Page 28 of Blood and Magic (RBMC: Helena, MT #2)

Vermillion

S he didn’t need to know I’d come in my boxers while going down on her, that tasting her had been as close to heaven as I’d ever come, even better the second time when I didn’t have to worry about Scorpions breaking through the tree line.

Hell, seventeen years ago, I would have never thought I’d have Maeve Vanderbilt in my bed.

Our twelve-year age gap would have been enough of a turnoff alone.

But now, I regretted all the years I’d spent thinking she was too young for me, that I’d be better off on my own.

I lamented leaving her last night and pretending what happened at the cliff was a mere hookup.

Holding her while she slept brought me a new level of peace I hadn’t realized I would ever experience. Her features softened, and she breathed heavily. Knowing I had her in my arms, that I would protect her against any monster who came for her, made me the luckiest motherfucker in the world.

She was burning up. Her body had gotten ten degrees hotter than it should have been, and sweat beaded across her skin from more than alcohol detox.

It wouldn’t be long now. Her magic would tear through whatever scotch remained in her system, and when she opened those eyes again, she’d be in the middle of her transition.

I fell asleep for a moment, only a moment, and that was when it hit.

The initial blast of her magic launched me off the bed, shoving me sideways until I collapsed on the floor with a grunt.

“Fuck,” I groaned, frozen in the shock wave of pheromones and magic pouring off her in a vibrant tangible cloud of energy.

It forced me to hover there as it ricocheted through my molecules and roped me into its trance.

My fangs extended on their own, my cock hardened, and the knot at the base pulsed, ready to lock me into place.

This was the magic of a transitioning shifter.

A more submissive person would need a dominant to see them through it, and vice versa.

Seventeen years ago, I had helped Guin. I’d been more dominant than her at the time, but she’d since grown to outrank me.

I wouldn’t stare her in the eyes for longer than five seconds now. But Maeve wasn’t like her older sister.

My girl wanted to be cared for, wanted to cuddle up against someone more powerful than her, and know nothing would harm her again. I sensed her shiver every time I called her a good girl, and she responded with a determined, “Yes, sir.”

The call of Maeve’s primal side reached inside me, gripped my wolf by the tail, and yanked me to her. I’d known it was going to happen, so I stayed close. But if I hadn’t, her magic would have expanded until it found a viable shifter to help her.

“Mill,” came her pained moan. “Please. It hurts.”

I pushed against the force of her energy, struggling to stand as it weighed me down. It was powerful, surging out of her in thick, potent waves. My wolf responded with a loud howl inside my mind, instinctively taking over the human part of me.

Give, he commanded. Help her. Mine.

She sprawled across the bedsheets, naked and coated in sweat, her features twisted in anguish.

“Ver...mil…lion,” she murmured.

Finally, the magic ebbed, and I inhaled her scent like a drug — flowers, caramel, and sun in the springtime. It pulled me under its spell, wrapping me in its supernatural strength like an anvil blanket. I crawled on top of her, positioning myself between her legs.

“Shhh,” I said, running my fingers down the side of her face. “Maeve, I’m here. It’s okay. You’re gonna be okay.”

She turned toward my hand and sucked my finger into her mouth, the sensation surging down my spine and into my balls. My cock had been hard most of the night, but now it ached with heaviness. I had to get inside her. I had to spill my magic into her body and sate this rising tide in both of us.

“It hurts. Please.” She opened her eyes and looked at me through the haze, her unfocused pupils glancing wildly around the room. “What’s happening to me?”

“You’re in transition, baby.” I took a deep breath, recognizing my bonding scent in the air, notes of cologne and pine and something distinctly me.

It would warn off other males in the area, including the four in the ranchers’ quarters.

They would sense her magic even though they were a hundred yards away.

It would affect them, and if they wanted to keep their heads attached to their bodies, they’d stay the fuck away.

“Transition?” Her brows furrowed together. “I don’t understand.”

“Shh, relax. I’m going to help you.” I kissed her lips, her cheeks, her eyes, anywhere I could get to mark her as mine.

Mine.

Mine, mine, mine.

Then I brought my wrist to my mouth and pierced my skin, the coppery rush of blood exploding across my tongue.

