“In the water,” he growled. Now. Before I bend you over the side of my bed and finally make use of it.
She gripped the side of the tub and stepped in. Her hiss as skin met hot water drove blood to his groin and heightened his foul mood.
“Sit down,” he demanded.
“No.”
His gaze ripped to her and narrowed. “Why not?”
She stood there, a goddess, a demon goddess in white skin and flaming curls both on her head and between her legs. Erion licked his lips.
“I don’t like the feeling of sitting in water,” she said. “I won’t.”
“You are trying to be a pain in my ass,” he growled, crossing the room and grabbing a small towel and a bar of soap from the table beside the bathtub. He knelt down and plunged the washrag into the water, scrubbed it with the soap until he created a substantial lather, then uttered the terse command, “Don’t move.”
Her hands fisted at her sides, but she stilled, remained silent as he reached down and dragged the hot, soapy cloth over her calves, then behind her knees. When he moved up her thighs, avoiding the red curls that called to him like a lover, she gasped and his cock pressed hard against his zipper. She was so close, heat surging from every pore of her skin and entering the atmosphere around them. He gritted his teeth against the growl of desire that wanted to escape his lungs and throat. He wanted to go slow, hours if he could manage it, explore every inch, let the cloth be his excuse to know her. Shit, this was madness. Though his nostrils were heavy with her scent and his tongue ached to be heavy with her cream, he forced himself to remain on task.
That is, until the rag brushed against her belly and she moaned deep and pained and sensually, and she stepped wider apart, granting him a perfect view of her pink pussy lips.
He fisted the wet rag and cursed blackly, violently.
“I am holding as still as I can,” she said, mistaking his desire for irritation. “You are rough. I can’t help shifting to keep my balance.”
His eyes lifted to meet hers, and he knew they were pitch-black and untamed. “Your scent makes me insane.”
“Your scent does the same to me,” she said, her breathing gently labored, her skin flushed.
Erion watched as one lone teardrop of sweat fell from her forehead onto her cheek. He licked his lips. The bead continued to move over her jaw, down her neck and collarbone, until it rose and fell over her nipple. His throat was so dry. That bead of sweat would quench his thirst; he was certain of it. It continued, building speed as it trailed down one side of her ribs, made a gentle left near her navel, then dropped, disappeared, into the arousal-soaked curls of her sex.
Erion cast the washcloth into the tub and brought his hands around her hips to cup her backside.
“I need it, Hellen,” he groaned, filling his palms with hot, plush skin. “I need to taste you, bury my tongue inside you.” He looked up, flashed her his fangs. “Just once.”
She stared down at him, her mind working, desire and panic and uncontained heat making her limbs tremble. “You won’t hurt me?”
“Never,” he said passionately. He couldn’t. He knew that weakness within himself now. He could contain her, quarrel with her, desire her, and miss her, but he could never harm her.
Her eyes darkened and she raked her teeth over her bottom lip. “Then wash me, Erion,” she breathed, her eyes mirroring his desperation. “Use your tongue and lick me clean.”
It was all he needed.
His hands left her soft, taut backside and came around to where she truly ached. He spread her open with his thumbs. Pink, so damn pink. Saliva pooled in his mouth and he growled at the wetness leaking from her cunt. He’d never been so hungry, so desperate to taste anything in his life.
“Erion, please,” she begged, her knees flexing slightly.
He leaned forward and licked her. The honey that met his tongue made his cock pulse, while the scent of her unrelenting heat made the tip bead with come.
“You are so beautiful, demon girl,” he whispered. “So hot I’m desperate to get burned. So wet I want to drown.”
His tongue lapped at her again, tended to both sides of the hard, swollen ridge before coming home to her clit. He circled the hot, tight pearl until her moans reached a fevered pitch. Then he eased back and looked up at her.
“Touch your breasts, Hellen,” he commanded as he pressed a finger inside her and stroked the tight velvet passageway of her sex. “I want to see you squeeze your nipples as I suckle your clit.”
