A Girl's Guide to Vampires

A warmth, a presence I hadn't felt in the vision of the other night surrounded me. "You smell like flowers, but you taste of heaven." Flames licked up my back, burning my neck, lighting me on fire. I struggled to escape the flames, but the Dark One's hold on me was too great.

"I've thought about you all evening, thought about this. You were never once from my mind. You were meant for me. Every inch of you is perfect, perfectly made for me. You are mine."

He was coming closer. He was almost upon me.

We will be together forever, Beloved.

Nooooo!

"Say it. Say the words. I want to hear them." The fire consumed the front of me, burning down past flesh and muscle and bone, boiling my blood away until there was nothing left of the essence of me. What was left was love.

"Raphael!"

"Mmm. I thought you'd never wake up."

I opened my eyes. Raphael's amber gaze burned into me seconds before his mouth claimed mine. I gave myself to him, gave him everything there was of me and accepted him in return.

A soulless howl of agony rent the fabric of the night, bringing tears to my eyes even as I understood that there was nothing I could do for the Dark One.

"Joy?"

I opened my eyes again and smiled at the concern in Raphael's beautiful eyes. "Hello, Bob."

"You went stiff for a moment."

I allowed my smile to go naughty and rubbed up against him. "I'm not the only thing that's stiff."

"Cheeky," he grinned, dipping his head down for another taste of my lips. The feel of his warm skin touching mine, the taste of him, of his body pressing mine down into the mattress, reaffirmed the knowledge that this was right, that this was meant to be. His presence banished the nightmare that almost was. A tiny spark of guilt flared to life with the thought that I should not be celebrating life with Raphael while another was suffering, but the honest part of my mind stomped out the guilt with the acceptance that some things were beyond my control.

I sucked on Raphael's tongue as he checked my teeth, sliding my hands down the muscles of his shoulders to his back.

"You're naked," I said, pausing in our kiss to breathe.

He leaned back and looked down at me, trailing a finger across my collarbone, down the middle of my breastbone, still farther down to my belly, ending with a tickle at the gates of my own personal paradise. "Ah, baby, so are you."

I melted into one big puddle of goo. Baby. It wasn't the word, it was the way he said it.

"I was waiting for you. Somehow I thought you would prefer me dressed this way."

He leaned forward to nuzzle his cheek across my breast. The barest hint of stubble added a dimension of tingle that I hadn't felt before. I sucked in a delighted gulp of air.

"You are positively psychic."

"And you're only just discovering this?" I laughed, my laughter turning to a gasp as his mouth closed over my nipple. "OK, I like that," I admitted, wondering why my voice was an octave higher than normal.

Raphael laved my breast with long strokes of his tongue before he released it. "So do I," he growled, his voice deepening as he bent over my other breast. "Fancy that, a spare."

"Yes," I gasped, trying to get some air into my lungs. It was impossible to breathe while his mouth was on my flesh, so I gave up the notion and just concentrated on what he was doing. "I keep it there for emergencies. You never know when you'll need a spare breast, my mother always said. And she was right. I'm extremely happy at this moment that I had the foresight to bring my spare along with me on this trip."

"And it's in such delicious condition," Raphael said just before his teeth closed gently over my nipple. I purred and arched my back so he could feast on more of it. "Round and firm and fully packed."

"You watch… too much… television," I panted as he kissed a hot trail across my belly. I had an idea where he was headed, and although I enjoyed the little nips and kisses he was delivering along the way, I figured I'd better stop him before he went too far. "Um, Raphael? You're not going to… you don't plan to… urn… you know, tongue tango down there, do you?"

He bit my hip, kissing the sting away as he parted my hesitant legs and settled between them. "I certainly am. I take it you don't have any objections?"

His dark head bent down to kiss a hot line up my thigh.

"Well, actually, I do."

He looked up. "You do?"

"Yes," I nodded. "It's nothing personal, but I don't like it. So if we could just skip the appetizer and get on with the main course, that would be fine with me." I reached under the pillow and pulled out the little plastic package. "I brought my own in case you didn't have any."

He frowned at the condom I handed him, then gave it back to me. "What do you mean, you don't like it?"

I made an indefinable shrugging gesture with the condom. "I don't like it, that's what I mean. I've tried it, and I don't like it, and since it can't be all that scenic for you down there, I'm sure you won't mind if we just skip it."