by Dee Carney
“So the newly transitioned we’re finding butchered should be disregarded? The bite and claw marks ignored?” His stomach tightened, pain and mental anguish from the memories disgusting him. He’d seen the bodies himself.
Locke made a small gesture with his hand as he backed away. “If we wanted war with you, it would be direct. We’ve seen the damage you think we’ve caused and I can assure you that a werewolf had nothing to do with it. Why would we? Look elsewhere for your butchers.”
“Vampires have no reason to do these heinous acts,” Bast spat. “It has to be you.”
“Are you vampires really so arrogant that you think the only creatures of the night that exist are you and us? I assure you, our populations are only the tip of the iceberg.”
“We might not be the only creatures that exist, but only your kind is unpredictable. The moon rises, and your beast takes over. All thinking and intelligence...gone.” He snapped his fingers on his last word. It probably wasn’t the most PC statement he could have made, but the minute they held Alice hostage, peacekeeping flew out the window.
Locke took a step forward, and Bast tightened his hold on the trigger. The werewolf’s teeth were bared. “We don’t turn into animals, and the moonrise makes us more predictable than most. You vampires have no idea what it’s like to share a body with something stronger than yourself. Something more cunning. More keen. And it’s not just sharing. It’s combining the strength of man and wolf. It makes us formidable.”
“If you say so,” growled Bast, “but I’d rather be in complete control of my faculties. There’s just room enough for me in this body.”
“We are in control. We can shift at will. But you? Are you in complete control of yourself, Bast Kent? Really? You’re not even like the others. I don’t understand how you defend them when you are so much more than they are.”
Frowning, Bast tried to wrap his thoughts around Locke’s words. “What do you mean?” It came out harsher than he’d intended. Certainly filled with more curiosity than he should have shown.
Locke’s next words were mired in smugness. “Wait. Are you telling me...you don’t know?”
Bast swallowed hard, his jaw clamped shut against the urge to cry out against the pain enveloping him. Locke shouldn’t have been able to sense his agony, but it seemed his last words might have been a jab at his condition. “Do you know what I am?” Bast asked, his voice a harsh whisper.
“Like I said, werewolves and vampires are not the only creatures of the night. We’re larger in numbers, sure. Maybe even the most intelligent, but we’re not alone. Something else wants us at odds, and you’re foolishly falling into line. Tell the Council it’s not us.”
“Answer me,” Bast said hoarsely, still with a singular focus. What did Locke know about him? Somewhere in the periphery of his mind, he heard what he’d said about werewolves not being responsible for the recent killings, but he couldn’t concentrate on that. Not with pain crawling over every inch of his skin right now.
There was sudden movement in front of him.
Bast’s finger squeezed the trigger before his mind caught up to the instinctual action. Locke had freed the creature from its guard, allowing it to bound away on four legs. Bast’s aim was true, the shots slowing but not stopping the beast that vaulted over him.
His head tipped back, allowing him to see with deadly accuracy where the hairs split to make way for the bullets. The blossom of red within. He tried not to see the flesh beneath but failed at that task. He refused to shut his eyes against the gruesome sight. Instead, Bast focused on the rapid heartbeat of the creature, its harsh breathing and rumbling growl ricocheting through its chest.
Even as the heat flared, he saw this and knew he shouldn’t have. The world was so very, very bright. Brilliant. As if the flame within leaped from his body and found home within the trees. Setting them aflame until the conflagration raged out of control.
The lycans used the harsh glare of light to their advantage, shifting into their natural forms. They left in a silent horde, taking their wounded wolf with them. The sharp tang of copper on the air was the only remembrance of their having been there in the first place.
“Good luck, vampire. You’re going to need it,” Locke called ominously, his voice dying on the night air.
Damn it. There was more Bast needed to say to them. To understand.
It would have to wait. He trembled violently, muscles tight with blinding agony.
Bast kept the gun at his side, despite the sparks of fire that surely must be welding the metal to his hand. “Alice,” he said hoarsely.
He hadn’t forgotten her. Never. But he needed her now. Not just the knowledge that she was safe, but at his side. His only salve against a burn that consumed him.
She came to him at a run, her body trembling when she pressed it against his. Her rainwater scent greeted him first. “Are you all right?” she asked, breathless.
He tilted her face to his. “Are you hurt? Did it touch you?”
“I’m fine, but Sebastian...your eyes.” She brought a hand to his face. Paused before sliding her fingers over his skin. “You’re sick again, aren’t you?”
“To the plane.” He kept his voice low, despite the tremors overtaking him.
Alice took a step forward, and Bast gritted his teeth, commanding his body to follow her. One jerky step after another, they tottered toward the plane. Not until they stood before the first step did Alice leave his side. Even then, she allowed him to partially drape his bulk over her as they lumbered up the stairs. From behind, it would look like he went to great lengths to protect her from possible assailants. In his heart, however, he knew he barely managed to lift one foot after another. The six or so steps might as well have been climbing Mt. Everest. Darkness hovered at the periphery of his vision, weaving in and out. He would either pass out and tumble down the stairs or struggle for the strength to keep moving forward.