“Oh, gods,” she moaned, grasping her breasts as her hips swung forward and back.
Erion eased another finger inside her cunt and fire-hot juices spilled around both his digits. Shit, I’m going to come just from touching her, he thought, as he watched her release her breasts and pinch and flick her nipples.
“Please, Erion,” she begged as the room filled with the luscious scent of her heat. “Please. I need to come. Right now, before I lose my mind. Please.”
Erion would never admit to it later, but in that moment, Hellen owned him. Her scent had taken up residence in his lungs, her moans directed the swell of his cock, and her pussy possessed his tongue. He eased his fingers from her tender cunt, spread her lips as wide as he could manage, and suckled her. Her clit instantly swelled in his mouth and he couldn’t help himself: his fangs elongated and they bracketed the hot bud. Just those tiny pinpricks combined with the rhythmic sucking of her clit made Hellen cry out. But it was no ordinary cry of pleasure. It was a scream, a sound so high-pitched, so otherworldly, the glass in the mirror by the bed moaned, then shattered.
The violent crash made Erion growl against her flesh, made him so deviantly hungry he slid his mouth all over her, dipping his tongue inside her, pressing his fangs closer, suckling her swollen clit until her legs shook, her back arched, and she came hard and uncontrolled.
For several moments, she rocked her cunt back and forth against his tongue, his mouth, his wet jaw, until her breathing began to slow and her moans turned to whimpers. And then she pulled back from him, sighed, and sat down in the water.
Erion stared at her, watched as she picked up the soap and the cloth he’d discarded and began to wash herself in earnest. Confusion commingled with the intensity of his desire and the raging hard-on in his jeans. She was in the water. Sitting in the water. She’d said . . . She’d said she wouldn’t sit in the water, wouldn’t wash herself . . . She’d forced his hand . . . She’d made it so he would have to—
His gaze narrowed and he growled, his anger another being in the room. “You lied to me.”
“Yes.” She sounded calm, clearheaded.
“You lied to me so I would touch you, lick you, get you off.”
She looked over at him, her red hair a mass of wild curls, her cheeks stained with pink from her climax, and her green demon eyes a little glassy. “It wouldn’t do to have me arrive sexually charged. Cruen might suspect something happened between us.”
Erion couldn’t believe what he was hearing—what he was seeing.
“You could’ve touched yourself,” he snarled, coming to his feet. His fucking cock was like granite. “You didn’t need me!”
“Yes, I could have,” she said coolly, then shrugged. “But you wanted to, and I wanted you to.”
He pointed at her. “Shut up!”
“Don’t be angry. Think about it. If he suspected you touched me, he wouldn’t give you what you’re after.” She gave him a tight-lipped smile. “It wouldn’t have helped either of our causes. Now, would it?”
Erion’s nostrils flared and he slowly backed up, his hands fisted. “You are a . . . a . . . DEMON!” he roared.
“Yes.”
And with that, she slipped down beneath the water.
9
Night bled into the last seconds of daylight as Kate watched the four members of the Impure Resistance
try once again to break into Cruen’s mental communication link. Gray, Piper, Rio, and Vincent had managed this feat with the Order not long ago, using their combined mental gifts to hack into the ten vampires’ telepathic mainframe to gain information. But for some reason, Cruen was proving a difficult subject.
They’d been at it for hours, first inside their compound, then on the beach near the water. The newly constructed Impure credenti was situated near the Atlantic Ocean and housed not just the Resistance members, but Impures who wanted to gain leadership roles within the new vampire ruling structure.
Kate hadn’t come looking for a new home, but to find and bring her fostered balas back home, where he belonged.
“I’m sorry.” Gray glanced over his shoulder, his eyes pale steel under the light of the moon. The leader of the Resistance, and Sara’s brother, stood shoulder to shoulder in a tight circle with his allies. “We can’t locate him. We hear rumblings, static, like someone talking on a cell phone, but locking on isn’t possible.”
