Lover Unleashed bdb-9

by J. R. Ward

  “Rain check?”

  “Later.”

  Instantly, her face changed, the lovely lines tightening up and hiding the fragile passion that had bled through her features. “But . . . of course. Indeed.”

  He hated hurting her, but there was no way to explain how badly he wanted her without making it pornographic. And she was a virgin, for God’s sake. Who deserved better than him.

  He took one last lingering look at her and told his brain to remember it. Somehow, he needed to not lose her. “Do what you have to. Now.”

  Her eyes drifted down the length of him and lingered at his hips. When he realized she was looking at his sex, which was standing at attention and then some, he discreetly hid what was going on beneath his scrubs with his hands.

  His voice got hoarse. “You’re killing me here. I can’t be trusted with you right now. So you’ve got to do it. Please. God, just do—”

  ELEVEN

  R avasz. Sbarduno. Grilletto. Trekker.

  The word trigger banged around V’s skull in all the languages he could put it into, his brain spicin’ his vocabulary up for shits and giggles—because it was either that or the thing would cannibalize itself.

  As he rocked his Google Translate, his feet took him through his penthouse at the Commodore over and over again, his relentless pacing turning the place into a multimillion-dollar hamster-wheel equivalent.

  Black walls. Black ceiling. Black floor. Night view of Caldwell that was never what he came here for.

  Through the kitchen, through the living room, through the bedroom and back.

  Again. And again.

  In the light of black candles.

  He’d bought the condo about five years ago, when the building was still under construction. As soon as the skeleton had risen down by the river, he’d been determined to own one-half of the top of the skyscraper. But not as some kind of home—he’d always had a place away from where he slept. Even before Wrath had consolidated the Brotherhood into Darius’s old mansion, V had been in the habit of keeping where he crashed and stashed his weapons separate from his . . . other activities.

  On this night, feeling as he did, the fact that he had come here was both logical and ludicrous.

  Over the decades and centuries, he’d developed not only a reputation in the race, but a stable of males and females who needed what he had to give. And as soon as he’d taken possession of this unit, he’d brought them here to this black hole for a very specific kind of sex.

  Here, he’d shed their blood.

  And he’d made them scream and cry out.

  And he’d fucked them or had them fucked.

  V paused by his worktable, the old wood battered and marked not just from the tools of his trade, but from blood and orgasms and wax.

  God, sometimes the only way to know how far you’d come was to return to where you once had been.

  Reaching forward with his gloved hand, he took hold of the thick leather bindings he used to keep his subs where he wanted them.

  Had used, he corrected himself. As in past tense. Now that he had Jane, he didn’t do those things anymore—hadn’t had the impulse.

  Glancing over at the wall, he measured his collection of toys: Whips and chains and barbed wire. Clamps and ball gags and razor blades. Floggers. Lengths of chain.

  The games he played—had played—were not for the faint of heart or the beginners or the casually curious. For hard-core subs, there was such a fine line between sexual release and death—both got you off, but the latter was your last shot. Literally. And he was the ultimate master, capable of taking others where they needed to go . . . and one thin inch past that.

  Which was why they all came for him.

  Had come for him—

  To him, he corrected.

  Fuck.

  And that was why his relationship with Jane had been a revelation. With her in his life, he hadn’t felt the burning need for any of this. Not for the relative anonymity, not for the control he exerted over his subs, not for the pain he enjoyed inflicting on himself, not for that sense of power or the pounding releases.

  After all this time, he’d thought he’d been transformed.

  Wrong.

  That internal switch was still with him, and it had been flipped to the “on” position.

  Then again, the urge to commit matricide was stressful as shit—when you couldn’t act on it.

  V leaned in and fingered a leather flogger that had stainless-steel balls tied on its ends. As the lengths filtered through the fingers of his ungloved hand, he wanted to throw up . . . because standing here, he would have given anything for a slice of what he’d had before—

  No, wait. As he stared at his table, he revised that. He wanted to be what he once had had. Before Jane, he’d had sex as a Dom because it was the only way he’d felt safe enough to get through the act—and part of him had always wondered, especially as he was cracking the whip, so to speak, why his subs had wanted what he’d given them.

  Now he had a pretty good idea: What was banging around his inner skin was so toxic and violent, it needed a release valve that was cut from its own cloth. . . .

  He walked over to one of his black candles without being aware that his shitkickers were crossing the floor.

  And then the thing was against his palm before he even knew he was gripping it.

  His craving brought the flame upward . . . and then he tipped the lit tip toward his chest, hot black wax hitting his collarbone and rivering down to streak under his muscle shirt.

  Closing his eyes, he let his head fall back as a hiss sucked through his fangs.

  More wax on his bare skin. More sting.

  As he got hard, half of him was on board and the other half felt like a total skeez. His gloved hand had no problems with a split personality, however. It went for the button fly on his leathers and sprang his cock.

  In the candlelight, he watched himself bring the candle down and hold it over his erection . . . and then tilt the lit wick toward the floor.

  A black tear slipped free of the heat source and went into a free fall—

  “Fuck . . .”

