A Blood Seduction (Vamp City #1)(14)

Still, he watched her with that dangerous intensity. He reached for her arm, the one tied to the bedpost closest to him. His cool hand curled around her forearm, his thumb tracing the vein from her inner elbow to her wrist, slowly, as if savoring the feel of the blood pumping beneath her skin. He dipped his head.

"No," she gasped, her heart ratcheting.

But he didn't stop. His nose teased the crook of her arm. His mouth tasted her skin as she lay, tense as a steel rod, dreading the stab of his fangs.

Instead, he slowly rose again, a dangerous smile in his eyes as if he enjoyed her fear most of all. The sadist.

He stood and moved to the foot of the bed, kneeling between her spread legs.

What are you doing? She refused to give voice to the question that burned in her throat. He enjoyed her fear, she could see it in his eyes. And she would give him no more satisfaction than she had to.

When his hands found her waist, her breath caught on a gasp. Pushing up her T-shirt hem, he unbuttoned her jeans, unzipping her fly with deft fingers.

"Don't," she breathed.

But he ignored her, yanking her pants down over her hips, where they got hung up on her spread thighs. But not before he'd revealed her black satin panties.

His hand shot between her legs, sliding along her most private flesh, stroking her through the satin. In the blink of an eye, he turned to the post where her right foot was bound and untied it.

The moment her foot was loose, she struggled to kick free, to knock him aside, but his grip was like iron as he forced her legs together long enough to push her pants down past her knees and off her right leg altogether. Then he was yanking her legs apart, tying her ankle again.

"Damn you!" She fought him, but there was nothing she could do to stop him.

He smiled, a darkly satisfied look on his face as he stared at her spread before him, only the small black panties barring his way.

Her breath trembled into her lungs, her body flushing hot, then cold, then hot again as he reached for her, this time stroking her inner thigh, watching her. "Do you have any idea how fast the blood flows out of the body when the femoral artery is breached?" As he spoke, his unusually sharp incisors began to lengthen and thicken. His pupils slowly turned white, surrounded by a sea of near black. Just as the other vampires' had. Vampires. Oh, God, how can they be real?

Slowly, he leaned forward, his face and those awful, sharp fangs dipping between her legs. Quinn bucked in panic, terror pulling at her mind as she struggled against the ropes tying her to the bed. Cool hands gripped her thighs roughly, holding her still. Teeth grazed the sensitive flesh of her inner thigh, and she quaked with terror over the fangs that were about to steal her life.

Tears blurred her vision. She should have kept Zack safe. If only she'd ignored that strange sight in front of her apartment. If only she'd turned and gone the other way.

Without warning, the vampire rose from between her legs and came to stand beside the bed, looking down at her. He leaned over, grabbing her jaw. "Look at me."

"I thought you were going to drain me."

One dark brow lifted. "Disappointed?"

"No," she gasped, her pulse pounding so hard she could barely breathe, let alone form words. "Of course not."

"I do not kill my slaves." He squeezed her jaw. "Nor do I wish them to fear me."

"I'm not your slave. And you love my fear. You love it!"

"Yes. But I've had my fill. And now you will forget."

She met his gaze stonily. "I'm not your slave."

A smile lifted his mouth. "Oh, but you are, piccola." He stared deeply into her eyes as if he were trying to hypnotize her or something, and slowly began to frown. His eyes narrowed. His grip tightened. "What are you?"

She scowled. "A woman. What in the hell do you think I am?"

True anger flashed in his eyes, reigniting her fear all over again. He leaned forward, crowding her, scaring her. "What are you?"

A freak. I'm a freak. A soon-to-be-dead freak, at the rate things are going.

The vampire attacked her without warning, turning her head, baring her neck, biting her. Like before, the puncture hurt for only a minute. And then he reared back, licking the blood off his lips as he stared at her.

"Mio Dio."

Without explanation, he released her and strode out of the bedroom, slamming the door closed behind him. "Blood!" His voice rattled the windows.

Quinn stared at the closed door, her mouth open with disbelief. What in the hell just happened?

She tipped her head back as her heartbeat slowly returned to something approximating normal, even as her mind whirled, a suffocating mass of confusion, questions, and dread.

A half hour later, maybe - it had felt like twenty years - the door opened, and a pleasingly round woman bustled into the room, carrying a tray. Eggs, by the smell of them. And coffee.

What was the vampire doing, fattening her for slaughter? Quinn's muscles bunched, an instinctive reaction as she fought against pulling on her ropes. Her wrists were raw and abraded from where she'd done just that too many times already. But she hated being so vulnerable. Hated it.

"I am Ernesta."

Quinn's pulse, which had begun to jackhammer at the first rattle of the doorknob, slowly began to calm. How, she wondered, was she supposed to eat or drink when she was still tied to the bedposts?