The Hunger by Janet Eckford Page B

will herself to walk away from the door, to go into her bathroom and run a hot bath with lavender and jasmine. She would cleanse her senses of the blood and gore that was right outside her door and survive another day of sobriety. Tried was the operative word, because as the sounds of teeth rending flesh from the bone filled the quiet night she found she couldn’t move.
            Mia was tempted--she was paralyzed, actually, with the desire to open the door and beg for the bits that were left. Savor the taste of a meal like no other, but she didn’t because she knew if she failed this test she’d never be able to pass any other the Family chose to send her way. She was her own woman now, and though it was difficult, she pushed that dark half of herself that craved the hunt back down into the deepest, darkest hole within her she could find. Her skin prickled and sweated from the exertion, but as with most challenges she faced, she surmounted it and breathed a sigh of relief.
            Pushing from the door, she shook her whole body and felt the tension of the last few minutes fall off her like discarded water. She tuned out the noises from the other side of the door and walked through her tiny studio apartment, touching the now-familiar things she was collecting in her new life. The gesture grounded her and helped keep her in the present. All of this stuff was an example of the life she’d planned for herself, a life that was away from The Family. She could do this, she thought as she headed toward the bathroom and the promise of a hot bath.
            “You’re getting sloppy.”
            The cultured tones and deep timbre of a male voice startled Mia. She should have known the Family wouldn’t have stopped with the attraction outside her door but would also send backup just in case she was stubborn enough to pass on what they were offering.
            “This is my sanctuary. I guess I assumed wrongly you all would respect that.”
            She turned slowly and watched as he unfolded himself from the dark shadows that danced at the very edges of the room. It was as if they were one and the same, and as he stepped fully into the low light she’d turned on when she’d left for work earlier in the day, Mia resisted the urge to sigh out her appreciation.
    It was hard, because one could not look at the sheer perfection that was Galen and not utter a sigh of contentment. He was darkly handsome with olive skin, burnished golden from his time in the sun, a tall, leanly muscled body that spoke of agility as well as strength, and a rakish mop of wavy raven hair that seemed to balance perpetually between groomed and wild. It was his eyes, though, that always held her captive, and as she gazed into them she resisted their magnetic pull.
            He was the bad boy incarnate that had you whispering a reluctant no even as you dreamed of him slipping those strong fingers under the edges of your panties. Galen was heartache and restless nights, but also moments of such exquisite pleasure that when he was deeply embedded inside you his bad boy ways didn’t matter. He was the ultimate predator, and it would take all the strength Mia had to resist him, because though she could deny her dark other half the pleasure of blood and flesh, they both longed for the pleasure Galen could create with one well-placed kiss.
            “You have had your fun--it’s time to come back home,” he stated flatly, interrupting her wandering thoughts.
            “My departure was approved by the elders. Your trespassing is in violation of that agreement,” she replied firmly.
            “Would you punish me, sweet Mia, for breaking the rules?”
            His question was like the warmest caress with the hint of a sharp sting. She resisted blushing as the memory of such caresses surfaced in her mind. Mia would not succumb to the charms of the bad-boy predator. No matter how