Underworld Queen (25 page)

“No thanks, Jeremy. It’s my job. My
real
job, not chasing after—” He stopped, not wanting to reveal he knew anything further about Jonas and Audray. “That’s what they pay me for, after all.” He wondered how much longer before he’d get called to the dean’s office. He knew the students wouldn’t complain, but their parents, who were paying nearly thirty thousand dollars a year, always wanted their money’s worth. He had a couple of parents’ messages he’d not returned.

Carl completed his desk straightening and picked up his briefcase, leaning it on his right hip, addressing his dark student, “So what’s your part in all this, if I may ask?”

“Well, I happen to know she really wants to get together with this Jonas Starling guy.” Jeremy watched the look of alarm Carl knew his face revealed.

“Get together?” he asked.

“You know she’s old. So’s my mom.” Jeremy’s chin rose as he tilted his head back, and smiled back at Carl at an angle.

“Why, I’ve met your mom, and she’s quite lovely,” Carl offered, walking toward the doorway. “And she certainly doesn’t look old.” He wrinkled his nose and slipped a finger around his collar to give his neck air.

“You really think so?” Jeremy brightly answered, making Carl wince. “Good. I’ll have to tell her. She thinks you’re pretty cute yourself.”

This wasn’t going anywhere Carl wanted to go. “No, no. You don’t understand. I was just being polite. Your mom’s a very attractive woman. I didn’t imply anything other than that.” He had the urge to run to his car and take off, never coming back to the college. He didn’t need the jealous husband of a black witch to come after him too. He walked with Jeremy down the creaky wooden floor of the abandoned hallway. He could hear lectures behind windowed classroom doors, the sounds of learning going on, people’s futures being shaped. He felt seriously outside all that now.

Carl, get a grip.

“Uh, Jeremy. You were telling me your mother and your aunt are very old. H…how old are you?” Carl wondered if he really wanted to know the answer.

“Oh.” Jeremy chuckled, books balanced on his hip, his head down. “I’m only twenty.” He leaned over and punched Carl in the arm. “In real years. But thanks for the compliment.”

Carl let it sink in as they exited the hallway into the afternoon sunlight. He needed to check his box in the lounge, but didn’t want his ridealong when he did so. Just in case there was trouble. He knew there would be trouble very soon. So he stopped. Startling him, several doors in the hallway swung open. A covey of students, flush with ideas, swarmed their way around the pair, jabbering like crows on a telephone line.

“So your mother isn’t your biological mother, then?”
Carl, you idiot!

Jeremy indicated he knew full well what Carl’s question implied by answering, “My father is human. My mother has outlived many husbands and lovers. I have lots of half brothers and sisters, some of them still living.”

Thank God for small favors. He’s a human, not a witch.
Carl was at a complete loss for words, and rocked back and forth in his wingtips, his Argyle socks damp as he tried to wiggle his constricted toes.

“That must make for some interesting family reunions.” It was all he could think to say.

Jeremy shrugged, shook his head and chuckled, “You have no idea.”

Carl didn’t have to use much imagination to see the picture. He pressed the tips of five fingers to his forehead, which was creased in a scowl. He squinted back at the young student, “Jeremy, can we just get to the point here? I feel like we’re digressing all over your family tree. Frankly, I think this is your business, not mine. So, let’s just finish and be on our separate ways, okay?” He dropped his hand and looked around him as the ocean of students subsided and they were left alone.

“Like I said,” Jeremy began, “we want another meeting. Glenda wants me there. She needs to talk to you in person.”

Carl started to object, but Jeremy interrupted him.

“She wants to meet in an hour at the Café Contada.”

“I can’t just drop everything and show up at some meeting off campus. I’ve got things to do here, and…and…”

“At the library? In the stacks?” Jeremy grinned. “You like the stacks,” he said as he wiggled his eyebrows up and down.

Carl pulled at the unbuttoned collar of his shirt, stretching his neck up and out of it. He rolled his shoulders and transferred the weight of his briefcase to his right hand. He thought of Molly all alone at the library, waiting for him. He would not put her in danger. This was a meeting he would have to do on his own.

“Agreed. I will meet you two in…” he checked his watch, “…at one-thirty.”

“Cool. See you then.” Jeremy punched him again in the right arm. It actually hurt this time. The casual attitude of this young student belied something deep and sinister, he thought.

Carl needed to go to his house and change first. His clothes were soaking wet. He gave Molly a call and told her he’d be delayed.

Glenda was already
seated behind a large frothing cappuccino when Carl arrived. He was glad he had showered and changed, since he figured she probably had a supernatural sense of smell. She would be able to smell his fear.

Jeremy was over at the counter making an order.

“Go ahead and tell Jeremy what you want. It’s on me today,” she said with a smile. She was trying to be sweet, he noticed. But it wasn’t working. Something thick, black and oily was bubbling just under the surface.

He declined and took a seat across from her.

“Okay. I’m here. I should be at school. I’m way behind on my grades. But I’m here. Can we make this quick?” Carl asked.

“Well, that depends on you.” She sipped her coffee and peered over the white foam, her black eyes scanning his face and down his neck. Carl saw a splinter of lust shooting towards him and, in spite of himself, he had a vision of hot sex with this vixen plastered against the back of his eyes like it had intentionally been pinned there.

