Rees marveled at the calm way the household took the arrival of the deadly storm. Down in Pas City, where Rio lived and Judith had her bar, they would shut down all the doors, sit against the walls, and wrap cloths over their faces until the storm passed. Everyone let anyone in off the streets when a sandstorm hit. It was an unwritten rule.
Here, the house went on as usual. The slight pressure change was the only acknowledgement that a deadly storm raged outside.
Talan, a worried look on her face, rose from the table and pressed a button to call Metri. He hastened in after only a few moments.
“Lady Petronella is out,” Talan said. “Is she all right?”
Metri nodded, making a reassuring gesture. “She is at the house of Lady Mira. She called not five minutes ago to tell me. She is fine.”
Talan looked relieved and dismissed the majordomo.
She cared, Rees realized. Lady Pet was a strange sort of woman to be Talan’s guardian, and their thinking was at odds, but Talan cared for her. So much so, that her first thought upon beholding the sandstorm was concern for Lady Pet’s safety.
Rees wondered what it would feel like to have her concerned for him.
This was getting out of hand.
He snatched up the bowl of cream and the plate of golden fruit. “Time for lessons, Talan,” he said, then walked away from her and back to the garden.
Chapter Five
Talan followed Rees into the garden, her intellect losing the battle to her curiosity.
The sandstorm thrashed and grated against the field far above, but it could not penetrate the force screen. The screen was powered by a class five generator, the best made. So while the storm raged in the streets, this garden remained cool and peaceful.
Talan felt anything but peaceful. Rees had angered her with his dismissal of her philosophy, but she should feel sorry for him, really. It wasn’t his fault that his genes had been manipulated, his DNA code changed so that he could never achieve the philosophical freedom that she could. Rees would be forever tied to his body. She should feel superior.
Instead, Talan wanted to run after him and apologize for arguing. She had the most absurd urge to please him.
Lady Pet would scoff that Talan had an absurd urge to please everyone, but this was different. Talan pleased others because it was her duty, because she wanted to show that she had manners.
She wanted to please Rees because she wanted to. She wanted him to look at her with that sparkle in his blue eyes and tell her he liked her.
She knew he’d been made to make her want to please him. Talan had read all about DNAmo and the Shareem after she’d found Lady Ursula’s diary and had learned disturbing things.
A Shareem could modulate his voice to the most soothing pitch to a woman’s ears. Rees could taste her pheromones on the air, he could project his own to excite her, or project endorphins to make her feel relaxed and soothed.
He could not actually force Talan to feel anything she did not want to, but he could manipulate conditions so that she’d most likely feel what he wanted.
This was how Shareem had serviced their decadent women in the past. They’d been created to please, but the women had begun to want more than simple pleasure. They’d grown bored and made their Shareem into more and more wicked creatures, willing and ready to do anything to extend the game of desire.
The things Talan had read about the level-three Shareem had shocked her. Rees, she thought after what they’d done yesterday, must be level two.
Even level twos had been a bit shocking, but level threes had delved into the realm of things she’d never known people did.
When DNAmo had closed, people had discussed what to do with the Shareem. Some had argued that they weren’t truly human. They didn’t have parents—they’d been grown in a jar filled with the best DNA available.
A contingent had wanted to kill them. Not in a brutal way, they’d said. Give them injections that would kill them instantly, and cremate the bodies. End of problem.
But many stockholders, already upset at their declining returns, had thought that too inhumane. The vote had been close, but the Shareem had been allowed to live—if they agreed to follow stringent rules and stay away from decent society, of course.
And Talan had brought one into her house.
Rees gazed at the sandstorm high above them. “Does the field ever break?” he asked.
Talan shook her head. “Lady Pet keeps everything in good repair.”
Rees continued to stare upward, the muscles of his neck tight. “Oh well, danger always adds spice.”
A vicious sandstorm could strip a woman’s flesh from her bones. The bursts of wind sent rock and sand like a grinding machine against buildings and humans. A storm could kill a person not protected by thick clothing and a breath mask.
