The Vampire King’s Captive

BRAN

It was oddly amazing. And strange.

Bran had never seen a thing like it in all his life.

Tracing behind Maria so that she wouldn’t know that he was there, he bent and placed his hands on the back of her thighs, dragging them up slowly.

She jerked and whipped around in surprise, the gown and shirt clattering to the ground now that she wasn’t controlling their movements anymore. Her eyes were wide with fear and when she saw that it was him, she sighed and fell face down on the sofa, mumbling something that he didn’t catch because she was speaking into the sofa.

“What was that?”

“I said you scared the shit out of me!” She snapped, twisting to sit up, but Bran pushed her back down. “Would you stop tracing in and out of here like a fucking creep? Let me up.”

“No, I like you like this.” He decided to ignore her request for him to stop tracing. That wasn’t possible. He liked seeing the surprised look on her face whenever she saw him too much to stop.

She blew out a breath and her whole body went lax with surrender, sending a bolt of lust shooting directly to Bran’s dick. Her head moved to the side so that she could watch him out of the corner of her eyes. She wouldn’t be able to see what he was doing, but he guess she just wanted to know that she could see him.

Bran dragged his hand slowly up her thighs until he reached the under of her ass-cheeks and a groan tore from his chest. Fuck, he would never get over this part of her. He lifted the skirt of her gown slowly until it pooled around her waist, and her ass, clad in lacy panties, was bared to him.

Generous and shapely and so fucking edible, he lowered his head and nipped at one cheek, then the other.

He heard her sharp intake of breath as clearly as he felt the shiver that ran through her small form.

“You’re so beautiful, I want to keep you in my pocket and take you everywhere with me so I don’t have to miss you every second,” he murmured absently as he pressed a kiss to the base of her spine. “Whenever the day gets too rough, I could just shove my hand into my pocket, have a feel of you, and all that’s wrong in my world would right itself.”

“Bran…” Goosebumps broke out across her back and a delighted rumble spread across Bran’s chest as he bent and licked at the skin of her back, loving the salty taste.

He pressed kisses on every surface he reached, moving slowly to her shoulders and bathing the area in open-mouthed kisses too, before shoving his face into her hair and inhaling her scent.

It spread far and wide across his chest, reaching every fiber of his being and as Bran had known that it would, his world righted. Grounded.

The mated vampire in him sighed and when Bran’s tongue brushed her neck, it begged him to pierce her with his fangs. To mark her and make her his finally, but the bracelet did its job and tamped down the urge.

The thing worked like magic.

Well, itwas magic.

Maria moaned as Bran brushed her hair to one side of her neck and left one side bare, peppering it with kisses up to her ear.

“Bran?” She asked almost sleepily and when Bran managed to blink into focus to look at her face properly, he saw that there was a small smile on her face.

He loved it. He would do anything he could to make her smile more.

His heart beat with the promise of it and his muscles tightened with the urgency to make her his. Hell, he wanted her. More than anything he’d ever wanted in his life.

He… Oh, fuck. He might love her.

“Yes?” He hoped the word hadn’t come out as weakly as it sounded in his own ears, because, fuck, he was terrified that he might be falling in love with her.

He couldn’t.

What did he know about love anyway?

“Where were you?” Maria asked, popping one eye open when Bran didn’t go back to kissing her. “You smell different.”

Bran hoped that the panic he felt on hearing those words didn’t show on his face.

He smelt different?Copyright Nôv/el/Dra/ma.Org.

“How do I smell?” He asked as he moved over to her front to sit next to her on the sofa.

“Usually, you smell like man and your cologne, of course. But now, there’s this other scent like…” she waved her hand haphazardly, her nose scrunching up. “There’s this other sharp scent that I can’t quite place my finger on. But it’s different and you don’t usually have it.”

This was his cue to tell her that Elizabeth would be living with them for the next week.

“Elizabeth is here.”

That gave Maria pause. Her brows furrowed. “What?”

“Elizabeth, the owner of the inn we spent the night at.” He tried to explain, and for some reason, his heart wouldn’t stop smacking against his ribcage. “In the demon realm, before we made it to Corey’s house.”

Realization dawned on Maria. “Oh. Elizabeth. Your… Lover.”

“Ex-lover,” Bran corrected quickly as Maria sat up slowly, thereby putting a huge space between them. He wanted to scoot closer and hold her, but he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to hold her while he was telling her that his ex-lover would be living under the same roof as her.

“Then why is she visiting you?” Maria asked carefully, staring at him through untrusting eyes.

Bran wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans. Why the hell did he feel so guilty? “She said the inn is under renovation and she needs somewhere to stay for a week. She’ll leave as soon as-”

“A week?”

“Yes.” Bran wanted to hold her so bad. To bridge the distance between them both emotionally and physically. “A guard showed her to her room right before I came up here.”

A furrow settled between Maria’s brows and her eyes moved past his shoulder. “She’s the other scent I perceived on you. Of course she is,” she murmured. “Is there a reason you smell like her?”

Bran’s heart turned to stone and sank into his stomach. “She touched me.” Then he added quickly, “But I moved away.”

“Okay,” Maria said flatly, then rose up from the sofa and padded into the closet with a throwaway, “I’m going to have a bath.”

Bran dropped his head into his hands and squeezed hard, wanting to scream all his frustration away.

He didn’t need to guess to know that Maria was mad at him. She’d never dismissed him like that ever since they mended things between them and now, she was pissed at him because of Elizabeth’s presence, walking away from him when he needed her to calm the raging storm inside his head.

Maybe he deserved her scorn. Maybe he needed to suffer for the decision he was about to take.

A decision that would shove her right into the arms of the man she loathed so much.