Escaping Exile Read online

  “Andrew—”

  I shove my tongue into his mouth to stop him from speaking.

  I curl my two fingers and caress inside of him. I can practically hear his cock filling with blood as I pump my fingers in and out. Edmund’s chest turns red and blotchy in the firelight as he scrapes his fingertips against the sheets. I add a third finger, and within seconds, tears escape his closed eyes. My fingers inside of him, I grab a handful of his hair and pull until his head tilts back at a painful angle. I bite the side of his neck—no fangs but still hard enough to leave a mark. He tries to pull away from the pain, but I have him pinned with my body and with the fingers that fuck him.

  I run my tongue over what will soon be a bruise, and he whimpers, pushing weakly against my shoulders. “I thought about this,” I say. “I spent hours thinking about this—whether or not you would fight me when I fucked you.”

  He shivers when I push my fingers extra deep.

  “I thought I would take you anyway, even if you fought. I needed you.” My hand is cold when I remove my fingers from his body. I kiss the side of his face and pull away. “But here we are, and I can’t.” I lean on the edge of the bed and cover my face with my hands. “You should be frightened of me, Edmund. I’ve done horrible things.”

  The bed shifts behind me. I expect another of his brutal punches, but instead, he rests his hand on my shoulder. “Horrible things, hmm?”

  “Yes.”

  “If you don’t fuck me right now, I’m going to agree with you.”

  I swivel my head around so fast, it almost hurts. “What?”

  He chews his lower lip. “I’m quite mad, you know. Part of why I left London, in fact. My mother wanted to send me to some home to fix me because I like men. Because I only feel alive on the edge of a knife. I’m filthy rich, did I tell you that? I’m supposed to be a duke, as my father before me. The seventh Duke of Wilshire. Instead, I play pirate because I’m miserable with the calmness of life. You asked me if I’ve killed, and I have. I like killing things. Well.” He looks away. “I could never kill a caterpillar, but I don’t mind killing men. When I saw you with that animal outside, it was like looking in a mirror. I don’t know if I’m more frightened of you or of myself.”

  I don’t reach out to touch him—even though he’s so close, I feel his heat.

  “If we fuck, will you kill me after? Will you be done with me?”

  “No.” I shake my head. “I don’t think I’ll ever be done with you.”

  “In love already?”

  I am so far beyond love with this kindred spirit. Love is too meek a word.

  I show him how I feel with a kiss—a violent gnashing of teeth and tongues. My sudden approach must have injured his lip, because I taste Edmund’s blood, rich and metallic. He is no wild boar.

  He pushes me away just long enough to turn around. He rests on his hands and knees in the center of the bed and presents his tempting ass to me. “Please, Andrew.”

  I practically shred my clothes. When I lean forward and lick at his hole, he makes a surprised oh sound. His arms go out from under him, and his spine curls as he shoves the side of his face against the pillow. I continue to lick and suck the part of his body I’ve already roughly prepared until his voice cracks beneath the volume of his moans.

  “Am I being punished for some reason?” I feel more than hear the rumble of his laugh, his voice muffled by linen.

  I kneel on the bed behind him and run my hand up and down his spine. I’ve wanted this since I rescued him on the beach, and now, I prolong the moment. I admire the angry scar on his back, the way his muscles seem to struggle beneath his skin. He is so strong but so pliant for me—a beguiling cocktail of humor and darkness, brilliant yet idiotically drawn to death.

  “Do I need to tackle you and ride your cock, you awful man?” Each word is coated with his panting breath.

  I push into him with the tip of my cock. The hot grip and Edmund’s relieved groan are almost enough to make me come. I clutch his hips and hold him steady as I take a few deep breaths, then I keep pushing. He sputters a long line of mixed vowels and consonants, but I’m beyond speech. Fully seated inside him, I bend forward and rest my body across his back, arms around his ribs. I rise and fall to the rhythm of his breath as he intertwines his fingers with mine.

  I thrust once, and he practically sobs. Again and I inhale the scent at the back of his neck and smell the beach after rain. My cock twitches inside him. Christ, I’m too close.

