Black Sunshine: A Dark Vampire Romance

Solon exhales, breath shaking, and runs a trembling hand over my ass, soothing the skin where I’m sure his handprints still remain. “I don’t know my own strength sometimes,” he murmurs by way of apology.

I don’t even have anything to say. I’m so blissed out that it feels like someone took my head off and screwed it on backward. My body doesn’t even feel like mine, it feels like it belongs to the universe, made of stardust and space.

Eventually he pulls out of me, leaving me hollow. I hear the zip of his pants, feel the table shift as he gets off it. He comes around the table and over to me, appearing in front. His lids are heavy, his smile lazy as he gazes down at me. Strands of hair have fallen on his forehead, giving him a mussed-up look that he rarely has.

“I have to say, I’ve never done that before,” he says, reaching for me. He grabs me by the waist and hoists me off the table like I weigh the same as a feather.

My feet wobble in my heels, so I lean back against the edge of the table, looking up at him in surprise. “You’ve never done it doggy style before?”

He rolls his eyes to the ceiling, lip curled, probably in distaste at my phrasing. “I’ve never fucked in the Black Sunshine before.”

“Oh. Did you see the stars?”

“I did. That was…peculiar.”

“Well, you proved your point,” I tell him, giving him a sloppy smile. “We definitely have rhythm.” Then I reach out on my tippie toes and brush his hair behind his ears. “Are you okay? Did you…feel like I was in any danger?”

He shakes his head, staring down at me. “No. Not this time.”

“Perhaps everyone watching us kept you on your best behaviour.”

He eyes the ghostly vampires who have barely moved. “I would hardly call that my best behaviour, my dear. Your ass might be pink for days.”

“I heal fast, remember,” I remind him, straightening his tie before I make sure my boobs are back in my dress. “Shall we rejoin the real world?”

He nods, and with a snap of his fingers, the flaming doorway appears behind us.

“Okay,” I tell him. “You have to teach me how to do that.”

“I bet you already know how.”

Then a look of gravity comes over his face. He reaches down and grabs my hand, giving it a comforting squeeze before he lifts it up to his mouth, placing a soft kiss on the back of it, his eyes never leaving mine. “You’re my weakness, Lenore,” he says quietly against my skin. “I never had one until now. Until you.”

My heart skips a beat at his words and I’m melting like gold.

Lord, this man owns me.

I can’t even respond.

But I don’t have to.

He brings my hand away from his mouth and then leads me through the burning door, back into the other world.

The flames fall away and disappear and we’re back in color.

Color and noise and smells and about ten vampires staring at us with wide eyes.

“Impressive, Absolon,” a female vampire with long blonde hair says, looking at both of us with a sly smile.

I try not to blush. We must have only been gone for a minute, and they must have seen or felt the shapes of us fucking like animals at high speed.

He says nothing to the woman, just holds my hand tighter and leads us out of the cigar lounge. I’m still totally out of it, overwhelmed by what happened, trying to recall each moment because I don’t want my brain to short-circuit like it did the last time he fucked me good.

I can tell Solon isn’t his usual collected self either. His step is more of a saunter than a stride, he looks relaxed and loose, his eyes bright and shining.

We walk back out into the party and Wolf is there to greet us.

Solon drops my hand and goes to slap Wolf on the back.

“Nice try,” he says with a hearty laugh, and Wolf gives him an innocent look in return. “I know what you were trying to do, golden boy.”

I’m smiling at them, feeling this warm and protective instinct toward them both, when a sulfurous smell fills my nose.

You’re the one, a sinister voice says inside my head.

I whirl around just in time to see a flash of teeth as they clamp down on my neck, my blood spilling to the floor.

Chapter Twenty-One

It takes half a second before the pain sets in, the agony of sharp foreign fangs tearing into my skin, realizing that someone, not Solon, is biting me, drinking my blood.

I scream.

The band stops playing.

The vampire sucks back my blood and then unhooks his jaw from my neck, and he’s stumbling backward a few feet with a look of awe and anger and my blood on his face, staring at me.