Dark Desire – Chapter 23
Memories of her life with Eric filled her mind. For two weeks Katy felt Eric's desperate need for her to remember him, and she wanted him to know that she did. Not knowing where to begin, she finally started to talk about their official, but informal, marriage ceremony in Vermont on New Years Day which was followed by the formal ceremony later that night in New Orleans. While Eric held her close and stoked her softly, Katy talked. The action of his hands was soothing and comforting. She told him everything she could remember.
The events of that day played out in her mind vividly as she talked, but she soon realized it was like watching herself acingt out the scenes of a high definition movie. All of the memories were detailed and real. She knew exactly what she did and exactly what she felt, but it all still seemed remote and detached somehow. That upset her a lot: she had her memories back, but something was still very wrong. If Eric knew that he did not give any indication; that made Katy feel relieved and glad.
They had been officially married in a short civil ceremony at 12:01 am New Years Day just outside of Burlington, Vermont. The ceremony was presided over by their host, Arthur Kellogg, a human supreme court justice, in the living room of his elegant Tudor home. Eric, Katy, Pam, Daniel, Judith and a small team of security vamps had arrived shortly after eight o'clock in the evening along with Nan Flanagan and the Magister. Around ten, Katy enjoyed a sumptuous late meal with Arthur and his daughter, Charlotte, while the vamps dined on the best Royal Blue.
Eric and the other vamps had started out the journey that afternoon in traveling caskets in the large cargo hold under the sumptuous passenger cabin of his large private jet. They all arose after dusk. When Eric joined her up front, he was strangely euphoric; he joked and teased with all of them for the remainder of the flight. He seemed younger and carefree, not at all like a powerful regent with heavy responsibilities. He seemed more like the twenty three year old human male he was when he was turned.
The judge and his daughter, who worked at the County Clerk's Office, expedited the procurement of their marriage license. Eric had saved Arthur and his then teenage daughter, Charlotte, from certain death at the hands of another vampire outside of a Shreveport mall almost thirty years before. Since then, judge felt he owed Eric and frequently did favors for him over the years. He told Eric that he would be honored to conduct his wedding ceremony anytime the vampire king wanted.
For the civil ceremony, Katy wore an knee length, Versace, light green, silk sheath with matching shoes. The elegant cut of the dress bared one shoulder and one arm; the neckline showcased the exquisite emerald, diamond and amethyst necklace that Eric had given her the night before. Matching earrings and a bracelet sparkled on her ears and wrist. Her shining blonde hair, held by pins and a light green velvet ribbon, was piled in soft curls on the crown of her head. Soft curls framed her face at her temples.
Eric had wore an expensive light charcoal Italian suit that shimmered and flowed with his body as he moved. He had on a light green silk shirt that matched Katy's dress with a darker green tie with a print that included lavender, gold, mauve and pink. The cut of his suit emphasized his broad shoulders and slim hips.
Pam, Judith and Daniel, also dressed for the occasion and witnessed the ceremony. Judith took photographs. Nan Flanagan and the Magister also observed the nuptials, at Eric's expense of course. A complement of Eric's vamp guards provided additional security for the couple.
Although the wedding in Vermont was the legally binding ceremony, for Kate, their "real" wedding would be the second formal ceremony tonight in New Orleans. That wedding ceremony and grand reception to be held at La Maisson's would be followed by a third vampire wedding ceremony and Katy's ritual turning at the palace before dawn the next morning.
After Arthur Kellogg pronounced them husband and wife, Eric kissed Katy deeply, breathed in her scent and whispered exultantly against her ear, "Hello, wife. You belong to me now." The vamp who didn't need to breathe deliberately did exactly that; his soft, cool exhalations tingled against her warm skin sending lovely tremors of pleasure through her. Through their bond, Katy could feel the full force of Eric's love and happiness; she also felt a deep sense of satisfaction emanating from him. It warmed her heart.
"Hello, husband. Don't you know that I belonged to you from the night we met?" she flirted back with him.
As if Eric had been holding his breath for a while, a long, breathy exhalation escaped him. She smelled his sweet, spicy breath flow lightly across her lips. "But now, it's official, my wife. No one can take you away from me, now." She felt a curious sense of relief suffusing him and wondered about it.
She didn't know what to say to that, so she teased him, "Silly man; just let anyone try to take me away from you. I dare them!"
Eric laughed again, hugged Katy close, picked her up and swung her around and around until she was dizzy. "Stop," she finally protested. The others looked at him as if he had lost his senses.
"Love!" Pam said in her affected bored voice and then laughed. The others just laughed.
