Page 13 of Prince of Demons (Demon’s Mark #2)

Kesh

K esh swallowed thickly, attempting to get his too-thick tongue to shape words—any words—but the distraction of her bared vulva was making it hard to think. The hair there was darker than the silky strands on her head, and lush enough to hide the valley below.

He moved without thought, blind urgency driving him toward her. He wasn’t aware he’d crossed the floor until Georgia’s sharp inhale finally broke the spell.

He flicked his eyes from her pussy to her face, frowning at the look on her pretty features. The blood had drained from her skin, and her eyes widened with the same terror he smelled in her scent—but the set of her jaw was pure, steely resolve.

Drawing in a deep breath, the girl backed up a step until the edge of his bed hit the backs of her knees. She kept her gaze locked on his as she climbed onto the mattress—and spread her legs.

The rushing of blood in his ears drowned out any and all sound for several seconds.

“What are you doing?” It came out like a growl.

“You need… to eat. Right? This is how…?” A deep blush spread from her chest up her neck to her cheeks in scarlet blotches, and she closed her thighs partway. “Oh, God, is this not… is this not what you meant? I’m so sorry, I?—”

He gave her a stare laced with enough darkness to silence her mid-sentence.

She thought he intended to take his nourishment from her cunt.

He wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with that approach to energy extraction, though usually when he was so desperate for release he sought out human women for company, he didn’t waste time feeding on them. He wasn’t an incubus—he could get much more satisfying meals with more… bloody methods.

However, over the years, a few women had left his bed weakened from more than multiple orgasms. And, when his hunger had been too great to control, some hadn’t left at all.

But what he’d said to her in the elevator was true: though he’d happily slaughter her entire species if the need arose, taking a female against her will? Never.

The thought of forcing a scared Breeder under his care to spread her thighs hadn’t so much as crossed his mind.

His dick gave an achy throb, urging him to release whatever flimsy morals had made him ignore the most obvious of solutions.

She had offered herself in exchange for the worthless, faceless human she’d made him spare, and she’d stripped naked, climbed on his bed and opened her legs for him unprompted.

She was hardly unwilling. At least not in the strictest sense of the word.

He let his gaze slide from her pussy up her body, lingering on her breasts for a heartbeat before he finally met her eyes again. “I can feed from you there.”

“Oh.” She looked like she was going to say something else, but only her slightly panting breath escaped her parted lips.

Kesh drew a long, slow inhalation, focusing his lust-hazed mind.

She’d offered her cunt willingly, and taking her energy from there was about the only way he wouldn’t hurt her in the process—but he wasn’t oblivious to the heavy throb in his eager cock, nor what would happen if he lost control during this particular meal.

She was a Breeder—every pheromone in her cursed body was crafted to lure him in, and if he surrendered to that pull…

She would die. Horrifically. But it was either this or somehow extract her energy while knowingly hurting her.

How was he supposed to feed on her terror when his entire body ached to soothe her?

He bared his teeth, frustration making his skin itch, and looked back up at her.

Her blue eyes were wide with fear, yet that willful tilt to her chin remained.

He would never be able to hurt her.

The knowledge lodged itself firmly in his skull, solidifying with his every breath as he stared into her scared eyes.

Even now, starving and so hard he barely had enough blood supply left to think, he knew into the marrow of his bone that—with this woman?

—he would break himself into atoms to avoid causing her harm. Fuck.

“Close your eyes.” His attempt at softness died on the gravel in his throat.

Georgia darted a startled look at him, pink lips parting in what was likely going to be a ‘why?’ But one glance at his demonic features, and the Breeder seemed to clock on.

“Okay.” Her trembling whisper went straight to his dick, and he gritted his teeth around a deep breath when she closed her eyes and laid her head back on the pillow. Surrendering to him.

She was so… vulnerable. Naked and scared, with lines of exhaustion drawn on her pale features.

He pushed down the rush of possessiveness bubbling up from his gut in response, forcing his mind to clear of the stupid instincts clamoring up from the depths of his primordial makeup. Right now, she was a meal—nothing more.

The weight of his knee on the mattress made her suck in a superficial breath, and when he climbed all the way up and rested a hand on each side of her shoulders, she stopped breathing all together.

