Embrace the Heat (7 page)

“What exactly is that supposed to mean?”
Simon asked. His nostrils flared, and he closed his eyes. His body
shuddered. “What is that smell?”

“I get it!” Layla snapped. “I smell
disturbing
to vampires. If I disturb you so much, maybe you
should leave.”

Simon let out a humorless laugh. “You’re
disturbing me, but I think I’ll have Rand leave. I don’t think his
wife would appreciate him being
disturbed
by a cute little
pixie.”

Simon refused to let go of the pixie thing.
While she usually got a little annoyed about it, they teased each
other all the time, so it didn’t bother her too much. Today, she
wanted to smack the hell out of him. “Fuck off,” Layla
muttered.

Simon had no idea what was up with Layla.
While he hadn’t been a big fan of Raven’s humans at first, Layla
had always been an exception. Now, he kind of liked the humans,
especially Layla. She was funny and fought dirty. While he didn’t
usually train the humans, because he didn’t think they should
fight, he’d sparred with Layla a couple of times. Sparring with her
wasn’t too much of a challenge. The little human’s head came up to
his chest, and he was much stronger than her. Still, she’d taken
him down a time or two. Today she looked like she wanted to stab
him in the balls. Worse, he felt aggressive too. Part of his
aggression had to do with his annoyance at himself for letting
Narissa back into his bed. That had been a really stupid move, and
he hated that Layla knew about it. There was more to his annoyance
though.

What the hell was that smell coming from
Layla? Why was it making him so hard that thinking was difficult?
After his activities the night before, he shouldn’t be able to get
it up at all. While he didn’t know what it was, he could tell it
was arousing every other vampire in the room. Simon inhaled again
because he couldn’t stop himself. The desire to lean in closer to
Layla just to drown in that smell was almost overwhelming.

“Rand,” he said, “go home and take Mitchell
with you.”

Rand was smart enough to know why Simon
wanted him to go home and started to leave right away. He hesitated
at the door. “Maybe training should be postponed.”

“Fuck this! In fact, fuck vampires,” Layla
snapped. “I’ll go home and shower.”

What the hell?
Layla was never that
volatile. Sure, she had a temper, but this was different.

Danny started to go after her, but Simon
stopped him. “I’ll go. This is my fault. Something is obviously
bothering her, and I pushed too much about the way she smells.”

Danny hesitated. “Maybe, I should go. She’s
been kind of bitchy, and you don’t know her as well as I do.”

That statement really annoyed Simon. Maybe
Danny had known her longer, but Simon knew Layla very well. “Set up
sparring teams while I’m gone,” he said. “Rand, I really do want
you and Mitchell to leave until I can figure this mess out.”

Without waiting for a reply, Simon raced
after Layla.

As her cute little ass stormed down the
street, every male vampire she passed stopped to inhale deeply. The
single ones eyed her with obvious hunger. The ones with significant
others looked confused and guilty. This was the last thing he
needed while Connor was away.

“Wait up, Pixie!” he called out.

“What do you want?” she snarled without
turning around or slowing her pace. Snarled was the only way to
describe her tone.

Simon picked up his pace and easily caught up
with her. He walked alongside her. “Sorry about embarrassing you
back there,” he said a little uncomfortably. He wasn’t
uncomfortable with the apology, but his pants were crushing the
erection he’d had since catching Layla’s scent. Chasing her had
only made the problem worse, and now his cock was throbbing against
his zipper. The vampire in him screamed out to grab her and do all
sorts of inappropriate things now that he’d caught her.

“Why are you following me?” she finally asked
and walked faster. “If I smell so disturbing, then you should stay
away from me.”

“Layla,” he growled. His voice was rough, and
she must have finally gotten the hint that he was chasing her
because she froze. “That’s better,” he said. “You need to calm
down.”

When she spun around to glare at him, her own
nostrils flared and she looked down at his pants. Her large brown
eyes widened with shock, and she just stared at his cock for a long
time.

