They weren’t right. He was probably confused. They would pass if only he ignored them long enough.

Tired from the mental fight going on inside him, he let himself be lulled in by the creaking of the house as it responded to the aftershocks of the earthquake. He snuggled deeper into the pillows, the soft sheets caressing his skin. A scent drifted to him: tantalizing, arousing, tempting.

So familiar, and so forbidden: Thomas’s scent. A shadow moved toward the bed.

Then cool air blew against his body as hands lifted the bed sheet off his body and laid him bare. The mattress depressed and a warm mouth pressed soft kisses on his chest while gentle hands caressed him. With every caress they stroked lower, until they reached the top of his pajama bottoms. Fingers reached for the strings and undid the knot, then pulled on the fabric, pushing it down his hips.

Without thinking, Eddie lifted his butt to help him slide the garment off his body. It made a soft whoosh as it fell to the wooden floor. Thomas’s hands were on his thighs and pushed them apart, so he could slide between them, settling his body there. His naked body.

Silently, Thomas’s head dropped to Eddie’s groin. He knew what his mentor would find there: a cock as hard as it had ever been. He was as eager to feel Thomas’s lips around him as anybody could ever be. Anticipation made his pulse race, and tiny pearls of sweat built on his forehead and neck. His chest heaved as the lust that he’d been trying to hold back finally burst to the surface.

As if Thomas had waited for it, his lips finally wrapped around the tip of Eddie’s cock, and painstakingly slowly, he slid down to the base. Eddie found himself engulfed in wet heat that threatened to consume him. A groan issued from his lips as he thrust upwards and deeper into Thomas’s mouth. He’d never felt anything so good. So intense. So hot.

Hands urged him to bring his legs up over his lover’s shoulders. It opened him up wider, exposing his sensitive balls fully. Warm palms cupped his sac, squeezing it gently, while his lover’s head bobbed up and down, sucking his cock in a steady rhythm.

He couldn’t help but mimic Thomas’s movements and thrust in counteraction to him, fucking his mouth as if his life depended on it. Under cover of darkness, he could allow himself to surrender to his lover’s touch, to his lips and his mouth. To simply give in to the pleasure Thomas was granting him. He shouldn’t feel this pleasure. Yet he did.

Thomas’s tantalizing tongue licked him, and his mouth sucked him with such perfect pressure, that he couldn’t resist the urge to spur him on, to praise him by letting him hear the moans and sighs he could no longer keep contained.

“Yes, fuck, yes!” he cried out.

His cock pushed deeper into Thomas’s warm mouth, harder and faster. Eddie put his hands on the back of his head, holding him there so he couldn’t escape. His hips moved frantically, up and down. All the while a firm hand squeezed his balls in the same rhythm. Then he felt one finger slip along the crack of his ass, pushing against the tight ring of muscles that guarded his dark portal.

A bolt of lightning shot through him, sending an intense wave of pleasure through his body.

When it hit his cock, his eyes flew open, his gaze zeroing in on the space between his legs. His own hand was wrapped around his cock, a cock that spurted hot semen in the air. Thomas was gone. No, not gone: he’d never been there!

It had all been a dream. A wet dream. The most erotic dream he’d ever had. And the most disturbing one at the same time.

He’d gotten off by imagining Thomas’s mouth on him, his hand cradling his balls, and a finger rubbing over his anus. And everything had excited him, even the finger that had rubbed over the tight entrance that was buried between his butt cheeks. Particularly that had made him hot. So hot that he’d come without warning.

Distressed, he sat up and wiped his semen-covered hand and stomach on the bed sheet then threw it on the floor. Something was wrong with him. This couldn’t be happening to him: he had gay erotic dreams. Did this mean he was turning gay?

He shoved a trembling hand through his hair. He had to figure out what was wrong with him so he could find a way to fix it.

16

Lights were ablaze in Samson’s house in Nob Hill when Eddie entered the foyer. Delilah closed the door behind him, her baby daughter Isabelle in her arms. The little girl was awake and flashed a nearly toothless grin at him. None of her front teeth had grown yet; however, tiny fangs peaked from her gums. Isabelle was bigger, her gaze more alert than that of a human baby, as if she understood far more than regular children. As a hybrid—half vampire, half human—she had the traits of both species, yet none of their disadvantages. She could be out in the sun, but would one day be as strong as a vampire.