The Sorceress Screams (30 page)

Soon Max’s
tongue dipped into my belly button. I whimpered because the heat he’d drawn had
reached the throbbing stage. He needed to do something
more
before I went crazy.

The slow,
delicious torture of Max’s trip up my torso had me writhing in need by the time
his mouth closed over my left breast. Pure desire shot from my nipple down into
my core. I cried out his name to the ceiling, digging my fingers into his
shoulders.

The tank top
was quickly tossed off as he lifted me to my knees so he could feast on my
breasts. His stiff length rested against my silk panties.

“
Querida
, they’re beautiful,” he whispered while switching
between each breast to offer adoring kisses.

I soon found
myself rubbing against him without realizing what I was doing. And when I’d
noted my wickedness, I increased the pressure rather than end it. Max groaned
loudly, muttering a curse to his god as he did. His hand dropped. Teasing
caresses feathered over my panties. Seconds later he delved his fingers into my
passage, drawing a panting cry from our lips.

Max set me
onto my back, tugging the slick silk over my legs in a frantic move. He dropped
them beside the bed, and then paused. His breath caught as he stared down at
me.

“Ay
dios
mio
!” In English, he
apologized for failing to give me longer than ten minutes of foreplay.

I understood
the apology when his cool, rigid tip pushed against my slick folds.
“¡
Sí
!”
I cried out.

With a mighty
groan he pushed forward, burying the cool length of
himself
to the hilt as he’d promised last night. His body shuddered with pleasure. Soft
oaths crossed his lips before he captured my mouth with his.

I met his slow
thrust, urging him faster. Something had to be done to soothe my throbbing
need. We moved as one in increasing vigor. Our cries mingled within the stone
room. The pace quickened until I could no longer meet it. I flopped back,
content to let him take control, reveling in the shivers of desire that
regularly shot over my body.

Our orgasms
came swiftly, one right after the other. I went first, exploding with desire
and screaming so loudly I might have popped my eardrum—a marked change from
yesterday’s soundless roar. Max gave voice to his desire as well, bellowing to
his god as the spill of cold seed filled me. I shuddered once in distaste for
the strange sensation before I pushed it down in favor of the wonderful calm
that had come over my body.

Max lay with
me for several minutes until my pulse eased. Then he drew us a bath in the
marble tub in his attached bathroom. I settled into the hot water, letting it
relax me as much as he had.

****

I should have
argued harder that I could walk on my own. Max was having none of it. He’d
cited my one stumble from the tub—something I’d assured him was caused by the
puddle of water at the base—as the reason I must allow him to carry me to the
festivities. If the looks on his guests’ faces were any indication, they knew
exactly what we’d been doing prior to appearing.

I should have
found a way to dry my hair and remove the wrinkles from my top. My hair looked
silly damp without its usual gel. And it was proof I’d recently been wet. Max’s
smug smile probably didn’t help. That expression made it easy for everyone to guess
why he’d been delayed.

He set me on
an open lounge chair beside his pool—the lounge chair beside Desmond. Max
lingered for a sexy kiss that somehow managed to stoke the fire of arousal
again
despite what he’d done to me a
half hour ago.

“Two hours at
most,
querida
,” he said. “Then I’ll take you back to
bed. I miss your warmth already.”

Searing
embarrassment filled my cheeks. He’d said it in English, loud enough that
everyone in the vicinity had heard him. I felt like a slut—worse, a
vampire’s
slut.

In Spanish I
said, “You’re making a scene.”

His mouth
spread into a bright smile. Mild surprise widened his eyes. He truly hadn’t
realized I understood his language.

He replied in
his native tongue. “So stop me.”

He knew I
couldn’t. My lingering arousal faded in the face of his now knowing smile.

“I could hit
you with a blast of Air and send you into your pool,” I said.

Max’s lips
curved into his mischievous grin. “Do it and I’ll make you join
me.
Rebecca.” My name had a sexy accent when he spoke in his
native tongue.

I turned my
head away. He brushed against me, lips pulling at my neck. A spark of desire
spiked from where they touched. Finally he sauntered jauntily down the lawn
past the many small bonfires.

Oh Zeus, he could have
bitten
me
! But he hadn’t. He hadn’t so much as
grazed a fang over my skin. I’d been foolish not to worry.

I was too
ashamed to look at anyone, so I stared at the crest on the pool’s floor. My
body remained stiff in anticipation of the reaction around me. But the only
reaction I got was Desmond standing from his lounge chair and fading into the
shadows.

Nell found me
ten minutes later. She was dressed in a cute, pale blue sundress that matched
her eyes. Her long hair was back in a soft braid that made her look her
youthful age. My employee dropped down into the lounge chair Desmond had
vacated, crossing one espadrille sandal over the other.

“You look…”
Her voice trailed off without finishing what I supposedly looked like. “Shit on
a trailer hitch! You did it!”

I shot her a
sharp look.

Thick wrinkles
twisted her forehead. She gaped at me. My cheeks tripled in heat at the
aghast
expression.

I stood,
hoping to avoid the many witnesses. I wasn’t going to argue with Nell in front
of them. With feigned calm I made my way down the lawn. Nell followed me to a
copse of trees that appeared to be guest-free.

“Yes,” I said
once we’d stopped. “I did it. I’m sorry if you’re disappointed in me.”

She folded her
arms. “Are you still insisting this is all because he has something of yours?”

I pressed my
eyes shut because it pained me to answer the frosty question. “No. I did it
because I wanted to.”

Nell pulled in
a quick breath through her nose. “At least you’re not lying anymore.”

My shoulders
slumped. “It started because he has something of mine. I wasn’t lying.”

