Dark Cravings (8 page)

“I’ve always been yours,” I gasped.

He pulled my head to the side and sank his teeth into my
neck. Pain. Pleasure. He was branding me. The harder Micah worried his teeth
against my tender skin, the more intense the pleasure became. Blood, sex—the scents
filled me. Everything felt different, more intense and more real this time.

Micah drew my hands up over my head. The movement forced a
low cry from me. I was trapped. Tight like a vise, he pinned my wrists against
the door.

He kissed me, angled my head farther back to deepen the
penetration of his mouth. I used my tongue to dance with his, countering each
thrust with an attack of my own. The moment he let go of my wrists, I curled my
hands around his biceps, brought him closer.

He pulled my full bottom lip into his mouth. I dug my
fingernails into the muscles of his arms. My hips bucked against his and I
grabbed his ass and dragged him even more tightly against me.

I needed more. When Micah pulled back, I made a small animal-like
sound of frustration. He stared into my eyes and smirked. The smile faded as
his gaze fell to the rapid rise and fall of my breasts.

“I want to taste your pussy.”

“Yes,” I whispered. That one word was filled with hungry
demand.

He was so hard against me. I slid my hand down, over the
crimson mark on his hip, the ridges of his stomach, to grasp his swollen shaft.
Micah’s self-control snapped. His emotions poured into me through some primal
connection I didn’t understand. He wanted not to just taste me, he needed to
possess me, own me. Need. Now. He pushed me harder against the door. I went
willingly, my legs spreading to accommodate him as he pressed closer. Lowering
his head, he tongued one nipple and then the other. I responded by stroking his
erection faster.

He raced a hand up my thigh, spread my legs wider as he
sought the heat of me. I was hot and ready for him. Always ready for him.
Greedy, he slid his fingers back and forth across my swollen sex.

I didn’t see him move, just felt the warmth of his mouth on
my trembling thighs. When I opened my eyes, he was crouched in front of me.

He moved his face to my throbbing pussy.

“Please,” I begged.

My whole body quivered with anticipation as I waited for his
mouth to touch me. But he didn’t give me the all-encompassing wet heat I
wanted. Instead he teased me with quick, darting flicks of his tongue. Heat
settled over my clit and he sucked me into his mouth. I bucked. The suction
stopped and he traced the outer lips before he swept inside. I slid my hands
into his thick, dark hair and curled my fingers through it to hold him in
place. Silently, I urged him to give me what I needed.

A low, keening cry of desire left me when he finally opened
his mouth wide and began to feast. I was instantly boneless as he laved me with
the flat of his tongue, a delicious combination of pressure and texture and
heat that quickly sent me soaring into another orgasm. Violently, I pulled his
head to me.

“More.”

I barely had time to recover before he stood and his cock
was inside me, filling me utterly, stretching me. I was reduced to sheer
mindless instinct. Nothing existed but his body and mine, the place we were
joined and the pleasurable pain of the desire we created in one another.
Arching my back, I murmured my appreciation as he nuzzled my breasts. He was
big and thick, and I greedily took him all, quickly adjusting to and then
glorying in his penetration. Plunging in to the hilt, he let out a hiss of
satisfaction. He moved his free hand up my torso and tugged on my nipples.

I wrapped my legs around his hips and crossed my ankles
behind his back, ensuring he wasn’t going anywhere. God, how I needed him.

And then he began to move. A confident, needful thrusting
that exactly echoed my own wants. He ducked his head and I closed my eyes and
bit my lip at the heat of his mouth on my breast. Our hearts sped in unison.

So good. It was exquisite torture—the hardness of him inside
me, stroking me, the rough scrape of his tongue on my nipples, the urgency of
his hands grasping my hips. Tension ratcheted tight inside me, faster than it
ever had before. I closed my eyes, reveling in every sensation as I stroked his
strong pulse with my fingers. My fangs throbbed, but I held back, waiting for
the perfect moment to strike. Glimpsing heaven behind the darkness of my closed
eyelids, I urged him on.

“Harder,” I demanded, opening my eyes to lock gazes with
him. “Faster.”

His eyes glittered. He took up my challenge, hammering into
me, each thrust pushing me closer to completion. Soon it was all too much. His
hard cock. My wet pussy. The rasp of his stubble on my tender breasts. The firm
pull of his mouth on my nipples.

I raced to the end. The tension tightened…and exploded. I
climaxed with a gasping sob and dug my fingers into his back. I pulled his head
up and sank my fangs into the strong muscle of his shoulder. He stiffened,
shuddered, every muscle taut as he found his own peak. Clutching my hips with
painful intensity, he rode out his pleasure.

