Beautiful Danger itcov-1

by Michele Hauf

  She wouldn’t make anything easy for the Order. Strolling through the building lobby and taking the stairs two at a time because she needed exercise after her long day spent inert, she entered her apartment and closed the door. Leaning over, she placed her palms on the floor and stretched out her spine and back again. A long session of yoga felt appropriate to work out the kinks, but she wasn’t about to linger in an asana.

  She couldn’t. A soul-deep compulsion moved her quickly through the apartment. She showered in less than five minutes, not washing her hair because she didn’t want it wet. Afterward, she combed her hair into a queue, then twisted it into a chignon and stuck a silver poniard through it. Stylish, yet functional as a weapon, if needed.

  Shuffling through the shampoos and body creams in her closet, she found the birth control pills. Not expired. She took one and placed the rest in the medicine cabinet, close at hand.

  Looking over her Order clothing, she shook her head. Didn’t need the protective Kevlar tonight. But the little black dress hanging from thin spaghetti straps on the velvet hanger had not been designed for the adventure she had in mind. Slender black leggings and a simple black T-shirt would serve. No underthings, because it was hot tonight and the humidity curled up tendrils of her hair against her neck.

  Slipping her feet into flat sneakers with good treads, she then opened the back door and scanned below. The iron stairs still lay below in the courtyard. Building maintenance would probably call it a loss and leave it as it lay until someone coughed up the euros to have it removed to a junkyard. Across the street, the rooftops were clear.

  The Order knights were like ninjas. You never saw them until the stake was aimed for your heart. But one ninja could always outsmart another if she was determined.

  Closing the door and balancing on the narrow wood threshold, Lark muttered thanks this side of the building was shrouded in darkness. Gripping the lip of the roof easement, with some difficulty, and more thanks for the workouts that had given her impressive biceps, she levered herself up and onto the roof. Admittedly, it had been much simpler when she’d had a vampire to hoist her up.

  Crouching low, she walked along the shingled surface, leaped to the next roof, which featured a border about two feet high at roof’s edge, and then looked out over and down to the main street below.

  Paris never slept, though her neighborhood was quiet and just far enough away from the main touristy areas to offer a peaceful lifestyle. So spotting someone moving about would raise concern, if not alarm, since it was after midnight.

  As suspected, she located the knight lurking in an alley across the street and two buildings down from hers. What caught her eye was the glowing embers at the end of a cigarette. That surprised her. Most knights took better care of their health. Wonder which one that was. Couldn’t be Gunnar; he was a physical specimen of health, spending most of his free time in the gym the Order maintained for training.

  “One of Rook’s lackeys,” she decided.

  With a smirk, she took off across the rooftops, knowing he’d never think to look for her above, rather than on his level.

  She hadn’t gone farther than two buildings south when a hand reached out from behind a stairway entry door and grabbed her, clasping over her mouth to keep her from screaming. She had no intention of screaming because his smoky scent curled about her, softening her reactive muscles and melting her against his hard, lean frame.

  “What are you doing?” Domingos whispered.

  “I knew you’d follow me home, and I wanted to see you again.”

  “You did?”

  She nodded. He released his tight hold on her and she turned in his embrace, fitting her body against his seductive darkness. Lark kissed him in the shadows of the entryway, leaning into his body and finally, perhaps for the first time all day, releasing her tensions completely to the only one with whom she felt safe.

  “I knew you were up on the chapel roof all day,” she said. Another kiss. A stroke of her finger down his fang stirred up a wanting moan from her lover. “Good thing it was a cloudy day.”

  “I can’t stay away from you, Lark. I need you in ways even I don’t understand.”

  “It’s because I keep your crazy away. But I don’t want to question this attraction. I just want to have it for as long as possible.”

  “You don’t know how that makes me feel.”

  “I do, because I feel the same way. We belong together. I don’t know how or why, but we do.”

  “Mercy, Lark, you are too good for me.” He buried his face against her neck, his breath warm upon her skin. The press of his fangs to her skin didn’t make her cringe because it was not done with intention to bite; he just couldn’t help it. “Please, don’t ever change your mind. But I know if you do, and you have to stake me, I’d take the stake willingly, knowing it’s by your hand.”

