His steel eyes hold mine with such determination. “Do what you have to do, but only for a moment.”

I’m confused by his permission, but I’m too weak to resist him. His grip on my wrists relaxes, and I slowly lift my hands to his broad, muscled shoulders, holding his eyes with mine as I carefully rise to lick a little bead of sweat off his neck.

A noise rumbles in his throat, and inside me his erection returns. My breath picks up as the flavor of him spreads through my mouth. Rising higher, I press my nose against his heated skin, inhaling fresh rainwater mixed with his delicious man-scent.

I’m on fire. My moan is matched by his low growl as I trace my tongue along the line of his jaw to the ridge of muscle in his neck. I’m acting by instinct, grazing my razor-sharp teeth lightly across his skin, touching him gently with my tongue. His hips begin to move, thrusting again, and I feel the muscles in his shoulders tightening as his orgasm builds.

At last I’ve found it—the place from before, the little pin pricks. Like before, it’s so easy, a warm knife through butter. I penetrate him, and the hot, thick taste of his life spills into my mouth.

Instantly, we’re plunged into that orgasmic place, tumbling down the rabbit hole, lost in a whirlpool of giving and taking inexorable ecstasy.

“Fuck!” He groans as he comes inside me, pulsing long and hard, over and over.

My eyes are closed, my mouth attached firmly to his skin as I drown in the tsunami of pleasure, life flowing into me from all sides.

It’s harder to stop this time. I want more of him, more and more of this. He seems unable to pull away as well. He’s still in me, throbbing and gripping my hips so hard, I think they’ll break.

I might have kept going. I might have… but a beacon of light cuts through the quick thud of his heart beating strong in his chest.

STOP! The voice I recognize as mine echoes through my transformed state. It reminds me what I want. I want this man to live. I don’t want to drain his life and doom myself to living alone as a monster. I want to live with him in the light.

It takes all the strength I possess to pull out. I break my seal with a moan of regret, licking my lips to be sure none of him is wasted.

Dropping back on the bed, I close my eyes to savor the sensation of him swirling inside me. Derek… my Derek… so strong… my fighter… my hunter…

Only like before, the strange, foreign element is back. It burns longer this time before ultimately disappearing into my bloodstream.

It’s not him. It’s something else. What have you done, my love?

My brow lines with confusion as I try to understand what I’m feeling. At the same time I realize his head is down, pressed against my shoulder. He’s inside me, but his breathing has slowed and his heart rate has returned to normal.

Slowly, he lifts his head, but his expression is unreadable. His eyes move around my face, and I know my appearance has changed. I know taking his blood makes him weaker, more susceptible to my powers.

He blinks those beautiful blue eyes at me, and his next words break my heart. “I wanted to give it to you. But you’d already stolen it.”

A wave of sadness covers me, and I’m sure I’ve lost him. I betrayed him, and now he knows I can’t be trusted. I’m the same as all the rest of my kind. I’m the thing he’s dedicated his life to destroying.

Despair tightens my chest, and I close my eyes, wishing for death.

9

Discoveries Derek

Melissa’s eyes close, and silent tears slip down her temples into her hair. Her small body is locked in my arms, and I can’t let her go. I’m still trying to come down from what just happened between us, by the realization it happened before, last night.

Stuart told me what she is before I left Lafitte’s. His shifter senses detected her immediately. I didn’t want to believe him, but it answered every question I’ve had since we met.

The riddle is solved. She’s a hybrid. A vampire has bitten her, and she’s drunk its blood. All that’s left is for her to make her first kill. Only as far as I can tell, she seems to be fighting that last step.

I should be repulsed by this knowledge. I should want to stake her. At the very least, I should be angry that she bit me without my knowledge or permission. Instead I’m entwined in her arms making love to her, allowing her to taste me. It doesn’t make sense. I’m immune to her glamour. Yet… I want this. I want her. I want all of it intensely and hard and desperately.

She’s beautiful and amazing and sensual and fucking everything to me. The first night I saw her so sad and alone in the bar, I couldn’t stay away from her. Perhaps that’s what it is—I see her fighting against the curse and losing. I won’t let her lose.

I followed her out of the bar tonight, chasing her down Bourbon Street in the pouring rain, because I was angry. I wanted answers. I was going to demand she tell me she’d deceived me.

When she jumped back into my arms, and I had her trapped…

I was still angry, but her deep sadness destroyed my desire to hurt her. Her vulnerability replaced my anger with a driving need to possess her. I wanted to taste her. I wanted to fuck her the way we did last night.

Shit, the memory of last night haunted me like the wildest sexual fantasy I’d ever known. I’d never come so hard or so long in my life. I blacked out for a moment it was so intense. It radiated my scalp, and I craved another hit like the instant junkie I’d become. I wanted more of her beautiful body, her luscious sweetness…

Jesus, how has this happened to me? I don’t know. I only know it has happened, and now we’ve got to figure it out.

As soon as I release her, she turns away quickly, hiding her face in the blankets like she’s always done, hiding her fangs. Her head is down, and I slide my hand from her shoulder, down her creamy torso to the arch of her back to her rounded ass. Every inch of her is beautiful.

“Melissa?” My voice is low.

I know she’s struggling for control. Vampires are easily lost in emotion, and I’m well aware her emotions respond to me as much as mine do to her.

“Look at me.”

Her body stiffens. She’s trying to figure out a way to stall, to buy time while she fumbles back to normal. I’m not going to let her this time. No more secrets between us.

“Melissa!” Taking her shoulder, I push her back on the pillow.

“No!” Her eyes squeeze shut as her hand flies to cover her mouth.

It’s too late. I see the long, white canines piercing little dimples in her bottom lip. I feel the churn in my stomach at the sight. Even without the remnants of shifter blood in my veins, I’m trained to respond negatively to her kind.

What I’m not trained for is the flood of tears spilling down her cheeks. She tries to cover her face, to hide her sobs, but I don’t let her.

“Let me go,” she begs, twisting in my arms. It breaks my heart how much she wants to hide. She’s so ashamed.

“Melissa,” I soothe. “My beautiful Melissa.”

“No,” she whimpers. “I’m a monster. A horrible nightmare.”

Relaxing my hold on her shoulders, I allow her to turn on her side, burying her face in the pillow, her long dark hair covering her.

With a deep exhale, I fall on my back against the mattress beside her. Nothing has prepared me for this. My enemy has formed the woman of my dreams, and she’s bound to my enemy as its slave.

“You were bitten,” I say softly. I don’t know her story, but the pattern is always the same. “Did you know what it was that bit you?”

She doesn’t lift her face from the pillow. I watch as her dark head moves side to side in a gesture indicating No.