  I freeze. “What’s your favorite animal?”

  “What?” He sounds frantic.

  I press my mouth against his upper back. “Favorite animal. Tell me.”

  “Uh…gah…uh, I don’t have one. There’s too many. They’re all… They’re all fascinating. What are you—”

  “Choose one.” I press open-mouthed kisses to his scalding skin.

  “Sharks because…I can never get close enough to study one. They’re…a mystery to me. Sailors used to call them sea monsters. Did you know that?”

  “Not mermaids?”

  He chuckles. “No. Sharks are beautiful, but…not like that. Not like mermaids.”

  “You speak as though you’ve seen a mermaid before.”

  He must think I’m distracted, because he tries to shove himself up from the bed and me with him. I hold tighter and press down harder, which makes him choke on a laugh.

  “You’re torturing me, you know.”

  I roll my hips forward, and he shouts. I’ve calmed enough to thrust into him, and this time, I don’t stop. This time, I lean back, grip his hips, and fuck him until even the pillow can’t stifle the litany of curse words intermingled with my name.

  “Oh God, oh God, oh God,” he says.

  I take hold of his hair and pull his head back. I wrap my other arm around his chest and drag him upward until he sits in my lap. The upright angle pushes me even farther into him, and his entire body shakes in my arms. A sound escapes him, a howl of pleasure-pain. With his back against my front, his knees on either side of mine, I press up and up. I keep him pinned to me with one hand on his chest as my other wraps around his cock.

  “Andrew,” he mutters and comes. Warm liquid covers my hand as his muscles contract around me and wrench an orgasm from my body. I growl and bite into his shoulder with my human teeth. He doesn’t make a sound, just wilts against me as I hold us together. I lick salty sweat from his back. His head falls forward, and I imagine he feels as I do—unmoored and floating. I’m a ship lost at sea, and Edmund is my compass. As long as I hold to him, I am not lost. This exile now feels less like a punishment and more like a reward, especially when he rests his hands on mine.

  I leave the bed long enough to wet my discarded shirt and wipe us both clean. I add another log to the fire before resting on top of the bedclothes beside my Edmund.

  He opens his eyes, just barely. “Why are you really on this island?”

  “I killed one too many people.”

  He squints in question. “You’re a loogaroo. Isn’t that what you do?”

  I push sweaty black hair from his forehead. “In the past. Modern times would have us more civilized. Drinking but not killing. You asked me once if there are many of my kind. I don’t know, but I was part of a coven in New Orleans. A club, of sorts, where vampires and humans joined together for…I believe the word would be orgy.”

  Edmund smiles. “Of course.”

  “We weren’t supposed to kill the humans, but I was never good at self-control.”

  “You are with me,” he says.

  “You’re different.”

  “How so?”

  I run my fingers across his chest. My brow furrows when I realize. “I’d like to keep you.”

  “I am happy to be kept.” He kisses my forehead. “So this island is your punishment.”

  “Yes. The leader of my coven, Michelle—she’s even older than me. She exiled me here.”

  He blinks, and some of the sex haze lifts from his eyes. I see the mo
ment he is fully functional, intellect engaged. “How did you get here? Did you not fight back? Could you not have escaped?”

  I think back to the long-ago day in New Orleans, after I’d killed that sweet whore with no remorse and come home to an ambush. “There were too many of them. They subdued me and locked me away. I don’t know for how long. By the time Michelle came for me, I was too weak to fight back. I was starving. That was before…” I follow a trail of sweat down his chest with my finger. “I had to learn to live on less once I arrived here. In New Orleans, I used to eat daily because I could. I can now go a week at least. Longer. The worst part was being tied up in the bottom of some infernal ship, mad with hunger. Next thing I knew, I woke up here.” I glance around our shack. “Loneliness has been my punishment…until you. Although even Michelle does me the honor of the occasional visit.”

  He leans up on his elbow. “She comes here?”

  I nod.

  “So she could take us back. To the mainland, I mean.”

  “If she chooses.”

  “Fuck, I might not actually die on an island.”

