Ganriel

by D. B. Reynolds

  Gabriel closed his lips over her clit, his growl vibrating against her wet flesh as he added a third finger, filling her full as an orgasm crashed over her. Her thighs closed around his head, her hips lifting from the bed as he gripped her tightly, refusing to release her from waves of passion so powerful that they flirted with pain. How could a woman contain such intense pleasure and survive?

  She heard herself moaning helplessly as Gabriel licked at her pussy, lifting his head only once, his face wet with her juices as he grinned and said, “Delicious,” in a low rumbling drawl that had her cheeks heating with embarrassment, even as she shivered with desire.

  She let her head fall back to the pillow, helpless against his una­bashed sexuality, her fingers still gripping his hair as if she had any control over him. Her body was his, given over freely and eagerly, and he was an artist in bringing her pleasure, finding sensuous points on her body that she’d never known existed before her warrior had taken her to bed. She tugged his hair, suddenly wanting him inside her, wanting her arms around him, the weight of him on top of her. “Gabriel,” she whispered. “I want you.”

  “You have me,” he murmured against her skin, as he tongued his way up her pussy, giving her clit a final lick, before going higher, kissing and nibbling her belly, then moving on to her stomach, where he shoved the T-shirt up to her neck, his eyes gleaming as he took in the sight of her breasts. Lowering his head, he took one swollen nipple into his mouth, sucking hard as his tongue swirled around the sensitive peak, rasping over and over the delicate flesh until her nipples were so aroused, so sensitized that she was making needy little noises and unable to stop. Then he closed his teeth over her nipple and bit. She screamed as pain became pleasure, as he sucked more of her breast into his mouth and bit her again, harder this time, enough to barely break the skin, enough that he licked up the tiny drops of blood and released a trace of his vampire euphoric into her system.

  Hana shuddered on the verge of another orgasm, every nerve in her body trembling with feverish desire, needing, wanting. “Gabriel,” she breathed, pleading. “Stop teasing.” His cock was hard against her, grazing her pussy in tempting torment whenever he moved, velvet skin over hard steel as he dragged it through the slick wetness pooling between her thighs.

  He ignored her plea, moving his mouth to her other breast as she moaned, knowing what he would do. She cried out helplessly when he sucked and scraped, when his teeth sank into her nipple, writhing when he took more of her flesh and bit harder, when her blood welled and he licked it up with a growl of hunger, as another half shot of the euphoric slid into her bloodstream. Her body came awake, her skin shivering as a thousand soft fingers were suddenly caressing, coaxing, rousing her to a fever pitch until she was thrusting her hips upward in furious need, demanding he give her what she craved, what she needed.

  But though Hana was a strong woman, her vampire lover out­weighed her by a hundred pounds and had his own plans. Her demands were met by more of the same, as Gabriel took his time with her breasts, seeming to relish every rasp of his tongue, every scrape of his teeth, until finally, finally, he braced himself on powerful arms, and leaving the T-shirt pulled up and her breasts exposed, he lowered his head to her neck and inhaled deeply.

  “You smell like sex and blood,” he murmured, his breath hot on her neck.

  Hana dug her nails into his back. “Fuck me. Now.”

  He chuckled. “I am fucking you, älskling,” he said, and then closed his teeth over her clavicle, just enough that she could feel it, could feel the danger of his bite and know he could snap the fragile bone in an instant. But Gabriel would never hurt her. She knew that as well as she knew her own name. It was the thrill of knowing he could, that tiny spark of danger, that sent erotic chills down her spine, making her want him even more.

  “Gabriel,” she whispered, pleading softly.

