Page 160 of Hunted

I give him one more. Then another. Another.

Until the smell of blood fills the air. Starts a curious flood at the back corners of my jaw that slowly fills my mouth with a stark, clawing hunger. Escalates when Valentin fucks me harder as he drinks me down. As my nails dig into his shoulders hard enough to draw blood.

Blood I curiously stare at before, with a feral little moan, I flick my tongue at.

He tenses for a single moment, but then his hips keep thrusting, driving delirium with every motion, as he drags his tongue over the bite before he lifts his head.

‘Does my fierce little hunter have a craving too?’ he slurs, his fangs and bottom lip faintly red with my blood.

I barely recognise the woman whose head bobs in a nod.

Who watches his eyes flare with a special kind of madness as first he drags his tongue across his left fang, hard enough to slash the flesh and create a small well of blood. Then as the bead drops to the tip of his tongue, he lifts his middle finger, pricks the soft pad against his right fang.

I’m floored with sensations I can’t describe as Valentin lowers his head, dragging his blood-soaked tongue across my bottom lip. And when my tongue darts out to lick it, he swoops, stroking my tongue with his.

At the first taste of Valentin’s blood, a million sensations bombard me, each more feral, more euphoric than the last.

And sweet angels in heaven, now I get it. Why men, women and creatures who roam this Earth crave vampire blood. It’s… it’s… ‘Oh… Gods.’

He groans against my mouth, his finger probing our joined mouths. More of his blood spills onto my tongue and a higher madness engulfs me as I suck on his finger.

Then… I feel it before I hear it.

A presence. Brushing the edges of my mind.

Little hunter.

I jolt so hard my breath stutters. Then I freeze, pussy clamped around him and eyes flying to his. Then to his unmoving mouth.

Little hunter, he repeats and I know he didn’t say the words out loud.

“Valentin?” I blurt.

He doesn’t look surprised. If anything, he looks… delighted.

Sì, cacciatrice.

Why the response in his ancient mother tongue sends fresh jolts through me is a matter for later. I shake my head but his gaze remains steady. Knowing.

“Did you just—?” I rasp, and then the voice is there again, lower, darker, threaded with heat that belongs nowhere near my thoughts.

Yes. I am here, Eira.

Oh. My. Gods. My skin goes tight with shock. And he hisses when I clamp tighter around him. “How?”

His mouth curves, sinful and satisfied, and then the words slide into my mind like velvet over a blade.

You took my blood. You invited it.

A shiver goes through me so intense it borders on panic – and then turns into something else because the intimacy of it is obscene. This is him inside my head while his cock is inside me, his attention and his shaft both stroking places hands can’t reach, his voice filling the private space where I keep my secrets and turning it into another kind of bed.

“Can you do this with everyone? Other than your Twelve, I mean,” I whisper aloud, because my voice feels too small for what I’m experiencing. And already there’s a possessiveness that makes me a little feral to think it’s a gift shared freely.

His hands tighten on my hips.

Not everyone. A pause, almost wry. Not lately. I have not gifted my blood in a long time.

The words feel profound and heavy. Too heavy. Too pleasing.