by Strong, Jory
Yesss. My price is tripled for such a task. I am no dog to set to watch.
Amusement in the voice, a purr of satisfaction. Enough to ease some of Etaín’s worry about surviving the payment.
“If there’s a danger of more people dying, you’ll summon me even if it’s only the first killer.”
Yesss. But the bargain stands. Three of my choosing.
“Agreed,” she said, needing only to open her eyes to leave mystical place for a real one.
“Got it?” Cathal asked.
“Not yet.” She accepted Eamon’s hand and the tug to her feet. Her arms went around both men, pulling them to her, the desire delayed earlier returning in a rush. “It may be awhile.”
“You’ll tattoo someone of the Dragon’s choosing?” Eamon asked.
“Three people. In exchange for being able to snag Cyco Chalino along with Roberto.”
Eamon’s smile of approval warmed her though it didn’t fully dissipate the chill of concern. “It might be dangerous to you and Cathal.”
He stroked his thumb across the back of her hand. “I believe we will survive it. Peordh. Predestination. I have come to accept it where you are concerned. I believe that’s why the magic chose Cathal, because he is of this world. A true anchor to it.”
Her throat closed. She squeezed Eamon’s hand but there was no promise she could make, that her magic would choose him as her heart had.
“Let’s go upstairs,” she said. To the bedroom, they heard, dark heat in their eyes as they accompanied her there.
No worries, she told herself. Embrace the moment. Embrace these two men who were more than she’d dreamed possible.
Clothes fell to the floor, shed in an impatient rush next to the bed. Then skin touched skin, fevered need reflecting a deeper one as masculine lips touched her neck, Eamon in front of her this time, with Cathal at her back.
“Together,” she said. “I want you both inside me at the same time.”
Skin didn’t lie to her. Neither did the hard cocks pressed against her. A pulse went through rigid heat that thickened, swelling with the desire for that ultimate expression of how their lives were joined together.
Cathal’s lips brushed across her ear. “Eamon’s magic might make it possible to do this standing, but I’d personally prefer the comfort of bed.” Husky amusement rather than the growled possessiveness that had sounded the first time she’d teased him with the possibility of this.
“Comfort it is, then,” Eamon said, he and Cathal maneuvering Etaín onto the mattress with the physical contact unbroken, each of them with a leg draped over her open thighs, hands roaming, lips alternating the claiming of hers.
Perfect. Or nearly so, Eamon thought, disappointment and pain there to dim this celebration of life and love if he allowed it.
He ruthlessly suppressed thoughts of the unhealed, inert tattoos. He’d spoken the truth, lack of a bond through them didn’t change what they signified, didn’t change the shape of their future.
With each kiss, each swallowed moan he felt the twine of his magic to Etaín’s. It was enough. She would always be enough, and Cathal, no longer a complication but a necessary partner.
His hand stroked downward, leaving a tightly furled nipple to rub across her clit, satisfaction surging through him at the instant lift of her hips in a feminine demand to give that pleasure center his attention.
She was wet, always wet for him. For Cathal.
His cock spasmed, liquid arousal escaping, making him laugh softly because she so easily made him ready for her as well.
Her breath came fast as he stroked slick fingers over her clit, took it between his fingers, pumped, and Cathal’s hand joined his between her thighs, plunging into her slit before moving to her back entrance, preparing her. Heat and need built until it became impossible to remain separate.
“Now,” Cathal said, hand circling his cock, a fist necessary to maintain control, masculine pride nonexistent when it came to Etaín.
A touch of her hand to his chest, a little bit of pressure and he was on his back. His hips lifted and his cock went unerringly to her opening when she straddled him. The hot slide into tight heat accompanied the press of luscious breasts to his chest.
Her mouth covered his. Their tongues twined as fingers interlocked, palm to palm and he didn’t fear what she might see with her gift.