There was no missing Simon’s erection. It was
just there and very big. In fact, she should be rethinking her
attraction to Simon. Instead, she was more aroused than she’d been
after any dream. Stifling her moan took a lot of effort. Layla
decided that the best way to deal with it was to remind herself of
the many reasons she couldn’t be with Simon. “How can you be
aroused after a night with two wood nymphs?” she asked without
looking up.

Simon’s voice took on that silky quality only
he could achieve, and she knew his full lips were curled up into a
sexy grin. “You know what happens when vampires chase someone,” he
purred. “You made me chase you. Even if you hadn’t, whatever is
going on with your scent is arousing every male vampire you pass.
I’m not the only one chasing you right now.”

Layla looked up at Simon with wide eyes.
She
was the reason Simon was aroused. Her blood heated, and
her body tightened. Okay so maybe she wasn’t the reason in the way
she’d like to be. His arousal was caused by the way she smelled and
the fact that Simon had chased her. Still, her body didn’t seem to
care what the reasons were.

Simon groaned. “Don’t look at me that way,”
he said. “This is not going to happen. I don’t screw humans.”

Layla flinched at his intentionally crude
words. This was Simon trying to push her away. “Don’t worry,” she
said with a condescending smile. “If I need a vampire, I’m sure I
can find one to take care of things for me.”

Simon’s upper lip curled back to reveal his
fangs, and he gripped her upper arm. “That is not going to happen,”
he said angrily. “Until we figure this situation out, you are
staying in your home alone.”

Layla panicked. Being stuck in the house was
not an option. She needed to get out. She was on patrol later that
day and really looking forward to the trip into the woods. “You
have no right to lock me up. I haven’t done anything wrong.” She
struggled in his grip.

“This isn’t a punishment,” he said holding
her arm tighter. “Stop fighting me.”

“Then let me go,” she said quietly. They’d
attracted an audience. More than a dozen vampires, all male. were
surrounding them. Layla’s instincts told her to fight. Those
instincts told her to run from Simon at the same time as they told
her to jump him and bite him.

Bite him?
She had no idea where the
hell that idea had come from. Looking around at the vampires, she
knew she needed to fight those instincts. Simon was part of the
leadership council for this territory. People needed to see him as
strong. Having a small and weak human refuse to take orders would
look bad.

With great effort, Layla relaxed in Simon’s
hold and dropped her gaze. “I’ll go home,” she said as meekly as
she could manage. She’d never excelled at meek.

“I’m walking you home,” he said with annoying
arrogance and didn’t release her arm as he walked her all the way
to her door.

Could this get any more embarrassing? The
crowd followed them all the way to her house to see what Simon
would do after her outburst.

“Go back to work!” Simon ordered the crowd
once he opened her front door and pushed her inside.

Much to Layla’s dismay, Simon followed her
into the house and shut the door behind him. He leaned against the
door with his arms crossed in front of his chest. “Thank you for
backing down. I know that wasn’t easy for you.”

All of the anger drained out of her body.
“You’re welcome,” she said. “I’m sorry for acting like a child. I’m
just really tense lately.”

“Then it’s probably a good thing you aren’t
going out on patrol today,” he said. “You need to have your head on
straight or you could get killed.”

As much as she hated to admit it, he was
right. Still, he couldn’t be serious about her staying in her
house. “I can’t stay locked up,” she said. “It’s just the new soap.
Something about it must be causing this.”

Simon let out a frustrated breath. He reached
for her but jerked his hand back at the last moment and walked
across the room. “It’s not your soap. I don’t know what the hell is
going on, but you’re causing too many problems. I’ll come by to
check on you tomorrow, and if things are better, you can resume
your normal activities. Until then, you stay in this house.”

“You can’t do that!”

“I’m in charge,” he reminded her. “Until
Connor gets back, you take orders from me. Your choices are to
willingly stay in this house, or I can put you in a cell.”

Layla fought the urge to fight him. She’d
never been good at taking orders under the best of circumstances,
and these circumstances sucked. Part of her wanted to push Simon
and fight back to see how strong he was. None of what she was
feeling made any sense at all.