Eric and Kate signed the marriage license, got their copy and joined their host in a toast to their happy union. The new couple couldn't celebrate long; they had a long flight back to New Orleans. They were in the air and back on their way home in Eric's private jet by 12:45AM. The two sat alone up front talking softly and making plans for their future, while the other vamps occupied themselves behind them. Eric 's was still strangely elated; his joy was infectious.
A few minutes before the plane took up a landing pattern, Eric claimed her hand, the one that wore his wedding ring. He brought it to his lips, kissed the back of her fingers and then turned her hand over and brushed his lips back and forth across her palm slowly. Katy had taken so much of his blood over the last two months that her senses were extremely heightened. The receptors in her skin reveled in the whisper soft touch of his mouth against her palm; the feeling was both exquisitely erotic and electrifying at the same time; it was hypnotic. Her heart had been beating fast; she swallowed hard and then stilled herself as if in a trance. She didn't realize she was holding her breath until she heard herself gasp.
Eric looked at her, his blue eyes were deeper in color than usual; they were almost violet. She loved the way his eyes changed according to his moods, and tonight, they seemed so mysterious and deep. She stared into their hidden depths to try and devine what he was thinking. She didn't want to break eye contact with him, but suddenly he looked down at her hand and turned it over, running his thumb up the long crease of her life lifeline and up past the pulse on her wrist. Katy caught her breath and murmured softly as a thrill ran through her.
Eric continued his love play, He turned her hand over and splayed his long, strong fingers across her smaller, softer, tapered ones as if measuring the difference in size. Eric's hands were not soft; when he was alive, he worked his fields as a farmer; he worked his weapons on the field of battle. The callouses on his hands were well earned, and they heightened the erotic sensation of his caress. Katy felt her body begin to tighten and warm in response.
Then Eric did a strange thing: he turned her hand palm up again and fingered her wedding ring, twirling it gently around her finger. He looked at her hand as if he had never seen it before. He smiled at her. His strange elation rolled through their bond, swamping her with his happiness.
Bending his head slightly, he leaned over and placed his cool nose up against her throat, breathed deeply and gave a satisfied sigh. "My Katy, my lover, my beautiful wife. So, so lovely," he whispered as the wheels of the plane hit the tarmac. Katy savored the sound of those words on his lips.
They arrived back at the palace an hour and a half before daybreak on New Years Day. Katy and Eric couldn't wait to be alone, but they endured the congratulations, the back slaps and the well wishes of the vamp staff and others, including Bill and Sookie, who had arrived earlier that night. To Katy's relief, she noted there wasn't a fangbanger in sight. Finally they made it upstairs to their bedroom.
At the bedroom door, Eric opened it, picked Katy up and stepped through with her in his arms. With one foot, he kicked the door closed behind them. Walking a few feet into the room, he stood Katy down on the floor in front of him.
"Don't move," he ordered as he reached behind her, unzipped her dress and unclasped the strapless bra she was wearing. Raising her arms, he lifted the dress up over he head and dropped it on the floor; her strapless bra fell along side it. Katy stood clad only in her bikini panties, hose and heels.
Katy started to move to embrace him. "Don't move!" he ordered her again.
Eric kicked off his shoes, stood before her and undressed himself, casually dropping his clothes in a pile next to her. Standing completely naked with his penis hard and long at full flag, he moved and pressed himself up against the naked skin of her stomach. Katy's hands automatically moved to touch him, but he gently moved them away.
Kneeling in front of Katy, Eric picked up one foot, and then the other, removing her high heeled shoes. Slowly, using both hands, he removed her garters and rolled down her hose, kissing the arch of each foot after he removed each silk stocking. Finally, hooking his fingers on each side of her panties, her pulled them down and helped her to step out of them. By the time he finished, Katy was already panting for him.
Eric wound his arms around her hips and rested his cheek up against the soft blonde curls that partially covered her mons and inhaled several deep, satisfying breaths. "I'm glad you didn't remove it all like other women do," he once told her. "I love to run my fingers through it when you come; it excites me so." Katy thought she felt his tongue flick against her and she shivered.
Eric stood up and walked her backward to her dresser against the far wall. Lifting Katy up, he sat her hips partially down on the top of the dresser and splayed her legs wide open. She was sitting well forward on the dresser top with her sex fully exposed to him. To keep her balance, Katy had to grab the ornately carved protruding edge of the dresser top along each side, lean back and arch her back a little. Eric stepped in between her legs. She could feel his organ, thick and heavy against her lower belly and the folds of her sex.
