by Siren Allen
“Yeah, what about them?” Please don’t say they’re ugly. Not that it would matter if he did think them ugly. He was a criminal. His thoughts didn’t matter to her.
“I’ve never seen the likes of them. They’re…”
She braced herself for what he was about to say. Who cared if he didn’t like them? She didn’t like his eyes either. So what if…
“They’re… magnificent.”
Well damn. Lark could feel the heat from her eyes intensifying. He liked that they glowed. How unusual. Most people thought Lola and Luna had beautiful eyes, but never her. She’d met some males who said she looked evil because of her glowing red eyes.
Her defensive attitude didn’t help their opinion. After they got to know her, they began to believe she truly was evil. But this particular male thought her eyes were magnificent.
Wait, why was she allowing him to flatter her? One compliment and she was turning into a blushing youth. But stars, this was the first genuine compliment a male had ever given her. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to focus on the task at hand. What was the task? Oh yeah, enhancements.
Lark cleared her throat. “My sister sent no word that you were not to be enhanced. How do you explain that?”
No answer. Raynor seemed caught up in her gaze. He cocked his head to the side, studying her. His chest rose and fell faster. This was getting weird. She called his name twice and he didn’t notice, still staring at her with that look.
“Raynor,” she called again, snapping her fingers. “Are you listening? Luna didn’t send word that you weren’t to be enhanced. Hey. Raynor!”
He blinked and the look was gone. His breathing slowed and he stared down at the table. After another moment of awkward silence passed, he finally spoke up.
“I understand. Perhaps we should wait until she arrives before allowing your youngest sister to experiment on me.” When he raised his head, Lark shifted in her seat.
Stars, the way he stared at her made her nervous. Such intensity, like he was consuming her with his gaze. His lips moved, words came out and she had to push the weird feelings he was stirring within her to the side and focus on what he was saying.
“Luna is the Sovereign Ruler here,” he told her. “I have to obey her. She told me I didn’t have to be enhanced. If I do as you say I will be violating her direct order.”
Damn it. His logic irritated her, so did his eyes as they followed her every movement. It was unnerving, another trait of his that she despised. She leaned forward. His eyes stayed with her.
She leaned slightly to the side and grabbed her tumbler filled with a protein shake off the table. His eyes stayed with her. She brought the drink to her lips, took a sip and swallowed.
He swallowed also. There were those nerves again, like butterflies let loose in her belly. Damn it, what was his problem? What was her problem? Why was she playing this game with him? Lark slammed the tumbler on the table. His eyes never strayed from her face.
“Look here vampire, I…”
“There’s liquid on your lips,” his deep voice filled the air.
Liquid on her lips? Oh, protein shake. Lark licked her lips. He growled. It was the sexiest sound she’d ever heard. Her hands shook, trembling with a need she couldn’t explain.
Okay, enough of this. “Fine, if you want to wait until Luna gets here to get enhanced, you can. You still have to give me the remote so I can make sure you don’t kill any more of my guards.”
“I will not harm anyone else.”
“So you say. I don’t trust you. Hand it over.”
“I would like for you to trust me.”
That shocked her. “Why?”
“I am worthy of your trust.”
Lark burst out laughing, causing the vampire to frown.
“I’m happy my words amuse you.”
He didn’t appear happy. The frustrated expression on his face only made her laugh harder. He said he was trustworthy. How ironic was that? That was like an ogre telling a fox shifter that he was harmless. Still chuckling she tore apart his statement.
“Trustworthy, I think not. You scared my sister Lola…”
“That was not my intention,” he interrupted her.
She hated being interrupted. “You also acted like a fool at the hospital so they had to put you in the dungeon.”
“I tried telling them I did not want to be enhanced. They wouldn’t listen to me.”
She continued on as if he hadn’t spoken. “Once in the dungeon you killed one of my guards.”
“We’ve already determined that his death was his own fault.”
“Plus you’re a vampire. Forgive me if I find it hard to trust you.”
He stared down at the table. For a moment she thought her words may have distressed him. Then she remembered what he was. A predator. She was the prey. She wasn’t going to fall for this little show he was putting on.
He was a vampire who would do anything to get free, to wreak havoc. Trust him? How could she? It would be like signing her own death warrant. He came from a cold dark place.
She came from one of the hottest planets in the galaxy. He came from a place where it was always night. She saw the sun almost every day, she loved when it roared and sparked, coating Venus with its radioactive flares.
She loved the way its heat felt on her skin. She was a child of light, a child of fire. He was a demon from the dark. There would never be trust between the two of them. However, trust wasn’t a necessity, because he was her concubine and she was his master.
He would do what she said or he would spend the rest of his life imprisoned on Mercury. And since vampires lived for a very long time, she was sure he didn’t want to end up as some ogre’s play thing.
Lark waited for him to speak, to continue defending his actions, to recite a list of reasons why he deserved her trust. He didn’t. When he finally raised his head, he stared at her with a look in his eyes that she couldn’t decipher.
“I’m already messing this up, aren’t I?”