Simon looked guilty, and that made it easier
to comply. He was her friend, and she knew he didn’t like doing
this.

“Fine, but I want out soon. This isn’t fair,
Si.”

“I know,” he said. He reached forward like he
might hug her but stopped and looked uneasy. There was an awkward
moment of silence. Simon had hugged her many times, but now he
seemed almost afraid to touch her. “We’ll figure this out. What I
said about you being alone was stupid. The male vampires need to be
kept away from you for now.” He breathed in deeply and then closed
his eyes. It looked like he was in pain. When he opened his eyes,
he wouldn’t look at her. “I need to get out of here.”

Without another word, he left.

The ominous sound of the door closing behind
Simon nearly made Layla panic. She couldn’t figure out why, but she
needed to run. She needed fresh air. This must be what Raven felt
like when she’d been kept away from the woods too long.

It was strange that she was acting more like
Raven now that Raven was gone. Layla really did feel like she was
going insane from the sexual arousal. Too bad she couldn’t take
care of it on her own.

There was only one solution to her problems.
It was time to start baking.

Roger considered himself an optimist. When
life gave you lemons, you used them to torture the person
responsible for planting the fucking apple trees you really wanted.
Nothing like lemon juice in cuts to teach someone a lesson. He
smiled at the image of the screams it would elicit. Now, that was
worth trying. Although, he wasn’t exactly sure where he’d get
lemons. He made a mental note to have someone find lemons.

Roger enjoyed his new home. He’d owned it for
more than eighty years, but rarely even visited it during those
years. Until recently, the details of this home were kept from
everyone, except his cousin, Miles. Now, he was grateful for his
foresight in having a place to go when things went bad.

Many of the people he’d brought with him
hated leaving the island settlement. Naturally, they’d been afraid.
There were some who’d lived there for decades, and many had been
born there. Admittedly, he’d hated leaving the crops behind, but at
least they’d been able to bring most of the livestock.
Unfortunately, they’d been forced to evacuate quickly. The blood
whores likely wasted little time before attacking the settlement.
Fortunately, he’d moved the lab equipment before the blood whores
got a chance to destroy it.

Actually, he and Miles had packed up most of
the stuff and started moving it before their failed meeting with
the vampires. Graham’s instability had been building for too long.
The fool had been too distracted with torturing the nymph to notice
that things were being moved. Even if Graham hadn’t been killed by
the blood whores, it had been time to leave the island settlement.
The vampires knew where it was. Once Graham told them he had the
nymph, an attack was inevitable.

Luckily, Graham had been killed by the blood
whores, because it might have caused more unrest if Roger had been
forced to kill Graham himself.

Roger liked his new role. Miles didn’t want
to lead. He was more of a follower. Even when they were boys, Miles
had preferred having someone else make the decisions. While Graham
was alive, Roger pretended to be satisfied with his position as
second in command. In truth, he had been satisfied until he’d been
forced to watch that idiot act like he was a god. Graham had also
been a fool when it came to sex, and that ultimately led to his
downfall. After learning that his favorite blood whore was close
by, Graham had been willing to risk everything to get her back.
Sure, Roger had been excited to see his own favorite blood whore,
but he wouldn’t have risked the empire they’d built to get him
back. Just the memory of the pretty blond blood whore got him hard.
He’d grown into a beautiful man, which was no real surprise.

For Roger, satisfaction came from power. He’d
never needed the physical part of sex to feel completion. He didn’t
really have a preference. Men and women were the same to him. It
was all about controlling them and getting them to do things they
didn’t want to do.

Back when his father had run the largest
vampire reservation in California, Roger had been given his pick of
blood whores and the power to do whatever he wanted with them.
Simon had been his favorite. The vampire had been about twelve when
Roger first found him. It was completely by mistake. Simon wasn’t
in circulation for clientele yet. Of course, when your father was
in charge, you could have any whore you wanted.