Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 137871 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 689(@200wpm)___ 551(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137871 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 689(@200wpm)___ 551(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Dane frowned and looked back to Juniper. “You’re a hybrid?”
She grimaced. “I’m something. Apparently, when you’re also a witch your blood mutates into a whole new sub-species. I could wake up as a mogwai tomorrow. Don’t get me wet or feed me after midnight.”
Adriel frowned. “I don’t understand that reference.”
“Gremlins.” Dane chuckled. “I remember that movie.”
“God, remember movies?” Juniper recalled nostalgically.
Unclipping her seat belt, Adriel twisted to face Dane. “Enough talking.” She rolled up her sleeve. “You must feed.”
“Wait, now? In the car?”
Dane pulled her wrist to his mouth. “Thanks.”
The car fell into an awkward silence, broken only by the soft sound of Dane suckling from Adriel’s vein. Talk about feeling like a third wheel. Juniper focused on the road, never blinking and careful to avoid any glimpse of what was taking place ten inches to her right.
Dane moaned.
“Do you have to make those noises?” The metallic scent of Adriel’s immortal blood became all she could smell. “I’m pretty sure this could have waited until we got home.”
“It’s so good,” he groaned.
Juniper glanced at Adriel and they both flushed. Did she like what he was doing? She couldn’t stop thinking about what Ade had said about men humping like dogs whenever they did a blood exchange. Was she getting some sort of pleasure from having Dane’s mouth on her?
“Don’t take too much,” Juniper snapped, as if she had any clue how this stuff worked and what was considered adequate.
“He’s fine,” Adriel assured, her voice all too breathy for Juniper’s liking. And why were her eyes so dilated?
Dane moaned again.
“Oh, come on! I get that you have needs, but I need you to tighten it up with the moans and groans. This isn’t a porn set. How much could you possibly need?”
They both stilled and stared at her.
Juniper kept her hands on the wheel and her eyes on the road. “What?”
Dane licked his lips and wiped his mouth. “I’ve only ever had Magdalene’s blood. Hers is…” He shook his head. “Incomparable—in a good way,” he quickly assured Adriel. “Uh, do you want me to…?”
“It’s fine.” Adriel retracted her arm and licked the puncture closed.
She supposed vampires didn’t need to worry about germs or catching colds because they swapped spit while feeding like it was as casual as a make-out session. Did it have to be so intimate?
Adriel folded her hands in her lap and lowered her chin to her chest, her shoulders hunched inward. She was strangely silent.
Dane leaned back, stretching his arm over the headrests as he blew out a breath. “It doesn’t usually hit me this quickly.” His comment was answered with awkward silence. “Uh, Juniper, wasn’t that the Ithaca exit?”
Veering onto the shoulder of the road, she threw the car in reverse. If she hadn’t been so distracted by Dane’s erotic feast of Adriel, she wouldn’t have missed it. “Hold on.”
They all grabbed hold of their seatbelts as she sped backward and made a sharp turn home.
Dane wasn’t buckled in, so he nearly slid out of his seat. “Jesus, Juniper. Slow down!”
He was one to talk.
CHAPTER 16
“Iwon’t let you!”
“Try to stop me!”
Adriel rushed up the back steps, which were now covered with overgrown tomato vines, and bolted into the house. “What’s going on?”
Dane and Juniper sparred off from opposite ends of the kitchen. Ruth sipped her tea at the table, exactly where Adriel left her. When her hearing aid wasn’t in, the mortal woman hardly noticed their incessant bickering.
“Tell her,” Dane barked accusingly.
Juniper’s chin jutted out in defiance. “You had no right to go through my things!”
“Your things? Everything you’re wearing, you stole from Ruth! All of those books were bought with her money!”
“Ruth, do you care that I borrowed your clothes?”
Realizing she was being addressed, Ruth set down her tea cup and smiled. “What’s that, dear? We’ve got crows?”
“Clothes,” she enunciated.
“Oh, my shows.” She reached for her cane. “I had better put my hearing aid in then. Where did I leave that?”
“Nice,” Dane remarked as Ruth shuffled out of the kitchen.
Juniper scoffed. “Like you haven’t enjoyed having a roof over your head and real food in your stomach these last few days. Don’t act so high and mighty. You robbed a church.”
“All right, you two,” Adriel chided.
“Churches like to help the needy.”
“Yeah, I’m sure it’s one of their commandments to give drifters all their sacramental wine. Could you be any more of a hypocrite?”
“Can someone please tell me what started this?”
“Nothing—”
“She’s planning to kill Jonas!”
The room silenced, and Adriel looked at Juniper in shock. “Is that true?”
She crossed her arms over her chest, choosing not to answer.
“Juniper?”
“What?” she snapped defensively. “He’s suffering. It would be the merciful thing to do.”
“Mercy would be reversing the spell, not killing him!” Dane yelled.
“No one is killing anyone. You two are friends. Where is this hostility coming from?”
“Why do you even care, Dane? They threw you out like yesterday’s garbage.”