by Nina Bangs
No, Kim was looking at the man standing beside the woman. And her gaze was fixed a lot lower than chest level. Brynn scowled. He’d never seen so much muscle on any guy, and he was wearing jeans that were so tight you could see . . . Jeez, he had to be kidding. No equipment was that big.
Brynn raised his gaze to meet the woman’s expectant stare. And froze. Something glittered in her eyes that said nonhuman loud and clear. Without hesitation, he slipped into her mind. No real surprise when he heard the frenetic thought patterns of a demon. He’d known that no human could have breasts that big, that firm, and that pointed. He’d bet the guy’s package was made in hell, too.
“I’m looking for a mattress.” He’d buy the damn mattress, get Kim out of here, and then try to figure out what two demons were doing selling mattresses in Galveston.
The woman moved in close, brushing her breasts against his arm. “Mmm, I’m going to enjoy fitting you to the perfect mattress. Here, lie down on this one.” She patted the mattress. “Then I’ll lie down beside you to make sure the fit is right for two people”—she slid her tongue across her lower lip and took a deep breath—“snuggled really close together.”
Brynn couldn’t help it. His gaze slid down to where her bionic breasts swelled to gigantic proportions, struggling to escape the flimsy prison of her minimally-there pink top.
He lifted his gaze to her face. “What kind of demon are you, and why are you here?” Brynn doubted the demons had been here long, or Galveston would’ve felt the effects.
Kim had moved on to assess another mattress with Mr. Big. Brynn would have to make sure the male demon didn’t draw her too far away.
The woman’s eyes widened in shock and then narrowed. He felt the slight pressure that told him she was trying to probe his mind, but he’d already raised his shields.
She looked thoughtful. “Hmm, not human, but what?” She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. No one would believe you if you tried to tell them.” Her gaze dropped the length of his body. “You’re gorgeous enough to be one of us.”
“And us would be?” He took another quick glance at Kim. The demon was standing closer to her now while he pointed out something about the mattress. He’d better not be suggesting that he test it with Kim.
“I’m Kiki and he’s Reese. Succubus and incubus to you.” She made a wide, sweeping gesture that encompassed the store. “Isn’t this perfect? A mattress store. I mean, who better to sell them?” Her expression turned sly. “The real owners are on an extended vacation in here—she tapped her head. They’ve asked us to fill in for them. Like, how could we refuse to lend a helping hand? Of course, while we’re in charge of the Lamberts’ bodies, we decided to upgrade the original models.” She slid her hand across the endless expanse of her breasts.
“Uh-huh. I thought night was your time. Not many dreams to go around during the day.” Possession. From what he’d read, the easiest way for a demon to exist outside its demonic realm. And in this case, the smartest. Anyone who knew the Lamberts might think they’d gone berserk with cosmetic surgery, but they wouldn’t doubt their identities. Brynn moved closer to Kim. The incubus now had his hand on her back. He felt his inner beast—the one he was forced to beat down during the compulsion—roar to life.
“He told us to do it this way. Play the good citizen during the day and then have our fun at night.”
“He? Who’s he?” Brynn felt he was standing on the edge of something important.
Kiki shrugged. She looked as though she regretted the he word. “The One Whose Name Cannot Be Uttered.”
He slipped back into her mind just long enough to realize that was the only name she knew this “he” by. And she must’ve sensed his presence in her head, because she raised her mental shields. He wouldn’t get anything more from her now.
Kiki guided him over to another mattress. “This is perfect for a great-looking guy like you. King-size for all those three-on-one situations.” She slid her gaze over to Reese and then smiled. “Your woman is a churning caldron of sexual frustration. She needs a man to turn up the heat and watch her burn.” She looked back at Brynn with sly amusement. “I guess Reese will be paying her a visit.”
Brynn’s inner beast snarled. “Tell Reese to stay away from her, or else he’ll be ordering a new set of oversized organs from hellinc.com.”
Kiki widened her eyes in mock wonder. “Mmm. Lots of passion. I’ll have to add you to my nightly rounds.”