  He growled in response, licking his way slowly back up to her neck, lingering there to scrape his tongue hard over her vein, before sucking skin and vein both into his mouth in a way that would mark her for days. She held her breath, waiting for the thrill of his fangs, for the rush of euphoric that was a thousand times hotter than the small infusions from the bites on her breasts. He licked her again, then lifted his hips and slammed his cock into her body at the same moment his fangs pierced her vein. Hana’s entire body—every nerve and muscle, every tendon and anything in between—kicked into instant climax. Her lungs froze in her chest so that she couldn’t even draw breath to scream as her body rippled with ecstasy, as Gabriel truly began fucking her. The draw of his fangs in her vein seemed to move in rhythm with the force of his cock pounding into her pussy, the grinding of his hips against hers tormenting her swollen and aching clit. Her body jolted back to awareness as air filled her lungs. She gasped, then sucked in a breath to scream, desperate to release the erotic sensations that were drowning her in pleasure. But she could only moan as fresh waves of desire rolled over her body, one after the other, keeping time with the thrust of Gabriel’s cock, the draw of his fangs deep in her vein. The pounding of his hips suddenly intensified, as he went faster, deeper. She gripped his shoulders, her legs crossed over his back. He lifted his head, his fangs slipping out of her neck, disappearing as he kissed her, letting her taste her own blood, seasoned by the cream of her sex that coated his tongue. She bit down on his lip, shuddering anew as his blood mingled with hers and slipped down her throat. Gabriel snarled and slammed into her as far as he could go, his blood soaking into her system while she screamed, climaxing over and over, as his body tightened and his cock flexed deep inside her, his groan filling the air as the wet heat of his climax flooded her pussy.

  Hana wrapped her arms around Gabriel’s back as he collapsed on top of her. She took his weight willingly, loving that he was as affected by their lovemaking as she was. Loving him. He lifted his head enough to lick the small wounds on her neck, then lifted it farther and smiled as he licked away the few drops lingering on her breasts.

  “You’re a wicked, wicked man, Gabriel Halldor.”

  He chuckled as he rolled over, holding her to his chest. “You love what I do to your body, woman. Admit it.”

  She kissed his chest. “Well, yes, that’s true,” she said primly, then laughed. “I love you.” They kissed tenderly, and she sighed. “I wish we could stay here all night.”

  “So do I.”

  She sighed again, more deeply. “I suppose we should get ready. We don’t want to show up at the big meeting smelling like sex.”

  “I’m quite certain there will be others in the room who enjoyed their wake-up just as much as we did.”

  “Really?” she said, suddenly curious. “I mean some of them are mated, but . . . what about your buddy Nico? Does he have someone? A girlfriend, a wife?”

  Gabriel shrugged. “I can’t speak to the present, but he never did before. Of course, none of us did back then.”

  “Right. You lived like monks.”

  He snorted. “Hardly. It was a parade of”—he stopped abruptly, seeing her narrowed eyes—“lonely nights and empty beds,” he contin­ued. “A battlefield is hardly the place for a woman. Except for the few female warriors, and they kept to themselves.”

  “Good save, vampire. Who gets the first shower?”

  “I’m thinking we should shower together. The picture I’m getting of all that hot water over your luscious body . . . it’s bringing out the wicked in me again.”

  Hana shivered. She might not survive a second round of Gabriel’s wickedness. She smiled and rested her head on his shoulder. Still, she wouldn’t have her warrior any other way.

  THAT NIGHT’S MEETING was in the big conference room on the first floor. Gabriel wasn’t sure if that was so everyone could sit, or so that when tempers ramped up and power began to pound through the room, there’d be fewer things to fall off shelves and crash into walls. The only potential pr
ojectiles in the conference room were a few bottles of booze and the crystal glasses to go with them, which was terrifying enough. He wondered if he should stroll over and shove everything breakable under the bar but decided remaining with Hana was more important.

