Shadowfae (13 page)

Dante’s body flushed, sudden heat radiating. His arms tensed around me, and I could feel him holding back, trying not to crush me. Slowly, delicately, he sucked on my tongue, the salty burst of blood warm and gentle, flowing into him. The intimacy overwhelmed me like a dark flood, and I longed to be closer. The barrier of clothing between us maddened me. I imagined us kissing like this but naked, my thighs gripping his on his lap, his sensitive vampire cock buried deep in my flesh.

Such erotic thoughts about a man I’d just met warmed me, and I flexed my tongue, giving him more. I could have released my rapture, tasted his energy, consumed some, but I didn’t. I wanted to be with him, not use him. If Dante wanted my blood like this—not a demand but a desire, not a rape but a shared pleasure—he could have it.

Dante swallowed, groaning, and the flesh between my legs swelled, painful. Surely, this was how thrall ended. Not in the rotting skeletal agony of energy starvation or flickering out after a thousand horrible, never-ending years, but in the dark, damning passion of a vampire’s kiss. Life bleeding out, red and burning, not lost on the wind but savored, relished, consumed. The ultimate orgasm, death.

Hot tension gripped me, my thighs trembling with longing, and I whimpered.

A different, hotter hand touched the back of my shoulder, startling me out of my spell, and I jerked back.

“Jade, I’ve been . . . oh. Shit. Sorry.” The touch snatched away, but the fine scent of cardamom drifted, laden with memory.

I swallowed, my mind overflowing with sudden confusion, and I couldn’t help turning my head.

Rajah stared at me, black hair drifting free, a crease deepening between his fine dark brows. He looked mouthwatering as usual, in a loose white shirt that glowed in the nightclub lights and soft blue jeans that caressed every firm curve. He sucked on that luscious bottom lip, his gaze flickering away. He looked mystified. Hurt. Confused.

Jesus. What was I doing? My hand drifted to my throat in embarrassment, and I shifted away.

But Dante smiled softly, his tongue brushing the tips of his teeth. “Always late to the party, Rajahni.”

Rajah’s gold-flecked eyes glinted with rage. “I’m sorry about his manners, Jade. If this is about you and me, DiLuca, leave her out of it.”

Suspicion hardened like a hot stone in my guts. I opened my mouth to ask, but Dante touched my hand, making me look at him, his ultra-blue eyes flashing a warning. With a sick stomach I remembered how Rajah had seduced me, first taking advantage of my rapture and then with some horrid attempt at empathy, fooling me into thinking he cared about me when all the time he only wanted sex. God, the way I’d behaved with him. Like the slut he’d treated me as, like they all said I was. A tear misted my eye, and I blinked it away.

Dante squeezed my hand, and I didn’t pull away. He slipped his arm back around my waist, protective, and glared coolly at Rajah. “Always so arrogant, assuming everything’s about you. Miss Jade and I are having a private conversation. I don’t remember either of us inviting you. Any questions?”

“Just one.” Rajah focused on me, his gaze dark and candid. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

Rajah was dangerous. Dante was safe. I looked Rajah in the eyes, uncomfortable warmth swelling in my belly. Damn, he had beautiful eyes, the bastard. I swallowed. “Perfectly sure, thanks.”

Pain swirled for a moment, and then his eyes glassed over, hard. “Fine. Sorry to bother you.” He walked away, biting his pretty lip. I watched him go, my eyes stinging.

Dante touched my chin, breaking my gaze away. “Are you okay?”

Looking at him, I felt better already. I smiled. “Sure. It’s nothing. What is it with you and him, anyway?”

He shrugged faintly. “Vampire fixation, I guess. He wants it pretty bad. He’s got quite a temper. You should be careful.”

Doubt slid a cold finger up my spine. Rajah lied to me about not wanting immortality, then. “What do you mean? He’d never hurt me.”

“Don’t be too sure.” He hesitated, like he didn’t want to say more. “I saw him last night, with a fae girl. He killed her, Jade. Just like that. I tried to help her, but . . .”

Nausea roiled. I’d seen Rajah last night, and he certainly hadn’t lacked for energy. Sex had poured off him in waves. He hadn’t needed to consume any.

