by Sam Cheever
I’d deal with Dialle later. When I was hopefully calmer and more rational.
Forcing my shaking hands into my pockets, I glanced at Slayer. We’d left Darma to babysit Mx. Diamon and returned to my office to consider next steps. “Any word in the underground about this Davis chick?”
He shook his head, frowning. He’d seemed distant and had been uncharacteristically quiet since we’d left Mx. Diamon’s.
“What?”
He was sprawled in my client chair staring at his shoes. He didn’t act as if he’d heard me.
“Slayer!”
His head jerked up. “Huh?”
“What has you bothered? You’ve been weird ever since we left the client’s house.”
He shook his head. “There was something in that house…”
“I know, all those doilies are creepy aren’t they?”
Astra!
I slammed my mind closed on Dialle.
Jumping out of my chair, I started to pace my office. A fine sheen of sweat coated my face. I swiped my sleeve over it and continued to pace.
“It’s not that. There was something there that nagged at me. Something familiar.” He looked up. “But I couldn’t put my finger on it.”
I stopped pacing and stared at him. He looked spooked. I’d never seen Slayer looking anything less than cocky. “Was this a brand-new feeling?”
“I…um…you know, now that you mention it I felt the same thing at Mx. Davis’ house.”
My stomach tightened around a painful coil of need and my skin felt abraded, as if someone had taken sand and rubbed it all over my body. My nipples were rigid and sore from rubbing against my sweater.
I was having trouble focusing my mind on the case, even hearing what Slayer was saying.
My daemon hickey sparked. Damn it, Astra!
Slam.
It sparked again and I cried out, falling to my knees as a wave of pure lust swept me. A roaring sound filled my ears and, in the distance, I thought I heard Slayer’s voice calling my name.
But the world had stopped turning and sound slipped away.
I realized with a start that Dialle had managed to yank me out of my office and was reeling me in.
My mind rebelled, sending rage-filled thoughts through my mental drawers as my body was locked, helpless and inert, in the enforced space shift.
I could feel Dialle’s anger in answer to my own, but I ignored that completely. It was his lust that drew my attention.
It matched mine for intensity.
Sound and movement returned as a familiar space formed around me. As soon as I could move I struck out at Dialle, my hand coming within a hair of connecting with his sexy square jaw.
He caught my hand and yanked on it, slamming me up against his chest. Dialle turned and pressed me hard up against the wall, pinning me there with his body. “I could feel your lust through space and time, Astra. Your need burns at me and weakens the court.”
“Frunk you to Hades! Let go of me!”
Dialle’s pretty black eyes roiled with the colors of passion. Bright purple and luminescent gold fought for dominance in his gaze. With his hands holding mine above our heads, he lowered his dark head and scented my neck. I growled in anger and pulled my power forward.
My daemon hickey sparked and the power flowed outward, making my skin throb with the need to release it.
Dialle lowered his lips to my throat and covered the mark he’d given me, swiping his hot tongue across the tear-shaped hickey and, in the process, calming the sparks. The power leeched away, back to its core in my mind. “What the frunk!” I tried to ignore the way my body fired at his touch, despite the squelching of my powers.
Unbelievably, he grinned at me. “That, my love, is what I’ve been doing with the witch. She’s taught me how to control your power so you can’t overwhelm mine.”
I frowned. I didn’t like the sound of that. “Why would you do that?”
He nuzzled my neck, covering the sensitive skin with tender kisses alternated with sharp nips. “I could not make love to you if I am going to lose myself in the process, Astra. It is too dangerous. Thus, though my body has burned for you these last days, I could not reach out until I’d found a solution. The witch gave me that solution.”
My eyes were closed and, against my will, my body swayed toward his. I felt the long, hard evidence of his desire for me against my belly and nearly moaned with delight over the prospect of soon having him inside me.
