To bring her back, I couldn’t interfere.
Meera couldn’t adopt her.
I couldn’t mess with her fate until the night of her twenty-first birthday: a condition signed in her blood and my name to satisfy the God of Death amongst his other requests. I gave up something we both wanted. I would’ve given everything to be with her.
“Open those eyes for me, pretty girl.”
The last word hasn’t passed my lips when her eyes snap open, meeting mine. They’re a bit darker than her natural green eyes, the outside of the iris a blood red, and I’ve never seen a more beautiful thing.
My pretty girl is now a vampire.
Mine.
“Theo.” My name on her lips is a soft caress. So lovely. So sweet. “My King.”
“Happy real birthday, pretty girl.” That spark I’ve missed is in her eyes, the one she got every time I used my name for her. Because she will always be that: my pretty girl. “I’ve missed you.”
“And I love you.” She’s in front of me in an instant, a little surprised by her speed, yet I’m her focus. Her hand comes to my cheek, cupping the side of my face. “Thank you.”
“I’d do anything for you. Even if it means breaking you, to bring you back to me.”
They stripped her of everything. Her emotions. Her memories. My pretty girl was left naked and vulnerable which others took advantage of, while my hands were bound by blood to not interfere. Because doing so could mean losing her all over again.
This was her journey—her fight back to me—and I had to hurt her to bring those repressed feelings to the surface. Gabriella’s emotions and powers go hand in hand.
“I know.” Her nostrils flare a bit, scenting me. I’ll smell a little different to her. My scent is stronger than her witch senses remember. “I’d never be angry over what you did to bring me back. Never judge you, because I’d do worse if it meant being in your arms again.” Gabriella’s eyes leave mine for a second to survey the room. She’s still as adorable as ever. Still as nosy. “Why are we here, though?”
“Because I’ve hidden two gifts in this house.”
“Two gifts?” Her lips curl into a smirk, her left hand—her ring finger twitching. “Is one of them the heartbeat, I hear?”
“Possibly, but not until after.”
“After...?”
At that moment, everything hits me. Slams into her. The years apart. The loneliness.
Our needs explode. It’s violent, a palpable volcanic rush that consumes and breaks and when my arms encircle her back, I breathe for the very first time in a hundred years.
My lungs expand, and she’s all I see.
All I hear. All I feel.
I'm home.
Our mouths clash, the taste of her lips making me growl as I pull her against me. My hunger is demonic, and I don't hold back, slamming her against the wall where the painting of our bedroom in Italy hangs, her sweet little tongue caressing mine. Moreover, she's just as desperate.
Just as needy, clinging to me as though afraid I'll disappear.
“Fuck, I've missed you. Hungered for you.” My words incense her, those lithe thighs encircling my waist and she grinds, desperate to feel me. Her body was made for me. She’s a gift I’ll always treasure. “Tell me what you want, needy girl, and it's yours.”
“You. Always you.”
“Then have me.” I croon against her lips, tasting the natural sweetness that’s always been a weakness. Embedding my fingers in her hair, I tilt her head back and rake my teeth down her lips and chin, not pausing until I reach the hollow of her throat. My mark is on the right; the imprint of my teeth forever brands her as mine.
Scraps of her shirt fall to the floor; the lace of her bra is next, and her heaving chest beacons me. To taste. To worship. “Motherfuck, beautiful.”
An intricate tattoo similar to the one on my back, but on a smaller scale, now adorns her flesh. It’s the mark of the royal family and appears on its own; a pair of dark wings stretched out—open—with beads of crystals and pearls. There’s a longer strand, though, that I can’t see because it disappears under her bottoms.
“Let me see you, too,” she pleads. Her eyes roll back when I cup her tit, pinching the tight little tip between two fingers. “Please, Theo. I need my King.”
“You want me, Mia Regina?”
“To worship every solid inch.” God, I’ve missed her mouth. The way she’s always spoken her mind, never holding back her emotions.
Her love. Her anger. Her wrath.
Slanting my mouth over hers, I take it in a quick yet brutal kiss. I’m re-familiarizing myself with her plump mouth and eager tongue—hearing her moan in pleasure as I nibble and then lick her lips. And it’s like the first time all over again.
“I love you so much, Gabriella.” My tongue intertwines with hers, fighting for a dominance she succumbs to and then lets me take. To possess her like she owns me. “I’ve needed you so much all these years.”
“I love you, too,” she says, her fangs descending. And fuck me if the sight of her like this isn’t delicious. My beautiful little demon. I also do something I’ve dreamed of for over a hundred years, licking each between harsh nips of her bottom lip. “Fuck me.”
“I will.” Another bite, this time to her jaw. “You have ten minutes to do your worst, pretty girl. Anything you please.”
“Just ten?”
“Ten. Not a second more.” Placing her back on the ground, I tear her bottoms and panties off with one hand while tracing a finger from her right nipple to the left, leaving the sting behind of
