Not that Callum being here tonight would have made much difference. He had been distracted from the moment he had met Kristina close to three months ago and that had only grown worse when he had discovered that she was pregnant. On top of that, Callum still hadn’t apologised for the whole fiasco that had severely damage the theatre’s reputation. Talk of what had occurred that night, and that Callum’s lover was a werewolf, had spread like wildfire through vampire society. Attendance was down but Antoine could smooth things over with the elite and the aristocrats given time.
He sighed and relaxed into the theatre seat, trying to get his mind off business and onto the woman on stage. It was impossible when his anger was riding him so mercilessly.
What Callum had done wasn’t the reason he was so annoyed. It was what he had done. It haunted him. He should never have allowed the performance that night to start, let alone degenerate to the level that it had. If Kristina had died, Callum would never have forgiven him. Antoine knew what it was like to lose someone you loved with every drop of blood in your body and it wasn’t something he wanted Callum or anyone to go through.
Dark memories stirred at the back of his mind and he forced his focus back to the woman as she stripped.
Sera.
She deserved his attention since she had made the effort to pull strings to get on his stage. It was a shame that she had none of the talent of her sire. She was too young, and too new as a vampire. Her looks were appealing though and that was the only reason he was allowing her to continue. Youthful with clear flawless skin, a rosy hue to her cheeks, and dark eyes. He couldn’t make out the colour. She skimmed her hands up her curves, past her bra and up the sides of her head, pulling her long hair up and tangling her hands in it, her eyes closing in apparent ecstasy. Blonde hair was always good on the stage. The lights played well on it. Her figure was better than average, with sumptuous curves and her navy lacy bra cupping what looked to be good firm handful-sized breasts. She ran her fingers over the bra cups, as though she had sensed his sudden desire to know what her nipples were like. He imagined them small and dark, sweet plums made for sucking.
Antoine cleared his throat and brought his focus back to appraising her as a performer.
She had nice hips. Her waist flared out into them just right, an hourglass figure made for tempting men’s imaginations and rousing a hunger to sweep hands over those dangerous curves. She unzipped her blue jeans and turned away from him, granting him a tantalising flash of matching lace panties that stirred his interest. His control slipped again but he reined it back and ran a glance over her bottom. Small, pert. She swayed her hips and teased him by lowering her jeans and then raising them again.
Was she wearing a thong or normal panties?
French knickers.
The vision of her in them flashed across his mind and he found himself leaning forwards as she edged her jeans down, eager to see if luck would be with him and she was wearing his favourite lacy little shorts.
Antoine leaned back, shocked to find that she had lured him in completely without him realising.
What was he doing?
It had been centuries since that had happened. He had watched the performances each night, unaffected by the act, uninterested. They were actors. Every one of them beneath him. His name and that of his older brother were on the licence for the theatre because it brought in the aristocrats with their money, not because he was debauched enough to want to watch people engaging in sexual intercourse on a stage, although the final act always got his blood pounding, just as it did any vampire.
That wasn’t a good thing.
That was dangerous.
And so was this female.
She shimmied out of her jeans, revealing his worst nightmare. Lacy navy French knickers. They clung to her bottom but rode up it as she bent forwards to free her feet from her jeans, flashing smooth peachy globes that caused an unsettling need to step up on stage and run his hands over them to feel their softness. She kicked her jeans away and then turned towards him, her smile sultry and her dark eyes meeting his. An errant wavy strand of her blonde hair caressed her neck and drew his gaze there. His urge to leap up on stage increased. He wanted to clear the hair away from the slender column of her throat, revealing it to his eyes. He would step around her then, keeping his hand on her shoulder as he brushed his front across her back. His hard cock would nestle against her bottom as she arched into him, eager for harder contact between them, and he would lower his mouth to kiss the soft flawless skin and breathe her in. He hungered to taste her and know her scent, to let it envelop him and send his desire soaring.
Antoine tamped down the need and pulled back on the reins again. He was in control here. This was all just an act designed to thrill. The desire in her eyes, the way she moved as though it was his eyes on her that made her want to do such a naughty little wriggle and put on a show were all fake.
Sera swayed her shoulders and then licked her lips and unhooked her bra. She let the lacy cups fall away from her breasts, revealing deep pink buds that made his blood cry out for him to give up his ridiculous need for control and get on stage with her.
That was not going to happen.
He glanced at his watch. More than ten minutes had passed. Part of him said to end it now, thank her for her time, and leave. It was safer that way.
Antoine looked back up to tell her just that but she stole his voice by running her hands over her bare breasts. Her hips rocked side to side, luring his gaze downwards, but he couldn’t take his eyes off her hands. She teased her nipples between her fingers and thumbs, and Antoine realised that she was no longer nervous.
She stared straight at him, her eyes dark with desire that he could smell on her, bold in the way she held his gaze, as though daring him to come and see if he could make her feel better than she was already making herself.
Antoine forgot what he was supposed to be doing. He forgot the rules he had laid down, forgot everything that his family had hammered into his head about not interacting with elite beyond what was necessary, raising him to be a true aristocrat. He forgot it all.
