Interlude: Cavatina Read online

  “I’m suffering now,” Alain moaned. He clenched his jaw, and through his bared lips, Cristoph saw his fangs fully extended again.

  Cristoph held out his hand, inching across the bed to Alain. “Let me help you!”

  Alain’s growl stilled him. It sounded like a lion was in their bed. “You are the cause.”

  “You don’t need to run from me. Or hide from me. You don’t have to be ashamed. I want you, all of you, as you are.”

  “You don’t know what you’re saying!”

  “I do! I know who you are! And I’m not afraid of you!”

  “I almost bit you again!” Alain roared. “I could have turned you!”

  “Why don’t you?” Cristoph cried. “If that’s what you need, then take me! I’m offering myself to you! Go ahead! Make me a vampire like you!”

  Alain’s fangs flared, and he bared them in a wild snarl at Cristoph. “Never! I’ll never bite you!”

  “Why?”

  “When a man is bitten, it leaves a mark on their soul. Even if it’s only a feeding. Even if they’re not turned. That soul is tainted for eternity. Darkness will always cling to him, be drawn to him. I cannot do that to you!”

  “Then, what about what I did tonight? I can bleed myself and feed that to you—"

  “No! I am barely restraining myself!” he roared. “If I taste you again, if I keep tasting you, I won’t be able to hold back. I stopped drinking the Holy Father’s blood because the craving became too much. I couldn’t stop fantasizing about it. I wanted his blood all the time. I wanted to hunt him! Take his blood when I wanted! I lost all control, over everything.” He moaned. “It’s everything in me to hold back right now, to not take you.” His sulfur eyes flashed. “I crave you… In every way.”

  Cristoph held his stare. Prey, prey!

  But he saw something more, too, something else in that predatory gaze. Desire mingled with his crippling need. A brutal restraint.

  He pushed his boxers down. “If you won’t take my blood, then take my body.”

  “Cristoph—"

  “I know what I’m doing.” He pushed his boxers down, under his knees, shimmied out of them. Naked, he held out his hands for Alain. “I’m yours. I’m yours, Alain.”

  Alain flew at him faster than he could see. Half a blink, one moment’s inhale, and Alain was on him, pushing him back, driving him into the mattress. Alain had lost weight since his turn, losing the little fat he’d had on his body, replacing it with hardened, corded muscle. He fed on blood and darkness now, etheric energy, and his strength overpowered Cristoph easily.

  Alain pinned his wrists over his head. He was over him, on him, everywhere. Scenting him, Alain’s nose and his open mouth dragging over Cristoph’s throat, down his chest, across his belly. Down, farther, and Alain buried his face in Cristoph’s crotch. Cristoph jerked, torn between frantic lust ripping through him and blind panic. Fangs wrapped around his cock, a slick mouth and a hot tongue working its way up and down.

  He trembled and tried not to move. Vampire fangs grazed his throbbing cock.

  Alain hefted him up, rolling him over until his ass was open, exposed. He dove in, feasting, it seemed, his long tongue and fingers opening him up. Cristoph grasped the mattress, arms over his head, and screamed through gritted teeth. It was almost like the first night, their first time. Alain taking him, overturning his world.

  He’d wanted more since that night. He’d waited so long for this moment, their second lovemaking.

  He thrust back onto Alain’s tongue and his fingers, trying to urge Alain on. More, more. “Take me! It’s been too long. I’ve waited for you!”

  Growling. Alain nipped at his ass cheek, sharp points almost breaking his skin. He shivered, tried to twist away. “Stay,” Alain commanded.

  He stilled. He panted, his knuckles aching as he gripped the mattress, arms shaking, heart pounding. Sweat beaded off him. A haze settled over him, lassitude, a contentment that seemed to steal into his mind, his soul. The world faded, and all he could sense was Alain. Alain’s yellow eyes, suns in the center of his universe, radiating out from the darkness of his form over his shoulder. Alain’s glittering fangs. “Take me,” he whispered.

  He rolled his head to the side. He didn’t know why. He arched his neck and gazed back at Alain.

  Bared his throat from behind.