Then Eamon was there, and the squeeze of her channel became tighter, pheromones or the brush with death or magic turning the awareness of another man’s cock against his, separated only by a thin feminine barrier, into something erotic, compelling, necessary. Natural. And they found their rhythm as if they’d always shared her this way.
There was no holding back. No possibility of it. Desire and need were raging fire and howling storm and crashing ocean. And release was a volcanic eruption, a lava-hot pour of molten semen and the awareness that Eamon spilled himself inside Etaín at the same time.
Rapture came as Eamon did. Physical. Emotional. A soul-deep, irrevocable joining of all that he was to Etaín, and through her, because of her ink, to Cathal.
Ecstasy was the fierce burn of the sun, golden rays piercing him with Etaín’s cry of pleasure, pouring the magic of Elfhome and Dragon and this world into him. Magic not constrained by physics, magic demanding closure, completeness, traveling into the tattoos she’d placed on him in a surge of joy and irrevocable joining. The barrier between their minds thinning with the shimmering promise that they’d be able to communicate telepathically in the future.
Tears welled in Etaín’s eyes at seeing the spread of color and the healing of Eamon’s tats. Emotion pounded into her with the fast beats of their hearts, the touch of skin to skin. Satisfaction. Pleasure. Intimacy. Permanence.
“I love you,” she whispered against Cathal’s lips and had the words returned to her, repeating it with Eamon after he rolled to his side, freeing her to slide off Cathal.
They sat to view the changes in the tattoos. Purple had been added to the ones she and Cathal wore, as well as to the bands on Eamon’s biceps.
“The color of Cathal’s aura,” Eamon murmured. The glittering green of Dragon scales now manifested in a sinuous line at the center of the design she’d put on him, the other colors were made more vibrant with the bond.
Pleasure suffused her, a bright glow needing expression. Connection. She touched her palms to the ink on masculine skin. “It doesn’t get any better than this. The worst is behind us now.”
Eamon leaned forward, lips heated velvet against her ear. Tongue a brush of carnal temptation to keep the chill of ominous prediction from settling in. “For the moment, Etaín. For this moment. There will be challenges to come. Never doubt it.”
* * *
Cyco Chalino turned onto the street, the sound of Jacko dying still in his head.
A whole load of motherfuckers were going to die tonight. A gift for Jacko, a tribute.
And when the fire burned out and the building was razed, if Cathal Dunne was still alive, he’d come back and do him. Or he’d have Spooky take care of it.
But tonight, once that rich pendejo’s fancy-named club was full, he was going to put a hell-HOUND into it. Maybe he’d hit the place with the flash bangs first, for maximum kill.
Oh yeah. He liked that. Or maybe when he got to Spooky’s hide-out, they’d decide to send his crew in, two minutes blasting away with the AKs for fun before using the launcher. He laughed imagining it. Loved the message of fear it sent. As long as he was alive, no one was safe. Not here. Not down in Mexico.
The driveway was blocked and only a couple of feet were open along the curve. With a shout he gunned the car he’d replaced the stolen Jag with through the space, doing a tight donut on the dirt-patch and dead-grass front yard.
Beneath the tires, brittle plastic exploded and metal flattened as he took out toys and a bike on its side. He stopped with a slam of brakes.
Inside the house kids went quiet as he passed them. Their mother was smart enough not t
o ask him what the fuck was going on when he was in a mood like this.
He knocked open the bedroom door with enough force to send it crashing against the wall and bouncing back. He did the same to the closet door, tossing the shit he’d used to cover the grenade launcher onto the floor.
He pulled the case from the shelf above the clothes bar. Motherfucker was heavy.
The weight told him the weapon was there. He knelt, opening the case anyway to make sure, stroking the remaining rounds. Oh yeah, he was going to use them tonight, maybe fire off all of them. In honor of Jacko. Like a fifty-gun salute with more killing power.
There were more rounds where these came from and he was connected to men who could buy and sell the people who’d be dying tonight. Long as drugs were illegal and there were plenty of people wanting them, it was like riding the money train.
