Blood Red (23 page)

But Althea’s warmth and comfort mattered more. Her chest rose and fell adorably with her quick breaths. He tossed a length of sable over her, then kissed her deeply, covering her lips with the exotic flavor of her quim.

Her hand fluttered up and brushed his cheek.
That was so wonderful. I’m flying still.

This was madness. Making love to her in this mausoleum, with danger so close at hand.

But danger appeared to heat her blood. As he tumbled her down into the pile of furs, and arranged the sable over her again, her nubile leg hooked around his. He flicked back her waist-length hair, almost dry now.

Her eyes sparkled in the firelight.
They made love to each other. I’d no idea what men did.

How exciting it was—

Did you find it arousing to watch?

Yes. I’m horrified to admit it, but I did.

She feathered kisses along his jaw. Damnation, but he hungered to make love to her. His lungs were filled with that thick smoke—an aphrodisiac, he was sure. His prick was as hard as the stone that formed this place. Every breath he took made his cock hurt.

Zayan made love to Bastien from behind. I thought it would be…but it was so…so sensual.

So exciting. Intense and hard, but after, it was the way Zayan touched him. Not like a demon.

Not like evil. It was the way I would touch you. It was with such love—

Love? The last emotion he expected Bastien to show to Zayan. To anyone, in fact.

Althea was no longer innocent. Not after witnessing that.

Her hands skimmed down his throat, down to his nipples. She caught hold of both and twisted. Pain shot from his poor squeezed tips like a bolt of magic and exploded in his loins.

His cock, in turn, almost shot off like a cannon. She was so brave, his sweet huntress. And she was an apt pupil of sensual arts.

Yannick fought for control and barely recovered before her hand ceased its torment on his hard nipples and squirmed down between their bodies to his cock, hard as a cricket bat and nestled against her soft, rounded belly.

Her delicate touch was gone. She gripped him like he would when he was mad with frustrated lust and wanted to wank off with speed.

“I want you.” Her husky voice was more alluring than a room full of demonesses and desire-inducing candles. “I want to do everything we did in my dreams. I realize now the dreams were the most tempting fantasies and I want to experience every one.”

Love-nips rained over his neck and shoulders as she flicked his hard nipple and tugged on his cock. A little of his juice bubbled out, dampening both her hand and his stomach. Her other leg hooked around him too and clamped around his hamstrings.

Blood Red by Sharon Page ©2006 Advance Reader Copy www.SharonPage.com 112

A beautiful virgin was begging to explore all her fantasies. Despite knowing he could be shot through the back with a searing bolt of magic, he hungered to oblige.

Hell and perdition, he couldn’t. Yannick shut his eyes to focus, but without sight, his other senses heightened. Smell, most certainly. Althea’s scent bewitched him and her touch tormented. She arched her hips up, trying to surround his cock.

Wait, please, love.

Her fetching moan of frustration made him question his sanity. But he had no choice. He shut out everything—her lovely face, her tempting body, her soft sighs, the wicked magic of the candles and focused on the dark. On reaching into Bastien’s mind.

Anger struck him first. A turbulent blend of fury and sexual arousal. Bastien’s emotions warred inside him, a kaleidoscope of the most base and brutal of human emotion. Revenge and hatred. Passion and fury at feeling so much need. And beneath them all ran a longing—a love so bound up with pain that Yannick flinched and felt his blood turn to ice as he experienced it.

He severed the connection, sagging slightly on his outstretched arms.

Would Bastien be willing to attack Zayan with him? Hunger for revenge was the dominant emotion he’d sensed.

Althea moaned, hooked her arm around his neck and dragged him down to her.

He opened his eyes.
Althea, sweet, I won’t make love to you here.

Her eyes pleaded into his.
It’s too dangerous but I want you so much,
she whispered in his thoughts.

The damn candles.

What are they doing?
she asked.
Are they resting?

Oh, they aren’t finished, sweet. I believe Zayan is tying Bastien’s wrists to the bed.

Tying him up?

For erotic purposes. I believe Zayan is fetching a whip.

Shouldn’t we attack?

The whip is also for sexual pleasure.