  Pressure and heat pulsed between Cristoph’s ass cheeks, at his hole. He gasped, bucked, and then went taut, arching his back as Alain pushed. His breath punched out of him as Alain filled him completely, all the way inside. Alain, pressed balls-deep into Cristoph’s ass, curled over his back and rested his forehead on Cristoph’s shoulder. His hands gripped the sheets, the gouged mattress beside Cristoph’s head. Talons sliced through the fabric again.

  Cristoph whimpered. He hadn’t been with anyone since Alain. It had been months, and he had been too busy to even take care of himself. Alain’s sudden entrance shocked him, every nerve, every millimeter of his ass seizing around Alain’s cock.

  And it seemed different. Alain the human was a different lover than Alain the vampire. The moves were similar, the rhythm. But there was a ferocity to Alain that hadn’t been there before. An edge that cut deep. Physically, he was different, too. Maybe it was how long it had been, but Alain felt bigger. Harder. He was deeper than he’d been before, deeper than any man had gone. Cristoph squirmed, the pressure of Alain’s cock pushing against something almost too-deep within him. Pain warred with pleasure, a delirious drunk haze that enveloped him.

  Alain ground into him. His hot breath landed on Cristoph’s cheek. His fangs were millimeters away from the back of his neck, his throat. His face. Cristoph writhed, panted. “Fuck me, please.”

  Alain jerked his hips back, dragging his cock out of Cristoph’s hole. It wasn’t all the way, but it felt like he was withdrawing from some inner sanctum of Cristoph’s, a place inside of him that didn’t want to let Alain go. His ass clung to Alain, trying to pull him back in, like there was an emptiness inside yearning for Alain’s cock to return.

  He cried out.

  Alain hesitated, the head of his cock pushed inside Cristoph’s hole. “You want a vampire?”

  “I want you.”

  Alain thrust back in, all the way, to that deep place inside of Cristoph. He drove out and in, filling Cristoph. Cristoph shrieked, clinging to Alain’s arms as he bucked, driving his ass back, trying to meet Alain’s thrusts, pull Alain even deeper inside of him. He’d never been as full, never been ravished so deeply, never had his ass taken so completely. His hole tried to hold onto Alain every time he withdrew.

  Alain’s gaze burned brighter, his eyes seeming to glow.

  Need filled Cristoph, a need that sang in his bones, in his blood. He scratched at Alain’s wrists, frenzied like a trapped animal. His cock was rock hard against his belly.

  He needed more. He needed everything Alain could give him. Everything.

  He twisted his head to the side again, baring his throat. “Alain,” he chanted, rocking on Alain’s thrusts. His eyes rolled back as Alain’s cock tunneled through his ass, blinding him with pleasure in every nerve in his body. His hole spasmed, clenching. “Alain, more.”

  Alain sped up, grunting and baring his fangs as he pounded Cristoph harder, faster. Cristoph screamed, his nails cutting into Alain’s skin. Blood scent filled the air. Cristoph’s blood, running through Alain’s veins.

  Alain roared, catching the blood scent. He pressed forward, and grabbed Cristoph’s hair, pulled him back, arching him taut. His hands cradled his skull, held his jaw and his neck and twisted.

  Cristoph hissed. His jaw was up and out, his neck bared.

  Vulnerable.

  “I want it,” Cristoph breathed. “I want it, I want it,” he chanted. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t see anything beyond Alain’s glowing eyes over his shoulder, the dark silhouette of his body. He couldn’t feel, not beyond the waves of bliss, the pleasure, the fuck of his lifetime. The hard cock pounding him, f
illing him in ways he never knew he needed. “I want everything. I want you. Alain. Alain.”

  Thrust, thrust. He gasped, the feel of Alain going even deeper. He was going to explode, absolutely explode. One more thrust, and—

  Alain pounded him again, kept going. Cristoph’s cock jerked, come shooting up his chest, thick ropes that covered his abs, his pecs, that leaked down his sides. He screamed, closing his eyes, bucking in the throes of his orgasm as Alain kept pounding his open ass. Pure joy flowed through him, every muscle seizing, his ass clenching around Alain’s cock as his orgasm rolled on and on and on.

  Snarling, Alain flew at him. His mouth fastened over Cristoph’s neck above his pulsing artery. Suction and a wet tongue lapped at his skin.

  Alain howled into Cristoph’s neck as he thrust, his cock jerking in Cristoph’s ass as he climaxed, as he shot into his hole.

