“Tina. Your wife?”
He nodded, a short motion, and her expression softened. “A nice name. I bet she was pretty, delicate. But strong of heart. Loved you.”
“Better than I deserved,” he said gruffly. “Love, don’t—”
She shook her head. “ ’S okay. The fever, it will be like that. But I’m going to be a hell of a lot stronger than your boy. You’re going to look like a slab of blood-soaked beef, and I’m going to be a starving shark. You need to leave. Go somewhere else for a while. A half day maybe.”
“Ah.” When he sat back on his heels in that comfortable manner bushies and blackfellas had, as if they could squat for days, Danny found it unexpectedly calming. “What if I give you some blood, about every hour or so?”
“You’ll get weak.” She shook her head.
“But you’ll heal faster, get you back to yourself.”
“You need to go,” Danny said stubbornly. Even though an idiotic part of her wanted him to stay. She didn’t want to be alone during this.
He studied her. “You’re not the best liar, love.”
“I don’t need to lie. I’m not the noble type, remember?”
“Maybe not entirely. But your chances will be better if you have a blood source.”
“You won’t leave.” She realized it from the set of his jaw.
“No.”
Danny bit back a sigh. “If you change your mind, I won’t think the worse of you.”
“Well, on something like that, it’s not your opinion that counts, love.” She didn’t need to second-mark him to guess what was going on behind those sea green eyes. She let her own narrow. “You’ve nothing to prove. I’m not your family. I’m a vampire that took you to my bed. Treated you like my slave.”
“And I let you. I wanted you to, Devil help me.” He bent down to her, ignoring her hiss of warning, bringing the rich smell of his life and heartbeat close. “Maybe I want you around to do it again.”
“Back up,” she said unsteadily. “Dev, I mean it.”
Her fangs were lengthening, and when his gaze flickered, she knew he’d seen the red tinge coming into her irises. A man who’d obviously confronted predators before, he did a slow and easy rock back onto his heels, nothing quick or startled. God, he could get her worked up even when she was like this. And he shouldn’t have been any prize right now.
Crusted with sand and ash, a few scrapes and burns from getting too close to the Rovers, he smelled of smoke and sweat. But she couldn’t dispel the effect of his provocative comment, the way he refused to flinch, no matter what danger she threatened. As if it had a rope on it, her mind tugged her gaze to the slope of his fine chest beneath the open neck of the shirt, the muscled line of his arm, the way his forearm rested on his thigh, his hand loosely dangling. And since she’d gone that far, she might as well indulge in an appreciative look at his groin, the curve of testicles and that amazingly large cock, emphasized by the spread of his thighs.
She was in roiling pain, unable to even hold herself up on her trembling arms. But that wouldn’t be the case for long. Even now, the stirring in her lower belly was ratcheting up her bloodlust. She shoved it away, while she still had the sanity to do so, and chose anger instead. Because if he was doing what she thought . . .
“I am not going to be your bloody death wish,” she snapped. “Do you understand that? I will stake myself first.” Anger flashed in his gaze. “It’s not like that.”
“Isn’t it? Rack off. Now.” She firmed her lips. “I don’t need you around for this.” A muscle twitched in his jaw. However, instead of saying anything more, he picked up the cloth he’d kept in the billy of water, wrung it out. As he wiped the cool dampness of it across her brow, he spoke low. “You’re sweating.” Then, even more quietly, “I won’t leave you like this, Danny. And you damn well can’t make me.”
The gentle stroking, at odds with his words, made her eyes close. “Bloody hell, Dev. I want the pleasure of you in my bed again, too. If you let me kill you, that’s not going to happen.”
“Well, when you put it that way. I’ll leave you to care for yourself, then. Even a man with a death wish will live another few hours if he thinks he might have one more naughty out of it.”
She smiled, her eyes still closed. “Worthless larrikin. All right, have it your way. Give me a little every hour, about as much as you just did. If I latch on to you at any point, you do whatever you have to do to knock me off you. The butt of your rifle might be best.
Shoot me if you have to. It won’t kill me.”
“I’m not going to hurt you when you’re already in pain.”
She opened her eyes then, forced herself up onto her elbows, hissed at him when he reached forward to help, arresting the motion.
