Page 15 of Trapped for Her Blood
I clamp my jaw to keep my fangs in check. “Explain!” I command through gritted teeth.
The terror in her eyes intensifies and I close mine for a moment, searching for wisdom. Until moments ago, no instinct told me this woman was a threat.
But I’m like three different people. Which part of my gut should I trust?
“I don’t understand magic,” she says, her breath coming back to her. “And I certainly can’t use it. Honest.” She licks her lips, seeking moisture.
“My mother could do things. She could move things with her mind, make things disappear, create illusions—that’s why your story sounded so familiar to me. But I never saw her control a person.”
“Given you were born to one, how are you not a witch?”
“I’m not. My mom wouldn’t explainanythingabout magic to me. She got angry whenever I asked. She claimed she only used magic to keep me safe…” Her voice trails off and worry fills her eyes. Worry or more bad memories?
Nothing about her expression reads threatening, and although my senses are overwhelmed by the scent of her blood, I can’t detect deceit in her pheromones.
“Safe from what?” I fight to tame the growl in my voice, to keep the bear and the vampire inside. “Why would your mother need witchery to keep you safe?”
“I don’t know.” She shakes her head and her expression changes. “Or I didn’t know then. Now I suspect…”
She is hiding something. “What?” I roar, and her eyes close as the ferocity of my breath blows back the stray hairs from her face.
I want to apologize for the volume, for the fierceness of my voice, but that desire is overshadowed by my baser needs. I am in human form, but both vampire and bear are struggling for dominance.
“It’s something….” Pausing, she slowly opens her eyes, full of terror. “There’s somethingunusualabout my blood.”
I sniff without thinking, drinking in a long inhale of her enticing scent. I know that the vampire inside me needs blood, desperately, but it’s hard to deny there is something more about my attraction toherblood in particular.
“What about it?” I ask.
“I’m not sure. I…I think my blood is special for vampires. My mother told me never to go out after dark. She never explained why, but now…now I think she was protecting me from vampires. From those who only go out at night.”
Everything about her reads genuine. She did not want to tell me this information, but my gut says it’s the truth.
My fear of her dissipates, along with my desire to kill, but my other needs for her continue to build. My fangs and cock throb.
I will not use either on this woman. Not ever. Yet I remain in my dominant position over her, trapping her beneath me, positioned to fuck, feed or kill.
“Andyouhave no command over magic?” I ask. Would she have not used it by now?
“None. I know it sounds naive…” Her teeth scrape her lower lip as she thinks. “But even though my mother could do these…thesethings.” She shakes her head. “After she disappeared, I started to think that everything she’d done had been in my imagination. I started to think I was crazy from the trauma of being left alone so young.”
“She left you?”
She nods.
“How old were you?”
“Fourteen.”
Only a cub. My heart opens wider and I let up some of the weight I’m pressing down on her shoulders.
“Over time, I stopped thinking of what happened as magic. I didn’t believe in…witches. Just like I never believed in vampires or werewo—shifters?—until the last few days.”
I stare into the depth of her violet eyes, their color so bright and unusual, dancing with the reflections of the flames beside us. There is no artifice in her eyes, only fear and shock and…and deep sadness. Perhaps we have more in common than either of us yet knows.
Moving off of her, I crouch near the fire, but she remains still, lying back as if I’m still trapping her with my much larger body.
“Did I hurt you?” I ask, as gently as the not-yet-fully-tamed bear will allow.