She shook her
head and then stalked across the grass. I sunk onto the glossy green surface,
alone and surprisingly cold in the summer heat.

I didn’t
understand myself. How could I feel so good with Max one moment and then
ashamed in the next? Was I as bigoted as Desmond? Or was this because Max was
supposedly the bad guy?

Across the
torch light and fire glow, attendees mingled in their small groups. Summer rock
songs spanning the decades echoed over the massive yard. Children played with
balls and hoops while adults kept an eye on them with bottles of beer and hot
dogs in hand. There were couples on blankets. Elderly in lawn chairs.
And dogs chasing sticks.

It looked like
a normal slice of Americana. And yet it wasn’t. These were the citizens of
Wipuk
, a hidden colony of witches, at a party thrown by a
vampire.

Even though
these people were the fringe of society, I didn’t fit in here. I was the fringe
of the fringe. It hurt my heart to think of it.

My gaze passed
over a face turned in my direction. I knew without focusing that it was
Desmond. He stood within a group of males parallel. Two had their backs to me
while one, a dark-haired hunk, also watched me. No doubt that was
Eamonn
Cary, the Dark witch high priest. The circle of
women to their left might have been
Eamonn’s
harem
for all I knew.

I made myself
look away, spotting a pale blue sundress in the distance. A wide male soon eclipsed
her. The dark, shoulder-length hair and leather jacket were details only Ali
Mac could claim. Nell tried to dart away. One rapid arm caught her. And then he
was bent over her. She squirmed and kicked for several seconds before going
pliant in his arms. I knew exactly what that felt like.

As I watched
them, Springsteen’s “Born in the USA” switched to Etta James. My spine went
ramrod straight. “Sunday Kind of Love” was
his
song.

Moisture
formed beneath my eyelids. I dashed my thumbs beneath my eyes, destroying the
evidence of my emotion. If I didn’t get out of view soon, I’d burst into
ridiculous tears in front of all these creatures.

I hopped to my
feet, sprinting down the lawn past the happy witches. There
were
woods lining Max’s property
to the west. The trees would dampen the
sound. They had to. I only had to run far enough.

I shoved
through the overgrowth, disappearing within seconds. Frantically I rushed from
the audio torture. It was dark here where the torchlight and bonfires didn’t
reach. But the music did.

Then the damn
song
repeated
.

“Stop!”
I dropped to my knees in the
brush. “Please.”

The CD
skipped. The music changed to the Mexican hat dance and then jumped to the song
Max had sung to me in the cantina.

“
Stop
,” I said now that I knew
he
was truly here. “You made your
point.”

“What point
did I make?”

I lifted my
head. Trip feigned
a recline
against one of the trees
he couldn’t actually touch. Water mist coated the shimmering midnight blue
shirt and black pants atop his honey-skinned slender build. That mist meant he
was ensconced within the Spirit Realm. Dark blond hair hung to his shoulders in
a grown-up surfer boy style. His eyes were hooded and hidden.

After
three
weeks, Trip had returned.

It had seemed
like all eternity. I’d begun thinking he’d given up his obsession. How wrong
I’d been.

“
Kora
.”
His
baritone voice went sharp. “What
point
did I make?”

“You’ve been
watching?” My answer was uncertain because I wasn’t sure it was the truth. I’d
gotten him in trouble. A punishment in Tartarus wasn’t something he’d easily
forgive me for, even if it
had
been
his own doing.

“I have.”

His lack of
emotion was unsettling. He’d always been an open book. Trip’s expressions had
been easier to read than a child’s. Maybe they still were. I couldn’t currently
see them in the shadows the woods and his hair cast.

“Why didn’t
you stop it?” I’d been wondering for weeks. “Was it because of your … punishment?”

“What are you
asking,
Kora
?”

“Charon, take
you, Trip!” I tossed up my arms. “You know exactly what I’m asking!”

He cocked his
head, tone going snide. “I don’t want to get this wrong.”

“You’ve
frightened everyone else away.
Why not this one?”

“I tried,” he
said with a haughty sniff.

“If you’d
tried he wouldn’t have…” I couldn’t finish the sentence, turning my head to
hide the flush in my cheeks.

“He wouldn’t
have fucked you an hour ago?” My heart skipped at the bitterness in his voice.
Trip took a menacing step forward. “Is that what you mean,
Kora
?
Or should I say
Rebecca
?” He spoke
the word exactly as Max had done countless times.

“
Don’t
call me that.” I jumped to my feet
so I could put some power behind my demand. Portions of his features became
visible.

“It’s your
name.” His pointed, mauve lips adopted a sneer. “I have more of a right to call
you that than he does considering I was nearby when you were given it. Is that
what you meant?
That if I’d frightened him away, it would
have saved you from being fucked by a
corpse
?”

“Why are you
here?”

Trip tossed
his hair out of his face. His jaunty grin didn’t reach his hazel eyes. “You
were depressed, alone, wondering why your life wasn’t as easy as theirs,
wishing you could have an ordinary existence with ordinary things. It seemed
like the best time to talk to you.”

I drew in a
choked breath because that was exactly what I’d been thinking when I’d been
huddled into myself on the grass, watching
Wipuk’s
citizens behave with seeming normalcy.

I made myself
breathe.
“The best time to talk or the best time to torment
me?”

“Are they not
the same thing?”

The typical
answer should have made me irate. Instead, it was as if a weight had been
lifted. I choked again.

No. It wasn’t
possible. I was
relieved
he was here?

But I was.
Against all reason, I’d
missed
my
lifelong nemesis. I felt alone on Earth when he wasn’t around.