A Hunger Like No Other

clinging to him, her small body quivering.

'Emma, look at me.'

She faced him, her silvery eyes mesmerizing. He knew her, she felt familiar, and yet he knew he'd never seen anything like the stunning creature she was. She tilted her head, regarding him with an unsure expression.

'I want to touch you. I want to bring you to come.'

She glanced at his torn hands with raised eyebrows.

'Then I'll kiss you. Pull your undergarments aside and kneel up right here.'

She shook her head slowly.

'Why?'

She whispered, 'Because these things keep escalating.'

'I dinna break my vow now.' Hands still clenched, he lowered his voice to say, 'I ache, I want to pleasure you so much.'

He saw her eyes grow soft just before she put her forehead to his. As if she couldn't help herself, she leaned in to lick and tease at his lips. Her hair fell forward, brushing his neck. Her exquisite scent washed over him, and he felt himself growing hard again.

Between her kisses, he rasped, 'Why can this no' go further?'

'This isn't me,' she murmured. 'I'm not like this. I barely even know you.'

Sheer frustration welled in him at her ridiculous assertions, said between tonguing his lips. He believed they were sentiments she felt she ought to be saying. 'Yet you've taken my blood directly from my body? That's as intimate an act as two can have.'

In an instant, she stiffened and drew back. 'That's true and regrettable. But I couldn't share myself so completely with someone I don't trust.' She rose and then curled up in the chair. 'Someone who's been so unkind…'

'Emma, I—'

'You know you have been. And just three nights ago, you frightened me more than I've ever been in my entire life. Yet now you want something from me?' She was trembling. 'Just leave. Please? For once?'

He growled in frustration, but he did limp to the door. At the hallway adjoining the rooms, he turned and said, 'You've bought yourself a few hours. The next time you drink, you're mine and we both know it.' The door slammed behind him.

Emma lay in her nest on the floor, tossing in her blankets. When had her clothing become so textured? She seemed to feel every line of thread against her sensitive breasts and belly.

And she wore silk.

Just thinking about what she'd done to him made her hips undulate as if she could still feel him beneath her. She'd made him…have an orgasm, by riding him.

Her face burned hot. Was she becoming Emma the Wanton?

And she'd almost experienced one, too. When she'd bathed, she'd found herself wetter than she'd ever been. She was beginning to suspect that blood lust for her wasn't the craving to drink, it was sexual lust because of drinking.

He was right—the next time she took from him, he could make her his, because tonight, she'd temporarily lost her mind, forgetting why she couldn't sleep with him. Though she'd desperately wanted to convince herself otherwise, she wasn't the type of person who could give it up without some kind of bond or commitment.

She didn't think of herself as old-fashioned about sex—there was, after all, a reason for her familiarity with Skinemax—and she had a very healthy attitude about the whole subject, for all that she'd never had an orgasm. But she knew deep down that she would need something lasting—and that it could never be with him.

Besides the fact that he was a crude and menacing Lykae who delighted in her discomfort, she couldn't imagine taking him among her friends. She couldn't see him watching movies at the manor, eating the popcorn she always made just so she could smell it and throw it at anyone who stood in front of the screen. He wouldn't fit in with her family because they would be sickened at the very sight of 'an animal' touching her. And because they would always be plotting to kill him and such.

Not to mention that in addition to all of their differences, he had another female out there who had some cosmic destiny to be his.

Emma was up for a little healthy competition, but against a Lykae's mate…?

Well. Now she was just being silly—

He knocked on the adjoining door, opening it without a decent pause, but luckily she'd cut out all that lolling and petting her breasts business.

His hair was wet from a recent shower, and he leaned against the doorway in jeans that rode just a little below his waist and just a little loose—as they should. He wore no shirt and she noticed one of his palms had a knot of cloth around it. She swallowed. Injured from when he'd cracked her headboard as he came.

He crossed his arms over that muscled chest. Her appreciation for it bordered on idolatry. She would so give him another amen…

'Tell me one thing about you that I doona know,' he demanded.

When able to force her gaze to his face, she debated, then finally said, 'I went to college and got a degree in popular culture.'

He appeared impressed, but of course he hadn't been around this time long enough to know that most people thought pop culture was a do-you-want-fries-with-that degree. He nodded, turning toward his room, and because he didn't expect her to, she said, 'Tell me one thing.'

When he faced her again, he did appear surprised she'd asked. His voice gravelly, he answered, 'I think you're the most beautiful creature I've ever seen.'

She was certain he heard her gasp before he closed the door.

He'd called her beautiful!

Before, she'd only felt a sad resignation, but now she was giddy. Oh, she was in a bad way. Her emotions were like a crazy compass dial, spinning wildly—

She narrowed her eyes, realizing what this was. Stockholm syndrome. Surely. Identifying with your bullying captor? Check. Forming an attachment to him? Check.

But in all fairness to herself, how many captors—actively acquiring—were six-and-a-half-foot-tall gods with delicious, sun-darkened skin, the coolest accent, and the warmest, hardest body she'd ever dreamed of? All this and the predilection to wrap that body around her? All this and he thought she was beautiful.

Not to mention the fact that he couldn't seem to give her enough of his luscious blood.

Was she becoming this Lykae's Patty Hearst?

Didn't matter. The bottom line was that she wasn't his mate, so even if he did seduce her and they had a little some-something going on, she'd be merely idling time until he found his true one. And if she got herself nailed and bailed by a man like Lachlain, she thought she might turn into one of those blubbery, weepy females. Which was not an option.

She was relieved she wasn't this mate of his. She was. If she had been his mate, it would have been like a life sentence. He would never let her go, she'd be browbeaten and miserable with him, and if she escaped he would come for her until her aunts finally killed him.

Her coven would delight in it. If they found out he'd kissed her and touched her intimately, they would unleash hell on him and his kind. As far as she knew, she was the only one of her coven ever to be touched by a Lykae.

And her mother had been the only one to fully succumb to a vampire.

Emma woke at sunset, sensing something.

She scanned the darkened room, popping up her head, peeking over the side of the bed, but saw nothing. She told herself it was nothing, even as she hastily dressed and packed, then rushed to Lachlain's room.

She found him still clad only in those jeans, with no blanket to cover him because he'd used his to secure her window. Right before her eyes, he began shuddering as though in the grip of a nightmare. He rumbled words in Gaelic, and his skin grew slick with sweat. All the muscles in his body tensed as if he was in great pain.