Carpathian 08 - Dark Legend

set to work with the bodyguard to ensure the house was protected inside and out. It would be necessary to change Francesca's manner of living to accommodate a high fence around the grounds now that there were humans to protect also. Santino was quick to find a design that fit the old-fashioned architecture. He had incorporated the safeguards Francesca had chosen to build into the fence itself.
    It was already well under construction; Santino didn't believe in procrastinating. Francesca was certain Gabriel and Santino would become good friends in time.
    "You are certainly accurate in your thinking," Gabriel murmured, his heart already finding the perfect rhythm of hers. She was his world and he loved waking up with the knowledge that she was there, waiting for him, so cool and serene and beautiful.
    Francesca smiled as she turned in his arms, her body molding itself to his, already soft and pliant, her skin warming as his blood thickened and heated. She reveled in the feel of his body; how different he was from her, his muscles so defined and hard. With her hands she sought his hips, the columns of his thighs, smoothed over his chest, lingered over the area where he had been wounded. "You hunger."
    She made it a statement. She had known he would awaken ravenous, and she was more than willing to provide for her lifemate. She could feel the hunger in him, a growing, living thing.
    Gabriel buried his face in the hollow of her shoulders, his mouth moving over her scented skin. His hands shaped her slender body, tracing her perfect form, her lush breasts and rounded hips, her small tucked-in waist. Their child lay beneath his palm and it excited him to think of it growing there, another binding tie between them. A rush of heat hit him with the speed of a fireball, exploding in his lower belly as her fingers danced over him.
    "Francesca." He breathed her name against the creamy mound of her breast, his warm breath teasing her nipple into an answering erotic peak. His lips kissed the vulnerable line of her throat, found her mouth, fastened there, his mouth dominating and very male. She was everything to him. "Everything." He whispered it into her mouth, sliding his tongue along hers in a fiery tango.
    He closed his eyes to feel her with his body, his hands exploring while his mouth moved along her neck back to the deep valley between her breasts. His body was growing hard and uncomfortable with wanting her, his hunger rising sharply. She murmured something softly against his skin, a little endearment, an enticement even, while her hands moved over his hips and settled with teasing, dancing fingers along the hard evidence of his growing need. His breath seemed to explode out of his body as she moved over him, her breast an invitation beneath his seeking mouth.
    Fangs lengthened, grew as his teeth teased and scraped her skin over her pounding, beckoning pulse. Her fingers were inflaming him, teasing and shaping, even as she arched her body closer to his. Fiery heat streaked through her, through him as his teeth sank deep.
    Whips of lightning danced over their skin as he fed voraciously, her blood, hot and sweet, flowing into the starved cells of his body.
    His body. Wracked with fires. Flames that could never be put out. He was so hot he burned with need. Even as he fed, he caught her slender hips and pinned her beneath him so he could surge forward, a powerful thrust, burying himself deep in her tight sheath. She was hot and slick with need, with hunger. Colors whirled and danced and the fire raged out of control. Gabriel just let it happen, let it consume him. Her body was all that mattered in that moment. He would plumb every secret place, delve deeper and deeper until he found complete sanctuary from the host of demons forever haunting him.
    He moved harder and faster, long sure strokes designed to inflame her, to bring her to the same burning fever he felt. He whispered her name as he stroked his tongue across the tiny pinpricks, closing the wound in her breast. He gathered her to him, reveling in the mysteries of her wondrous body. He was lost for all time; she was his world and everything good in it.
    Francesca looked up at his face above her, etched in sensual beauty, his black eyes glittering with the intensity of his wild lovemaking, swimming in unexpected tears. She gasped, .touched a teardrop on his impossibly long eyelashes. His perfect mouth softened, curved in response. "You are just so beautiful, Francesca. I