  She’d gripped his hand tightly as they entered the room, smiling only briefly when he’d pulled out the chairs closest to the door, just as he’d said he would, to facilitate a quick escape if the meeting got out of hand again. There was no longer any doubt that she was Sotiris’s main target, at least for now, and that fact plainly worried her. His Hana was a trained warrior, which meant she knew how this scenario was likely to end—with either her or Sotiris dead, or even worse, with her under the enemy sorcerer’s control. She’d gone so far as to ask for Gabriel’s promise that if it came down to it, and the only way to stop Sotiris from using her was to kill her, Gabriel would take her out himself. He’d wanted to tell her yes, if only because he knew she was sincere, that her greatest fear was being reduced to nothing more than a captive pawn who was used as a weapon for evil. But as he’d told her, he’d never be able to kill her, no matter what the circumstances.

  Gabriel stood when Nico arrived with Kato and Damian, and surprisingly, their women, too. He thumped shoulders with the men and smiled at the women, then sat down again, even more pleased that he and Hana had chosen seats closest to the door, since Nick took one glance at the setup and immediately went for the chair at the head of the table nearest the window. No matter where Raphael sat, Nico’s choice of seating would leave Gabriel and Hana in a neutral position. Although for a moment he wondered if they should move, after all, since he assumed Raphael would want the opposite table end for himself. But before he could decide, Raphael swept into the room with Cyn, closely followed by Jared and Juro and a human male whom Gabriel didn’t recognize. The vampire lord didn’t hesitate before pulling out a chair for Cyn in the middle of the long side of the oval table and sitting next to her, while Juro sat between Raphael and Damian, and Jared took a seat on the opposite side of the table next to Kato. Three more vampires filed in and took up positions around the room, including the pale-eyed female, Elke.

  Raphael immediately took charge of the meeting, and Gabriel realized it didn’t matter who sat where. This was Raphael’s home. Naturally, he was in charge. If Nico tried to assert his authority based on table position, he’d seem rather foolish, and he was smart enough to realize it.

  “I want to introduce Steve Sipes,” Raphael said, indicating the human who’d remained standing behind him. “Steve’s in charge of my daylight security and needs to be part of this effort. It stands to reason that Sotiris will think a daytime attack on the estate has the best chance of success. He’ll be wrong, but he can’t know that.

  “We all know why we’re here, so let’s not waste time. Hana, I’d like you to tell us what happened last night in my office. My own senses tell me you were attacked, is that correct?”

  Hana gave Gabriel’s hand a final squeeze, then put both arms on the table, hands in front of her and fingers laced casually, showing no sign of the stress he knew she was feeling. Gabriel smiled inwardly. She was a warrior, indeed.

  “Gabriel and I already discussed this, and I’ll tell you what I told him.” She proceeded to do so, telling them of the malevolent feeling of Sotiris’s magic, and her strong belief that while he wanted her alive as his puppet, he’d rather kill her than let her fall into someone else’s hands. The logical “someone else” was obviously Nico, since he was Sotiris’s ancient enemy. But she assumed Raphael had been added to the list now that she and Gabriel were living under his protection.

  “Can you augment Raphael’s power, the way you could mine?” Nico asked, sounding genuinely curious.

  “I’ve never tried, to be honest,” Hana said, which wasn’t quite what she’d told the vampire lord when he’d asked the same question. But then, Gabriel realized, Hana didn’t know Nico the way Gabriel did, and so didn’t understand that he was every bit as trustworthy as Raphael. It didn’t help that the two males had such vastly different personalities. Raphael was all contained power and control, which was more consistent with the style of governing that Hana had grown up with on her grandfather’s estate, while Nico fairly crackled with energy and wasn’t exactly known for either patience or temperance.

  But since it was Hana’s freedom on the line, Gabriel let her choose her own answers.

  “And I’ve never met anyone I could ask that question,” Hana continued, gazing steadily at Nico, “since I’ve never come across anyone else with my particular talent. Though that might simply be because until we arrived here, the only person I’d met with significant magic was Sotiris, and I was too young at the time to recognize it.”

  “I see.”

  Gabriel couldn’t tell if Nico believed her or not, but it didn’t matter, since he could hardly tie her to a chair and force the truth out of her.

  “We suspected all along that Hana was the target,” Raphael said. “After last night, I don’t think there’s any doubt. The only question then, is how do we best protect her until we can take Sotiris out?”