Talan had never been anything but safe from the storms. The storm watchers always gave fair warning, and it was a rare person who got caught in them. Today, however, it had blown in unexpectedly early.
“What are we going to do?” she asked Rees.
He set the bowls of fruit and cream on a wooden table next to a garden bench. “Tell Metri and the rest of your staff to stay away.”
Talan pressed a keypad outside the door. All the windows and the glass wall of the dining room went dark. “They will only come if I call.”
“Well, you might be screaming pretty loudly.” He winked. “At least, I hope so.”
A shiver went down Talan’s spine. How could he make what should be frightening seem so desirable?
Because he’s trained to, she reminded herself. That voice makes you want to do anything he says.
Rees stripped off his robe. Beneath it, he wore a sleeveless linen tunic. His hard body filled it out, and the black chain around his biceps gleamed.
He lifted a piece of bright orange fruit in his fingers. “What is this? I’ve never had it.”
“Mango.”
Rees dipped it into the bowl of cream. “It’s good. Come here.”
She went to him slowly, her heart beating faster. “Yes, teacher.”
Rees shook his head. “That was yesterday’s game. Today, we will play something different.”
“What?”
“Do not ask so many questions. Or I’ll paddle you.”
And why did her heart race every time he said that?
He held out the fruit to her. Talan reached for it with her fingers.
Rees pulled away. “Just eat it.”
Talan hesitated a moment then she leaned down and closed her lips around the mango.
Rees pressed the fruit into her mouth. The sweet juices spurted as Talan bit down.
“Mmm,” she said.
He slowly wiped his thumb across her lips, then he raised it to his own mouth and licked the leftover cream from it. Talan silently chewed and swallowed the fruit.
Rees’s eyes went dark as he took her face between his hands and kissed her.
His mouth was warm, his lips strong. His tongue slid into her, stroking, and Talan wound her arms around his neck. This was what Lady Ursula had done with her Shareem. Woven tongues together and embraced in warmth. She’d envied them.
Talan traced her fingers over Rees’s back, loving every muscle, every strong sinew. His hands slid to her bottom and pulled her tight against him.
Talan moved her hips, wanting him to touch the hot ache of her. So far, only she had touched herself; he’d scarcely put his hands on her.
Rees kissed her cheekbone then traced it with his tongue.
“Rees,” she whispered.
He went on licking her, wetting her face, his tongue hot and possessive.
“Rees, I want you.”
Rees licked his way down her throat. He began to bite then, sharp nips of her flesh. He shoved Talan’s hair out of his way, bit her throat, sucked. It hurt, and was darkly erotic, and Talan loved it.
Rees kissed and bit across her shoulder. He hadn’t asked her to take off her clothes. Had told her
to stop asking questions.
“What do you want me to do?” she whispered. “I want to please you.”
Rees bit her, hard, and Talan gasped. Rees lifted his head. His eyes glittered, the blue filling the whites. “I please you. That’s why you brought me here.”
Talan shook her head, feeling almost drunk. “You pleased me, yesterday. I want to please you, today.”
Maybe he wanted her to play. He was a level two, maybe he wanted a game. “What do you want me to do?” she asked.
His eyes went hot, and he put heavy hands on her shoulders. “Get on your knees.”
Talan’s legs went weak, and she found it easy to kneel before him. The outline of his cock behind his tunic was right at her eye level.
Rees lifted his tunic, and his cock sprang out. Talan liked looking at it. She could kneel here all afternoon, stare at it, and be perfectly happy.
“Kiss it,” Rees said.
Talan drew in a sharp breath. She was fast approaching realms she did not understand.
“Kiss it,” he repeated. “Do it.”
Talan leaned forward, pressed a kiss to the smooth, engorged head in front of her. His skin was satiny and so warm. It felt good to her lips and tasted a little salty. She kissed the tip twice more for good measure then licked it.
