“Listen, I don’t exactly trust any of us with her…” Corry started and trailed off when the older vampire began to laugh.
“Don’t preach to me about safety, especially when you came close to ripping out her entire femoral artery. What were you gonna do? Fill the wound with your dick?”
The monster slayer took another few steps toward us, then the remaining distance between us was gone in a blur. I felt myself being wrenched away from Corry. Then my back was pressing against the hood of the muscle car, the engine rumbling beneath me, rattling my spine.
Eros’ wicked grin came into view a breath later, his hands pressing against the hood of his car, caging me in his arms. His attention briefly flicked to the headless Boston vampire on the ground, then looked back at me with dark excitement dancing behind his eyes. “You and I are going to be the best of friends, I think.”
I gave a dry laugh. “Oh yeah. We’ll be making friendship bracelets and braiding each other’s hair by the end of the night, I’m sure.”
“Don’t provoke him, Red,” Corry hissed.
Eros grabbed my chin and jerked my gaze back to his. “Go ahead,” he challenged in a grating voice. “Provoke me.”
My brain scrambled for a response. I asked him to show me his darkest fantasies, and now my role was to play the part. So I responded with how I would have that night before I knew him. Before I’d come to love any of them.
I kneed him in the junk. That’s what I would have done had this been the way things had gone down that night. I’d been warned about the Knight Prince with a reputation bloody enough to earn him his nickname. If this was how I’d met him, instead of in his den, I would have done my best to get away from the deranged bastard.
Now, in the safety of his dreams, I could indulge in that dark side of his mind that asked, “what if…?”
When he recoiled with a grunt, I took off running.
If this was real life, I was sure I could outrun him. But right now, Eros had the reigns over his dreams. Besides, I wanted him to catch me. And he did. In a matter of seconds, he was on top of me, wrestling me to the ground like a predator taking down its kill.
“Go to Hell, Bloodsucker,” I screamed as he crawled onto me and pinned my wrists to the ground over my head.
“Fine. But only if I get to drag you down with me, baby.”
His lips crushed against mine, and when a sharp pain shot through my skull, I realized what was happening. His fangs punctured the flesh of my lips. And fuck me, did it feel like the kiss of death.
I pushed against his chest, even though I wanted to pull him closer. I didn’t think it would be so hard to pretend that I didn’t want this.
“G–get off of me,” I said, my low, breathless whisper muffled against Eros’ lips.
Eros pulled back, laughing at the obvious excitement lacing my words.
“I think we both know that’s not what you’re wanting. I know who you are. Where you come from. I know what you’re born of and what they have done to you. I know how incredibly alone you’ve been made to feel. But I promise you this, Baby Doll…” He sat up, straddled my hips and brushed his fingertips over my bloodied lips before dipping his index finger into my blood like a pen into ink. Then he traced what felt like a little heart over his mating mark seared into my shoulder. “I’m going to rip you open and spill out everything you have to give me. You’ll feel the most visceral of pain. You’ll feel pleasure. You’ll feel me, every fucking inch I have to offer you, whether it’s by blade, stake or fat cock. But loneliness? You’ll never feel that again, Doll. Not while you’re with me.”
My heart felt so full it ached.
But this was no place for tears or mushy words. Eros showed his love by showing me his truest self, and he was about to relieve the darkest, deepest part of himself that he’d never shown me before. So I wasn’t about to fuck that up by ending our game now.
I continued to struggle, but he overpowered me with ease, pinning my wrists above my head with one hand while his other sunk into his pocket.
My breath seized as my imagination ran wild with what he was looking for. He extracted a metal zip tie a second later, something that I could break out of as easily as tissue paper—ifI had any intention of escaping.
He secured it around my wrists with one motion, a lusty moan bleeding from my lips when he secured it tight enough to cut into my flesh.
His nostrils flexed, and his brown eyes bled red. “Yeah, you fucking like that.”
My heart slammed against my ribs, and my pulse throbbed so hard I could feel it between my legs. I squirmed, feeling my cheeks heat even as the icy rain hammered down.
He was back in his pockets again, this time pulling out a black nylon bag. Before I could say anything, he shoved it over my head and cinched the cord tight around my neck with the jerk of his hand. My world tilted as I felt myself being lifted and tossed over his shoulder.
The sound of Eros’ combat boots slapping against the wet pavement sounded over the rumble of his muscle car, then came the groan of hinges.
He was putting me in the trunk.
“What are you going to do with her?” Corry’s voice spiked with panic.