Twenty-nine
Fire summoned Etaín as the three of them stood beneath the shower, a burn of it where the Dragon’s name lay camouflaged in the ink on her skin. “Get ready to move,” she murmured, closing her eyes and mentally traveling the path of the alliance bond.
Sssoo the Earth-bound Elf is yours as well. Your mother told me it would be so.
Another day perhaps she’d bargain to learn more about her mother, about her birth father, but there was already enough debt between them.
Yesss.
The Dragon moved and a scene unfolded at the edge of the shore, scrolling out in the wake of a ripple to become a pool table with a masculine arm lining up a shot. Movement sent the white cue ball forward to strike the blue-striped ten but it didn’t sink into the hole.
Turn lost. Roberto’s head lifted, providing Etaín with a panorama of the room.
Anticipated victory rushed into her at seeing his cousin Cyco and four others, at recognizing this place belonging to an uncle. She’d been in this room, played pool on this table. Only once or twice, but she recognized the furniture, the curtains, the old shag carpet. She could find this house.
“Got it,” she said, opening her eyes.
They left the shower, drying and dressing quickly.
Liam and Heath and Myk joined them at the sedan, informing them that Cage had taken Derrick and Quinn to his boat.
Myk straddled her Harley, an image straight out of an erotic fantasy with his long dark hair and masculine features. She gave both him and Heath general directions then got in the car.
A couple miles away from their destination she said, “Much closer and someone will tip them off and they might spook. I should get out here.”
Heath pulled to the curb. Behind them Myk rolled to a stop. Eamon’s hand tangled in her hair, forcing her mouth to his. “Take no foolish chances.”
“I doubt I’ll have the opportunity.” She welcomed his lips and tongue, lost herself in scent and heat and the promise of a future together, doing the same with Cathal before making herself leave the car.
Liam had already disappeared into shadow by the time she took the offered helmet from Myk and put it on.
She straddled the bike then rode around the sedan, the kisses like liquid sunshine in her belly, blending in with adrenaline and a little kick of fear to make getting this handled and behind them urgent.
She took a corner, turning into an alley almost immediately, glad it wasn’t cluttered with trashed furniture and bald tires abandoned there. The sedan followed and she felt the spell working like a bubble bursting against her back as the car disappeared from sight in her mirror.
Warmth spread through her in a rush of love. This was Lord Eamon bending, stretching, involving himself in human affairs.
She slowed at the end of the alley, waited for a car to pass in order to allow the sedan to stay right behind her. It was a clear shot to their destination.
She hadn’t known the address, but memory got her to the house. A subtle hand signal noted it for Heath though she passed it, doing a U-turn in front of a neighbor’s house then another U-turn before stopping, the delay giving the men time to park and leave the car.
She took off the helmet, making a show of shaking out her hair. She kept her face hidden to hinder recognition, bought time by giving the appearance of a woman wanting to look good before going to the front door.
Liam would be inside now, getting the lay of the land, counting, positioning himself to stop hearts if necessary.
That made her own skitter.
She got off the bike and headed toward the front door, a confident amble rather than a hurried approach. The whole point of this was to make it appear as if she went in alone, and make the tip she was a few minutes away from giving Ordoñes hot enough to act on immediately with a fugitive apprehension team.
She had someone’s attention, inside the house and from across the street. She felt eyes on her, as well as the unseen caress of a masculine hand along her spine.
A hard knock on the door brought a guy in his early twenties. “Yo, mamacita, who you looking for?”
All good humor until she answered “Roberto Jimenez.”
“Nobody by that name here.”
“Roberto!” she yelled. “Roberto Jimenez.”
He stepped out of the room that had the pool table in it. “Let her in, Cricket.”
Cricket complied, making a point to look up and down the street before shutting the door.
She walked toward Roberto, experiencing a shimmer of déjà vu with Cricket next to her. It was like stepping back into the dream of the slaughter, the two of them approaching the bar together. There was no mistaking the intangibles that made up a person’s presence.