  “Don’t say that, lover.” She lifted his chin and stroked the hair from his eyes. “I won’t harm you. Ever. And I’ll do whatever I can to keep anyone else from going after you with a stake. It’s not right. You present no danger to mortals.”

  He tilted his head. “I do need to drink their blood to survive. But I don’t kill. Never. I couldn’t do that to an innocent.”

  “I know that. And the Order understands that is how vampires must survive, and we normally only go after the ones who present serious danger to mortals. That’s why I’m so angry they accepted this assignment from pack Levallois.”

  “Let’s not talk about the dogs now. Come home with me? Let me make love to you until the sun comes up, and then we’ll close all the curtains and continue to make love until we fall asleep in each other’s arms.”

  “I’m right behind you, lover. Lead the way. But be watchful. There’s a knight on the street below, keeping an eye on my movement.”

  “I think you’ve given him the slip.”

  “There could be others.”

  “Then we’ll take my highway home, yes?”

  She slipped her hand into his and let him lead. With this man, she had no fear of falling.

  Chapter 12

  Domingos poured Lark a goblet of dark red wine, kissed her mouth, wet with wine, then whispered for her to go wait for him in the bedroom. She pulled the silver poniard from her hair, letting the soft darkness spill over her shoulders, and winked at him as she strolled down the dark hallway toward a glimmer of moonlight that drifted through a window.

  “Don’t be long,” she called back on a sexy chime. “Or maybe...yeah, take your time. I’ll be waiting, thinking of you.”

  She turned a corner, and he squeezed the neck of the wine bottle so hard, it cracked. He barely managed to get it to the sink before the bottle fell and he dropped the thick, shattered glass into the stainless steel basin. Gripping his head, he tugged his hair and clamped his jaw tight.

  “Go away!”

  The clattering in his brain rattled right back at him, defying him to expect that he could have another night of sanity with the sexy woman who had teasingly walked away from him.

  He scented blood, and his phoenix growled, slapping his cut hand to his mouth. The taste of his blood did not satisfy, but it reminded that it had been too long since he’d fed. He’d spent the entire day on the cathedral rooftop and had tracked Lark home, ignoring the insistent blood hunger.

  Normal vampires had but to feed once or twice a month. Since Domingos had escaped the pack? He needed blood daily. The madness demanded it—or perhaps it was the phoenix—and when he thought he could starve it, the world only went darker and his bones began to shake within his skin.

  He should have fed before bringing Lark to his home tonight. Slithery whispers coiled inside his brain in wicked agreement. Could he slip out and quickly find a donor? It was well after midnight, and he lived in a quiet neighborhood. Unlikely to stumble upon someone taking a stroll this late. Most of his neighbors were elderly and hit the mattress as soon as the sun set.

  Squeezing his fist forced out blood from the cuts tha
t then dripped onto the crimson wine stains in the sink. He risked letting his hunger loose should he venture into the bedroom in search of the sensual pleasures Lark’s body teased him to enjoy.

  Go get her! We want!

  “If you keep quiet,” he muttered, “then I will give you what you want. But give me sanity this night. That is all I ask.”

  No reply clanged about inside his skull, so Domingos took that as an agreement. He washed the blood from his hand under the faucet, then claimed a new bottle of wine from the rack beside the fridge and padded down the long dark hallway.

  He could smell her, the sweet, dark richness of her blood mingling with the citrus scent that must be shampoo or body wash. It was a deliriously gorgeous flavor he could already taste on his tongue. And he knew her skin tasted salty-sweet, clean and warm. And bright, so bright. And there, between her legs, he liked to lick her until she moaned and grasped his hair, pleading with him to never stop, never stop—oh, he never would.

  Pausing outside the bedroom door, Domingos put a palm on the wall and bowed his head. Tendrils of discordant violin notes prodded the edges of his thoughts. He would not bite her. He must not, for he risked losing her trust, and that was all he had in his life. One woman who trusted him.

