Raven Mask

by Winter Pennington

  “No,” Rupert said, “I like stray. It suits her. She did show up on my doorstep when the accident happened.”

  I flipped him off. He laughed.

  “On your doorstep?” Lenorre inquired.

  “Yeah, bled all over the damn place. You have no fucking idea how long that took to clean up.”

  “You never told me that,” I said.

  He shrugged. “Why bother? You’re my friend. I would rather you be alive than dead because I went all OCD at the wrong moment.”

  I shook my head. “OCD just doesn’t seem your style, Rupert. It sounds more like my mother.”

  “Your mother?” Lenorre looked thoughtful. “You never mentioned your mother.”

  “I had to come from somewhere.”

  “Have you met her?” she asked Rupert.

  “Once. If you ever meet her you’ll see where Kass gets her stubborn streak.”

  I suddenly had an image of taking Lenorre home to my family and laughed.

  Rupert caught it. “You just pictured it too, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, yes, I did.”

  “Pictured what?” Lenorre asked.

  “The look on my mother’s face if I were to introduce you two.”

  Rupert said, “Your mom wouldn’t care.”

  “She probably wouldn’t.” I pictured my mother’s reaction. Oh, honey, she’s cute. A little tall, don’t you think?

  “All right,” Rupert changed the subject, “we were talking about the crime scene. Was there any other evidence besides the bite marks?”

  “The boy was naked.”

  “It was intimate,” Lenorre said.

  “Definitely intimate.”

  “It must’ve been someone he knew well to get that close to him,” Rupert added.

  “Not necessarily.” Lenorre looked contemplative. “Did anything at the scene hint at any type of sexual activity?”

  “I didn’t see or smell anything.”

  “What did you smell?” she asked.

  I made a disgusted face. “Death.”

  “You should call Arthur,” Rupert said. “Let him know that the ME needs to run a test for any type of bodily fluids on or around the body. They may have already done one, but make sure.”

  Why hadn’t I thought of that? See, friends are very important. Especially those with more experience.

  “Right, but what about the vampire?”

  “I will see what I can do,” Lenorre said.

  I walked around the couch and sat down, rubbing my temples. “This puts my other investigation on the back burner,” I said, and looked at Lenorre.

  “What other investigation?” Rupert asked.

  “Sheila Morris,” I said, “the alpha female of the local werewolf pack.” It took a few weeks but I’d finally told Rupert that I’d been kidnapped. I couldn’t lie to him. He seemed worried and pissed that he hadn’t been there. I assured him that Lukas Morris was one dead puppy. He’d told me he was happy and sad. Happy, because I’d personally filled Lukas’s body with silver ammo. Sad, because he didn’t get the pleasure of doing it himself. I’d met Sheila once. I don’t like her. I especially don’t like the things I’ve heard about her from Rosalin and Lenorre. So, I was watching her and trying to see what dirt I could dig up. I had a gut feeling she would pull some new stunt, probably one that would get people killed. I just didn’t know when or how.

  “Do you want me to take over?”

  “I can’t ask you to do that. If she’s into the same kicks as her brother, your life would be seriously at risk.”

  “My life is always seriously at risk.”

  “She’s a werewolf, Rupert. I don’t think you could handle that.” I wasn’t trying to be rude, just truthful. I wanted to keep my friends safe. If I had to tell them something was too difficult for them, that’s what I’d do, but I should’ve known it wouldn’t work. Rupert’s blue eyes went cold and hard, like water freezing. If looks could’ve killed, I might’ve dropped dead. I’d seen the expression on his face only a few times. It’d scare the shit out of any bad guy. To have it directed at me, to feel the full force of it, made my blood run cold. The wolf perked her ears, ready for a challenge. I tightened my shields.

  “You have no idea what I can and cannot handle.” His tone was grave, dropping a few octaves with each syllable.

  “You want the case?” I asked. “Fine, but I want you to call me if you need help.”

  “I need all the information you have on her, whereabouts, history, etc.”

