A Vampire's Christmas Carol

So wrong.

He was like a furnace, and she loved that heat. It surrounded her. Banished the chill that had clung to her ever since she’d awakened in a morgue and realized that he was gone.

Her fingers slipped down, down, moving to the snap of his jeans.

“Simone?”

She undid the snap. Slid down the zipper. His c**k sprang toward her. Fully erect. Thick. So hard. Simone lowered to her knees before him. He watched her with a gaze she couldn’t read. Once, she’d been able to read him easily, but not anymore.

She could only hope her emotions were as hidden. She couldn’t, wouldn’t let him see the fear that curled within her. Passion would win this time. Desire would triumph.

Her fingers curled around his cock. She stroked him once, from root to tip. Again.

Then she put her mouth on him.

“Baby…” His fingers sank in her hair, but he didn’t push her away. He urged her closer.

And she wanted to be close. She wanted to memorize his taste. Wanted to stroke and touch all of him. She kissed his heavy length. Loved the way his c**k stiffened even more beneath her mouth. She loved—

In a flash, Simone was on her back. The old bed sagged beneath her, and her vampire stared down at her with his glowing, golden eyes.

“If I didn’t know better,” Ben said, his deep voice hard with desire and rage, “I’d think you missed me. But then, angel, you wouldn’t have stayed away ten years if you really wanted me that much.”

If they kept me away, if they didn’t give me a choice…Simone swallowed back the words. They would only hurt him more. He didn’t need to know what he’d done to her. “I want you more than anything,” Simone told him, and her words were the truth. She wanted him enough to trade all that she had.

Enough to risk the dark that could come.

His hands flew down and a second later, her shirt went sailing across the room. Her bra followed it. Then his mouth was on her breast. He licked and he sucked and desire surged through her as Simone’s hips arched toward him.

“Hurry,” Simone whispered. “I need you now.” Before time ran out for them.

He pulled down her jeans and took her underwear away with them. His own jeans were tossed to the floor. He positioned himself between her spread legs, and the broad head of his c**k pushed into her.

Yes!

But he stilled. “Why?”

Simone shook her head. “Please, Ben, now.”

“All these years…you should have come to me.” His fingers curled around her hips. Lifted her up.

Then he plunged into her.

Simone moaned. Ten years. There had been no one else for her during that time. There never would be anyone else.

“I needed you. I wanted you.” He withdrew. Thrust in even deeper. Had her eyes rolling back in her head as the pleasure lashed her. “You should have come to me.”

His thrusts were rough. Frantic. His hands made sure that she met him, plunge for plunge as he lifted her hips up against him.

“I wanted to,” she whispered, then Simone bit her lip. She couldn’t say more.

“I’ll be the one to bite.” His mouth pressed to hers. “And I will bite.”

His hand lifted from her hip. His warm, wicked fingers covered her sex. Found her clit. Stroked her as he thrust.

Her release was close. Her entire body tensed as his mouth slid to her throat.

“Do you still taste as good?” Ben demanded.

Speech wasn’t really possible for her right then. The wild pants were pretty much all Simone could manage as her fingers fisted around the bed covers. He was driving so deep into her.

“I bet you do still taste as f**king good. Let’s find out…”

His teeth sank into her throat even as he plunged into her again. His bite electrified Simone as pleasure erupted within her. His mouth…his cock…she cried out, lost, as her climax shook her straight to the core.

“That’s right.” Ben licked her neck. Kissed her. “You didn’t come to me, but you can come for me.” He lifted her legs up higher, opening her even wider to him as he thrust and thrust and—

He came on a hot burst of release inside of her. “Simone.”

Her eyes flew open. When had she closed them? And Simone saw her vampire staring down at her with a gaze gone blind with pleasure. She let go of the covers and held him as the pleasure continued to surge through them both.

Sex with Ben had always been phenomenal. Powerful enough to steal her breath. To make her shudder.

But it wasn’t the sex that had bound her to him.

He pressed another kiss to her lips, but this time, the kiss was gentle. “I missed you,” he confessed softly. The rage was gone from him.

It would come back. He still didn’t realize what would happen that night.

But she did, and the pain already had her heart aching.

Chapter Six

“It was my fault,” Ben said as he stared down at her. He’d braced his hands on either side of her so that she didn’t feel the weight of his body. “You were coming after me. You were hit by the SUV, because of me.”

She shook her head, moving slightly against the pillow. “I didn’t look when I ran after you.” She should have looked. Angels could take the form of humans if they wished. She’d taken her old human body because she wanted Ben to be able to see her. To touch her.

But that body was vulnerable. When angels were flesh and blood, they could be hurt. They could be killed.

They could be…changed.

Angels were supposed to stay out of the sight of human beings. She’d been taking a huge risk just by assuming her human form so many times around Ben. “The choice was mine,” she told him.

Most days, angels stayed in their astral forms. No one saw them that way. And angels, when they were in that astral form, they could fly right through cities. Right through buildings.

She’d been so used to the invulnerability of the astral form, that she’d forgotten how very fragile a physical body could be.

Until an SUV had hit her.

One instant, she’d been surrounded by a swirling world of white snow, and in the next moment, she’d only known darkness.

Later, she’d found out the darkness had been due to the body bag that she’d been put inside. The emergency personnel had zipped her up in that bag and tossed her into cold storage.

“Where have you been?” he demanded as his gaze searched hers. “All these years, where were you?”

She put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him back.