“How’d you know I was here?” Roberto asked when she reached him. The boy she’d known wasn’t present in this man’s eyes.
“I’ve been asking around, trying to look up some of the people I used to hang out with. You know Vontae’s dead? He was killed in that shooting at the Curs hangout.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“You have time for a visit?
“Sure.”
“Check her for weapons and a wire?” Cricket asked.
“I’ll do it.” Roberto leaned the pool cue against the wall.
“Without an audience?” She made her voice husky and could have sworn she heard Cathal growl.
“Yeah, why not.” A jerk of his head sent Cricket down the hallway toward the room with the pool table in it. She strained to hear the clack of ball against ball but didn’t.
Roberto crowded closer. Like a lover until he grabbed her, slamming her against the wall, hand locked on her throat, gun jammed hard against her chest.
The space around her took on a deadly, waiting quality. The eyes on the palms of her hands blazed, a weapon she didn’t want to use if it meant the entirety of his memories would become hers, his life swallowed and made part of hers by a weapon she didn’t understand.
“Talk,” he said, putting weight behind the gun already digging into her. “Who else knows I’m here?”
Choices spun through her mind like a roulette wheel. An instant when the gun wasn’t pointed at her, when the accidental pull of a trigger wouldn’t kill her, was all her unseen companions needed.
She spat in Roberto’s face.
He reacted with violence, meaning to strike her with the gun but finding his arms held by men who seemed to appear out of nowhere. And then he sagged between Cathal and Heath, forced into sleep by Eamon, the gun dropping to the floor.
“Get it done, Etaín,” Eamon said, the heat in his voice and expression in his eyes making it clear she’d failed to follow his take-no-unnecessary-chances edict.
“The others?”
“Myk is capable of making someone lose consciousness. He and Liam have done what was required of them.”
“Might as well make this easier for the police,” Cathal said. “Let’s put this guy in the room with the others.”
He and Heath hauled Roberto down the hall, dropping him into a chair. Eamon allowed the air-cradled gun to fall onto the cushion.
“Moment of truth
,” Etaín said, crouching, pressing her palms to bared skin. “Where is the gun you used to kill Vontae?”
His guilt touched her, the barest flicker of remorse, the hesitation caught in the nightmare. Where is the gun you used to kill Vontae?
And she saw it, had felt it pressed below her breast. He hadn’t even bothered to get rid of it.
Ballistics could do what her gift couldn’t do for the police, provide evidence admissible in a court of law. “Where’s the other gun you used at the Cur’s hangout? Where are the silencers?”
The answers came easily, including who had accompanied him, though she posed those questions so only a sliver of memory would be lost, and felt satisfied the guilty and their the guns were all here.
“The sedan won’t remain hidden for much longer,” Eamon warned.
She acknowledged it with a nod, but delayed to ask a final question, because she couldn’t leave without knowing. “Why kill so many people? Why did you invade the Cur’s handout?” Why?
She slid into his memory. Cyco was across the table from him, the two of them eating burgers. “The three Curs die,” Cyco said, “it sends a message that the rest of them don’t want to be moving stolen weed for the Norteños.”
Which three? she asked, delving deeper for the targets, recognizing the men by sight though she didn’t know them. And never would. They’d all been at the bar.
Time flowed again. Roberto said, “I got a better idea, let me get a crew together. Let me take a shitload of Curs out.”
Cyco laughed and she understood why he’d gotten the street name. “Trying to be like me?”
“Fuck no. I’m my own man.” But his desires weren’t hidden from her. He wanted what Cyco had, the name, the respect. He wanted to be a legend, like his cousin.
“You hit their hangout, you better make sure you kill Anton Charles and his brother, otherwise shit will go down.”
“It’ll be a clean sweep. Me and my crew might even top what you did in Mexico.”
“Going to take twenty-six bodies then.”
“When we get done at the bar, you’ll see them bringing out at least that many.”
It sickened her, made her burn with the need for justice. Vengeance. Sometimes there was little separating the two.