  Fangs scraped Cristoph’s skin.

  He arched his neck, tried to push upward into Alain’s bite. Just a little more…

  Alain’s hands stilled him, held his head firm. His lips, his tongue, nuzzled Cristoph’s skin above his carotid artery.

  But his fangs did not pierce skin.

  He did not bite.

  Slowly, they came down from their high together, Alain pulling back, nuzzling at Cristoph’s throat as if he could scent the blood in Cristoph, taste him through his skin and his sweat. He’d have a massive hickey there tomorrow.

  Cristoph went boneless, melting into the mattress, Alain’s cock still lodged inside of him. He shifted. Alain thrust slowly, again.

  “Are you still hard?”

  “Mmmm,” Alain murmured.

  What was sex with a vampire truly like? There’d been nothing in the official records, the research he’d quietly done on the side. Surely, he wasn’t the first human to fuck a vampire. But maybe he was the first human to fuck a vampire and live, or live on as a human. Alain had been oh-so-close to tearing through his throat.

  And, what did it mean that Alain had come inside of him? He’d been religious about condoms before, in his playboy days. But now Cristoph was committed to Alain, and Alain… Well, what did condoms matter when your lover was a vampire?

  Or did they matter more? Vampire venom was known to travel through the bite of a vampire. Did it travel through sexual contact, too?

  A thousand thoughts fought for supremacy, battling against the sex drunk haze still floating in his brain. Some part of him recognized the haze was Alain, the vampire’s effects. Pheromones extruded during the hunting phase of vampire activity, his mind spat, a line from a Victorian tome. Inducing willingness and complacency in the victim, and an urge to vulnerable sexual immorality. Showing your soft underbelly to a predator, turning your neck up for the kill. Welcoming your own death.

  Alain rolled his hips into Cristoph’s ass. He was still rock hard, moving easily through Cristoph’s hole. Slick sounds filled the bedroom.

  “Fuck me again,” Cristoph breathed. He pushed his ass onto Alain’s hard cock. He wanted, needed more. Maybe he was damned already, maybe he was already infected and was going to be a vampire like Alain. Maybe that was meant to be. Or maybe he simply loved Alain and always would. “Fuck me again.”

  * * *

  Scraping sounds filled the apartment, the scratch of a bed frame on a wooden floor. Breathless moans. Panted curses. Pleas for more, for harder. Growls in response. Slick wetness and shaking gasps.

  Luca sat at the kitchen table in silence, his head in his hands, his eyes closed, as a single tear rolled down his cheek.

  * * *

  8

  Outside Austin, Texas

  “This isn’t the White House for crissakes,” Jack’s mom, Mary, cried as she threw her head back and laughed. “Y’all pose as if you like each other at least!”

  Ethan squirmed, his cheeks burning. Jack snorted next to him, giggling and refusing to meet his gaze. “This happened last year, too. Levi said almost the exact same thing.”

  “I’m not good with photos,” Ethan groused. “I never smile right.” All his life, in all his professional portraits, from the Army to the Secret Service, he was instructed not to smile. To look solemn. Stern. Or, as Scott repeatedly told him, constipated. “Besides,” he said softly. “These are your parents. What am I supposed to do, lift you in my arms and ravish you?”

  Jack winked. His blue eyes flicked down Ethan’s body. “My momma always said she just wants me to be happy in life. And you know what makes me happy.”

  That didn’t help the burn in his cheeks. Or the heat rising elsewhere. He puffed out a breath, turning toward the Christmas tree in Jack’s parents’ living room for a moment as he rolled his shoulders. Damn it, he was in his forties. Popping inconvenient boners was supposed to be a thing of the distant past.

  But Jack always could get a rise out of him. A definite rise. Every single time.

  Jack’s hand swept down his back, rubbing between his shoulders and over his spine. “You all right?” His eyes twinkled.

  Maybe it was time for a little mischief of his own. Ethan nodded. “I’m good. Let’s take this photo.”

  “Finally!” Mary cried. She was still laughing. “Look like a happy married couple, please, not like a posed and boring presidential portrait!”

  “Hey!” Jack cried.

