To Love a Shifter: A Paranormal Romance Boxed Set (75 page)

“I understand, Luka. You don’t have to worry about me. I’m more worried about you. What about your injuries?”

“They’re almost perfectly healed.”

“And blood?” I asked. “You know you’ll need another bag again soon. You haven’t completely regained what you lost during your fight.”

“We’ll figure it out tomorrow.” Luka was using a firm but reassuring tone and I relaxed, knowing it meant he had a plan but didn’t think it was necessary for me to know about it yet. Luka had long taught me that some plans weren’t meant to be shared right away, that some things were better left unsaid while other things simply needed more time to come effectively into play.

Although the first level smelled distinctly of dust and old furniture, the second level was surprisingly clean, the bed in the master’s bedroom freshly made and with toiletries supplied in its adjoining bathroom.

“Very efficient,” I murmured, impressed.

“I’ll tell the clean-up crew you were pleased with their job.”

I stilled. “The same clean-up crew that…” I trailed off questioningly.

Luka flashed a brief smile. “Yes.”

I tried to repress a shudder. Somehow, the word ‘efficient’ for them had taken a whole new meaning. I just hoped they didn’t do any other kind of clean-ups in this place. The thought of sleeping in the same place someone else had been killed was definitely not conducive to having a good night’s sleep.

Luka tucked me in like a child and I let him, instinctively feeling the need in Luka to take care of me in whatever way he could. The guilt in him was tangible. I knew he blamed himself for getting me involved with this, but I also knew that by tomorrow his rational mind would make him realize that this was inevitable.

The kind of opponents he had were the type to fight dirty, the type not to give up, as long as they could strike from the back.

I watched Luka take a chair between my bed and the study desk, placing it against the wall so that no one could come up on him from behind. Surprisingly, there wasn’t even a single scratch on him and his clothes were still crease-free, and his gleaming blond hair had not a strand out of place.

A giggle escaped me, something that I had to let go of,  more for relief and to keep the hysterics at bay.

“What?” Luka asked with a raised eyebrow.

“You look like you just stepped out of a fashion magazine.”

He rolled his eyes.

“You do,” I insisted.

“Just sleep, Caylie.”

I shook my head. “I can’t. Not just yet,” I admitted. “Were you afraid, Luka?”

He shook his head.

“Are you afraid now?”

“No.”

I grimaced at the calm way he answered. “I was. When I saw their stake guns and when you threw me out of the window—” I frowned at the memory.

“Nothing would have happened to you, Caylie. I promised I’d take care of you, didn’t I?”

“When you’re falling ten stories down, those kinds of promises don’t count.”

A smile briefly curved his lips. “Touché.”

The silence returned. I tried to sleep, figuring out that Luka needed some peace and quiet to strategize but all I could do was toss and turn.

“Caylie.” Luka’s voice was lined with exasperation.

I cringed even as I rolled over to my side so I could face him again. “Did I disturb you?”

“What’s wrong?” he asked gently. “What’s keeping you up?”

I fidgeted restlessly under the covers. “I don’t know. I just
can’t
.”

Luka paused. “I know of a way to make you fall asleep.”

I watched him put his glasses down on the table before walking towards me and sitting down at the edge of my bed, next to me but not near enough for any part of our bodies to touch. “It’s a little unorthodox, though.”

I snorted, the sound making Luka chuckle. “Do you really think that’s going to bother me?”

“It’s very unorthodox,” Luka said solemnly, but there was a wonderful twinkle in his eyes that almost made me catch my breath.

“Just tell me and I’ll do it. I want to sleep.”

“You’re sure?” A secretive smile played on his lips.

I nodded.

“Fine then. But first we have to get rid of one thing…” Before I knew it, Luka had grabbed my wrist and tore off the bracelet Jeff had given me. He threw it to the floor and they scattered into pieces, the sapphire beads bouncing in different directions.

“Luka, why did you—aaah!” One moment he was gazing at me with possessive triumph glittering in his eyes, and then the next moment he had thrown the covers away, flipped my dress up, tore my panties away and was inhaling my scent. I tried to struggle the moment I realized what he was about to do, but Luka’s hands clamped my hips down to the bed easily.

“Oh my god, don’t do…oh!” Luka’s tongue had touched the top of my folds, teasing and tickling the tip before slowly licking me down.

“
Luka.
” This time it wasn’t a protest. It was a moan, a plea, a cry for more.

I could feel him smiling against my folds.

Asshole.

He nipped my clit and I nearly jumped off the bed. It was his way of saying he heard me loud and clear.

My head fell back against the pillow, my legs collapsing to the sides and leaving me spread-eagled before him.

There was no more time to think, not with Luka torturing me with his tongue.

He made me breathless, senseless, and shameless. “Please,” I begged. “Luka, please.”

Luka groaned at the mewling sounds I was making. “Caylie.”

“Luka, please!” I lifted my hips up, trying to have him kiss me more, harder, longer.

