pressed against her chest while my forearm rested against her spine to keep her upright.
Holding her felt right. Warm. Intoxicatingly real.
What is happening to me? I wondered. I didn’t cuddle.
Ignoring the oddity of our situation, I opted to embrace it and ensured she took more than her fill of my blood. It would expedite her healing, just like it had a week ago.
“Soon you’ll feel a tingling sensation in your arm,” I told her softly. “That’s how you know the bone is mending. We’ll need to set it properly and keep it at that angle through the process. Then it should return to normal in a few hours, if not sooner.” My blood was ancient, my immortality resolute. A human drunk on my essence should heal faster as a result.
I combed my fingers through her hair, belatedly noticing the blood coating my skin.
Oh well. We’d both need a shower after this anyway.
After several minutes of allowing her to acquire her fill, I eased her away from my wrist. “That should be enough.”
She didn’t reply, just gazed up at me dreamily.
My lips curled at the contentment in her features. “Yeah, that was definitely enough.”
She hummed something unintelligible in response.
“I think I like you in this state,” I murmured, pulling her carefully into my lap. Her head fell to my chest on a sigh, her body completely relaxed against mine. “There’s so much I could do, and something tells me you would approve so long as I just let you have a little more blood.”
My words had no impact on her, confirming my statement.
“The healing may disturb your euphoric state,” I warned her. “The bone-mending process is more painful than the original fracture.”
At least it wasn’t a gunshot wound. Those were a bitch to recover from, which the vampires outside would currently be experiencing. I really needed to take care of them before they woke up, and I needed to track down the final intruder—the one intelligent enough to run.
“I’m going to put you in a temporary dream state,” I whispered to Willow. “You’ll be safe, and you’ll heal faster.”
She hummed again, but it didn’t sound like a protest.
I stood with her in my arms and walked over to the couch to arrange her in a comfortable position that protected her arm. Then I carefully repositioned her forearm to ensure her bones healed accurately.
Willow didn’t cringe or complain, her mind lost to a dreamy state of euphoria brought on by my blood. It would change as the mending started, but for now, she just stared up at me with a sated appeal that I wanted to replicate in the bedroom.
Leaning down, I brushed a kiss against her temple and compelled her into a deep sleep to help soften the mending experience. My compulsion served as an apology of sorts, one I didn’t really comprehend. Had I protected her better, she wouldn’t have been injured. And yet, at the same time, I needed to know how she handled herself in dangerous situations.
“What am I going to do with you, pet?” I asked her for the thousandth time, bewildered by this odd little attachment building between us. It would pass, of course. But it temporarily intrigued me.
With a shake of my head, I left her to heal. I had a few bodies to decapitate.
8
Willow
Dark green orbs haunted my mind, smoldering and intense, reminding me of something I couldn’t quite grasp.
Another dream?
A dark memory?
I couldn’t say, the knowledge there and gone in a flash as something nudged me back to reality. My mind eagerly accepted the reprieve, not ready to indulge in the sadistic thoughts of my past.
Something about a—
“Willow.” The voice intruded on my thought, drawing me into a state of awareness and away from the experience I longed to forget.
I opened my eyes. The lights were all on, and he stood before me with damp hair and a towel wrapped around his waist.
Nothing else.
All that perfection on display had my throat drying and my tongue eager for a different kind of taste of him.
This was why vampires were dangerous. They were alluring and beautiful and lethal. He could snap my neck as easily as that monster had my arm and drink the life from my veins. Yet he could effortlessly bring me to my knees, his very appearance a seduction to the senses. And he knew it, too.
“Feeling better?” he asked me, his gaze going to my forearm.
I glanced at it, frowning. It was completely healed.
“How long was I out?”
“About six hours.” He