Hunger Embraced (The Hunger Series) (27 page)

I knew when Daniel came into the room. No sneaking around for him. If my libido could have done its own little happy dance, it would have. Naked.

“It’s not nice to sneak into my home, Gregory.”

“You called. I came.” A look passed between them before they both smiled and clasped forearms. How long had they been brothers in arms? Hundreds of years? Anything was possible.

“What are you trying to do, Miri?”

“I’m hungry. And I have to cast and other things…” My eyes lit on Gregory briefly. I didn’t know how much I could trust him and didn’t want to give away anything I shouldn’t.

“Were you going to make toast?” He bent to pull out the toaster. I checked out his ass and blushed scarlet when Gregory cleared his throat and coughed over a laugh.

I stuck my tongue out at him and closed the freezer. A big white smile was my reward.

“I wanted to make a sandwich. But you don’t seem to have anything here that is edible for anyone besides rabbits or cannibal chickens.” I hugged my elbows and pouted when he came over to the fridge and started to put things back from where I’d gotten them. Maybe a stopwatch would be fun to carry around so I could time how long it took him to clean up after me.

“She does have a point. Perhaps I should help the girl out. I’m sure I could provide a decent meal.” Gregory gave me the old once-over while leaning casually against the table. I took a few steps back until I collided with Daniel. It would probably be pretty bad if the Hunger decided to rise just for fun and I hurt Gregory. A well-muscled forearm wrapped around me and squeezed. Gregory was damned sexy, and I knew my magic would sit up and take notice before long. In fact it probably already had.

“He is teasing you cara, and testing me.”

“Oh.”
That was something I knew how to handle.
“Brace yourself, T.T.B. I’m about to get my sexy on.”

“Miranda—”

“Shhhh.”

I wasn’t getting an onslaught of sex images from Gregory; he was clamped down pretty tight. But I knew he thought I was sexy. In fact, Daniel was shielding too. Hmm….

I bent my head and kissed Daniel’s arm. Then I turned and stood on tiptoe, making sure to slide my body up his before I wrapped my arms around his neck and coaxed him down into a slow, lingering kiss full of tongue and teeth. I wrapped one leg around his thigh and pressed my groin against him. His hard shaft jerked and seared a line of heat into my flesh. When I released him, I gave a good sultry look over my shoulder at Gregory. His face remained impassive but his aura gave him away. It had darkened in color and his pupils were dilated. People really shouldn’t try to play sex games with the Incubi. It’s in our DNA.

“Gregory.”

“Yes, lass.” He lowered his brow and met my gaze.

“I’m in love with Daniel. But he says we can’t be together. Are you going to turn me over to the Council?” Might as well get it all out there, right now. I wanted to know where I stood with this guy.

A startled look flashed over his face, his gaze flicked to Daniel behind me, and then back.

Daniel growled a warning. He crossed the room, pushed me behind his back, and leveled a stare at Gregory.

Shit. I hadn’t meant to issue some kind of challenge.

The other man held his hands up in the universal sign of surrender, and Daniel relaxed a fraction. “Nay, lass.”

“Miranda, what do you want to eat?” Daniel turned his back on the other man, ignored him, and gave his attention to me.

“I wanted a sandwich.”

“Fine.” He moved to the open refrigerator and scavenged out three different cheeses before moving to the cabinets and retrieving a griddle. The tension in the room dropped considerably. “Grilled cheese coming right up.”

“What kind of cheese is that?”

“You’ll like it. Trust me.”

“I know that I like it, I already tried it. I wanted to know what kind it is.” I glowered at him and looked at Gregory. He smirked at me, his chest shaking with silent laughter. I gave him the finger, and he laughed out loud before sobering. “So why is it Daniel says we can’t be together?”

Gregory put his hands in his pockets. “We are not allowed a mate. I think it may be the Council is afraid they’ll lose what is left of their Guardians to love. If we Bloodswear ourselves, we break our vow and are marked for death.” Gregory sniffed the air. “You smell delicious. No wonder our boy here is being territorial.”

“If Daniel were to break his vow, who would they send to kill him?” I leaned back against the counter.

