I straddled him slowly, letting the silk of my robe slide from my shoulders and pool around my waist. Cass's breath hitched. His eyes drank me in like he couldn't believe I was real — like the part of him that died on that hospital bed had only come back for this.
For me.
"You don't move," I said, my voice low. "Not unless I say."
He nodded, breathless. "Yes, Sera."
God, the way he said my name.
I leaned down and kissed him again — slow and possessive — tasting the fear still lingering in his mouth, the aftershock of almost being taken from me. My hips rolled forward, pressing against the bulge in his pants. His body arched, instinctive and aching, but he didn't touch me. He remembered the rules.
"Good boy," I murmured against his lips, and he shuddered.
I unbuttoned his shirt with deliberate slowness, baring skin inch by inch. My tongue followed the path of my fingers — over the sharp edge of his collarbone, the line between his pecs, down the center of his chest. I kissed a spot just over his heart — the same one that nearly stopped beating. His breath caught.
"You terrified me," I whispered against his skin. "Do you know what it felt like… watching you fade? Feeling and knowing I might not reach you in time?"
He swallowed hard, his voice raw. "Then take it out on me. Mark me. Ruin me."
I looked up at him — all flushed cheeks and trembling restraint.
"Oh, sweetheart. I intend to."
I slid down his body and undid his belt, yanking his jeans open with a snap. His cock was already hard, flushed and leaking, twitching slightly under the weight of anticipation. I didn't give him relief yet — just pressed my mouth to the inside of his thigh and bit down hard enough to leave a bruise.
His groan was helpless, head falling back.
"Still no touching," I warned.
"Yes, Sera—fuck," he hissed.
I took him in my hand first — slow strokes, just enough pressure to tease, to test. He was thick and hot and so responsive it made my mouth water. When I finally wrapped my lips around him, I sucked deep and slow, dragging my tongue under the head. His hands fisted the sheets. His hips jerked once — too eager.
I pulled back immediately. "You disobeyed."
"I'm sorry," he choked out. "I—I couldn't—"
I slapped his inner thigh. Just once. Sharp and hot.
"Then control yourself."
He nodded, panting. "Yes, Sera. I'll do better."
I smirked. "You will."
I straddled him again and guided him to my entrance — wet, aching, ready. I didn't sink down right away. I hovered, just barely letting the tip slide through my slick folds. His thighs were trembling now.
"You want it?"
"Yes," he breathed. "Please."
"Beg."
"I need you. I need to be inside you. I want to feel what you feel. I want to be yours in every way you'll take me."
I smiled.
Then I took him.
Slow. Agonizingly slow. Inch by inch until I was fully seated, until I could feel every twitch, every pulse, every desperate tremor. His head tipped back and he moaned like I'd just broken him open.
"Oh my God, Sera—"
I rolled my hips, slow and controlled, using his body like it was mine — because it was. Every drag, every grind, was deliberate. I was building him up just to tear him apart.
"You feel that?" I whispered. "That's me. Wrapped around you. Claiming you."
He nodded frantically, sweat on his brow, eyes dazed. "You're everything. I can't—I can't breathe without you."
I leaned forward, bracing my hands on his chest as I moved faster — riding him harder now, dragging pleasure through both of us like a storm. The bond hummed between us, pulling tighter with every thrust. Every sound he made, every broken gasp and whispered Sera, wound itself into my bones.
And when he was close — when his thighs trembled and he looked like he was falling apart beneath me — I bit him.
Hard.
My fangs sank into the curve between his neck and shoulder, and he cried out, hips bucking wildly as he came inside me, body arching like he was offering himself on an altar.
His blood hit my tongue and the taste nearly made me come undone.
It was devotion. Heat. Him.
I followed him over the edge seconds later — clenching around him with a soft, gasping moan as the bond surged white-hot in my chest. For a moment, everything blurred — time, space, breath — until it was just us. Just this.
I collapsed over him, panting, lips brushing his throat where I'd marked him.
He didn't speak.
He didn't need to.
Because I felt him — heart full, body wrecked, soul open.
And every inch of him screamed one truth:
He was mine.
------------------------------------------
The room was quiet now.
