Red Demon

by Deidre Knight

  As gently as he could, he led her toward the king-sized bed. His wings fell heavily across his back, tickling the bare skin. He flashed on an image right then, of Jules writhing and naked beneath him, those same wings brushing the bare legs she wrapped about his torso.

  In a flurry of fevered motion, they were on the bed, tangling together in a graceless, surging motion.

  “Gotta get these clothes . . . off,” he cursed, but she was already beating him to it. She had her fingers working at his zipper, struggling to lower it. The task was made much more difficult by the way his cock punched against the thing. As if his hard-on could find its own way out of his pants and into her beautiful hands.

  After a moment, she sighed, reclining against the pillows. “I think you’d better take over this job, my love.”

  He knelt beside her and cautiously unzipped his pants, pushing them down about his thighs. He’d worn boxers, and immediately his erection jutted out through the opening, the air cool against his heated flesh.

  With a slow, catlike smile, she studied his erection. “I suppose, long as you’ve lived, that you knew Michelangelo.”

  He grinned like a fool, beaming at the praise.

  “For surely,” she added, drawing in a breath, “you represent his ideal of masculine beauty.”

  His wings spread behind him, dragging across the bedspread. That wouldn’t do. This moment, this joining of their bodies, should be graceful, easy. He swallowed, and absorbed the feathered appendages again.

  She leaned up on her elbow. “Later? You’ll . . . have them again? For me?”

  “Anything Juliana Tiades wants, milady shall have,” he promised, wondering what she’d make of the soft down that covered his pubic area when in hawk form.

  She collapsed onto the pillow with a delighted grin. “I want to be naked, wrapped all in your feathers,” she said, and he blinked in shock, afraid he might come just from thinking about that idea.

  With a heady, intoxicated groan, he followed her down onto the pillows. She parted her thighs, welcoming him much closer, and he began working at her layered bustle. Lifting it up about her hips, so he could settle between her legs, he was overcome by the image of her as a birthday present, one intended only for him.

  “You said you wanted me to unfasten you,” he reminded her with a growl. “That night when you’d ordered the French lingerie.”

  “I want you to open me. Completely, Aristos, because everything I am is for you . . . so I should belong to you completely, too,” she encouraged, staring up into his eyes. He must have hesitated, because she nodded, dragging his right hand to the front of her corset. “Unbind me, Aristos. We’ve waited so long for each other. Make me yours for all time.”

  As if by some unspoken agreement, they began peeling away the layers together. Ari’s pants went flying across the room in a balled-up heap; her lingerie vanished beneath his deft fingers. And then they were bare, totally, with no separation between their bodies at all.

  “Take me,” she urged, pulling him down atop her own body. “We should never have been denied this moment. . . . Please, make me yours now.”

  She twisted her hands through his hair, tongue mirroring that motion inside his mouth. They were all motion and heat, hands caressing each other. Rocking together, hip to hip, a crazy tempo already going between them . . . and he wasn’t even inside of her yet.

  Angling his hips, he pressed the tip of his erection against her slick opening. He wasn’t sure any woman had ever been so wet for him. It was important to be gentle, but he almost wondered whether he was capable of restraint, what with the way she lifted her hips, urging him inside of her.

  He shifted his weight, pushing more firmly, and she gave a light yelp. He lifted his body, but she instantly seized his hips, urging him back to her.

  “You . . . surprised me; that’s all.” She panted slightly, burying her face in his long hair. “Do it, Ari. I’m ready; it’s okay.”

  “I’m a big guy,” he warned her, narrowing his eyes as he studied her much smaller body beneath his own. “It’s gonna hurt a little, but I’ll be good to you, baby. I’ll make it as painless as possible . . . and as sweet as you deserve. Then the really fantastic part comes right after. I promise.”

  He leaned on his elbows, needing to look right into her eyes, but his sweaty hair waved across his face. She brushed it back, keeping that palm against his cheek. His late-afternoon beard shadowed his face, and she rubbed her fingers across it, frowning slightly.

