Once Bitten, Twice Burned (Phoenix Fire 2)

She almost shuddered. The last thing she wanted right then was to feel his teeth sinking into her throat. She hadn’t been lying about those nightmares. He’d been starring in her dreams all week. Not those lab coat–wearing jailers and their constant needles. Ryder.

Fangs. Fury.

Only after he bit her in her nightmares, sometimes, he did . . . more. Things that didn’t scare her, but turned her on. She swallowed.

“Would you want me to take your will away?”

She realized he hadn’t actually answered her question. Could he do it? Could he take the memory away?

But with all the crazy crap that was going on already, did she want to add mind control to her list?

No, thank you.

“It took me three days to remember who I was.” She licked her lips. His gaze dropped to her mouth. Lingered. His gaze seemed to heat. “So no, don’t take the memory away.” It had just been desperation talking. “I don’t want anyone to ever mess with my mind again.” Because she was convinced that Wyatt had done something to her. He’d made her forget.

Hadn’t he?

Ryder’s hand seemed heavy against her throat, and his thumb was stroking her skin. A small, circular caress.

“You don’t seem as—as wild as before,” she blurted. It was true and reassuring.

His gaze rose back to meet hers. “I drank from four guards when they took you away. Before you, it had been months since I fed.”

The twisting in her stomach got worse. “If you try to take too much from me, I will kill you.” Fair warning. She remembered his unbreakable hold. The terror that had clawed through her.

“To stop me, just drive the stake into my heart.”

The rough edge of the wood rubbed against her fingers.

His head began to lower toward her neck.

“No!”

He froze.

“Um, not the neck, okay? Bad memories. Really bad.” Like there were any good memories of this place.

But Ryder nodded, and the overhead light glinted off the dark gold of his hair.

He took her left hand then and lifted her wrist toward his mouth. “Better?”

In the grand scheme of things? Probably not. But her wrist was a better option than her neck. Her breath rasped out. She was so in over her head. A vampire. He’s a real vampire and I’m—I don’t know what I am.

Monster.

His lips feathered over her skin. Sabine jerked and her fist shoved the stake against him. Not into him, but—

Ryder was watching her with that green stare. A stare that seemed so intense that it actually made her feel like he was looking into her. Then he quietly ordered, “You must trust me. I won’t let you down again.” A grim pause then, “Stop thinking about what happened before.”

Her laugh was weak. “That’s a little impossible.”

“Sabine.” He said her name like it was a caress. The way a man would say it in bed.

They were in bed. She was, anyway.

“Close your eyes,” he told her. “Think of something good.”

There was nothing good there. They were prisoners. No one knew where she was, and Sabine wasn’t even sure of what she was any longer.

The right corner of his mouth hitched up. “Your eyes aren’t closed.”

The vampire couldn’t be teasing her right then. The blood of the men he’d killed—her blood—stained the floor. But he was lightly holding her hand. Gazing into her eyes. Looking at her like a lover.

“You need to let the fear go.”

“Easy for you to say,” she muttered. “I didn’t sink my teeth into you and not let go.”

His smile vanished. “No, you didn’t.” He pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist.

She closed her eyes.

“Now you do that?”

Sabine didn’t answer him. Something good. She had good memories rattling around in her mind, now that her memories were actually back, anyway. She could pull some of them out.

“Where were you the last time you were happy?” Ryder asked her.

The image slipped through her mind. The dark bar. The laughter. The blues music that hung in the air. Rhett’s music. “New Orleans.” Her home. The only one she’d ever known. “At my brother’s bar.”

His breath rushed out. “You have a brother?”

The memory wanted to drift away. She held it tight. “N-not blood. The people who adopted me—my parents—they already had Rhett.” Rhett had been the reassuring constant in her life. Always there. Always watching out for her. With her eyes closed, she could see him so easily in her mind. “He was playing the blues, and I was dancing behind the bar.” The whole family had been there. Laughter. Voices mellow. She’d been swaying to the music, thinking how lucky she was. “I sang with him.” Her lips curled. “I sound like a dying frog when I sing. Half the crowd left instantly.”

His laughter came, surprising her, and her lashes flew up.

He looked different when he laughed. Still dangerous, but different.

He drained your blood. Don’t go weakening around him.

“Hold that memory,” Ryder told her as his laughter faded away.

She closed her eyes again.

His mouth was on her wrist. Pressing lightly. His lips parted. His teeth sank into her wrist, and there was only the faintest flash of pain, not nearly as bad as the prick of Wyatt’s needles, then Ryder’s mouth tightened on her skin. He was sucking her flesh. Taking her blood.

The fear rose within her once more.

Hold the good memory.

She tried to hold it. Singing in the bar. Rhett shaking his head as he told her that the blues just wouldn’t ever be for her. Her mother had waved her on. Sabine had laughed until her sides ached.

His mouth seemed to harden on her wrist as Ryder took more.

The memory flew away from her as her eyes shot open once again. The stake was slippery in her sweaty hand, but she wasn’t about to let that thing go. “Ryder.”

His eyes were open, too. Open and locked right on her. His pupils were swelling as he stared at her, swallowing up the green of his eyes. So much hunger was in that stare. Hunger, desire.

A dark lust.

Her heart raced in her chest. “I don’t want to hurt you.” Was that the truth? Or a lie? She wasn’t sure. He hurt you. The stake pressed down harder. “But I will.” Sabine let the stake draw blood, just to show that she wasn’t making an empty threat.

Say it and mean it. Her father’s advice. Don’t take shit from anybody in this world. A favorite mantra of his.