  Ethan grinned. He reached for Jack, standing side by side in front of Jack’s parents’ Christmas tree in their Texas ranch home. For a moment, it looked like the same pose as before, staid and formal with their arms around each other’s waists. Jack looked at the camera, his smile already in place, waiting.

  Ethan twirled Jack and dipped him, grinning as Jack gasped, as Jack’s hands flew to his shoulders, as his jaw dropped before he threw his head back and laughed. Mary cheered, calling “Finally!” and Ethan knew she was taking picture after picture after picture.

  Jack cupped the side of his face. His blond hair was golden in the light of the fire, shimmering in the twinkling Christmas tree lights. Jack kissed him, soft and sweet, their lips lingering as Ethan pulled him close.

  “All right, you two,” Andrew said. Jack’s dad chuckled, flushing slightly. Even in his seventies, he was still Jack’s dad, and like all parents, there was a fine line between seeing your child happy and seeing your child—even an adult child—as a sexual person. “Do we need to get the hose?”

  Ethan pulled back fast, straightening Jack and tugging down his sweater. He hoped his bulge wasn’t too obvious. “No, sir.”

  It had been a joke that began sometime after they’d first started visiting. Ethan hadn’t realized how much he and Jack touched, how often, how deeply. How connected they were, and how he couldn’t stand to go too long without curling up beside Jack again, holding his hand or lying with him in the hammock or kissing him or wrapping him in his arms and rocking as they watched the sun setting. Maybe it was because they’d always had barriers before, had always been separated by the need for secrecy, and then their jobs, and then public pressures and keeping up presidential appearances. And then, trying to save the world.

  Simply being two men in love with nothing to do but love each other was a sweet addiction, one he never wanted to end.

  Apparently their deep and abiding affection was a source of amusement for Jack’s parents. After finding them “canoodling” all over their ranch and house, the jokes about turning the hose on them started, especially after Mary found Jack writhing on top of Ethan in Jack’s truck bed when they’d visited for Thanksgiving. Luckily, Ethan hadn’t ripped Jack’s clothes off yet, and they were only guilty of some hot and heavy petting that day.

  No matter that Ethan was forty-two years old, being caught by his lover’s parents was still a scarring experience.

  Jack rolled his eyes. “Da-ad,” he said, stretching the simple word out to two long syllables. In a flash, Ethan could see teenage Jack and Andrew facing off, the same tone, the same inflection as they argued about homework and sports practice and curfews. He smothered his own grin as
Andrew shook his head.

  “Finally, Christmas photos are done,” Mary proclaimed. “That only took about two hours longer than I expected. Next time, we’re going to set up some motion cameras around the property and get a snapshot of you two out on your own. Something candid. But not too risqué! Can’t go putting porn up on the walls now, can we?”

  Ethan struggled, willing himself not to self-combust. His skin seemed hot enough to sear, certainly close enough to the flash point. Had a man ever literally died of mortification? He hid his face, stared at the floor, the fireplace, the ceiling. Anywhere but at Mary and Andrew.

  “Mom,” Jack said, laughing and threading his fingers through Ethan’s. “You would regret that plan. I guarantee you’d see something you did not want to!”

  “Mmmhmm,” she said, peering over her glasses. “I know I would. After about four and a half minutes, too. Wouldn’t take me but that long to catch you two necking it somewhere. I see it now just fine without hidden cameras!”

  This was worse than being publicly outed as secretly dating the President of the United States. Ethan groaned and buried his face in the back of Jack’s neck. His arms snaked around Jack’s waist. Belatedly, as Mary started her deep chuckle again, he realized he was making her point soundly.

  Oh well. He kept his face in Jack’s neck and hugged him from behind. Jack’s arms covered his, and the conversation moved on, Mary talking about their Christmas Eve church service she and Andrew were attending, before going into their plans for dinner before the midnight service. Jack chimed in and offered to help cook.

  “Or,” Jack said, “Ethan can help.”

  “I was going to say,” Mary said, eyeing Jack. “I know you barely know what a kitchen is.”

  “Hey!”

  “I’m happy to help,” Ethan said. He made a conscious decision to step back from Jack, moving to his side. Their arms were still around each other’s waists. “I’d love to learn the family recipes. I kept him fed in the White House, but I know it wasn’t ever as good as your home cooking.”