Despite her pain, she made sure the command she injected into her voice was that of the woman who’d bound him to a bed, teased and tormented him for hours, who’d drawn pleasure from goading him to climax with the lash of his own whip. “Dev, there are only three things that can kill a vampire. Prolonged exposure to sunlight, cutting off my head, or a stake directly through the heart, which is much harder to do than most books and films tell it. Everything else will fix itself. In several days, any trace that I’ve been burned will be completely gone. But when a burn is this bad, there’s delirium first. I’ll be mad for blood, little better than a rabid animal. No rope in your pack will hold me.” She paused, considering. “Though it would slow me down. Ever done a hog-tie on a person?
Wrists to ankles to throat?”
“What?”
She made an impatient gesture. “If I try to get free, I’ll choke myself. It can weaken me, make me pass out. Though since I don’t need oxygen to live, lack of air won’t kill me.”
“I’ll just bind your wrists,” he said uncomfortably.
“Dev.” She forced herself to patience, though part of her wanted to scream. Perhaps this was why so many vampires liked having full, third-mark servants. No need to explain everything. Merely open that part of your mind and they’d understand. “The healing will continue, even under the rope. As I said, the question isn’t will I heal, but how fast. You’re right; regular blood throughout will help with that, but if you’re determined to stay, then you do it my way, damn it.” Despite the ripple of raw pain that came with it, she turned to her side, staying up on one arm. The braid he’d tucked into a knot had loosened and now fell forward to brush against the curve of one breast, the pink tip of a nipple. As she saw his eyes follow it, she remembered how fascinated he’d been at the boardinghouse, when her hair was loose and reached the cleft of her buttocks.
She remembered how his shoulders had tensed, the muscles in his arms rippling against his bonds, conveying his need to touch her.
Bloody hell. Just the heady memory, combined with the pain, made her sway. Ignoring her warning once again, the stubborn idiot had his hands on her, steadying her. Saliva gathered in her mouth, wanting to tear into him.
“You’re not like any woman I’ve ever known,” he said.
“Of course not. I’m not human.” She turned her head to look up into his face. “Don’t confuse me with her, Dev. That’s not safe for you. Plus, it would make me quite angry.”
He held her there, his large hands on her shoulders, feeling every quiver and twitch. He didn’t know what a lethal concoction was simmering beneath his touch, her pain and bloodlust, as well as plain physical lust. “Tie me the way I said, Dev,” she said shortly.
“All right?”
He nodded at last, went to his pack and came back with a coil of rope. As she eased herself back down to her side, she found herself holding her breath, watching him measure it out, the rope sliding between his fingers. The way he studied her body as he did it. When he dropped to one knee by her, she reminded him with a voice now thickened by things other than pain. “Wrists to ankles to throat.”
He turned her back onto her stomach, and she laid her cheek down on the rock, a quiver running through her as he guided her hands to the small of her back, making the soft breast flesh and tender nipples rasp against the rock. Steeling herself to that, she folded her arms in a box position. “Wrap them,” she said. “From wrists to elbows. It will be stronger that way.” As he did it, she was conscious of his heartbeat, his increased breath and the conflict it likely caused within him. “Don’t beat yourself up about it, bushman,” she murmured. “It’s in you, pleasure from dominance. It’s one reason it was such a pleasure to master you. You understand the way of it enough to get aroused on either side of the coin.”
“But you’re a bleeding mess right now. I feel like a bastard, getting hard . . .”
“I’m wet for you, Dev.” His words clogged in his throat, and she would have smiled, if she wasn’t in such pain and trying to bite down on any show of it to keep him on track. “Vampires mix sex and pain so regularly, I’d have to be dead to be immune to your arousal. As I said, don’t confuse me with a human.” Clearing her throat, she felt the prick of her fang. “Now the ankles. Hurry.” She was sweating again, a sickly shudder running down through her back. His heartbeat was getting louder, only it was the volume of her senses increasing it, a tempting drumbeat in her ears.
He was efficient and smooth, telling her he hadn’t lied about his experience as a stockman. He knew his way about a rope and worked quickly. But still, by the time he adjusted the cord around her throat, she was growling low in her chest, her jaw clenched against need, the sharp stab of lengthened fangs. She’d rebuked him twice for not making it tight enough. When he’d finally obeyed, cinching the line between wrists and ankles, and then taking up the slack between ankles to throat so she was well arched, her breasts rising off the ground, the moan that slipped out was caught between ecstasy and agony.