She didn’t know how to answer that and was almost one hundred percent certain he wasn’t referring to the trust issue they were just discussing. His eyes were no longer a black bottomless pit, instead they were an Earth blue color.
Beautiful. She had to force her gaze away, choosing instead to stare down at the video that was on repeat in the middle of the communications table.
Damn it she wished she could remember what caused the eyes of his kind to change colors. She’d read it in one of the many books that lined the walls of their library. What was it? Sickness, no, his kind didn’t get sick.
Happiness? No, their eyes remained black when they were happy. Remorse? Maybe. That sounded about right. Surely he wasn’t remorseful. Vampires didn’t feel remorse for killing. It was part of who they were.
He would keep killing. It was his nature. Being a servant to anyone went against everything encoded in his DNA. Having him there was one big mistake and unfortunately it would be her people who suffered because of it. Damn you Luna.
“I’m not evil,” he spoke up.
Isn’t that what all the villains said? “No, you’re just a killer. In my book that’s the same thing.”
“There’s a difference.”
“Nope, there’s not. Look, Raynor, you can’t change who you are…”
“Here.” He reached across the table. The remote to his collar was in his hand.
Shock held her in place, but only for a second. Snapping out if it, she reached for the device, scared he would take it back if she didn’t snatch it up quickly. When the tips of their fingers touched she shivered.
Get it together, she told herself. Don’t let this creature get to you. Lola was the sensitive sister who let her feelings cloud her judgment. Not Lark. She was the hard-ass, the ‘tough as nails get the job done’ sister. The sister who didn’t take shit from anyone.
So why were his words from earlier on repeat in her head? You smell… perfect. Why would he say that about her?
She tried to recall which perfume she’d put on this morning. She couldn’t.
She’d just grabbed a bottle and sprayed. She wasn’t like her sisters who favored certain scents over others. As long as she smelled nice, that was all that mattered. But he hadn’t told her she smelled nice, he told her she smelled perfect. Why?
“Eventually you will trust me.” His deep voice pulled her back to the present. “It’s inevitable.”
Lark cleared her throat. “Trust is earned, not given. And my trust isn’t what’s important right now. Your place in our harem is what we need to be discussing or this conversation is over.”
“Let’s discuss it then.” Raynor clasped his hands together and rested them on top of the communications table. The electrical clamp was still locked around his wrists, the red light beeping to let her know it was still on. She was safe. For now.
“Okay, we’ll discuss it. For a crime you committed on your home planet, you were sentenced to spend the rest of your days locked away in a lonely cell on Mercury. However, when presented with the opportunity to serve your sentence in another way, you agreed to come here, to our harem. Raynor, you agreed to be here,” she reminded him. “Therefore you will do as we say. Until Luna gets here you will remain in a cell. We only allow concubines to live in the residence hall. Once Luna arrives and agrees to your enhancements, you will go along with the ruling and you won’t cause any trouble over it, understood?”
There, she’d delivered her speech in a diplomatic way. And she hadn’t raised her voice once. Improvement. She deserved a cookie or something.
His response was a chuckle that held no humor. “That wasn’t a discussion, Lark. That was you giving me orders.”
Really. “But I didn’t even yell.”
“Still, it was an order.” The grin vanished from his face. “I don’t take orders well.”
Oh really.
“Okay,” Lark cocked her head to the side, staring at her captive mockingly. “My bad, Mr. Vampire, sir. I didn’t mean to order you around like you were a prisoner sent here to obey me. Let me rephrase my request. Mr. Vampire, will you please do as I say and be a good little blood sucker while you’re here? And when Luna returns, please let us enhance you so that you can work in our harem and make us a boatload of currency.” Lark smiled. “Is that better?”
“Yes.” Raynor leaned closer to the table, the darkness in his eyes returning and swirling faster than before. “I especially like the Mr. Vampire part. But sweet Lark, that wasn’t a discussion either. That was you begging me to behave. I have to admit,” he gave her a wicked grin. “I rather like it when you say please.”
“Fuck that,” Lark slammed her hands down on the table. Raynor didn’t flinch. “Do as I say or else.”
“Or else what?”
“Or else I’ll do the fucking enhancements on you myself. And I have no idea how to do it, so I promise you it will hurt and you probably won’t survive it.”
“No thank you.” Raynor leaned back in his seat. “Lola seems gentler than you. I’ll take my chances with her… if it comes to that.” He winked.
Lark rolled her eyes. But she couldn’t ignore the sudden burst of jealousy she felt at the thought of Lola touching him. Being around him was clearly starting to affect her sanity. She needed him out of her sight, now.
Still smiling, he asked. “What’s so special about these enhancements anyway? Why do you insist on having a harem full of enhanced concubines?”
“You will find out soon enough.”
They were done here. Rising from her seat, she turned to leave the room, keeping a wide breadth between her and Raynor as she moved. Her hands itched to punch something or someone. Perhaps punching a vampire would make her feel better.
“What if I wanted to find out now?”
Say what now? Her steps slowed, but she didn’t stop.
He continued. “I may be willing to go along with this if I knew more about it.”
