“Dreaming about it and doing it are two different things. And I’m not doing it; you’re the one in control.”
His laughter was low and wicked. “Would you like me to let go of you? It is not as if you are not capable of floating on your own.”
Her fingers twisted convulsively in his shirt. “Don’t even joke about it, Aidan.” But he never once loosened his hold on her, and she felt safe and protected. Taking a deep breath, Alexandria looked around her.
Wisps of fog drifted past her. She wanted to reach out and touch one, just to see if she could, but she wasn’t quite comfortable enough to relax her death grip on Aidan. The stars glittered overhead, and below her the waves raced across the ocean and crashed on large rocks, spraying white foam in all directions. The droplets looked like sparkling diamonds scattered across the deep blue of the sea. The wind was tugging at the treetops, so that they bowed and swayed, branches waving up at her.
Alexandria felt a burst of joy. She felt free. The heavy, oppressive weight crushing down on her was lifted for the moment, and she was laughing, really laughing. The sound of it pierced Aidan’s heart, wrapped it up, and squeezed hard. His arms tightened even more. He wanted to hear her laugh like this all the time. The scent of her, the feel of her, was pushing at his control, calling to the wildness in him.
She felt the change in him. The way his body stirred against hers, the way it hardened in urgent demand, the possession in his arms as he held her to him. They were on the balcony of his house now, the one that wrapped around the third story, his private quarters. His feet touched down, but hers didn’t, and he carried her easily to a plush lounge chair just outside the intricate stained-glass sliding doors.
“Aidan!” It was a breathless protest. Panic welled up. She could not be alone like this with him. He was too much of a temptation, and she was too vulnerable, her emotions ragged and raw.
His mouth skimmed over her eyelids, her cheeks. “Did I not tell you that you should trust me?” He settled her on his lap, his hips cradling her bottom. She was pressed against him intimately, and it didn’t seem to matter to him that she could feel his violent need of her. Secrets between them did not exist. She could have easily reached into his mind and found the same information.
Alexandria shivered, suddenly afraid. There was something different about him, some elemental change she had noticed since he had awakened her this last time. He looked at her differently, as if she was his alone, as if his right to her was complete, unchallenged. There was tenderness but also a deep resolve, a relentless purpose. She touched his face with trembling fingers.
The night shone on his masculine beauty, the thick mass of tawny hair spilling to his broad shoulders. She could see his lush eyelashes, the elegant nose, the strong jaw and perfect lips.
“Merge your mind with mine.” It was a soft command.
She stiffened and shook her head. Her life had already been taken over, changed forever. Instinctively she knew he was dragging her closer to him, drawing her further into his world. She had to control something. “I won’t, Aidan. I don’t want this.”
“I only intend to feed you, cara, nothing more, although I will admit the temptation is almost more than I can bear. Merge your mind with mine.” This time his voice dropped an octave, became mesmerizing, hypnotic, a low, lazy, seductive lure.
She struggled against the hard strength in his arms. Her mind echoed the words feed you. Her stomach somersaulted. Her heart pounded. Instead of revulsion, there was hot anticipation, the sexual tension between them rising even higher. She stifled a low sob. This wasn’t her. None of it. She didn’t want a man so badly that her entire mind and body ached and burned with need. She would never consider biting into someone, yet at the thought of her mouth against his chest, his neck, her body clenched and throbbed in reaction. Liquid heat pooled deep inside, a steamy sensuality she had never known.
“Merge your mind with mine,” he whispered again, the words like a seduction against her skin. His tongue caressed her pulse, and her body tightened in anticipation.
In desperation she did as he wished. His mind was a haze of hunger—physical hunger, urgent, demanding. Erotic pictures danced in his head. His tongue stroked again, lower this time, as his fingers slowly threaded through the pearl buttons on her sweater. She was bathed in heat, need, hunger. Her skin was ultrasensitive. She heard herself moan, felt the cool air blow tantalizingly across her breasts.
He touched her, his hand sliding up her narrow rib cage to close possessively over the satin skin below her breasts. His teeth nipped her neck, her throat. He murmured something inarticulate. I want you, Alexandria. You belong to me. You are mine. His teeth skimmed down to one breast, lingered, scraped erotically. His velvet tongue stroked the hard peak, once, twice. I am your lifemate. You will take from me what you need. Feed, cara mia. Take from me what only I can give you. She felt his mouth close over her softness, the heated pull erotic and strange.
Her eyes closed. She was in a dream world. Her body felt heavy, was unfamiliar with yearnings she had never experienced and her entire being raged for a release she needed as desperately as she hungered. His hand opened his shirt, and they were skin to skin. For a moment he held her there, savoring the feel of her creamy flesh against his hard muscles. Aidan’s hand came up, and he brought her head to his chest, simply holding her there in an unbreakable grip.
His mind reflected back her need to feed, amplified it until the red haze in him was in her. Her cheek nuzzled his taut muscles, felt the roped sinews beneath the skin, breathed in the surge of his life’s blood. She felt his body harden even more, hot and full with need. A slow, feminine smile of satisfaction curved her mouth. Her tongue tasted his skin, the flavor of him, masculine and spicy. Addicting. Her lips brushed his pulse.
Aidan’s muscles contracted, clenched. His teeth came together, and he closed his eyes against the demands of his body. She was like hot silk and white lightning. Fire skimming over his chest. It spread across his flat belly, lower still, to torment him with a painful, unfulfilled promise of release. Her tongue teased, dancing over his skin until he thought he might go mad.
Alexandria possessed a natural sensuality, heightened by the Carpathian blood now flowing strongly in her veins. Aidan was her lifemate, and despite the fact that she refused to acknowledge what was happening, her body craved his, needed and hungered for him. Her natural inhibitions were being pushed aside, her humanity swept away on a tide of rising passion. Her blood, raging with fire, cried out to his. Her body moved against his, seeking a closer bond, skin to skin without the confines of their clothing. Her mind was meshed with his, woven together beyond all solitary thought. What he wanted, she wanted. What she needed, he needed.
Her tongue caressed his pulse, swirled lightly over his muscles, stroked a brown, flat nipple. He threw back his head and groaned aloud. A fine sheen of sweat coated his skin, and his body swelled in urgent demand, his jeans far too tight, his body straining to break free. Her teeth scraped lightly, insistently. A trembling started somewhere in his legs and took over his body. His very blood pulsated with waves of urgency, a molten volcano ready to explode. He wanted her more than he had ever wanted anything in all the long centuries of his existence. His arms tightened possessively. He bent his head to brush his mouth over her silky hair, her closed eyelids, her temples.