Rees tensed, the muscles of his thighs and abdomen tightening. “Gods, Talan.”
“Is that what you wanted?”
Rees reached over to the table, and came up with a handful of cream. He plopped the cream right onto his cock. “Suck it clean.”
Talan smiled. She leaned forward again and licked a dab of cream from the tip.
His voice became harsh. “No, don’t lick it. Suck it.”
Talan screwed up her courage, opened her mouth, and wrapped her lips around the end of his cock.
It jumped in her mouth. Talan took the cream onto her tongue, then swallowed, and suckled more. Another inch went inside. She kept sucking, tasting the tang of him and the mellowness of the cream. She nipped him, like he had done to her neck, and he let out a groan.
Did I hurt you? she wanted to ask. But his hand went to her shoulder and gripped it fiercely. “That’s it, Talan. Suck me, baby. Suck me hard.”
She sucked. She wiped her tongue all over his head, tasting the difference between the smooth tip, the flange, the shaft. Talan suckled some more, her lips hurting from stretching so far, but she didn’t want to stop.
Rees threaded his fingers through her hair. “Gods, that’s good.”
Talan blindly touched the base of his shaft. Her hand met coarse, curled hair and scalding hot skin. Rees jumped.
“I’m going to come,” he said hoarsely, his Shareem voice broken. “And you are going to swallow me down, Talan.”
She wasn’t certain what he meant. Rees’s hips moved, and his hands in her hair tightened.
And then she felt her mouth fill with hot, salty liquid, burning her tongue and the back of her throat.
Talan started to jerk away in surprise. Rees’s hands shoved her back onto his cock, forcing her to take it, to let him fill her mouth.
“Swallow it, love. Swallow it for me.”
Talan drew back slowly, taking the liquid into her mouth, wrapping her tongue around his tip to get every drop. She swallowed, the come burning and hot all the way to her belly.
Finally she looked up, licking the last droplets from her lips. “Was that right?”
Rees grabbed her by the shoulders and dragged her to her feet. He plunged his tongue inside her mouth, tasting himself on her. He held her so tightly, she could barely draw breath. Rees’s cock, hardly less rigid than before, ground into her belly.
Talan twined her arms around him, reveling in how much he wanted her.
Rees seized her face between his hands. “I want to fuck you, Talan. I want to fuck you and fuck you. I want to fill you full of me, then I want to put my come deep inside you. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” Talan wanted it too. A dim part of her knew he’d cast his Shareem spell on her, that she should not want this, but she told the dim part of her mind to go out and play in the sandstorm.
“I want to turn you over and come in your ass. The ass that I’ve paddled until it’s red. Do you still understand me?”
“Yes.”
His grip tightened. “I want you to beg for it. I want you to beg me to fuck you.”
Her mouth was so dry, she couldn’t form words. His eyes went dark, dangerous. “Beg me, Talan. Or I’ll take your ass without preparing you, and that will hurt.”
She gulped. “Please, Rees.”
“Please what?”
“Please fuck me. Please fuck me, Rees.”
“Beg me to fuck your sweet ass.”
“Yes. Please, Rees, fuck my ass.”
He stared at her, eyes boring into hers, a madness there she’d never seen in him before. The game had gone away, and she began to feel, through whatever he projected over her, a twinge of fear.
“You’re a bad girl, Talan.”
“I know. Please punish me. Please fuck me.”
He drew a long, long breath. His hands on her face softened, the hard grip loosening.
“Gods, Talan,” he said in a quieter voice. “You’re not ready. I don’t want to hurt you, sweetheart.”
“I want you to. It would be a good hurt. I want you to hurt me good.”
Rees shook his head, his face against hers. “No, love. You’re just feeling what I want you to feel. What I’m trained to make you feel.”
She whimpered. “No.”
“I’m afraid so, baby.”
Rees gathered her close, letting out a long sigh. Talan rested her head on his shoulder, his warmth soothing her shaking body.
