by Lexi Blake
I flushed and set my fork down. The bad cop had definitely shown up. Donovan strode across the room in his jeans and black T-shirt. He was casual, but there was no denying his magnetism. The faery was gorgeous, but Donovan screamed power. His demeanor answered one of my questions. The king still considered me some form of dangerous animal.
“I couldn’t hurt them if I was in Italy,” I said flatly. “Perhaps you should have left me there, Your Highness. I can get back on a plane this afternoon if you like.”
The king leaned against the edge of the table and glared down at me. Arms crossed over his powerful chest, I could tell he was still pissed off. “Do you have any idea the chaos that stunt of yours caused? Your uncle has been my faithful servant for over ten damn years. You walk in and now I have to question his loyalties. Did you really think I would let you get away with it?”
“Daniel, what are you doing?” Quinn stood up as four big, burly werewolves walked in. I recognized one of them as Trent, the queen’s guard. He was carrying handcuffs and leg shackles. He approached me, a grim look on his face.
“You going to fight me, sweetheart?” Trent popped the cuffs open.
I put out my hands. “Nope.”
His hands covered mine and he was far gentler with those cuffs than I would have expected.
It didn’t matter that Trent was a thoughtful jailor. I felt the need to fight. The need to run as fast and far as I could flared inside me. Rage began to build. It started in my gut and threatened to spark like a wildfire. The wolf inside me started beating on her cage. She wanted out. She wanted to fight.
This had been Donovan’s plan all along. I wondered why he hadn’t come to Venice and arrested me there. Anywhere I ran he would find me. I had two choices. I could let my beast out and they would kill me, but not before I’d killed a bunch of them, or I could stay calm and let them take me to my cell. The cell at least offered tomorrow. I fiercely brought down my mental walls. The last thing I needed was to scare the hell out of Marcus. He would know what had happened to me soon enough.
“Did you hear me?” the king was asking.
“Yes,” I replied, the world already receding at the periphery of my vision. In this place, I could think calmly. This was a place unavailable to the wolf. We shared a soul, but I was in charge, and I pushed her out of my calm oasis.
Trent was securing the shackles and he did the oddest thing. He leaned over and I heard him whispering in my ear. “You can do this, Kelsey. You can beat this.”
I wasn’t sure what he meant. I couldn’t beat anything. I wasn’t allowed to fight at all.
“I’m putting you in a cell,” the king enunciated. “I’m going to chain you up and leave you there because you can’t be trusted. You’re an animal and you proved it by running away. Hell, you proved it in that arena.”
“All right.” I heard myself respond and I felt the chains snapping on, but my mind was already elsewhere. It was all a part of Marcus’s training. He’d taught me I was stronger than my instincts and that sometimes the true fight wasn’t about violence. I let myself relax and focus on something good. I could tune out negative forces in this moment by focusing on something positive from my past. I wasn’t an animal no matter what Daniel Donovan claimed, and he couldn’t turn me into one.
Vaguely, I heard Donovan continue to rage at me as I was hauled up, but I could feel the cool of the Italian night on my skin. It was six weeks earlier and I was back in Venice. It was the night I decided to become Marcus’s lover.
* * * *
They fought over who got night number four in the rotation. I always knew which night it was because the girls fought over who got to feed the master. At first I thought it was funny that a group of grown women were fighting over who got bitten that night. Lately, it was irritating. Night four, it seemed, was about how long Marcus could hold out before he gave in to the urge and had sex with whoever happened to be his meal for the night.
Vampires like sex with their blood, but Marcus preferred having a mistress to random partners. Marcus was considered picky by the standards of the supernatural world. He was a vampire with enormous amounts of money and influence, yet he’d purchased only three companions over his nearly two thousand years. A companion is a special female with blood that makes a vampire stronger and faster than a vampire with no companion. Companions are rare and vampires have been known to fight wars over them. Helen of Troy had nothing on a truly bright companion. The fact that Marcus had the money to purchase one but chose not to said a lot about his standards.