  That didn’t take long, because I didn’t know much. I told him about Sheila’s history of being a sadist and where she lived. Some of it, Rupert knew from our talk about my being kidnapped. Lukas had revealed things about his and Sheila’s childhood. I told him what I could about the pack.

  In the end, Rupert stood. “I’ll see if I can find out more about Sheila. I may be your friend and I don’t mind taking this load off of your shoulders, but you still owe me.” I caught the flicker of a faint smile.

  I laughed. “Go figure.”

  “Twice now,” he said.

  “For what?”

  “For the last time I went hunting with you. I was almost werewolf kibble.”

  “You were not! We were fine.”

  His blue gaze flicked to Lenorre. “Then, there was a certain situation where one of her chicks with fangs tried to use me as a punching bag.”

  “She has been punished,” Lenorre said, “as she was not meant to cause you any physical harm.”

  “Nice to know, but I still don’t trust you.”

  “It is your prerogative to think of me what you will,” she said idly. “Only remember your thoughts do not affect me.”

  Chapter Four

  Rupert left. Lenorre and I remained seated. I glanced around the cream-colored room, trying to find a clock. Some days it’s easy for me to keep track of time. But other times I’m so preoccupied with other things that I forget about it. Being with a vampire, I tried to be aware of time more at night than ever before. I certainly didn’t want Lenorre to burst into flames because of some unexpected vitamin D.

  As if Lenorre had heard my thoughts, she said, “Do not fret. We have a few hours until the sun rises.”

  “Was I that obvious?”

  “Yes, and I assure you, I will not burst into flames if I am not in bed when it does rise.”

  “What happens if you’re not? Do you just die wherever you’re standing?” I sounded harsh, but couldn’t think of any other way to put it. I wanted to know, so I asked.

  She watched me for several moments. “No. I wouldn’t just stand there.”

  “You’d flee?”

  “More or less.”

  I stood. “I need to shower and to put my things away.” I didn’t want to talk about death anymore tonight. Even if my girlfriend technically personified it.

  Lenorre moved gracefully across the room, picking up my laptop bag and swinging it over her shoulder. I grabbed the backpack, tossing one of the straps over my left shoulder.

  She waited in the doorway, watching me with a blank yet thoughtful expression that I couldn’t decipher.

  “What?” I asked as I walked by.

  “Is it so wrong to enjoy watching you?”

  “No. I just don’t understand it.”

  We made it to the basement on the other side of the house and through the large steel door into the underground lounge. As always, I had to wait a few seconds for my vision to readjust to the light.

  Lenorre led me through the labyrinth of hallways, then opened the double doors at the end of one hallway. Her bedroom was about the size of most living rooms. The king-size canopy bed, placed a foot or two from the wall, was draped with black and burgundy silks. I never knew what colors would decorate it. Unlike mine, Lenorre’s bedding changed a couple of times a week. My bed doesn’t see enough action to warrant such frequent upkeep.

  On the other side of the room was a sitting area, with a black sofa pressed against the farthest w
all near a matching armchair. The sofa’s back curved in almost a heart shape. Its arms were wide and curling, and on the inside of the curl was a spiral of light gray. The sofa stood on four black-clawed feet.

  Once a beautiful painting of the night sky hung on the wall behind the armchair, but now it was gone. The painting had been from the perspective of someone standing on a cliff, gazing at the deep waters of the ocean, with the horned crescent moon high overhead, reflecting off the water. The picture was shattered the first night I had stayed with Lenorre. I learned not to play touchy-feely with the vampire before she died at dawn. I had noticed the pain buried deep in her eyes and tried to distract her from it. The distraction cost both of us, because when she woke, the hunger she had felt before dying channeled into blood lust. Let’s just say, it wasn’t pretty. The picture didn’t survive. I’d have offered to replace it if it hadn’t been one of a kind.

  Lenorre placed the laptop in the armchair while I let the backpack slide down my arm and onto the couch.

  “I will start the water,” she said.

  She disappeared into the bathroom, and a moment later I heard it running. Bath? I walked quietly into the huge room.

