stripped it from her, he snatched the small case from his jacket and plucked the ring out. He seized her left hand and pressed the ring down her finger. 'This shows my claim on you,' he grated. 'Take it off right now if you truly don't want to marry me.'
The metal was hot like a brand, the ring fitting her perfectly. She could no more take it off than she could quit breathing.
'I want you, Néomi. Forever.' Just before he took her lips again, he rasped, 'Want me, too.'
As his kiss deepened, he yanked up her gown to her waist. When he sensuously palmed her sex, she responded as if he'd lit a fuse, growing damp in a rush. Her hands were desperately seeking all over his body.
When she unzipped his pants and tugged free his rigid shaft, the broad head nudged against her entrance.
With his hand splayed over her chest, he pressed her back to the mirror. She drew her bent legs up, placing her heels on the edge of the dresser, as open for him as she could be. With a groan, he swooped his arms under her knees, then leaned forward.
Caging her in, surrounding her, he entered her body. Possessing her. 'I feel you pulling away from me.' With a long, hard stroke, he murmured, 'Don't... '
He watched her expression, the emotion in her eyes. This is a good-bye. Even as he was inside her, she was telling him good-bye. And I don't even know why.
With everything he felt for her, he took her, driving between her thighs. His shaft throbbed within her tight sheath as he struggled not to come, wanting this to last forever.
The more she pulls away... He would never let her go. Never.
Take her... claim her completely. The last barrier between them. Conrad needed to bite her, to mark her, like an animal. He was the monster they all thought him.
No! He had to fight... had to overcome the instinct.
He felt his fangs sharpening. As his hips bucked, he found himself easing toward her pale neck, drawn to the hectic pulse he could see so clearly. Possess her completely. He licked her, preparing her.
Lost...
He pierced her tender skin; the sweetest flesh he'd ever tasted closed tight around his aching fangs. Was she moaning? He could feel the sound.
His eyes flashed open when he began sucking her, because God help her... he knew he'd do this again.
As her rich blood hit his tongue and slid down his throat like silk and wine, he groaned in ecstasy. Heat seared through his veins. Her heat. Her essence.
'Stop now.' Her words were faint compared to the exquisite beating of her heart in his ears.
No. Want more. Sucking harder.
'You'll hurt me,' she whispered.
Must have this.
'Conrad... '
With a will he hadn't known he possessed, he stopped taking. But he left his fangs in her flesh, growling against her damp skin as his seed erupted from his body in mind-numbing waves. Connection. Marked. Mine... .
When he drew back from her, he studied her face. Her cheeks were pinkened. He hadn't hurt her.
He'd bitten her. He'd taken her blood. And it had felt like it was supposed to happen. He'd heard her moaning. She'd taken pleasure from his bite. I didn't hurt her—
She burst into tears. With her bottom lip trembling, her eyes glittering, she whispered, 'How could you, Conrad?' She raised her hand to slap him—the closest to fury he'd ever seen her.
37
'What is wrong with me?' At the folly yet again. All the night creatures around him were silent, as if they sensed his threat. 'Why can't I be right?' he roared to the night.
Néomi hadn't been physically hurt, but she'd been inconsolable. 'You have no idea what you've done!' she'd cried. The hand poised to strike him had faltered. She'd closed it to a fist before lowering it, without giving him the hit he'd deserved.
As her gaze had flickered over his face, the expressions he'd grown used to seeing had been absent. There'd been none of her looks of pride in him, or glances brimming with desire.
She'd appeared betrayed.
For an hour he retraced his habitual path along the water's edge. He scarcely registered it when the skies opened up and poured. Earlier when he'd left the room, he thought he'd heard her beginning to cry harder. To cry over him.
It made his chest feel hollow, and his new heartbeats pained him. Hell, could death feel worse than he did now?
The only thing that heartened was that she hadn't removed the ring. They'd both glanced at it and then met eyes. He'd felt sure she'd throw it in his face.
But she hadn't rejected his claim on her. Not yet.
A sound behind him. At first he thought she'd followed him out into the rain, and he twisted around, words rising from his tongue. I'm in love with you. I will do better. I won't hurt you again—
Eight swordsmen greeted him, weapons drawn, Tarut among them. There weren't many males that Conrad had to tilt his head to meet their eyes, but this was one of them.
Goddamn it, how could Conrad have been so careless? His senses had never failed him before. The demon could have walked up right behind him and sliced off his head, before Conrad would even have known.
'Will you trace, Wroth?' Tarut said, raising his voice over the rain. 'Or fight?'
'Finally ready to die?'
One last battle, then. If Conrad was defeated, then maybe it would for the best. When Néomi left him, the memories would take over once more, and he'd be lost anyway.
Or if he won... She hadn't taken off his ring. If he won, he wouldn't let her leave him.
Let fate decide my future.
There were eight swordsmen against him, and he was weaponless. But Conrad would be fighting for her— because he'd vowed if he killed Tarut and rid himself of the mark, then she'd become his wife.
Things became simple. Kill eight; keep her forever.
Conrad's fangs sharpened. He ran his tongue along one, the blood like a hit of adrenaline. Obstacles stood between him and what he wanted. He sneered at the demons. They had no idea what they'd stumbled into. Eliminate the obstacles.
He charged the closest one. In a flash, Conrad's hand shot out, ripping the demon's throat from its neck. Blood spurt. In his mind, these beings kept him from Néomi. A surge of fury coursed through him. They were a threat to her very life.
Conrad reached the next one, grabbing it by the horns, twisting the head until vertebrae cracked. His fingers bit into the demon's thick skin, ripping the beast apart with his hands.
They'd dared bring death to his and Néomi's home... .
Rage erupted in him—never had Conrad felt its equal. And soon... he succumbed to the frenzy, doing what he did best.
As Néomi peered into the mirror at the two pinpoints of blood on her neck, she shivered all over again.
The bite that had given her such pleasure also spelled her doom. She'd never felt more connected to a living person, and once it was over, never more betrayed.
Now she felt only regret. Her anger with Conrad had been akin to chastening a beast of prey for hunting. He was a vampire; he'd bitten her. She knew he hadn't made a conscious decision to do it. He'd appeared confounded, appalled with himself as he'd grated, 'I'm supposed to protect you from men like me.'
She gazed down at the breathtaking ring he'd bought for her, but she couldn't bring herself to remove it. He'd