Dialle’s lips touched my shoulder and I shuddered with pleasure. His inquisitive tongue skimmed across my collarbone and lower, tasting the tender skin between my breasts. My sexual core clenched with joy, sending spasms of pleasure outward to coil in my belly.
I wanted to lose myself in his touch, revel in his intoxicating kisses, but my mind wouldn’t stop torturing me with doubt and my stupid mouth wouldn’t stop flapping. “At what cost, Dialle?” My eyes opened and I focused a questioning gaze on him. “What price did you pay for her help?”
He curled his lip. “I paid nothing. She is my slave. I demanded and she gave.”
A knife speared my heart. “You demanded what exactly?”
Dialle released my hands and stepped back. I bit my lip to keep from crying out at the loss of sensual promise the distance between us created. “I cannot believe you think I would sleep with that monster, Astra. She is a soulless pain junkie.”
I cocked my head, hating myself for what I was about to do but unable to stop. “And?”
Dialle stared hard at me for a long moment and then shook his head. “I will not justify my actions to you, Astra. I am king and must make decisions for the health of my court. You will either trust me or not. I cannot control that.” Pain crossed his handsome features just before they started to blur.
I felt myself beginning to space shift and opened my mouth to stop him from sending me away. My heart screamed in pain. I didn’t want to leave him like this. My body didn’t want to lose the promise of his touch. But my mind just couldn’t stop thinking that he was hiding something from me. And, as he disappeared from my sight, I cursed my traitorous mind. Just once, I wished I could follow the dictates of my heart and body and tell my untrusting brain to go frunk itself.
* * * * *
“Where the hell did you go, Astra?” Slayer’s face was tight with anger, his manly jaw all clenched and rigid.
My skin was on fire, lust boiling under the surface and expelling heat in waves. I wondered if Slayer could see it rolling off of me like heat shimmering above asphalt on a hot summer day.
I started toward the wall behind my desk, intending to open a window, before realizing I was in my new office way underground.
“Shit!” I swiped a shaky hand over my face to remove the sheen of sweat.
“Are you all right? You look terrible.”
“I’m fine. Talk to me about the case.”
Slayer watched me pace my office for a few beats until I turned a glare on him. Then he expelled a breath and returned to the subject we’d been discussing before we were so rudely interrupted. “My usual connections have been unable to tell me where Mx. Davis might have been taken. There were no viable magic signatures to follow at the house. We’ve received no demands from any kidnappers. In short, we have nothing.”
My office door opened and Bob walked in. He gave Slayer an assessing look and then cast his unassuming gaze toward me. “You okay? You look like hell.”
I sniffed and increased my pacing. Sweat rolled down between my shoulder blades and my skin throbbed. “I’m fine. I wish people would quit asking me that!”
Being a werewolf, I’m sure Bob was used to having people bark at him, but still, I felt immediately bad about it. I stopped pacing and turned to him. “Sorry. I’m having a bad Settling day.”
I blinked. “Did I just say that out loud?”
Slayer snickered. “I’d be happy to take the edge off for you, Astra.”
I curled my lip at him. That was why I tried never to disc
uss my Settling. There was always some cocky male around who felt the need to offer me his services. “Har!”
Bob looked from one to the other of us and shook his head. “Pheromones are flying around this office like butterflies. I’m growing hair and feeling the need to howl at the moon just from being in here for thirty seconds. I’m thinking I should go back to my office and call you instead.”
My lips twisted as a smile threatened to emerge. Leave it to Bob to drag me back down to earth. “That won’t be necessary. I’ll stay way over here and try to keep my pheromones in check. Slayer will give you an update.”
The update didn’t take long since we knew nothing, and had even less of an idea where we were gonna go next.
Bob left and I sent Slayer away a few minutes later, needing to be alone with my physical and emotional pain.
Alas that wasn’t to be.
The air in my office shimmered and I jerked to a stop, pulling my power forward with something that felt like delight. Doing violence on some poor, unsuspecting schlub sounded really good at that moment.