  “Juliana,” he said slowly. “Don’t look away from me. I don’t want to hurt you; you know that. So let’s move through it together. You and me, sweetheart.”

  After a moment, she gave a resolute nod. He started to apologize for the impending pain, for his monumental size—that he was bigger than a mortal man. But she cut the words off with a kiss, cupping his face between both her palms. She moaned and said, “Ari, do it. Now.”

  And so he did.

  Having learned as a child that pain was best endured swiftly and without hesitation, he gave a single, jolting thrust, sheathing himself fully inside her. She tensed, a sharp little cry passing her lips, and he held his entire body still, even though he all he wanted was to start moving deeper within her.

  Better for the pain to have its way, and then the sensation would be done. Forgotten, too, because he planned to obliterate it from her mind and body—to replace it with a series of pleasures so heavenly, there’d be no way she would recall this momentary unpleasantness.

  She sucked in a breath and clung to him, her fingers digging into his broad shoulders. He waited, his forehead pressed against hers. At last, she relaxed, sighing beneath him.

  She smiled up at him. “You’re inside me,” she whispered in amazement, stroking his face. “It feels . . . odd. But beautiful.”

  “It gets better,” he murmured, giving a hesitant thrust.

  Her eyes widened in surprise, and she gasped. He stilled again. Then, she wrapped her arms about his neck, nodding decisively. “I’m ready.”

  She’d spent enough time imagining this moment, Juliana thought, and yet she’d never come near its real power. As Ari began to move and push inside her, the waves of pleasure were more than she’d ever thought possible. But it was so much more than that, so profound, this realization that he was literally inside of her, the two of them separated by nothing at all. She clung harder, pressing her eyes shut at the wonder of it.

  You are one with me. . . .

  She couldn’t stop shivering and thrilling at the knowledge that, after their years of physical separation by death and eternity, they were now totally joined; nothing could ever separate them again. Ari moaned loudly, almost seeming to sense her thoughts; he arched his long back. They made sounds of pleasure, free- falling into each other. He was hesitant and gentle at times, demanding and aggressive at others, but all of his motions seemed calibrated to heighten her pleasure and satisfaction.

  Ari was every bit the romantic, tender partner she’d always known he would be. He had proven determined to pleasure her, driven by the same crashing need that was compelling her onward—that had her wrapping her legs tighter about his waist. Already she was discovering that doing so would draw him deeper within her, create a sparking jolt of pleasure in her deepest places—while eliciting a leonine purr from his full lips.

  Yet no matter how deep he surged or how overwhelmed she felt with the lust and heat of it all, she couldn’t seem to get enough. So she clasped his hips, speeding his rhythm, matching it with her own frantic motions.

  This, he clearly liked very, very much. For he growled, shifting her slightly so that he pushed even deeper.

  She moved her arms up to caress his back, holding him close, rising with every one of his movements. But it wasn’t enough—she needed even more, a part of him that he was holding back.

  As her pleasure spiraled upward, stealing her breath, she moaned, “Wings. I want you, Ari. All . . . of you!”

  They came alive benea
th her fingertips immediately, prickling the skin of her palms as they lengthened and expanded across his back. At that instant, pleasure trembled like a quake through her own body, her slickness gripping about him. Ari increased the friction and pace, hammering into her with murmured cries of wonder, pleasure. He whispered tender Greek words that she couldn’t understand, and then he arched upward, wings beating with tremendous, rushing motions that mirrored the way his erection jerked inside of her.

  Rolling waves of intense pleasure spun through her body, between the two of them; they clung and moved, riding the sensations to completion. Until, utterly spent, they simply held each other.

  Trembling, awed, they pressed their faces together—she began to sob in response to the wild sweep of emotions, hot tears rolling down her face. She couldn’t have stopped them, not if she’d wanted to. Especially once she realized that she tasted more than her own tears.

