Finding the Blood Assassin [Lords of the Expanse 3] (Siren Publishing Allure) (5 page)

“We have to land at the private strip,” he told her as he closed his eyes and leaned his head back. “I can get to my home from there, but I will need to feed once we land. I will need a lot of blood. They drained me and the silver has me hovering at the edge. As soon as we set down I’ll need to feed, and then I will need to get out of here before they send someone to investigate why you did not land at the military field as is protocol.”

“They will never see me land,” she told him, confidence in her tone. “I can remove the silver if you want me to, Raven. However you will have to trust me long enough to free you at least from their biting sting.”

Shaking his head even though she couldn’t see him, he sighed. “No, Jamison,” he purred, it was perfect like her the beast said. “The silver doesn’t bother me, and you would need to use something to slice through the metal. As much as I trust you at this time, I am not letting you or anyone near me with metal cutters.” Especially my cock, he thought with a shudder. “I have silver in other parts of my body left over from when the Syndicate held me. This is nothing compared to that constant burn.”

She shuddered. “I can’t even begin to imagine the pain.” She had once placed on a new necklace on and didn’t realize it was silver until her skin began to sizzle. “I hope that you made them pay with their lives, my lord?” She hoped that whoever did that to him had pain, in blood.

“They are all dead,” he said, satisfaction in his voice. “Pain is a state of mind, my lady.” He reverted to the proper title as she had, automatically. “If one is well trained in pain, one can ignore it unless it is of necessity to pay it mind. I am well trained, and the pain they inflicted is nothing more than an inconvenience.”

“My father decided that I didn’t need that sort of training, but I needed the training of a proper lady instead.” She snorted. “That didn’t last.” She was running a finger over the closed door as she spoke. “And then I went through puberty.” She sighed. “Twenty-five years early.” There was that addition, and she wondered what his thoughts would be on that.

“That is extremely rare,” he said slowly. “I’ve only heard of four other females going through their puberty early, and even then it was only ten or so years, never a full twenty-five. How did your family deal with that?” he asked curiously.

“Not very well.” She shrugged. “Mother went to one of the spa planets because it was simply too much. Father was on a mission, so there was just me.” She would never, never make her children go through that. “When I came out on the other side of it, I was changed.”

She didn’t want to talk about how, so she shook her head. “I had someone who I felt was close to me, however, I learned differently.” She shrugged. “He convinced me that we belonged, and I gave him all I was, until I met his lady wife, that was.” Why was she telling him these things? Why was she giving him everything she kept hidden and locked away? “Anyway. How are you feeling, Raven?”

“All right for the moment,” he told her honestly, leaning his head back and closing his eyes. “This is helping me to remain distracted enough for the time being.” But he knew it wouldn’t last for long. The fact she also wasn’t in the room with him helped, too. “I’m sorry for all the pain you’ve had to go through, Jamison. No one should have to have those they trust turn from them or play them. I more than any other know that and I am honestly and completely sorry for your heartache,” he said softly.

“Thank you for that, my lord, but without the flame and pressure a diamond would never come from coal would it?” She let out a hefty sigh and then was silent for a moment before saying, “I need to check the flight computer, and I think I’m going to up our speed a little. You can continue to talk to me, it pipes through the whole ship. I will answer if you wish.”

His body twitched at the knowledge she would be moving about the ship again, but he fought it down. “It would likely be the wisest course for us to continue to speak for a time,” he decided. “If not, let’s not think on that at this time, my lady. We are not yet at the place where we need to worry on the what-ifs. Tell me something of yourself that no one else knows.”

Chapter 5

“Jami, call me Jami, please, my lord,” she said, and he could hear her moving around, a door opening and then sliding shut on a small whoosh of air. “Something about me that no one else knows? Something that no one else knows?” she repeated slowly, as if having to think about it. “I would rather not tell you because then someone would know.”

