"I want to see you," she gasped in between his hungry kisses. "I need to see you, Rio..."
She didn't wait for his permission.
Casting her hand about, she found the lamp beside the sofa and clicked it on. Soft yellow light bathed the room in illumination. Rio was poised above her, straddling her hips with his knees as he stared down at her in what looked to be pure misery.
His eyes were glowing fiery amber. His features were drawn taut, his jaw held locked but not quite able to mask the astonishing length or sharpness of his fangs. The dermaglyphs on his shoulders and arms were churning with color - beautiful, deep saturations in a range of burgundy, indigo, and gold.
And his scars...well, she saw them too. Couldn't really ignore them, and she didn't try to.
Dylan came up onto one elbow and reached up to him with her other hand. He flinched, turning his face to the left like he meant to hide his ruined cheek. But Dylan wasn't about to let him hide. Not now. Not from her. She reached out again, tenderly placing her palm against the hard line of his jaw.
"Don't," he said thickly.
"It's okay." She gently turned him to face her full-on. With the utmost care, she lightly caressed the scarred skin. She followed the damage to his body, smoothing her fingers down the side of his neck, to his shoulder and biceps, over the skin that had once been as smooth and flawless as the rest of him. "Does it hurt for me to touch you like this?"
He said something, but it came out strangled, unintelligible.
Dylan sat up fully, lifting herself until her face was level with his. She held his gaze, making sure those thin, catlike pupils stayed rooted on her eyes as she softly stroked his cheek, his jaw, his wonderfully sensual mouth.
"Don't look at me, Dylan," he croaked, the very thing he'd said before, she realized now. "Fuck...how can you look at me so closely - how can you put your hands on me - and not be revolted?"
Dylan's heart squeezed up like a fist in her breast. "I'm looking at you, Rio. I see you. I'm touching you. You, " she said with emphasis.
"These scars - "
"Are incidental," she finished for him. She smiled as she glanced down at his mouth and at the perfectly white, perfectly incredible pair of fangs that had sprouted from his gums. "Your scars are the most ordinary thing about you, if you want to know the truth."
His lip curled back as if he were going to push her away with more talk of his perceived defects, but Dylan didn't give him the chance. She held his face in her hands and leaned in close, giving him a deep, unhurried, passionate kiss.
She moaned as his hands wove into her hair and he kissed her back.
Dylan wanted him so fiercely, she could hardly stand it. God, the whole thing made no sense - this craving she had for a man she hardly knew and for so many reasons should be terrified of, not kissing like there was no tomorrow.
But she didn't want to stop kissing Rio. She put her arms around his shoulders and drew him down with her, back onto the sofa. His hair was silky against her palm, his mouth hot and questing on hers. His hand was strong but gentle as he slipped beneath the hem of her tee-shirt and smoothed his palm up her stomach and then over her bare breasts. Dylan writhed as he caressed her, his fingers teasing her nipples into hard, aching buds while his tongue played along the seam of her mouth.
"Oh, God," she gasped, burning for him already.
He wedged himself deeper between her thighs, spreading her wide with his knees and grinding his stiff erection against her through their clothes. She nearly came from the delicious friction of their bodies. Good Christ, she was going to climax for sure if he kept up that fluid rhythm that left no doubt as to what kind of lover he would be once they had their clothes off.
Dylan lifted her feet and locked her ankles around his hips, letting him know that she was willing to go wherever he wanted to take this. She wasn't used to throwing herself at a man's feet - could hardly remember the last time she'd had sex at all, let alone good sex - but she could think of nothing she wanted more than to be making love with Rio. Right here. Right now.
He sucked her lower lip between his teeth as he rolled his hips against hers. She reveled in the graze of his fangs, in the hard, driving thrust of his body and the flex of his muscles under her palms. He slid his hand between her legs, his fingers cleaving her wet, hot flesh, and Dylan could not hold back the cry that curled up from her throat.
"Yes," she hissed sharply as an orgasm rolled up on her out of nowhere. "Oh, God...Rio..."
She was spiraling inside, lost in pleasure, and clutching Rio as her core pulsed with her release. She heard his wild sounding growl, registered dimly that he had broken their kiss to let his lips wander down along the column of her throat. She wrapped her arms around him as he nuzzled her neck, his tongue playing hotly against her tender skin.
The rough stroke of his teeth in that spot startled her.
She tensed, even though she didn't want to be afraid of what might come next. But she couldn't call back the automatic reaction, and Rio drew away from her as if she'd screamed at the top of her lungs.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, reaching for him but he was already gone, moving off her and taking himself more than an arm's length from the sofa. Dylan sat up, feeling oddly bereft. "I'm sorry, Rio. I just wasn't sure..."
"Don't apologize," he muttered sullenly. "Madre de Dios, do not apologize to me, please. This was my fault, Dylan."
"No," she said, desperate that he stay with her. "I want this, Rio."
"You shouldn't," he said. "And I would not have been able to stop."