Prologue

The Moon burns brightly through night's dark blanket.

It takes a moment of wakeful thought to realize that I'm not where I should
be. This is not my bed. These are not my silver handcuffs locked tight against the pulse of my wrists. I inhale, a short gasp, while the heartbeat inside my chest starts to rapidly climb to an unstable arrhythmia.

Haunting light from the full moon streams in, casting the room in creeping, dragging shadows that slither and scrape across the far wall. The scream that tries to erupt fails miserably - my mouth is so parched that no sound can escape with any strength. Trying once again to pull in a full breath of air, I exhale scream after scream until absolutely no more sound leaves my throat. Time stretches itself, elongating to feel as if I've spent ages shackled to this bed post instead of mere hours.

The turn of the door knob stops my breath.

A silhouette comes from the shifting darkness. Pulling at the restraints that bind me to my spot, trepidation lurking, my mind pulses into manic thoughts of hysteria until a face is revealed.

Legion

His right hand gripping a cup, fingers stretching around the curve of the crystal. "Are you thirsty?"

That voice still sounds the same, as if it hasn't been two years since last I heard the sin of him.

"Yes," So thick is the word that the sound falls as soon as it's said out loud. He dips a singular finger into the top of the glass. When he pulls it out, I can see the shine of the water on his flesh. He places that finger on my lips, wetting them, coating them with water. A whimper comes from the base of my throat when his skin is no longer in contact with mine.

"Open your mouth." Directing me. He's always the one in control - always the one to set the rules for how our games are played.

I open my mouth for him. "Wider. I know you can open wider than that, or have you forgotten?" The sound of his voice edges into a deepness that makes my thighs rub momentarily together.

Once again, his finger pulls out of the water. This time he holds it over my open mouth, drip by slow drip the liquid lands on my tongue until I swallow what he has just given me.

Not enough to quench my thirst. Just enough to tease.

When he thinks I've had plenty, he puts the glass down and replaces it with something else that makes me take a shuddering breath in, expanding my lungs fully before almost moaning as I exhale.

"You've missed this, haven't you, Ember?" Legion's deep voice fills the room with its intensity as he taps the silver-lined tip of the crop against my ankle.

Leather has been replaced with silver.

Deliberately, he travels the tip methodically higher along a slow trail, the silver tasting my calf in an exquisite heat, only to unmercifully slide it up my inner thigh. He gives a slight tap, signaling me to spread my legs further apart for him.

Agony vs. ecstasy.

A wicked excitement starts to flow making the flesh of my thighs quiver.

"Why did you take me?"

"The question is, why did you allow yourself to be taken, Rogue?" He makes no more sound, this Hunter reaping the rewards of a successful chase.

"How did you do it?" I ask, trying to focus my mind on his answer instead of the way the crop is sliding up and down the length of my thigh, switching sides when he gets to my knee. A gasp slips out - more a moan if he's paying attention to my sound, which he is.

Leaning himself down, the material of his shirt purposefully brushing across my chest, his mouth to my ear, he whispers, "Wolfbane. Not enough to kill. Just sufficient for this." Straightening himself up, he runs the tip of the crop across me from hipbone to hipbone, where the band of panties meets flesh.

My breath sighs in expectant pleasure at the warmth of the silver tip.

The Hunter inhales slowly, nose flaring at the edges with a tinged curve of his lips that tells me he can detect the scent of what he's doing to me. Before the bite, he only understood my body language. Now he understands everything.

There is an intensity to him that he didn't possess before, and it calls to the Madness in me that is starting to become unhinged from within. My self-imposed restraint is loosening.

He's always been my undoing.

"What will you do with me?" I ask through a moan. He's taking his time letting the crop slide down the length of my arm, as if we have all night to do this.

The Hunter backs up from the bed. The Moon's light is growing brighter as she reaches her final pinnacle in the sky. My shifting flesh starts to pulse and hum, my body starting the Change that will soon overtake my reason and replace it with the Madness that comes once a month on the full moon.

"Think of this as a conflict resolution session - me finally resolving all your conflict for the last time." The first button of his shirt comes undone, followed by the second.

"Hunter, we have no conflict." As I say the untrue words, the hurt remains in my voice. Can he detect it?

"I am no Hunter anymore. The Bitten can never be Hunters again, but you know this don't you, Gypsy?" Another button comes undone to reveal the hollow of his neck, where my bite lays on his flesh.

"I was punished for that." Tension starts to build up from within me when the last of his buttons fails, his shirt opening to reveal how the bite has changed him from man to Male. His musculature is thicker, denser - consuming to the eye.

"I know you were. Why do you think I have been on the trail of a Rogue this long? It would have been easier if you were allowed to stay with your so-called pack, but then again, I've always loved the Hunt." His voice provokes a warmer sensation to sweep entirely through my body. The pull to him had always been there, and now it's impossible to fight.

"You lied to me," I don't even recognize my voice, the pain is so powerful. My eyes start to fill with tears that I refuse to let fall. I've cried enough because of him, this Hunter.

The crop once again makes a path along my clavicle towards the hollow of my neck, the tip pressing into the spot that makes a fluid, wet moan break out from my throat. The veins in his arms are starting to dilate and engorge with blood, his body readying him for the Change that will overcome the both of us within a few minutes.

"I never lied about that, but you were holding something back from me, were you not?" His voice embodies the perfect pitch of sound. My breathing once again falters when the crop travels up the length of my throat, then back to caress down the skin of my sternum.

Twisting within the silver handcuffs, I know that trying to free myself is useless.

In this moment, I am at his mercy, yet he shows me he does not possess mercy.

There is no fighting this. The shudder of my thighs is a giveaway, the pores on my skin opening up to release the basic scent of a Female who is willing.

The first of his sounds travel from deep within his chest, up along his throat to percuss out as if a base drum just vibrated my core. This is my first time ever hearing his Madness, and it brings mine even close to the surface. The muscles of my forearms shift before realigning back to normal.

I inhale his scent, which pours out from pores that have opened completely, allowing the sin of him to travel outwards. Greedily inhaling, I let the smell drown my lungs from within.

"I've missed you." His first confession.

"I've gotten over you." My lie forced out.

"Have you?" Bending down, the heated words touch the base of my neck as the stubble of his face brushes my cheek. The touch of his finger against my flesh is searing to every sense I have.

"You waited for the full moon for this, didn't you?" I'm barely able to get the words out. He affects me on the most basic, primal level.

"Of course I did. Isn't this how it's done between the Bitten?" There is no doubt in his calm voice.

"What is to be done?" Again, I try to slide my wrists out of their bindings, as his dilating pupils consume the color of his iris. His Madness is surging to the surface.

"I'm going to bite you back." The last word is barely audible as his jaw flexes forward revealing teeth that have been tucked away until now. His body is succumbing to its Madness.