Forged in Blood: A Dark Paranormal/ Fantasy romance (Broken Bloodlines Book 1)

“It’s too much,” I whimper. Children scream, torn from their mothers’ arms. Fire and blood. So much blood. Her agony. His despair. A betrayal so deep and unnatural that it alters the fabric of a person’s very being. Pain engulfs me, centuries of agony that he’s kept buried deep in his heart. And I feel it all at once, the soul-eviscerating anguish that he carries with him every single second of every day.

Tears stream down my cheeks. My heart feels like it’s being crushed in a vise. “It’s too much,” I say again.

You wanted to know the truth, Ophelia. This is it. His voice is as clear in my head as my own, and it’s not unnerving at all. Not like when I first heard the boys. It’s as though he belongs there. Like he’s always been there and he always will be.

It hurts. A whimper is ripped from my throat.Property of Nô)(velDr(a)ma.Org.

I know.

As quickly as he let me in, he shuts me out again. At least he tries to lock down that part of his brain, but I’m already inside. The pain is overpowering. My lifeblood flows to where his mouth is attached to my neck. He pulls me down, sinking his thick length deeper inside me and rolling me over him so my clit rubs against him, creating delicious friction. The perfect harmony of pleasure and pain conducts a symphony of ecstasy within the deepest recesses of my body.

I have no idea what’s happening to me, but my muscles vibrate with electricity, and I feel invincible. While I’m trying to understand the sensations hurtling through me, Alexandros dips his hand between my thighs and presses hard against my swollen clit. My core explodes into a billion fireworks, and I lose all control, all sense of time and space and reason.

I rock into him, chasing more of whatever it is he’s giving me, because I feel like lightning in a bottle. And it’s not only the spectacularly intense orgasm stoking this feeling; it’s the power surging through my veins. Like wildfire laced with morphine. And it’s not his power that I feel. Not like when the boys share their blood with me. This is like a rebirth.

My head falls back on a strangled cry, and his mouth is ripped from my flesh. Blood gushes from the wound, and he laps it up, coating my skin with his saliva to help it heal, but it’s already closing over, being knitted back together by an ancient power that flows through me.

The room is on fire, agápi mou. His words are so clear in my head, like they’re my own thought but in his voice. So deeply embedded in my consciousness that he’s already become a part of my being. Sure enough, flames burn high and bright, growing closer with each second. But I feel only a gentle warmth from their lethal flame.

You may be immune to the flames, my little one, but I am most assuredly not. He suckles at my neck, much more gently than before. Although I would be willing to burn before I would be willing to move.

Panic grips my chest. The whole building is going to burn down and it will be my fault. Again. How do I stop the fire?!

You know how, Ophelia.

But I don’t. I close my eyes and battle the raging emotions swirling through my body like a tornado. And like a tornado captures everything in its path, so does the tumultuous vortex inside me. Pain. Anger. Euphoria. Sadness. All of it rages within me, and the only thing anchoring me to reality is him. And if he wasn’t inside me, with his arms around my waist, I feel like I might explode into stardust and disappear.

Focus! Find your light and focus. His voice is smooth and steady. Calming.

I have no idea why or how I understand what that means, but I concentrate on my solar plexus. In my mind’s eye, I see a dazzling bright-white orb. The swirling vortex immediately calms, allowing me to isolate each emotion. I focus on the heat prickling at my skin and picture the flames extinguishing around us while imagining all of the oxygen being sucked from the room.

A shiver runs down my spine.

Good girl.

I open my eyes. The flames are gone, but Alexandros’s office is destroyed. The bookcases smolder as fragments of burned paper flutter to the floor like snowflakes made of ash. My heart aches for all the precious history within those pages that I annihilated. “I wrecked your office. Your books.”

He stops feeding, and my head spins at the rush of blood flowing back to my heart. “You have wrecked much more than my office.”

I’m not sure what that means, but I offer him a murmured apology anyway.

“You can burn down this entire world if you want to, little one. So long as you stay by my side while you do it.” He bands his arms around my waist, and a wave of euphoria lights up my veins once more. “Or exactly like this. Whichever you prefer.” He rocks his hips upward, sweeping the crown of his dick over a sensitive spot inside me.

“Yes, this please,” I pant.

He licks the blood from my already healing neck and fucks me on his lap.

Please bite me again, I beg through our bond.

I have already taken enough tonight, little one.

I roll my hips over him, and he growls against my neck. But it feels so good, I whine.

I can make you feel good in so many other ways, Ophelia. He picks me up, wraps my legs around his waist, and lays me flat on his desk. My teeth clash together and stars pepper my vision when he drives into me.

He fucks me hard, and I feel his release building as keenly as I feel my own, and it’s so overwhelming that I try to block it out, but I end up tapping back into his pain instead.

Not now, agápi mou.

My love?

Yes. His tone is so tender, so unlike anything I’ve heard him say before.

I can’t not feel every part of him, and this part of him, it’s his root, the center of his being. And his pain is partly my pain too. But I can’t …

He thrusts harder, his fingers digging into my hips, and seals his lips over mine. My mouth instinctively opens, allowing him entry. The coppery tang of my blood fizzes on my tongue as he claims my mouth as easily as he’s claimed the rest of me. His kiss is fierce and dominant, bruising and cutting my lips. But I’m lost in the taste of him and the punishing pace of his hips as he drives into me.

My focus narrows, homing in on the exquisite pleasure of our impending climaxes. I claw at his skin, pulling him deeper and closer as I try to take more. He growls, feral and unrestrained, and the sound makes my inner walls ripple around him.

For a few blissful moments, we forget the truth of what he just showed me and find oblivion in the beautiful and primal union of our bodies.