by M. L. Briers
“Huh?” Carson looked towards the back door, and Lulu snorted a chuckle as she waved an absent hand.
“I don’t think she’ll kill him,” she shrugged it off. Carson opened his mouth to speak, but she motioned to the bottle in his hand. “Keep pouring, that much Scotch wouldn’t even get a nun drunk.”
“Drunk?” he frowned. He wasn’t sure he wanted her drunk, she was enough of a handful sober, and then there was the whole wooing thing.
“Just a little numb will do,” she said dismissing his worries with another wave of her hand. “Oh here, let me speed things up.” She took both glasses and tipped the contents from one into the other; she looked suitably impressed. “Better.”
“About that lesbian thing,” Carson said as she brought the glass to her lips.
Lulu’s eyebrows pinched together, and it took her a long moment to catch up with what he was saying.
“Sure, if you know any; I don’t mind you fixing me up,” she shrugged, grimacing inwardly. She never could keep her lies in check, which was why she tried not to tell them in the first place.
Carson narrowed his eyes at her as a low, deep rumble echoed in his chest. Hell, he knew she was pulling his chain, and yet, she’d put that thought in his mind – his mate with someone else.
Normally, the thought of two women together would have enticed his X-rated thoughts in an entirely different direction, but that didn’t happen. She was his mate, and an imaginary male or female had the same effect on that green-eyed monster within him, and his rush to anger was a real one.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he bit out.
Carson reached for his empty glass and poured the Scotch, eyeing his mate as he did it. The woman offered him an innocent smile, and he noted just how sincere she looked – he’d remember that – she was a good actress when she needed to be, but she wasn’t getting anything by him. He could sense her deceit.
“I guess we’ll never have a family, but that’s okay, I can live with that,” Carson said, placing the bottle down on the counter between them and reaching for his glass.
“What?” Lulu craned her head on her neck and frowned. She wondered if she’d heard him right.
“I suppose that I can make that sacrifice for my mate,” he said before taking a long drink of the fiery liquid. It burned and felt damn good going down.
“Never having sex again?” Lulu turned her nose up at that idea.
“Well, like I said, a sacrifice…”
“That’s not a sacrifice; it’s a bloody tragedy, an abomination of the worst kind…” she spat out without putting her brain in gear. When he grunted, she snapped her mouth shut and her attention fully on him.
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
~
“Needs must,” Carson shrugged.
“There’s a word – n-e-e-d-s,” Lulu offered back, looking as if he’d just grown another head.
“Needs,” he said with a downcast expression – then he pepped right up. “Still, you are my mate, and you come first.”
“I do?” She looked lost.
“You do.”
“That’s … good to know,” she muttered, taking a small sip of her drink and thinking on that one.
The guy was crazy. He was young, virile, and sex on a damn stick, and there he was telling her that he’d never have sex again for the rest of his days – geez, she knew that mates were the sacred cow of everything, but seriously? Like – never?
That man should be sainted or something. People should fall at his feet and worship at the altar of his selflessness.
Who did that – who just never had sex ever again? Priests, she guessed, not shifters in the prime of life.
Lulu felt guilty. Not just for winding the man up, because he kind of was fair game, but for the fact that she was being deceitful and he was more than prepared to put her feelings and needs first.
“It’s not like either of us can help what we are, how we’re born, right?” he said, rubbing it in once he’d seen her reaction to his declaration.
Lulu grimaced again and made a lame noise in the back of her throat in agreement. He was right – he was a decent man, a shifter, yes, but thoughtful to the extreme, and she was a horrible, deceitful person, and she felt ashamed of herself.
“As long as we’re together…” he shrugged one broad shoulder, and that movement made his bicep bigger, and his chest looked beefier.
Lulu had to admit, just not out loud, and certainly not to him, but she was attracted to the man. Pretending to be something she wasn’t came as second nature to her, it wasn’t as if she went around declaring she was a witch, but still … she felt about twenty shade of mean right then.
Carson watched her mull that over. For the first time in his life, he wished that he was a vampire and not a shifter, just so he could read her mind.
~
~
“Umm…” Karen scowled as she eyed the vampire. Slade hovered in mid-air over the cushion at the end of the sofa she was sitting on.
“Yes?”
He’d been standing in front of her with his hands at his chest to show her that he was no threat for so long that he thought it was time to take it to the next level and show her that he could sit beside her without pouncing. He guessed she had other ideas.
“What are you doing?”
“I like to call it sitting,” Slade offered back, and still he didn’t complete the task and put his backside down onto the cushion. “It’s what sofas are made for and their whole purpose in life — who am I to deny it its purpose?”
“I need…” Karen pushed up to her feet, walked towards the hearth, and wrapped her hand around the poker that she’d been eyeing for the last half an hour.
Satisfied with her weapon of choice, she turned back toward Slade to find him sitting on the sofa with a cocky grin on his lips.
“Feel better?” Slade asked, amusement flashed in his eyes and made her feel slightly silly.
