Chapter Five

Byron stared at Agnes and fought the urge to blush. She always made him feel like she was trying to imagine him naked. The fact that she was born the same year he was didn’t change a damn thing. She looked like she was his great-great-grandmother. She was an amazing witch, and one of the most respected members of the council, but she was also downright mischievous.

“Don’t tell me she isn’t here,” he warned, trying hard to keep his tone respectful. “I can hear her breathing and I can smell her. I won’t leave.”

Agnes smiled and took her long cloak from the peg beside the door. “I’m thinking I’ll be going into town. For a day or two. The inner rooms are safe from sunlight and you are free to enter at your own will, now and forevermore, Byron Matthews of America, Hunter of the Council.” With that formal final remark, she threw the cloak over her shoulders and moved away, much quicker than a woman of her age should have been able to move.

Byron crossed the threshold and moved inside. He was tired, he was fucking hungry and he was pissed. The council hadn’t told him a damned thing and he had been reduced to asking individuals. Fortunately the first one he had asked had known him, vaguely, but known him all the same. Malachi had looked at him, narrowed his ancient eyes and said, “You’re a friend of Eli’s.”

“Yes,” Byron said cautiously, staring at the ancient in front of him. There was something about the red-haired vampire that commanded attention, commanded submission. Byron didn’t realize what a mark it was of his will that he didn’t fall and submit. He didn’t realize how much it set him apart from other, lesser Masters who were already centuries older.

Malachi saw it, though—he recognized it. And wasn’t surprised at all at why Eli had befriended the dark, towering American. He’d be a powerful Master, a powerful Hunter. And like all powerful Hunters, he’d need powerful friends while he was young like this. The young ones tended to be targets early on. Better to take them out quick, before they became too powerful.

Malachi’s mouth quirked in a slight smile. “Fucked up, did you?” he asked. “Go ask Agnes. She has a woman at her place. A wolf, if my sense of smell serves me. And I’d say it does. I’m smelling the same woman all over you.”

Byron had dashed out without even hearing Malachi’s soft, “Good luck. Lucky bastard.”

Now he was searching for her. Her scent filled the large house, it was everywhere. And she was nowhere.

“What are you doing here?”

He turned and saw her staring at him, wearing a big man’s shirt. Narrowing his eyes, he realized it was his shirt. He moved and had her around the waist without even realizing it, kissing her hungrily, greedily, his hands sliding up the shirt to find her naked little body warm and soft.

“You left me,” he accused, pulling away to glare at her.

“You sent me away,” she snapped, her eyes hot with indignation.

“You weren’t supposed to leave yet, and I’d changed my fucking mind,” he snarled back, catching the hands she was shoving against his chest and pinning them behind her back. “I hadn’t told you to leave yet, had I? Stubborn little brat. Have you forgotten yourself? Forgotten me?”

Kit refused to struggle once she realized she wasn’t getting away. His big, heavy body had her effectively pinned against the wall at this point, his cock cuddled against the softness of her belly, one hand pinning her wrists behind her back. Staring at his chest, refusing to look at his face, she said, “I wasn’t going to be thrown out on my ass. I’ve got more pride than that.”

“Damn you,” Byron snarled as he released her wrists and caught her face in his hands, tangling them in her short hair, kissing her roughly. “I wouldn’t have thrown you out. You would have been put in a fucking limo, driven to the fucking airport, and flown to fucking France on my fucking plane. And you fucking know it! Why are you doing this?”

She tore her eyes away from his chest and made herself meet his furious eyes. They were hot, wild and gleaming. His fangs had slid down and were flashing in his anger. The air in the room felt thick with it. Her own anger had burned out on the flight here, but staring at him now was causing a different kind of heat. “Why?” she asked softly. “You want to know why?”

“Yes. I want to know why,” he growled, lowering his face until they were mouth to mouth. “I did not want to take you into my service. You were my ward, and I did not want you to have to serve and obey any Master, even one who would indulge you. But you chose to enter our world and now you are openly and flagrantly violating our laws. You left me without my consent. You could very easily be punished by the Council, whether I will it or no, so, yes. I want to know why.”

“You had already made the choice to send me away, Byron. The fact that the act wasn’t yet complete doesn’t mean that much. You didn’t want me anymore,” she stated simply. “I couldn’t stay there anymore.”

“After the night we spent together, you can actually think I don’t want you?” he rasped, his fingers tightening in her hair to the point of pain.

She smiled sadly. “Not enough to keep me.”

Byron felt his heart break as a tear rolled down her cheek. “Damn it, Kit,” he rasped, bending down and catching it in his mouth. “You’re coming back. You’re mine.” He grabbed the edges of the shirt and jerked it off of her, exposing her body.

“I won’t come back if you think you can just send me away for a year. Two years. Even two fucking weeks,” she swore, folding her arms over her breasts and glaring at him.