  Nico snorted a laugh. “Easier said than done, my friend.”

  Raphael gave him a cool look, as if to remind him they were in no way friends.

  “I was talking to Cyn,” Nico clarified, grinning when she only rolled her eyes in disgust. “Seriously, though,” he continued, “I’ve had several recent run-ins with Sotiris—”

  “Wait a minute,” Cyn interrupted. “Should we be saying his name like that? Isn’t there some rule in magic about using the name of a powerful sorcerer?”

  “Normally, yes,” Nico responded. “But first, I don’t believe that’s his given name, and I know it’s not his family name. And second, he can’t be surprised we’re talking about him, especially not after last night. So, I think we’re okay, sweetheart.”

  Cyn stuck a finger down her throat in a gagging motion, which made Nico and Raphael laugh out loud, while the others only smiled their amusement. Gabriel smiled, too, once Hana whispered the significance of the gesture to him.

  “I’d gone so long without hearing so much as a whisper from or about Sotiris,” Nick continued eventually, “that I’d begun to think he was dead. He’s never been the type to lie low, but when he finally showed up after Damian’s curse was lifted, I realized that was exactly what he’d done, more or less. He’d turned to crime instead of sorcery, using just enough of his magic to give him an edge, like causing fatal ‘accidents’ to get rid of inconvenient competitors. Once Damian’s curse was lifted, though”—he nodded at the big warrior on his right—“Sotiris came roaring back. He felt the curse break, naturally. It was his curse, after all. And in one of those twists of coincidence that magic is so irritatingly fond of, Sotiris’s path crossed Damian’s at almost the exact moment he was set free.” He indicated Damian’s dark-haired woman. “Casey was already working for me and on the trail of a talisman so powerful that it’s known simply as ‘the Talisman.’ We didn’t realize until she tracked it down and tried to, shall we say, implement a transfer of ownership, that Sotiris’s people were on the same trail. Casey got to it first, and Sotiris’s people almost killed her before taking the device.”

  “What made this talisman worth the risk?” Juro asked.

  “When it was made . . . nothing. It was a pretty bauble that as far as I could tell, sucked in random energy and stored it. But in the modern era, with our dependence on electronics? It could shut down entire cities, drop airplanes from the sky. A terrorist’s wet dream of a weapon, and that’s exactly whom Sotiris was planning to sell it to.”

  “Let me guess,” Elke said dryly. “You stopped him.”

  Nico’s eyes flashed, but he managed a smile. “Casey and Damian did most of it, but yes.”

  “And the device?” Raphael asked quietly, shifting his gaze to Nico.

 
“I don’t know a safe way to destroy it yet, but it’s locked away and neutralized until I can come up with something.”

  Raphael studied Nico, his distrust obvious. Then he shrugged as if to say that was a problem for another time. “Have you clashed with him since then?”

  There was something about the way he said it that made Gabriel suspect Raphael didn’t need to ask the question, that he already knew Nico had encountered Sotiris at least once more.

  Nico gave the vampire lord a silent nod of agreement. “When Kato’s curse was lifted,” he said. “After Damian’s release, I think Sotiris began actively searching for the others. He’d somehow discovered the mu­seum where Kato had been taken and had ingratiated himself with the museum’s board to keep track of the statue, probably with the goal of acquiring it for himself and hiding it away where he could taunt Kato forever. Sorcerers live a very long time, you know.”

  “As do vampires,” Jared commented, grinning as if he were jesting, but everyone there knew he wasn’t.

  “Yes, well.” Nico indicated Grace, the delicate-looking blonde who’d freed Kato and at whose house Gabriel and Hana had met the others for dinner. “Grace broke the curse in the nick of time, but Sotiris didn’t give up. Kato’s magic is somewhat unusual, and—”

  “He’s the Dark Witch’s son,” Raphael interrupted. “That’s more than ‘somewhat unusual.’”