Brynn turned away from the succubus and strode over to Kim. He arrived just in time to watch Reese slide his hand down to Kim’s behind as he described how said part of her anatomy would sink into the mattress. Ha. Old Reese was about to get a demonstration of Brynn’s fist sinking into his face.
He didn’t bother with politeness. Grabbing Kim’s hand, he pulled her away from the incubus’s side. “Hey, thanks for your help, but we’d like to look at the mattresses on our own.”
With a shrug, Reese transferred his attention to a new customer who’d entered the store.
Kim frowned. “I don’t know what you think, but I think these people are a little strange.” She glanced around the store. “Great mattresses though.” Smiling up at him, she sat down on a mattress and patted the spot beside her. “Okay, now we start trying them out.”
It seemed like Brynn had bounced and lain on every mattress in the damn store. Luckily, a trickle of customers had kept the terrible twosome busy. Kim now stood with him in front of an open door that Brynn assumed was a storeroom. She glanced over the entire store. “From what you’ve said, I guess it’s between the mattress by the door and the one over in the corner.”
Brynn really didn’t give a damn. “Which one do you think is the best buy?”
She glowed with the joy of being asked to make the choice for him. And that made him inexplicably happy. His happiness was short-lived.
As Kim looked away to see where Kiki was, Brynn felt the compulsion rolling over him. Damn, he hadn’t kept track of the time. Yanking his T-shirt over his head, he glanced at his watch. What the . . . ? That wasn’t right. He had no more time to think.
Kim had just spotted Kiki when she felt Brynn’s arms wrap around her. His breath moved over her neck, a warm slide of pleasure.
“Take my body, Kim.” The heat of his words coated her in sweet temptation, and the hard-muscled pressure of his chest against her back did amazing things to her breathing. “Lie with me on this bed and let me strip the clothes from your body slowly, touching every bared inch of flesh with my mouth.”
Ohmigod! She turned in his arms to stare up at the face of his alter ego, and once again was blown away by the change. His eyes actually blazed with the golden shine of sexual desire. His mouth was fuller, needier. It begged her to explore its texture, its power to excite, to arouse.
His sheer sensual impact left her speechless for a moment, but she could still act. She couldn’t let anyone in the store see this. Kim laid both palms flat against his bare chest and shoved as hard as she could. Her shove caught him by surprise, and he stumbled back through the doorway.
The room was dark, but she could still see enough to recognize that it was a storeroom. Right inside the doorway lay a new mattress. Kiki and Reese must’ve been in the act of carrying it out of the storeroom when Brynn and she came into the store.
Brynn’s momentum didn’t allow him to catch his balance before the mattress tripped him. As he fell, he grabbed her hand, carrying her down on top of him.
Minor interruptions didn’t interfere with the compulsion’s single-mindedness, because Brynn cupped her buttocks in his big hands and pulled her tightly against his erection.
In a moment of weakness, she responded. As he thrust his hips upward, pressing between her splayed thighs, she closed her eyes and slid back and forth over his arousal. Her body clenched around the imagined sensation of his freed cock rubbing back and forth, back and forth right there. And when he removed his hands from her buttocks to put them on both sides of her head so he could guid
e her mouth to his, she let him.
His lips were heated and hungry, slanting across her mouth and demanding that she respond. He traced the shape of her mouth with his tongue, asking that she open to him. He didn’t have to ask twice. She parted her lips and tasted the promise of all he wanted to do to her. In a distant part of her mind, she was aware he was reaching between them to unbutton his jeans, but all she could think about was the magic he was creating with his mouth.
“Oh goody, you’ve chosen your mattress.” Kiki smelled a sale. “Great choice. Notice how the pressure of two butts doesn’t make it sag. I mean, a good bed just screams fantastic-for-sex. We can arrange payments if you like. Are you sure you don’t want Reese or me, or maybe even both of us, to test it with you for those special times when two aren’t enough?”