“You haven’t heard a thing I’ve said, have you, Kit?” he muttered, taking her wrists and forcing them down to her sides. He knelt in front of her small, sweetly scented body and caught one rosy nipple in his mouth, raking the plump globe with a sharp fang and groaning when a drop of blood beaded on her flesh. He licked it away and suckled on the tiny wound until no more flowed. Then he pulled away and stared up into her eyes. “I changed my mind. You’re coming back with me. You belong with me, to me. As much I belong to you.”

He released her wrists, grabbed her hips and pulled her to the floor, feasting on the sweet cream from her cleft, catching her clit in his mouth and suckling it until she was moaning and crying his name. He stroked downward from her cleft, using the natural lubrication from her body to probe her rosette and he shuddered when she opened for him, when she started to rock helplessly against him as he drove his tongue inside her pussy while he screwed his finger in and out of her ass, then added a second.

He worked her close to orgasm before he turned her onto her knees and shredded his clothes. A hot musky power seemed to be filling the room, pouring from him, and Kit shuddered with it as it washed over her. She knew too much about vampires not to realize what it was. Byron was coming into more of his power, and his call was increasing. She just hadn’t realized how very susceptible she would be to it.

Her body was too hot, too tight, too hungry for him and she was certain she would die if she didn’t get him inside her. When she felt him probing the tiny hole of her bottom, she quivered and tried to shift, force him inside her pussy, where she needed him. He snarled at her and she felt his dominance roll over her, just like his call and she stilled, her head falling forward, her torso dropping to rest on the floor while he continued to draw the cream from her cleft to her anus.

Byron hadn’t ever felt anything like what was breaking loose inside him—he couldn’t fight it, couldn’t question it. He had to be inside her, had to do it this way, had to do it now. The shuddering, creeping power inside him was almost as arousing as the sight of her slick, wet folds and the scent of her cream and sex as he prepared her ass for his invasion. It rolled from him, like waves from the ocean, and it affected Kit almost as much as it affected him.

He gripped the cheeks of her ass in his big hands and pulled her apart, stretching her a bit as he pressed his cock against her. She whimpered. Byron said roughly, “Hush, now, Kit. Give me this now. You can take it, I promise.” As he spoke, the subtle power increased, and when it did, she became more aroused and forgot the burning pain as he pushed inside the tight virgin hole that he had lubricated, using only the sweet cream from her body.

He whispered to her again, and when he did, she cried out, as though his voice was touching her. “You’re tight, hot, sweet. Push against me. You will like it.” She bore down and he slid deeper inside.

Kit screamed softly. The more he talked, the hotter she became. It felt like his voice had developed a hand of its own and was touching her clit with every word he spoke. As he pushed deeper inside her ass, he spoke and whispered and she whimpered and cried, until he was completely seated inside her. He was too big, stretching her too tightly, too full and even his whispering roughly to her didn’t help. Then he started to pump inside her, and the burning tearing pain increased. Kit screamed and said, “Byron, stop, please!”

She started to beg as the pain turned into sweet, glorious pleasure with each hot, deep thrust as he pushed her hips lower and filled her with hard, rough digs of his cock. Bending his body over her, he licked her neck before sinking his fangs into her, his weight carrying her to the floor.

Her hot blood flooded his mouth, rolled over his tongue and down his throat as his balls grew tight and tingled as the orgasm rushed closer. She felt like silk around his cock, dragging and clinging with each thrust, pushing that sweet little ass against him, moaning and crying and begging, “Harder, Byron, oh, please, again!” He lifted them back up a little so he could drive deeper inside and he shuddered as she screamed. She gripped his cock like a silk fist, tight, hot and he pushed back inside as he reached between her thighs and pinched her clit, found it tight and hard and swollen, and he drew his fangs from her neck so he could rumble at her ear, “Next time, I’m going to find somebody to fuck your sweet little pussy while I fuck your ass. Will you like that?”

She shuddered and pushed harder against him, clenching her buttocks around his cock and mewling when he started to fuck her dripping vagina with his fingers. “Tell me, Kit, will you like it?”

“Yes!” she screamed as he drove his thick cock inside just as she started to come, screaming in short, hard peals that echoed off the walls.

Byron pulled his hand from her pussy and shifted, crouching over her on his knees so he could drive inside her, hard, deep and fast, as his climax built and exploded out of his cock and he flooded the tight, hot little rosette that held him so snugly. Something inside him broke open, echoed inside her. He roared out her name and she cried out his while her convulsive climax milked the semen from his shaft.

Byron came to rest atop her body and then he rolled to the side, drawing her into the curve of his body and burying his face in her hair. He felt something inside his heart that hadn’t been there before.

Her. Kit.

Kit smiled sleepily. Through the new bond, she felt his surprise. “I told you,” she said, squirming against him. He still hadn’t withdrawn from her and she could feel him pulse inside her.

He pushed against her and she felt his renewing arousal, then his alarm as he felt the burning pain that she was feeling. She clamped down on his arm and held tight. “I’m fine,” she whispered. “Need a bath. Then you can take me to bed and put your cock to use in a little more traditional manner.”