  Like a churning ocean wave, a bad feeling smothers me. Michelle will adore Edmund. His bright eyes will charm her. She will laugh at his wry humor and appreciate his intelligence. Most importantly, she will see the way I love him. Oh God, she will take him away. She will punish me with his absence. Oh my God.

  “Andrew?” He touches my face. “What’s the matter?”

  I hug him hard against me.

  He takes a breath as if to speak but says nothing when a snap and a shout come from outside. Edmund pushes me away and lurches upward. “One of my traps.” He stares at me. “The man-eating bastards are here.”

  He’s right. I smell at least twenty men and women outside. The light from the native torches dances against the windows as my sailor pulls his clothes back on. He almost falls over in his hurry, as though clothes will protect him from being eaten alive.

  “Andrew,” he whispers. “Get up.”

  “I can’t protect you from them. I have not enough strength.”

  He stares at me, breath coming ragged and hard. His panicked pulse drums in my ears. “What if you drank from me?”

  “No.” Now, I stand. I move toward the window and see their torches come ever closer.

  At a metallic scrape, I turn to find him with my small knife pressed against his forearm. “I will not be eaten alive by cannibals.”

  I hold my hand out. “No, Edmund.”

  “This is what’s happening now, whether you like it or not.”

  “I might not be able to stop.”

  He sighs and smiles softly. “Then, don’t.”

  He cuts hard and deep, and blood bubbles from the wound. I sweep forward and lift his arm to my mouth. I drink heartily, sucking his skin into my mouth. He doesn’t pull back. He doesn’t fight me. He stands as I drink until he can stand no more, but I catch him before he hits the floor. I cradle him in my arms as I continue to consume until his heartbeat slows, quiets. I want to keep going. His blood is rich and sweet, but I want to devour his very soul.

  I stop before I kill him. Only just. Strength flows through me as I leave Edmund curled by the fire and step out into the humid night in nothing but my skin and my beloved’s blood. I resemble one of them now, the barbarians. We are the same, and the dark creature in me grins.

  The first man to attack, I twist his head from his spine. The second: I tear his heart from his chest. I soon lose count as spears pierce my flesh, but the only blood that flows from me belongs to Edmund. What I consumed of him, they steal, so I steal some more. My fangs rip flesh, and I gorge myself on blood that tastes of terror. It’s not like the innocent boy in New Orleans. I don’t feel their wild souls as they die. They’re empty inside, made vacant by murder. Good thing I don’t believe I have a soul to lose.

  Soon, everything is quiet. Discarded torches sputter out in the sand. A female creature moans, so I chew her throat until I hit spine. Waves crash against the shore. I’ve never heard the ocean from this far away before, but I blame the blood. I could fly back to America right now if I wanted.

  Then, Edmund whispers my name.

  I rush inside, and he hasn’t moved. He still rests on his side in front of the fading fire. I tear fabric from a shirt of mine and wrap the deep cut on his arm that has mostly stopped bleeding. Then, mindless of the gore, I lie down behind him and tug his body against mine.

  “My beautiful sailor,” I whisper into his hair.

  He murmurs but soon falls asleep again. His heart beats as I kiss his neck and behind his ear.

  “I love you,” I say. “I love you, I love you…”

  Chapter Fourteen

  BEFORE I EVEN open my eyes, I know she’s here, because suddenly, the house smells of New Orleans—of smoke and incense and whiskey and all the wicked bits of modern humanity. A week ago, I would have bathed in that scent, but now, all I want is the man in my arms, sweating with the heat of a well-fed vampire and the still-sputtering fire.

  Michelle lingers in the doorway. Her eyes, a beguiling shade of purple, take in the scene before her. I’m sure I left her quite a different scene outside. Over the scent of my lover, there is rotting flesh. Flies buzz. The presence of death might as well be an actual person in our midst. A very large person.

  “Care to explain yourself?” she asks. I’ve never been able to place her accent, a strange mixture that is sometimes Irish and sometimes Creole.

  I sit up and pull Edmund with me. He falls limply across my chest, but even half-awake, he still clings to me—and I cling back. “You won’t take him from me.”