“I’m not gonna hurt you,” he heard himself say. “And when you wake up again, all will be well. Okay?”

A delicate frown marred her forehead, and he didn’t have to breathe in her scent to know that, after seeing how he went about feeding earlier that morning, after knowing exactly what he was, she didn’t believe his reassurances.

She still managed to force out a nearly inaudible, “Okay.”

Kesh kept his gaze firmly on her face as he shifted on the bed, the graze of a peaked nipple against his forearm enough of a reminder that he needed his full focus to get them through this with her life and his dignity still intact.

She smelled… too good, and even a featherlight brush of her skin against his sent shockwaves of need through his exhausted body.

Focusing on keeping his breaths slow and even, he knelt back up on the bed and let his hand slide up one of her legs. She stiffened at his touch, but didn’t resist when he grabbed her by the back of her knee and spread her open.

“Blackened stars!” He was only half aware of the snarled outburst, hands clamping onto the Breeder’s thighs in response to her small squeak at the threatening sound.

How? How did she smell like this? His entire being was alight with the scent of her.

Dazed, he slid off the bed and pulled her to the end of it in the same motion, snarling a warning when she tried to resist his hands spreading her thighs wider. She thought to deny him? Sought to cut him off from the source of everything there was? No.

Without preamble, Kesh buried his face in her pussy and inhaled.

Heady musk so intense he could barely take it rolled over his tongue and down his throat.

Eyes clenched against the onslaught to his senses, he slipped his hands from her thighs to her soft labia and spread her open, pressed his nose against her warm flesh and breathed her in again.

And again. Every mouthful of her scent shot lightning through his veins, almost painful in its blissful addictiveness.

He opened his mouth on instinct, driven by the hard need for more, and pushed his tongue between her soft folds.

Heady, tangy flavor filled his mouth and pulled a groan from deep in his chest. If he’d thought her scent was addictive, the taste of her nearly short-circuited his already flagging brain.

He sought the source of it on instinct alone and teased his tongue around her tight and reluctant entrance. She gave him a few hesitant drops of her essence, but it was far from enough. He wanted to bathe in her—drink her up until she had no more left to give.

Her flesh parted more willingly as he moved up her pussy, seeking the center of her pleasure.

“Shit!” The Breeder’s gasped cry came the second his lips brushed her clit. She jumped and tensed her thighs, but he easily kept her spread open with the bulk of his arms.

What was that?

Frowning, Kesh flicked his tongue over her clit, ignoring Georgia’s mewl of protest. No. Surely it couldn’t be?

He jerked his head back and swallowed a curse. Between her parted folds, a band of gleaming metal encircled her small nub.

“Someone… Someone ringed you?” Anger throbbed through his heated blood, forcing enough of his focus from his desperate need that he managed to pull his gaze from her pussy to her face. Her unmarred face.

A Breeder’s ring, meant to help her future mate secure her willingness until she settled into her new life by his side, was always given to a woman at the same time as her blinding mark.

Always. The implication that Georgia had hers while still retaining her ability to see their true forms..

. Someone had had her in their grasp, had known what she was…

and they had inflicted terror upon her. Purposely.

The fog of lust waned, replace by his fury. He pulled further back, darkened gaze sweeping over the Breeder’s prone form. She might be tall for a human woman, but compared to his massive bulk, she was only slight. Delicate.

It would be so very easy to simply… break her.

He’d had human women in his bed before, but they’d been thrumming with lust for him, blind to his true form and eager for pleasure.

Georgia stared at him with nothing but fear in her round eyes.

“I can’t do this.” He moved his hands from the softness between her legs and pushed off the bed, rising to his feet.

“W-what do you mean?” she croaked, scrambling to push up on her elbows.

For a moment, his vision blurred at the edges. Fuck, he needed to feed. He hadn’t been this drained in years.

Kesh flicked a couple of fingers in the direction of her naked body before he turned, intent on the exit. “Deal’s off. Go to sleep. The building is secure, and I will be back soon.”

“Wait.” Her voice rang through the room, surprising him with its strength.

He looked at her over his shoulder, eye-ridges raising with impatience. “What?”

“Don’t go. Please. Please, don’t.” She knelt up on the bed, chin wobbling once before she steeled her jaw.

“I have to eat.” It came out as a snarl. “Now.”