He looked…soft.
Her chest constricted. Seeing so much tenderness echoed in his dark eyes was almost too much for her to handle.
Zia lowered her gaze to where his lips rubbed against her wound before she moved it back up to where her fingers were gently petting his hair. Following the origin of a lock of gray hair from his temple to his ear with her thumb, she whispered, “Agreed, Mr. Bounds.”
ChapterTwelve
“I knowyou can’t spend the night, but maybe you could stay with me for a while? I mean, only if you want to, of course,” Zia found herself suggesting a few hours later.
Dinner did eventually make its way into her stomach, though it took a while for them both to recover from their… interlude. Even then, Harlan was apparently reluctant to let go of her. She spent most of the evening sprawled in his lap, boneless, as he fed her bites of delicious food. He didn’t seem to mind that there was a wet spot on his thigh from where he came, and she didn’t either.
It made that drugging feeling ofpowerall the stronger.
Shedid that. She made this powerful, fearsome being orgasm without so much as a touch. Was there anything more erotic than that?
But the night was ending. Her stomach was full, she was a tiny bit tipsy, and Harlan stood in the dark stoop of her cottage, his hair mussed and his eyes night-glow. At some point, he completely abandoned the braid.
Probably because she kept raking her fingers through it.
Zia didn’t want to say goodbye. She craved more of that taste of closeness — if not from his fangs, then from the comfort of falling asleep in his arms.
She blinked, staring at the old thumb scanner by the door knob. In less than a week, he went from sensual boogeyman in the shadows to someone she desperately wanted to cuddle with.
Hold your horses, Zia. You don’t even know if this man likes sharing a bed!
“I’ll stay for as long as you want me to.”
Her eyes flew back to his as her thumb met the scanner. Suddenly feeling shy, she backtracked, “It’s okay. I don’t mean to be pushy. I know you probably have stuff to do, so I wouldn’t want you to waste your night.”
There was a faint beep, and then Harlan reached around her to open the door. Instinctively, her magic reacted, bending the wards slightly to let him through.
She blinked again.That’s new.
Normally she had to actively will the thick net of woven magic, anchored with advanced sigils on the house's walls, to bend. The only people her magic instinctively recognized as non-threatening were her immediate family. Everyone else rubbed up against her wards wrong, which was exactly their point. Strangers needed permission to enter.
Except Harlan, apparently.
“There is quite literallynothingI would rather be doing than spending time with you, Zia.” To emphasize the point, he palmed the back of her neck and used his thumb to tilt her head back. Pressing a slow, skimming kiss to her lips, he murmured, “If I had my way, we’d be at the manor right now. I’d tie you to my bed and have my wicked way with you, pet. And then you’dneverleave.”
Pressing her palms against his chest, she teased, “Don’t you think it’s a little fast to be asking me to move in with you, Mr. Bounds?”
Slowly, he began to back her into the house. The fresh, earthy scent of all the greenery she so lovingly cultivated filled the air like a soft greeting. Her heels clicked on the cheap laminate of the entryway as the shadows closed in around them. She felt him reach back. A moment later, the door swung shut.
“You aremyanchor. Living together is a given.” He pressed a series of soft, seeking kisses to her lips, the corners of her mouth, and even the little dimple in her chin. “Your security and happiness is now my only concern, pet. When you move into the manor, I’ll be able to spoil you every second of every day. More importantly, I’ll know you’resafeevery second of every day.”
Zia’s mind was muddled by the kisses, by the hand roving over her waist to palm her backside, by the crisp, luxurious scent of him in her lungs, but still, she caught the wordssecurityandsafety.
Greatly reluctant, she stalled his next kiss with a gentle press of her fingertips to his lips. Searching his expression in the shadows of the entryway, she said, “You told me that you worked for the Amauri family and the Syndicate for a long time. Is that why you’re so… focused on security?”
She knew that the Syndicate was a sprawling network of wealthy vampiric families constantly at war with one another over whatever it was organized crime groups valued, but he told her he was retired. Besides, they were as far from the New Zone as people could get. She struggled to imagine any threat lasting more than a moment in the EVP. The elves wouldn’t suffer any sort of organized crime in their territory.
…Right?
Perhaps it’s just a vampire thing. Or maybe old habits,she thought, watching his jaw tense.
He stroked the swell of her cheek with his thumb before he took a step back. In an instant, that softness she had quickly become so fond of vanished like a puff of smoke. In its place was the inscrutable vampire who raised the hair on the back of her neck. “Go get changed into something comfortable.”
“Why?”
