His teeth scratched her throat, tiny, erotic pricks of pain.
His masculine need rolled off him in waves, and her traitorous body answered, going wet and molten hot.
In the past, she'd always responded to him quickly, often from nothing more than a lustful look.
But this was different.
It was as though she was flame and he was fuel, and there was nothing she could do but let it all burn out of control.
That's how they get you.
Vampires are very sexual beings, they ooze sex appeal and are magnetic and irresistible to humans.
They're spiders that weave sensual webs to capture the careless fly.
The familiar words of Aegis leaders rang through her head, and though she knew she should fight, she couldn't.
"Please," he whispered brokenly.
He lifted her hand, placing the point of the stake over his heart.
"I can't control...myself.
Don't want to hurt you."
His mouth was at her jugular.
Andrea's entire body quivered, and a sob caught in her throat.
What he was asking her to do...oh, God.
A shudder tore through Kaden's body.
"Andrea...fuck."
His fangs pierced her skin.
Her stake pierced his.
They both gasped.
Neither had gone deep, but there was no doubt they could both kill.
They remained still, frozen in a twisted game of cat and mouse.
He needed to feed, and she needed to kill him, but neither had the willpower.
He squeezed her hand, putting pressure on the stake, driving it deeper into his flesh.
She strained against him, her hand shaking as she tried to keep him from jamming the stake all the way to his heart.
She wasn't ready to do this.
Wasn't ready to lose the person who had filled her life with more than revenge.
Before Kaden, she'd been nothing but a machine.
She'd done what was required to stay alive -- eat, sleep, drink.
But there'd been no joy beyond killing demons, vampires, and weres. Kaden had saved her life -- more than once.
"No!"
In one smooth move, she flung the stake away and grasped his head, pulling him firmly against her.
Kaden's teeth penetrated her throat in a white-hot stab of pain that veered sharply to pleasure.
His moan vibrated through her, and she was lost to him.
Chapter Four
She should have killed him.
Now it was too late, and Kaden didn't think he'd ever be the same.
He'd crossed a line -- vaulted over it --
and there was no going back.
Sensation stabbed at him, shooting like mini-orgasms through his fangs, all the way to his groin.
He should tear himself away from Andrea.
Man-up and do the right thing.
But he was so cold and she was so warm.
She smelled like leather and cherries -- a strange combination, but one that had always excited both the lover and the warrior in him.
And best of all -- worst of all -- she tasted like sweet, sweet sin.
Silky, warm blood filled his mouth and cascaded down his throat, filling that empty hole inside him that hurt.
No, not filling...because his chest cavity was truly empty now, his ribs caging in a useless heart and lungs that still breathed even though they didn't need air.
Some sort of cell memory kept him breathing,
he supposed, and he wondered when that would end, when his lungs would collapse and shrivel.
Andrea's pulse tapped against his teeth, and he moaned at the ecstasy of it.
He'd been guided by instinct when he'd bitten her, and even though guilt knotted his stomach, he couldn't fight the drive to suck harder.
He also couldn't fight the desire to ease her onto her back and settle himself between her legs.
Only the knowledge that there was a camera mounted in the corner of the ceiling kept him from tearing off her clothes, ripping open his fly, and plunging into her body.
But still, some instincts were too powerful to deny, and he rocked his erection against her core, drawing a low, heady groan from her.
Beneath him, she writhed, arching up to plaster their bodies more solidly against each other.
An erotic surge crashed through him in a hot tide, swelling his c*ck and making his balls throb.
Andrea tightened her legs around his h*ps so his c*ck rubbed right where she needed it, and with each thrusting motion, she gasped, her panting breaths coming faster and faster.
Damn, he loved the sounds she made when she was making love.
Granted, they weren't exactly making love, not while they were fully clothed, but the motions were the same, the feelings were the same, and oh, yeah, the way she drove him wild with her fingers digging into his back was the same.
"Kaden," she whispered, "yes, yes."
She was close, something he knew not from experience, but from his new senses.
He could smell the delicious scent of her lust, could taste the zing of desire in her blood.
It was like a drug he knew he couldn't kick.
As a human, sex had been great.
As a vampire, it was out of this world, and he hadn't even gotten inside her.
