His smile was slow and reluctant. “Maybe you really have begun turning into a vampire. Because you may have read my mind.”
“It’s not hard to predict stupid.”
Lucian let out a surprised laugh, then his expression sobered. “I learned a long time ago not to love. The more my kind care, the deeper the eventual scars run. The more we love, the more we grieve.”
“Then you really are dead. If you’re too scared to love because you don’t want it to hurt, then you’re not living. You’re just existing. I don’t care if I am turning into a vampire or if Bennigan shows up in an hour and kills us both. I’m going to live. And that means loving you, whether you like it or not.”
He didn’t answer at first, but his fingertips ran a goose-bump inducing path down my cheek and neck. He looked lost in thought before he finally spoke. “I care more about you than I am willing to accept. Enough that it frightens me. Enough that I don’t know what limits I wouldn’t push past or what barriers I wouldn’t break. You’ve become my everything, and the thought of someone taking you away or hurting you is too much to bear.”
“Then let me promise you something. If you ever think about disappearing on me again or doing the honorable thing and leaving, I will recklessly come looking for you. I’ll turn over every rock and ask every vampire where you are until I’m in so much more danger because you left than I ever would’ve been if you stayed.”
He searched my eyes, then a half smile formed on his lips. “You mean every word of that, don’t you?”
“All you have to do is look at what happened the first time you tried leaving. I went and turned myself into a vampire and got kidnapped within twenty-four hours. Imagine if you try it again.”
Lucian nodded, smiling. “Then I have no choice. I do love you, Cara. More than I can understand. And it seems as though you’ve checkmated me.”
I chewed my lip. “You promise to stop trying to run away from me?”
“I promise to stay right here. Loving you. Protecting you. For as long as we have.”
“That’s the sweetest thing a guy wearing women’s pants has ever told me.”
Lucian smirked, then hiked up his tight-fitting pants. “Maybe we’d both be more comfortable if I took these off.”
I arched an eyebrow. “The backseat of that car was pretty spacious.”
“I also noticed that.”
36
Lucian
I kissed Cara, backing her toward the car as I awkwardly tried to free myself of the ill-fitting clothes. As much as her physical presence was all-consuming, I still felt the rush of excitement from our conversation—from telling her the truth and feeling her rip away my last thread of resistance.
She was right.
The only way to keep her safe was to stay.
She would put herself in more danger if I tried to do the honorable thing and leave.
It meant there were no more barriers. No more reasons I couldn’t be with her in every way. And there was no denying what had happened to her. She may not be ready to hear it yet, but I could smell it on her and sense it through the bond, which had begun transforming, just like she had.
Cara was already one of my kind.
I lifted her shirt over her head, then pushed her into the backseat of the car because nobody but me got to lay eyes on her body. I was relatively sure we were alone, but I wasn’t taking any chances.
I tugged the door shut behind me, then finished undressing her and peeling off her small blue panties and red bra.
“I would’ve made sure they matched if I knew we were gonna fang,” she said.
I laughed. “Please don’t call it fanging.”
“Oh, it’s done and decided. Vampire sex will henceforth be known as fanging. All applicable euphemisms of the word ‘fang’ will be used with extreme prejudice.”
I stripped out of my shirt, deciding we could argue about the minor details later. Cara Skies was completely naked, lying on her back, and waiting. Those horrible clothes were removed from myself, and there finally wasn’t a single thing standing between us from doing exactly what we’d been wanting to do since our first day together.
I hooked my arms underneath her knees and tugged her toward me, making her lay completely flat on the backseat. There wasn’t limitless room to work with, which meant I was bending my neck and positioned on one knee while she had to keep her legs bent. But complaining would’ve made as much sense as a starving man saying there wasn’t enough salt on his steak.
I lifted Cara’s leg, kissing from her ankle up to her sensitive inner thighs, which drew blushing giggles from her.
I kissed everywhere, feeling myself slip into what felt like an automatic state of consciousness. I’d deprived myself of her for so long that I no longer felt in control. She was here, and I was going to take every inch of her.