She started riding him, her thighs spread across his hips, her sex grinding on his as if they were naked together and making love. Even through the nylon warmups he wore, he could feel Tess‘s intense heat. Her panties were wet from desire, the sweet scent of her arousal slamming into his brain like a hammer.
―Christ,‖ he gasped, reaching up to grab the headboard as her feeding rose to a frenzied crescendo.
She rocked on him, faster and harder, her blunt human teeth latching on to his neck as she sucked deeper than ever at his vein. He felt her climax swelling, breaking loose. His own was roaring up on him fast as well, his shaft surging, leaping, ready to blow. The second Tess came, Dante surrendered to his own release. The orgasm crashed into him, laying him low, wringing him out. He was lost to it, unable to stop the fierce pulsations that seemed to go on endlessly as Tess settled on top of him in a sated, heavy sleep.
After a while, Dante unclamped his hands from the headboard and brought them down gently on Tess‘s slack body. He wanted to be inside her, needed it like he needed air to breathe, but she was vulnerable right now and he would not use her. Now that she was out of danger, there would be other times for them to be together like this, better times.
God, there had to be.
CHAPTER Thirty-one
Tess came awake gently, her face breaking through the surface of a warm, dark wave that floated her body toward a welcoming shore. She took a breath and felt cool, cleansing air rush into her lungs. Her eyes blinked open, once, twice, the lids feeling heavy as though she‘d been asleep for days.
―Hello, angel,‖ said a deep, familiar voice very near her face.
Tess lifted her gaze until she saw him—Dante, looking down on her, his eyes sober but smiling. He stroked her forehead, smoothing damp strands of hair out of her face.
―How do you feel?‖
―Okay.‖ She felt better than okay, her body resting on a soft mattress, cocooned in black silk sheets and the strong shelter of Dante‘s arms.
―Where are we?‖
―Someplace safe. This is where I live, Tess. Nothing can harm you here.‖
She registered his assurances with a pang of confusion, something shadowy and cold hovering at the edges of her consciousness. Fear. She didn‘t feel it now, not for him, but the feeling lingered like a mist clinging to her skin, chilling her. She had been afraid a short while ago—deathly afraid.
Tess reached a hand up to her neck. Her fingers made contact there with a patch of inflamed, tender skin. Like a sudden flash of lightning, a memory ripped through her mind: a hideous face, with eyes as bright as lit coals, a mouth opened wide in a terrifying hiss, baring huge sharp teeth.
―I was attacked,‖ she murmured, the words forming even before the memory took full root.
―They came up to me on the street and they... attacked me. Two of them dragged me off the street and they—‖
―I know,‖ Dante said, carefully removing her hand from her neck. ―But you‘re all right, Tess. It‘s over, and you don‘t have to be afraid now.‖
In a blur of recollection, the night‘s events played in fast-forward through her mind. She relived it all, from her walk past Ben‘s apartment and the realization that someone other than him was inside the place, to the shocking sight of seeing the large men—if they even were men at all—
leaping down from the balcony to the street below and chasing after her. She saw their terrible faces, felt the bruising strength of the hands that seized her and pulled her into the dark where the real brutality was to begin.
She could still feel the terror of that moment, when one man held her arms and the other pinned her down with the weight of his huge muscular body. She‘d thought she would be raped, probably beaten as well, but her attackers‘ intent was only slightly less horrific.
They had bitten her.
The two savage monsters held her down like felled prey on the floor of a dark, dilapidated shed. Then they bit her at the neck and wrist and began to drink her blood.
She had been certain she was going to die there, but then something miraculous happened. Dante happened. He had killed them both, a fact Tess had not so much seen as felt. Lying on the rough plywood floor of the shed, the smell of her own blood choking her senses, she had felt Dante‘s presence. She had felt his rage fill the small space like a tempest of black heat.
―You... you were there too, Dante.‖ Tess sat up, her body seeming miraculously strong, no lingering aches from her ordeal. Now that her mind was clearing, she felt energized and refreshed, like she had just awoken from a deep, rejuvenating sleep.
―You found me there. You saved me, Dante.‖
His smile seemed haunted, as if he wasn‘t sure he agreed and didn‘t feel comfortable with her gratitude. But he wrapped his arms around her and pressed a tender kiss to her lips. ―You‘re alive, and that‘s all that matters.‖