I’m not a companion. I’m rare, but not in a glowy, feminine way. I’m a strange combination of wolf and human. My DNA gives me good instincts, makes me faster and stronger than a human. It also makes it necessary to shave my legs twice a day. Laser hair removal was definitely in my future. Why did I think Marcus wanted anything more from me than to train me and send me on my way? The only other man who’d really wanted me had needed the marriage to placate his father’s interests. Gray claimed to love me, but his father had been interested in producing a child with someone from my gene pool.
I belted the robe around my body as I thought through the situation. I was looking for a way out. I was being cowardly, and cowards never got what they wanted. Besides, if I thought about it rationally, I could see Marcus’s not so subtle attempts at seduction. He’d made no secret of his wish to take our relationship past friendship, and while he’d been perfectly gentleman-like, there were certain signs of his growing impatience.
I’d asked for books and Marcus had brought me a bag of them. He’d told me he’d bought all the English language books he could find in Venice. Apparently, all Americans read in Venice is erotica. It was all over the house. I would sit down for a minute and find a book marked with a passage Marcus thought I would find particularly stimulating. When I’d very nicely demanded a thriller with a mystery that didn’t concern where to shove a butt plug, I was given a copy of a Steve Berry novel complete with chapters I was sure he hadn’t written himself. The man wrote thrillers, but there was a scene with some of the dirtiest sex I’d ever read between two people trying to chase down an ancient society bent on destroying the world.
I had to admit, it made the book even better.
Pulling my courage around me, I walked down the corridor and straight to Marcus’s door, where the women argued in Italian.
Lucia looked up and a slow smile spread across her face. “Can I send them away, Kelsey? Please, tell me I can send them away.”
“We won’t need them anymore.” The words were confident, but inside I was a whirl of nerves. I slept beside Marcus every night. At bedtime, I would start out at the edge of the mattress and by the time morning came, I would cuddle against him until his skin was my blanket and his arms wound around me. I would wake up and feel how much he wanted me, but I hadn’t been ready. Tonight, I was ready. I couldn’t stand the thought of these women fighting over what should be mine.
Lucia sent the women away in a flurry of Italian. There was moaning and complaining and tears from one, but finally the hall was quiet and Lucia gave me a reassuring hug.
“He’s going to be so happy, Kelsey,” she promised. “I believe he thought you would go back to the Council without him.”
Without Marcus? My whole world seemed to be Marcus. I could barely imagine going back to Dallas, much less returning without him. “Do you really think he wants me?”
I knew he liked me, but I’m not a great beauty like Zoey Donovan-Quinn. I’m…just me. My body’s fine, but I don’t have large breasts. I’m more athletic than centerfold worthy.
“Stop panicking,” Lucia said affectionately. She smoothed back my hair. “He wants you so bad he can’t stand it. I knew you were ready when you let me take you to the spa today. Why do you think I had them wax you, silly?”
I grinned. I’d known why she did that. Marcus might be Italian, but he preferred certain body parts a little more Brazilian. “I thought you were torturing me.”
I gave Lucia one last smile and walked through the door. We had connecting rooms. Marcus had owned this house in Venice since the 16th century, but like Marcus himself, the place looked damn good for its age. Everywhere I glanced I saw wealth and opulence, but there was nothing more beautiful than the man in front of me.
Marcus stood looking down at the fire. He was partially dressed for our evening out. He had on slacks and a dress shirt, but not his ever-present tie and suit coat yet. He seemed so lonely I wanted to rush to him and throw my arms around his lean body. He was often like this. It must be hard to be the oldest person in the world, to have no one who shared his stories, his experiences. All of his friends were gone. Though he helped the king overthrow the corrupt Council, I knew he missed them. They’d been his comrades for millennia.
He turned toward me and his face softened. “You’re not dressed. I thought we were going out tonight. Go and get ready. I will join you as soon as I’ve dined. I know a restaurant in Cannaregio. It has the best wine selection. At least it did back in the thirties. I thought we would see if it’s still good. I should be no more than ten minutes and then I’m all yours, cara mia.”
