"No," he continued, "I was thinking there was something I wanted to try." And he took my whole face in his hands.
I couldn't breathe.
He hesitated—not in the normal way, the human way.
Not the way a human man might hesitate before he kissed a human woman, to gauge her reaction to the forthcoming intimacy, to see how he would be... received. Perhaps he would hesitate to prolong the moment, that ideal moment of will-he won't-he, those five to ten seconds of how-will-it-taste, sometimes better than the kiss itself.
Instead, Fredward hesitated to test himself, to see if this was safe, to see if his desire to love me as a woman was greater than his desire to love me as a meal.
And then, without warning, his cold, marble lips pressed very softly against mine.
What neither of us was prepared for was my response.
Blood boiled under my skin and into my lips. My breath came as a savage, wild gasp. My eyes closed immediately and then shot wide open. My fingers parted as I breathed in his heady scent. My lips knotted in his hair, clutching him to me. I felt like I was exploding, like I was dying. I had never felt anything like it.
Immediately I felt him turn to unresponsive stone beneath my lips. His hands gently, but with irresistible force, pushed my face back into its rightful place on my head. I opened my eyes and saw his guarded expression.
"Oops," I breathed, wondering if I'd ever feel a climax like that again.
"That's an understatement," he said, responding to my statement. It was as if he could read my mind.280
His eyes were wild in a different way than mine, his jaw clenched in acute restraint, yet he didn't lapse from his perfect articulation. He held my face just inches from his.
He dazzled my eyes.
"Should I... ?" As painful as it was, I tried to disengage myself, to give him some room.
280. Vampiric mind-reading.