“Me. And it would be a foolish thing to do. We’d both end up dead because of it.” I liked Gregory already. Sexy and straight forward. Good qualities to have. His eyes flared briefly, a gorgeous purple-violet light emitting from them before he shuttered his magic away.

I grinned at the big man, and he winked in return.

“Were you going to eat or just flirt with Gregory all night?” A plate with a delicious smelling sandwich hit the counter.

The surly tone drew my attention to Daniel. Gregory coughed to hide a chuckle, but I couldn’t help feeling bad.

I picked up the sandwich and took a big bite. It was heavenly. A groan of pleasure left my lips. “Oh man. Mouthgasm.” I looked up, disturbed by the sensation of eyes boring into me.

Daniel held himself stiffly a few feet away. Gregory grinned and looked back and forth between us. I raised an eyebrow in Gregory’s direction, and he shrugged. Great. Loads of help there. I put the remains of my sandwich down. The pantry seemed like a good idea, so I opened it and found my bag of jelly beans. I took out a healthy handful before holding it out in offering to Gregory. He shook his head no, so I dug out Daniel’s M&M’s. He held his hand out. I tossed it to him. Daniel had wrapped a rubber band around the bag when he put it away the last time so they didn’t spill all over the floor.

I picked out the flavors for a raspberry mocha and sidled up next to Daniel. I’d have to re-christen him Mr. Cranky Pants if he didn’t lighten up. He didn’t resist when I slid the candy between his lips, just kept his arms crossed and glared at the floor. Sexual tension poured off him in waves, but I didn’t know what to do.

“Raspberry and coffee? And chocolate?”

“Yep. Raspberry mocha. Here, try this one. You’re in luck. This was a good bag.” I popped four jelly beans in his mouth and waited for his reaction.

“Tiramisu?”

“Yep.”

“I am beginning to see the appeal.” Some of the tension left his shoulders. “Gregory, if you insist on eating all of my chocolate, you’d better be just as determined to replace it.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.”

I stood on tiptoe and gave Daniel a quick kiss on the cheek. He tensed visibly when my breasts brushed against his arm.

“How do you feel about her?” Gregory asked the question with his eyes on the bag of candy, but his attention focused entirely on Daniel.

He laughed: hollow, empty, almost despairing to my ears. “As if I could describe it so easily. This woman who makes me want to throw away the vows I have kept for the past five hundred years? To completely besmirch my honor, lose all I have been for so long? I barely know her, and yet…”

Gregory nodded. “The Council is not what it once was. Neither are we.”

He rattled off a couple of phrases in Italian.

“What am I to become? She calls to me, a siren's song that will surely dash me on the rocks of desire and wash the pieces out to sea. I am left broken in her arms.”

My knees wobbled. God, the man could bend words into pretzels.

“We deserve happiness, Daniel. Whatever that may mean. I am the only one who could possibly be a match for you, and I would never take the assignment.” Gregory stood up and tossed the empty candy bag into the garbage. “I’m going to go out for awhile. I expect you to have resolved this by the time I get back. We need to get you Blooded tonight, Miranda.”

He walked over to me and whispered in my ear although I knew it was pretense. Daniel could hear him just fine. “I haven’t heard him speak Italian in a hundred and fifty years. Don’t screw up.”

I didn’t hear the door close, but a change in air pressure told me he had left. Suddenly everything seemed awkward. We’d been given permission of sorts to have sex, to be Bloodsworn, and now neither one of us knew what to do. I stood there next to him for a few seconds, looking at the ceiling and wondering if I should just jump on him. Why was sex with strangers easier than this?

Would he still want me now? The forbidden fruit being the sweetest and all that. What about long term? Marriages could be dissolved, but a Bloodswearing was forever. My heart sped up to triple time and I clenched the edge of the granite slab behind my lower back.

Daniel swooped down on me. His lips met mine hard, and he stooped down to grab me by the ass and pick me up. He set me on the counter only long enough to strip my sweats and panties off. Long strides took us to the wall in the living room next to the front door, and he hoisted me up above his head.

“Put your legs over my shoulders. Now.”

It took a little maneuvering, but once he let my upper body rest against the wall and backed up I was able to do as he demanded. One arm wrapped under my back, supporting a good part of my weight. He looked at me from between my thighs and retracted his lips until I could see the full length of his fangs. Then he nuzzled them against my inner thigh, watching my reaction as I squirmed and rocked against him, unwilling to ask aloud for what he teased me with.

