Succubi Are Forever (16 page)

“Ladies,” he said in a no-nonsense voice. His gaze moved over the rocks, then in my direction, as if he could see me in the darkness. “You don’t look thrilled to see me, Jackie.”

There was no humor in his voice, no playful affection.

“It’s true,” I admitted, and winced at the pain in my jaw, putting a hand to it and falling silent again.

Seeing Noah down here made even more curse words rise to mind. Not just the regular ones, too. He needed a whole string of them.
Shitfuckdamnitalltohell.

He must have come here for the same halo. Damn it. That would be the only explanation as to why he’d kept showing up. Unless… someone had sold us out. Someone with peach hair and cold eyes, I suspected. Either way, the Serim knew we were after the halo and they’d come to snatch it first.

And who better to send than the one man that I was unable to disobey? I watched, guarded, as he stepped forward on one of the stones, and began to calmly make his way toward us.

“We don’t need your help,” I called, pressing a hand to my cheek. It throbbed something awful, but I ignored it. “You can go back. We’re cool.”

He made it to us in no time at all, which I kind of hated. Soon enough, he was at the stepping-stones beside us, holding the lantern out to peer at the two of us. Remy got to her feet, dusting off her wet jeans and I got to mine as well, my entire body shivering, my jaw a black ache that wouldn’t go away. I’d scraped and bruised the hell out of my leg on my fall into the water, but that was trivial. A nice, long, thorough round of sex with Zane and I’d heal fast. I just had to endure until he awoke.

As Noah’s gaze slid over me, I knew he took note of my bruises, my shivering, my swelling jaw. I said nothing, just crossed my arms over my wet chest and glared at him.

He glanced at Remy, then at me. “I’m not here to rescue you.”

“You’re here to stop us,” I said through my tight, throbbing jaw. I looked back at that smear of green light, so faint in the distance. So close and yet so far.

He tilted his head, studying me, and then stepped forward onto the next stepping-stone. “No, I’m here to retrieve the halo myself.”

I swallowed the gasp that threatened to rise in my throat and gingerly moved onto the stone he’d left. “What? Why?”

He continued to move forward, taking the light with him, leaving us no choice but to follow close behind. As I hobbled onto each stone he vacated, Remy followed.

“Because I am compelled, of course,” Noah said without turning around, and I could hear the bitterness in his voice. “The council wishes to have the halo and the Archangel Gabriel’s favor for themselves, and I am their willing puppet.”

I said nothing to that. He carried the burden of those tasks because he’d accidentally turned me. What was I going to do, apologize for existing? I couldn’t say I was sorry to be an immortal, only sorry that Noah was the one paying the price for it.

But somehow, I guessed that “sorry” wouldn’t make things better.

So I said nothing.

Noah was remarkably surefooted on the flagstones, as if they weren’t slippery with water or incredibly small. His strides were long enough that he walked on them without hesitation, unlike the anxious, slow steps forward that Remy and I did. With him in the lead, we made it to the other side, crossing that immense underground lake.

The “other side” proved to be a rounded nook, no more than fifteen feet wide and about that long. At least there was firm, solid ground to stand upon. We moved to the rock and stared at our surroundings. The luminescent green moss I’d seen from across the lake covered the small alcove like a film, setting the entire area aglow. A ten-foot-tall wall, heavily carved, blocked the way between us and the rest of the cavern. A stone door with a circular carving rested in the center of the wall, covered in more moss. As I looked overhead, the ceiling rose high into the darkness, and I was unable to see the top of it. The cavern seemed endless. The cold, black water made gentle lapping noises at the lip of the stone platform.

I reached up to touch one of the walls and the moss came off on my hands, so I was careful not to brush anything else. I didn’t want to be stuck in the dark again. I hugged my wet T-shirt close and looked over at Noah, waiting.

He turned the lantern off, testing the light. The green glow from the moss was dim, but enough that we could still make out each other’s outlines and the door ahead of us.

“So if you’re here going after the halo, should we just turn around?” Remy asked. “Jackie’s a little busted up.”

I glared at her.

“No,” Noah said quietly, shrugging off his shirt. “Stay.”

