He sucked in a breath. There was only one way that happened. If they were mates.
Which was something he could never have.
Jesus, but she was making him think, making him consider. Making him want.
No.
“How old are you?” he asked.
She swallowed the bite she was chewing and wiped her mouth with a napkin. “Twenty.”
Nikolai dropped his head to his knees with a groan.
“Almost twenty-one,” she said, cracking open a new bottle of water Leo had brought in with the tray.
His gaze cut back to her. “When?”
She wiped her wet lips with the back of her hand. “My birthday’s on Friday.”
What kind of fate would lead him to this brave, beautiful creature, a woman who had saved and protected him, at the height of her blood power for just four more days, when he could never claim her, never have her? Not for keeps.
She rose from the bed and stepped around him to return the tray to the table.
Her scent wrapped around his heart, his cock. Heat flickered across his right palm. “Goddammit,” he snapped. All the signs were there.
“What?” she said.
He couldn’t let himself be seduced by an impossible idea. He sprung to his feet and made for the door, still open from his earlier rushed entry. “I have to go.”
“Why?” She followed after him, the alluring beat of her heart and intoxicating femininity revealing her place within the room.
He couldn’t stop, couldn’t reply, couldn’t look at her. If he did, there’d be no going back. He grasped the edge of the door.
Small hands fisted in the back of his shirt. “Wait. Why are you leaving? I mean, did I—”
He halted, heart slamming against his sternum, fangs stretched out and aching. “Release me,” he rasped.
She heaved a shaky breath he felt against his arm. “I…can’t.”
“Release. Me,” he said louder. Competing emotions warred within him until he thought he might split apart.
“Nikolai—”
It was his name rolling off her tongue that did it.
He whirled and buried his hands in her hair. He pulled her to him, causing them both to stumble, and he backed her into the ancient bars of the door. It clicked shut, sealing them in and cutting off the last of his restraint.
Tilting her head back, Nikolai devoured her mouth. His lips sucked, his tongue explored, his fangs rubbed against her moist flesh. Oh, God, she was so sweet and warm and wet. He stepped into her, forcing their bodies together from chest to thighs. And, goddammit, she was soft everywhere he was hard.
Her hands curled around his neck and climbed into his hair, fingers tangling and tugging. She pulled him in tighter and surrendered to the kiss. She met him stroke for stroke, their tongues curling and twining together.
And Nikolai no longer knew who was surrendering to whom.
*
Kate was adrift in sensation. She felt engulfed by the heat rolling off Nikolai’s big body, which was hunched around her possessively. His hard muscles flexed and bunched against her, setting her on fire everywhere they touched. His warm, spicy smell invaded her brain until it was the only thing she knew. His tongue in her mouth, his hands all over her—she couldn’t fight it. In truth, she didn’t want to. Earlier, when it seemed he planned to kiss her, she’d resisted the idea, kept her body from succumbing to the instinctual pull and leaning toward his. But now, even though he represented everything she’d never wanted, she could no longer deny that something about him spoke to her body, her psyche, her very soul. She was totally and completely seduced by her vampire.
A groan sounded from deep in his throat, conveying pure, desperate need, and he pressed harder into her. Against her back, the iron bars formed an inescapable cage. In front of her, his body towered over and confined her, emphasizing the thick ridge of his erection straining against her belly. She’d never felt more free than she did in that moment, utterly trapped by Nikolai.
And if his preternatural power wasn’t prominent enough in the sheer strength of his body around hers, the hard edges of his fangs against her lips and tongue wouldn’t let her forget it. Fascinated despite herself, she wrapped her tongue around a fang and flicked at it. Nikolai growled and ground the steel length of his cock into her hip.
Kate went hot and wet between her legs, completely overwhelmed by her body’s ecstatic reaction to his. Never had she imagined she’d be capable of such euphoria. She’d certainly never felt it before. Maybe she wouldn’t again. The thought unleashed a current of panic into the lust flowing through her, because what she was feeling for Nikolai was so much more than physical.