He breached me with one long finger and flicked my clit. He didn’t taste me, didn’t slide those fangs into my flesh like he knew I wanted. Another finger joined the first, and I cried out, slamming my hands palm flat against the wall in frustration. My nub throbbed and need spiraled out of control.

“If we do this, everything changes. There is no going back. Do you understand? I am yours forever as your Bloodsworn Mate. If we do this, if we breach this last boundary, my brothers will never accept me back into the coven.”

I was frustrated as all hell that he chose now to start giving me a speech. I just knew I wanted him inside me.

“Please, Daniel, please, just fuck me already. Please.” The last whimpered word garbled because he chose that moment to lower his tongue to my clit and move it in a slow circle while continuing to thrust with his fingers.

He sucked at me until my nub was so swollen I thought it would burst against his teeth. Then the sharp scrape of a fang grazed on that most sensitive spot. He alternated between sucking at the wound and running his tongue over it. The soft pressure of his tongue contrasted with the fierce pulls he created with his lips. I screamed, the sound torn from my throat, and banged my head against the wall, bucking my hips against his mouth.

Daniel backed up in a movement so fast I didn’t realize what had happened until my tummy slapped down on the arm of the couch. He knelt behind me and took me again with his mouth, and I knew he wanted to erase the memory of what had happened in the bathroom with Adrian, trying to wipe it away with new memories of pleasure so intense they erased any others. His tongue lapped and teased me until I forgot everything but him. My breasts ground into the buttery soft fabric of the furniture, and I strained to move as another orgasm spilled from the center of my body and burst from my fingertips.

My useless legs gave out, but he caught me, spun me, and yanked the shirt over my head before throwing it across the room. Daniel fell to his knees in front of me, buried his face between my breasts, and ran his tongue across my nipples. I grasped his hair and used it to hold him in place when he tried to move from caressing my sensitive flesh with his lips and tongue. He wrapped his big hands around my waist and burrowed his face in my cleavage, growling against my skin.

“I meant what I said; there is no going back from this. Are you sure that is what you want?” Magic caressed my skin, his eyes alight with power. The sound of the sea crashing into rocks filled my head.

“I want you. I don’t deserve you, but I want you.” The silky strands of his blond hair slid through my fingers.

“It’s not the same thing. We will be bound together forever.” One thumb circled my nipple, and he licked it, watching my face.

“I may be dead tomorrow, in an hour. I love you. Give me this, please.” I grabbed his face and hoisted him up until he kissed me. I could taste myself on his tongue and lips. I slid my teeth over his lower lip and sucked it into my mouth, nibbled and lapped at it until he groaned and picked me up off the ground. My hands tunneled into his hair, and I yanked his head to the side, letting my mouth slide over his earlobe and down his neck. I bit down hard and twisted my head to make it hurt just enough to walk the line between pleasure and pain.

He carried me around to the front of the couch and lay down on top of me, never taking his lips and tongue from mine. I could barely breathe, but it seemed like an insignificant worry. I didn’t need air, I needed Daniel.

His zipper stuck, but I freed it and grasped his cock with a surprised gasp. So large and hot, and I couldn’t wait to feel the way it would drag through my tight channel. He rammed his fingers inside my soaked pussy roughly, growling against my lips and muttering under his breath.

“
Yes! Yes…harder…more…ours…”

I knew now with certainty the voice belonged to my Hunger. I couldn’t agree with her more. I was wet and ready for him, my hips rising off the couch with each thrust. I stroked him back hard and fast. His teeth found purchase in my lip, and he sucked blood off. He grasped my wrists and held them pinned to the couch above my head. His cock throbbed tight against the entrance of my vagina, and I moaned, lifting my hips to encourage him. The hand that had so deftly manipulated my flesh found the small of my back and raised my hips up even higher. Daniel shuddered and kissed me again, not as roughly as before.

He began a slow roll forward that made me cry out in frustration. I wanted his cock inside me now.
I didn’t want a repeat of the torture of the bathroom, where he tried to be careful. I coiled my legs around his hips and used the leverage to give a good shove that seated him all the way.