The Last True Vampire(30)

Her body twitched, the slightest tell that she was preparing to bolt.

“Do not think of running from me, female. It will do you little good. I’d catch you before you took even three steps.”

Her cheeks puffed as she blew out a quick breath. “Do me a favor. Don’t call me ‘female.’”

So full of fire, this one. Her outward show of defiance did nothing to hide the sweet, fragrant bloom of her desire, however. She wanted him. Craved him as surely as he craved her. A human would neither sense nor understand the connection forged between them, but Michael did. “What should I call you then, my pretty little liar?”

In the distance, the quiet purr of Ronan’s Aston Martin’s engine approached. Thank the gods. Michael felt too exposed on the street, time ticking by much too quickly. The slayers were excellent trackers. He needed to put as much distance between them and their enemies as soon as possible.

“We’re leaving.”#p#分页标题#e#

Indecision flashed over the female’s features and Michel let out a sigh. She pushed off from the brick wall and took off at a sprint. True to his word, he overtook her in three quick strides, seized her by the wrist, and hauled her back against his body. “Let me go!” The words were forced from between her teeth as she kicked her legs out and gripped his hand in an effort to pry his fingers away.

Ronan came to a stop a few feet away and Michael lifted her up into his arms, her weight as insubstantial as a feather in his grasp. Ronan came around and opened the rear passenger side door for Michael. Her protests mattered little to him at this point. Whether she realized it or not, she belonged to him now. “Fighting me will do you no good,” he said close to her ear. “You’ll simply exhaust yourself trying.”

“You can’t snatch me off the street and force me to go with you, you jerk!” She clawed at his arm, but her struggles got her nowhere. “If you put me in that car, I swear to god I’ll bail the first chance I get.”

Michael pulled away and flashed her a cold smile. Her golden eyes locked on his mouth and a flicker of fear brushed against his senses. “You are mine to protect. Mine. But I won’t hesitate to punish you if need be.” The words rumbled on a low growl in his chest. “If you attempt to do anything to harm yourself, the consequences will be dire.”

“This is kidnapping.” The pleading words left her mouth in a rush. “You’ve already killed someone tonight; do you really want to add a federal charge to your list of crimes? Let me go. I won’t say anything; I promise. The guy was going to kill me. You totally saved my ass and I appreciate it. I won’t talk to the cops; I swear.”

Michael deposited his prize in the backseat. The air left her lungs in a woof of breath and she let out an enraged shriek. “Can you lock her in?” he said to Ronan. Michael’s eyes met hers. “In case she decides to bail.”

Ronan rolled his eyes and flipped a switch on the inside of the door panel and then went around and repeated the process on the other door. “Never thought I’d need to engage the child locks.”

“If she insists on behaving like a child, we’ll have to treat her as one,” Michael replied.

“Be still, my heart,” Ronan replied over the roof of the car before he opened his own door. “All of this romance is choking me up.”

“We might be followed,” Michael said. “A direct route home might not be a good idea.”

“You act like this is my first rodeo.” Ronan buckled his seat belt and pulled out onto the street. “You just worry about protecting our cargo. I’ll worry about getting it where it needs to go.”

That’s what she was, it seemed. Cargo. A rare and valuable treasure entrusted in his safekeeping—

A barrage of images assaulted Michael’s mind and he went to his knees, cracking the sidewalk beneath him from the impact. He’d shouldered the whole of the Collective for far too long and he was breaking under the strain of memories.

The empty void where his soul had once been became full, almost to bursting . The tether spurred him past reason and the female’s scent drove him into a frenzy. Her impact upon him was unfathomable, changing him in an instant. He couldn’t keep himself from her no matter what she was or how fervently he might try to deny their bond. Their souls were tethered. She felt it as surely as he did. A sweetness permeated the air, the female’s arousal hardening his cock and elongating his fangs.

Michael gave his head a violent shake, as though he could dislodge the memory. It was too much for him to bear alone, and the images were nothing more than flashes he could make no sense of. He cradled his head in his palms, gritting his teeth against the pounding in his skull.#p#分页标题#e#