What he didn’t forget was how it had ended the last time he had let himself slip and fall, and how much he had despaired on discovering that she was gone, and how he had spent close to three centuries nursing the pain in his heart.
Antoine slammed the lid on his desire, stamping out the flickering spark of it in his chest.
Sera frowned as though she had seen the change in him, and then continued, and it seemed to Antoine that she had doubled her effort.
He felt dangerously close to slipping again.
She cupped her breasts and pinched her nipples, her gaze locked with his. He tried not to stare at her, fought it with every ounce of his will. When he managed to drag his eyes away, they betrayed him and fell to her hands, following them as she ran them over the flat plane of her stomach to her hips. He stopped breathing when she slipped her fingers into her blue knickers and shifted her hips backwards, moaning as she touched herself.
Devil. He bit back the growl that rolled up his throat and battled the hot rush of desire that came with it. He wouldn’t give in to her. He wouldn’t slip. He was in control.
She moaned again, the sound filling the theatre and curling around him, taunting him. Her face was a picture of bliss, her eyes closed and rosy lips parted with satisfaction. He gripped the arms of the seat until his knuckles bleached and ached, refusing to fall for her act. It wasn’t going to happen. Not now. Not ever.
She was elite, a turned human no less. She was beneath him.
Devil, he wanted her beneath him.
Not going to happen. His cock throbbed, telling him that it could easily happen. All he had to do was surrender the rigid control he insisted on having in his life, the ridiculous need for order and distance, and give in to his hunger.
He couldn’t give in to his hunger.
The Devil only knew where that would lead him.
He knew exactly where,
and the thought sobered him up so quickly it was as though someone had dumped a bucket of ice on his crotch.
Sera frowned again and Antoine knew she had seen the change this time. No doubt about it. She turned up the heat, trailing a finger up over her breasts, luring his gaze up with it, and then sucking it into her mouth. He swallowed the dry lump in his throat and stared at her mouth, watching as she worked her tongue over the pale digit, twirling it around the tip. He throbbed in his black trousers again, aching at the beautifully erotic sight of her as she sucked one finger and touched herself with another.
His heart began to pound.
Nothing good would come of this.
He had to put an end to it now before it was too late.
He had to save himself.
“Shall I bring Victor back in?” His voice cut through the silence, loud in his ears. She stumbled, a blush heating her cheeks, and looked uncertain. “You are no use if you will not perform with a man... or a woman. I could have a woman brought in if that is your preference?”
The thought of her touching another man had his blood burning with rage. Touching a woman, however. That had a certain appeal.
Sera shook her head, grabbed her clothes, and headed for the steps down from the stage.
She was giving up?
That should have satisfied him.
So why did he want to block her exit and make her stay?
CHAPTER 4
“You aren’t finished,” Antoine said and Sera paused at the edge of the black stage, her clothes bundled in her arms. Was his voice trembling? Maybe it was just her hearing. She was shaking all over, partly due to desire and partly due to nerves. He spoke again and his voice was tight, harsh. Hungry. “I want to see you finish... alone if you have to.”
Sera risked a glance his way. He stood a few feet below her. Had he intended to stop her physically if she had tried to leave? She couldn’t believe that, or the spark of desire in his eyes. His enlarged pupils almost swallowed the whole of his pale blue irises. Sera ran her eyes over him and found confirmation that she wasn’t imagining that hunger in his gaze or his voice. The outline of his hard cock was unmistakable in his dark formal trousers. She had come here to seduce him and she was so close that she could almost taste victory. He had said that he wanted to see her finish and he didn’t care if she did it alone.
So alone she would finish.
She placed her clothes back down on the stage, aware of her partial nudity and his eyes on her. Did he like what he saw? The thought that he did boosted her courage and gave her confidence, but did nothing to rekindle the sputtering flame of her desire.
Antoine sat again, his ice-blue eyes on her and his large hands resting over the ends of the arms of his chair. He had clutched them when she had been performing for him, had held them so tightly that his knuckles had burned white. She had felt as though he was holding himself back, stopping himself from doing something. What? That one question had burned in her mind, driven her to keep teasing him, to keep pushing him to see why he felt the need to restrain himself.
Did he want to touch her too?
Sera slowly walked back to the centre of the stage, closed her eyes and ran her hands over her bare breasts, her nipples tingling as she imagined that it was his hands on her now, his strong cool palms cupping and kneading her. Her teeth sank into her lower lip and she loosed a breathy moan, unable to contain it as she continued her fantasy. He had told her to finish. She knew what that meant. He wanted to watch her climax. Just the thought of achieving an orgasm while he was watching her had her heart pounding erratically and gave her the strength to keep going.
Her head tilted back and she lowered one hand, skimming it over her stomach and then her hip, down to her knickers. His gaze followed, boring into her, heating her blood until she was burning for him. Pretending it was his hands on her wasn’t enough. She wanted to feel them on her for real, wanted him to come to stand behind her and toy with her breasts while she fingered herself. She ached to feel the hard press of his cock against her bottom and the soft wetness of his mouth on her shoulder.
