Zane’s Redemption (22 page)

When he drew the door shut behind him, she stopped holding her breath. She’d better use the time he was gone. There had been no time to change into fresh clothes, even less to take a shower. Considering what they were planning tonight, she felt the need to groom herself, not just to be ready for him, but also to boost her self-confidence. She’d never touched a man as intimately as she’d already touched Zane today, and she hoped that instinct would guide her so she wouldn’t turn out to be a klutz in bed.

In the bedroom, Portia quickly shimmied out of her jeans and sweater, then tossed her socks, panties and bra on a chair. Realizing how uninspiring her underwear looked, she picked it up again and chucked it under the bed. No need for him to see what cringe-worthy panties she wore. It would only serve to turn him off, not on.

A look at the king-sized bed with its decidedly masculine dark striped cover made her shiver despite the welcoming warmth in the small house. In a short while, they would lie in each other’s arms there, naked, wrapped only in their own passion and desire.

Not wasting any more time, Portia hurried into the en-suite bathroom and stepped into the large shower. Soft pebbles caressed the soles of her feet, the same smooth stones that also graced the shower walls. The warm spray of the water ran down her body as soon as she turned the faucet.

She reached for the soap and lathered her skin. When she inhaled, she realized that the soap was unscented. It surprised her, particularly because the scent that Zane gave off was so intensely masculine that she’d thought it came from a scented soap he used. But it appeared that the scent she felt so drawn to was all him. She should have guessed as much. A vampire like Zane, whose raw power and energy constantly bubbled to the surface, would carry such a potent smell.

Portia didn’t bother washing her hair. It would take too long to dry, and considering that Zane was entirely bald, she bet he didn’t have a hairdryer. She quickly rinsed her body clean of the soap and stepped onto the soft rug in front of the shower, reaching for the towel that hung on a wall rack.

“When I said ‘make yourself comfortable’, I didn’t realize I’d be missing something important.”

Her head snapped toward the door, where Zane filled the frame.

Reflexively, she pressed the towel to her front, covering her nakedness, at the same time as a gasp escaped her.

His eyes darkened and honed in on the towel. “You won’t need that.”

Hesitantly, she lowered her hands, pushing the towel down past her nipples, which  were suddenly hard and erect, and exposed to his hungry gaze.

Zane’s nostril’s flared, and his body moved. With two steps, he reached her and clasped his hand over hers. She relinquished the towel to his control. It dropped to the floor a second later.

Zane’s shirt brushed against her breasts as he drew her against his body. “I could have watched you shower if that damn dog wasn’t so inexplicably fond of snow.”

She raised her lashes and lost herself in the golden flecks of his eyes. “Or you could have helped me.”

With a groan, he sank his lips onto her mouth and captured her. Her lips parted on his demand, welcoming his forceful invasion. Pure and unadulterated lust careened through her veins instead of the blood that normally ran there. Her pulse quickened to a pace faster than any human dance when Zane’s tongue stroked against hers in a relentless assault, asking for her surrender.

Instinct guided her responses. Portia greeted his masculine taste with a feral growl of her own, sending him an unmistakable signal that if he wanted surrender, she demanded the same from him.

Without giving her reprieve from his searching tongue and pressing lips, his hands slid around her back and down to her behind where he filled his palms with her flesh. In the next instant he hauled her toward him, his cock as hard as before with only his cold jeans as a barrier between them. A barrier she wanted gone.

She tugged on his shirt, pulling it out of his pants, and fumbled with the buttons. But she was shaking so much with the need that he’d awakened in her that her fingers didn’t find purchase.

Zane moaned, and the rumble sank deep into her core, heading straight for her womb, where it crashed against the waves that her body created. When he ripped his mouth from hers, she wanted to scream, to protest, but before she could, his lips connected with the sensitive skin of her neck, as she obligingly offered it to him.

A wave of white hot heat skated over where his firm lips suckled her damp skin, evaporating the remaining pearls of water from her shower.