  Face burrowed against her shoulder, massive shoulders trembling against hers . . . Ari wept silently, too.

  Chapter 23

  “Well, that’s one mystery solved,” Ari drawled. He was lying on his belly with one large wing curling her right up against him. “You’re a wing chick. And you like me. You really, really like me.”

  “I love you!” she blurted in dismay. Didn’t he understand the depth of her feelings by now?

  He only nestled her closer, wedging her flush against his hip. “I love you more.”

  “So it’s a contest?”

  “Spartans are competitive about everything, Jules.”

  She frowned, a niggling thought edging at her mind. “I know my history, don’t forget.”

  He grinned, propping his chin on both forearms. “Yeah, you know we were glorious.”

  “I know you were married. That you were required to have at least one son; that it was the only way any Spartan was allowed to fight at Thermopylae.”

  His smile vanished. “I had three.”

  “Wives?” she gasped, and he cut his eyes at her.

  “Woman, I thought you just said you knew your history! We weren’t polygamists,” he snarled, and then more quietly added, “I had three sons. Amazing little men . . .” He rested his cheek on the pillow again, facing her. “I miss them every day. That’s not something I ever admit to anyone, by the way.”

  “But River? Emma? You seem so close to them.”

  He sighed. “River’s my best friend, has been for a long time. But I never told him about you, either. Some things . . .” He scrubbed a hand over his eyes, then looked at her. “Some stuff’s just too painful to talk about, you know? So you lock it away, hide it inside. Like losing you. Loving you and then losing you.”

  “They had no idea I ever existed,” she finished, already knowing that was true. “I wondered why you’d never mentioned me.”

  “Didn’t talk about you; didn’t chat about my boys. All of it”—he tapped his chest—“I kept in here.”

  “What happened to them after . . . well, once you stepped into eternity, so to speak?”

  “I never found out.” He flinched at the admission, his eyes drifting shut as if to escape the pain.

  “Didn’t you wonder how they fared?” she asked, surprised that such a deep-feeling man could have ever rested without knowing.

  “Others among us, they watched their loved ones and families from the shadows. I just couldn’t.” He stroked her nose, letting his fingertip linger on the end of it. “You know, I’m a pretty simple man, always was, and that part of me . . .” His expression grew troubled. “Some parts of me never did change.”

  “I waited at the town house for you.”

  He said nothing, frowning. “Did you suffer?”

  “Did you worry that I did?”

  He shook his head. “I thought you were in Elysium. I had to believe that because the alternative hurt too fucking much.” He gave her an apologetic look. “I don’t know how it worked for you, living on all these years like you did, but I found avoidance a pretty handy tactic. I’m sorry. If I’d known, or understood that you needed me . . . still wanted me . . .”

  She touched his cheek. “There are many things I don’t recall about my death, Aristos, but I know that I had a choice. I remember a warm light, the way it beckoned to me. I was supposed to go on, but somehow I couldn’t leave. I chose to linger . . . to wait for you.”

  “I should’ve come back to Savannah sooner,” he whispered intently. “I never should have left.”

  “My choice wasn’t your fault.”

  “Yeah, but I always figured your death was—my fault, I mean,” he admitted. “That’s the main reason I was so angry all these years. Not just your dying or . . . that it was because of me.”

  “Aristos!” she cried, but he waved her off.

  “I should’ve revealed my nature more carefully, not shown up so winged and eager. I mean, we were going to make love. That was scary enough, I’m sure.”

  “I did not kill myself. Know that.”

  After a long moment, he nodded. “I believe you now. Totally.”

  She ran her fingers through his long hair in appreciation. “And I thought you beautiful, my love.”

  He smiled languidly. “Yeah, pretty much got that one figured out, too.”

  She settled her cheek against the pillow, their faces only a few inches apart. Neither spoke for several minutes; they just lay there, drinking the other in. She studied every line and scar and mark upon his face, lifted a fingertip to a mole she’d never noticed, close to his left ear.

