A Hunger Like No Other (Immortals After Dark #2)(71)

Run.

She was trying to! No keys. She sprinted back and scanned around the castle for a work truck, a freaking tractor at this point.

She stilled and frowned, feeling warmth from just above the horizon. As if in a trance, she lifted her face to it. The full moon. Rising tonight.

She felt the light. Like she’d always imagined people did with the sun.

Her hearing was sensitive; things called to her from the forest beyond. She’d avoided that dark place in all her exploring. The sight of it had defeated even her newfound sense of courage.

Run there.

She had to fight the urge to sprint headlong into the abysmal-looking forest. Lachlain would catch her there—he was a hunter, a tracker. That’s what he did. She had no chance of escaping.

Still her body twitched from the battle, as if she missed running within the forest, though she’d never been. Was she going mad even to think of this?

Run!

With a cry, she dropped her shoes and obeyed, fleeing the manor and a soon-to-wake, irate Lykae. She plunged into the woods and realized she could see. Her already strong night vision was perfected.

But why was she seeing? Did his blood affect her so much? She’d taken a lot. Now she knew Lykae could see as well at night as by day.

She smelled the forest floor, the moist earth, the moss. She even smelled rocks wet with dew. Dizzying. She might have swayed, but her feet fell perfectly placed to the ground as if she’d run this way a thousand times.

The scents, the sound of her breaths and her heart beating, the air rushing over her…heaven. This was like heaven.

Then she became aware of something new. The running was an aphrodisiac, with every footfall vibrating up her body like a long stroke. She heard his bellow of rage echoing from miles away at the manor, seeming to shake the whole black world around her. As she heard him crashing after her, she felt the need for release. Not fear of what he would do to her when he caught her, but anticipation. She could hear his heart pounding furiously as he neared. Even when weakened, he ran headlong for her.

He would chase her forever.

She knew this as if he’d spoken it in her mind. He would claim her and never let her go. That was what his kind did.

You’re his kind now, her mind whispered. No! She wouldn’t give in.

A Lykae mate would’ve let herself be caught. Would be waiting for him, naked and spread in the grass or leaning back against a tree, hips offered up and arms overhead, reveling in the fact that he was chasing her, anticipating his ferocity.

Emma was going insane! How could she know these things? She would never welcome ferocity. Give a cry early, at the first sign of pain. That was her rule.

She’d just reached a clearing when she heard him lunge for her. She tensed for the impact with the ground, but he turned and took it on his back, then moved her bodily to lie in the grass. When she opened her eyes, he was above her, on all fours.

He was larger. His eyes weren’t their golden color. That eerie blue flickered across them. His exhaled breaths were low rumbling growls. She knew his body was weakened, she had felt how much so when he ran, but his obvious intent made him strong.

“Turn…over,” he bit out. His voice was distorted, grating.

Lightning streaked the sky above him. He didn’t seem to notice it, but she stared at it like one might a comet. Could she be more Valkyrie than she knew?

Sane Emma said, “No.”

The lightning also illuminated in flashes what he was inside. Fangs of his own, the ice-blue eyes, his already incredibly powerful body rippling with more muscle. He yanked her bag and jacket from her, sliced open her clothes to strip her, snarling and growling while she beheld the lights above in a daze.

“Arms…over…your head,” he grated, while tearing his jeans from himself.

She did this. He was still positioning himself over her, bending down to kiss or lick, moving a hand or a knee. Something was happening that she didn’t understand. This wasn’t just random movement, this was…

Ritual.

As he moved above her, the urge to go to her hands and knees grew overwhelming. To brush her hair aside and present her neck. He dragged a tongue across her nipple and her back arched.

“Turn…over.”

As if someone else were in her body, someone carnal and aggressive, she did as he commanded. Movements behind her that she couldn’t see. She could feel his huge erection slide against her backside, then prod against her thigh.

Smell the night, feel the growing moon bathe your skin. She was going insane…knew it when she pressed her chest down into the grass, arms in front of her, and raised her ass up. He growled as if pleased, then immediately kicked her knees open with his own. She could feel herself getting wetter though he wasn’t touching her.

She ached. She felt empty. She knew she could feel the scents of the earth if he would just enter her. She rocked back as if to attract him.

“Doona do that,” he hissed. His hand landed on her backside, then clutched, holding her in place.

She moaned, her eyes rolling back in her head.

“With the moon…I canna…be as I should. If you knew what I was thinking right now—”

She spread her knees wider, though a beast was at her back about to go mad from the moon, with a shaft that could rend her in two. She should be curled in a ball with her hands over her head. Not rocking front and back trying to attract him.