Luka more than took the hint, his thumb pressing on my clit as his tongue slipped between the folds, delving into the flesh before thrusting in and out.

“Luka!” I couldn’t remember screaming so loudly in all my life, couldn’t remember feeling as good as this as my body arched like a bow. I came in multiple jerks, and Luka lapped it all even as I begged him to stop and let me catch my breath. But he ate everything up still, ignoring my cries and whimpers as he cleaned me well and good, leaving not a single drop to dry.

After, Luka gathered me into his arms, my back against his chest, my head tucked under his chin. He pressed a kiss to my hair. “Sleepy now?”

There was a smirk in his voice. I should have found it insulting but all I could do was snuggle closer to him, an answering smile forming on my lips when Luka groaned as his cock immediately rose to attention between the curves of my ass.

“Naughty little bauble,” he muttered in our language.

I laughed, and that only seemed to make him harder. His arms tightened around mine. “Sleep.” This time he said it as a command, but one softened by the fondness in his voice.

I couldn’t help a yawn as my eyelids started to drift closed. “Tomorrow,” I told him drowsily. “Tomorrow we have to seriously talk.”

His chuckle reverberated against my body, tickling the hairs on my nape to stand. “About what,
mi vavli
?”

My eyelids lost the battle to sleep and I closed my eyes completely. “We have to talk about how you could want me…but not want to take me.”

I couldn’t meet Luka’s eyes the entire time the next day, not when I was forever mentally cringing at what my stupid silly mind made me say last night. God of Caros, how pathetic could I get, practically guilt-tripping a guy into having sex with me?

If Emilia Moretti ever found out about this, I would just go vampire and bite myself to death. I swore I would.

Luka had left a little after lunch, telling me he was going to hunt. I thought he meant hunting for information but when he came back a little after seven in the evening looking disgustingly fit and vitally healthy, I knew he had done a different kind of hunting instead.

Unfortunately, it was also the exact time my knees wobbled out of hunger and I would have fallen down flat on my face if Luka hadn’t caught in time.

I felt incredibly woozy. “Have I been poisoned?”

Luka shook his head. “No,
mi vavli
. You’re just hungry.”

“
Hungry?”

“You haven’t a single intake since the last time we ate at the hospital.”

My eyes widened. Had it really been that long? With so many things that had happened, I hadn’t even realized I hadn’t drunk blood for over twenty-four hours already. I lifted worried eyes to him. “How am I going to drink here when we don’t have supplies?”

In answer, Luka bit into his wrist, just small enough for blood to trickle out. He offered it to me.

I automatically shook my head. “But—”

Luka lifted his wrist closer.

My nostrils flared.

“You need to drink. We’re going to leave in a while.”

But he really didn’t have to convince me by then. The aroma of blood was too powerful for me to resist and I took what he offered. My eyes drifted closed as the first drop of blood hit my tongue and then I started sucking.

Drinking blood had always been sensual, but I realized it was nothing compared to drinking directly from a living source—and especially if the person you were in love with. My arousal communicated itself to Luka in a second, and the moment he groaned my senses went haywire. I rose to my feet and went for his neck.

Luka’s back slammed against the wall. “Caylie,” he gritted out.

I sucked harder, longer, but still it wasn’t enough.

I sank to my knees and tore his pants open, freeing his cock in an instant.

Luka froze. “Caylie—”

My fangs went out fully and then I was biting him ever so gently.

Luka growled the moment I started to suck. His fingers sank into my hair and he was thrusting his dick in and out of my mouth, and all I could do was suck harder and longer as his blood poured into me.

“I’m coming,” Luka said between clenched teeth.

In answer, I licked my bite closed before I sucked on the head of his dick hard.

Luka’s hips tensed for one second before he was coming, his cock spurting out his release even as his hips didn’t stop moving. I did my best to lap everything in but some of his cum still trickled out of my mouth. I was so unbelievably aroused the moment I realized he was spent, I rose to my feet and rubbed my body against Luka’s.

And because this was Luka—the Caro who women sighed and talked about, so much so that even I had heard of his stamina and prowess in bed no matter how much I hated to know anything about him back then—his cock stirred back into life after less than a minute, his arms gripping mine as I writhed against him.

“Caylie—”

“Take me, please. I won’t tell Emilia. I promise, I won’t—”

One moment we were almost one, every inch of our bodies in contact with each other. But the next moment Luka had virtually thrown me to the bed, away from him. The look on his face made me cry out.

Luka whitened. “No—”

I jumped out of the window. After nearly flying ten stories last night, this ten-foot-jump was a piece of cake.

But what I didn’t count on was having vampires attack me from all fronts.

“Luka!” I screamed for him with all my might, knowing it was my best shot at survival. The next best thing was to stall. They slashed and snarled, more like rabid creatures than intellectual beings that used to belong to one of the finest races in the world.

