He toyed with her breasts. His erection thickened as he shallowly thrust. She dropped her head against his chest. With his fingers rolling and tugging her nipples and his length rubbing her sensitive inner muscles, she could’ve been bound to the bed, stretched and open for his pleasure.
She grasped his wrists. “Calan, we have to—”
“I have to make love to you.” He pressed his lips to her hair. His warm breath heated her scalp, and a rush of tingles added to the sensation his slow, sensual strokes created. “Lose myself in you.”
A hard lift of his hips drove his length deeper. Her inner muscles quivered. Her own release hovered within her grasp. Unable to stop herself, she dug her heels into the mattress and raised her hips. They rocked together. His push countered her drive. The sounds of sex and the delicious tightening of her muscles over his cock sent her up faster than she’d ever experienced.
He kissed her neck. “I want to greet the sunrise just like this for eternity. With you, flower. Only with you.”
The reverence and longing in his voice swelled her heart. She held the knowledge close and moved quicker over him until the actual words clicked.
“Sunrise?” She pulled herself off his cock, rolling to the side and ignoring the slight tug to her nipples, and stared down at him, hands splayed over his chest. Here she’d thought they’d only dozed off. “Sunrise? We slept all night?”
His eyes widened, and Harley felt the brush of his mind in hers. He tried to latch on to her anxiety. She shoved from the bed before he could ease her. She didn’t deserve his comfort.
Calan propped himself on a bent elbow. “Yes. I haven’t slept since before my imprisonment. You’ve given me a wonderful gift.” He narrowed his eyes. “Why are you upset?”
She shook her head and turned away to collect her clothes. She couldn’t blame him. He hadn’t had sex or touched another person in a thousand years. He’d needed everything she’d given him, especially the security of her arms. She’d held him close while he’d slept spooned behind her, a leg draped over hers as if he was afraid she’d disappear. As soon as his breathing had slowed with sleep, his mind had opened to her.
What she saw in an array of memories and emotions had convinced her that the man who’d saved her was the most noble, if not slightly frightening, one she’d ever encountered. She’d seen images of battle upon battle, horrifying displays of rage, but the flashes that chilled her the most were the ones of his siblings dying, over and over.
They all hung in similar prisons. Different bedrooms surrounded them while different tortures tore screams from their throats. One similarity remained—Calan suffered with them. Every time he touched their minds, he experienced the same pain they did. Still, Calan reached out to them, trying to comfort them the way he had for her.
Love. The emotion had wrapped around her. She’d let it work its way into her and had tugged Calan’s strong body more firmly around her. After almost a decade of staying up all night, she’d thought she’d have no problem keeping her eyes open. The warmth of his body and his comforting scent ripped her convictions apart.
Harley yanked her top over her head, slipped on her thong, and bent to pick up her jeans. Warm palms on her ass jerked her upright. Calan hooked his arms around her waist and pulled her firmly against him. His cock pushed, hard and needy, into her spine.
“Tired of me already?”
“No, of course not.” She turned in the loose circle of his arms and slid her hands over his chest. “I told you about Raul. He threatened my family if I didn’t go to him by sunrise.”
Red seeped into the whites of the eyes focused on her. She sucked in a rough breath, not at the sight of the blood filling them. The images he unintentionally showed her last night had clued her in to exactly what her lover could become. The form she would’ve assumed belonged to a monster if she didn’t know the soul inside didn’t frighten her. It was the sight of two distinct rings of blue in his eyes that stopped her heart.
The hazy dark blue circling his pupil that had developed yesterday now formed a solid band, eclipsing his familiar color.
“Your ey—”
“Do you not think I will keep my promise of protecting your brother?” Calan’s orbs took on a faint glow.
“I do, but—”
“But you think I’ll fail?”
“No! But I need to go to him and—”
“What? Bind him to you? Give him your love, which I hope to earn? What, Harley? What do you need to do?”
The guttural growl to his voice drew her gaze to his mouth. Pointy molars replaced his flat teeth. The sight of them made her shudder. She shoved the fear away and stood on her tiptoes. The deadly fangs lengthened. His jaw cracked. The sharp ends on his fingernails dented the skin of her hips. She dug her fingers into his hair and pulled his head to hers, bringing them eye-to-eye. He might be angry, but so was she. Angry at herself. “Never. I’m not binding him to me, not willingly at least. And that’s how it has to happen, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, to claim a redcap, there’s a ceremony performed that binds him to your body, then your soul. The redcap and every sluagh he creates can then ultimately be controlled by you.”
He didn’t tell her how it was done. Fine by her. She had no plans on tying Raul or any redcap to her. The very idea disgusted her. “Good, then you have nothing to worry about. You are the only man I want bound to me, body or soul.”
A smile spread over his face. Her toes curled under