“Zane,” she murmured, not knowing really what she was asking for, but certain that whatever it was, she wanted it. Wanted him.

“Easy, baby girl,” his husky voice breathed against her neck as his lips nibbled toward her earlobe and sucked the soft piece of flesh between them.

A painless bite stole her breath, making her breasts heave and brush against the cotton of his shirt, reminding her once more that he was still fully clothed. But she needed to touch him. Without thinking, hands curled into fists gripping the lapels of his shirt. One forceful rip, and all buttons went flying.

Finally, there was skin she could touch: warm, smooth skin. Hairless, just like his skull. Her fingers glided over his chest, where sinew and lean muscle flexed, and where his heart beat violently.

“Oh, God, Portia,” he groaned and threw his head back, his hands on her stilling for a moment. When she looked up at his face, she watched his fangs lengthen and the glow in his eyes intensify.

A thrill of excitement shot through her at the knowledge that she could reduce this man to a creature who only lived for this moment of passion and desire.

“I want you,” she whispered and felt her own fangs itch beneath her gums.

His eyes flashed with lust, and his nostrils flared before he dropped his head back to her. But instead of kissing her lips or her neck, he moved lower and captured her breasts, a word bouncing against them that she wasn’t sure she’d heard correctly.

Yet, it still echoed in her head:
mine
.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Mine.

Zane would never give voice to it, yet the thought bounced around his head, forbidden and unattainable as it was. But just because he couldn’t act on it, it didn’t stop the wish from repeating again and again.
Mine, mine, mine
. Like a song on a loop it came around as regularly as seconds ticked away on a clock. With no means to tell his mind that he had no right to make her his, to claim her for himself, he did the only thing he could: he lavished her body with the passion that had been locked up inside him for so long.

His lips locking around one taut nipple, he swiped his tongue over it and relished the breathless moan Portia released. She was more responsive than he’d expected a virgin to be. At the same time, her responses to him were pure and unaffected as only those of an inexperienced woman could be. He found that it appealed to him more than the artificial moans and grunts the prostitutes and sluts he frequented played for him.

Every moan and sigh from Portia’s lips felt like a gift. And selfish as he was, he coaxed more of them out of her by sucking harder and working her other breast with his hand, squeezing and molding it in his palm. So firm, yet so soft, her body was a contradiction in terms.

Unable to get enough of her, he sank down to the tile floor and pulled her with him, laying her down on the soft bathmat. His hands roamed her body, exploring unchartered territory.

When he trailed kisses down her stomach, her head reared up. “Zane? What are you doing?”

It wasn’t an admonishment, but a question colored in surprise and disbelief. He raised his lids and collided with her intense gaze, her green eyes glowing with lust. She had to know what was coming. Even as a virgin, she couldn’t be that ignorant.

“I need to taste your pussy.”

Her breath hitched, and his nostrils flared as the scent of her arousal intensified.

“You don’t have to do that,” she whispered a weak protest, but her eyes said otherwise. She wanted his lips on her, his tongue inside her.

“I have to.”

Not a horde of vampire hunters chasing him with stakes could stop him now. Lowering his head, he moved his hands to her thighs and pushed them apart, opening her for his own pleasure.

A triangle of dark curls greeted his approach, and the tantalizing smell of youth and purity beckoned him to move farther south. He sank his face between her spread thighs and inhaled, allowing her scent to engulf him. Everything else faded into the background. The cold tile floor was suddenly forgotten. And even the soft woofing of his dog in the next room subsided. The only things his senses were able to process were her scent and the feel of her silken flesh under his hands. Her soft, almost inaudible moans provided the background music to this enticing tableau of ripe and willing woman.

Zane stroked his fingers up her thighs, allowing them to converge at the moist folds of her sex. As he brushed against the warm cleft, Portia jolted.

“I’ll be gentle,” he heard himself reassure her. Gentle? Could he really be that? Could he be tender and careful with a woman as precious as her? Or would his desire for her unleash the beast in him?