I sucked, pulling rich, spicy blood into my mouth. It flowed
into me and I swore I felt it moving throughout my body. After a few minutes, I
pulled away, my tongue lapping at the small, neat puncture wounds.

One breath, two. The tingling warmth of my orgasm vibrated
out to my toes and fingertips. Or maybe that was the bliss of his blood. Micah trailed
his tongue up my neck and into my ear, the wet invasion a shocking, sensual
pleasure. And then he was kissing me, deep, wet, open-mouthed kisses that
tasted of sex and blood and want.

He pulled away, panting.

And then reality crashed through the sexual haze. Micah
froze, pulled out of my body and left me empty. I was swamped with such an
overwhelming need to have him close, to have him inside me.

Micah must have misunderstood. He stepped away from me,
horror filling his eyes.

“Jesus, Ella. I’m sorry…I-I don’t know…”

I tried to tell him that it wasn’t his fault, but I couldn’t
seem to find my voice.

Micah shook his head, bent to pull up both my panties and my
pants. After he dressed me, he stumbled back until he hit the opposite wall and
slid down it. Without another word, he brought his knees up to his chest. He
hugged his arms around them and began to rock. He looked so lost. The thumping
of his head against the wall behind him made my heart hurt.

What had we done?

I found and pulled on my sweater.

“Micah,” I said softly, crossing the room.

“What did she do to me?” he asked.

“To us, Micah. It wasn’t just you. You didn’t attack me. I
was there with you every single second. This wasn’t your fault.” If he heard
me, he didn’t acknowledge.

“Micah, Ella?” The door behind me shook under the fist
pounding against it.

I jumped, spun to the mirror and wished I hadn’t. My hair
was a tangled mess from Micah’s fingers. My skin was flushed from his blood,
and my eyes… They were glassy and wide. I looked like I’d just been thoroughly
fucked.

The doorknob jiggled violently. “Are you all right?” Roy
yelled.

I opened the door to meet Roy’s concerned, stress-reddened
face. I didn’t know what to say or how to explain what in the hell had just
happened. My uncle looked at me, then looked at Micah huddled against the wall.
Bright-red rivulets from the punctures in his shoulder were slowly disappearing
down his chest.

“Jesus, Micah,” Eli said as he pushed past me and slid to
the ground next to his brother.

My eyes filled with tears. I was disgusted with myself, with
the situation, with the fucking demon that had crashed into my life and ruined
everything. Despite the heat flaming my cheeks, I forced myself to meet my
uncle’s gaze.

“We’ve got a problem.” I hated how husky my voice sounded.

“I’d say that is an understatement. You two just managed to
cause a city-wide blackout. You’re lucky the hospital has backup generators,”
Roy hissed. “I shouldn’t have let you come here. I knew the connection between
you was intense. I miscalculated. Together you two are more than powerful, you’re
explosive.”

I flashed back to the graveyard and the fiery dust motes
Micah and I had created. How could we be explosive? My heart was racing too
fast.

“Couldn’t it just be coincidence?” I rationalized. I knew
the lie for what it was. Denial.

Roy shook his head. “This is worse than I feared. I’ve never
seen or felt anything like what happened when you walked into the room. I
watched yours and Micah’s auras combine—that didn’t happen at the house. Power
exploded the moment you touched. We don’t have time to sort this out right now.
I’ve heard from several of the other Shadow Hunters in the surrounding areas
that there is a wave of demons headed straight for us. We can discuss this
problem later. Ella, if you’re okay, we need to get Hannah out of here and do
damage control. Let Eli take care of Micah. For right now, I think it best to
keep you two separated.”

I bit my lip and looked over my shoulder at Micah, who was
cradled in Eli’s arms as if he was a little boy. The moment I looked at him,
familiar heat stirred inside the dark place inside me. Micah lifted his head
and I sucked in a breath. Our eyes met. His hands flexed against Eli’s arm.

“Get her out of here. Roy, Jesus… I can’t control this. She
needs to leave, now,” Micah pleaded.

Roy swept the room, took in the whole of the situation
before he nodded and gripped my shoulders. Even though I knew that if I didn’t
leave, Micah and I were going to end up on the floor in front of an audience,
in front of my uncle, I couldn’t seem to make myself move.

Roy’s grip on my shoulders tightened. When I tried to move
closer to Micah, my uncle forcefully pulled me from the room that smelled of
sex and promises. It held the scent of darkness and blood and everything I
wanted. The overhead lights flickered as if even the generators were going to
give out and Roy swore under his breath.

