Page 48 of The Demon Prince

But he couldn’t stop. He clutched her harder, drawing her further into his embrace and drinking so deeply he felt her shudder. Yes, this was what he wanted. He wanted her shivering and shaking and needing him for all eternity.

She would never leave this place. He would keep her safe and sound for the rest of her life because he couldn’t ever let her go. Not after this. Not after knowing what her blood tasted like pouring down his throat and into his very being.

He would smell like her. Taste like her. He would consume her until there was nothing left.

Katherine tapped his shoulder once, twice, but he couldn’t let her go. His hands curved into claws, sinking into the fabric of her dress and through the soft skin beneath. He snarled at the scent of more blood. Would it taste better from her back? Her breast? That pretty little dip where her hips and waist met?

She sagged and clarity hit him as hard as a gong being struck.

His Katherine, limp in his arms because he hadn’t been able to control himself.

Gluttony wiped at his lips, licking the blood off the back of his hand, and he stood with her in his arms. Though fear made him sick to his stomach, he also felt stronger than he had in centuries. She was his elixir, and now he would keep her.

ChapterEighteen

Her dreams were full of him. And strangely enough, she knew they were dreams.

Katherine was very much aware that she was walking through a dreamscape as she strode through misty halls. A pale white gown swirled around her knees, so sheer she could see straight through it. And at the end of the hall, a monster waited for her.

Red, glowing eyes illuminated the mist that surrounded him. The light left him in a swirling, blood-red massacre and yet she wanted him. Oh, she wanted him so much it hurt. Her heart thundered, her neck throbbed and pulsed, and she could feel herself growing wet and slick.

She wanted him to hold her again. She wanted to feel his heat pressing between her legs, urging her forward. To rock. To move in ways that she had never before. She wanted to feel him between her legs and in her neck. At the same time. Devouring her whole as only a creature like him could.

She’d never thought she would be like this. Katherine was scared of the creatures that surrounded her town and had a healthy respect for them as she walked by. But she’d never wanted to touch one of them. She’d never wanted them to do what he had done to her.

What kind of person enjoyed that?

But she supposed it didn’t matter because this was her dream, and in dreams, there were no consequences. She could race toward him, arms outstretched as she cupped the back of his neck and drew him down to her shoulder.

His fangs pierced through her skin so easily, sliding into her as she wished another part of him would. And then those big hands... She could feel the ghost of his touch, not quite where she wanted him, as though even her dreaming mind couldn’t conjure what it would feel like for him to touch her.

But she wanted to know. Katherine wanted him to palm her breasts, to squeeze them a little too hard until he trailed his hands between her legs. Would he be good at that? She’d heard the women in the village talking about it, but Katherine had never been the person they wanted to speak with.

She’d never... No one wanted to fuck a woman with a bad hip. She was the villager on the outskirts. No one even knew if she could have children, or if the pregnancy would kill her because she couldn’t move her leg out of the way. She had to keep it down. Had no mobility to move it to the side.

Even Gluttony must have noticed the way she sat on his lap and had to lean to the side. It left her neck bared for him, and gave him easier access, but her weight had to move almost entirely onto her bad leg. It could take the weight. It was just so stiff that she couldn’t actually open that leg wide enough, and...

Now the thoughts changed the dream. He looked down at her with disgust, his hand moving to her hip and flicking it with a claw. “This is a problem,” she heard him say. “I cannot have a broken woman in my castle.”

“I’m not broken,” she whispered, but the hurt seared right into her bones. Almost as though she could feel his disdain inside the marrow of her hip.

“You are broken, Katherine. Not even I can help you.”

Kat. He’d called her Kat when she returned, or pet. Not Katherine. And this wasn’t... this wasn’t real. It was just a dream and she could control her dream.

“Come back to me,” she said, opening her arms and struggling to control her own dreamscape. “I want to feel you against me.”

She knew what that felt like. Surely he would give her this. He would let her press herself against his body, because her mind knew how to conjure that. Maybe if he held her, then it would all... all...

But his smile was so cruel. “No, I’m not going to do that, Katherine. You’re so broken. Why would I ever want to touch you again?”

She could feel her heart shattering. It hurt so much to hear him say that. Like everyone else. Like everyone who thought she was too broken, too weak. She couldn’t do anything with her leg like that and poor, poor Katherine. Someone should help her. Someone should send her food, because clearly she couldn’t take care of herself. Why would she even try?

A loud rumble of thunder speared through her dream. And for a moment, she saw someone else in Gluttony’s eyes. A black shadow that had never been there when she’d seen him before.

Then she blinked her eyes open.

The darkness of her room was startling as she coughed and yanked at something sinister that covered her eyes. It was sticky, clinging to her fingers with an icy cold. And then a sharp snap of lightning illuminated the room, and she saw her fingers were coated with a dark mist. A mist that gathered together with a laugh as it rolled off her bed toward the floor.

---