Vincent, the dark-skinned Impure who was all broad shoulders and masculine swagger, gave her a grim smile. “We’ll try again, veana.”
“Absolutely,” Gray confirmed. “This continued and dangerous break with sanity will not go unchallenged.”
“To take a balas,” said Piper caustically. The third member of the Resistance opened her eyes and sighed. “He is a true monster.”
“We shouldn’t be surprised. He has committed atrocities for ages,” Riordan James added, his dark, narrowed gaze hitting each of them in turn. He moved out of the circle with the natural grace of a military killer. “Another sin to add to the list. Another sin we will be sure to remind him of when we strip him of skin and make him scream.”
A wave of grief moved over Kate, and she turned away from the group and walked down to the water’s edge. She understood Rio’s violent words. She felt them herself. But the idea of making Cruen pay didn’t soothe her. It only made her fearful, made her miss Ladd more. Made her desperate to have the balas safely back in her arms.
The gentle waves licked at her bare feet, the cold water making her shiver.
“I met a very insistent Nicholas Roman at the gate.”
She turned to see Dillon, Gray’s Pureblood mate and the first mutore she had ever met, come to stand beside her. The newest member of the Order shrugged with feline grace. “I wasn’t in a position to stop him. You know pavens and their mates. Even with my jaguar out and growling, your true mate would not be denied access.”
“Damn right.” Nicholas moved to the other side of Kate and took her hand.
Though his palm felt good against her own, safe and warm, Kate pushed back against the feeling of being cared for.
“If you’ve come to take me home . . .” she began coolly. She wasn’t ready to leave. She’d already met with two of her acquaintances from Mondrar, paid them well to dig, find out anything they could from within their circle. Now she would remain here, watch as the Resistance attempted once again to find Cruen. And again. However long it took.
“We’re not going home, veana.” Nicholas lifted her hand and kissed it, his eyes locking on to hers. “We’re going to see Erion.”
Kate gasped, hope surging as she rounded on her mate. “Did he find Ladd? Does he have him?”
The light in Nicholas’s eyes dimmed as he took her other hand. “Not yet. But I think he knows something he’s not telling us. I want to find out what that is.” He lifted one dark eyebrow. “You in?”
Kate tried not to feel the heaviness of disappointment, the unending scratches of fear on her unbeating heart. Nicholas was trying so hard to help her, to help Ladd—they all were. And maybe Erion did know something. He’d been so secretive.
But leaving the Resistance. Would they continue? Would they push as hard to get through Cruen’s impressive mental bindings if she wasn’t there standing over them?
“We’ll keep trying, Kate,” Gray said behind her.
She glanced over her shoulder to find Gray once again shoulder to shoulder in a tight circle with the members of the Resistance. She’d forgotten the brave Impure male could hear the thoughts of all but his true mate.
“Promise?” she said, looking at each one of them in turn.
Rio clipped a nod; Vincent and Piper too.
“Every hour,” Gray said, then turned to Dillon and smiled gently. “And my kitty cat here will return to the Order and dig deep while we do.”
Dillon growled and flashed her jaguar. “They all fear my beast. I will put it to good use.”
Though she felt less than confident about leaving, Kate nodded, then wrapped her arms around Nicholas and whispered, “Let’s go.”
• • •
Cruen stood on the balcony overlooking the desert and attempted to access his balance, his power, but he had nothing in reserve. The male who stood beside him, who had entered the compound in a flurry of green robes and overt condescension, was in his most human form, but that didn’t fool Cruen into thinking the male was weak. Cruen knew what this male was, what he was capable of when he was angry or felt betrayed, thwarted, or threatened.
Or when his daughter was missing.
“She never arrived, Abbadon.” He despised the curl of fear in his own voice.