  Heh, echoed the repulsive nightmares in his head. Heh, heh.

  Blocking the intrusive madness, Domingos swung around the doorway and leaned against the frame, presenting a forced smile that he quickly erased for fear she would see the lie in it.

  Sitting on the bed, her back to the gothic, carved wood headboard and wine goblet lifted near her chin, sat the sexiest bit of flesh and blood he had ever known. A finger toying with her lower lip, she cast him a glance from under a fall of lush, thick hair as black as his own. Drawing out her tongue along her upper lip, she teased up the jittering desire that fizzed through his veins. Now it melted throughout his system, relaxing him, chasing the madness to the depths, and stirring his greedy wants to the surface.

  “Too perfect,” he said, thinking he was undeserving, and then not caring, because he wanted to take all of her while he was able and worry about the consequences of right and wrong later. “Mine.”

  She tilted her head. “Yes, yours. Come to me, my dark lover.”

  She stretched out a leg and drew the other to the side, opening herself to him. She’d taken off her pants and wore only the long T-shirt, but the move revealed the soft darkness between her legs. Her eyes sparkled teasingly.

  Domingos set the wine bottle on the dresser and, taking off his shirt, approached the bed and glided forward like a cat, coming up between her legs. He kissed her there, upon her mons, a worshipful morsel for her beautiful design. Drawing his kisses down into the crease where her thigh met her torso, he then worked upward, pushing the soft cotton T-shirt higher with a hand.

  She sipped the wine and, with a sigh, imbued the air with the heady grapes from the Rhône valley. “You want to know what I was thinking before you got here, lover?”

  Had to be better than his struggle with the broken wine bottle in the kitchen and the resulting hunger pangs. Domingos moved onto his knees, straddling her. He tugged up her shirt, lifting it to reveal breasts unhampered by lacy things. “Yes.”

  “I was thinking about how much I love this wrong. The we wrong.”

  That label hurt him, but he didn’t lose his composure, and instead bowed to kiss her breasts, one, then the other. Small yet round, they sat upon his palms lightly and beckoned a good squeeze, which he gave each of them.

  “I am wrong,” he had to agree, “but we are not.”

  “We are, lover. Don’t deny it. But I’m okay with that. In fact, I think I need this wrong. Everything right hasn’t been working so swell for me lately.” She strolled her fingers through his hair, which always made his scalp tingle and tighten. “Will you be my wrong?”

  He didn’t want to be that for her, but he knew it was the only truth they could have. A hunter and a vampire defined wrong. And so Domingos nodded but couldn’t force himself to audibly agree.

  He dashed his tongue around her nipple, losing himself in the luxury of Lark’s lithe, toned body instead of dwelling on her wine-induced theory of their relationship. When he suckled her she responded with her entire body, arching her back, spreading her legs wider and moaning sweetly. Her stomach brushed his chest. One foot hooked about his ankle, and she drew her fingers through his hair and down the back of his neck, where her fingernails grazed, yet did not worry the tender skin on his back.

  Undone, this woman literally unfurled beneath him, changing from a controlled, bladed and vengeance-seeking hunter into a soft and supple vixen receptive to pleasure.

  Beautiful danger, she.

  He lifted his head from her breast and she tilted the goblet to his mouth. The wine was not sweeter than she, but it was just tart enough to ward off the growing desire for something else he wanted to drink from her. Yet the blood hunger pangs poked at his nerve endings, unwilling to let him forget the one thing necessary to his survival.

  And when she stroked his fang—he never should have told her how that action aroused him—he had to grip the sheets tightly not to lunge to her neck and sink them into sublime heaven.

  “You torture me, Lark,” he said on a tight moan.

  “Don’t say that. I don’t ever want to hurt you.”

  He took her fingers from his mouth and kissed them. “It is a torture I could endure ever after. Lost in you, falling deep into your skin, your breasts, your mouth.” He glided his fingers down between her legs. “Your wetness.”

  Setting the goblet aside on the nightstand, he moved up to kiss her mouth, and she pulled him in for a greedy devouring, wrapping her legs about his hips and crushing her breasts to his bare chest.

