Prologue
"If you tell anyone, I will deny it and decapitate you," she said casually as she pulled her panties on.
"Noted," I replied as I watched her through hooded lids and pondered what it would take to get her to remove the offending scrap of material and go for another round. Was I insane? Yep. Did I have a death wish? Absolutely.
"I just said I would remove your head and that's all you have to say?" she demanded.
"Depends on which head you're talking about."
"Oh my God. I cannot believe you just said that," she yelled and hurled a lamp at my head.
Ducking the light fixture, I rolled off the bed and donned my jeans. I winked as I caught her ogling my backside. "I heard you and I raise you one. I will deflower, deny, and decapitate. Damn." I shook my head sadly while grinning from ear to ear. "Already deflowered...two hundred years ago."
"You're an ass," she hissed as she yanked on the rest of her clothes, covering a body that was made for sin. However, the mouth left much to be desired. Well, not when it was wrapped around my...
"This was a mistake that will not be repeated," she informed me haughtily as she twisted her red curls into some kind of sexy looking bird’s nest on the top of her head. "Never going to happen again."
Who was she trying to convince? Herself? Me? We'd been playing this game for quite a while. I was tempted to make a wager with her since she had a hard time passing up a bet or a dare, but that could backfire on me in a large way.
"Heard that one before, Red." I slid my shirt over my head and quickly sidestepped a left hook from the insane woman I'd just given eight consecutive orgasms to.
"My name is not Red. If you value your jewels you will remember that," she snapped as she strapped a dagger to the sexiest thigh I'd ever seen.
Why were the hot ones certifiable? I slid my katana into its sheath and waited patiently for the next insult. Was I a glutton for punishment? You bet, but it was worth every damned second.
"You know," she purred, "you're not really that good."
"Interesting," I commented as I slipped a knife into my boot. "That's not what you screamed ten minutes ago."
The look on her face was priceless. The next words from her mouth...not so much.
"I faked it."
Rolling my eyes, I wondered for a sickening moment if that was true and immediately decided it was bullshit. I was over two hundred years old. I knew when a woman faked it. Didn't I?
I shrugged and chuckled. "Well, that's too bad because I enjoyed the Hell out of it. Especially when you screamed my name and your body clamped itself around my..."
"Enough," she shouted as she practically sprinted to the door. "You're an arrogant son of a bitch and I can't stand the sight of you. You will never touch me again. I will no longer slum it with lowlife asscranks like you and your big mouth and your big ego and your big..."
"Dick?" I asked politely.
"In your dreams," she informed me over her shoulder as she hightailed it out of my suite like the Devil was on her heels.
I flopped back down on my bed and smiled. Now I knew she was lying...
Score one for me.
Chapter 1
Later that afternoon...
All Hell had broken loose. I hadn't had so much fun in ages. Literally.
"Bet you can't nail my head," I challenged with a smirk. Riling her up was my favorite pastime.
"Bet this, jackass," she shouted as she hurled something colorful and large.
The object flew through the air like a speeding bullet. I couldn't even make out what it was.
"Shrew," I shot back with a laugh as I ducked. The crash was loud. I winced as I realized she'd just annihilated an ancient Ming vase.
"Moor dweller," she hissed as she flung another irreplaceable artifact at my head.
"Very clever," I replied as I dodged the incoming projectile.
"I thought so...Heathcliff," she purred.
Her smile was infuriating and lamentably hot. The room was decimated. There was very little else to break except for her...
It would be far easier to be in a room with the abomination if I didn't want to kill her or bed her. I was torn between which one would give me more satisfaction...tearing her arm off or losing myself inside of her body. Unfortunately neither was a viable option at the present time. Her fiery red curls had fallen out of the mess on her head and fell loosely down her back. Her creamy skin tempted me to distraction. She was every man's fantasy and my personal nightmare. Even the sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose, which she usually disguised with glamour were making my pants tight and uncomfortable at the moment.
Working as a team had been a tremendously bad idea, evidenced by the rubble that used to be Prince Ethan's study--my dearest friend and brother to the nightmare that was staring daggers at me from five feet away. Thankfully Ethan's son, young Samuel, our one and only student, had not been present for the latest showdown between his teacher, her and his fight coach, me.
I'd simply leave the room. That was far more mature than throwing her over my knee and spanking her. Or, God forbid, stripping her down and fucking her into submission on the couch we had destroyed in our melee. Leaving would ensure that she lived another day in her long immortal life and that I wouldn't be brought up on charges for killing a Princess—no matter how much she deserved it.
I stiffly turned to go and was shoved right back into the room by my cousin Astrid, the mother of the child we were supposed to be teaching.
"What in Satan's slightly misguided obsession with Journey happened to this office?" Astrid demanded as she stormed into the room and plopped down on what used to be a priceless antique settee. "Motherfucker, this chair just stabbed me in the ass."