He wanted to pull back, to try to get himself under control so he wouldn’t hurt her, when her hands suddenly stroked over his skull, her fingernails softly grazing his skin. He lost his ability to move. A shudder went through him and right through his cock, making pre-cum ooze from the slit.

Zane licked his tongue over her flesh, lapping up the juices that coated it. His entire body went rigid with his first taste of her innocence.

Holy hell!

He’d never tasted anything as delicious, and he’d eaten a lot of pussy in his life. This was nothing like he’d ever had. Her tangy flavor was rich and ripe, the texture of her flesh so soft and smooth, teasing his lips and tongue by making them tingle. His pulse raced, his heart pounding through his chest as if it wanted to jump out of his body and into hers.

Portia was better than the best blood he’d ever drunk.

Need to possess her charged through every single cell of his body.

Mine
, his mind screamed again, deafening him. Warring emotions battled in his heart, the need to have her on one side, and to protect her from himself on the other. In between those two forces, a third reared its head: the will to protect himself from falling for her, from giving his heart away only to have it crushed when she ran from him.

Zane pushed away the thoughts, forcing himself only to live in the moment and take what she was willing to give him: her body, nothing else. He would have to content himself with it, even though he wanted more now. He would do his darnedest to tempt her to give him more. He’d already violated Scanguards’ ethics, and one-by-one was breaking every single rule he’d ever put in place for himself: never to get involved, never to care, and never to hope for love.

It was all shot to hell now.

All because of Portia and the way he reacted to her. Just like she reacted to him. Her body twisted beneath his mouth, her pelvis rocking against him, and her hands kept caressing his sensitive skull.

For the first time in his vampire life he was grateful for the fact that he was bald. It had made his skin more sensitive to touch, and now acted as one of the most erogenous zones of his body besides the one now struggling to escape his pants.

With his tongue, he explored her beautiful pussy, nipped, sucked and licked this way, then that. When he stroked upwards and connected with her clit, she let out a breathless cry.

“So sensitive,” he mumbled against the fully engorged bundle of nerves.

But Zane gave her no reprieve. He wanted to taste her passion, her lust, and her desire. He needed to feel her come apart in his mouth, to know that he could give her something that she would remember, a feeling she would never forget and always associate with him.

While sex had always been a power play for him, never to be confused with affection or love, as Portia writhed beneath him in obvious ecstasy, he felt his heart soften, the wall around it crack. Not wanting to examine the implications of this, he doubled his efforts and pulled her clit between his lips, pressing them together.

Her moan was followed by a shudder. Wave after wave crashed against his lips as her orgasm broke.

His own release was only prevented by the tightness of his jeans and the zipper that dug painfully into his aroused flesh. Had he been naked, he would have spilled his seed onto the tile floor.

Zane groaned and kept licking over her clit, igniting her once more. Then he lifted his head and looked at her face. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted, showing the tips of her fangs, and her chest heaved. He’d never seen a more beautiful sight in his long life.

“Next time you come, I’ll be inside you.”

Her eyes flew open, and she pinned him. “Now.”

Her breathless word did something unfamiliar to his facial muscles. They twisted, his lips pulling up into a curve, parting as they did so. He brought a hand to his face to see what was happening to him and realized to his surprise that he was smiling.

He hadn’t smiled in over six decades.

***

Languid pleasure made her body feel boneless. Portia had masturbated a few times before, and while it had made her feel good, it couldn't compare to what Zane’s hands and mouth had done to her. She felt weightless.

When she opened her eyes, she looked at Zane’s smiling face. He looked so different now, younger and so much happier than she’d ever seen him.

Zane rose from between her thighs, thighs she’d so willingly spread for him only thinking of her own pleasure. With fluid grace, he pulled her into his arms, cradling her against his naked chest, still wearing his shirt and pants, and carried her into the bedroom.

She pressed her head into the crook of his neck and slid her lips against his skin, kissing him. She sensed him tilt his head to allow her closer access. Sighing her approval, she brushed her fangs against his neck, sensing the pulsing vein beneath that screamed for her to tear his skin so she could drink.