Avabella

My, my! What did he mean by that?

I looked at Alpha Elias with a confident smile. “You know I can reduce you to ashes or even into nothing if you lay a finger on me, right?” I said in English, my Spanish accent was heavy.

He put his hands on the bluish gray wall, at either side of my face, successfully trapping me between his warm, hard body and the smooth, cold wall that was against my back.

The room we were in smelled clean and fresh. It had a huge four-poster bed on my right, which had amazing engraving of a long chain of flowers. The bedsheet was of pristine rose color. On the farthest end was a doorway, which I knew led to a modern bathroom with complete toiletries and accessories. Opposite to the bed was a heavily curtained ceiling-to-floor glass window. The light was automatic but was dim. Nonetheless, I could clearly see the shifter’s handsome face close to mine. He was too close for my lady parts’ comfort.

“I haven’t laid a finger on or in you yet,” he whispered, using the same language. His warm breath fanned my beautiful face.

Darn! Did he just say ‘in’ me? And ‘yet’? I could feel the warmth spread across my cheeks. It somehow made my stomach flutter, making my lady part down there clench in anticipation. I could even feel the heat pooling in between my legs. Double darn!

“No need to use your sorcery on me, Avabella,” he added. His tone was huskier as moments passed by. My name had never sounded so darn sexy on anyone’s lips other than his. Ever! “I just want us to get to know each other better.”

I looked at him in disbelief, brows furrowed. “What? By doing this?” I was ready to give him my bitchy attitude. I pushed him by the chest but he won’t budge. His chest was like all muscles, warm… and hard! My hands suddenly itched to touch him more but I just laid my hands over it, feeling his strong and steady heartbeat.

“I should have done this a long time ago,” he confessed.

My eyes went round. And I was speechless. What did he mean this time? I waited for him to continue. I could just look into his eyes and listen to him. Yeah, I should just give him a chance to say something right in my face. That was the least I could do for my grandaunt and her husband’s best ally.

“I am imprinted on you ever since the first time I saw you that night in the middle of the battle, here at the Supreme Castle.”

“What?” I thought my eyes went even wider when I heard it. I didn’t mean it but I laughed so hard right in front of his face. Well, he let me laugh until I could laugh no more. He was just staring at me. I could see no offense on his part but perhaps he was offended. I cleared my throat.

“But you had a lover,” he stated.

That made me laugh again. Seriously? Where did he get that idea?

“I… I had a lover? Who was it?” I was truly amazed by this, and it was really funny. I wasn’t even aware I had a lover.

“I thought so, at the time. It took me months to figure out that Diego wasn’t your lover but your cousin,” he said, almost embarrassed.

“Darn! You thought Diego was my lover?” I cussed again and laughed. “How did you even get the wrong idea? Plus, for your information, I’m no incest. Neither is he!”

Didn’t he ask Diego or Maria Adriana? Maybe he just waited for the information to come to him on its own. He seemed to be someone who wouldn’t blabber something so personal. But I really thought he and Iago were very close. Perhaps he didn’t dare since I was his friend’s relative by marriage.

A slow smile pulled up his sexy lips. Triple darn! It seemed to pull some strings inside my tummy, making me feel giddy. Why was he affecting me like this? Sure, I was even used to flirting but I couldn’t bring myself flirt with this shifter. At all. Never. He was different. He was way too serious for my taste.

“Then that makes you mine, Avabella.”

I choked at my own saliva upon hearing it. “Excuse me?”

His right arm came down to embrace me by the waist, making me feel of the lower part of his body. His hard lower part body, which made my jaw hang. That hardened part, I knew what it was, which made the heat between my legs grow damper and hotter.

“You’re mine, Avabella… and you’re bound to carry my offspring in your sexy uterus.” Then Alpha Elias gave me the most seductive smile I had ever seen in my entire life. It was so tantalizing and breathtaking! To admit it to him or not, I believed he knew those very words shot incomprehensible fiery desire right into my very core, making me real wet!

I laughed at his words like they were a joke. He was smiling down at me, grinding his hard arousal against my abdomen. That made me groan softly, making me stop laughing. ¡Maldición! That felt so good, making my lady parts throb with blazing want and desire. It made me anticipate for the next move he was going to do.

I cussed and gasped. Was this counted as dry humping me already? Darn! I’d never felt so sexually excited like this. I did kiss and made out with a number of men in the past, but I never did the deed because I never thought it was time and no man had made me feel something… Wait, something like this in my twenty-six years on Earth?

Our eyes held for the longest minute and our breaths were not normal anymore. Our chest rose and fell.

“It’s impossible, Alpha Elias,” I managed to say.

He stopped grinding his hips against mine. I lowered my eyes, smelling his sensual clean and conifer scent. It was stronger at this very close proximity. It was all I could breathe in in this room.

