by L. A. Boruff
About L.A. Boruff
L.A. Boruff lives in East Tennessee with her husband, three children, and an ever growing number of cats. She loves reading, watching TV, and procrastinating by browsing Facebook. L.A.’s passions include vampires, food, and listening to heavy metal music. She once won a Harry Potter trivia contest based on the books, and lost one based on the movies. She has two bands on her bucket list that she still hasn’t seen: AC/DC and Alice Cooper. Feel free to send tickets.
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Also By L.A. Boruff
Southern Soil
Literary Yours
Snow Cure
THE UNSEEN WARS
War of Fangs
War of Fire
War of Wings
VALENTINE PRIDE
Co-Written with Laura Greenwood
Unicorn Mates
Unicorn Luck
Unicorn Truths
COVEN’S END
Co-Written with Lia Davis
Kane
Voss
Quin
Jillian
SATURDAY IN REVERSE
Co-Written with Laura Greenwood
Face the Music
Gimme a Beat
Play Their Song
Charming the Djinn
Romy Lockhart
Charming the Djinn
“Yer not human.” His slurred words are full of wonder as he gazes intently at me. His rough fingers stroke the side of my face. Hands cold, face bruised and bloodied. He’s still sexier than sin in that heavily-tattooed body with his shock of red hair and that sultry Irish accent.
“How can you tell?” I ask, trying to keep him talking. He doesn’t look too good and I need to keep him awake if I want to get him out of this alley before someone comes back to finish the job.
“It’s yer eyes. Yer soul is old.” His weak smile fades as his eyelids flicker shut.
“Wake up, Finn,” I say gently. I’m afraid to raise my voice. This man was supposed to die tonight, and if anyone finds out he survived, Bronson will seek to set things right with immediate effect.
“What’s everything so damn dark fer, eh?” He groans as I help him get to his feet.
I stumble as he staggers, the five-inch heels really not making this any easier, but I’m all he has right now. Even if we’re not going to get very far like this. My stomach churns as I realize what we need to do. Getting him out of this back alley sounds simple, but we need a place to go that won’t send tongues wagging back to my Master and put Finn’s luck back on a downward spiral.
That means no to most of the other hotels on the strip. Not that those would be easy to walk into unnoticed with a barely conscious, beaten-to-a-pulp man, clinging to me like a preserver anyway.
“Can we go get some wine, then?” His suggestion is supposed to be amusing, I think. He sounds drunk already, but he hasn’t had a drop tonight.
I look back at the door Bronson’s men threw him out of. I waited to come to his aid. I had to. Being caught here with him would have been revealing the heart I’m not supposed to have. I’d be treated differently if my Master knew about this. I’m wary about bringing him inside. I know if I leave him out here he’ll die. Whether that’s from the injuries he already has, or from someone happening on him while he’s this vulnerable, I can’t say. I just know the worst will happen if I don’t help him now.
Sighing, I commit to my decision. No one should still be lurking around on the other side of that door, but I’m going to have to make this quick. There’s still a chance the men who hurt him could come back.
I decide on the route I’m taking and take my first step forward. Finn doesn’t move with me and I turn my head to check how he’s doing. He shakes his head slowly.
“No. I’m not going back fer more o’ that. My mistake. Fooled me once an’ all that.”
“We don’t have other options right now. In the morning, you’ll be able to leave safely. Tonight, we need to hole up in my room.”
His bright blue eyes fall on me intently again. “Ye saved me life, ye know.”
I smile. “You don’t know the half of it.”
* * *
Rescuing the man who’d tried to swindle my Master out of a hundred grand or so wasn’t going to get me killed. Like Finn guessed, I’m not human. I’m a thousand years old, even if this body isn’t a day over twenty-five. I chose my human form a long time ago. Thick, golden-blonde hair tumbles halfway down my back. It always looks as if I’ve just been to the salon without the wasted time and effort. My body is slender but strong and very nicely tanned. Skin just radiating with good health. My eyes are a clover-green that always seems to be sparkling. I’m beautiful in this form. The embodiment of good fortune. You don’t want to see me when I embody the flipside of that coin.