"Ask Wuthering Heights," the flame haired viper snapped as she pointed at me with her middle finger—definitely not an accident on her part.
I glanced up at the ceiling hoping against hope it would give me the strength not to rip an appendage from her body. I'd had enough of the Wuthering Heights slams. Yes, I was named after a literary character. And yes, my sister was named Cathy. However, my mother had been friends with Emily Brontë...hence the names. I'd come to terms with it hundreds of years ago...or so I'd thought.
"So Cousin Heathcliff..." Astrid said as she grinned at me. "Care to enlighten me?"
"Not particularly," I told her. "Why don't you ask the lady?"
My nightmare blushed in fury. Her delicate hands fisted at her sides and her eyes blazed green, which delighted me to no end and made the erection in my pants even more painful. Vampyres didn't blush, but this one did—an anomaly that fascinated me.
"Raquel?" Astrid questioned as her head bobbed back and forth between us like a spectator at a tennis match.
"He has anger issues," Raquel spat.
"Pot, kettle, black," I muttered.
"Plus he keeps daring me," she said as if it were all my fault.
"Well, I can certainly understand that," Astrid said. She gave me the stink eye while acting as if the bullshit Raquel just spouted made sense. "However, do you think you guys could take this outside instead of destroying my house?"
"Ask him," Raquel said without looking at me.
"You're buying this crap from her?" I demanded of my cousin.
Astrid shrugged and grinned.
Raquel completely ignored me and went on. "Anyway, he's a chauvinistic pig who clearly comes from a line of pigs. I can't be expected to work with him."
Astrid was enjoying herself far too much. She found a clutter free spot on the floor and got comfortable. My cousin, too many times removed to remember the number, loved drama—especially drama that she didn't create.
"You do realize you just called me a swine oh sister in law," Astrid said as Raquel blanched.
My mother had been Astrid's grandmother several hundred years after she had given birth to my sister and myself. While at first it had been awkward and alarming since Astrid and I mistakenly thought we were attracted to each
other, it turned out to be a blessing. The logistics of our heritage were complicated. Easiest and shortest way to explain--reincarnation on my mother's part.
"I didn't mean you," Raquel replied contritely.
"Heathcliff is my thirty-fourth or seventy-eighth cousin," Astrid told her as she played with the shattered pieces of a vase that was older than dirt. "So while he may be all those other things, his line is pristine."
Even I had to roll my eyes at that one. I was a Vampyre and Astrid was half Vampyre and half Demon. Pristine was pushing it.
"Raquel, come with me," Astrid said as she got up and stepped on an ancient scroll. Both the bane of my existence and I winced at that one. "We'll find Samuel and you can teach him quantum physics or some other equally redonkulous bullshit like algebra."
"My pleasure," Raquel said as she waved goodbye to me with her middle finger and flounced out of the room.
That would definitely be the first body part I would remove.
"Heathcliff, you wait here. Ethan wants to talk with you."
The sound of Raquel's laughter as she sped down the hall made me grind my fangs. She wouldn't have the last laugh. Nope, I'd make sure of that.
***
"She's a pain in the ass and as difficult as they come, but she's brilliant and she's my sister. You will make this work. And for God's sake stop betting her or daring her to do things—she can't stop herself," Ethan said tersely.
My oldest and closest friend ran his hands through his hair in frustration as he took in his office. I glanced around at the disaster and looked down at the floor. I never lost control. Ever. That woman was knocking me off of my game and I didn't like it.
"She not difficult. She's a fucking menace," I told him. There simply had to be another way.
"Correct." Ethan grinned, enjoying my pain. He was just as bad as his mate, Astrid. "You two are it. Astrid and I trust you with the life of our son and that is not something we do lightly."
"She blushes," I said.
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Raquel blushes," I repeated.
Ethan busied himself with trying to piece together a statue that had been the victim of Raquel's wrath. He ignored my query.
"It's not normal," I went on.
"Nothing about my sister is normal. Nothing about her is typical and most of what I know about her defies logic. However, that's her story to tell. Not mine. Furthermore, you are both related by blood to my son and unfortunately the two of you are the most qualified to teach him what he needs to know," Ethan snapped as he tossed the statue into a wastebasket. "My child is six months old. He's the size of a four year old. He can turn people’s skin all colors of the rainbow, not to mention he can conjure Trolls and Gnomes." Ethan shuddered. "He's been kidnapped by Fairies and he needs to be trained to defend himself. Not sure how much clearer you need me to make this."
"Then let me teach him to fight and send her back to the rock she lives under," I shot back. "He doesn't need to know his multiplication tables to kill a Troll."
"And that is where you are wrong, my friend," Ethan said. "His mind is a wonder. We need to feed it and keep it occupied so he stops animating stuffed animals that have death wishes."
"You're joking."
"No, I'm not joking. Not even a little fucking bit," Ethan ground out. "Have you ever been attacked and almost decapitated by an army of orange and blue teddy bears?"