“Unfortunate.” The Demon King spoke with deadly calm.
“This is not my doing,” Cruen said, turning his head but not looking directly into Abbadon’s eyes. He knew what lurked there, knew it could make even the bravest of males lose their bowel functions.
“And what have you done to recover her, Cruen?”
“I have searched, both in my mind and on foot.” He spoke too quickly.
Abbadon glanced around himself with an expression of false confusion. “Yet she is not here.”
“I will get her back,” Cruen ground out.
The Demon King made a soft grunt, like someone who was applying little effort in cutting off the airway of an enemy. “You know where she is?”
Sudden exhaustion blanketed Cruen and he gripped the railing. “I know who has her.” What an unfortunate turn of events. Not at all what Cruen had planned, had hoped for. Erion had better come through, or it was going to be a bloodbath for all.
Abbadon’s inhuman snarl slapped him out of his reverie. “You know where my daughter is, and yet you are still standing here.” The male ran his forked tongue over his dry lips. “Perhaps I have chosen foolishly. Perhaps you are not the one who will bring about my heir, my foothold on this Earth.”
“I am the one,” Cruen said with as much aplomb as he could manage.
Abbadon’s nostrils flared. “I wish to all that is evil that I could create this child myself, that my bitch of a mate hadn’t tricked me with her pleasing tongue and rendered me vacant of seed.”
“Truly, there is no one more fit for this task than I. But . . .”
That last word had Abbadon changing, growing, morphing into his most demonic state.
There was nothing Cruen could do about it, nowhere he could go. He couldn’t flash, which meant he couldn’t get to Erion. His gaze traveled the length of the scaly, red-faced, and terrifying Demon King.
“I regret to say I need your assistance. Again.”
• • •
Nervous energy rolled through Hellen as she stepped inside the furnishings shop that would soon contain her fiancé. She wasn’t afraid of Cruen, of seeing him and binding herself to him—no, that she counted on, that she was glad for, because it would bring her the draft and it would save her sisters from a future of handpicked males and hell-born children. What made her nervous was her appearance. She was bathed, combed and presentable, but dressed in new, modern clothing that Erion had procured for her. They were similar to his own jeans and sweater though tighter fitting.
Will Cruen accept me this way? she wondered. Question why I no longer wear my weddi
ng gown? She couldn’t afford to have him reject her.
Erion stalked forward, leaving her near a mustard-colored chaise. The male had barely glanced her way since the bathtub incident. Not to give her the clothes, not even when he’d escorted her here. His eyes refused to connect. It was clear he hated her for deceiving him, for making a fool out of him. And she didn’t blame him.
She watched him move to the counter, inspect a few items, then slam his hand down on a small brass bell. He’d thought she’d used him just to ease the continual heat that raged inside her. She reached out and touched the top of the chaise, so cool under her hand. Maybe she had, but not in the way he was thinking. Not as a power play, not to shame him for wanting her. She’d manipulated him slightly because she’d wanted his touch—believed that he wouldn’t give in to what they both desired without that ruse regarding the water. The truth was that she was inexplicably attracted to him, had been from the first moment he’d touched her. She couldn’t help herself, her mind, from wondering what it would feel like to belong to such a male as this one. Brutally handsome, savagely loyal, with a touch that burned and cooled and soothed and possessed.
But she would never know. Beyond one moment of sexual bliss. She was destined for Cruen. She was destined for a life without love, without true passion, heat, fire, or lust. Erion was appalled and offended by what she had done, but, truly, could she be faulted for constructing a moment where she got to experience all those glorious feelings at once?
“You’re late.”
Hellen heard the voice before she saw the male it belonged to. The curtain behind Erion rustled, and a strange man appeared. He was short and meek, but he didn’t seem human. Although he certainly didn’t come across as vampire either.
“Where is he, Raine?” Erion said, his tone thick with impatience. “I’m more than ready to return this package to its rightful owner.”
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