I’d turned him down, and he’d taken out his anger on some poor fairy.

“Don’t let him bother you. He’s just jealous of me. And he should be, tonight.” Dante brushed my hair from my shoulder, a smile curling his lips. “How about that drink? You can tell me more.”

“Okay.” I smiled back. I couldn’t remember what I’d been telling him, but it didn’t matter.

He slipped his hand into mine, and we walked up to the bar. He whispered to the bar girl, and she poured thick ruby-red wine that stained the inside of the glass. I lifted it to my nose, a dark, fruity, musky smell rising.

Dante’s eyes glinted. “Drink up.”

J
ade puts the glass to her lips, and Dante watches greedily as she sips, blood staining her mouth. She’s already senseless, her eyes distant and euphoric like a fae junkie’s. Her slender throat bobs as she swallows, one gulp, then another. His pulse flows quicker, anticipation whetting his taste buds.

Such a seductress, charming that fucking idiot Quinn. She really knew how to suck a man, too. He’d watched transfixed as she’d taken Quinn to the hilt, his own cock full and aching in sympathy. No wonder Rajahni wants her.

Well, Rajahni can’t have her.

Dante takes the empty glass from Jade’s fingers and slips his arm around her thin waist, leading her away. He’s never seen any reason to play by the rules, never laid stock in dusty centuries-old clan traditions. Follow the rules, get screwed by the rules. He learned that with emphatic force as a boy, the day Mussolini marched the Blackshirts into Calabria to shoot and kick the shit out of hundreds of the people who’d voted the fucker into office in the first place. And he’d sucked up another powerful dose when the Reds strung the aging Il Duce up from a bloody meat hook in Milan. The spoils go to the strong, not the nice or careful. Stop kicking for an instant, and you’ll sink.

Dante is young, delirious on his power, not old and stale like Angelo Valenti, or Sal DiLuca, Dante’s predecessor. Who squealed like a squashed rat as he bled to death, thank you very much, a sound Dante still remembers in hot blood-soaked dreams. He always swore he’d bathe in Sal’s blood, and a mighty fine bath it was. He orgasmed as he held the struggling old man down, hard and long and breathtaking, burning blood and come splashing his skin. He’s not afraid of that, doesn’t shirk from what it says about him. Hell, if it feels good, bring it on. That’s what power’s for.

Fuck ’em if they can’t take it. And fuck the demon lords, too. All jealous of his freedom. Dante’s got no time for useless courtesies or ancient clan bullshit about territory and suitable mates. And now he’s on his own in the new world, with no crusty elders controlling his every move.

So let the world drown in blood and chaos, and all these craven liars who pretend they’re so goddamn civilized will eat each other alive to stay afloat. Let them sink deeper into brutality with every dying thrash, and Dante and those he deems worthy will watch and laugh. His own dark hell on earth, so much tastier and more fascinating than the one below.

Pity Jade won’t like to watch. He’s rather enjoying her, even if it’s just to spite Rajahni. He offered Rajah everything once, and Rajah turned him down, saying he didn’t want to live forever. Laughing at the very idea. No one laughs at Dante DiLuca and stays happy. Dante will fucking well make sure the smug bastard lives every last excruciating moment of his thousand years with Kane. Just thinking about it makes him hard and ready.

He pulls Jade onto the couch with him, distant strobe lights flickering in drifting white smoke. Her gaze smolders as he tells her silently what he wants her to do, the blood connection between them crackling in the stale air. As she stretches onto her back and slides her fingers between her legs to open herself for him, he smiles. Vampire blood, the date rape drug from hell.

He rips her panties away, opens his trousers, and plunges inside her. She’s tighter than he expects, coating him like hot honey, and he has to push hard to enter her fully. She cries out, weak, but thanks to the blood, her rapture is stunned and useless. He nuzzles her breast through her soft dress as he thrusts, tugging the flowering nipple with his front teeth, saliva running from his mouth to soak her. She moans, her muscles rippling around him, and he grins, curiosity a pleasant throb in his balls. “So who are you thinking of, Jade, now I’m fucking you?”

“You,” comes the answer, faint. “Rajah. Killian.”