“Much.” Of course, she wasn’t going to admit she felt silly, or back down from her stance. Piper and Lulu wouldn’t do that, and they were used to dealing with someone like him.
“Just make sure that you thrust the stake hard and fast right through my heart…”
“W-hat?” The mental image that he’d put in her mind did nothing to swell her confidence and everything to disgust her at the thought.
“Well, I wouldn’t want to be flailing around like a headless chicken with the poker sticking out my body, front and back, because that could be messy, and awkward.”
That brought a whole new set of images to her mind, and she didn’t care for any of them. Slade judged her mood and decided that he’d got the reaction that he was hoping for. Maybe she wasn’t such a bloodthirsty wench after all – he could hope.
“And then what? It’s not like that would kill me — you have to make sure that you plunge the poker deep into my heart.” He pressed on, drawing her a pretty picture and taking heart in the fact that she was grimacing at the thought of it.
“I think I could do that,” she offered, quite innocently, so innocently in fact that Slade knew he had probably misjudged her mood.
While she didn’t like the idea of dealing with an undead vampire, she didn’t seem to have a problem with the act of trying to kill him in the first place.
“You think? When dealing with vampires, you have to be sure. Not me, of course.” He was back to holding his hands up to his chest again, palms towards her in surrender, and watched as she narrowed her eyes on him. “You can call me a practice run, stab me as many times as you want until you have the desired effect of killing me because I won’t attack you back. But other vampires…” He shrugged.
“But I don’t want to kill other vampires…”
“Just me then?”
“Well …” She left that hanging there, but Slade got the message.
“Go for it, give it your best shot — stab,” Slade offered back. “I’m not going to stop you.”
“I’m … thinki
ng,” she said, and she was — thinking about how best to handle the situation, how best to handle the vampire, and if she really wanted to kill him or not.
He was as sexy as hell, but that cocky grin on his face told her that he knew that. All the stories that she’d ever read said that vampires were designed to lure you in — he’d certainly done that.
“Oh, for the time when you weren’t prejudging me, and we shared an hour of pleasant conversation in each other’s company – but perhaps you’re right, fangs — bloodlust — it’s not as if I can control myself, oh wait!” He held up his index finger on a Eureka moment.
“That was different — I’m sure you were eyeing up my jugular vein the whole time,” Karen tossed back.
“Of course, why would I even bother to admire your curvy figure that a man could die craving to explore, your eyes, that a man could get lost in, or your bubbly, infectious personality that is a damn sight more appealing to while away the hours with than anyone else around here possesses?” Slade tried to quash the cocky grin on his lips and go for a more innocent look about him.
“You think I have a curvy figure?” She asked, raising her chin slightly and eyeing him with suspicion. Personally, she thought her hips were too big and she was carrying a little spare winter warming flesh around her middle, but she’d always been critical of herself.
“I do, it’s very tempting.”
“As tempting as my blood?” She snapped back as if she’d called him out in a lie.
“You seem obsessed with blood, tell me, which one of us seems to have a bloodlust at the moment?”
“Huh?”
“Well, there you stand, poker in hand and ready to stake me through the heart, and all that you seem to talk about is blood — blood — blood.”
“Because it’s what you’re thinking about, isn’t it?” She demanded.
“No, Miss Marple, I’ve had my bloodlust in check for a number of years now — but I am rather concerned with yours.”
“You can’t turn this back on me…”
“Blood hungry wench that you are.” He was back to offering her a cocky grin again.
Karen went to speak but took a moment to think about it. There he sat, seemingly harmless, no fangs in sight, and a big smug grin on his face — how was she supposed to react to that?
The man was right, they had spent a good portion of time together, and he hadn’t attacked her, drained her blood from her body, or even shown a hint of his fangs. She hated the fact that she was more than curious to see them — would they be the same as described in the books that she’d read?
She tried to push that thought from her mind. The man was a vampire — the last thing she wanted was for him to get his fangs out. Fangs meant feeding — feeding meant blood — she had the blood — ergo, feeding on her.
It felt strange to her that the thought of him feeding was somehow appealing at the same time as it was appalling. In every piece of literature that she’d read about vampires the act of feeding was supposed to be erotic, that led her to wonder if that was actually true. Not that she wanted to find out — or maybe she did?
Karen wondered if maybe she should just ask him? Hell, no. That would give him entirely the wrong idea.
“You do know that I can read your thoughts, right?” Slade’s words sent a rush of adrenaline through her body, and her mind scrambled to man the barricades at the same time as she tried to try to remember every thought that she’d had around him.
Then the cold chill of embarrassment washed through her veins. She might not remember every single thought, but she knew what she’d just been thinking about.
“Whoops,” she muttered on another grimace as she looked anywhere but at him.
“Indeed.”
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
~
Nick stood stock still with his arms folded across his chest offering her a look that said he was onto her game. He even cocked his left eyebrow and bade her to bring her best.
“Behind you!” Darlene tossed up a hand and pointed over his shoulder.