“But Marcus, it’s night number four,” I pointed out quietly.
He shook his head and I saw his weariness. “I’ve decided to push my limits. I will not need extra time. I’ll feed and we can go.”
My heart ached because I could feel his loneliness. It was a part of our connection. I could sometimes feel what he was feeling like it was my own emotion. It had to be extremely strong to transfer to me. Marcus wanted a lover, not some random female body in his bed. He longed for it. He longed for me.
This was why I couldn’t deny him a moment longer. I could feel his need.
“That’s a shame, Marcus.” I unbelted the robe and let it fall to my feet. I wasn’t wearing anything under it but my own clean skin. It made me vulnerable, but I was betting everything on the fact that he wanted me. “I was hoping to catch you with your defenses down.”
The vampire’s fangs lengthened and, if I wasn’t mistaken, that wasn’t the only part of him that got bigger as he stared at me. “Mia amore, sei un tesoro.”
“That’s good, right?” I wished he would touch me. Everything would be all right if he would touch me.
“You’re sure?” His eyes never left my body. He gazed on it, looking up and down as though memorizing the hills and planes. It made me feel beautiful. He pushed his desire my way, a warm wave that rolled over my skin. I realized how much restraint Marcus had shown. If he’d let this loose on me before, I would have given in easily. He’d waited until I was ready, and now feeling his desire was a gift. I’d spent my whole life feeling solitary even when surrounded by people. I couldn’t do that with Marcus.
“I want you, Marcus. I want to be your lover.”
He moved faster than my eyes could track. One moment he was standing by the fire and the next he was in my space, his nose running along the line of my neck. His hands barely touched my shoulders. “I want a mistress, Kelsey. It means more than lover. I am not a modern man, bella. I don’t understand modern relationships. I want you for my mistress. I want to take care of you, to be responsible for you.”
I didn’t see how he could possibly be more responsible for me than he already was. I lived in his home, slept in his bed, depended on him for my very sanity. His hands tightened on my shoulders, strengthening our connection. It hummed along my skin and reminded me of everything I stood to gain if I gave myself to this man.
“I am not calling you master in public,” I vowed as my hands found his lean waist. Master was the traditional term for a vampire lover.
“But in private?”
A naughty smile swept over my face. “I’ll probably do whatever you like, my master.”
He took a small step back and held his arms slightly away from his side. “Then undress me, my mistress. I want to feel your hands on me. I’ve wanted it from the moment I saw you.”
I stepped toward him and pressed my body against his, loving the places where his skin kissed mine. He went still, allowing me to explore. Now that we were here together, he seemed infinitely patient. Stretching up, I kissed the strong line of his jaw as my fingers worked the buttons on his dress shirt. My hands lovingly smoothed the shirt off him. Marcus’s chest was a thing of pure perfection. I let my palms run across smooth muscles. His skin was slightly cooler than a human’s. “Did you look like this when you were human?”
I was fascinated by the stories he could tell. Some nights I listened to him talk for hours.
His lips curled up in a supersexy grin that let me know he liked how I was looking at him. “Not quite. When a vampire turns, he becomes an almost perfect version of himself. Nutrition wasn’t the same in those days, especially for my people.”
Marcus had been among the first Christians, and he’d also been among the first martyrs. He’d been thrown to the lions back in the day. By back in the day he means the early first century A.D., and he’d actually taken out the lions and promptly been thrown into the ring with slightly more intelligent competition. His body showed no signs of his gladiatorial past, though I know it’s all in there. My honey knew how to fight, but I wanted the lover.
I worked off his slacks, pushing them past muscular hips. I quickly discovered that Marcus wasn’t a great believer in underwear. His big cock pulsed against my fingers as they brushed it.
When he was gloriously naked, his hands pulled me roughly to him. He pressed our bodies together, pushing his pelvis against mine. My nipples were hard pebbles against the strength of his chest.
