Page 72 of The Nightbound Soldier

“Are you back?” she asks.

I smile, although if I had a heart, it would be breaking. Good thing I have no heart, for it would just become another enemy I’d have to destroy on my way to reclaiming vampire power in the fae-dominated world.

“I never left.”

“Liar.” She thrusts her hands into my hair again. She makes a mess of it. Again. And giggles, pleased with herself. “You are handsomest when you’re coming. I want to watch you come all the time.”

Her channel squeezes my cock, and I groan as I grow thick and hard inside her again. Before fucking her more, I glance out the window, gauging how much time I have left.

Not much.

Better make the best of it.

30

NOTTUZA

Facing each other, we’re lying on our sides.

Fleur is slipping into sleep, which lets me watch her in silence and allows me time to disassociate from this caring side she seems to evoke from deep inside me.

The bright moon shines through the window and illuminates the curve of her perfect body.

I run a claw over the hill of her hip and the dip of her slender waist, then over her arm, where I pause to take her hand and flip it over. I swipe my thumb over the inside of her wrist and bare my fangs, then pause, realizing I want her to offer herself to me so I don’t have to sip her blood here and there and live in a perpetual state of hunger.

I snarl and drop her wrist, leaping out of bed before the idea of staying tangled up with her past dawn wins. If I stayed, I would jeopardize the lives of the people I promised to protect just so I could fuck the very cute fairy who will, eventually, dump me like she dumps dresses she deems out of style.

And that’s if I’m lucky and Fleur no longer wants me.

If she wants me, the siren could entrap me in her world and keep me there for as long as she pleases, while out here in the real world, I’d be nothing more than a drooling vegetable.

I could spend my entire existence under the siren’s spell.

Standing by her bed, I reach into the nightstand where I know she keeps my toy soldiers. There’s a princess toy in there among the soldiers. I pick it up and run a thumb over the pregnant belly before pocketing the figurine and taking out a soldier, then close the drawer.

I break off the toy soldier’s head and leave the two pieces on the nightstand.

31

FLEUR

Yawning, I wake up like a kitten near her mother’s belly. Warm and feeling safe, the waning sun heating my body this evening. The sun and the moon are next to each other.

Two opposites that, when put together, form a beautiful sight.

They remind me of Nottuza and me. Two very different people mating.

I don’t reach across the bed, because I know he’s not here. Vampires don’t rest in places they deem insecure. He probably started the obsession with secure resting places, and now every notturno has it in their blood.

I’m sure he left right after I fell asleep last night.

I wonder where he sleeps and what his bedchamber looks like. Perhaps some span, he will trust me enough to show me his private quarters.

Likely they are catacombs.

I laugh at the thought, then rise from bed. The moment I step onto my bare feet, liquid trickles out of me. I sniff. It’s his seed. Smiling as I recall last night and the many times he came inside me, I think there’s no wonder I’m full of his seed.

As I pass the mirror, I pause and examine my many bruises.

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