“Eli, whatever you do, do not let Micah out of your sight.
Until we can figure out what kind of spell the demon has laid upon them, they
are not to be in the same room together. I can taste the darkness but I’m not
equipped to deal with spells of this nature. I know someone who might agree to
help us. I’ll call you soon. Take care of Micah.”

When Micah tried to get up, Eli had to use the entire length
of his lanky body to keep him on the floor. I looked at Micah and knew
something irreversible was happening to us. The bite on my thigh and the one on
my neck began to burn. My tattoo throbbed. A line of fire raced between the
points and it felt was as if I was being torn apart.

“Go.” That was the only thing I heard before Roy dragged me
out of the room, down the stairwell and out of the hospital.

The farther away I got, the stronger the urge to vomit
became. The sensation threatened to drive me to my knees. I made it to the
truck before I retched. Hannah wrapped her arms around me. Her jasmine scent surrounded
me. I fell against her, buried my face into my sister’s shoulder and cried as
if I was going to die. I begged. I looked into Roy’s eyes over Hannah’s
shoulder and pleaded for him to let me go back inside.

Roy shook his head and closed his arms around both Hannah
and me.

PMD (Post Micah Disaster) Day One

I clutched Hannah closer and cried in
huge, uncontrolled, gasping sobs against her stomach. The steady up, down
stroke of her hand along my back did nothing to soothe the ripping pain deep
inside my chest.

“Shush, it’s going to be okay,” she
cooed and rhythmically pulled her fingers through my hair. “Roy says the
withdrawals will pass.”

I barely heard anything over the
pounding in my head.
Go to him. Leave. Find your mate. You won’t survive if
you don’t.
It wasn’t Julian in my head, but some twisted dark part of my
subconscious. My inner vampire had found a voice.

I fought my instinct to find Micah
and curled my body around my sister’s instead. She gathered me tight and held
me throughout the night as the agony sliced me in half. Piece by piece, my soul
came apart.

PMD Days Two and Three

The chain around my left wrist
clanked and rattled. I tugged on my restraint. Metal cut through skin and into
what felt like bone. “Come on, I swear if you let me go I won’t leave the
house.”

Of course, I was lying.

Two feet in from me, sitting in one
of our handcrafted oak dining chairs, Roy bent his head and dangled his clasped
hands between his slightly spread legs. He looked up at me with sorrow. “We’ve
discussed this, Ella. I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

My growl reverberated throughout the
basement. I bared my fangs.

“Unchain me,” I demanded.

“No.”

Go to him. He needs you.

I screamed and raged against the
voice in my head. Why wouldn’t it go away? The never-ending pain in my chest
redoubled and I cried out. I had to get free. Had to see Micah. I struggled against
my cuff and the sharp rusty scent of blood filled my nose.

“I’m dying, please.”

“You aren’t dying. This will pass,
Ella, I promise. We’re gathering all the research materials we can to
cross-reference magical tattoos with lust spells. We’ll figure this out.” Roy
rose from his chair and walked to the stairs leading to the upper level of the
house.

My screams barely eclipsed the
closing of the door. Alone, I collapsed to the floor. I curled my legs to my
chest and wrapped my free arm around my calves. The moment I dropped my
forehead to the knobs of my knees, the tears fell and didn’t stop for a long
time.

PMD Day Four

“You need to eat.” Hannah pushed the container
of steaming stir-fried rice across the table.

The scent hit me and for a moment, I
thought I might throw up. I shook my head and stared out the window over the
kitchen sink. Rain fell from the sky and streamed down the glass. I traced each
individual rivulet and forced back the nausea. Dull pain throbbed through my
chest, but it was manageable.

“Is it blood you need?” she asked and
did a horrible job of hiding her grimace.

My fangs pulsed.
Micah
. He
still lingered on my tongue but I couldn’t pick out the unique facets of his
taste anymore. The ache sharpened.

“I’m fine, Hannah.” I was so far from
fine, it wasn’t funny.

Go to him, Hannah can’t stop you.
I shoved the little voice in my head—the one that got quieter as the days
passed—into some shadowed corner of my psyche. I resumed my window staring contest
and drew figure eights on the table with the tip of my finger.

“You’re not okay,” Hannah snapped. “When’s
the last time you slept? Or ate? Roy had to force water down your throat, which
by the way wasn’t pretty. While we’re at it, we should discuss showering.”

I glared at her. “Don’t you have some
sorority formal thing to go to?”

She pushed a few shiny strands of her
hair behind her ear and leaned back in her chair. One arm at a time, she
crossed them dramatically over her chest. “I’m not leaving you.”