Kim froze, her heart pounding and the heat that had been building low in her belly now churning with embarrassment. Still caught in the throes of his compulsion, Brynn kissed a path over her jaw and down the side of her neck.
She leaned close to his ear and whispered, “I don’t want your body, Brynn.”
He went still beneath her. She rolled off the mattress and climbed to her feet. He followed. Even though she didn’t look his way, she was aware of him pulling on his shirt.
He said nothing to her as he walked to where Kiki and Reese stood. “I’ll take this mattress.”
Reese grinned. “Have to say I’ve never seen anyone give a mattress that kind of test ride. You guys rock.”
Kim expected Reese to pat Brynn on the butt in recognition of a great play. She trailed after everyone as they went to the front register where Brynn paid for the mattress, a box spring, and a frame with his credit card and then arranged for delivery. Afterward she followed Brynn out to the car.
“Kimmie?” Fo’s eyes filled her whole screen. “They aren’t human.” Fo’s eyes slid all the way to the left as she tried to look at Brynn. “Are they demons like you, Brynn?”
“We’ll talk about it later.” His tone quelled even Fo.
Silence stretched between them as Brynn drove away from the store. Finally, Kim couldn’t stand it anymore. “Maybe you should stop at that big discount store we passed on the way here. You’ve moved up to a king-size mattress, so you’ll need new sheets.”
He nodded and kept driving.
“I never asked why you live in the castle. You’d have a lot more privacy if you had your own place.” There, let him try to answer that with just a nod.
“When Eric, Conall, and I signed on for the job, we agreed to live in the castle.” He shrugged. “It doesn’t bother me.”
“Oh.” She was all out of safe topics.
He exhaled deeply and glanced across at her. “We have to talk about what just happened.”
“No we don’t.” When in doubt, deny.
“If Kiki hadn’t interrupted, we’d still be on that mattress.” Surprisingly, he sounded like he was simply making a statement of fact. No accusation in his voice.
Because she felt so guilty, Kim immediately leaped to the attack. “I never lose control like that, so there had to be something else going on.” She thought for a moment. “You must have some demon power that makes women lose control around you. I’m surprised you never realized it.” And yes, she totally believed that. Sort of. Okay, maybe.
“Sure, but I wasn’t using it on you.” He didn’t even glance at her as he dropped his bombshell.
“No kidding? Really?” Talk about a lucky shot in the dark.
“I’ve always had the power to call women to me sexually.” He narrowed his lips to a hard line. “I’ve never used it. I never will use it.”
“Any woman? Young, old, nonhuman? Any woman?” The possibilities boggled her mind.
“Small sentient machines?” Fo.
“Any woman.” His expression said he was sorry he’d mentioned this particular power. “But we’ve gotten off topic here.” He slid Kim a quick glance. “You wanted me.”
“That might be a yes. Or not. I haven’t decided yet. I have to think about all the variables connected to what happened and arrive at a logical conclusion.” Prevarication was a gift.
He didn’t say anything else for a moment, and that gave her a chance to think about their exchange. Strange, he didn’t seem upset with her like he’d been with Liz. Of course, she hadn’t tied him to the bed, just laid on top of him.
“Something important happened back there.” He glanced at her, and his eyes gleamed with excitement.
Kim frowned. Sure, it had been a wonderful few minutes, and his kiss had speed-dialed her desire, but she got the feeling that wasn’t what he was talking about.
Brynn pulled into the store’s parking lot and found a spot close to the door. Then he turned to look at her. “Kim, I’d been with you for exactly one hour and five minutes when the compulsion hit.”
Where did the extra five minutes come from? “Are you sure?”
“I checked my watch as soon as I felt the change start.” He reached over to clasp her hand. “The change is never late.”
He didn’t say anything else as they went into the store. She could understand that. After five hundred years, he wouldn’t want to give himself false hope.
They were looking at the sheets when Brynn finally spoke. “Does something about the store feel strange to you?”
She looked around. “A lot of people seem to be changing tags on stuff.”
