How to Discipline Your Vampire(90)

            “I have a request. I want to talk,” he said with a jaunty wag of one eyebrow.

            I hugged him tightly and gave him a peck on the mouth as I stood on my tiptoes. “You did seem a little quiet today. This had better be good, Gentry.”

            He tongued my neck, and swirled lightly on my earlobe. “That goes without saying.”

            I groaned and writhed against him. “I think I want to make a request first,” I panted.

            His mouth moved south down my neck and his tongue flicked open the buttons on my shirt. “You’re distracting me.”

            I gripped his silky black hair as he finished unbuttoning my shirt. As he kissed my navel, I pulled his head back sharply. He looked up at me with those endless indigo eyes.

            My hands ran from the top of his head, down his cheeks, and grabbed his jaw. “Now, what could make my dirty boy come back so soon?”

            He grimaced and hesitated before he spoke. “You said something in your sleep last night. I need to know if you were serious.”

            “What?” I said, raising my voice an octave. “I say a lot of stupid shit in my sleep. What was it?” Did I call him by someone else’s name? Did I cry for my mommy? Did I sing show tunes?

            He sighed. “You asked to become a vampire.”

            I gasped. “No. Way.”

            He shook his head. “I shouldn’t have said anything. Forget I even mentioned it. What girl in her right mind would want to be a monster?”

            I made a sound of disgust in my throat, annoyed by his self-pity. “That’s not what I meant. It’s just . . .” I trailed off, trying to pinpoint why this question made me so queasy. Did I say that? More important, did I want to?

            “So was it just a fantasy you were having in your sleep? Wanting to be together long-term, without the commitment fears when you’re awake?”

            “First off,” I said with a warning tone, “our relationship revolves around me calling the shots, not you. If I want something to change about our relationship, like, whether or not I was alive or dead, I’d say so.”

            William’s shoulders sagged. “Good.”

            Wait, good? He didn’t want to change me? Or did he want me to change for his own purposes? I narrowed my eyes. “Why are you asking about this?”

            “I just thought . . .”

            “What? That I’d finally be able to spank you harder?”

            His face fell. He had lost an inch in the last minute. “Don’t push me, Cerise.”

            “You seem to want to push conversations that I don’t want to push,” I exploded.

            He laughed bitterly. “And that’s part of it, too.”

            “How?”

            “Why would you want to become a vampire when you won’t even admit your feelings for me?” he finished quietly.

            “This relationship is working fine as it is. Why would you want it to be different? That’s why you asked if I was serious or not. You’re trying to get me to commit by becoming a vampire.”

            He crossed his arms. “Is it so horrible that I’d like to think of our relationship in terms of decades of sharing our love, and not years? I know it makes me sound weak, Cerise, but I need it. Love.”

            “Your journals never spoke of a need for love,” I hissed. “Just a good spanking. This is because you think I’m the weak one. I’m not enough for you the way I am.”