Tilting her head up to his, Eric kissed her long and deep. His tongue played little games with hers. Moving his mouth away, he stood for a long moment, then removed the hairpins and the ribbon holding her hair up off her shoulders. His finger nails scraped softly over her scalp before he splayed his hands in her hair and combed it down around her shoulders with his big fingers. He ruffled the tresses a little to make sure they fell free. With her head extended back and her spine gracefully arched, Katy's, soft, shiny blonde hair now fell well below her shoulder blades. Eric could see it all in the mirror behind her; she made a lovely picture. A fresh burst of desire bloomed within him like a fireworks display; he felt his erection get even harder and longer as he growled low in his throat. Katy's eyes had been closed. The rumbling sound low in his chest seemed to startle her as she opened her eyes wide in pregnant expectation. She licked her lips, and Eric caught her tongue with his teeth an fangs and sucked on it for a while.
With one of his big hands gently cupping the back of her head and the second around her graceful neck, he nestled the thumb of that second hand deep into the small hollow at the base of her throat. He drew circles with that thumb around and around and upward, touching lightly against her throat. His large hand could have easily snapped her delicate neck in two. Katy shivered as he leaned and inhaled her again.
"What do I smell like?" she asked him.
"You smell like orange blossoms, honey and spice; like nothing I ever smelled before. Your smell is so delicious, you intoxicate me, but I smell my own blood in you too; and that is even more intoxicating," he signed as he breathed slowly against her neck again. He laughed softly to himself as she shivered with each word. Through their blood bond, he could feel exactly how his touch and his lips made her feel. It was like touching his own skin. He could feel exactly how much she loved and desired him; that was the most intoxicating thing of all.
Katy could smell his special blend of musk and spice. "You make me feel drunk, too," she breathed to him. She almost almost swooned as a heady rush of love and lust made her feel dizzy. She clutched hard at the sides of the dresser to keep balance. The curved molding on the front of the dresser was a little uncomfortable against the back of her thighs and her bottom, but she didn't care; her body was too busy responding to what Eric was doing with his large hands.
He he ran his big hands ever so slowly down the the tops of her arms and up the underside moving them to the top of her shoulders. He stopped for a moment than began to move them down her upper chest until he finally covered a small breast with each hand. He moved his palms back and forth across each small rosy nipple. They plumped, then hardened in his hands. Eric moved down and took one sweet bud in his mouth; his fangs fully extended for a long time, lightly abraded her skin, a jolt of lover's lightening flashed from her breast to her groin. A sudden wet warmth blossomed between inside her core and spilled out onto her thigh. Competing ripples of pleasure inundated her breasts and her groin, threatening to suck her under.
Eric smelled her arousal before he felt it. He spread her legs wider, and with one hand opened the lips of her sex and slipped a finger inside. He touched the wetness there. Pulling the finger out, he rubbed her essence over his swollen shaft then licked his finger. He slipped his hardened penis between her wet lower lips and began to rub back and forth. Katy keened his name softly as her first orgasm washed over her.
She tried to put her arms around him, but he shrugged them away. 'No. Don't touch me, lover. Tonight, I give. You receive."
"I have to touch you. I need to touch you." Katy's body shook as she begged and reached for him again. "No, lover. Tonight, we do it my way," he said as he took her hands and planted them down against the sides of the dresser and held them there.
He slowly lowered himself, his tongue trailing kisses from the sensitive hollow of her throat, down her chest, over each breast and standing nipple, to her navel and down to the top of her sex. Finally he was kneeling before her with face between her legs. Spreading her thighs wider, he reach up and opened her up, gently sliding his finger up and down against the soft tissue there. He knelt for a minute just looking at the exposed flesh as it pinked from her arousal. He rubbed his nose and cheeks against the silky skin of her inner thighs and blew against her secret place. Katy jumped; the sensation was indescribable. Moving his face again, the slight stubble of beard brushed against her, rasping ever so slightly. Katy's body jerked as it trembled so hard she thought it would never stop.
Eric lightly kissed the folds of her sex, and with his tongue, he found and tormented the swollen bud of her clitorus. Katy jumped again as his cool tongue touched her heated skin. She tried to wiggle away, but his hands held her firmly now. He teased and sucked, rolling the delicate flesh with his lips and tongue, until her until she put both of her hands in his hair and pulled him into her. She didn't think she could stand anymore as the telltale rippling of an intense climax pulsed through her again; wetting his face. "Eriiic...! I can't stand this. I'm coming apart!" she keened his name as her orgasm hit.
"Come for me, Katy love. Come for me. That's the way," his deep voice crooned and encouraged her.