Rees was shaking, too. He, the trained Shareem, breathed fast, his heart pounding beneath her ear.
Talan didn’t understand what she was thinking, couldn’t separate what she really felt with what he’d made her feel. “I want you, Rees.”
“No, Talan. You don’t.”
She raised her head. His jaw was hard, sandpaper rough. “How do you know?”
“Because I’m Shareem. I know when a woman’s body is ready for what she desires and when it is too soon.”
“When will I be ready? I want to be ready now.”
He laughed softly, his velvet voice returning. “Not long.”
She put her lips to his ear. “My pussy is all wet, Rees.”
His laugh turned wicked. “I just bet it is.”
“What do you want me to do? Do you want me to touch myself while you watch?”
“Hmm, that would be nice. But I have another idea.”
He lifted the bowl of cream from the table. Talan smiled, her pulse still racing.
She was calming from the madness of a few minutes ago, when she’d wanted nothing more than for him to push her face down onto the bench and shove his cock deep inside her. She’d wanted to take it and cram it in herself.
The feeling had come from nowhere and had overwhelmed her. When she’d begged for him, as he’d said he wanted her to, Rees had looked almost . . . sad.
But the look on his face, now, the bowl of cream in his hands, said he was returning to the fun and games.
“Sit on the bench,” Rees told her. “And spread your legs.”
Talan started to comply. But just then, a tearing sound came from overhead, and in the next instant, the canopy faltered and the winds of the sandstorm came screaming in.
Talan gasped for breath, and found her mouth and nose full of sand. The bowl of cream shattered to the floor.
She clutched at Rees. They needed to get into the house. She must lead him there, or he would die.
But she couldn’t find him in the yellow-brown mass. One moment he’d been standing next to her, the next, he was gone.
Talan groped for him, not finding him. Then she groped for the table, for anything solid.
A strong arm wrapped around her waist, lifted her from her feet. Rees to
ok two steps, three, and then they were falling in through the open windows of the parlor.
Rees disentangled himself from her and slammed his hand against the window’s panel.
The window sealed. Sand that had swirled in with them rained to the white carpet. The sandstorm, furious, beat at the windows, but could not get in.
Rees leaned against the wall, panting. Talan crawled up onto the sofa and lay there, trying to get her breath.
Metri and two footmen rushed into the room, eyes wide. “Are you all right?” Metri asked.
“Fine,” Talan croaked. “Rees got us out in time.”
“But the garden is ruined,” Rees said. He sounded morose. “That beautiful garden.”
Metri looked at Rees as though reassessing him. “Lady Pet will have the garden repaired. But the two of you look awful. I suggest a bath.”
Rees shot Talan a look. She knew she had sand all over her and must be a mess. Rees’s hair had gone a shade darker, and sand had collected in the hollows under his eyes.
“A bath,” he said, his voice still hoarse. “Good idea.” He held out his hand. “Talan?”
And she, under Metri’s stunned gaze, took Rees’s hand and let him lead her out of the room.
Chapter Six
“I really wanted to use the cream,” Rees said as they entered the bathroom.
He still held Talan’s hand and felt her trembling. That had been close.
Thank the gods he had noted the placement of the door and window control panels when they’d gone into the garden in the first place. He always took note of control panels in case patrollers showed up somewhere he shouldn’t be and he needed to get away fast. Rees had a perfectly legitimate reason to be here, but habits died hard.
Talan hadn’t known where to go. She’d been blundering into the middle of the garden when he’d caught her.
He now watched Talan shake the sand out her skirts. The sandstorm had been a blessing in disguise, because in the garden, Rees had lost control.
Shareem never lost control. It’s our gift, Rio had said. Rio was always in control. Whenever Rees and Rio shared a lady, Rio was always master.
No matter what they actually did, it was all about control. The lady in question surrendered control, which was what was so exciting about the Shareem. She surrendered herself to Rio and his exotic moods—or to Rees, who was unpredictable.
Tales of the Shareem, Volume 1 Page 5