“All three? Ambitious. Still, you won’t remember any of this, so go right ahead.” He laughs, his urgent breath wetting her dress more. “Now tell me what you really want from me.”

She shudders, resisting, her head jerking from side to side. “Kane—”

“Not Kane. You.” He likes it when she fights. “And don’t tell me you want to be loved. No one loves hell’s whore. Believe me, I know.” He captures her mouth, driving in his tongue, and lets blood-tinged saliva flow, another sly taste of persuasion. “What is there without love, Jade? Tell me.”

She sighs, sensual, tilting her hips against him to slide him deeper, and the words he’s waiting for slip at last from her shining lips. “I want to die.”

Desire thickens his blood, and a growl wells up in his throat. “Say that again.”

“Kill me.”

His cock swells, painful. He could kill her, too. Vampire blood can erase her fragile immortality, wash it away like dirt whether she knows it or not. But he won’t grant her wish, not yet. Not until it suits him, and she begs him properly. But he can’t wait any longer to taste her, and he drags the shoulder seam of her halter dress inward, revealing one small white breast with a hard, puckered nipple.

“You know this’ll hurt. Don’t scream.” He stretches his jaws, snarling, and with a growl of hungry desire he fastens his mouth over the peak and sinks his teeth in deep.

Blood, boiling and glorious, flowing over his tongue, rich with her salty stink. She moans and writhes. He sucks, filling his mouth. He drives deep into her as he swallows, but the pleasure of rapidly nearing orgasm is pale compared to this.

Her lifeblood pumping into him, her soft skin trembling in his mouth, the dirty, gritty taste of pain against the hardness of her nipple yearning for more sensation. Complete submission, and with it come her thoughts, fragments of memory, ecstasy, fear. Whispers of scent and sensation, a thousand different men, the succulent brush of lips, the slick taste of skin and pressure of teeth, hot hardness filling her, hurting her, pleasuring her, all together in a heady rush of life. And most recently, the luxuriant fall of midnight hair, slick swollen lips teasing hers, the enthralling scent of spice.

Jealousy burns Dante like acid, overboiling his desire, but triumph steals his breath away. He can see into her mind. He knows what Rajahni’s up to, wanting out from Kane’s thrall. And he knows exactly how to fuck it up.

Hot tension grips his balls, explodes along his cock. Desperate, he sucks hard and long, one last delicious mouthful, and comes with a deep groan, jerking into her.

He laughs as aftershocks steal his breath. Come inside a succubus. Not many men get to do that and live. But she can’t steal a vampire’s soul, at least not with rapture. He licks the last of her blood away and pulls her damp dress back to cover the seeping wound on her breast. She didn’t come, and her flesh twitches in protest as he withdraws.

He crawls up to her face, his breath hot and coppery, wetting her ear. “Sorry, darlin’. Maybe next time. Now listen carefully, and I’ll tell you how you can find Vorenus Luna.”

10

I
pushed up on my elbows in my sweaty bed, squinting at the afternoon sun pouring in the open venetians. Dust motes swirled, glinting, and my body sweated and burned in the sun-cooked bedroom air. Jesus. What time was it?

The digital clock on the bedside table said 3:25. I groaned and flopped the damp sheet aside.

I dragged myself up to the bathroom, a throbbing ache in my temples. My stomach hurt. I leaned on the wall next to the toilet, fumbling knotted hair from my face, and waited for the nausea. I was naked, sweat running in rivulets over me, and I smelled like a seldom-cleaned distillery where someone had died. My wrists felt swollen, my thrall bangles tight. I had no idea how I’d gotten home. At least the other half of my bed was empty.

My stomach churned at last, and I bent lower and let the spew heave out into the bowl, stinking and stringed with scarlet. I wiped my mouth with a hot sticky hand, tasting acid and copper. God knew what I’d drunk last night.

I turned the shower on and stumbled under, grateful for the cold water soothing my skin and running through my hair, blissfully icy on my pulsing scalp. I rinsed sweat from my limbs, gingerly lathering soap everywhere. I rubbed absently at a tender bruise on my breast I didn’t recall getting. Not only did I not remember getting home, I didn’t remember much at all, beyond tramming it to