Well that settled it. A command. Not that I was planning on leaving. I’d find a way to get around Noah and get that halo for myself. “So what is this place? Since you got here without a map or anything.”

He glanced back at me. “This is the final resting place of the Archangel Azazel.”

“Then what’s with all of this?” I gestured at the door, which was as beautifully carved as everything else in this weird place. “What’s with all the stairs and the stepping-stones? It’s not like it’s a maze. Just a lot of walking. Why go to so much effort?”

“It was a labor of love,” Noah said softly, running a hand down the carved circular door. “Azazel was the best-loved of all the archangels. I imagine someone built this for him to show how much they loved him. An homage to him, even in death.”

“Well, as tombs go, this one hasn’t had a single booby trap,” I pointed out. “So either we’re doing something wrong, or these guys didn’t have much imagination.”

Noah glanced back at me. “This is the entrance to the tomb proper. Behind it lies a madman’s way, the measure of the unknowing, and the light of the eternal.”

He’d known what I was after all along. I gritted my teeth. “So what was all that other crap? The stairs and flagstones and everything?”

Noah smiled faintly and glanced over at me. “Foreplay.”

“Foreplay!”

“Only those truly devoted to Azazel were meant to come this far. If you make it this far in, then the real tests begin.”

Oh goody.

“What does the council want from Gabriel anyhow?” I managed to grit out.

“I don’t know,” Noah said in a grave voice. “Nothing good, I’m sure.” He held the shirt out to me. When I hesitated, he said, “Take off your shirt and put this on.”

Burning anger flashed through me and I tore the wet shirt over my head, flinging it to the ground with a wet slap. My breasts were covered in nothing but a filmy bra, my hard nipples evident even in the low light. I took the shirt as I’d been compelled to do and buttoned it loosely. I didn’t want to admit, even grudgingly, that it was a lot warmer than what I’d been wearing.

It was the fact that Noah had swept back into my life and thought he could just control everything again.

He seemed to know my mutinous thoughts, taking a step toward me. There was a hint of a hard smile on his face and he reached out to brush a thumb over my busted jaw. “I can help you with this, you know.”

I slapped his hand away. We’d been lovers for a long time, but I was with Zane now, and Zane and Noah hated each other. Sleeping with Noah without coercion meant that I was betraying the man I loved.

And while succubi had questionable morals, I wasn’t heading down that road.

A hard, wry smile twisted Noah’s mouth. “Spurned by my own creation,” he said softly.

“Why can’t we just be friends?” I grated through my aching jaw.

He chuckled, the sound low, as he turned toward the door. “Why Jackie, I thought we
were
friends.”

Yeah, ’cause this was so friendly.

Remy cleared her throat. “I hate to cut all this palpable sexual tension here, but, Noah, how did you get down here?”

As he moved toward the wall, he glanced over it, assessing. With one hand, he brushed his fingers over the carvings. “I came down the same way you did. Through the room of lights and down the stairs.”

“But what about Ethan?” Remy asked, a note of worry in her voice. “He let you pass?”

“I told Ethan that I was here to help you. He was enthusiastic about the thought. Good deed and all.”

I clenched my fists. Curse him for turning our Boy Scout against us. “You suck.”

“I did what I had to,” Noah said. He moved to the door, studying it for a moment. The center of the door was covered in moss and he wiped it away with gentle fingers, revealing a series of buttons in a circle. Another halo symbol? Noah placed his fingers over the center carving and pushed. The symbol of Ra, I noticed.

It depressed inward. He turned it over and then began to depress the circular buttons on the edges of the carving in a very slow, deliberate pattern, as if he were working an ancient combination lock.

“So I suppose you’re just going to swoop in here, snatch the halo, and ignore the two of us working so hard to get it for ourselves?” I asked him, getting annoyed when he didn’t even look up from the carving. He just continued to press the buttons in combinations of two and three at a time, pausing, and then pressing a button again.

“Hello, Noah? Earth to Noah, come in please.” Remy said impatiently. “We’re trying to lecture you here. You can play Connect Four with the wall some other time.”

“You can lecture me afterward,” he said after a moment, and I heard a click, then a rumble as the door’s symbol depressed and began to twist on its own. He’d unlocked it. With a satisfied look, he turned to me. “I’m sorry if you’re angry, Jackie. You know I don’t want this for myself.”

