Zauran (3 page)

Wow, he's the last silver eyed Vampyre.

When my eyes open he pulls away just enough to murmur across my lips, “Yes, I'm the last. Lucky girl.”

His bite into my lip is cruel, burning pain right up to my cheekbones, and his reaction to my blood hardens and presses into my body, announcing we've just moved over the threshold of polite.

I've stepped from the light into the exhilarating danger of night. I've longed to sample this bittersweet apocathary. Sponsored by the last vampyre can only lead me into hazardous and enthralling catacombs. Willing to surrender, my resistance fades. His dominant claim gives me hope that dreams really can come true.

*

Zaria:

Breathless, I watch the intimidating form fill the doorway. He leans his forearm above his head to support his weight against the doorframe while wiping blood away onto the back of his hand. His derisive smirk is aimed at me.

I can't say I'm sorry Zauran smacked him. That's what you get for rummaging in someone's head without permission.

“
Zaria, my oh my, you surely do bring out the best in us,” sneers Ryan.

Adrenaline pumps with the immediate drilling of my heartbeat at that. It's a threat. When Zauran met me he couldn't restrain his wild fire and he humiliated me so severely I'm surprised I ever forgave him. Stripped, fingered, forced to orgasm against my will, and now having someone twice his size say that to me, it ramps up survival instinct and I just run, fleeing to the opposite end of the passage.

“
Leave her alone,” says Zauran.

It's an order which leaves no room for debate.

Looking back as I enter the sanctuary of the kitchen I watch the two men eye each other. They're definitely related.

“
Correct,” says Ryan, his voice still the mesmerizing prayer of shredded stars. “I'm this loser's brother.”

“
Older brother,” says Zauran, clarifying for me.

I could have guessed that. Ryan's just a more solid version of Zauran. He's about half a foot taller and a third wider.

Cripes! I need to get out of here. Coming here was a mistake.

Ryan shakes his head, filling the doorway and blocking the exit to outside, “No. I'll stay out of the way in the den until you leave.”

He nods to me as if in confirmation, giving me the look of imminent harm should I contest his decision and make to leave anyhow. “I can
make
you, Zaria. And trust me you do not want to entice me back into your head because then I will not be responsible for my actions.”

And with that hanging like mustard gas between us in the hallway, he takes a right and disappears.

Zauran stares at me as if in indecision, finally exhaling so loud it barely conceals his despair when he closes the front door again.

His voice jumps into my head,
The kitchen? You do love to hide in my kitchen.

It's true. This kitchen is the source of my misery.

He strides fast with those lengthy legs that have a gap between them as if there is a fist between his knees. They're slightly bowed and it endears him to me. He has a moody walk, it sways his shoulders with each step, and when he pushes his windswept untidy black hair out of his eyes to stare down at me and his other hand connects in a heavy thump with faded black jeans, it makes me smile.

His long sleeved Tee is pushed up to the elbows, revealing straight dark hair resting over the sexiest arms I've ever seen on any man.

Not that he's a man.

“
You are not helping, Zaria.” He walks past me into the kitchen, slumping into a farm-style chair of carved pale wood.

Dumping heels loudly on the kitchen table in their barefoot entirety, he rests long legs and flops his head back to stare at the floorboards of upstairs, leaving his arms draping heavily on either side of his chair.

“
Why the kitchen? Why is it the source of your misery?” he says to the ceiling.

Perching on the chair next to his I survey the pronounced Adam's apple sprinkled with short stubble. I know from experience his stubble is softer than cobwebs and lately I've been wondering what it feels like when it combs a path down my spine.

That snatches his attention to me like a homing missile. “Zaria, what the hell is going on?”

Swallowing guilt back down, I wedge my fingers hand against hand between my thighs, staring at the floor. “I never get to cook. It's killing me.”

“
What does that mean?” he says.

“
Darise can manifest anything, any time he wants it. He doesn't understand how memories can be attached to simple things like cooking. I'm tired of coming home and never smelling food cooking. I don't have anything to make my mouth water, nothing that smells like
home
.”

Daring to meet his mystical eyes, I know my emotions are showing. “Zauran, I never have the laundered smell of fresh ironing to hit my senses, no pot of soup slowly simmering on a cold day, no stew left to cook all day in the slow cooker and to fill every corner of the house with delicious temptation. I never get to enjoy the aroma of freshly ground coffee and baking cookies. I miss normal! It will always remind me of the instant comfort I found in your kitchen because of a simple pot of soup bubbling on your stove on the coldest day of my life. I've been deliberating about it a lot lately and every corner I turn in the maze of my mind leads back to
this
kitchen and that pot of soup.”

Slowly sitting up, placing his feet on the stone tiles of the floor because he's immune to the cold, his palms press together when he leans his elbows on his knees and muscles coil with tantalizing tension. “What are you saying, exactly?”

“
Big girls don't cry, they get even. If you don't like the status quo make a change...”

I trail off to stare back at him.

“
Are you saying what I think you're saying?” he says, his voice a thousand octaves gruffer than usual.

Brushing hair away because it keeps cascading to cover my face when I look down, I harness the courage to meet his gaze. Inhaling, fighting back fear, I know he will hear without me verbalizing it.
We never tried. I chose Dari
se
without ever knowing all of you. I think I made a mistake. It was too quick, too fast, too impulsive.

