Distinctly Human
He could feel her trembling beneath his hands as he moved himself lower down her body, her veins thrumming with energy and life and blood. His hands were firm on her thighs and he could feel her blood pulsing beneath his thumbs as he slipped his hands down the inside of her legs. She sucked in a short breath and he smiled; he knew the sensitive skin there was ticklish. His dark curls skirted her skin as he pressed a kiss to her inner thigh. He smiled against her flesh as she breathed out a sigh of contentment and the points of his incisors grazed lightly over her skin. She ignited in him a thirst that had little to do with her blood and more to do with feeling her warm skin beneath his cold skin, feeling her lips against his and her hands in his hair as their bodies clashed in all the right ways.
He had to be careful with her, he knew, but sometimes it could be difficult. She'd sweated out the infection for eighty-eight days, a feat rarely accomplished. Her mind was stronger than most, but her body was still that of a teenaged girl. The knowledge that he could easily overpower her, could drink her painfully human blood, was constantly at war with the knowledge that she'd worked hard to NOT become a vampire; he loved her too much to take that away from her. It would be so much easier had she chosen to become a vampire-
He sighed against her skin, his lips tracing along the sensitive flesh of her thigh, listening to her blood and smelling her desire. So was so pale and so passionate, being a vampire would suit her. He chuckled to himself at that thought.
"Gavriel," Tana sighed, slipping her fingers into his curls as his tongue darted out to taste her. He groaned against her as her flavor engulfed his tongue. This was something so distinctly human, so distinctly her; something only Tana could give him.
He felt so alive with her. More alive than when he was alive.
After their coupling, as always, they lay pressed together. His hand rested over her left breast, feeling the beat of her heart slowing back to normal. His lips were pressed against her throat, feeling the blood thrum beneath the surface. Lying next to her, he almost felt warm. Feeling her heartbeat through his palm, he could almost pretend he could be feeling his own heart, his own life beating within him.
Tana stroked a finger slowly across the back of his hand, tracing lazy circles around his knuckles. Her eyes were closed in contentment. Gavriel smiled against her skin. Tana would have to be human enough for the both of them.
Story originally posted to AO3 January 2014 (at the time, there wasn't a category for the book here.)