Page 35 of Grim’s Delight (The New Protectorate Syndicate #1)

EIGHTEEN

His mind went blissfully fuzzy as the pain numbed. Felix dropped his head back, exposing more of his neck to her.

When she began to rock her hips into his, seeking friction, he made quick work of freeing his cock and pushing aside her soaked panties. They both shuddered as he lined them up. Dahlia sank down on him in one hard movement, sucking him into the hot well of her body like it was her due.

She clamped down hard enough that he swore he could feel the throb of her heartbeat all around him. Careful not to dislodge her, he grabbed her hips and began to rock her up and down, just a little, just enough.

“That’s it, pet,” he encouraged her thickly. “That’s my girl. Ease up a little. Just— just bite with your top teeth. There you go.”

He groaned again as her fangs slid free.

Dahlia’s lips sealed over the wounds to pull directly from his veins.

Each suck was greedier than the last, and each one made her cunt spasm around the hot bar of his cock like she was trying to milk him dry in every way.

It was the most painfully erotic thing he’d ever experienced.

Felix hadn’t been entirely certain he’d let his blood bride feed from him. His reluctance wasn’t out of some macho bullshit like some, but rather a practical thing. If he intended to be away from her as often as possible, it wasn’t feasible to have them so reliant on each other.

To conceive a child it would be necessary for her to take his venom regularly, but after the fact it was less so. He intended to feed only enough to keep her from experiencing venom withdrawal, but he wasn’t about to introduce that weakness into his own life.

But, as always, everything was different with Dahlia.

The joy of feeling her messy, painful bite was exquisite. It even eclipsed the satisfaction of his own bite. He discovered that it was one thing to claim Dahlia, but it was another to be claimed by her.

To be possessed by her, to sustain her, to have her venom flowing through his veins, and to be her first…

Thumbing her tight little clitoris, he came with a pathetic little cry, his hips jerking. She rippled around him, her back stiffening with her own orgasm, but she didn’t stop drinking. He filled her up as she took from him, drop by glorious drop.

Felix stroked her hair out of her face as she drank her fill, savoring every pull of her lips and the silk of her half-dried hair under his fingers.

Her weight in his lap was perfect. The heat of her silky, dripping cunt around his softening cock was bliss.

Everything from her scent to her little hungry noises made him want to keep her there for as long as she’d let him.

But vampire stomachs could only take so much. Blood brides had a larger appetite than most, since they were designed to feed on their fellow vampires — who themselves had razor thin margins for nutrition — but even they couldn’t take more than a pint at a time.

Dahlia pulled back with a shudder, her breathing heavy. She rested her temple on his shoulder as her body lost all its tension.

“You did great, pet,” he sighed, cuddling her close to his chest. “I’m fucking honored to be your first bite. And your last.”

She said nothing.

He hummed, riding the pleasant high of her venom as it made its lazy way through his system.

He’d always wondered what it’d be like to experience venom.

Now he understood a little of what a vampire brought to the table.

It didn’t completely negate the bite, of course, but it was a nice perk.

The closest thing he could equate it to was drinking a smooth alcoholic synth.

It was just enough of a buzz to feel loose and warm.

That was probably why it took him a second to notice she was shaking.

Suddenly on high alert, Felix sat up a little and tried to get a good look at her. Dahlia had gone sickly pale. Her eyes were squeezed shut and her lips were clamped between her teeth as silent tears tracked down her cheeks.

Salt bloomed in the air, souring the sweet scent of her and the musk of sex.

“Dahlia,” he whispered, stroking her cheek. Worry cut through him. “Baby, what’s wrong? Talk to me. Did you hurt yourself? Did I hurt you? Should I call Alvin back?”

Seeing his proud Dahlia reduced to tears was gutting. Felix floundered, helpless and increasingly alarmed, when she pressed her face into his ravaged neck and let out a plaintive cry.

“What’s wrong with me?”

Holding her closer, he answered, “Nothing. Nothing’s wrong with you. You’re perfect.”

“I don’t want to be a vampire,” she cried, shoulders shaking in earnest as she fought back sobs. “I don’t want to drink blood. I don’t want to— to— feed on you or bite you when you make me so mad I could spit. I’ve become an animal. I just want to go back to how I was before.”

Regret wasn’t something he felt often, but when he did, it was excruciating.

Felix silently cursed himself as he stroked and kissed her hair.

“Oh, pet. No. You didn’t bite me because you were mad.

You bit me because you were possessive. That’s just being a vampire, Dahlia.

It’s instinct. I knew it and I pushed anyway to see what you’d do.

I’m sorry. I forget that this is new for you.

I should’ve… I should’ve been gentler with your first bite. I didn’t think and fucked up.”

She sniffled. “Did the boogeyman just say sorry?”

“He’s been known to do it every now and again.” Felix pressed another kiss to her hair, a little bit of his worry easing. Hearing a little of her spark come back didn’t help the regret, though. If anything, it made it worse.

