Page 35 of Auctioned for Her Blood
I look away. “It’s ridiculous.”
“Ember.” His finger grazes my cheek, gently nudging my gaze from the window and back toward him. “Nothing about you could ever be ridiculous. Not to me.” His hand drops from my cheek to my shoulder, and its heat reaches far below the surface of my skin to penetrate my bones.
Adjusting my body as it absorbs his warmth and support, I draw a breath and let it out slowly. “My mother…”
“Who disappeared.”
“Yes.” He remembered. “My mother forbade me to go out after dark.” I laugh. “It’s funny, now that I have some perspective, but… I’m not really sure what her issue was. I guess it was because we lived in the wilderness with wildcats and bears and no neighbors for miles. I guess that’s why her rules were so strict.
“But even after she disappeared, her warning stuck with me, and it turned into a…a kind of commandment I couldn’t break. I developed a phobia.” How else can I explain my bizarre behavior?
“If it is a phobia, you’re facing it now. Be proud of that.” His hand slides back up to cup my face, his thumb gently stroking my cheekbone as he looks into my eyes. “You lost your mother, the most important person to you in the world. It makes sense that you’d adhere to her rules, even long after she was gone.”
I nod, relishing the sensation of his hand on my face, his callused thumb strumming my skin.
Heat and wetness gather between my legs—a sudden flood that makes me fear I’ll discolor my dress—and then his thumb grazes my lower lip, and the heat and wetness throb.
I’ve never felt anything like this. The ache. The need. I can barely breathe.
Kiss me, I think, hoping I’m sending the right signals.
I’ve never been kissed, not properly, not seriously or with passion, and my lips are quivering, all the blood that’s not pooled between my legs moving up to my mouth, burning and twitching my lips, and they part as my breaths continue to shallow, coming too fast now to pass through my nose.
Ryker bends toward me, his lips hovering there, waiting, teasing, sparking messages across the millimeters that divide his mouth from mine and intensifying all the desire roiling inside me. Closing my eyes, I wait for him to make his move, my anticipation building so high that my head, my whole body feels like it’s about to explode.
He pulls back. “We’re here.”
Gasping I realize the car stopped. “What?” I can barely breathe, barely speak. I can’t remember where we’re going or why.
I shake the fog from my head. “Oh, yes. The restaurant. Right.” I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment, hoping to regain my center—my sanity.
“We’re not at the restaurant quite yet, luv.” The limo door opens, and Ryker reaches back for my hand as he slides out.
Hand in his, I step out of the limousine, confused. We seem to be in some kind of industrial location near the river, the area lined with warehouses, and Zuben’s warnings about Ryker flash through my mind again. Is he going to torture and kill me in one of these warehouses?
Far in the distance, the lights over the Ben Franklin bridge shine, and much closer, I see and hear a helicopter.
Eyes widening, I turn toward him. “Is that…is that for us?”
He nods. “The restaurant’s in New York.” He leans down, his lips next to my ear. “And as for that kiss… I’m saving you for dessert.”
Chapter Eleven
Ember
I feellike I’m flying. Well, technically weareflying, but it’s way more than just the helicopter causing this exhilaration, more than the cocktails and wine I had with dinner too. The restaurant he took me to was intimate, the food delicious, and the staff treated us like celebrities or royalty.
As the lights of Philadelphia come into view, I’ve never felt happier, and Ryker intertwines our fingers and raises them to his lips. The soft press of his kiss on the back of my hand makes my insides contract.
I look into his eyes. “Thank you,” I say. “Thank you for the most amazing night of my life.”
“You might have already thanked me—once or twice.” Ryker winks, but other than that small gesture he doesn’t break eye contact, and I can no longer remember seeing anything beyond what I see in his strikingly bright blue eyes.
They’re so brightly blue they don’t seem real, and I feel different under his gaze, the same person and yet utterly changed, more mature, more desirable, more fully myself, and yet also someone whoneedsRyker, needs his touch, his kiss, his body in a way I’d only imagined before tonight. Sexual desire—now that I’ve experienced it—my imagination did not do this feeling justice.
“Your car has arrived at the Heliport, Mr. Stone.” The pilot’s voice breaks into my fantasy world, and Ryker pushes a button and speaks into a small microphone. “Thank you.”
I’m panting now, like I’ve been running, even though I’ve been sitting for the forty-five minute flight, and I look out the windows to see we’re about to land back at the port on the Delaware River. Soon after that, we’ll get into the limousine and the driver will take me home.