Doesn’t happen often, and I’m damn glad of that. The nails of that demonic bitch are a nightmare to cut back down. Not to mention it usually means someone just died. Sometimes multiple someones. Okay, usually multiples. Which is why I’m careful about doling out bad luck. Little and often helps balance things out. People lose a hand of cards, a treasured possession gets stolen, or their car breaks down. Those things happen every day and they’re not usually related to humans crossing paths with someone like me. They all hurt a little but they don’t mean the person is on a permanent downslide.
I shouldn’t care if it does, but that’s my problem. Like I said; it won’t get me killed. Finn, on the other hand, is dead-meat if Bronson finds out he’s still breathing.
I work the route out from start to finish in my head before we make the trek back up to the fourth floor of the hotel and casino, and we make it to my room unseen. Mostly. The maid who barely noticed us doesn’t count. She’s new around here. She doesn’t even know who I am yet, and her eyes were totally glazed over when she glanced our way. I don’t think she even really saw us.
I let out a breath as I close and lock the door behind us, hitting the lights and letting my arm drop when he takes a few steps forward on his own. My feet are throbbing. I’m used to heels, but I guess I’m not used to having to drag grown men around while I’m wearing them. I take them off and place them on their shelf next to the wardrobe. Every pair I own are green. I keep telling myself I’ll buy a different color next time. Yet, every time I go to a shoe store, I come back with green.
“Nice place,” Finn tells me in a surprised tone as he walks into the suite.
“It’s okay,” I say, shrugging when he turns to me with wide eyes. Gilded or not, it’s still a cage.
He catches sight of himself in the mirror and touches his cut cheek. “Christ, I’m bleedin’ me face off.”
“I’ll get you a towel—” I start, moving toward the bathroom.
“I’ll sort meself,” he tells me, wincing a little. “Wouldn’t have any painkillers would ye though?”
“There are some in the cabinet under the sink.” Being human has its downsides. The ability to feel physical pain is one of those downsides. I may be immortal, but this form is still human for the most part. I will simply never age and never die.
“Tanks.” He shuts the door over and I hear the tap running.
Getting Finn out in the morning will be easy. Bronson is paranoid about leaving his coffin during daylight hours. It’s just the few hours before dawn that we’re going to have to get through without incident.
The knock on the door makes me jump. One complication on the way. I’d forgotten about Damon. He always seems to know when I’m in my room. No security cameras needed. His sense of smell as a blood-thirsting creature of the night was apparently all he needed to keep track of my whereabouts.
I clear my throat and put the latch on before opening the door by just that little crack to speak to him.
He frowns at me, his handsome face in brooding mode as usual. His skin is a few shades darker than mine, and his hair is that rare perfect jet-black shade that so few naturally have. He d
oesn’t look like a typical vampire, but he’s one of Bronson’s men and has been for years. He’s only been my lover for a few months.
“What’s going on?”
“It’s two in the morning, Damon. A girl needs her beauty sleep.”
“You’re a thousand years old and that body doesn’t age a day regardless of how much sleep you get.” He glances me over as much as he can through the crack, his heated gaze lingering on my tanned leg showing through the side-slit of the dress.
I know he loves this outfit on me. Emerald satin and easy to slip right out of. It’s really too bad I’m harboring a dead-man right now. There’s an itch I’d love to have him scratch. Preferably with his tongue.
“Well, I’m tired, so what are you doing here?” Let’s just pretend he can’t smell my desire. That’ll work.
He sighs, his gaze fixing to mine. His eyes are so dark they almost look black. There’s such a smooth transition when he morphs from human to vamp. I’ve watched it take several victims by surprise when he grows fangs. His eyes barely even change. His frown is back as he opens his mouth to start his inquisition.
“Why did you save the Irishman?” He doesn’t blink as he stares at me.
