Dark Magic Page 0,117

separation from her. Despite her outward appearance of serenity, her mind was as wild as the storm. She was soaring above the earth, no longer anchored by skin and bone. The fury of the impending gale was in her, turbulent, untamed.

He could find no condemnation in her for his failures, no blame for the sorrow in her. There was only a fierce need to find a way to understand and accept those things she could not change. She felt the shortcomings were her own youth and lack of experience. She was particularly distressed that she had inadvertently placed him in danger because she didn't have the knowledge to shield her presence from their enemies. Gregori nearly groaned aloud. He didn't deserve her; he never would.

Savannah turned her head slowly toward him, her blue eyes dark with the wildness of the storm in their depths.

He could feel it then, the heat and hunger. The raging storm. It moved through her blood the way it moved through the night sky. It called to something primitive and savage in him. He felt the beast roar, the hunger swamp him. Silver eyes glowed red in the dark night, ferocious, feral, more animal than man.

Gregori would never forget that moment. Not in a century, not in an eternity. The night was theirs. In spite of everything between them, there was nothing that could keep them apart. They belonged together. They needed each other. Hearts and minds, bodies and souls. Trees swayed in the winds; plants nearly bent double under the onslaught. The humidity was high, the air filled with electricity arcing and snapping. Jagged bolts of white heat slammed into the ground, shaking the earth. Lightning hit the side of a building a few blocks away, charring the walls and sending bricks spilling to the sidewalk and street. It exploded a nearby telephone pole into a shower of fiery sparks.

Savannah stood in the courtyard, the lightning arcing across the sky above her, the wind whipping her hair around her, the rain soaking her body, and she lifted her arms to embrace the raw power of nature. Her skin was creamy, flawless, wet. The silk shirt clung to her rib cage and emphasized the dark rose of her erect, beckoning nipples. Her legs were bare and slender, and the dark triangle of curls at their apex enticed and beckoned, mysteriously summoning him. Her long hair, unbound in the wind, was wet and wild, like the night itself.

Gregori went to her because he had to; he had no other choice. Nothing, no obstacle could have prevented him from getting to her side. His arm snaked out and dragged her to him, his mouth meeting hers with the ferocious intensity of the storm. He couldn't find the words, had no words to give her, only this, his fierce need to show her what she was to him. What she gave to him. Life. Everything.

He wanted her just like that. Wet and wild, with lightning streaking across the sky and scorching their blood. His mouth took hers, feeding voraciously, devouring, claiming her for his own, branding her mouth, her skin with his mark.

Fire raced across her neck as he kissed her, stroked her with his tongue, as his teeth sank deep. The pleasure and pain shook her, reduced her to a wild ecstasy, craving, forever craving more. He took her blood, the sweet, hot fluid filling him as he gorged himself, as he tasted her very essence.

As he fed on her honeyed spice, his hands stripped the edges of the shirt aside so that he could cup the fullness of her breasts, reveling in her body, her softness. So perfect. He could feel what she wanted in her mind - the savage hunger, the need to match the fury of the storm, the need to feel alive in the midst of all the violence surrounding them.

Her need was his. He stroked his tongue across the pinpricks so his mouth could wander down her throat, leaving fire in its wake. He found her breast through the thin, water-soaked transparency of her shirt and suckled wildly, a frantic frenzy of lust and love. His hands found her bare bottom, cupped her buttocks to drag her against his raging body. Need overcame sense; his fangs burst forth, and he pierced the creamy swell of her breast, so that she flowed into him like nectar.

Savannah cradled his head with one arm, her other hand exploring his body, deliberately bringing him to a fever