Their eyes were the most terrifying part of them, completely soulless and empty. One look at those eyes and I knew they’d never hesitate to drink me dry and eat my flesh. I fought with them all I could, using everything I had learned in the survival training classes every Caro student was required to complete.

“Caylie!” Not more than a few seconds had passed when Luka somersaulted from the window and landing in a neat crouch between me and another vampire. Yet it had seemed like eternity and I was already limping and bleeding in so many places.

Luka immediately kicked the nearest vampire away. He turned to me swiftly, rapidly taking note of my condition.

“I’m okay,” I managed to gasp as I forced myself up and got back into a fighting stance. But even this proved too much and my injured leg crumpled under me.

“Caylie!” There were vampires heading toward us again. It was as if with every vampire we killed, two more sprung out from nowhere.

“No!” I screamed. “Fight them! Don’t worry about me!”

 With a curse, Luka turned around again, just in time to avoid the vampire that was about to pounce on him.

“Luka!”

I twisted around towards the sound and Emilia Moretti came flying out, dressed completely in black and fully armed. She was hurtling steel stars toward the vampires, giving Luka the chance to recover and reposition himself. Riyu and Stefan came tearing out of the woods not a moment later, and the tides had turned.

It was over almost in a blink of an eye, the vampires retreating to wherever they had come from.

I immediately looked for Luka, just in time to see him sway on his feet. “Luka!” I crawled towards him, unmindful of the pain that shot through my spine as I applied pressure to my broken knee.
Oh God of Caros, please let him be okay. That’s all I ask. That’s all I need to know before I leave him.

Emilia had Luka’s head cradled on her lap when I was finally close enough to see his face clearly. Luka’s face was too pale. The sight of it was too much and I covered my mouth, feeling my fangs about to extend. How was I going to survive this?

Riyu’s eyes were on me, cold and as unfathomable as Luka’s. “Are you all right, Caylie?”

He knew.

I glanced at Stefan. His ever charming smile was on his lips, but his eyes were also wary.

They knew.

I willed my fangs to retract with all my might. “I had just taken blood from him when we were attacked.” My voice was still muffled by my hand. “Combined with his injury—”

Riyu knelt to the ground, slashed his wrist with his teeth and held it close to Luka’s lips. “Drink.”

When it clearly wasn’t enough, Stefan immediately replaced Riyu. But his face was near ashen and there still seemed no change in Luka’s extremely weakened state.

I crawled towards Luka when Stefan was forced to move away before he became low on blood himself and leave us more vulnerable to a possibly waiting ambush.

“You’re injured yourself,” Emilia said, her tone sharper than anything I’ve heard her use. “Let me do it—”

“No.” I tore my own wrist open, willing myself not to faint because the act alone exhausted me. “We are Caros. We take care of our own.” I pressed my wrist to Luka, and felt fainter and fainter as he began to suck. But his color was returning, and that was more than enough.

As Luka stirred, Emilia whispered under her breath, “Your fangs may be gone, but your eyes are still red-rimmed.”

* * * *

Slipping away when Brethren forces arrived and before Luka could regain consciousness, I moved to the edge of the woods, knowing that no matter where I was
she
would hear it. I murmured her name, injecting in it all the need I had in my heart.

The Invisa appeared, dressed in a deep red coat, its overly large hood covering her entire face in shadows. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m turning vampire, Invisa. I love Luka, and he loves
another
.” I stopped, struggling to push down the rage that rose at the mere mention of the other girl who had Luka’s heart. “You have to take me into custody.”

Cold fingers clasped my face, turning it up as ageless eyes studied me. Time seemed to stop the moment she touched me and when she let go, I gasped, not realizing that I hadn’t been breathing all the while.

If I thought she could help me, somehow offer me a cure for what was happening, she slashed away my hopes with one word. “Yes.”

I dropped to the ground, not realizing that I still had a semblance of hope left until the Invisa had completely taken it away from me.

“You must make a clean break,” she advised.

“What do you mean?” I ask dully.

“You know of the seeds from which vampires are made of?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

“A guilty heart can still be a seed. If you do not want him to share your fate then you must break his heart before he breaks his for you.”

* * * *

The headlines were more horrible than I could ever wish them to be. The press had somehow painted Luka into a possible traitor, saying that the ambush which took place at the Brethren hideout had been an alibi to prevent him from being tied with what was now known as the Screamless Massacre.

The first time I saw the carnage in the hospital we had escaped from, I had thrown up, unable to fathom how such violent destruction could help the vampires’ causes. What could they gain from this but more enmity from all the races?

But then the clues started piling up and we all realized that it would be to the cost of our lives to underestimate our opponents.

Every Caro’s tongue had been cut out before they were tortured while the humans were swiftly disposed of. With murder of this magnitude, it was impossible to keep the human investigators away and the worst questions were being asked. What did those without tongues have in common and what made the other group of victims different?

The human world thought of Caros as a group of wealthy individuals, but once they learned that there were those who led normal lives among us, that in our midst we also had teachers, housewives, and firefighters, it would be the start of the end.