They were inside, door secured and plane taxiing before Alice turned to him. “Kiss me,” she demanded.
Bast’s guts were churning, but he found the strength to chuckle. What he would have said next dissolved as she took charge and pressed her mouth to his.
Goddamn, she tasted good.
His tense body relaxed a little beneath her kiss and Bast allowed himself to sink into the relaxing hold of the seat. But not before pulling her down to straddle him. Alice came to him willingly, holding his face between her hands as she gave him what he needed. Her kisses sustained him, and he would not question why.
The plane climbed into the air, pulling Alice away from him, but Bast would have none of it. His fingers threaded together behind her back, holding her still. Letting her feel the force of his arousal for her pushing up from his pants and into the juncture between her thighs.
Her tongue slipped in between his lips, and with it the cooling force of her breath. It extinguished the fire raging inside of him, and the relief was so sweet, he could have wept from it.
“You have marked your claim on me,” he said in between nipping at her lip. Those big blue eyes of hers fluttered open. Drowsy and seductive. “Now—please—my turn.”
Chapter Twelve
Alice could barely catch her breath. Not five minutes ago there was this dog—a wolf—staring her down. Then Sebastian came, and she had the letter opener, but he was sick and she had to get him better. Had to get him home...
“Oh my God,” she said, her voice trembling. “This i
s so crazy.”
His lips moved over hers. His hands holding her so very, very close. “You handled yourself like a warrior, princess.” He paused, studying her eyes. “Yes. My warrior princess. I like the sound of that.”
She unclenched her fingers from his shirt, wincing as the blood rushed back into them. It felt as if the sharp edge of the letter opener still cut into her hand as she gripped it tightly. If Sebastian hadn’t arrived when he did, she might have had to defend herself with it. That prospect didn’t frighten her as much as it probably should have. She’d been fending off attackers since her late teens. “I could feel you getting sick. I saw it. The others might not have been able to, but I knew what you were going through. What if...”
“Shh,” he soothed. “It’s over now, and we’re both alive and well. Kiss me again. Kiss away my hurt.”
Alice lowered her face to his, wanting the oblivion. Needing it. She slanted her mouth over his, opening herself to his taste. His heat. “That thing...what was it?”
“Nothing more than a warning.” Keeping one hand on her back, he slid the other beneath her shirt. “Are you still planning on using that letter opener?” he said, chuckling.
A wince later and she uncurled her fingers, still wrapped around the smooth handle. “I was going to put it back lat—”
“I knew you had it. You’re not very good at being stealthy.” His fingers kept trailing fire along her belly, his mouth paralleling with a similar flame on her neck.
“Am too stealthy. You couldn’t have known.”
“Your walk gave you away. A little stiff-legged.”
Her breath caught as Sebastian pulled the T-shirt up and over her head. He leaned forward, covering her breast with his mouth, moistening the bra as if it wasn’t there. Alice found herself arching into the heat coming from him, her mind almost too caught up in his actions to process his words. She paused though when his nibbling became almost too much to bear. “You knew but didn’t stop me?”
Sebastian sighed, his forehead resting against her sternum. He took a deep breath then raised his head to look her in the eyes. “I gave you carte blanche access to my home, where I am still a stranger to you. With your background, I would have been more surprised if you’d left my belongings unmolested. I don’t condone your behavior, but I do understand it.”
A sudden wash of shame flooded her. “I was going to steal it at first. That’s inexcusable and...I’m sorry. For what it’s worth, I’d decided to return it before you offered me the job. I thought you’d never know.”
Sebastian gently bit her lower lip, pulling a gasp from her. “I know.”
Why? It made no sense. For him to know what she was, to have figured out she would have robbed him in his sleep if given half a chance, he should have turned her out at the first suspicion. Instead, Sebastian kissed her. He took sustenance from her and allowed her to take from him.
Just her luck, right? To have a man so perfect, he would have been a Prince Charming for any other woman. To her, he’d been no more than a mark.
The realization made her heart clench.
Then again, her life didn’t come with a Prince Charming. Hers came with stoners and meth addicts. With a brother who tried to sell his sister to his friends. With an illness that might kill her one day—sooner, rather than later.
Alice rocked her hips, purposely brushing against Sebastian’s erection. Anything to banish the current thoughts from her mind.
“You’re thinking too hard,” Sebastian said. His thumb brushed beneath the curve of her breast. Back and forth, stirring her arousal.
“Kiss me again, please.” Her words were a rough whisper. Full of yearning. She wanted him, the man, but she wanted for herself. Just once, she wanted...