Even as she spoke, a woman stopped in front of her and whisked the set of sheets from her hand. As Kim gaped, the woman put a sticker over the original price. Oh, good. Maybe they’d walked in on a storewide sale. Then Kim looked at the new price. “A hundred dollars? You’ve got to be kidding. This is a discount store, like in cheap prices.”
The women giggled. “New owners, new prices. Take it or leave it. Oh, if you want to sell your soul, we’ll give you a really competitive deal. Just go to the service desk.”
Kim had opened her mouth to voice more outrage when she got a look at the woman’s eyes. If the eyes were windows to the soul, then as far as Kim could tell, nobody was home. An involuntary shiver skidded down her spine.
Brynn leaned close. “Leave the sheets, Kim. Let’s get out of here.” He took her hand and hurried her from the store.
Kim watched openmouthed as other angry customers streamed from the store. “What’s going on?”
Once inside his car, Brynn leaned his forearms over the steering wheel and stared straight-ahead. “Kiki and Reese are demons—a succubus and incubus. The people working in this discount store? All demons. Galveston has a problem, Kim.”
“My time, my time!” Fo’s joy in landing in a hotbed of demons was the only positive emotion in sight. “Take me back inside, Kimmie, and I’ll destroy all of them for you.”
Kim looked uncertain. “Are you sure, Brynn? Where’d they all come from? Maybe I should call Lynsay and Dirk to help. I’ve never seen so many in one spot. It’s kind of freaky.”
“No destroying just yet.” He started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. “First off, if demons have taken over the only two stores we stopped at, we can assume they’ve taken over other stores in Galveston. The question is, why?”
Uh, because they’re evil soul-sucking dirtbags? But she couldn’t make a blanket statement, because Brynn didn’t seem to fit that description. Her life would be a lot less stressful if she could see the world of demons like the other Vaughns did. Demons bad. Destroy. “So why can’t I start getting rid of them now?” She hated her demon-destroying job, but in this case she didn’t have a choice. She couldn’t just let them take over a whole city.
“Think, Kim. The mattress store owners and all the people working in that discount store were possessed. If the same thing is happening all over the island, we’re talking more demons than you, Lynsay, and Dirk can handle alone. The demons are trying, in their own demented ways, to keep low profiles, to fit in with the rest of the population. Kiki let it slip that someone she called the One Who
se Name Cannot Be Uttered was calling the shots.” He paused as he turned onto Seawall Boulevard. “What we have here is a huge influx of demons under the control of a leader. I’d say they’re getting ready to . . . Ready to what? That’s what we need to know.”
Kim frowned. “So the demons are here for some kind of big event?” She couldn’t wrap her mind around a demon invasion this large.
He nodded, his gaze intense as he glanced her way. “If you start destroying the demons right now, they’ll know you’ve made them. There’re too many of them. They’ll wipe you out in one night. The trick will be to find out what they have planned and then cut off the head at the same time you attack the army.” A line of concentration formed between his eyes. “We’ve got to close the portal.”
“Portal to hell?” This just got scarier and scarier.
“This many demons in one place means that a portal has opened somewhere in Galveston. Worse than that, only an archdemon could’ve opened it. Archdemons don’t usually make personal appearances. When they do, chaos follows.”
“So your suggestion is?” She’d heard about archdemons and portals to hell, but she’d never experienced any of them. She didn’t think any of the Vaughns had. It hadn’t happened in living memory. No matter what he said, she’d have to tell Lynsay and Dirk. They’d have to call in the whole Vaughn family to save the city from whatever was about to happen. But she agreed they’d have to control the urge to rush out and start zapping demons until they had more people and a plan.
He pulled the car into his personal parking space. Then he sat for a moment staring at the castle. “I know you’ll have to tell your family about this.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “And to think I was hoping for something to happen that would draw attention away from me.” His laughter was short and bitter. “Be careful what you wish for and all that stuff. Eric, Conall, Holgarth, and I have to find the archdemon and his portal, then we have to shut both down.”
“I’ll help.” Every Vaughn in the world would have to answer the call for this one.