Rolling his eyes at her words, Raven shook his head. “Amusing,” he muttered before he bent over double, a hand to his middle as fire raced under his skin. “How long until we reach the planet?” he asked on a groan he couldn’t stop to save his life. His body was fighting back, wanting to get the nourishment it so badly needed, and it wasn’t going to play fair. Soon he’d either have to have her dose him or he’d have to attempt to place himself into a trance.

“Two days, my lord. With me pushing the engines to their limits, it will be two days. And then, I hope, there will be a place where I can put down for a while so that I can fix the baby up. But don’t worry, my lord, I won’t be in your hair. As soon as I drop you off you will never have to see me again.” She let out another heavy sounding sigh. “I will get you there as quickly as I can, my lord.”

Groaning softly, he nodded to himself. “Don’t push too hard,” he warned, knowing that if something happened they could be stranded, not a prospect he was looking forward to. “Just get us there, Jamison,” he whispered moments before he passed out, his body unable to take the internal pressure a moment longer.

She heard him hit the ground and sighed. Dammit, she wished that her father hadn’t held him in such high regard. 

Throttling back on the speed slightly, she moved from her seat and knowing he was out cold, moved into his room where she stood quietly at his side and opened her vein to him. Pressing her wrist to his lips, she silently prayed she could give him just enough to take the edge off of the bloodlust he was feeling, or she wouldn’t make it to his home world. 

Before he could wake, she sealed off her wound and stood back, moving silently and out the door. She had given him a lot of her blood and felt it. She felt the wooziness and knew she needed to refuel herself or things would be very, very bad for her. 

Grabbing three bags, she quickly drained them before moving to the sonic shower to hopefully get rid of most of the pains and kinks in her body. She was only half awake with the lights off when she fell, much like he had, facedown and naked on her bed. The sleep of their people took her, and being as young as she was, she hadn’t been able to rebuke the pull.

Groaning as he rolled slightly, Raven pushed up from the floor. Not the best place to be sleeping considering the deck plating was a hard metal alloy. In the next instant he tasted her on his tongue and, eyes snapping open, he licked his lips slowly. “What did you do, girl?” He breathed as he pushed to his feet, one hand to the wall to brace himself. He didn’t feel quite as close to the edge and knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she’d fed him from herself while he’d been passed out. “Sneaky, Jamison,” he muttered. “Very sneaky.”

Shaking his head, he went and pulled on the pants he’d been wearing earlier and a shirt before he began to walk slowly through the ship. Checking the control room, his eyes very determinedly turned from the view. He saw that she’d slowed them but that they were still on course. Shaking his head again, he tracked her to her room and, before he thought better of it, soon stood staring down at her naked back, buttocks, and long legs. He did wonder what it would feel like to have those long lithe limbs wrapped around his waist a moment before he covered her with a blanket and left her alone. 

She had no idea how long she lay in bed before she twisted, turned, and let out a soft moan of disapproval. She was exhausted, true, but she had work to do, too. Sitting up, she pulled the blanket up and over her body and sighed. The nipple rings in her breasts gleamed brilliantly in the low light from the bathroom. He had asked her something about herself that no one knew. It was simple. She liked a little pain with sex. She loved to be spanked while being taken, loved to give as good as she got. Why didn’t she tell him? She didn’t tell him because she wasn’t that stupid. He would likely have had a heart attack if she had told him that his grabbing her by the neck and tossing her against the bulkhead was a serious turn on for her. 

She let the blanket fall and stood, stretching wide and far behind her before she went through her morning yoga routine and then the sonic shower. Getting dressed in another uniform, she pulled out two bags of blood and quickly emptied them before moving off to the control cabin to see how much closer they were to his home.

She saw him look up as she stepped into the room, a brow cocked in a decidedly regal look. “You know, if it had been anyone else I’d have cut your throat for what you’d done.” He had his back to the view screens, she noticed, his words from earlier coming back to her. He set the data pad in his hand down, her eyes following the movement and she saw, well, it looked like a report of some sort. Made sense he’d want to get everything down before they got back to his home. “How are you feeling?” he asked her, drawing her attention back while shifting in his seat. He did move his boots from where he’d propped them up onto an inactive console, though, she noted.

