand, raw and unbridled.
And Mira gave in to it with abandon.