Grace knew where this would lead if it continued. She wasn’t stupid. Of course, she’d fallen for Michael before she knew the full truth about him, and that had been pretty dumb. She just couldn’t resist the bad boys, especially when they seemed slightly redeemable. That had to be where Caspian’s power began. He’d said he wouldn’t hurt her and suddenly she’d shoved him into armor that, albeit black, had its own special shine. Next thing she knew, she’d have him wielding a sword and asking her to let down her hair so he could climb up her tower and rescue her.
The reality of it was, however, if she fell in love with Caspian, painting him up like a French whore with her antihero cosmetics, she’d spend her life waiting for him to pop in and visit. She’d be alone with her spells and crochet, and the next time she looked in the mirror she’d be an old woman with no family, having never lived life. And, Caspian would almost certainly lose interest when she became too old to be exciting. He might like fucking her now, but demons didn’t have hearts. He couldn’t fall in love with her. It was all an exercise in futility. She didn’t even know why she was thinking about love. It wasn’t like she had such soft feelings anymore. She’d learned better.
Her fingers strayed to Caspian’s shoulders, his biceps, down his forearm to his hands. Goddess, how she loved his hands. The things those hands had done to her, the way those fingers had moved inside her. His fingers were long and elegant but strong and talented.
She twined her fingers with his and exhaled deeply, rolled onto her back, and drifted off to sleep. But only seconds later she started awake again because his arm clamped down on her belly. It was like being caught in a Chinese finger trap; the more she struggled, the tighter he held her. She slapped at his hand to get him to let go, but of course, it did no good. He was still sleeping like a coma patient.
This was going to end in the “suck” column, because she really had to pee. And sweet bleeding hell of hells, it had begun raining outside. The gentle pitter-patter of the raindrops hitting the window would have been enough torture by themselves, but she could hear the water trickling through the downspout like a musical waterfall.
Grace tried to clamp her thighs together, but it didn’t seem to help. Dreaming of a trip to the porcelain god, she struggled against Caspian but accomplished nothing. Well, that wasn’t completely true; she felt his erection pressing against her rump as she managed to roll over. So . . . she’d accomplished a hard-on. Or it could just be the Morning Wood fairy. She didn’t know if demons were susceptible to that.
She squirmed some more, hoping that if she rubbed against him enough, it would wake him up and he’d let her go. No such luck was to be had. Grace only had enough room to roll over, back to Caspian. She did so and pinched his nose shut, hoping that would wake him up, waited patiently for his brain to tell the rest of the body that he was getting no oxygen and to rise before his life functions ceased. But after her arm ached from holding his nostrils together, she realized he didn’t actually have any life functions.
She was about to let go when his eyes popped open. There was almost an audible snap. Grace shrieked and dropped her arm, and a moment later found herself flat on her back with a horny demon atop her.
“Not nice, Gracie,” he said against the edge of her mouth. He didn’t even have morning breath. She didn’t know whether to be thankful or jealous.
“What’s not nice is that I have to pee and you won’t let go of me. Now, get off unless you want a . . .” She couldn’t bring herself to say it, even as a silly threat. He might just be that perverse.
She suddenly found herself sitting atop the aforementioned porcelain god. Of course, Caspian had forgotten to miracle her knickers down.
“Will you stop that? You can’t just transport—” she called out.
She was interrupted by the slamming of the bathroom door. Obviously, he wasn’t as perverse as she’d thought. This made her unreasonably happy. Grace was a big fan of never being so comfortable with someone that it was okay to leave the bathroom door open. After all, if she was to put her mouth anywhere, she didn’t want to see—
She decided not to pursue that thought.
When everything was finished, she found herself back on the bed underneath Caspian, just as she’d left him.
“You really have to stop that.”
Caspian didn’t say anything, just crushed his mouth to hers. Grace was immediately on fire. His talented tongue ignited sensations in her akin to dropping a blowtorch in a drum of gasoline. She needed him in a way that was previously unknown to her, which was totally unacceptable. This was business. She had to get rid of him fast—and yet the bad-sex idea was still at the very bottom of her list of plausible courses of action.
She broke away. “Wait.” She was going to ask him what he was thinking about right now. She was going to be disgustingly cute about it, too. He was male, so this had to work. Of course, she’d said that before.
“For what?” His hand slid to her breast, and his thumb across her nipple caused it to peak. Sensations shot from the sensitive bud deep into her belly.
“I want to know what you’re thinking about.” The words tumbled out of her mouth in a rush. Damn it! She must really want to know what he was thinking. That couldn’t be good. Why did he have to think at all? He was eye candy. Who cared what he thought?
Apparently, she did.
His brow furrowed and he seemed confused. “What do you think I’m thinking about? You.”
Oh! That warmed her insides, but the warmth was far from comfortable. It began a wildfire, knowing that Caspian was concentrating on nothing but her. But what had she expected? Did she picture him pondering the exchange rate of the zloty against the U.S. dollar? Maybe the plight of the Galapagos booby? She was repeatedly amazed by her own naïveté.