  Lenorre sat on the edge of the tub.

  “I thought you were starting the shower?” I narrowed my eyes.

  “The shower is too large.”

  “So? What’s your point?”

  Lenorre tilted her head to one side. “I shall be tempted to join you.”

  I closed my eyes and focused on breathing. “You just had to put that image in my head, didn’t you?”

  I heard the water shut off before I felt the weight of her presence in front of me. “That look on your face,” she said, voice low, “hearing the way the breath catches in your throat, listening to your heart as it skips a beat. Such intimacy pleases me greatly.”

  The word intimacy made my body tighten and the breath actually catch in my throat.

  “Why are you doing this?”

  “Because I want to know you want me.”

  “Can’t you see I do?”

  I heard her move around me, her energy like a gentle breeze, cool and untouchable.

  Her whisper echoed. “Kassandra, I want you to succumb to your desire.” She didn’t try to hide her British pronunciation, lilting the words in places I couldn’t imitate. Then again, I’d never been very good at accents. Lenorre didn’t accentuate her words harshly. Her smooth intonation was soft and purring, delectable and soothing at the same time, like silk and chocolate.

  I inhaled a shallow breath. “You want me to lose control for you?”

  “No, I want you to consent to succumb to your desires.”

  I turned and looked at her then. “I won’t.”

  “You will not allow yourself to succumb because you are afraid,” she said with an unblinking stare.

  I nodded and stared at the floor, not entirely thrilled that she was right. I hate admitting that I’m afraid more than I hate actually being afraid.

  Lenorre touched my jaw gently with two fingers, lifting my gaze back to hers. It reminded me of when we first met, only this time she wasn’t trying to help me control my beast.

  “You have been hurt,” she said, “as have we all. I want you to lose your fear, to lose your control, to lose the distance you place between us. I want you to stop running from me.”

  “I’m not running. I’m still standing here, aren’t I? If I was running, I wouldn’t be in this relationship.”

  “No, you are not running in a physical sense, but you have placed chains and shackles around your heart, trying to keep it safely in a cage, trying to force it to behave.” Lenorre placed a finger over my lips, and I frowned. “You gave yourself to Rosalin, you allowed your wolf to rule your head in a moment of passion, because she was not a threat to your heart. You were able to distance yourself, to give your body to her, to have that release with her, because somewhere in the depths of your mind you knew Rosalin would not scratch below the surface.”

  I had been thinking practically the same thing after Rosalin and I were together. In truth, I hadn’t done anything to her. I had tried to walk away, but she persisted. I had submitted to the energy of our beasts. Lenorre knew afterward that our encounter had been casual. Rosalin and I were friends. She still flirted with me every now and then, but when she saw Lenorre’s anger after that one incident she didn’t cross any lines. Fine with me. Rosalin was pretty, but we were better as friends than lovers. Besides, I had my hands full with the vampire in front of me. I didn’t need a werewolf too. I’m not greedy, nor do I need that much difficulty and drama.

  “What are you thinking?” Lenorre asked.

  “I agree with what you just said.” I didn’t continue. It’d be too uncomfortable to admit the truth aloud. Lenorre already knew what had happened. I didn’t need to say it.

  “I have brought you to the brink,” Lenorre said, “but every time you reach that point you back away a little more and pretend nothing has happened.”

  Was I backing away? I felt like she was luring me into her intricate web. Then again, what we force ourselves to see and what’s really there can often be two different things. The authority I’d worked so hard to exert over the beast was the same mastery I was trying to exert over my heart.

  “I lost control for you once,” I told her. “You could’ve taken me then.”

  “I desired you, not the beast that was riding you,” she said coldly.

  “In that moment, Lenorre,” my voice was breathy, “I wanted you, more than I’d ever wanted anyone, more than Rosalin. I can’t even begin to describe the things I craved for you to do to me. How can you say I’m the one running away from what happened earlier? I forgot about everything, everything but you—your mouth, your hands, your body.” Just admitting it out loud made my stomach flutter uncontrollably.