“You really did know,” he whispered as he braced a hand on her hip and gently pulled out of the sweet embrace of her ass. She flinched, tried to hide it, and Byron cursed himself viciously, then he scooped her into his arms and carried her into the bathroom. “I’m sorry, sweet,” he murmured against her hair. He knew now what had happened. It wasn’t just the mate-bond, but his own power increasing. The call tended to get stronger with age, and usually happened gradually, not in the middle of sex. His shouldn’t have increased for a good fifty years. But that was what had happened. His had just taken the mother of all leaps, and with Kit, of all people. He couldn’t fight it, neither could she, but he damn well could have just found a better way to fuck her.

“No, you couldn’t have,” she said as she gingerly settled down on the edge of the bathtub. He glared at her.

She grinned cheekily at him. “Not very fun having somebody know your every waking thought, is it, Master Vampire?” she asked. Then she slid him a hot, smoky look from under her lashes and purred, “You know how hot it made me, dreaming of you doing just that to me some day? I loved it, every second. How hot you were, the way it felt when you opened me and just stared at me before starting to slide your cock inside me—”

Byron felt himself harden as she spoke and he growled, “Enough, Kit.”

“Even the way it hurt at first, and how you told me I could take it,” she whispered.

“Enough,” he groaned, glaring at her. “Right now, I can’t,” he snapped, moving closer and jerking her hips against him. He stroked one careful finger against her bottom and she arched against him, crying out at the burning pain and he said, “See? You can’t do this again, not here. Not yet. So stop teasing me.” The signs of her very obvious pain and the sympathetic backlash through their new bond were enough to cool his burning lust, and he released her slowly.

She pulled away and went for the cabinet where Agnes kept some of her more basic ointments and brews. She found the oil she needed and added it to the bath. “I’ll be right as rain come morning. Between this, and my own healing—”she ended with a shrug and started to step into the bath but he lifted her and gently put her down into the slowly rising water.

She watched with lifted brows as he started to shuck his own clothes. “You’re going to smell like slippery elm,” she told him, admiring the long, muscular lines of his body. He had the widest damn shoulders, with a vee of hair on his chest that thinned down to a fine line over his muscled belly before widening just over his sex. His cock was long, thick, softer now, and smooth, hanging over his furred sac. As she stared, his cock started to harden and Byron snorted out a muffled half curse, half laugh.

“Damn it, Kit, how am I supposed to not fuck you again if you keep looking at me like that?”

She tossed him an arch look and said, “I expect you to fuck me again. I just said we’ll use your cock in a more traditional manner.” She scooted forward a little as he moved into the tub and eased down behind her, wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin on her crown.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you,” he whispered.

She knew he wasn’t talking about the sex. He had finally gotten it through his old-fashioned head that sending her away had damaged her pride and her heart. A smile curved her mouth. “Did it make you mad when you realized I had left?” she asked.

“Mad? No. Insanely furious? Yes.” He gripped her tightly and rasped, “You won’t do that again, Kit. I mean it.”

“I’m your mate, now, Byron. You’re no longer my Master. The Council will no longer recognize that tie,” she reminded him.

Byron groaned and slammed his head back against the wall. “Are you trying to drive me crazy?” he demanded.

“No. I’m trying to get you to see you’ll have to start treating me as your equal. Shouldn’t be too hard. You’re only a century old. You’re not as antiquated as some of the other vampires. But I’m your mate, your equal. No longer your second, or your servant,” she said, squirming and wriggling until she was facing him. Then she kissed him, pushing her tongue hungrily into his mouth, reaching down and massaging his cock. She blindly sought out some soap and added it to the massage and once she was certain he was clean, she straddled him and drove herself down on him, sucking his tongue into her mouth and shivering as his hands came up to cup her breasts.

He drove his thick shaft up inside her, head falling back so that he could stare up into her sweet, heart-shaped face as she rode him, her slim, muscled thighs lifting her body up and down, working her pelvis against his. He reached between them and stroked her clit and she sobbed out his name.

He felt her orgasm and he started to push harder up into her sleek wet pussy, water splashing onto the floor over the rim of the tub. Her eyes swirled and glowed in her lust, burning hot with her power and her need, her nipples stiff and hard. He groaned and leaned forward, catching one in his mouth and biting, suckling, feeling her pleasure through the bond until it mingled with his own as their combined orgasm rushed at them.

She was still gasping for breath. He had something he wanted to ask her, but he was going to wait. He’d let her rest. He’d rest. They’d go into town tonight and he would buy her dinner at some fine restaurant, where he could watch candlelight dance on her mellow-gold skin. Maybe dancing. And he needed a ring. Maybe Agnes could help—

Her slim fingers threaded through the longer hair that fell from the top and sides of his head and she tugged his face up from her breasts where he had been pondering how to propose. After more than a century of living, he wanted to make sure the one time he did it, he did it right.

“Byron, I was thinking…you want to get married?”

Her laughing eyes met his, and he started to laugh. Equals. She had beat him to it.

He kissed her and laughed into her mouth. “Why the hell not?”