  “Give me your madness,” she whispered. Her eyes sought his. “Take me beyond the strange darkness that haunts you and show me how you want me. Kiss me. Bruise me. Kill me with your need.”

  Her words frenzied his want, and Domingos followed her commands, kissing down her jaw—avoiding her neck—and moving to her breasts, where he suckled roughly and brought up the color of a bruise to her skin. Pretty, his mark. And there, below the gorgeous mound of bosom, he licked along her ribs, snaking his fangs over skin, teasing at making a cut, but knowing he must not.

  He could, but he mustn’t.

  You can. We need her.

  Lark’s body responded to the tease, nudging against his mouth, begging for a roughness he was willing to give. Sucking hard at her skin, he tasted the salt and sweet of her, and when he pulled away, he admired the love mark coloring her pale flesh.

  Gliding a hand down between her legs, he pushed one leg aside and pinned it down with a knee. With his other hand, he gripped her wrist and pressed it high against the headboard.

  Lark sucked in a gasp, her lips parted as her gaze locked to his. Pleading? Yes, she was his now, and he could do as he wished, and while she squirmed, she didn’t utilize anywhere near the strength he knew she possessed.

  Hooking a hand up under her knee, he drew up her leg and she pressed the heel of her foot against his shoulder, her toes curled against the skin that wasn’t damaged. Domingos bent to worship her with his tongue. No roughness here, only the soft yet insistent lashes that he knew would bring her to the edge. She clutched his hair, which he liked because he could gauge her needs with each tug or push against his head. Yes, more, like that. Or maybe, no, not so hard. Or even, linger, do that longer.

  “Domingos.” She thrust back her head, releasing her grasp on him and stretching her arms out across the pillows. “Find me, find my core and burn it. Mark me.”

  Mercy, he wanted to do just that. Mark her with his fangs.

  Not yet.

  Soon.

  Keeping his tongue on her clit, he slid his fingers inside her, moaning at the heat of her, the slippery entrance and clutching muscles that greedily begged for all that he could give. Unrestrained gasps, short cries of “Yes!” assured him she
liked it all. And when her hips bucked and her voice let loose loudly, he did not stop until she pushed away his head and rolled to her side, drawing up her legs to her stomach briefly, then rolling again to her back and letting out a laughing sigh.

  He loved that orgasmic laughter.

  “Fuck, that was good,” she said breathlessly. “You are a master.”

  He licked a fang and offered a wink. “I could listen to you come all day. Much better than the noises in my head.”

  “You’re okay?” She pushed up onto her elbows, sweat pearling on her breasts and belly, and lush hair spilling into her lashes.

  “Yes.” He lied only a little. The insistent nudge to bite her tingled at the roots of his fangs, but the voices only whispered for him to take her and did not yowl like a skinned cat. One small, yet odd, blessing. He could manage for now. Stroking aside the hair from her lashes, he asked, “Again?”

  “Mmm...” She reached for the goblet and finished the last of the fragrant wine. “It’s my turn to make you come, lover. But first more wine.”

  He claimed the bottle and instead of pouring another goblet, offered her the bottle, which she took and tilted back to those lush red lips. Quickly sliding her legs over the side of the bed, she handed him the bottle, which he indulged, while she unzipped him and hastily drew out his cock.

  Domingos groaned at the contact of her hot fingers to his shaft. Wine dribbled down his chest. Lark bent to lick it away, teasing her tongue to his nipples, all while squeezing his rod and drawing him closer, onto the bed again.

  He tilted up her head and tapped her mouth. She lashed his fingers with her tongue and she drew them into her mouth as she would his cock. The intimacy of their hold, her hand on his cock and his fingers in her mouth, floored him. A man should be thankful for such trust, and he was.

  Her pretty little moans composed a melody, and in that moment, Domingos decided he needed more music in his life. He’d denied himself that precious song too long. Be it a woman’s voice, or perhaps the mournful bellow of a cello, he would seek it more often from here on out. Be damned that he was a vampire. He would not taint the music any more than the madness could kill him.