Something Wicked This Way Comes by Jenika Snow Page A

flavor of her rich, metallic, and sweet blood as it filled his mouth, and at the first swallow of the fluid he snapped his eyes open. Realization slipped into his very pores, into his cells, his very being. He took one more drink from her, her artery beating, pushing the blood into his mouth.
    His mate.
    His female.
    The one person who was supposed to make him a better person.
    The one person that was his everything, that was born for him .
    But he’d never be a better person, never be a good man, a male that could give her the life she deserved. He didn’t know her, but he knew she was made for him, born to be his. Lathan knew no matter what, he wouldn’t be able to walk away from her. She was his, and because she was his mate his fang marks would forever be on her neck, proudly displayed.
    She was here, pressed up against him, making sounds, struggling. He was a monster, a demon like everyone said. He had his mate in a vice-like grip, his fangs in her neck, and her blood in his body.
    He ripped himself away from her, hated that he’d become this evil creature that couldn’t even control himself, couldn’t tame his basic urges. But even if he could have, even if he was fully a vampire, not this hybrid monster, her blood would have still called to him, made him desire her like no other.
    The shock traveled through him, and when she stared at him, her hand on her neck, blood oozing through her fingers, he cursed internally. He moved closer to her, saw her wide eyes, the fear coming from her, and knew that if he didn’t close the wound she’d bleed to death.
    He focused on her eyes, didn’t want to have to manipulate his mate, his female, but if she didn’t allow him to close the wound she’d die. That was not something he was going to let happen, not by someone else, and not by fucking him.
    He used the power from his vampire side, the part that allowed him to mesmerize a human. He commanded her to be calm, to come to him. Her pupils dilated, and she dropped her hand. Blood pulsed out of her, but she came toward him, her body not her own. He didn’t care about using his powers of compulsion on a human if he needed to feed, or for his own gain. He was a monster after all. But Lathan didn’t want that for his female, didn’t want to be the reason she was under compulsion.
    When she was in front of him, he leaned down and ran his tongue along the twin puncture marks. They’d close, but she’d have his mark, have the twin scar marks, and a reddish hue around the wound because she was his mate. It was a way for others of the paranormal world to know that she was taken, and that anyone who thought to touch her would reap the pain and destruction of putting their hands on another’s mate.
    He groaned at the flavor of her blood as he swiped his tongue once more over the wound, sealing it with the properties in his saliva. When Lathan pulled back she was staring at him. He could give her a new memory, make her forget about this time, this horror in her life. And that’s what it was: a horror. He was a demon, and being with her, making her stay with him, isn’t what he should want for her. But Lathan couldn’t walk away. His body and mind screamed at him to take her. She was his, after all, by birthright and fate—she’d been born for him. But Lathan knew she would be strapped with an evil male, one that had death surrounding him.
    Take her.
    Claim her.
    Forget about everything else.
    She’s yours, and you deserve her.
    “Go home, eat something with protein, wash yourself, and don’t remember the violence tonight,” he spoke softly, using the deeper compulsion to make her do what he said. She blinked a few times, touched her neck again, but wasn’t moving right away.
    “You want me to forget about what you did to me,” she said in a soft, almost nonexistent voice.
    He was taken back, because the truth was, once a compulsion was set in place the human didn’t question anything. They did what they were told.