A tall, dark form shimmered into view. For the briefest moment I thought it was Dialle and hope soared in my breast. But I quickly realized the intruder was about as far from Dialle as you could get.
As soon as he solidified, Milc looked around my office with a grimace, obviously judging it unkindly. “Quaint,” he informed me with a sniff.
“What the hell do you want, Advocate?”
He looked at me and his nostrils flared, scenting me.
I bristled. “Leave.”
He stuck his long nose in the air and strode nonchalantly toward my desk, his dark eyes skimming its surface looking for…something. “Congratulations.”
“Why?”
“Nobody’s tried to kill you in several minutes. That must be a record for you.”
“Har.” His smile made the heat on my body turn to ice, creating cold sweat where there once had been fire. “Why are you here?”
“My king has ordered it so. I must try to keep you safe, though it seems a daunting task.”
Mention of Dialle brought on sexual bipolar syndrome. My pussy clenched with need at the same time my stomach tightened in pain. “I’ve told you—repeatedly—that I don’t need your help.”
“Yes.” His tone was cold and dismissive. “You have.”
“And yet, here you are again. Stalking me.”
He stopped fingering the things on my desk and looked at me, his cold face softening. My back stiffened. He was changing tack…playing me. “Surely you can understand that I am in a difficult spot, Mx. Phelps. I have been ordered to do something that you will not allow me to do. I cannot even force you because that would bring the wrath of the king down upon me.” He sighed dramatically, shaking his head.
I stared at him for a moment and then clapped my hands. “Nice pity party. I’m so sorry you invited me to the event. Now, can you leave, please?”
I blinked and he was on me, standing well within my comfort zone. He grabbed my wrist. My power tried to rise but his hand on my arm stopped it. My daemon hickey sparked and the advocate glared at it.
“You tasted of the insipid Brina. You allow her to protect you. But you disparage me at every turn.”
I narrowed my gaze on him. “So that was you she was fighting with in Mx. Diamon’s home?”
He yanked my arm and I fell into him. His cruel mouth lowered and covered my lips. I growled with anger and tried to jerk away from him but couldn’t.
He was incredibly strong for an advocate. Something wasn’t right.
Even as my mind rebelled, my skin cringing from his touch, my body warmed under his kiss and started to open for him.
His tongue speared between my lips and my mind formed a picture of his cock sliding into the wet, throbbing channel of my pussy. The visual was as real as if we were naked and rutting together on top of my desk.
I could feel the thick, hard length sliding into me, skimming against the hungry nerve endings crying for release.
At the same time, hot hands fondled my breasts, tweaking my nipples, sending bolts of pleasure through my body and turning my muscles to mush.
Anger throbbed in my mind. Lust pulsed between my thighs. I was as helpless as a bidgie bug squashed on a viewport.
The air beside us started to pulse and Milc threw up a hand, blocking whoever was trying to shimmer into the room.
The angry cry that initiated in my throat came out as a moan as the pleasure built, burning through my body like fire. Milc bit my lower lip hard, drawing blood, and I slammed into release, screaming, my body shuddering helplessly under his phantom touch.
He released my wrist and I fell to my knees, feeling them crack under the impact. I knelt there, shaken beyond anything I’d ever experienced before. My body had been invaded with just a thought and I’d had no control over it whatsoever.
I was as weak as a kitten, panting and feeling as if I’d been wrung dry of strength. Only my mind raced, frantic for action.
This could not stand. I had to do something to stop the advocate. He was much too powerful. And there was something else too. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what it was, but something about the advocate was bothering me. Whatever it was, I knew it was important.
He bent at the waist and kissed the top of my head. “Your missing client is at the court.”
My head shot up, my eyes narrowing. “You lie! Dialle would have told me!” Although, given our current circumstances, I wasn’t completely sure he would.
Even if I’d given him the chance.