“What are you saying? And it’s Elias for you, Avabella. You’re not a shifter and I’m not your Alpha.”

My eyes glowed red as I lifted my eyes to look at him. Yes, he was right. I bared my fangs and pushed him as hard as I could. He ended up crashing against the opposite wall, leaving a dent and a crack in it.

“Clear your head, Elias! I don’t care if you’re imprinted on me or not. I don’t care if you’re attracted to me or more than that. I have no intention of getting close to you!” I told him firmly. My heart was beating so fast like I was just in a race. “Do you understand?” I added. My vampire face was still on.

Just as fast as I pushed him hard, he was back right in front of me in his wolf speed. “You can never make me go away now, Avabella. Not anymore, now that you know what you are to me,” he said calmly.

“I don’t care!” I yelled at him. It just occurred to me that Maria Adriana already fixed the castle, so this room was soundproof. Darn it! No one would help me if I wanted it. But of course, I could take care of myself well. I always had. Besides, Elias wouldn’t do anything to harm me. It was just that… I could not trust myself to not do anything that I might regret later on.

True. I felt something. I realized I was attracted to him since the very beginning but this wasn’t right. He was a wolf. Although Maria Adriana married Elias’ kind, she and Iago were different. They were totally different from my and Elias’ situation. To add, I didn’t and I never thought that another wolf in the family was even necessary. They were difficult to handle. I always wondered how Maria Adriana handled her husband well. She could keep a tight leash on Iago and he wouldn’t mind. But of course, she didn’t do that. There was no need. After all, they were fated to be together from the very beginning. It happened since they were children.

So, yeah. It was way different for me and Elias. I had never expected this to happen.

“I can’t be bound to and by a wolf, Elias!”

He looked at me with a composed face, as if he had never ground his hard-on against me. I noticed I also calmed down. My neutral and natural face was back on, to normal.

“You’ll be, in the future,” he mumbled. “I’ll do everything in my power to make you fall for me, Avabella.”

I snorted. “That won’t ever happen, Elias. You see, I enjoy being free. I am not like my great-great-grandaunt Maria Adriana who’s been in love with her husband since she was young. Although they fought many times, she had always been bound to him. From the very beginning.” I shook my head and gave him a wary smile. “It won’t be the same for us simply because you’re imprinted on me. I’m sorry that you are but you can’t have me.”

“You’ll be, in the future,” he muttered again. “I’ll do everything in my power to make you fall for me, Avabella.”

God! He just repeated what he said a little while ago. And that was verbatim.

I looked at him with renewed interest, however. He seemed to be more good-looking as minutes passed by. I couldn’t seem to take my eyes off of him.

“Why are you looking at me like that? Have you changed your mind already?”

I scoffed. “Me? No. Of course not!” I turned my back to him. I opened the heavy curtain to look outside. It was snowing as the sun began to set. In a few minutes, the city would be blanketed in darkness but the lights will be switched on and the party would make the castle livelier.

I froze when I felt Elias embrace me from behind. My hand remained holding the thick purple curtain.

“Are you going to use your powers to get rid of me?” he whispered in my ear. His breath was warm and ticklish. It made the goosebumps rise up on my skin.

“No, if you let go of me right now.”

“You said you loved Diego,” he told me, not letting me go.

I slightly turned my face to look up at him. His eyes were in the scenery we were gazing at. It was the castle garden, where the acolytes were preparing to have the party. With their vampire speed, the decorations were almost done.

The huge pastel blue tent was set up. Balloons of colors blue, green and silver hugged every post. A buffet table was set on the left side by Chiara and Zehra, while pots of blooming flowers in a staircase design were currently set by Hestia.

I blinked, looking at Elias’ beard. My hands wanted to feel how rough or smooth it was. But I held the curtain tighter.

“Yes, I love Diego with all my heart. I love everyone in my family,” I said.

“Do you like Nianzu?” he asked, dropping his gaze to my face.

I looked away then. “Of course. Nianzu is a very nice man. He…” I trailed off, brows knitting.

“Tell me about him. You always travel with him and Diego. Are you attracted to him?”

“Wait. How do you know I always travel with them? I didn’t tell you that. Or was it Iago or Maria Adriana?”

“Neither of them told me. I’ve been following you since you left France, after seizing this castle.”

My ears perked up because of it. I elbowed him hard in the ribs, making him stagger back and groan in pain. I turned to look at him with fangs bared and eyes that glowed red.

“You’ve been stalking me the entire time?”

He shrugged, after straightening up. He wasn’t holding his ribs anymore. Perhaps he healed fast as I broke one or two.

“So it wasn’t a chance meeting when I saw you at the coffee shop in Andorra de Vella or at my great grandfather’s estate in Madrid?”

The creep!