I don’t flinch, but it’s hard to hold in the curses that want to explode from my mouth. Why can’t my powers of luck work on myself? You’d think I should be the luckiest woman on the planet, but I’m being caught out within minutes of hiding a guy who should be dead.
“I didn’t,” I say, at least trying to buy some time.
He knows I’m lying. I know he does. Damon might be one of the only two men in my heart, but he’s also under Bronson’s control. That’s where it comes in handy that he can’t use his powers of compulsion on me. He can’t tell his maker I’m hiding Finn as long as I play innocent. Suspicions are nothing. Evidence is everything.
“Yeah, well, there’s a pool of blood missing its dead man out back and I don’t think you want to know what it means if Bronson finds out that guy didn’t bite the dust last night.” His tone is hushed, a clear warning as the concern comes through in his expression.
My shoulders relax. Bronson didn’t send him then. He just figured things out and came to me himself. Anxious about what trouble I could be getting myself into rescuing the Irishman. It’s sweet, really. “He looked dead to me, Damon. Maybe one of the other vampires decided he was hungry. Did you check with Dean?”
He smiles wryly. “We don’t eat road-kill. I’m sure Dean will be along. Just make the Irishman breathe a little more quietly when he does come by. He won’t think twice about breaking the door down to snap every bone in his body.”
He reaches through the crack to stroke the side of my face.
“Good-night, Maeve.”
“Night, Damon.” I close the door and lock it. My heart is hammering as I lean back against it.
Finn walks out of the bathroom, cleaned up of blood and without his shirt. The tattoos start on his chest and spread out over his arms and neck. His cuts and bruises don’t seem quite so appalling without the excess of blood. In fact, he looks better than fine. My greedy eyes eat up the wiry, toned body before me, the desire Damon stirred in me spilling over now.
“Who was that then, Maeve?” he murmurs as he moves toward me, using my name that he clearly just heard Damon utter.
“That was one of my lovers.” I smile and shrug when he raises an eyebrow.
He stops a few inches from me, towering above me now that my heels are off.
His gaze drops to my lips, his lips curling in amusement. “Ye have more than one?”
“I have two,” I tell him, waiting for the heat in his eyes to melt away. I stay away from mortal men for a reason. Well, two reasons, really. And their names are not Damon and Dean.
Besides the fact that they lead shorter life-spans, humans don’t seem to understand love can be bigger than two people in a house with a picket-fence and a couple of kids planned out. None of those things will ever be mine, but there’s room in this heart for more than one man. This heart that shouldn’t exist. I don’t know why it’s beating so loudly but I can’t seem to stop it now that it’s started.
“Will they give a toss if I tank ye for saving me life?” He’s leaning in now, his hands resting on the door. “I don’t wanna be pissing anyone off now, an’ I will back the feck off if this is somethin’ ye don’t want.”
I must be crazy to even consider this. Oh hell, I’ve already jumped off a damn cliff by bringing him up here. What’s one little tryst on top of that? “They’ll understand.”
His kiss is soft at first, tentative. His lower lip is swollen from his beating. I expect him to stop, but he only puts his hands at either side of my face and tilts it a little more, rough thumbs stroking my skin.
His mouth works against mine, hungry and persistent. I pull him closer and feel the slightly raised skin of more tattoos all over his back. I want to lay him down and take in every inch of inked flesh, to ask what they all mean and why he’s so covered in them.
He groans and I start to break away. He pulls me back in close before our lips can part, one hand dropping to stroke my ass. The moment I’m pressed tighter against his crotch I can feel the evidence of his arousal against my belly.
He comes up for air and his pupils are dilated. “Well, that was somethin’ but I don’t tink it makes up fer what ye did fer me.”
“No?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “That’s gonna need a longer kiss wit quite a bit more tongue.”