Gentle lips brushed over hers, and the live wire short-circuited every synapse in her brain, detonating one after the other until there was no thought left. She moaned into his mouth, reveling in the heat still lingering there. Like before, he fed it to her and she consumed it greedily. Never had it been like this. The intensity, soul-grabbing.
He nibbled down the length of her neck, and each stroke of his tongue over the spot where he’d twice bitten previously sent a bolt of awareness through her. Alice’s back snapped straight, pleasure and heat and greedy need making her fingers fold into the material of his shirt. When he’d drawn from her last, she’d been prepared for the pain that had never come. The first and last time he’d bitten that place, the passion he aroused in her became a living thing, a part of her and him, creating a union from them both. God help her, she wanted to feel his bite again.
Alice made quick work of the buttons of his shirt, needing to savor all that warmth beneath her hands. His skin against hers.
She raked her fingernails over his chest, pride flaring in her as he hissed in a breath. When her touch went lower, stroking over the ridge of flesh tightening his pants, the same slow inhale became ragged.
“Not here,” he said in an abrasive voice.
The words managed to penetrate the haze of her mind. She kept stroking him. Memorizing the length of his promise. “Even if I want it? If I’m saying yes?”
“Christ, Alice. Not while we’re likely to be interrupted. Or overheard.” He kissed the tops of her breasts, which threatened to tumble from the confines of sensible white cotton. “This is as far as I dare.”
But his fingers belied his words, rubbing the burgeoning tip of a hardening nipple.
How quickly she’d forgotten about Pope. She looked toward the front of the plane and found him studiously occupied with cleaning individual specks of dust from the galley. His ears and neck blushed a deep crimson, and for some reason, that made her smile all the more.
Alice kept that slow, sensual rock of her hips steady. The grip of her hand on his cock sure. “What’s the matter, Sebastian?” she whispered, her breath against his ear meant to be as tantalizing as her words. “Don’t have a bit of exhibitionist in you?”
“You would torment the man?”
“If it meant getting closer to you? Yes.” The brush with the wolf had left her shaky, yet exhilarated. Trapped behind it, there had been a moment of paralyzing fear during which she’d made a promise to herself. Each day had just become her last. After she’d spent twenty-four hours with a vampire, the past two years with seizures that left her at their mercy, and then staring at death’s golden wolf eyes, she’d realized she had to start living in the now.
And here, the now was with Sebastian.
“Are you really all right?” He was serious. So serious. “I swear I’ll work quickly on finding another cure for my sickness. I won’t put you in danger again.”
“In twenty-four hours I’ve done and seen more than ever.”
“So you enjoy being this close to being eaten by a werewolf?”
The blood in her face drained in a rush. “A what?”
The smile on his face was grim. “And as much as I’d love to be with you, I think perhaps I should spend the rest of the plane ride explaining a few things about my world. The things you don’t know can get you killed. It might also help with some of the research you’re doing for me.”
She wanted to argue. To go back to what they were doing. To experience the feelings he roused in her. Her disappointment tasted bitter, but Alice nodded. Instead of leaving though, she rested her head against his chest, and listened to the deep timber of his voice as he began to talk about his life.
* * *
“So let me make s
ure I have this straight...”
Bast stared into her eyes, doing his damndest not to look at her lips. Every time his gaze dropped, they ended up making out like teenagers. Made explaining things a little on the slow side.
“Vampires, werewolves and other ‘fictional’—” said with air quotes, “—creatures exist.”
“Yes.”
“Vampires and werewolves don’t get along.”
“Right.”
“You’re in charge of the people who guard the vampire leaders just in case war erupts?”
“Succinctly said, but that explanation will suffice. So, yes.”
Alice narrowed her eyes. “And the reason you’re telling me all this is...”
Because he found it hard to believe he’d ever let her go. Not when in little more than a day’s time she’d shown him more compassion than he’d seen in his lifetime. His sluggish heart beat a little faster, something akin to fear fueling a surge of adrenaline every time he thought about her leaving for good. “Part of it is to ensure your safety while you’re under my employ. The other part is to help you in your genealogy research.”
She wiggled a little in his lap, teasing the longest-held erection he’d had in years. Damn, he didn’t remember as a teenager being able to sustain one like this. With the creamy curve of her breasts just beneath his view and the heat of her cunt resting so close to him, he didn’t know what to wish for more to end the sweet misery.
“You’re killing me,” he grumbled.
“Am I too heavy for you?” she asked, the smile on her face drippy sweet. Alice tilted her hips forward, and the contact electrified him.
“Ask me again after I start feeding you properly. For now, don’t even think about moving.”
“You encounter those things a lot? The werewolves?”
“More now than we used to, but rarely resulting in bloodshed. Once upon a time the vampire kept to his community, and the werewolf kept to his. Now that it’s becoming more difficult to keep our existences away from humans, we’re finding we need to occupy the same places. We’re almost like animals on the verge of extinction struggling to survive in the twenty-first century. Human population growth, steel enclosures, technology...all of it threatens to expose us.”