I have to be careful with her, he thought, unpleasantly reminded of Alastair’s cutting remark.

In a more serious voice, he added, “I can’t imagine how hard this is for you, but I also need to be honest with you, Dahlia: you being turned is the best fucking thing to ever happen to me. Even if that does mean I’ll have to deal with the prick Alastair Bowan forever.”

“Because you needed a blood bride.”

“Because I need you,” he corrected her. “It would’ve killed me to give you up.”

“But you would’ve.” There was an understandable note of accusation in her tone, but it was overshadowed by her curiosity. “Why? I never clocked you as the type to give up the things you want. No one tells Felix Amauri what to do, right?”

Resting his cheek against her hair, he let out a heavy breath. “No one except you.”

“I’m being serious.”

“So am I. You don’t seem to understand how much control you have over me, pet. Someday soon you’re going to figure it out. I honestly can’t wait.” He was quiet for a moment, trying to sort through his thoughts so he could explain himself to her in the way she deserved.

They both knew he wasn’t good at this feelings shit, but he owed it to her to try. She’d given him her trust — conditional and perhaps ill-informed as it was — and that meant he had to return the favor.

Clearing his throat, he said, “But there are some things that even I can’t fuck around with.

My family is one of them. If it was just me and you, I would’ve made you mine the night we met.

But it’s not and never has been. I owe my cousins my loyalty.

They’re my responsibility. Not just them, but their kids, too.

Keeping them safe sometimes means I don’t get what I want. ”

He wasn’t sure what to make of the surprise in her voice when she replied, “Your family means a lot to you.”

“Why so shocked? Don’t most people care about their families?”

Dahlia sat up a little, dislodging his head. She still looked pale and shaken, but there was some life in her eyes when she deadpanned, “Felix, you blew up your aunt.”

“It’s complicated,” he replied, smoothing his hands up and down her bare arms. He couldn’t tell if the touch was meant to soothe her or himself. Not that it mattered. He’d always be greedy for her, and he’d never take it for granted that she belonged to him.

Never.

“If Yvanna had backed down and let me take over the family like my grandmother intended, we never would’ve had an issue.

The problem was that she and my uncle Julius — the man who died the night we met — belonged to a generation of Amauris that…

” He drifted off, struggling to find the right words to describe how absolutely monstrous his father’s generation had been.

“They were bad people. All of them in their own special ways. My grandmother was the generation that rebuilt the city after the dragons razed it in the Great War, and she felt like her children needed to be just as tough and ruthless as she was.”

“But they didn’t have to survive the same way she did during the war,” Dahlia astutely pointed out. “Those things weren’t as necessary.”

He nodded. “Exactly. What she got was a generation of monsters, each of them special in their own ways and not one of them loyal to each other. When I was born, she vowed to do things differently. For me, family comes first. Real family. My cousins. Their kids. The people who’ve pledged their lives to our name whether they share it or not. They’re my responsibility.”

“You once told me that your grandma raised you.” Big blue eyes, so soft compared to how they normally appeared when they gazed at him, looked even brighter with the sheen of tears in her eyes.

Felix rubbed his thumb over her bottom lip, a kick of arousal hitting him hard as he smeared his blood across the cushion.

Answering her unasked question, he muttered, “My father was a piece of shit who lived too long. Dora had him killed a few years before she passed. She didn’t want me to have to do it. ”

Dahlia grabbed his hand and held it, their fingers twining against her steadily beating heart. “And what about your mom?”

“She’s around. Not my biggest fan, as you can imagine. She hated my dad, but they had some sort of fucked up bond between them. I don’t think she’ll ever stop blaming me for his death.”

“But you didn’t kill him. Your grandma did.”

He shrugged. “I would’ve, though. To fix this fucked up family, I would’ve.”

Dahlia gave him a long, considering look. “What do you want to do with it? Get out of the syndicate?”

A laugh exploded out of him. “Fuck no!”

“It was a valid question,” she snapped, releasing his hand to smack his shoulder.

He shook his head. “I want the family to stop eating itself alive. I want the kids to have time to grow up without being put to work before they can even drive. I want my own to not worry that someday their siblings will take them out. So no, we’re not getting out of the syndicate.

I doubt we’d ever do that. The syndicate built this city, Dahlia. It built this family.”

“What if I don’t want to be part of that?”

The moment hung taut between them, heavy with the weight of expectation. Felix tried to relax his fingers on her waist, but it took more effort than he liked.

Trying to keep his voice level, he answered, “I wish I could give you a choice, Dahlia. I really do. But I can’t.”

She turned her head sharply, her gaze locked on some distant point across the room. The softness between them, sweetened by the sharing of blood and sex and secrets, evaporated. Its sudden absence left a cold vacuum somewhere in his chest.

“So I really am a prisoner,” she said, flat and bitter.

Felix swallowed a sour taste in his mouth. “You’re my bride. I’ll do anything for you — except let you go.”