She walked to the door thinking over what he’d just said. Would he be more willing to participate if he saw how much pleasure he could bring his clients if he was enhanced? The more pleasure he provided the more requests he would receive.
And it wasn’t like the concubines didn’t profit here. They were paid handsomely for their services and none of them were forced to do anything they didn’t want to. It wasn’t like on Earth where providing sexual favors for money was frowned upon.
Here, if you were above the age of consent, you were free to do anything you wanted, as long as it wasn’t a criminal act. Most of the concubines were happy to be here, because their other option was prison.
And Mercury’s prison was run by brutal ogres who were said to eat off parts of the prisoners when they acted up. Yes, the harem was heaven compared to the hell on Mercury. Still, she didn’t trust Raynor’s sudden desire to want to know more about the enhancements.
He might only be pretending to want this, then once he was set free in the harem he would destroy everything, everyone. Lark stared down at the door handle. She didn’t know how she was going to make having a vamp in her harem work.
It was too risky. No amount of currency was worth the lives of her people. It wasn’t her job to make these kinds of decisions. Running the military was what she was good at. Enforcing the law was her specialty. Creating building floor plans was her passion.
Accepting a vampire into her harem was above her pay grade. Yet, Luna wasn’t here to deal with this, so the responsibility fell to her shoulders. And if things turned ugly, which they would, she would be the one to blame. She would be the one her people hated.
Lark sighed, eyeing the door, her way out, her means of escaping the vampire and the crazy emotions he stirred within her. Yet, she couldn’t leave without explaining why she was being this hard on him.
“Luna made a mistake in sending you here. Your kind isn’t meant to be around other living things. It’s why you live in the Kuiper Belt, the darkest and deadest region of the galaxy.”
“You don’t know me and apparently you know even less about where I’m from. You don’t know what I’m like or what I’ve been through. Yes, I killed your guard, but he wanted to do things to me that were unjust, immoral. I defended myself. You would have done the same if you were in my position.”
“That doesn’t change…”
“Give me a chance. Don’t judge me before giving me an opportunity to show you I’m not the creature you think I am. You may be surprised at what you find once you get to know me.”
She doubted that. Yet, she couldn’t deny the fact that a well-behaved enhanced vampire would bring in good currency. If only she could control him. She had a remote. Would that be enough?
Only one way to find out. Lark turned to test out the remote and gasped when her eyes connected with his. He was too close. When had he moved? Fear raced through her. She hadn’t heard him get up.
There had been no sound from his chair scraping against the floor as he backed away from the table. Yet now he was standing right in front of her. Close enough to kill her or kiss her. Neither appealed to her, or so she told herself. Stars, his scent was going to be burned into her brain for all eternity. Lark tried not to breathe it in.
He cocked his head to the left, his eyes peering into hers. “Do I frighten you?”
She shook her head. A lie. Hell yeah he frightened her. He would never know it though. She’d been around plenty of males who wanted her to fear them, who thought because she was a female she would be easy to manage.
A few of her guards thought that, at first. The first few weeks after her father passed away, they challenged all of her decisions. They thought she was just the little engineer who loved drawing building layouts and having her team create them.
They didn’t believe she could lead the military. They questioned all her calls. She quickly learned a stun gun to the groin could shut them up and keep others from questioning her judgment. She would do the same to Raynor if she needed to.
“I’m n
ot scared of you.” Her voice didn’t shake. Thank the stars.
“Good, I don’t want you to be.” He leaned closer to her. She pressed her back against the door, needing more space between them. He simply followed her, inhaling deeply as he went. “Has anyone ever told you, you smell divine?”
So do you big guy.
Lark could barely think with him standing that close. She pushed against his chest. He didn’t budge. And she didn’t miss how solid he felt. She pulled her hands away before they did something silly like lift his shirt so she could see his abs.
He really did have on a lot of clothing. A lot of damp clothing. It was hot as Hades here, yet he wore a black trench coat, black cargo pants and a black T-shirt. It was either damp from the mist all prisoners went through to clean them, or it was damp from sweat. If he was trying to look the part of a crazed villain he was doing a great job.
“Move away from me,” she spoke slowly making sure her voice didn’t betray her.
This creature was wreaking havoc on her mind and body. It had been two solar flares since she last had sex. Venusians were known for their sexual prowess and going that long without having someone touch her flesh was making her crazy. So crazy that even a vampire could arouse her.
“Answer the question,” he whispered, staring down at her.
“Um, I.” There it was again. The darkness in his eyes was swirling. Fascinating. She shook her head to clear it. “What was the question?”
“Has anyone ever told you that you smell divine?”
Of course not. No one flirted with her. “No, no one has ever told me that.”
“Good,” his wicked grin kicked her desire up a notch. “I get to be your first.”
Her first, she wished. Wait, no she didn’t. Her embarrassment caused her to revert back to her first line of defense, sarcasm. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re an irritating pain in the ass?”
“And lived? No. I guess that makes you my first.”
Oh my. The images his words caused her mind to create were illegal on at least three planets. She needed to get the hell away from him.
“Look, I have to go.” She pushed at him again, her shove had adverse effects.