Sera groaned and it came out as a growl.
Or had it?
She flicked one eye open and found Antoine gripping the arms of his seat again, his whole body taut and coiled. He had growled. Oh. Sweet mercy. The thought that she had torn such a feral sound from him had her close to coming undone.
The only thing that stopped her was the cold edge that still lingered in his eyes.
She would break through that.
Sera hooked her fingers into the waist of her knickers and swayed her hips as she slowly eased them down her thighs and then off her feet. Antoine watched her every move like a hawk and she was tempted to toss her underwear at him just so she could see his reaction. She kicked it aside instead, afraid that such a move would shatter whatever spell she had cast on him, and slipped her fingers back into her plush petals. Another groan left her but Antoine didn’t growl with her this time. She was close now, hot all over, near to bursting. She wanted Antoine’s eyes on her when it happened, wanted to make sure that she had the whole of his attention.
He was watching her but that could easily change. Darkness crossed his handsome face when she pulled her hands upwards, trailing them up her sides and over her breasts. She felt wicked as he frowned, his gaze clearly expressing that he hadn’t wanted her to stop touching herself. Her eyes dropped to his crotch and the hard bulge there. She wanted to touch that. She burned with the need to run her hands over him and feel his heat. Did he burn for that too? Would he turn her away if she stepped down from the stage and tried to touch him?
It was too much of a risk right now.
She had to work him up first, had to push him to the very edge, and then when he was close to falling, she would make her move.
Sera turned away from him and took a deep breath. It felt so wrong, so dirty, but so damned good as she bent over, exposing herself to him, and heard his low restrained growl. She held her ankle with one hand, reached between her legs with her other, and gave herself over to the pleasure so she didn’t think about what she was doing. She moaned with the first brush of her fingers over her own clitoris and then swirled them around it, her breathing quickening and blood burning again. Her heart pounded against her chest and she closed her eyes. Another groan escaped her, louder this time, and she bit her lip. It felt so good.
So very good.
Antoine’s gaze burned into her, heightening her awareness of him and making everything else disappear. She touched herself, breathing hard and fast, enjoying the feel of her fingers and the tingles that shot through her with their every brush over her aroused nub. Her other hand clutched her ankle, fingertips pressing in, and her head spun. She wanted more. Was so very close.
Just a little more.
She moaned and worked her hips, rubbing her fingers over her clitoris at the same time, unable to stop herself as her desire reached a crescendo.
So close.
Cold air shifted behind her and something thrust into her slick channel, plunging deep into her core. Sera cried out her climax, body shuddering and clenching the hard rod buried inside her. Her hand slipped from her ankle and she almost collapsed in a heap on the stage but a strong hand held her hip, keeping her upright. She breathed fast, head spinning, confused and lost in the haze of her orgasm. What had happened?
She had never experienced something so explosive and wild, so blissful and satisfying.
The cause of the Earth-shattering climax that had come upon her slowly pumped her once and then withdrew, and she realised that it was Antoine’s fingers.
Sera gathered herself and then straightened on shaky legs and turned to face him where he stood on the stage behind her. He looked at her, dispassionate and cold.
“There, you can perform with another, but still not enough to work the stage.”
Sera couldn’t believe what he had done. She trembled all over, still reeling from it and her climax. Had she won he
r game of seduction?
The look in his eyes said no.
He wanted her to leave.
She had been realistic when speaking to her sire about Antoine. She had known that she stood a slim chance with him and had prepared herself for the inevitable rejection. She had been so fixed on her feelings being one sided and him showing no interest in her at all that she wasn’t sure what to do now that he had.
There was one thing she did know though.
He wanted her and she would be a fool to give up on him now.
She wasn’t going to leave, not when she was so close to convincing him to take a chance on her. She had got him on stage and got him to touch her. She knew that if she had just a little more time with him that she might be able to make him see that the desire zipping between them wasn’t an act. It was real.
“I can perform,” Sera said, mustering her confidence so he didn’t hear the nerves in her voice. She smiled and tilted her head to one side, running her gaze over him. The hard bulge in his trousers hadn’t gone anywhere. That was a start. “Just give me a second chance.”
Antoine frowned, his cold eyes turning dark, as though he didn’t like the thought of her having a second chance with Victor. She had to be imagining that.
“But I want to be able to select my partner.” Those words leaving her lips caused his frown to harden.
“An unusual request. I may be inclined to allow it providing you will actually perform.”
Boy would she.
Her smile widened. “I promise I will if I can choose who I perform with.”
The darkness in his eyes deepened and red ringed his irises at the same time as a wave of anger rolled over her. Her smile held. Did he know how jealous he looked? She wanted to ask him but didn’t want him to kick her out. He had no reason to be jealous but the sight of him feeling such an emotion sent her confidence up another notch and gave her the strength to continue.
“Has someone here caught your eye?” he said, little more than a thick growl, and she nodded. “Name them and I will see if the vampire or human is available.”
Dark and Dangerous: Six-in-One Hot Paranormal Romances Page 91
