Page 13 of Forbidden Wolf

As a vampire, I took guarding my property seriously, including the man who currently held my heart in the palm of his rough hand. Our time together might not last forever, but right now that sexy wolf belonged to me. The thought of him injured roused every protective instinct I had.

I fought the urge to seek out the lycan settlement. Instead, I submerged myself again and lost myself in deep contemplation, my mind tormented by the images of Levi in danger. The only way I could help him, was to risk everything and turn my back on my family. My heart told me to take the risk even as my head debated all the pitfalls that stood in our way.

***

Tasha

Levi’s blood still pounded through my veins, connecting me to him in a way I never expected. I sensed his worry and his fear, but I also felt the same floaty feeling that I was experiencing. Both of us were caught in this web of seduction that had ensnared us. From that first night a magnetic force bound us together, miraculously saving us from the death sentence we’d inflicted on each other. I’d felt the cold clammy hand of death on my neck before it had been ripped away.

The angel on my right shoulder screamed caution and pleaded with me to walk away before it was too late. The demon on my left shoulder already had his lighter out ready to burn all our bridges, setting my panties on fire with the memories of last night.

Levi had transcended sex beyond my expectations. My friend Sabine hadn’t even kissed a boy and she’d had several lovers already. Why would anyone miss out on any part of what I experienced last night?

Kimber wandered around our apartment, nursing the injured monkey. Dad would have a fit if he knew I’d brought a wild animal into the facility. All creatures were kept in a containment unit.

We were vampires, not savages. Just because we had fangs didn’t mean we had to bite.

The memory of the taste of Levi on my tongue made me want to moan. Yeah, we didn’t have to bite, but sometimes the temptation was too damned much, especially when the blood was inside a werewolf who was currently starring in my own personal fantasy.

Six hours to sundown and I felt like those caged animals pacing in an enclosed space. I needed open air and freedom. I wanted to choose my own life instead of my coven leader deciding which unit I should be in, depending on how much I pleased him.

Sabine had already allowed Castus into her bed. He had a preference for virgins, and nothing delighted him more than the young female vampires visiting him to allow him to be their first. He creeped me out with his stares that bored into my soul.

More than once Mum had called him a pervert and Dad shushed her, scolding her with his eyes. Castus was to be revered and anyone found disrespecting him was severely punished.

“What did you see in the forest last night?” Kimber asked, sitting down to feed the monkey a small selection of fruits I’d gathered in the forest. “Did you find the black jaguar?”

A smile curved my lips and I sat down beside her on the sofa in the living room. “I did. His fur was as soft as velvet, and his purr was the loudest I’ve ever heard.”

“I’d like to see all these wonders one day,” she said with a sigh.

Kimber was a pure soul that Mum and Dad both fussed around. She developed gifts at an early age the same as me, but she had trouble controlling them. Out here, far from prying eyes, she was reasonably unnoticed.She felt and saw things that were happening around her, sometimes she saw things just before they happened, her eyes glazing over as she sketched them on her art pad.

“You seem different today,” she said, staring intently at me.

“Ah-ah. No using your funky magic on me, pipsqueak. You know what Mum said.”

She moved her gaze to the floor. “We are to be less than nothing, not special or different in any way. If anyone approaches us, we are to be dull and boring.”

Kimber enjoyed being a social creature and having to isolate herself made her sad. I tended to enjoy my own company, so it had never been as difficult for me.

“You get used to it,” I assured her. “Imagine yourself wrapped in a huge blanket that nothing permeates through in either direction. When I’m with people, I mute my responses and what I feel by envisaging myself in a massive fluffy black blanket. After a while it becomes automatic.”

“Why black?”

“Because black absorbs the light. It is the colour of protection but also of death.”

Levi’s wolf popped into my head and his response when I mentioned the colour of his wolf…I’m different. Our colour is linked to our abilities. Mine means that people tend to leave me alone.

Did that mean that Levi was as lost as I felt most days? He rarely mentioned his life and when he did, there was never a positive aspect to it. We were more alike than I first realised. Outcasts living on the cusp of our societies.

I felt the sun slowly descend in the sky, my vampire survival intuition sensing it like a low hum in my blood. It was our greatest weakness and over the years, we’d adapted to living in a world filled with daylight with shutters and sealed properties to keep the light out. At this time of year there was equal length of night and day. I preferred winter when the nights were longer, and I was free to roam.

“Do you have to leave at the end of summer?” Her voice sounded small and more childlike than her age.

“We all have to join the army the September after our twenty-first birthday. I don’t want to but there is no other choice.”

Her small hand found mine. “Someone needs to keep us safe from the lycans who want to murder us all in our beds.”

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