  Oddly, she wondered whether his wife had ever done the same, reached out and touched that one detail of his stunning body. “Did your sons have any moles?”

  He didn’t answer at first, and she wondered whether perhaps she’d pushed him too hard about his past. Then with a laugh, he said, “They all had a birthmark. Same one as me.” He lifted the long hair from his nape, turning so she could see a small red blotch. “Family gift. Kalias has it, too; Ajax doesn’t.”

  But then he grew more thoughtful. “You know, if I’d seen my sons again—even once—my heart would have died inside me. I was aware of it from the beginning, that my life had ended, or at least my normal, human one, and so I never turned back. Let them mourn me however they saw fit, and just . . . lived my duty. My bargain was to save them, and I’d done that. But it didn’t mean I could watch from the hidden places—not when I couldn’t approach them, or talk to them, or . . .” He blew out a breath. “Love them.”

  “What of your wife?” It was impossible not to voice the question. “You loved her, as well?”

  “I cared for her, but it was nothing like I felt for you from the first,” he answered with a sideways glance. “We were childhood friends, given to each other at birth by arrangement between our fathers. I don’t think she found me very handsome, nor did she care for my humor.” He smiled then. “You, on the other hand, understood me from the get-go. You were the woman I’d longed for, the one I’d kept hoping to find in the back alley of some century, the dusty corner of a random decade. Little did I know that you’d be waiting for me, all flouncy and proper in good ole 1893.”

  She played her fingertips across several feathers, pretending they were ivory piano keys, a Chopin piece tinkling through her mind. “I wanted to be a spinster, you know. It was my grand plan. Until I met you.”

  “So independent,” he said with a throaty growl. “Turned me flat on, woman. Still does.”

  “I do adore your wings,” she admitted with a shy smile. “They’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

  “Wish I’d known that years ago.”

  She rubbed her hand across his right wing, the one he had tucked across her bare body. “I do not understand why you ever thought otherwise.” She scowled, thinking back. “Which means that several mysteries remain unsolved.”

  “You said someone else was in your room.”

  She fought against the hazy shroud of memory, reaching with all her strength and will to recall who that
person had been. A shadowy figure emerged.

  Clinging to Ari, she pressed harder, determined to learn the being’s identity.

  Ari was at the window, beautiful, waiting, but then someone called her name.

  She turned; his deep voice was commanding. “Don’t open that door,” she heard him warn.

  She tried to walk toward Ari, but the man moved closer, threatening. Some warning was issued, but she couldn’t hear it now, couldn’t recall.

  The image grew dark and vanished once again.

  “It was a man!” she cried. “Yes . . . but . . . no.” She shook her head again. “Not a man. A male.”

  He leaned up onto his elbows. “You’re saying there’s a difference.”

  She closed her eyes, struggling to visualize details from that long-ago night. “It was a male presence. I’m not sure if he was truly a man, though. Do you understand?”

  He studied her with interest. “He might not have been human?”

  “I was a medium, Aristos. Perhaps he was a spirit of sorts.”

  “Or a demon,” he added, eyes alert and bright. “I was in Savannah with my . . . uh . . . job. Trailing a nasty demon trader. A badass entity that had figured out how to convert mortal souls into demonic ones. Not just possession . . . I’m talking turning humans to the darkest side, the vilest kind of transmutation, and against their human wills.”

  “Did you ever find that man?” she asked, wondering whether maybe there was a connection between the fuzzy memories she had of a male entity in her room, and his work at the time.

  He paled visibly. “Never. He left town, eluding me. We didn’t hear of him again.” Ari took her hand in his. “Jules, darling. Are you telling me you think that Caesar Vaella—that was his name—are you saying he might have been the one who came into your room that night?”

  She reached into her recollections, but no matter how hard she tried to penetrate the veil, she could not clarify the male’s identity. “I don’t know, but I am certain,” she said, growing fully convinced, “that whoever or whatever came into my room that night was unknown to me—and was male.”