Milc tapped the tip of my nose with a finger. “Not at all. Though I think you misunderstood, my queen. She is not at the court of Dialle the Second. She has been taken to the court of Nille the First…the next king of the Royal Devils.”
* * * * *
It was déjà vu all over again.
Instead of the Viper, however, this time the Red Knight sliced through the fog at the edge of the Mississippi river on the approach to Prince Nille’s court. It used to be his father’s court, but I was happy to report that King Nerul was currently soothing his backside with a fire extinguisher in Hell.
As we neared the spot just outside the industrial section of Angel City where the entrance to Nille’s kingdom lay, I found my gaze automatically searching for the gargoyles Nerul had had guarding the entrance on that fateful day, the day I’d first clapped eyes on the randy king and his degenerate court.
This time no gargoyles guarded the court. Which meant that either Prince Nille didn’t know we were coming…or he didn’t care because he knew something we didn’t…namely, that he was gonna kick our asses before we had a chance to take him out.
I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, realizing that I might have to tap into my uber-devil, whom I’d been introduced to when my Settling started to get occasional control over my psyche.
I really didn’t want to tap into that side of my nature. The last time I had I’d barely managed to climb back out.
“Are you sure this is the right place, Astra?” Slayer was frowning, probably thinking pretty much the same thing I was…well, except for the uber-devil thing. Slayer had already survived his Settling and had come out slightly weighted toward his angel side.
That was the best possible outcome. I didn’t mind embracing a portion of my devilish nature. That was my fun side, my reckless and, yes, slightly mean side. But without it my world was way too vanilla.
Vanilla was white. Like life among the clouds. In Heaven, a wild day was one where you exchanged your white slippers for off-white ones.
Bleurgh!
“Assuming that Milc didn’t lie…” I shifted a wry glance toward Slayer and he snorted. “This was King Nerul’s court. I’m guessing that his son would locate his court here too. We need to at least start here.”
I dropped the Knight to the ground outside the cave entrance and we climbed out. “Lock, arm and climb,” I instructed my air vehicle. The Knight lifted into the sky, pu
lsing with the blue light that told me the protective magic had kicked in.
I turned toward the cave’s entrance and stopped, feeling the memories roll over me with painful insistence.
My mind formed a picture of me sitting beside Nille in my prison chamber. We’d been discussing his father’s next move, which included imminent death for both of us. At the time I’d believed Nille was the chosen one, the great unifier who’d been proclaimed by prophecy to unite the light and dark worlds.
Next my traitorous memory carried me to the epic battle within the court’s chambers, where Nille single-handedly killed most of the court’s inhabitants and turned his awesome powers on me. If it weren’t for the angels’ intervention I wouldn’t be standing in front of the court to remember it.
And then later I’d dragged my partner Emo from the wreckage and bent over his dying form on the ground outside the cave… I shuddered at the memory, my eyes sliding toward the spot, now thick with weeds and refuse.
“Astra? You okay?”
I jerked my gaze from the spot and my mind from the painful memories and turned to Slayer. “I’m fine. Let’s go get this son of a demon.”
The passageway into the court was just as I remembered it. The space pulsed with green light that appeared to have no source. Unnaturally smooth walls dripped with cold, slimy moisture. The passage ended after a few minutes and forked in two directions. Going with previous experience, I took the passage to the right. As before, the cave’s entrance ended in a small cul de sac with no apparent openings. This time, however, I knew how to move beyond the appearance of solid walls.
I closed my eyes and lifted my arms, pulling my power forward to throb along the surface of my skin. Rather than focus the power, as in a power arrow, I allowed it to ease away from me in a cloaking wave.
The power undulated toward the walls of the enclosed space, illuminating the single portal on the wall I faced. I withdrew the power and refocused it in that area. With a rumble, a pinpoint of light appeared in the very center of the wall and grew, moving outward until a small archway was outlined there.
Slayer moved through the archway and I followed, allowing the power to retreat as I cleared the opening. The opening slid silently closed behind us.
