It was a peace beyond anything Domino had ever known. A happiness he could find no words for. Broken only by the sound of his cell phone ringing, its demand muted by the jeans encasing it. The sound of it jarring him from the warmth of Dakotah’s arms and body.
With a groan he rolled to the edge of the bed and fished through the clothing on the floor until he retrieved the phone. Fane. Which meant the wolves in Atlantic City had reached a decision on whether there was to be a challenge or a blood pledge.
CHAPTER 9
“Even Victor Hale’s allies don’t trust him with their lives,” Fane said as soon as Domino answered the phone. “They didn’t allow him a choice. They elected to throw him into the ring with you. The padralls accepted on your behalf and agreed to a challenge after sunset—tonight. I could have changed it but then thought better of it.” There was a hint of amusement in Fane’s voice that immediately grated on Domino’s nerves. “It gives you the choice as to whether or not you want to make the third exchange with Dakotah before fighting her enemy. After all, her life would be forfeit as well should you bind her to you and then lose.”
Domino’s nostril flared. “Perhaps I will rip out two throats tonight.”
Fane laughed. “I see you still harbor delusions that you could best me.”
“It’s no delusion,” Domino growled.
“Dementia then. But on a serious note, I have asked Cable to assist with the arrangements and ensure there is no opportunity for mischief or deceit—though the presence of so many dhampirs and vampires will drive the point home to the wolves that we are prepared to slaughter them all.”
“It’s no less than the truth.”
“And it’s good they’re reminded of it. For the sake of my bride, who claims we are on our honeymoon and begs for my attention, I hope we’re not delayed here any longer. I’ll see you tonight.”
Domino closed the phone and dropped it onto the pile of clothing next to the bed before repositioning himself beside Dakotah and pulling her into his arms. She was tense and he could feel the wild mix of her emotions. “Don’t think to leave me,” he said. “Don’t think to take Victor Hale on by yourself.”
“It’s not your fight.”
He laughed. Warmed despite the way her heart raced against his chest and her body vibrated with concern. He didn’t need the third exchange to know what she was thinking. What she was contemplating.
“It will hardly be a fight at all. Do you have so little faith in my abilities?” He rolled, trapping her underneath him. Her gaze caught in his. “From the time we are children we are trained in the use of restraints. Will you force me to bind you in order to keep you from doing something foolish? Or would you rather I simply command you not to leave the bed during the day?”
Dakotah opened her mouth to challenge him, to dare him, to insist he let her fight her own battles, but the words didn’t come. The wolf held them back until they dissolved on her tongue, replaced by a different demand. “I want to be there when you fight.”
He snarled in response. A gut reaction. A need to know she was safe. That her enemy couldn’t reach her.
Her face tightened. The eyes that moments before had been soft and yielding became polished stones, reflections of the wall she was prepared to build between them.
“Only if you stand with Fane,” Domino said, forcing the words out, hating that his heart thrilled at the sight of her satisfaction, at the way her body relaxed underneath his. He tightened his grip on her, wanting to meld them into one being. “Do I tether you to the bed or command you? Or will you give me your promise to stay by my side while The Sleep holds me? To be next to me when I wake?”
Her eyebrow lifted in amused challenge and happiness uncurled in his chest and belly. “I assume any promise will exclude bathroom breaks and trips to the kitchen?”
He growled softly. “Say the words, Dakotah.”
“I’ll stay.”
He resettled them, spooning her back to his chest and curling his arm around her, holding her tightly to him in a gesture that made her feel cherished rather than imprisoned.
Outside, beyond the heavy drapes, the sun rose higher. She was aware of it though she couldn’t see it. Just as she was acutely aware of Domino’s skin pressed to hers, his heart beating, slowing as a heavy lethargy descended, pulling her under, The Sleep taking her as it took him.
Domino knew the moment she left the bed. It was nearing sunset. The lethargy clung to him, but because of the wolf, The Sleep didn’t hold him as mercilessly as it did other vampires. He followed her movements by sound, smiled when she went into the bathroom and filled the old-fashioned tub Matteo had insisted be installed.
When she slid into the water, Domino forced himself to stand, the wolf aiding him against The Sleep. The Heat and Hunger also rising, allies instead of adversaries. Wanting him to be close to Dakotah in order to make the third exchange.
He halted in the bathroom doorway, his cock going to rigid attention at the sight of her in the tub, her head thrown back, her eyes closed as her hands smoothed soap over slick female curves.
The scent of her filled his nostrils. The desire for her filled his soul.
She tilted her head and opened eyes dark with need and lust. “Join me?”
His cock led the way, jutting out in front of him as he moved to the tub.
She laughed, a husky sound that added to his torment. He groaned when she took his shaft in her hand and brushed her thumb over the engorged head, stroking until the tip was wet. Then she used his cock to guide him into the tub and position him where she wanted him, at the other end, so that she could rise onto her knees and straddle him.
The blood burned through Dakotah’s veins. Whispered and hinted of an ecstasy yet to be experienced, an ecstasy beyond what she’d already had with Domino.
There was no fighting the call of blood to blood. Of body to body. The yearning of the soul and heart.
There was no denying the truth of what they were to each other. The wolf’s truth. The truth revealed in the tarot cards. The truth she and Domino had both come to accept.
They belonged together.
Her fingers speared through his hair, holding him still for her kiss, an exploration of lips and tongue, a savoring, a taste of desire found in wet heated darkness and the smooth glide of female against male. He let her control the kiss though his hands moved to her back, his fingers traced her spine and sent shivers of delight along her nerve endings, then moved to her sides, her hips as his cock stroked her folds, her clit. Sending heat spiraling through her.
She groaned and rose higher in the tub, rubbed her nipple back and forth across his lips. Taunting him by not allowing him to latch on and feast despite his growls of frustration.
He retaliated by filling her channel with his cock, by securing her so she couldn’t fuck herself on him as his fingers went to her clit, stroking, teasing, making her sheath fist and unfist around a thick, pulsing shaft that remained stationary.
Dakotah relented, stilled, brought him to her breast and held him there as he suckled, the pull of his mouth sending ice-hot shards of need straight to her engorged knob so that it strained against his fingers, jerked under his caress. So that she whispered, “Please.”
He took control then. Shifting, plundering her body with his cock as his fangs sank into her breast. Dark urges filling him, whispering for him to take her to the edge of human death, to the point where her heart stuttered in warning. But he resisted, wanting more than a single fuck in the tub before finishing what they had started.
And so he fed, holding her tightly to him, their thrashing sending water cascading over the edge of the tub. Her scream of release echoing off the walls of the bathroom. His own muffled against her flesh.