Kiss of Midnight_ A Midnight Breed Novel - Lara Adrian [694]
She was dreaming.
Reichen wondered how long she’d been sleeping, or where her dreams had carried her that her pulse would be beating as rapidly as a skittish hare’s. His thirsting gaze drifted down from the delicate beauty of her face to the smooth golden brown skin of her throat. Ticking frantically at the right side of her neck, her artery beat beside a small scarlet-colored birthmark. Reichen’s fangs were already filling his mouth, but now they throbbed, his eyes rooted on that tender patch of flesh with its diminutive teardrop-and-crescent-moon symbol riding so close to Claire’s pulse.
Jesus, he was parched.
His belly was tight and empty, his limbs heavy and fatigued. He licked his lips, hardly able to keep himself from leaning in a bit closer, until the light beat of her pulse was banging in his own veins as loud and demanding as a drum.
God, he thirsted… so deeply that the need was primal, animal, urging him to sweep in and take his fill like the predator he truly was.
That it was Claire beneath him was the only thing that made him pause. How long had he wondered what she would taste like? How many times had he come this close—hell, even closer than this—to pressing his fangs into her buttery soft skin and drinking from her vein? He’d wanted that more than anything at one time. But it was the one thing he’d never done, not even in their most fevered moments together.
As much as he’d hungered to taste her, to bond her to him through blood, he had never taken his need for Claire that far. She was a Breedmate. Unlike the larger percentage of Homo sapiens females walking the planet, she was one of a small number bearing unusual blood and DNA properties.
Claire and those like her, born with the crimson stamp somewhere on their bodies, were also uniquely gifted with extraordinary psychic abilities. And, unlike other human women, they had the ability to form an unbreakable bond with members of the Breed and bear their young. When a Breedmate offered her blood to one of Reichen’s kind, it was a precious gift—the most sacred of all. It forged a bond that could be severed only by death.
Reichen couldn’t lie to himself and pretend that he’d never been tempted. But he’d hardly been the kind to settle down, especially then. For all his libertine ways, and as laughable as it seemed to him now, his honor had prevented him from taking something from Claire that could never be called back. One sip of her blood meant she would live in him for as long as he drew breath. He would be bound to her always, drawn to her always, regardless of any vow she’d made to another male.
Even through the smoke and fog of his recovering mind, he could still recall how hard it had been to exercise control where his hunger for Claire was concerned. But he’d been careful. As hard as it was, he’d been a pillar of restraint, right to the end.
If he’d known then that she was going to waste so little time giving herself to Wilhelm Roth…?
Reichen growled just thinking on it.
His fury wasn’t so cooled that he didn’t entertain the idea of slaking his thirst on her right there and then. He leaned in, unable to tear his hungering eyes away from the rhythmic beat of her pulse. Her scent beckoned him as much as the rush of her blood beneath her skin.
She was even more beautiful than he remembered. This close, she robbed him of breath. Made him ache to touch her.
Jesus Christ, she made him burn far worse than sunlight or fury.
It stunned him to realize that he wanted her still, after all this time. After all her mate had done to destroy him. He wanted Claire for his own… still.
Reichen drew in a rough breath of air, his lips peeling back off his fangs. He wanted her, and, by God, he would take her.
“No,” he growled to himself. “Damn it, no.”
Claire’s eyes