  When his lids loosened enough so that he could open them, he looked down to see the hardened wax on the rim of his head, the little line of it paving the way to where it had dropped off.

  This time he moaned deep in his throat as he lowered the candle tip—because he knew what was coming.

  More moaning. More wax. A loud curse that was followed by another hiss.

  There was no need to go pneumatic. The pain was enough, the rhythmic drop on his cock shooting electric shocks into his balls and the muscles of his thighs and ass. Periodically, he moved the flame up and down his shaft to get clean shots at fresh flesh, his arousal leaping every time it got hit . . . until there had been enough foreplay.

  Sweeping his free hand under his sac, he went vertical with his sex.

  The wax hit right on the sweet spot, and the sharp agony was so intense, he nearly went down on the floor—but the orgasm was what saved his legs from going loose, the power of the release stiffening him from head to foot as he came hard.

  Black wax everywhere.

  Come all over his hand and his clothes.

  Just like the good ol’ days . . . except for one thing: It was really fucking hollow. Oh, wait. That had been part of the GOD, too. The difference was that back then, he hadn’t known there was something else out there. Something like Jane—

  The sound of his phone chiming made him feel like he’d been shot through the head, and even though it wasn’t loud, the quiet shattered like a mirror, the shards of it showing him a reflection of himself he didn’t want to see: Happily mated, he was nonetheless here in his chamber of perversion, getting himself off.

  He hauled back and Curt Schillinged the candle across the room, the flame extinguishing in midflight—which was the only reason the whole fucking place didn’t get burned down.

  And that was before he saw who the call was from.


  His Jane. No doubt with a report from the human hospital. For fuck’s sake, a male of worth would have been outside the OR, waiting for his sister to come around, supporting his mate. Instead, he’d been banished for being out of control, and had come here to spend quality time with his black wax and his hard-on.

  He hit send as he stuffed his still-hard cock back in his leathers. “Yeah.”

  Pause. During which he had to remind himself that she couldn’t read minds, and thank fuck for it. Christ, what had he just done?

  “Are you okay?” she said.

  Not in the slightest. “Yeah. How’s Payne?” Please let this not be bad news.

  “Ah . . . she made it through. We’re en route back to the compound. She did well and Wrath fed her. Her vitals are stable and she seems to be relatively comfortable, although there’s no telling what the long term result is going to be.”

  Vishous closed his eyes. “At least she’s still alive.”

  And then there was a whole lot of silence, broken only by the quiet whir of the vehicle she was traveling in.

  Eventually, Jane said, “At least we’re over the first hurdle, and the operation went as smoothly as it could—Manny was brilliant.”

  V judiciously ignored that comment. “Any problems with the hospital staff?”

  “None. Phury worked his magic. But in case there’s someone or something we missed, it’s probably a good idea to monitor the record systems for a while.”

  “I’ll take care of that.”

  “When are you coming home?”

  Vishous had to grit his teeth as he did up the buttons of his fly. In about a half hour, he was going to have a ball so blue it was a U of K fan: Once was never enough for him. It took five or six times to get him what he needed on an average night—and there was nothing even close to average doing right now.

  “Are you at the penthouse?” Jane said quietly.

  “Yeah.”

  There was a tense pause. “Alone?”

  Well, the candle was an inanimate object. “Yeah.”

  “It’s okay, V,” she murmured. “You’re allowed to think like you are right now.”

  “How do you know what’s on my mind.”

  “Why would there be anything else?”

  Jesus . . . what a female of worth. “I love you.”

  “I know. And right back at you.” Pause. “Do you wish . . . you were there with someone else?”

  The pain in her voice was nearly eclipsed by composure, but to him the emotion was bullhorn clear. “That’s in the past, Jane. Trust me.”

  “I do. Implicitly. You would cut off your good hand first.”

  Then why did you ask, he thought as he squeezed his eyes shut and hung his head. Well, duh. She knew him too well. “God . . . I don’t deserve you.”

  “Yes, you do. Come home. See your sister—”

  “You were right to tell me to go. I’m sorry I was an asshole.”

  “You’re allowed to be. This is stressful stuff—”

  “Jane?”

  “Yes?”

  He attempted to form words and failed, the silence stretching out between them once more. Fucking hell, no matter how much he tried to put sentences together, he found that there was no magical combination of syllables to properly phrase what was in him.

  Then again, maybe it was less a function of vocabulary, and more a case of what he’d just done to himself: He felt like he had something to confess to her, and he couldn’t quite do it.

  “Come home,” Jane cut in. “Come see her, and if I’m not in the clinic, find me.”

  “All right. I will.”

  “It’s going to be okay, Vishous. And you need to remember something.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I know what I married. I know who you are. There’s nothing that’s going to shock me—now hang up the phone and get home.”

  As he told her good-bye and hit end, he wasn’t sure about the noshock thing. He’d surprised himself tonight, and not in a good way.

  Putting his phone away, he rolled up a cigarette and patted his pockets for a lighter before remembering he’d tossed his Bic POS back at the training center.