I placed the wound against her lips and sighed as she started pulling, sucking down my life’s energy, tugging my magic into her.

I sensed it outside myself, swelling in her, starting to mingle with her own newly born instincts.

She opened her legs wider, rocking her swollen wet cunt against my still-clothed cock, and while I let her drain my wrist, I pushed my boxers down to my knees and angled myself at her entrance, shoving inside with one hard thrust.

Maeve gasped and arched into the contact, digging her nails into my shoulders so hard, they left marks.

I winced against the sharp pangs but kept going, unable to stop.

Her pussy was so wet with slick, so warm and enticing, the rush of euphoria spread through my entire body, up my spine and over my scalp.

Her mouth opened again, sharp little fangs now extended from her canines.

She opened her eyes and they glowed a bright, luminous blue, like her human form but lighter, the color of the sky on a brilliant summer day.

God, she was fucking gorgeous, especially with all that crimson spread over her lips, trailing down her chin and neck.

“More,” she moaned, and I didn’t know whether she was talking about my blood or how hard I rutted into her. I brought my wrist back to her mouth so she could take more of my magic, and I thrust into her like a beast, like I was starved for touch and intimacy.

“Fuck, you’re so good,” I said. “You feel like bliss, like fucking heaven.”

“Yes,” she cried. “Please. More.”

Between the pull of her mouth and the tight embrace of her cunt, I couldn’t hold on for very long.

Nor was I meant to. The point of the transition was to get as much of me into her as quickly as possible.

When my orgasm threatened to take hold, I sank into it with a satisfying moan, burying myself as deeply into her as I could.

The muscle at the base of my cock expanded while I exploded, locking us together as undiluted pleasure pulsed through me. With my magic now coating the inside of her, the rush of her hormones subsided, and she relaxed against the mattress, her arms around my neck to keep me close.

“Mill,” she whimpered before kissing me. “You’re here.”

“I’m here, baby,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere. I’ll see you through it. I’ll help you.”

That seemed to appease her, and she hummed before closing her eyes and succumbing to sleep again.

I lay on top of her and brushed the hair out of her face, tracing the angles of her cheeks and lips with my fingertips, memorizing them, burning them into my retinas.

I didn’t want to forget a moment, not a fucking second.

I, too, had been caught up in the trance.

The transition magic dulled reality and warped time, making me dizzy with intoxication.

By the time my knot loosened, the preternatural energy swelled up in her again, launching out of her soul in a potent force.

It pushed me into the air, and I hovered there for a moment, suspended in the grip of its fury, and when it finally let me go, I slid down her body, kissing and licking her skin, consuming the sweat on her precious body.

But the real prize was between her legs.

When I spread my tongue through her, I moaned against the delicacy of her slick mixed with my cum.

It tasted like both of us, and that amplified the heady arousal brewing inside me.

Wetness streamed out of her, and I lapped it up, swirling my tongue around her clit the way that had made her moan earlier in the night.

She pushed her hips up to meet my face, and I gripped her ass to hold her in place, feasting on her, reveling in being the one who got to see her so vulnerable, who got to protect her when no one else could.

“Fuck, baby,” I groaned. “You taste amazing. I could stay down here all fucking night.”

She sank her fingers into my hair, scratching my scalp and fisting handfuls to hold me where she wanted me.

I gorged myself on her, gripping her thighs hard enough to leave marks, but that didn’t matter.

Maeve bucked against me, riding out the waves of her pleasure as they crested and ebbed, rose and fell again.

I crawled on top of her, and she calmed down when I kissed her lips, lining my cock up at her entrance before sliding home in one fluid motion.

Fuucckkk , the connection flamed through my body like sinking into a warm bath, and when she wrapped her legs around my hips, changing the angle of her pelvis to take me deeper, I melted against her.

She needed more from me, more blood, more magic, so I tilted my head to the side to expose my neck, and I grabbed her head to bring her to it.

“Bite me, sweetheart,” I said. “Go on. You need it.”

She moaned and sank her new canines into my throat, which should have been painful and terrifying.

But under the influence of the tether between us, it sent shock waves of pleasure zinging through my veins.

I moaned and fucked her harder, shoving into her, using my knees to spread her wider, to go as deep as I possibly could. She drained me, and I relished it.