“I’m feeling fine.” She took her seat and pressed a button. “There, the solar shields are down so the view screens are closed off.” Leaning back in her seat she shrugged. “I needed you to have the edge off. I don’t like being caged in with a Vampire Warlord of your reputation who is riding bloodlust.” She moved her booted feet to prop up beside his and shrank down in her seat slightly. “You were out cold, and I took the opportunity.” She wasn’t sorry for what she had done and she damn well would do it again. She would just likely have to drug him next time.

Lifting a brow at her words, Raven turned his seat slightly to look at her dead on. “Just what do you mean by a Vampire Warlord of my reputation?” he asked, curiosity coloring his tone.

“My lord, you forget that my father helped to raise me.” She smiled as she recalled her father, who was still very much alive and kicking. “He felt the sun and moons would fall from the skies before an enemy would get the best of you.” She lifted a delicate shoulder in a shrug. “According to him, when the bloodlust hit you and you let it out”—she moved in her seat to get more comfortable—“you could decimate worlds with it.” She folded her arms under her breasts as she watched him. “I know you were fighting it. You were winning but you were hurting, my lord. I could help, so I did.” She moved her feet so that her boots tapped his. “And I would do it again. You have to feed, my lord. It really does boil down to that one single fact.”

Grunting softly at her presumptuous nature, Raven just studied her for a long moment. “It’s genetic you know,” he murmured softly. At her look he shrugged. “The inability to feed while in motion,” he clarified for her. “My grandfather and uncle were the same. It’s not something we can overcome, which can be hard to deal with on long flights. Which is why I trained, not for space, but for covert missions safely on terra firma instead. As long as I am not in flight I can keep the bloodlust at bay for well over a year,” he confided quietly. “Had they not used so much silver or electricity upon my body, I wouldn’t have been in such desperate straits.” 

“I can understand then why you didn’t choose to become captain of your own starship.” She watched him and then jerked her chin in his direction. “I saw the silver, I’m sorry for that.” She wanted to remove the hoops and lick the wounds. It was the oddest thing. She wanted him. Even with the growls and the anger, she wanted him. She had heard of his voice, how people hated to listen to it because of the low, frightening timbre, but she liked it, a lot. “We are only about twenty-three hours out now, my lord, so it’s not long at all before you will be on ground and able to feed till your heart’s content.” And she would never see him again, strange how that made her chest constrict. “Now, I’m going to go and check the engine, if you will excuse me?” she asked as she stood. “The comms are open. If you need me, just yell.”

“I will,” he said quietly as he watched her. “As for the silver,” he murmured as she headed to the door, “it actually doesn’t bother me. The piece that was near my spine was worse. The piece that is in my leg is more bothersome,” he said when she paused. “It’s what they did with them that bothered me a little more and pushed me to the edge and the need to escape.”

She winced because he had mentioned electricity and nodded. “Then it was providence that I came. I know that your—” She’d been about to say the word mother but stopped herself. “It’s a good thing that I was sent to find you when I was, my lord.” She bowed her head to him respectfully. “I will get you home as quickly and safely as possible, my lord, and then you will be well rid of me and able to heal as you need.”

“I don’t want to get rid of you, my lady,” he said, looking surprised at the words as they left his mouth. “I have been rude, crude, and more than a little inflexible, and you have acted as a true lady.” His lips twitched slightly, not quite a smile but she knew he was remembering her dropping him with a well-placed knee. “You should be commended for even tolerating me for a moment. I can honestly think of no other that would have bothered.”

She smiled and shook her head. “Then it’s a good thing that it was me that she contacted. It’s a good thing that she only wanted the best for you.” She reached out, unable to stop herself, and touched his cheek. “You were abused, hurt. It’s little wonder that you are even now civil as you have been riding the bloodlust. It is fine, my lord.” Stepping away, she smiled. “Now, I need to get down to the engine room.”