Delicious agony.
He shuddered, sucked, rocked against her until the friction became nearly too hot to handle and a vibration sang through his veins.
This was crazy, but his body had hijacked his thoughts, and nothing mattered but getting inside her.
Impatient, he slid his palm down her body, but before he reached her zipper, she cried out, her orgasm hitting so hard and fast he could only hang on for the ride as she bucked beneath him.
She called out his name, over and over, her smoky, pleasure-soaked voice nearly sending him over the edge with her.
"I love you," she whispered.
"God, I love you."
The words stopped him in his tracks like nothing else, not even his own will, had been able to do.
She'd never said that to him, not in the entire year they'd been together.
He'd suspected, but then, he'd suspected that he was in love with her, too.
But it was something he'd never planned to admit, not when a Guardian's lifespan was as likely to be measured in months as in years.
Five years ago, he'd lost Gabrielle to this violent life just days after their engagement, when she'd been bitten by a werewolf, had slaughtered several other Guardians, and Kaden had been forced to kill her.
He couldn't go through that again, and he'd guarded the words, "I love you," with the ferocity of a lion protecting his pride.
Andrea knew how he felt about love, and damn her for striking at him with a weapon every bit as dangerous and painful as a stake.
Roaring in agony and fury, he broke away from Andrea, surprising himself at the speed with which he came to his feet.
Wide, glazed eyes blinked in confusion even as she slapped a palm over her throat.
Blood seeped from between her fingers, and shit, he was a dumbass.
A newbie vampire dumbass who must look utterly ridiculous, standing in a cell with a raging hard-on making a tent in his cargos.
Quickly, he seized her upper arms, yanked her to her feet, and swiped his tongue over the punctures he'd made, another instinctive move.
And then he stepped away, but the cell was far too small to allow enough distance between them.
An entire ocean of distance wouldn't be enough.
Not when he still wanted her so badly it hurt, which was exactly what he'd been trying to avoid.
"Dammit, Andrea."
He rammed his hands through his hair, needing to do something with them before he grabbed her again and this time, refused to let go.
"I told you--"
"Yeah, you told me."
Her hands formed fists at her sides, and her face was flushed from her cl**ax -- and from anger.
"Told me you never wanted to fall in love again, because it hurts too much when it ends.
You told me when we first fell into my bed that our relationship could go nowhere except between the sheets.
But it went a lot further than that, and you know it.
It's time to stop skirting the issue and pretending that we only have strong feelings for each other."
Fuck.
He flicked his tongue over one fang, a new habit he'd developed.
Because he was a vampire.
Which she seemed to be forgetting, even though two seconds ago he'd been at her throat and sucking her lifeblood out of her.
How the hell could she act as though it hadn't happened?
As though she'd forgotten what he'd become?
For every second of every hour, until Gabrielle turned into a slavering beast, he'd been well aware of the fact that she had been bitten by a werewolf.
And yet, he'd been careless.
Sloppy.
Although it was Aegis policy to kill any human who had been bitten or scratched by a were-beast, he'd let his love for her cloud his judgment.
He'd heard rumors of humans who were immune to the infection, and on the off chance that Gabrielle was one of those rare people, he'd restrained her until night fell, bringing the curse of the full moon with it.
Worse, he'd not wanted to hurt her, so he'd kept her restraints loose.
When she'd turned, she got free and killed five of their colleagues before Kaden had put a silver killing bolt through her chest.
The pain, the guilt, had mired him in misery until Andrea showed up in Portland a year ago, a transfer from the Phoenix cell.
She'd been like a whirlwind, sucking him into her life with her dry humor, take-no-prisoners attitude, and intense energy, which was exactly what he needed after four years of loneliness and one-night stands.
"Well?" Andrea prompted, and he realized he'd been lost in his thoughts, which was not the place he wanted to be.
Not that their reality, where they were locked in a dungeon, was much better.
Way to feel sorry for yourself.
God, he was a moron.
If growing up with two blind parents had taught him anything, it was that self-pity was a pathetic waste of time.
"Well, what?" he snapped, residual lust giving him the sharp edge he needed to do what he must.
"You do realize that I'm a vampire, right?
And you're a vampire slayer.