“You belong to me,” he said as his fangs lengthened further and I was drawn into his magic.
I sighed as it ran along my every nerve and my pussy started to throb. I could feel myself getting wet and soft as he pulled me in. His fingers tangled in my hair, and he pulled my neck to the side.
When his fangs pierced, I came like I never had before.
* * * *
“What the hell is wrong with her, Hugo?”
Somewhere in the distance, I could hear the king speaking.
An unfamiliar voice with a crisp British accent responded. “There’s nothing at all wrong with her. She’s doing what she was trained to do. It’s called focused meditation. You pushed her into a place where her two options were to allow her rage and fear to take over or go to a place where you can no longer touch her. She’s one of Marcus’s girls, isn’t she? He always did a damn fine job with Hunters.”
“Can she hear me?” the king asked. “Can you bring her out of it?”
“Marcus could,” Hugo allowed, and I heard Donovan sigh. “She’ll come out when she decides it’s safe. Is this why you called me here, Your Highness? You want me to work with Ms. Owens? Why isn’t Marcus continuing to work with her? I find it hard to believe he doesn’t want to do it. It’s been a long time since we had a Hunter to train. Academics tend to fight over them. Marcus always had a thing for these girls. He was damn good at training them and he genuinely cared about them.”
I blinked a couple of times and took a deep breath as I let go of the vision.
“She’s out,” the man named Hugo said. He was a thickly muscled man with a broad smile. “Hello, Ms. Owens. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I’m Hugo Wells. Your trainer is a good friend of mine.”
My hands were shaking. I’d meditated before, but never under duress. It seemed I had some adrenaline pumping through my system.
Hugo Wells drew my hands into his large ones, rubbing them briskly. I felt his warmth. It was a little like when Marcus touched me, but not anywhere near as strong.
“You’re an academic.”
“I am,” he replied surely. He was an attractive man who appeared to be roughly forty years old, but he was a vampire so he could be a thousand for all I knew. He had blue eyes and salt and pepper hair. “You’ll stop shaking in a moment or two. It’s an aftereffect of the intense meditation.” His kind face smiled on me,
and I could feel a wave of satisfaction being pushed my way. I might shield against that from another vampire, but I’d come to trust academics. Hugo was trying to give me what I needed. “You did a damn fine job, Ms. Owens. You were able to go passive when you needed to. Marcus would be proud of you. You scared His Highness, though. He sent the prince to fetch me. Lucky for him, we academics are daywalkers or he’d be sitting here with no knowledge of what was happening.”
“Why would the king care?” I asked, still a bit unsettled.
It had been so real. I could still feel the warmth from the fire. Marcus had laid me down on the carpet in front of the hearth and made love to me over and over again that night. He’d been insatiable and I’d basked in his affection. I’d had sex before, and with one man I’d felt that elusive closeness and intimacy everyone looks for, but I could feel how Marcus wanted me, how he needed to touch me. It’s unlike anything else. I didn’t have to hope or have faith. I knew in that moment I was beautiful.
I wouldn’t feel his hands on me again, I realized, and I felt tears well. I would miss him so much in this cell.
“Don’t cry, sweetheart,” Hugo Wells said, and I felt a calming wave rush over my senses. “It’s going to be all right. Like I said, you did well.”
The king knelt beside the chair I sat in. “I’m sorry, Kelsey. I had to make sure you had control of yourself. I couldn’t have you walking around here like a ticking time bomb. You did well. Marcus did everything he promised.”
I looked down and the cuffs had been taken off. I was still sitting in the chair I’d occupied before the king interrupted my lunch. I looked around and everything was the same. I had no idea how much time had passed, but I was still in the same room. I’d expected a cell of some kind. “This was some sort of test?”
Trent was at my side with a tissue. He tried to hand one to me, but I wasn’t taking anything from the asswipes who had put me in cuffs. He managed to look a little hurt, but I really wasn’t concerned with his feelings.