  His head cranked around and he looked at one of those goddamn black candles. With no other option, he went over and leaned in to light his hand-rolled.

  The idea of going back to the compound was the right idea. A good, solid plan.

  Too bad it made him want to scream until he lost his voice.

  After he finished his smoke, he meant to extinguish the candles and go straight home. He honestly did.

  But he didn’t make it.

  Manny was dreaming. Had to be.

  He was dimly aware that he was in his office, lying facedown on the leather couch that he regularly crashed on for REM catch-ups. As always, there was a set of surgical scrubs wadded under his head for a pillow, and he’d kicked off his Nikes.

  All this was normal, business as usual.

  Except then his little nap warped on him . . . and suddenly he wasn’t alone. He was on top of a woman—

  As he reared back in surprise, she stared up at him with icy eyes that were blazing hot.

  “How did you get in here?” he asked hoarsely.

  “I am in your mind.” Her accent was foreign and sexy as hell. “I am inside of you.”

  And then it dawned on him that beneath his body, she was so very naked, and warm—and holy Christ, even with his confusion, he wanted her.

  It was the only thing that made any sense.

  “Teach me,” she said darkly, her lips parting, her hips rolling under his own. “Take me.”

  Her hand moved between the two of them and found his erection, rubbing at it, making him moan.

  “I am empty without you,” she said. “Fill me. Now.”

  With an invitation like that, he didn’t give anything else a second thought. Fumbling around, he shoved his scrubs down his thighs and then. . .

  “Oh, fuck,” he groaned as his hard cock slipped up her slick core.

  One shift over and he would be buried deep, but he forced himself not to breach her sex. He was going to kiss her first, and more to the point, he was going to do that right because . . . she’d never been kissed before—

  Why did he know that?

  Who the fuck cared.

  And her mouth wasn’t the only place he was going to go with his lips.

  Pulling away a little, he ran his eyes down her long neck to her collarbone . . . and went even lower—or at least tried to.

  Which was his first clue that something was off. Although he could see every detail of her strong, beautiful face and her long, braided black hair, the sight of her breasts was hazy and staying that way: No matter how much he frowned, there was no clarity coming. But whatever, she was perfect to him no matter what she looked like.

  Perfect for him.

  “Kiss me,” she breathed.

  His hips jerked at the sound of her voice, and as his erection slid against the very heart of her, the friction made him groan. God, the feel of her pressed up tight to him, with the head of his cock having parted her and burrowed in, searching for that sweetest spot. . . .

  “Healer,” she gritted as she arched back, her tongue coming out and dragging over her lower lip—

  Fangs.

  Those two white tips were fangs, and he froze: What was underneath him and ready for him was not human.

  “Teach me . . . take me . . .”

  Vampire.

  He should have been shocked and terrified. But he wasn’t. If anything, what she was made him want inside her with a desperation that left him in a sweat. And there was something else . . . it made him want to mark her.

  Whatever the hell that meant.

  “Kiss me, healer . . . and don’t stop.”

  “I won’t,” he moaned. “I’m not ever going to stop.”

  As he dipped his head to bring his lips to hers, his cock went off in an explosion, the orgasm shooting out of
him and going all over her—

  Manny came awake on a gasp that was loud enough to rouse the dead.

  And oh, shit, he was coming hard, his hips grinding into the sofa as delicious, hazy memories of his virgin lover made him feel like her hands were all over his skin. Fucking A; even though the dream was clearly over, the orgasm kept coming until he had to lock his teeth and jack one of his knees up tight, the jerking pumps of his cock fisting the heavy muscles of his thighs and chest until he couldn’t breathe.

  When it was all over, he sagged face-first into the cushions and did his best to grab for some oxygen, because he had a feeling round two was going to get its groove on soon. Tendrils of the dream tantalized him and made him want to go back into that moment that had not existed and yet felt as real as the consciousness he had now. Reaching into his memory banks, he tugged at the filaments of where he’d been, bringing the female back into—

  The headache that plowed into his temples all but knocked him out—sure as hell, if he hadn’t already been horizontal, he would have landed on the damn floor.

  “Fuuuuck . . .”

  The pain was astounding, like someone had nailed him on the skull with a lead pipe, and it was a while before he had the strength to shove himself onto his back and try to sit up.

  The first attempt at vertical didn’t go well. The second was successful only because he braced his arms on either side of his torso to keep from pulling a down-and-out again. As his head hung like a deflated balloon off his shoulders, he stared at the Oriental rug and waited until he felt like he could make a beeline for the bathroom and fire back some Motrin.

  He’d had these headaches a lot. Right before Jane had died—

  The thought of his former chief of trauma brought on a new wave of someone-please-shoot-me-between-the-eyeballs.

  Breathing shallowly and purposely thinking of absolutely, positively, fucking nothing somehow got him through the attack. When the agony had mostly passed, he lifted his head experimentally . . . just in case a minute change in altitude brought on another pounder.

  The antique clock behind his desk read four sixteen.

  Four a.m.? What in the hell had he done all night since leaving the horse-pital?