Page 52 of Blood Moon Bound

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Constantine

I held Delphine carefully in my arms as Veera sped for home. “You’re safe now, sweetheart. No one will hurt you ever again.”

She stared up at me, eyes wide, trying and failing to hide her pain. “Y-you left me.”

I shook my head. “Never. You were here.” I touched my chest and felt my now beating heart. Something I never thought would happen in my wildest dreams. “The entire time. It was yours. Only yours. You brought me back to life.” When I’d heard her scream, my heart felt as if it exploded through my ribs. Now I could feel it, beating steadily in my chest.

“But Veera…”

“She’s one of my warriors, a friend, nothing more.”

She drew in a shaky breath as her eyes closed briefly. When they opened again, what I saw had me pulling her tighter to me.

“Y-you won’t ever leave me again, will you?”

“No, my precious one. I’ll never leave you again.” And I meant it. I was done with war, with fighting. I’d protected my race for hundreds of years. It was time to live again, with my Delphine.

“I only ran because I couldn’t bear to be in your home without you. I couldn’t be there b-believing you weren’t coming back, that you didn’t want me.”

“I should’ve told you what I was doing. I was worried you’d hate me for what I had to do.” Rage still pumped through me, but the scent of Douglas’s blood lingering on my clothes, the reminder of his death, helped a little to calm me. Veera had taken care of John, and Bentham had just been a bonus.

We sped up the driveway, and I held Delphine close as I rushed her inside. She was badly wounded. Her back was torn open and there were burns on her skin. She was hungry and weak. The checklist of my mate’s pain made me want to bring Douglas back to life and end him again, but far slower this time.

Alice gasped as I rushed by.

“I need to clean her wounds,” I said and took the stairs two at a time.

My bedroom door was open, and I carried Delphine in and laid her on the bed on her stomach. Alice rushed in behind me and handed me the supplies I needed.

“Prepare some food. She needs to feed but will need to eat as well.” Alice gave my shoulder a squeeze and rushed off to do as I bid. “I need to clean your wounds before I feed you and the healing starts. It might hurt.”

She nodded as I took the knife from my boot and cut the gown from her body, revealing every slice and bruise and burn. My blood boiled in my veins at the damage done to her.

I cleaned them as quickly and carefully as I could, every one of her muffled whimpers tearing me apart. The thought of her with Douglas, for not only the last couple of days but most of her life, wasn’t something I could stomach.

“Has he done this to you before?” I asked.

There was a pause. “No…he never hurt me, but he would…tell me how he hurt others, would make me listen to their screams at the door. Punishment if I angered him. He’d tell me that he dreamed about…about cutting me.” Her breath shuddered from her. “And th-the only reason he hadn’t was because if he started, he wouldn’t be able to stop. He’d end up killing me and I was worth more to him alive.”

Fury pumped through me all over again. I couldn’t speak for a long time and made myself focus on tending her wounds—until something caught my eye on the bedside table, a long-stemmed red rose. It’d been dried, its crinkled, velvety petals a deeper shade now, and so fragile. It was the rose I’d left on Delphine’s pillow that night, I knew it instantly. She’d kept it, dried it, so she’d always have it.

I’d searched for the perfect bloom for so long, desperate to erase the pain I’d seen in her eyes, pain I’d caused, and I realized that night, my little bride had stolen my heart even before she’d brought it back to life, before I allowed myself to see the truth myself.

When I was done, I crawled over her and began the slow process of licking every cut to hasten her healing. “Okay? Am I hurting you?”

“It feels hot, tingly, but it doesn’t hurt.”

I moved over her body until I’d tended every slice and burn. She’d relaxed some, but I hadn’t, and I wouldn’t until she’d fed. Carefully moving her over me, I tilted my head and led her to my vein. She was too weak to strike fast, and the slow way her fangs sunk deep had pleasure-pain shooting through me, making me instantly hard for her.

I ignored it. I ignored everything that wasn’t ensuring Delphine got what she needed. She moaned softly as she drew deeply on my vein, the weak movements of her body growing stronger with every swallow of my blood.

A growl rumbled from me when the scent of her arousal filled my senses. I’d been without her for three long weeks. Missing everything about her, longing to hear her voice or catch her scent in the house, to see her sweet smile or have those wide lavender eyes on me.

To feel her lips against mine—to sink inside her heat and claim her over and over again.

She bent her knee, her thigh sliding over mine, pressing her hot, wet pussy against me.