Oh God, Bastien spoke of that. Of craving the flick of a whip against his…his bare bottom.

Do you also enjoy being whipped?

Regret surged up in Yannick’s heart. Althea’s innocence had been a precious thing and he’d chipped away it, piece by piece. A gentleman’s duty was to protect a woman, to protect a young lady’s starry-eyed view of the world.

No, I don’t enjoy whippings. I received too many of them at my father’s hand and I never
developed an addiction for the crack of a whip on my arse.

Althea’s arms slid around him and she held him tenderly. Concern and sorrow and shock—

all the emotions he hated to evoke—glittered in her emerald eyes.
Your father whipped you?

Why?

For disobedience. For breaking rules. For protecting my mother. To pass the time on a
winter’s afternoon.

That’s horrible.

He eased off her. His cock, he could see, now drooped a bit. Instead of standing proud Blood Red by Sharon Page ©2006 Advance Reader Copy www.SharonPage.com 113

between his thighs, it listed to the left and the head arced down. Damn his father.

Crack!

The first blow had landed across Bastien’s buttocks. Now would be the time to attack, while Bastien was caught up in punishment, while his emotions were raw and engaged, while he was caught in the cusp of subservience and defiance.

I am going to attack Zayan
, Yannick warned.
You must stay here.

Althea felt the excitement of battle surge as she caught up her crossbow and defiantly followed Yannick out of the shadows. Though he didn’t turn, he issued a command in her head.

Stay back, Althea
.

By the bed, Zayan stood with his back to them. Sweat gleamed on his back with each powerful stroke of the whip. Splayed across the black sheets, Bastien whimpered and moaned.

The velvet ropes binding him to the bedposts went taut as each blow struck, then Bastien would relax and the ropes would go slack before the next flail over his skin.

Even she could smell the coppery tang of his blood.

How could that be pleasurable?

Althea caught her breath as Zayan ceased to crack the whip and instead bent over his victim.

He licked each of the wounds, murmuring gentle words.

And suddenly the unthinkable, the horrifying, became erotic.

Now was not the time to contemplate that. She dropped behind another trunk, one with a direct line of sight—and line of fire—to the bed. At least she had her spectacles, though they were streaked with dried raindrops. When Zayan turned, she could fire the bolt at his heart. And she had better bloody well not miss.

Get back and hide, Althea.

And what would be the point of that?

Her heart leapt to her throat as Yannick, barechested, approached the bed. Without his shirt, he appeared too vulnerable.

He stopped several yards away, legs slightly spread, hands up in front of his chest.

Shielding his heart.

Her fingers hovered over the bow, ready to launch the bolt.

The next slash of Zayan’s whip was arrested in mid-flight and the tail fell limp over Bastien’s body. At the same instant, two white bolts shot from Yannick and struck the ropes binding his brother’s feet to the bedpost.

With a roar, Zayan spun around. His hair whipped about him like a black cape. Glowing hellish red, his eyes riveted on Yannick. A deep evil chuckle echoed around the room.

Zayan’s blast sent Yannick hurtling back. Horrified, she watched, helpless, as his backside struck the bare floor with a crunch and his head followed with a bang. Despite the punishment, Yannick leapt back onto his feet so fast he blurred before her eyes. In mid jump, he sent a stream of brilliant white light that drilled against Zayan’s naked, wide chest.

Triumph shot through Althea as she saw Zayan stagger. But he took only two steps back before regaining his balance. In that instant, she saw the uneven match between Yannick and the ancient demon. She had never felt so afraid of a foe before, and her fear was all for Yannick.

Zayan could blast him off the face of the earth.

Blood Red by Sharon Page ©2006 Advance Reader Copy www.SharonPage.com 114

Instinct guided her finger to the bow’s triggering mechanism. Steady breaths. She drew them in. Refused to let emotion guide her. Wait…wait…

Zayan howled like a wolf and lifted his hands—

Now.

The bolt flew true and sliced into Zayan’s naked chest. The force drove him back, slamming the back of his legs against the bed’s footboard. His enormous hand wrapped around the carved bedpost. His fleshy lips curved into a smile as he looked down at the shaft protruding from his chest.