Just the hush of our breathing. The weight of her body over mine. Tangled limbs. Shared heat. The lingering ache of too much want and the kind of closeness that made it hard to tell where she ended and I began.
Her skin was warm against mine. Silk and steel. Draped over me like armor — no, like sanctuary. For the first time in what felt like lifetimes, I didn't feel like I was bleeding inside.
I didn't feel hollow.
I felt whole.
Sera hadn't moved much since she collapsed on top of me. One arm curled possessively around my chest, the other draped low across my waist, thumb resting just beside my navel. Her breath tickled the edge of my collarbone, slow and deep, like she was trying to match her rhythm to mine. Or maybe it was the other way around.
And her hand — her hand was still pressed flat over my heart.
Like she needed to feel it beating.
Maybe she did.
Maybe she didn't quite believe I was still here.
I slid my fingers gently into her hair, threading through those dark waves that always smelled faintly of night jasmine and blood and something that was just her. My touch was soft, reverent. No words. No pressure. Just… presence. Just us.
I didn't say anything. I didn't need to.
Holding her like that — steady, grounding, real — was all the truth I could offer her. All the truth she needed.
Because she was everything.
She stirred then. Just barely. Just enough to shift her hips against mine in a lazy drag that still made my breath catch. But it wasn't a come-on. Not now. She lifted her head to meet my eyes, her silver gaze unguarded.
No sharp edges.
No command in her stare.
Just rawness.
And fear.
She blinked — once, slow — then looked away quickly, like she'd revealed something she didn't mean to. But I saw it. I felt it. The tremor beneath her skin. The way her breath hitched like she'd forgotten how to inhale.
"Sera," I murmured, brushing my thumb along her jaw, coaxing her back to me. "Talk to me."
She shook her head at first. Not a no. Just hesitation. A silence thick with the weight of too many years, too many lost chances.
But then her voice cracked out, soft and wrecked: "I saw you dying."
My chest tightened.
"Cass," she breathed. "You were just— gone. One second you were there, stubborn and reckless and you, and the next… I couldn't feel you. Not like this. Not like now."
Her throat bobbed. Her gaze dropped to where our bodies were still tangled, her hand still pressed over my chest like an oath.
"I've lived a long time," she whispered. "I've buried lovers. Friends. Family. I've watched everything I care about rot away or be torn from me."
She inhaled sharply.
"But that moment — seeing you fall, feeling your heart go silent — that wasn't just grief." Her voice trembled. "That was rage. That was terror. It was a kind of desperation I haven't felt since I was human."
My fingers curled against her hip.
"I would've burned the world just to get you back," she said, voice lower now, like it hurt to admit.
A beat.
"I did burn something though," she added bitterly. "My rules. My lines. My control. I gave you my blood, my bond — everything I said I'd never give again."
"I didn't ask—"
"I wanted to." Her eyes flashed, and for a second she sounded like herself again. Fierce. Uncompromising.
Then she softened, all that fire melting into something devastating. "Don't you get it? I didn't do it out of obligation. I didn't save you because I had to. I did it because even if it killed me, even if it cost me everything I swore to protect, I'd still choose you."
My eyes burned.
She finally looked at me — really looked — and I saw it all. The fear. The love. The guilt. The ache of someone who had broken her own laws for someone else's heartbeat.
I reached for her hand and pressed it tighter against my chest, over the echo she'd brought back to life.
"I'm here," I said softly. "Still breathing. Because of you."
Sera exhaled slowly, shakily, like she'd been holding that breath for days.
"You scared me," she whispered.
"I know," I murmured. "And I'm sorry."
She gave a small nod. Then she leaned in — not to claim, not to dominate, not to silence — but to feel. To believe. Her mouth met mine in a kiss that wasn't about fire or frenzy.
It was grounding.
It was grief and gratitude and relief.
It was love.
When she pulled back, her forehead stayed pressed to mine. Our noses brushed. The air between us tasted like salt and heat and the kind of bond that felt holy.
And in that quiet, that hush that followed ruin and resurrection, I made her a promise — not with words, but with the way I held her.
No matter what came next — no matter the war, the risk, the blood still owed — I'd never make her feel that kind of fear again.
Because I was hers now.
Utterly. Irrevocably.
And I'd fight like hell to stay that way.