I was speechless.
"I thought not," Ethan said wearily. "Add to that a fire breathing purple plastic dragon and a dagger throwing headless doll. My son thinks this is funny."
"It actually is kind of funny."
The glare I received made me bite back the tasteless dragon joke that was on the tip of my tongue. Samuel was not just a Prince and the child of Astrid and Ethan. He was a True Immortal--one of nine. God was Good. Satan was Evil. Mother Nature was Emotion, her husband, the father of Satan was Wisdom. Hayden, the Angel of Death was Death. Elijah, the Angel of Light was Life. Dixie, Satan's daughter was Balance, her half-sister Lucy was Temptation. Astrid was Compassion and Samuel was Utopia--a combination of all of them. That kid had one Hell of a row to hoe.
"I knew this would be difficult," Ethan admitted, "but it is what it is. You will do this because I have asked you and you will do it well."
"Yes, I will, but I will not be responsible if your sister loses a few limbs."
There was no choice in the matter. I had no issue with training the child. I adored him and it was an honor to have been asked. However, getting along with the shrew was difficult at best and impossible at worst.
"As long as it's not her head then I'm fine with that. Just don't do it in front of my child," Ethan said. "Clear?"
"Clear."
It was a promise I didn't know if I could keep.
Chapter 2
"Me can't eat pie. Me a Vampyre just like you," Samuel explained to Raquel as I watched from my seat at the desk in Ethan's newly renovated office. I pretended to be absorbed in a folder filled with fighting techniques, but I was truly fighting to keep my eyes off of Raquel. She was a witch and I was determined to break the psychotic spell she had on me. Clearly screwing her out of my system wasn't working. I'd been doing that for two hundred years with no clear end in sight. My pants were killing me at the moment. Embarrassingly, not even Samuel's presence could quell my desire.
The furniture in the office had been replaced with finds from yard sales since we had destroyed a small fortune due to our skirmishes. The ragtag desks and chairs looked ridiculous in the grand office with the marble floors and cathedral ceilings, but it was a wise move on Ethan's part. We could not be trusted around priceless objects.
"It's not the kind of pie you eat," Raquel corrected him with a giggle and a kiss. "It's math. You can't eat math."
Why didn't she ever giggle at anything I said? Where in the Hell did that come from? I pressed my fingers to the bridge of my nose and went back to the paperwork in front of me. Astrid, my only and least favorite cousin at the moment, had decided Raquel and I would work with Samuel together. It would force us not to kill each other, or so she thought. She was wrong. I knew if need be I could distract Sammy with something shiny and dismember my foe in two seconds flat. The major problem with that scenario was the she could potentially do the same thing to me. I might outweigh and outmuscle her, but her rabid desire to maim couldn't be discounted.
She was dangerous to my concentration, my life and most definitely my libido.
"Do you remember what I told you about pi? What a big number it is?" she asked Samuel as she pointed to a passage in a book.
Sammy closed his eyes and slammed his chunky little hands over the numbers.
"The first fifty numbers in dethimal digits are 3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510. Is me right?" he asked as he peeked under his hand.
"Um, yes," Raquel choked out. "How did you know that? We haven't learned that yet."
"Me debided some stuff in my head, silly Raquel." He laughed and pulled on her red curls as he popped his thumb into his mouth with satisfaction.
"Very good," she whispered as her eyes caught mine in shock.
Did this kid even need us? Well he needed me, but his brain was a sieve. Maybe Raquel could go back to her dungeon and leave me to work with Samuel.
"Looks like he's smarter that you," I said as I got ready to duck in case the textbook came flying.
"Looks like you're still an ass," she shot back.
"Ass ass ass ass ass ass ass," Sammy chimed in gleefully as Raquel closed her eyes and dropped her head to the table in defeat.
Damn it, that was my fault, not hers. She would not get in trouble for teaching him the word ass when I goaded her into it.
"Samuel, an ass is a donkey--an animal similar to a horse. Aunt Raquel was referring to me as a strong and masterful horse with all of the massive parts that a horse has. She has hung a great honor on my head. Do you understand?" I asked. My double entendre was not lost on my enemy a
s she bit back a laugh and pretended to throw up. Grinning, I shrugged and blew her a kiss. Furthermore, I was not in the mood to be chastised for expanding his swearing vocabulary. His mother, Astrid was doing just fine with that on her own.
Raquel rolled her eyes dramatically swallowed her grin. However, she said nothing. Astrid had threatened to remove tongues if her boy learned new potty words. I liked my tongue and God knew I liked hers.
"Yes, Sammy," she agreed with me. "Although Heathcliff is a donkey. Donkeys are much smaller than horses in every way. In fact many would call them puny—tiny, puny and inconsequential. Unable to satisfy the needs of anything."
A Fashionably Dead Christmas Page 9