My scowl deepened. “Fine.”

“Fine.”

I took in her slightly pursed lips
and narrowed eyes. Even in pissy-sister mode she was gorgeous. No matter how
different we were appearance-wise, there was one thing that we both shared.
Stubbornness.

The invisible noose wrapped around my
throat eased just a little. I wasn’t alone in this. I drew in a breath, then
another. I would fight this
infatuation
with Micah and I would win.

“Wanna play Scrabble?” I asked.

Her lips twitched. “Maybe.”

PMD Day Five

“I’m never having sex again,” Hannah
groaned.

I lowered the book I’d been
pretending to read about thirteenth century prophecies and looked across the
pile of research materials sprawled between us on the basement floor. She
curled her upper lip and wrinkled her nose at the ancient, leather bound scroll
five inches from her face.

Although she gagged a little, she
tilted the paper to the left for a better view. “I mean seriously. So gross.”

I shook my head and resumed my
perusal of my assigned book. One page at a time, I flipped through and looked
for pictures. I found none. “If it’s so disgusting, then why don’t you just
look away?” I asked.

“I’m trying to determine if this
demon’s penis is oozing pus or seminal fluid.”

Now I scrunched up my nose. I threw
my book into the pile between us. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. I’ll never look at the
male genitals the same way ever again.” She handed me the scroll with a
shudder. “I’m going to die a virgin.”

Depicted on the yellowing parchment
was a cock large enough to penetrate an elephant. Or maybe there were two
dicks, I couldn’t tell. I unrolled the paper a bit more and brought it a little
closer in an attempted to decipher the image. One dick, split in half. Two-inch
horns ringing the base protruded from the phallus. Above the spikes, mouth-like
holes did indeed leak something.

“You’re hardly a virgin,” I said
absently and glanced at the caption below the hand-drawn picture.

It wasn’t written in a language I
knew. In fact, none of the dusty old books Roy had ordered us to go through were
in a language I was acquainted with. In an attempt to curb my restlessness and
not give into the urge to bolt over to Micah’s apartment and tear off his
clothes—with my teeth—Roy had suggested I help Hannah with research. We were
supposed to be searching for any reference to the Vampire Queen and the Demon
Son while he tried to figure out why my heart was still beating. At least my
blood test had come back. I wasn’t pregnant.

Roy had yet to deduce what had been done to Micah and me, or
how to break the connection between us. Was it a lust spell? A binding spell?
He had no clue and neither did I. What I did know was that it sucked.

I couldn’t sleep or eat. Looking at food made me think of
blood, which made me think of Micah. When I looked at my bed, I thought about
sex. This led to more thoughts of Micah. Not to mention, anytime I did close my
eyes, Julian was there waiting for me. On top of everything else, I couldn’t
deal with my sire.

“Am too still a virgin!” Hannah
shouted and snapped me out of my trance. “Jeremy Wyatt doesn’t count. He lasted
all of two seconds.”

I lifted an eyebrow, rolled up the
scroll and handed it back. “And what about that Mark guy in your Econ class?”

“Five minutes of my life I’ll never
get back or forget. He made this awful noise in the back of his throat and he
was so sweaty!”

“Girls!” Book in hand, Roy walked by
us and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I don’t need to hear about these kinds
of things. Keep looking through the books. The answer is in there somewhere.”

The wrinkles on his forehead deepened
in concentration. He licked his finger and flipped the page he’d been studying.
I glanced at my sister. For the first time in days, I grinned. “Hey, Hannah.” I
nudged her with my foot. “Wanna know about Micah’s penis? Maybe it’ll help with
the research.”

Rory shook his head and marched up
the stairs. As soon as the door shut, Hannah broke into a fit of giggles. The
lingering pressure in my chest eased. I picked a random text from the pile,
settled my back against the wall and started flipping through it.

PMD Day Six

Torrents of icy rain fell in vertical sheets. The thunderous
din was deafening. Ah, what a perfect night to get my ass kicked. At least I
was finally off house arrest, even if I did have a chaperone. I grunted and
cursed under my breath as I struggled to claw my way out of the freshly dug
grave I’d been knocked into. The six-foot hole was less a grave and more a
muddy wading pool.

I reached for the slippery hand Eli held down to me and
gripped his wrist. He pulled me out as if I weighed all of twenty pounds, spun
to face the demon whose ivory claws were aimed at my head and threw out a sweet
side kick. Before his boot made contact, the thing poofed away.