“
Why now?” he says, raising two hallucinogenic eyes to engage mine.

“
If he can have a secret lover, so can I.”

“
But he'll know.”

The rock in my chest slowly slides to weigh down my stomach. “I want him to.”

“
You're using me to hurt him.” It's a cold statement.

His gaze narrows and he seems to be scrutinizing my very soul where it floats somewhere in the back of my head. Tension twists in my chest. I can't read his body language at all. I just dumped my heart, hopes, and fears, on this kitchen table and he's just sitting there!

Is he judging me? Does he think I'm a repeat offender or something? Taking a stabilizing breath I lift my chin to set the record straight. “Zauran, he obviously doesn't want me. It's already over, I know it is. But before I leave him I'd like to know what my future holds.”

“
And you assume I am willing?”

“
Yes! Or you wouldn't have punched your brother for eating me alive with his eyes.”

The silence hanging between us is like the squeaky wheel on a shopping cart. You can only take so much before you snap.

I'm a freaking idiot. Any man who has to think about it this long isn't interested.

“
Forget it,” I say, needing to disappear with my shame.

I'm bloody mortified I've made such a complete fool of myself.

Eyes as dark as wet smoke hold my attention when he stands, taking the step to my chair and claiming my hands, pulling me up to stand before him.

Anticipation and excitement swirl my senses like greedy quicksand. I watch him thoughtfully lick his lips through the bottom of my long eyelashes. I'm so tight inside I think I'm squeezing blood out of my heart drop by drop, it's making me faint.

Any second now he's going to tell me I'm delusional and a complete moron who needs
be grateful for the little you have
pills.

What's he waiting for?

Your undivided attention
, whispers into my head in a demanding tone.

In typical Zauran style he pushes the boundaries immediately, covering my breast with his palm, using the other to cup my head and yank my hair to tilt my face up to stare over the planes of his chest hidden beneath a shirt so tight it's revealing, up to his face full of dark triumph and primitive lust.

In a rip of displaced air his mouth is on mine, his tongue in mine, hands lifting me and wrapping my arms over his shoulders; my legs guided and forced to lock around his lithe hips.

H
is passion is defeating my neurons like a crusader sent to convert.
Keeping my eyes open, I'm held hostage in his gaze, afraid and thrilled in equal measure when he walks us toward the other door in the kitchen. The one with steps leading up to the second floor.

Really? You don't think I'm a heartless hussy?
I think to him.

Jesus Zaria, I need to spend more time in your head because you are torn apart inside. Did he do this to your self-esteem?

I can't swallow with the invasion of his kiss, yet I can feel the tendrils of his presence slipping into my head and worming deeper.
I... You really want me?

Want you would be putting it the polite way. When you were shivering in the hallway, before Ryan ruined the party, I wanted to tell you my door is always going to be open to you. Zaria I will always catch you when you fall.

Gripping tighter I squeeze for all I'm worth. In a world where everything's unstable, Zauran has become my rock. A very distracting mountain of a rock that I've been fantasizing something shocking over.

The answer to that thought is nothing shy of mental and neurological annihilation. His tongue is hot, possessive, his mouth forcefully imprinting mine, the hand over my spine staples me closer to him. I'm locked in Zauran bondage that breathes intimidation.

Oh sweet Mary, the saints can't save me now if I've made a mistake.

You haven't made a mistake, and I'm about to prove it to you.

Chapter 4

Zaria
:

Dropping me on a wide bed still covered in chilling charcoal shadows, he hauls his shirt off in one fluid movement, spearing me with the intensity of his expression.

I think it's meant to be dominant and scary
but the mischief in his eyes sabotages the stern cast of his face. The creviced corners of the room cling to icy drafts and shirking shadows, enticing bumps across my skin when he tugs my fleece jumper up and over my head.

Like an illumined manuscript enriched with antiquity he caresses reverent fingertips down my spine, ready to open my pages and inhale the library of my soul, tracing fingerprints across me to read my goose-bumps like braille.

Prowling over me, his advancing nearness forces me to retreat. My spine sinks onto puffy duvet fragrant with the crisp smell of his winter rain scent.

I'm vaguely reminded of how mammoth and muscular he is with the sight of ripples and clenching bulk wreathed in darkness and shifting shafts of ghostly moonlight.

His fingers flex wide before gripping into the linen next to my head; hot lips whisper arcane secrets in the first language down my neck. A tongue slides hotly over my undulations to circle and snare my cold tense nipple.

I always wondered you know.

“
What... wonder...?” I manage to exhale, my breath misting as if we're in a tomb encased with walls of judgment.

What color your nipples are.

A rakish smile greets me when he lifts up to look at me, leaving my nipple brittle.

The expression in his glittering eyes is the look of a knife plunging in to siphon out my soul.

It's eerie in here suddenly.

With every movement etched muscles dance between the moon's caress and blots of black shade, wafting the thermal ambiance of his skin at me.

He smells so enticing. Closing my eyes briefly I inhale personified comfort.

Unbidden I recall the stories of neuri which I heard as a little girl. They are the Serbian werewolves who roam seven nights a year; the length of God's creation. They are all powerful and dangerous.

I sense that danger now. Power emanates from him in a strange warm current which dips and rises through the riming cold pools of the room. His irises shutter with strange light, staring into me as if those eyes are portals to heaven and are allowing me to glimpse the sanctified guarded by the neuri.