Eric pulled Kathy to a standing position, but her knees were so weak, she began to slip to the floor. Her thighs were wobbly and trembled mightily; they would not hold her. Eric picked her up and moved to the bed. Her back barely hit the mattress before he buried his thick deep inside her and began to move; it felt like heaven to her. She tried to lift her legs around his back, but her thigh muscles wouldn't cooperate, so Eric did it for her; it allowed him deeper purchase.
By now, Eric was panting hard as hard as she was; his breath was ragged as he pumped into her, grunting with the force of each thrust. Katy arched up against him, meeting each downward movement, moaning as she did. By now all rational thought had left them both, neither one of them were coherent; they were all feeling, all sensation, all nerve endings alive with glorious pleasure now. With their hands intertwined at their sides, they moved and bucked against each other. Their gutteral cries deepened as they approached a magical pinnacle.
Through their bond, they could both feel every touch, every sensation that the other felt as their mouth and their hands loved each other. Aas he slid his manhood deep into her slick hot core, withdrew and slid in again, automatically her silky folds clenched, released and pulsed around him. Such exquisite pleasure was almost unbearable.
Eric's buttocks tensed for a moment, then he poured himself into her. "Oh, god, Katy!" he cried out as his orgasm thundered in waves; her own final orgasm flowed and melted into his; he could hear the sound of her inner core spitting her juices around him. He fell heavily against her, spent.
Katy relived every detail as poured out the memories of the night of their official wedding ceremony. The memory was so good, and she was glad she had it. All during her recitation, Eric lay next to her holding her close, comforting her, stroking her. Katy felt such relief that she almost cried. She hung on to him, hoping he would kiss her, but he didn't.
Eric relived his own joy and relief when the judge pronounced them husband and wife. He had lost his first love,Sookie, to Bill Compton. He was determined not to lose Katy to anyone. He marveled at his presumptousness believing that no one could take her from him. But, no other lover did; it was those vile beasts, Tiffany Coulter and Ralph Thompson. How he hated them for that. Laying there beside her, he wished he could crush and kill them both all over again.
After a while, Katy realized that although most of her memories were back, something was still clearly wrong. She puzzled over that until she realized that although she remembered the blood bond, she did not actually feel it. She had not felt Eric inside her mind since she had woken up from her coma. She knew the blood bond was there somewhere inside her, but she felt like it was buried behind a wall as thick and strong as a bank vault. Katy felt more alone then she ever had in her life. She wanted that part of herself back. She wanted to feel Eric inside her mind again; she wanted to be part of him.
Looking up at Eric with tears in her eyes, she said, "You know, that I don't feel you anymore, don't you?"
"Yes, I can feel it," he brokenly whispered to her. From the desolation and sadness in his eyes, Katy finally understood Eric's pain. Like her, he felt alone, but it was so much worse for him. It wasn't just her memories he wanted her to recover; it was the sense of their shared blood bond.
For over two weeks, she had forgotten who he was, so she didn't suffer. Eric did. Every day, she talked to him, every day she lay beside him. Her presence was a physical reminder him of what he had lost.
In a sudden burst of insight, Katy understood well why vampires did not often form a blood bond with humans. The blood bond wasn't intimate and invasive only for the human, but for the vampire as well. Closer to their animal nature, vampire passions and emotions were so much deeper than those of most humans: they were wild, rough and primal. Much more than most humans could ever understand.
The sheer mental intimacy of a human/vampire blood bond magnified those passions and emotions until they were almost completely overwhelmed. Although the vampire controlled the blood bond, it was far from total control; they often felt like they were teetering on the edge of oblivion. Bonded to the right person, the mere presence of their human in their shared bond helped them control the raging animal passions, and the bond was an indescribable pleasure. Tied to the wrong human, the passions could rage out of control, and the blood bond was an intolerable hell. Breaking the blood bond was dangerous and painful for the vampire and was not to be undertaken lightly.
Eric remembered that for two glorious months their blood bond had been a living, breathing thing inside them, connecting them, completing them, making making them part of each other. He and Katy were as close as two separate beings could be without sharing the same skin. Now, although he felt her emotions as strongly as he did before, there was also a hole deep inside of him that couldn't be filled.
He knew she didn't feel him, and It was killing him, sometimes sending him into violent rages. Although he loved her and would spend the rest of his life with her, he wanted to share more than the normal maker/child bond with her after he turned her. He wanted, no he needed, to share the incredible richness of their blood bond forever. The Magister insisted that he turn Katy once her rmemories returned, but he intended to stall a little longer. He knew that if Katy's blood bond did not surface before her turning that deep sharing would never happen. That thought terrified him.
"It will come back. I know it will," Katy fiercely told him. Eric wanted desperately to believe her as he fell into slumber.