“Like I’m going to fall for that one,” Nick offered back in a dry tone and with a sneer that did little to warm her to him.
A heartbeat later and one hearty thump upside his head and his body crumpled to the ground revealing the vampire that stood there looking rather pleased with himself.
“He can’t say that I didn’t try to warn him,” Darlene shrugged.
“Yes, thanks for that,” Boris offered back in a dry tone that said he wasn’t best pleased with her tactics.
“What can I say? I like to see a fair fight,” Darlene lied.
“Then why did you call me?” Boris offered back looking rather bored with the situation at hand. He’d only come to her rescue because she’d called in the favor that he owed her. “No friends?”
“Says Billy-no-mates,” she snorted.
“Do you really want to have a discussion about mates?”
“That’s not the point,” Darlene grumbled as she glared back at him.
“Yes, I caught the gist of the conversation between you — you’re welcome, by the way — but I won’t get between you and your mate again,” Boris informed her. “My debt is paid, and I’m out of here.”
“But, my friends are at the main house…”
“Good luck with that…” He turned to walk away, but she wasn’t finished with him yet.
“I could use a hand,” Darlene grimaced. She wasn’t sure what his help would cost her, but her friends were worth the price.
“What part of my debt to you is paid didn’t you understand?” He tossed back over his shoulder, continuing to walk away.
“Fine, then I’ll owe you.”
“Interesting offer — but what part of I won’t get between you and your mate again didn’t you understand?” He tossed back.
“I’ll owe you one for every friend, and I have three friends; that’s three extra favors…”
“Tempting, but no.”
“Oh, come on!” Darlene stomped her booted foot on the ground and clenched her fists at her sides.
“Wolves, witches, and mates — a vampire would have to be stupid to get involved…”
“You’re already involved, you’re here, aren’t you?” Darlene hissed back.
“My advice — leave your friends behind and don’t look back, run, run, and save yourself.” He chuckled before disappearing into the darkness of the night.
Darlene looked down at her mate’s crumpled body and grimaced. She had warned him. It wasn’t her fault that he was too stupid to believe her.
Now, she would have to rescue her friends by herself. No problem.
“Nice dress by the way,” Boris called from somewhere in the distance, and she grunted her contempt for him before turning on her heels and stalking away from Nick.
~
~
“What is that?” Piper hissed.
“What?” The alpha tried for innocent, but he wasn’t sure that he could pull it off.
He knew exactly what she was talking about — his length had sparked to life and was rock hard, bulging against the material of his jeans — and he’d tried to shift his position and hide it from her, but that obviously hadn’t worked.
“You know what,” her eyes had narrowed to tiny slits in her face, and she hissed her words back at him like a coiled snake ready to pounce.
“A natural byproduct of our situation,” Den said.
“Well, if you don’t want to get another knee in the balls, I suggest you get the hell off me,” Piper grumbled.
She got that he was an alpha male shifter, full of testosterone and reacting to his mate as any man would in the circumstances, but that didn’t mean she had to like it. The trouble was — she did like it.
Thoughts, images, and questions circled the wagons in her mind as she tried to deny her attraction to the man. It wasn’t working.
Fate had made it so that there was an instant attraction between them, and that had been the
case. But he’d been an alpha shifter, and she was a witch — it had been easier to push those thoughts aside when she hadn’t known that he was her mate.
That knowledge jumped up and down in the back of her mind waving its hands and baying for attention like it was okay to be attracted to him because fate said so. But it wasn’t okay because if she let the mating pull have its way then she knew exactly where that would lead. A lifetime with him.
There was a part of her that didn’t see that as a bad proposition — and there was a part of her that rallied against it. She wanted to be the cheerleader for the second part, but when he was pressed against her like that then the first part was winning out.
“Do not kick me in the balls again,” Den grumbled a growl within his chest, and even though there was an inch of air between them, she still felt that rumble go through her hard nipples.
“Then don’t make me,” she offered back like a warning mixed with a challenge, and challenging an alpha never ended well.
“Perhaps it’s time that you realized that there is no running from fate,” he offered back, and those words pinged back and forth in her mind. It wasn’t like she hadn’t thought about that already.
Fate was fate, and he was right, you couldn’t run from your mate — not permanently anyway.
“Well, I seemed to have assumed the position already, so why don’t you just take advantage of me?” The sarcasm dripped from her tone, but a heartbeat later and his lips came down on hers.
For one long moment, her brain screamed at her — zap him! — But, then the soft, demanding touch of his lips smacked her brain upside the head, and without even considering what she was doing, she melted against him.
There were kisses, and then there were kisses and boy-oh-boy, could that man kiss?
Her body didn’t just melt — she was boneless. Her mind felt like a punchdrunk boxer — dazed and confused — and worst of all, she liked it.
Piper hated herself for liking it, and liked it all the more.
That constant spark of excitement that hit home deep within her and brought her body to life was intoxicating. Her hands seemed to have a mind of their own as they traced down his back and sought the smooth skin under his shirt.