I scraped the mud from my jacket and looked up at Micah’s
brother. His normally curly hair was now straight and dripped with water. The
nearly black strands hung to his chin. The bruise I’d seen in the hospital last
week had faded only to be replaced by a ring of purple circling his other eye.
If I wasn’t mistaken, his lower lip had split open recently too.

A badass hunter complete with battle scars had replaced the
serious Eli I’d know for the last several months.

“Thanks,” I shouted.

“Don’t mention it,” he panted and pushed his dark hair out
of his face. The boyish grin he’d just flashed faded. “Duck!”

I threw myself back into the mud and felt the rush of air
above my face.

“Fuck,” I hissed. At least someone was paying attention.

Rolling to the left, I used the momentum to propel myself to
my feet. I only had a second to plan my attack. My gaze darted left, and then
right, over the variety of rounded and flat-topped tombstones. I surveyed the
lot. Cracked in half. Too short. Too pointy. Crumbling. Too tall. When I found
the perfect stepping stone, the grin that curved my lips exposed my fangs.

I sprinted and leapt. The smooth, concrete hedge I landed on
was slippery. As I slid to the end, teetered, and almost fell on my face, the
stray thought hit me,
This plan sucks
. The demon, with its rotting,
hollowed-out eye sockets, made a clicking sound in the back of its throat I
barely heard above the howl of the wind.

I jumped off the hedge and into a full three-sixty rotation.
As I lined up with my attacker’s head, I threw out my leg in a flawlessly
executed roundhouse kick that cut through nothing but rain. The demon
disintegrated. I landed on a soft patch of freshly cut grass and a cyclone of
sand rained down upon me.

Wonderful. Along with mud, there were now finely ground
pebbles woven into my hair. I spit out a mouthful of gritty dirt and tried to
rub out the sand in my eyes.

“Damn. What is this thing?”

“It’s an Osiris demon, some Egyptians see him as the god of
the afterlife,” Eli grunted as if was in the middle of hitting or kicking
something.

How did he know this crap? I looked to the sound of his
voice and tried to find his tall form through the sheets of rain. My moment of
distraction was a careless mistake.

The demon solidified, struck.

Claws slashed along my lower back. Hot, hot, pain. I
staggered a few inches and teetered on the slick, melting edge of another open
grave before Eli caught me and pulled me to safety. I was seriously off my
game. Sleep deprivation was a bitch.

“Jesus, Ella, are you okay?”

My chest constricted. It took me a several seconds to exhale
through my agony and nod that yes, I was fine. It took two more to realize my
plan to kick the sandman across the cemetery into the moss-encrusted mausoleum
wasn’t going to work. My fucking boot wouldn’t budge from the mud that incased
it.

Our attacker switched its focus. Now in solid form, the
thing delivered a rapid succession of closed-fist hits to Eli’s stomach and
ribs. Each blow landed with a sick thudding sound. Pain etched across Eli’s
face. Instead of doubling over, he pulled a knife from his boot and stabbed. Good
boy. The demon dissolved and the weapon drifted through a cloud of sand.

The wind changed directions and I swore Mother Nature
laughed at me. Capricious bitch. Instead of blowing away, a mixture of sand and
rain pelted me in the face. Shit. I couldn’t see. My senses tingled, told me
the demon was shifting. I moved a second too late. The sandman reformed in
front of us. I shoved Eli out of the way and took the hit aimed for him. Poisonous
claws raked across my abdomen.

The world spun. I stumbled back in a daze. I looked down at the
blood welling from the gut wound. The sticky substance oozed from the gashes. Warmth
slid down my stomach. Since my transition from quasi-vampire to full-fledged
vampire, I healed faster. Already the blood flow was slowing. Stopping. The
cuts, not deep enough to scar, were already healing, but damn did they hurt.

The scent of blood carried through the night. I tasted the
honeyed rust on the tip of my tongue. I spun back in a flash of movement and
sent my fist speeding through another sandy cloud as the demon turned into
faceless granules.

“This isn’t working,” Eli growled and pulled a large, shiny
gun from the back of his Levi’s.

My stomach lurched and I froze. Wind whipped my hair. Rain
pelted my exposed skin. I didn’t care about any of it. In that moment, Eli
looked exactly like Micah. Dark hair. Square jaw. Tight black shirt and faded
denim. Firearm in hand. The rhythm of my heart increased and I had to shake my
head to clear the double image. My rambling thoughts weren’t helping me win
this fight.

I turned left, then right in an attempt to pinpoint the
demon’s direction.

“What’s the matter? Can’t stay and fight like a real demon?”
I yelled into the rain.

“Fight?” The thing’s low-pitched cackle came from behind me.