She threaded her fingers through my hair and held tight, trusting me to give her what she needed. I bent her backwards just enough to suck a hard nipple into my mouth. She had the most perfect pair of br**sts – I’d been obsessed with them since day one. I bit down on her nipple, and her blood gushed into my mouth. As I drank, I moved one hand from her hip to her other breast, zapping the nipple with my thumb. Her muscles clenched and rippled around my c**k each time and, f**k, it felt too good.
“Jared, I’m gonna come.”
That was fine with me, because I could feel the telling tingle in the bottom of my spine and I knew I wouldn’t last much longer. I released her nipple and pulled her flush against me. “Tell me you’ll never leave me, Sam,” I demanded in a tone unintentionally harsh. “Say it.”
“I won’t leave.”
Slipping a hand between our bodies, I sought out her clit with my thumb. “You’re mine, Sam. Mine to keep. Remember that.” A few zaps to her clit were all it took: those aquamarine eyes went blind with pleasure and her entire body tightened around me. She bit the crook of my neck and my climax thundered through me, seeming to go on and on and on.
Her whole body sagged against mine when she finally stopped drinking. “Love you,” she slurred against my neck.
I dropped a kiss on her shoulder. “And I love you, baby. More than anything.” And for that reason, I’d need to tell her about the vision that I’d had through Luther. There was no denying that I should have told her before we Bound, but I’d panicked that it would make her change her mind. That same sense of panic was still with me now, but it was wrong to keep this from her. She deserved to know. I just had to hope and trust that this wouldn’t change anything, had to trust in her.
Smoothing her hair away from her face, I said, “I need to tell you something.”
Lifting her head to meet my gaze, she arched a questioning brow. I sensed her sudden unease, but it wasn’t visible in her expression.
“I’ve never told you about the vision that I had through Luther, have I?”
She blinked, her unease replaced by extreme curiosity. “No, I don’t think you did.”
“It was when I was made a commander within the legion that Antonio offered for me to have a vision. I was originally going to turn the offer down. I’ve never believed that things are pre-destined, and I didn’t like the idea that I wasn’t in control of my own fate. But I was curious.”
Sam smiled. “It was curiosity that made me accept the offer as well.”
“In my vision…” I hesitated, scared – yes, f**king scared – of how she’d react.
Sensing my fear, she tightened her hold on me and shot me a look of concern. “Jared, whatever it is, just tell me.”
I took a deep breath. “In my vision, I was standing on a podium in one of Antonio’s parlour rooms. And he was announcing that he would be stepping down as Grand High Master and…I knew in the vision that I would be replacing him, even though I didn’t hear him say it. But when the vision ended, I just laughed. I hadn’t believed that it would ever happen in a million years.” Because no one had ever made me feel important, no one had ever made me think that I’d ever be given a role like that. “I wondered if maybe Luther’s visions were more like methods of motivating people. One thing I was sure of was that it would never come true.”
“But then Antonio later made you Heir.”
“I almost refused. I didn’t like the idea that it made me close to the fate that I’d seen in that vision. I wanted to be in control of my own path. But I also thought that that was a stupid f**king reason to turn down Antonio.”
Obviously confused about where I was going with this, she pursed her lips. “So you haven’t mentioned this before because…you didn’t like that it was coming true?”
If only it were that f**king simple. “I didn’t mention it before because…Sam, I was alone on that podium. You weren’t there. Nobody was.”
Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. “Oh.”
When all I sensed from her was shock and she didn’t try to move away, I continued. “I wasn’t alone and grieving someone, so it wasn’t that I’d had you and then somehow lost you in that future that I’d seen. I was alone and I was okay with it.” I watched her face carefully, searching for any sign that she would pull away. Not that I’d let her pull away, but I’d need to be ready to pin her down if it came to that. “I never told you about it before we Bound because I was worried that if I did, you would take it as some kind of sign that we weren’t meant to be together, that our futures weren’t supposed to collide or something.”
Mixed in with her shock was now confusion, but there was thankfully none of the apprehension or disquiet that I’d expected. “You never thought that that was what it meant?”
I cupped her face. “The point is…I didn’t care if it did. I didn’t care if it meant that the only way I’d ever one day replace Antonio was if I was alone. I still don’t. I’m not giving you up.”
She was quiet for a minute. “What you’re saying is…you knew when you Bound with me that you could very well be working against a future in which you ascended?”
“Yes, I knew it, and I didn’t care. No one and nothing could have made me stay away from you. I wanted you, needed you, and I had every intention of Binding with you – even if that meant that someone else would take over from Antonio. I just wanted you.”
She blinked, still more shocked than anything else. Again there was a short silence. “So when you say that I come first to you, you really do mean it, don’t you?”
“Finally she gets it.”
That got a smile from her, but then her expression turned speculative. “Are you sure you didn’t pursue me so hard because you were fighting the idea of your fate being controlled?”
It was hard not to feel sorry for her when she came out with crap like that. “Sam, if that was the case, I wouldn’t have accepted the position of Heir, would I?” My tone said ‘duh’.
“And none of this ever gave you any doubts about Binding with me?” Pure and utter disbelief coated her words.
“No. Not one.” I rubbed my nose against hers. “I don’t know why you weren’t in that vision. You told me that you’d been in Evan’s vision, and I know that he had his vision around the same time that I had mine. So it couldn’t have been that your future as a vampire was unsure at that time.”