  Michelle doesn’t smile. She eyes Edmund like one of those damned dead cannibals. “Hmm, would that finally teach you to behave?”

  “I have nothing left to learn.”

  She crouches in front of us, and her long, green velvet skirts spread like water. “You have one thing still to learn: how to live without something you love.”

  Edmund’s grip on my shoulders tightens and releases when he wakes. I look down as his eyes open. He looks up to see me covered in blood, but it’s the sight of Michelle that makes him jump.

  He notices the well-dressed woman with the long white hair and says, “Bollocks!”

  She is high class and cleanliness. I am a filthy, murdering piece of offal. Yet, he’s actually afraid of her, bless him.

  “It’s all right,” she says calmly, but he ignores her.

  “Andrew. What the hell happened last night?”

  “You need food.” I never intend to let him go. “Michelle, would you be so kind as to get Edmund some salted pork?”

  “Of course,” she says as if she’s oh so amicable.

  Edmund moves away but not very far. He falls off my lap and onto the ground at my side, giving only a fleeting glance to the makeshift bandage on his arm.

  “I’m alive.” He laughs and looks up at me.

  I smile back at him.

  He takes the piece of meat Michelle extends to him. I’m surprised when she joins us on the ground, but I suspect she wants to be close to the mystery of my human.

  “Thank you,” he tells her. “I apologize for screaming at you when I woke, but I didn’t expect to… Well, I guess I thought I’d be dead when I woke. Which doesn’t make sense, because I suppose you don’t wake up when you’re dead.”

  “Andrew and I did,” she says.

  Edmund takes a long, deep breath. “Oh. Right.” He swallows a piece of pork and blinks at me. “Andrew, did it rain blood last night?”

  Michelle has the gall to chuckle, but I drop my chin to my chest and close my eyes.

  The whole world goes quiet when Edmund presses his nose against my cheek and whispers, “Thank you.”

  With my eyes still shut, I reach up and tangle my fingers in his hair. I hold his face close to mine, because she’s going to take him away. I know she will.

  Her voice cuts through our calm. “Edmund, is it?”

  “Yes, m
iss.” His face moves away from mine, but he holds my hand tightly.

  “Would you like to go home, dear?”

  He squints at her pale, perfect face with the small nose and wide eyes. I think I know that look of his. He appraises her as he would a new species—one laden with poisonous skin. “I won’t leave without Andrew.”

  Christ, I don’t know if he’s bluffing. His steady heartbeat gives nothing away. Of course, if Michelle wanted him to leave, she could make him. Or she could kill him. I’ll die if she does. Immortality be damned, I will drop dead, erase myself like the Elder who birthed me.

  Michelle smiles. The tips of her fangs touch her bottom lip. “Do you love him, Edmund?”

  He laughs once, quickly. “I hope to spend the rest of my reckless life with this madman, but I fear you won’t let me.”

  I linger somewhere between joy and horrible grief because what he said could seal my fate. I’m ecstatic my feelings are reciprocated, but this could be the perfect eternal punishment, taking him away. Michelle finally has the means to break me. She thought sending me into exile would make me an example? No, this—robbing Edmund from my grasp—is the true torture she has sought.

  “You believe I would kill you?” she asks. She brushes her long fingernails rhythmically against the fabric of her dress as though music plays where it does not.

  Edmund smiles. “Oh, yes. I think you’d rather love to.”

  Her fingers stop moving as her head tilts to the side. “You are a very dangerous thing to love, aren’t you?”

  “Terribly,” he says. “As luck would have it, though, I think Andrew can handle me.”

  She doesn’t even honor me with a glance, but my Edmund does not wilt beneath her scrutiny. If anything, he sits up taller.

  “I look forward to getting to know you better, Edmund.” She stands. “Congratulations, Andrew, your exile is over.”

  “What?” I practically choke on the word.

  “You have not only spared a human from your own tendencies, but you protected him from outside threats, as well. In the many years of our friendship, you have never loved anything. Now, you do. Cherish it.” Her purple gaze takes in our bare surroundings. “We sail for New Orleans. I’ll give you a moment to collect what you will.”