“Well, what about me?” she demurred, her hand on his chest, his deliciously wide expanse of chest. Oh, this was hard. And so was that rock of manhood seeking entry between her thighs, making her all wet and slippery. How could she tell him that the club was closed, its velvet rope drawn shut, when her body was being so traitorous? She was standing there holding the doors wide open and bringing him in for a landing like a 747. She was even holding glow sticks.
“Caspian—” she began.
He closed his mouth over that same nipple and looked up at her.
“I’m serious,” she managed.
“Balls deep, baby doll. That’s what I’m thinking about.” His mouth was poised over her breast, his breath doing damnable things to that responsive flesh.
“That’s it?” she prevaricated.
“What do you want me to be thinking about? The gestation of a Galapagos turtle?”
Grace scowled. She’d just been thinking that word, “Galapagos.” Was he in her head again?
He laughed. “Oh, come now.”
Come? Yes! Right now. Oh, please.
But Grace didn’t listen to her body.
“You know you’d be angry if I was thinking about anything but being with you. What’s with all this conversation stuff anyway? We speak an older language. A more primal dialect.” He licked his lips before flashing his pearly whites and dipping his mouth back to its task.
Grace hated herself for a moment, but luxuriated in sensation. Then, she didn’t know where or how, but she found the strength to move her hand up to palm his face and stopped him mid-delight.
Caspian sighed. “What now? I can’t give you mind-numbing, earth-shattering, clit-wrecking pleasure if you keep interrupting me.”
“Maybe I don’t want mind-numbing, earth-shattering, clit-wrecking pleasure. Did you ever think about that? Hmm? I bet not.”
Right. Because it was so horrible and awful, and not at all what a sane woman would be after. Not that she had all of the sandwiches in her picnic basket. Grace wanted to shake herself, to rattle her teeth out of her head like pennies from a piggy bank for being so stupid. Talk about cutting off her nose to spite her face. She shouldn’t desire him as much as she did
.
“Uh, no, Grace. I actually never did think about that. I thought we were past it.”
“What’s that supposed mean?”
“You know very well what it means,” he replied.
“You mean, when I first summoned you and you did that female change-y thing? Just because I said okay then? Well, a onetime ‘yes’ isn’t good for eternity. It’s not like Open Admission Day at Yankee Stadium.”
“Your hand is still on my face.”
“Sorry.” Grace moved her hand but didn’t put it down. She knew the minute she did, Operation Talk Him Out of Your Knickers was a bust, because he would be in them and she would be out.
“Do you want to do that again? Is that what this is about? Fine. We can experiment. I can change form—”
“Caspian!”
“That’s not the right answer either?” His brow furrowed, and she could see his mental wheels spinning fast and furious, clearly seeking the correct response. “I wasn’t kidding when I said I’ve never worked this hard to please a woman. Mortal or no.”
He looked so genuinely confused that Grace actually felt sorry for him—until she imagined him pleasing other women. Immortal women with voodoo punani. All of whom she hated instantly on principle.
Hated? It couldn’t be jealousy. No, never that. She scowled at the thought. But it wasn’t written anywhere that she couldn’t lie to herself. She could tell herself any little thing she pleased. Thank God. Sometimes self-delusion was just what the doctor ordered.
“So, are you going to tell me the right answer or not? Usually that’s what you women do when you start having feelings or . . .” He trailed off, glancing around like a kid caught up to his elbow in the Christmas cookies.
Grace growled. “I’m not having . . . any kind of feelings. What’s wrong with you? Just because I’m female and you give great orgasms doesn’t mean I’m going to get all anime-eyed, a baby seal awaiting your attentions. I’d have to be sixty-three kinds of coconut-flavored dumbass to fall for a demon. Your kind has the attention span of a goldfish.”
“Whoa! I never said you were doing anything of the sort,” Caspian replied.
Grace cursed her idiot tongue and wondered where its filter had gone. She was sure there’d been one installed at birth, right there between her brain and mouth. Apparently, it was on the fritz, or it caught some sort of virus that had eaten its operating system. She would never have vented that little bit of information otherwise.
Of course, even to her own ears her protests were a little too hot. And she knew she sounded petulant, but she couldn’t help it. Or she didn’t want to. Who cared, really? Of all the ways that this could end, none of them was good. Not for her, at least. Caspian wouldn’t be hurt. He would just go on with his demonic business.
“You’re upset about something,” he said.
You think?
“What’s wrong, Grace? I can’t fix it unless you tell me.” Caspian rolled to the side and with gentle fingers pushed errant strands of hair from her forehead. “This isn’t like you.”
What was this pile of horse apples? She’d just had a tantrum and he was indulging her? He was asking her what was wrong? Why wasn’t he just washing his hands of her? And, how would he know what was “like her” or not? She could be a Bitch Kitty Deluxe on a red wagon for all he knew.
A faint and silly hope sparked to life in her breast: He cared for her. He had to! Joy burst through her limbs in a molten rush, but it congealed like cold lead when she realized that Caspian still had to go. There was Nikoli. Even if they managed to save him, she couldn’t very well raise her son with a demon. And she couldn’t forget what would happen when she got old. She would still age, still die. It was inevitable. Her life functions would cease, while Caspian was eternal. Why would he want to court that? And what about when her beauty was gone, when her “velvet-walled Heaven” was more like an abandoned cabin built of poison oak? Would he stay with her then? Could she even ask him to?