“It doesn’t matter if you want it for yourself or not. The point is that you’re still pushing ahead of us. That makes you a big jerk, just like that asshole Phryne,” I pointed out.

“You say the sweetest things,” a cool, familiar voice whispered behind me. I heard a splashing sound at the edge of the platform and then the sound of a gunshot and Remy’s cry of pain as she pitched forward. I barely caught sight of Ashara’s dark, dripping hair as she lowered a gun from behind Remy. Phryne was here?

A second gunshot went off. My head exploded.

All went dark.

“The sad truth of the business is that someone’s always going to step over someone else to get ahead. Or give head to get ahead.”—
A Porn Story,
by Remy Summore

~*~

Warm kisses pressed to my skin, dancing along my breastbone and stomach. Hands traced my hips and slid my shorts off.

A tidal wave of pain rushed through my head, nearly blacking me out again. I existed in that weird space without dreams or consciousness, only vaguely aware that someone crouched over me, running hands over my body. A mouth descended on my sex and began to lick, and I whimpered. No, not Noah. I didn’t want Noah.

I wanted Zane.

“Don’t fight me, Princess,” a voice whispered against my thighs. “Just lie back and heal.”

Zane. I relaxed. That tongue pressed to my clit and then I felt teeth sink into my slick folds, even as the tongue pressed to my clit again.

The orgasm that shot through me knocked me out again.

When I next awoke, it was to the feeling of warm hands stroking my breasts, teasing the nipples erect. My head throbbed and ached, but the pain was being quickly drowned out by the sensations flooding through my body.

“That’s it, Princess. Come back to me,” Zane said softly, whispering against my neck and then pressing a kiss there.

‘What… where am I?” The words were soft, difficult to speak, my gaze fuzzy. My senses were drowning in Zane, his warm, naked body pressed against my skin. My legs were parted underneath him, but he wasn’t deep inside me. His cock pressed against my belly, a hard bar of need as he continued to kiss and stroke every inch of my skin. “Zane… how?”

“Shh,” he said softly, moving up to kiss me into silence. His tongue stroked into my mouth, sending a bolt of lazy pleasure through my body. Then he lightly nipped at my full lower lip, letting me feel his fangs. “Still in the tomb. Don’t worry. You’re safe with me.”

His thumb traced small circles on my nipple, teasing the peak erect as my topsy-turvy senses tried to align themselves. He continued to kiss me, softly, gently, languidly, slow, sensual kisses that drugged my senses and made my body pulse with pleasure. We had all the time in the world, those kisses told me, and he was going to spend it loving me. His lips captured mine again, his tongue licking at the seam of my mouth before breaking the kiss again.

God, he tasted amazing. I whimpered when he pulled his mouth away from mine, needing more. His hand brushed my cheek and he kissed down my throat, pressing light, firm, tasting kisses to my skin.

My eyes began to focus in the low, greenish light, and I noticed the spread of Zane’s black wings over the two of us. God, that was sexy. I always loved the sight of those feathers, the thick sweep of them. I reached up to touch one, run my fingers through the weave of feathers the way he liked, but my arm was sluggish to respond. Before I could raise my arm, Zane was there to press it back down again, then brushed his knuckles over the skin. “Just relax. Let me love you.”

And he nipped at my nipple. It sent a shiver of delight through my body and I relaxed again, letting him work my body as I watched with dazed, sleepy eyes.

“My beautiful Jackie,” he whispered, then lapped at my erect nipple, coaxing the peak to stand taller. “Gorgeous, sexy princess.”

“Zane,” I murmured softly. “You feel so good.”

“I know,” he said with a grin. His mouth dipped back to my nipple and he circled it with his tongue.

“Bite?” I asked softly. I loved it when he bit my nipples.

But he shook his head at me and gave me the lightest of teasing flicks on my breast. “Not tonight, Princess. You need your wits about you.”

Wits seemed to be the last thing I had right about now. My world was full of Zane’s delicious skin, his rippling black wing feathers, the weight of his body over mine. I felt so languid that all I could do was enjoy the sensation.

When his mouth dipped to my navel, I caught my breath. “I want you inside me,” I told him. “In me, possessing me.”