  A dark look slid through her eyes before she closed them. “Kassandra, I desire more than just your body.”

  I unbuttoned the leather jacket, letting it fall to the floor. The Mark III and shoulder holster were in plain view. Lenorre’s eyes flew open, then flicked from my face to the gun.

  “If that’s what you want,” I stepped closer, “then take it, but stop analyzing the situation. When you analyze, when you talk instead of act, you give me time to think, and when you give me time to think, you give me time to distance myself.”

  I heard her sharp intake of breath and suddenly understood why she enjoyed listening to the breath catch in my throat. I watched as her chest rose and fell. The undead don’t have to breathe to survive. I knew she had taken that breath for my benefit. Her gaze filled with an otherworldly light. Her eyes that had been smoky were suddenly liquid silver.

  “I should have known,” she said softly, but before I could ask what she should’ve known she grabbed me. Her arms snaked around my back. She kissed me as deeply, and as passionately, as she had earlier. With her body against mine, with her tongue filling my mouth, all thoughts washed away like words written in sand. Her hands slid down the arch of my spine, over the slight swell of my ass. A moment later I felt her nails through my jeans and the pain made me moan. In one fluid motion Lenorre picked me up. I wrapped my legs around her thin frame, burying my hands in her long silken hair, crushing the curls with my fists. Lenorre didn’t break the kiss when she carried me into the bedroom.

  Chapter Five

  She broke the kiss when she placed me gently on the bed, then climbed on top of me and turned off the bedside lamp.

  I looked at Lenorre and felt like I was stuck in some erotic, thrilling black-and-white movie. Her curls fell around her incredibly pale face, making it appear even more striking. With her on top of me, the cut of her gown pulled away from her body. It was loose enough that my gaze was drawn to the swell of her white breasts.

  A new wave of desire filled me. The anticipation speeded up my pulse, made my heart beat faster. Could she see me as well as I could see her in the dark? But before I could ask, she grabbed th
e front of my shoulder holster, pulling my face to hers.

  She kissed me, gently at first like the brush of a moth’s wing. I pressed into the kiss, begging her for the depth my mouth craved, my body craved. She pushed me down on the pillows, her pale face looming like some dark beauty. With both hands she grabbed the strap of the holster, and before I could tell her not to, the leather snapped.

  “There are things I want from you, Kassandra,” she said, words like a susurrus wind tickling autumn leaves. Lenorre’s power rode the air and pulsed against my skin like a clinging mist.

  Her voice sent chills up my spine, encouraging my body to rise to meet hers.

  “Things that might frighten you,” she whispered against the fall of my hair. Her hand traveled the front of my body. She placed her hand between my legs, and even through the jeans, I could feel the weight of her power. The promise of what we were about to do.

  The wolf stirred, rising in me like some great wave. She pushed near the surface, but instead of threatening to break through, she waited. I placed my hands on Lenorre’s hips, sliding them up the curve of her body until I cupped both of her breasts.

  Her dark eyelashes fluttered.

  “You won’t frighten me, Lenorre.”

  “Are you so sure?” Her body went inhumanly still. I sat up and caught her shoulders. Lenorre let me push her onto her back.

  I climbed on top of her, grabbed a handful of her gown, and tugged. The buttons popped in a small orchestra of ripping thread and little pings as some of them hit the wall. I pressed my mouth against her collarbone, nibbling lightly. Lenorre moaned.

  Her hands were cool as she raised my shirt and stroked my stomach, but instead of taking off my shirt she tucked her fingers under the waistband of my jeans. At the touch of her fingers so dangerously close, I reached down to unbutton them. I was going through far too many clothes these days. And I hate shopping. I don’t mind the new clothes, but I don’t enjoy trying to pile-drive through a maze of shop-crazy women. This little werewolf is not that courageous.

  Her mouth was suddenly against the side of my neck, tongue lingering over my suddenly thudding pulse. “No.” She pushed my shoulders and I fell back.