No. It was better to make him go away before he realized he cared. Caspian was a glutton, devouring any sensation he could experience. He’d suck the marrow out of her until there was nothing left. Even knowing the impossibility of their relationship, that’s what he would do when he realized he had feelings. He’d glut on them—on the sensations, at least. She’d be left with nothing. Not her heart, not her soul. He’d take those both away.
No. Actually, Grace knew better. He wouldn’t take her heart and soul; she’d give them away free and clear. She could already see it on the horizon, like a thunderstorm rolling across a prairie. And here she was, galloping forward at a hundred miles an hour.
What was she going to do? Should she really tell him what was wrong? Images flashed through her mind of Caspian in all his fiendish glory. While the sight was beautiful, it was also terrifying. She believed that he would never hurt her on purpose, but what if she made him angry, called forth the kind of rage that sometimes masked pain? Grace had really stepped in it this time, stepped in it with bare feet. With every second that passed she could feel badness oozing through her toes.
“Why do we have to rut like dogs in heat every time we’re together?” she accused. Great. Perfect way to drive home the fact that she wasn’t having feelings, pushing him away like this.
Goddess, though, she sounded like an Olympic champion nagger. Her voice was shrill and irritating, and she didn’t like herself, not talking like this. She didn’t know how Caspian put up with it. Or maybe he was just acting the way she’d expected, his attention like a crow’s: on her until something better and shinier distracted him.
“Because you like it?” he said.
Part of her wanted to say that she didn’t, but that would have been a big fat lie. There was no amount of language tampering that could make that statement true. She’d just end up choking on her words.
“I didn’t say I didn’t like it, but I . . . want to do something else.” She almost hadn’t been able to get that one out, because all she wanted was to feel his body working hers in that primal rhythm, slick and hot and hard. She imagined his hands, his mouth—oh, his mouth!
His lip curled in distaste. “What else is there?”
“I don’t know. You could take me out to dinner.”
He sounded hopeful. “Afterward, as you so eloquently put it, can we come back here and ‘rut like dogs’?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
He sighed. “Grace. I hate to remind you, but . . . I, uh, already paid for it,” he said.
“Really.” Apparently Grace was also one of those people for whom the word was also a warning. This wasn’t a question. It wasn’t a declarative, either. It was filler. It was a placeholder to prevent her rage from spewing forth in a tsunami. For he’d just given her what she needed to escape him.
Caspian must have realized his mistake. “I didn’t mean that how it sounded.”
“How did you mean it?” Grace’s mouth was a thin slash that barely concealed her teeth. She felt her face pinch with displeasure.
Caspian was backing slowly away, as if she were a lioness with a paw caught in a steel trap. He was clearly smart enough to know dealing with a woman’s sensitivities was a brutal business, even if he was contractually in the right. “I just meant that we’d traded. That we’re still trading. That ...”
“That I’m just some whore. Your Mephistophelean contract binds me for fucking and suddenly I’m your property?” The last of it was half a question because her voice broke off at a higher pitch. Grace was angry, but her heart was also falling to pieces along with Caspian’s dark but shining armor. She’d always assumed it would.
“I see that you’re upset,” he began.
Upset didn’t even begin to describe this, but the situation was ultimately a good one. It was a good thing that her silly dreams and impossible hopes were shattered like spun glass on the concrete of reality. It would make the future easier. It would make what she had to do easier.
“I don’t want this
anymore,” she said. And what do you know, it was the truth. It wasn’t a half-truth or even a convenient stretch; she really didn’t want this. She didn’t want the pain, the complication, or the abject despair when he left her.
He moved away from her, making a show of getting up off the bed, though he could have just teleported himself away. Despite the fact that she had no patience for women who wouldn’t say what they were thinking and expected their men to simply know, part of her was still hoping that he’d argue. It had been so easy to cast the first stone before she’d moved into this glass palace. But he didn’t oblige. She wondered if he knew more than he said.
He flashed her a devastating smile and turned to leave. “Whatever you want, Grace.” He paused by the dresser and turned to eye her once more. “If you change your mind, I’ll be around.” Then he was gone.
“I won’t,” she declared, needing the last word. Also, speaking aloud made her intention more real, cemented her resolve. It would be so very easy to call his name and bring him back, to forget everything but the heat between them, his cock pounding into her, filling not just her body but those dark, despairing places of her soul that would still be empty when they finished.
A sudden ache between her thighs drowned out all else. She remembered Caspian’s demonic tongue teasing her clit while stroking the inside of her, his hands all over her body. How did she get herself into these messes? This infernal sex drive was like an STD. She hoped there was a cure, because she needed it now. In an attempt to find relief, her fingers traced her body, following the same paths, invoking memories of Caspian. They slid inside her very wet passage, and her thumb worked her clit.
How to Lose a Demon in 10 Days Page 12
