My eyes locked with his, and we held ourselves poised there for one terrible long moment, on the threshold of something wonderful. On the brink of something disastrous.

"I can't... No children, Dontaine. I can't get pregnant." Could not risk what I would pass on to a child in my possessed state. No other word for it. Possessed and driven by instincts not just Monere but demon dead.

I felt his entire body clench. Felt every powerful, strong muscle lock in silent protest as he fought himself. Fought against every screaming male and animal instinct he had to plunge himself into me and mate. His brown eyes glittered so sharply down at me that I was surprised they did not cut me. His face was tight, almost brutal, above me, and he growled. Actually growled. One poised terrible moment... then he rolled abruptly off me and lay on his side, breathing harshly.

I went limp with relief. With knowing how closely we had come to disaster. "Thank you. Thank you, Dontaine," I said, touching his shoulder. He flinched as if I had whipped him, his entire body coiled tight.

"We can have sex," I whispered tentatively, my hand frozen still on his shoulder. "Just... I can't risk getting pregnant. Not now. Not while I'm like this."

He took a deep, shuddering breath. "All right," he said, managing to sound oddly calm and reasonable, while every muscle in his body screamed with tension.

Hesitantly, I smoothed my hand down his shoulder, ran it lightly down his arm. And that stroking caress flared anew that drowning sensuality, that powerful draw of male to Queen. He shuddered as I drew myself against him, rubbed myself against his back. Stroked my hand against his chest, pausing to circle once each tight flat nipple. I lifted myself over him and rolled him onto his back, and he moved unresistingly where I wanted him to go.

I almost purred at the pleasure of seeing him spread out like a beautiful offering before me, and didn't even try to resist the bounty of his lovely body. I kissed his other shoulder, trailed my lips down a sinewy forearm. Whispered them over his puckered nipples, lapping my tongue roughly over the little soldiers that had come so attentively to attention, while my left hand roamed lower, following the lightly furred trail that arrowed down his middle, leading me to where he pointed straight up like a giant tree towering over thick brush. I touched him, ran my hand up and then down, measuring his length, grasping his generous width. Velvet hardness, pulsing life.

He made a deep rumbling sound, pushed himself against me, and his hands buried themselves in my hair as I suckled and laved his little nipples, then moved my lips lower, following the path my hand had blazed. A light kiss over a ridged abdomen, a gentle lick low over the belly that made him quiver, a nuzzle over where his musky scent lay most thickly, causing his thick shaft to brush against my cheek, allowing me to appreciate how butter-soft his outer skin really was  -  such softness to cover such hardness  -  and then my mouth was over him, on him, around him. He was of average length but so thick around that I had to open my mouth fully to take him in. I hummed with pleasure as he slid thick and smooth inside me. I ran my tongue around him, tasting him, more sharp, more bittersweet here.

Then I lost the sweet pleasure of it as my mouth suddenly flared to burning life. As my teeth ached, my gums throbbed. As I realized that what filled that supple hardness in my mouth was not muscle but blood. Blood that called so strongly tome, so suddenly, that I ripped myself away from him, falling onto my back, my elbows. Because for one terrible moment I had almost plunged my teeth into him. Had almost felt his blood running hot and pulsing down my throat.

I cried out and my hand covered my mouth as if by that action I could stop the fangs from coming out. Dontaine knelt beside me, the powerful jut of his arousal too close, too tempting to my burning teeth. I fell back from him, hands raised up to ward him off.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Your blood. Too much blood down there. Too close to the surface."

"What do we do?"

"I don't know." I shook my head, finding it hard to think when I was so suddenly filled once again with bloodlust. Demon bloodlust.

"Let me." He moved down to my feet, touched my thighs gently, asking permission. Opening my legs to him, closing my eyes, I granted it. Yes, yes. Please, anything. Anything to take away that terrible urge, that terrible thirst.

It soothed, eased, with the first touch of his lips on my inner thigh. With the firm powerful grasp of his hands on my outer thighs, opening me up even more to him. To that questing, marauding, wicked, wicked mouth. A lick, a kiss, a gentle nip that stiffened me suddenly in fright, not lust.

"No blood. You cannot take my blood," I said, my heart pounding with the new threat. It was a strong Monere instinct to mark your lover. To break their skin and taste their blood. If he did, I did not know if the demon hunger that possessed me would pass on to him. "You must swear not to take my blood."

"My oath on it."

I went limp at averting that other near disaster. "God, I'm sorry. So many things you can't do... I just  -  "

"Hush. You are here before me, opened to my pleasure. All is well," he soothed, and played his lips upon my mound, nuzzling the curly hairs there, inhaling my scent, breathing upon me as the golden fall of his hair brushed the sensitive skin of my belly, my thighs, like a thousand whispering kisses. I was too grateful to him to be embarrassed at being exposed so blatantly like that. Too thankful at feeling the bloodlust ease and another lust rise and take its place as he lowered his mouth and licked me, a delicate teasing stroke.

Oh!

Nerves tingled to life within me. Pulsed deep in my core, wetting me, spreading my legs even wider for him. I whimpered, then jammed my hand to my mouth as if to stop the sound.

"No, let me hear your pleasure also as I taste it." And his words and the hot gust of his breath blowing over me there brought another low sound to my throat. Made me writhe, lift myself up to him. Begging, pleading without words to touch me again like that. With a low pleased rumble, he did. His head dipped down and his tongue lapped over me again with a surer, firmer stroke. Then another, and another. Driving me nuts. Giving me a taste of pleasure and making me want even more. "Tell me what you want."

"I don't know," I gasped. "Just more. Harder... Oh God," I breathed as he obeyed me, and sensation lashed me with sharp pleasure. He bent my knees, pushed them back so that I was completely opened to him. And I could only clutch his head, hold him to me as he spread me apart with gentle fingers and speared his tongue into me like a rapier thrusting sharp and deep. I cried out, arched up into him as he began a driving rhythm, pushing his tongue deep and repeatedly into me, his forefinger feathering lightly over my plump and swollen pearl that he had plucked free from the outer folds. And I didn't know which sensation was worse, or better, or more unbearable.