Damn. She’d missed. The bolt pierced him two inches too high.

Althea tensed, ducked back behind the trunk, knowing Zayan’s next bolt would blow right through the trunk and tear her apart—

Fire exploded in front of her and the flame shot around her like an embrace. Screams rang in the chamber—her own horrified screams. She could see the fire, centered in a world of black.

Then nothing.

“Do you want her? She is yours for the taking.”

Dazed, Althea opened her eyes. She was falling—

No, she was on the bed. The bed where Bastien and Zayan had made love. Where Bastien had been whipped. Above her, the black canopy was large and fathomless, like the night sky, but she saw blurry forms on it. Female forms, nude and voluptuous. Frolicking against the black silk in a tangle of limbs. She squinted to see. Her spectacles were gone.

Pushing with weak arms, Althea sat up. Her dress was half ripped apart, gaping indecently over her left breast, and her skirts hung in tatters around her legs. Zayan lounged at the foot of the bed and flashed her an evil smile. His fingertips lightly brushed the sole of her foot.

She scrambled back. Beyond the foot of the bed, Bastien and Yannick stood several yards apart, facing each other, but watching her. Yannick’s face appeared carved of stone, his eyes flashing firelight like mirrors, but she knew that he hid intense protectiveness behind that impassive, cold gaze. She squinted again to focus on Bastien. His eyes set her heart racing.

They held such longing. Such fear.

“I am not standing in your way to claim her,” Zayan said to Bastien. “You may keep her as your plaything if you wish.” Zayan pointed carelessly toward Yannick. “It is your privileged brother who is preventing you from claiming what you want. If you destroy me, what will you achieve? Domination by your brother? Destruction, perhaps.”

Deep and controlling, Zayan’s heavily accented voice filled her mind. She wished she’d forced Father to tell her more about Zayan. Yannick and Bastien must know everything about him, but she did not, and now she saw how impetuous she’d been to chase after a foe she didn’t truly understand.

Zayan sprawled across the mattress like an indulgent Roman emperor. “I cannot destroy him, Bastien. He is protected. But you, as his twin, have power that I do not. The choice, my lover, is yours.”

With a gasp, she realized that was true. The choice rested entirely in Bastien’s hands.

Destroy his lover or destroy his brother.

Blood Red by Sharon Page ©2006 Advance Reader Copy www.SharonPage.com 115

Althea realized that once Zayan had caught her, neither Yannick nor Bastien had tried to combat him out of fear for her safety.

Holding her breath, she sent a pleading look to Bastien. But his expression darkened, his lashes dropped to hide his eyes. He crossed his arms over his naked chest. A sneer curled his perfectly formed lips. “
You
want me to kill my brother.” He turned to Yannick. “And you wish me to destroy the vampire who embraced me. For once in my life—or rather my afterlife—I hold the balance of power.” Bastien licked his lips, as though savoring a new taste, large silvery-blue eyes brimming with wicked mischief.

Zayan flicked the whip. The tail of it struck the floor near Bastien’s feet. For his part, Bastien didn’t flinch, even though the strap nicked his toes. He took on an expression of mulish stubbornness. For a full-grown, naked vampire, he appeared startlingly boyish and vulnerable.

“You whipped me because I allowed it. Once again, in that circumstance, the power is in my hands.”

Zayan laughed, low and cruel, and grabbed her ankle. Before she could launch a kick, he dragged her down the bed. Already bunched high above her knees, her torn skirt pulled higher, revealing her naked inner thighs. Those red eyes bored into her soul as Zayan stroked the length of her left leg, halfway up her inner thigh. His touch set her quaking, igniting fear she’d never known before, even when at grave risk.

Zayan held her gaze but released her leg. He inclined his head with eerie politeness. “I will not desecrate her. So, my young lover, what then is your choice?”

“I choose to kill neither of you.”

But Bastien’s hand shot up and fire leapt from it. A white bolt struck Zayan’s shoulder. At the same instant, Yannick hurtled an equal weapon. The spear of white light struck Zayan on his other side, just above his heart. The twins sent bolt after bolt. They drove Zayan from the bed, drove him to cower on the floor, and to scramble back like a wounded animal.