I’m about to ask what he’s waiting for when he drops to his knees and pushes the skirt of my dress upward while his lips trail feather-light kisses up my thighs. He stops to remove my panties, which are lacy little things he could have easily torn apart. But no, he insists on pushing them to my feet and getting me to shuffle out of them.
He smiles at them before he stuffs the panties into the pocket of his jeans. “Ye like yer green.”
“I like your tongue even better,” I tell him, as his hands push the skirt completely out of his way.
“Yer so damn wet already,” he murmurs, his hands gripping my ass cheeks as his head dips to the valley between my legs.
I gasp in a sharp breath as he makes good on his promise to kiss with more tongue. I stroke my hands through his red hair as he slides his tongue in and out of my aching pussy. I’m tensing up with need and he’s teasing me to breaking point, giving little flicks to my clit but largely ignoring it. He sucks on my lips and moans without removing his tongue from my slit. I swear I feel the vibration from his pleasure working its way through every part of me.
“Please,” I gasp out. “Please, please, please—”
His tongue moves up suddenly and the focus switch to that swollen mound of flesh is so intensive that my back arches instantly and the first flush of my climax has me crying out and grabbing fistfuls of his hair to keep him right where he is. He continues to lick while I ride the wave of pure ecstasy he just pushed me into. He keeps going until I still beneath him, shaking and breathing hard.
I let go of his hair and he backs up, licking at his lips. His expression is euphoric, and I see that he’s freed his cock from his jeans and its rock hard, being pumped in his right hand.
I get down onto my knees on the carpet and pull my dress off, up and over my head.
Finn’s hand moves faster as he gazes at my naked body and whispers, “Fecking hell.”
“Let me help with that,” I tell him, crawling closer.
“Ye do realize yer bloody gorgeous.”
I smile. “This is just me on a good day.”
I really wouldn’t want him to see me on a bad one.
“I can just take care of meself here,” he starts to protest, as I push him down. He lets go of his cock and lays there as I move his jeans down enough to get them out of my way. I straddle him quickly. He’s big enough to make me gasp sharply as I push down onto his hard length.
He closes his eyes, whispering, “Feck.”
; “What is it?” I wonder if he’s hiding something.
“If I look at ye I’m gonna lose it,” he whispers.
Oh. Well, that’s flattering. At least he isn’t freaking out. I lean in and kiss his neck.
“It’s okay, Finn. If you come too fast this time, we can go again.”
He groans. “Stop makin’ it worse, woman. Yer the bloody devil.”
I start to rock, feeling the first sparks of a second orgasm as I ride him. It flares when he opens his eyes to gaze at me. His incredibly clear, blue eyes. I don’t know exactly what it is about this man, but he makes everything inside of me come to life. I barely know a thing about him, but I know I need to keep having him like this. His touch lights a fire inside of me.
His hands grasp my ass tightly and pull me faster, taking charge of my body as I start to come.
“Oh bloody hell,” he gasps out as my contracting pussy milks his cock.
He spills his seed. I feel the heat of it before he relaxes his grip on my ass. He gazes up at me.
“I was gonna mention we didn’t use protection,” he tells me, “but I don’t tink I’d mind knockin’ ye up, and seen as how ye were the one to go fer bareback, I didn’t tink you’d mind too much either.”
Oh, right. Contraceptives. Probably an issue if I were as human as I looked. “I can’t conceive.”
“Ye can’t? I’m sorry...”
“It’s not an issue.” Though the hollowness I feel in this newly developed heart of mine makes me wonder if it is, deep down. “No worries about anything else either. I can’t contract or pass along human diseases.”
“I’m clean too,” he tells me. “So, what are ye, if ye don’t mind me askin’?”
I move off and help him to his feet, where he promptly discards the last of his clothing and follows me to bed. I try to think of something to tell him that won’t reveal much, but honestly, something about all of this feels too right to worry about what the outcome might be. Either that, or I’m being blinded by the love I’ve begun feeling in earnest. Not just the first twinges for this human, but the full-on devotion I’ve discovered for Dean and Damon these past few months too.