“Stop it,” Carl said.

She tilted her head to the side and gave him a smirk. “You’re one attractive professor. Wish I had someone like you when I was doing the University thing. But in those days I loved rogue warriors and mercenaries.”

Should I be flattered?

“Anyway, it’s more fun when the male doesn’t know I’ve sent the telepathy. So, you’re safe, for now.”

“I’d like to get this done so I can get back to school.”

“To Molly.”

“And to her.”

“You know you risk her life by being petulant and a little defiant in your attitude, not that I don’t enjoy defiant men occasionally,” she answered.

Carl stood. “Look, I’ve told you everything I know. I agreed to take your money and do the research. I’ve agreed to refund the money. In fact, I’ll refund every cent.” He reached for his wallet from his hip pocket and discovered he’d left it in his pants at his cottage. It was a fruitless gesture anyway, since he never carried that amount of cash on him. “I’ll return it and let’s just call it even.”

“Not acceptable. I’m still in need of your talents.”

“And if I refuse?” he said with his hands on his hips.

“You know this won’t go well for Molly.

“Your henchman on standby?”

“No, he was too heavy-handed and had to be dealt with.” Glenda studied her red nails. “I was thinking…” she looked over to Jeremy who was on his way to the table with a plate of food. “I was thinking Molly could stay with Jeremy for a bit. They are, after all, closer in age than you and she. And Jeremy here says he rather likes the girl, don’t you, Jeremy?”

Carl ripped his eyes from Glenda’s face and stabbed a look at Jeremy, who was watching his aunt, blushing. Then he met Carl’s gaze and swallowed.

“You thought I liked men. Well, I do,” Jeremy said and tried to smile. He sat himself down and looked at his food. Carl leaned forward, gripping the back of his chair, his fingernails digging into the leather until it hurt. He was about to say something he would regret, so kept his mouth shut and listened, but his insides were fuming.

“He is still experimenting with his sexual identity,” Glenda offered. “I think Molly could help him with that, what do you think, Carl? She immune from glamour, or do you think she could take to suggestion as well as you?” Glenda smiled up at Carl but her eyes were stone cold.

“This is pathetic,” he said, sneering down at the witch. “You know I have no power in this evil game you are playing. Leave me out of it. I can’t do anything but make it worse, for all of us,” Carl added, knowing in his heart it was the awful truth.

“Not so, Professor. Not helping me would certainly make it worse, much worse for you and Molly.” Glenda leaned across the table almost planting her chest in her cappuccino as she pointed to the chair. “Sit down and shut up. I am only going to ask you one more time and then I’m done with you, with both of you.” When Carl didn’t move, she added, “Permanently.”

Carl deposited his large frame in the brown leather barrel chair across the table from the witch, glancing through the window at the throng of afternoon shoppers streaming along the sidewalk outside. He reviewed options in his head and couldn’t find any. He sat tall and inhaled deeply. He remained silent, head slightly tilted, squinting into Glenda’s dark eyes.

A faint smile had formed at the ends of her upturned red lips and at the corner of her eyes, as little laugh lines revealed themselves tenderly. He wondered if she knew how much he hated this, and whether or not she liked seeing that.

“Okay, then.” She sat back, flicking her dark hair behind her shoulder and running a jeweled white hand with red fingernails through the air dismissively. “I want to arrange a private meeting with Mr. Starling.”

“You know what he is.”

“Yes, a dark angel.”

“So I’m not sure how to contact him.”

“You have his phone number, or at least you have the woman’s.”

“Audray.”

“That’s the one,” she said as if she had temporarily forgotten her name.

“What makes you think he’ll come if I call him?”

She smiled, as if he’d asked the one question she was looking forward to answering. “Because, you and I both know, Starling is a hero. Heroes will always show up to save the innocent with no thought to themselves.”

“But he’s going to protect Audray. He doesn’t really care about me,” Carl said nervously.

“I don’t think Audray is the only woman he cares about. I think he owes you a favor, and Molly too. And then there’s the witch in the woods. Do you really think he could stand to see all of them harmed, if he could help it?” She leaned over the table again and held her hand outstretched, motioning with her fingers for his. Carl placed his hand in hers slowly. He instantly felt the electric current of a sexual glam come over him, and in spite of himself, his dick got hard. He tried to pull away but she crushed his fingers with superhuman strength.

Damn it.

“Don’t worry, Professor. All I want is a meeting with the handsome dark angel. You can tell him that. I have a question to ask him. If you arrange this meeting, you can tell him he will be free to go afterwards. And I will ask nothing further of you.” She squeezed, then let go of Carl’s hand which he shook in pain. Glenda smiled. Carl’s hand throbbed, but not nearly like his groin did.

“Professor, it’s only a small request.”

“Why wouldn’t you do it yourself? Why couldn’t you send Jeremy?”

“Because Starling trusts you. And I can choose where to meet him this way. That part is important to me.”

Carl knew that was the catch. “So you’ve lied about your innocent intentions,” he said.

“Meaning I will harm him or try to keep him from being with his woman? Hardly. He’s safe.” She inhaled and raised both arms above her head as she showed off her ample bustline and slender waist, her hands and wrists writhing in the air above her head. “But my intentions? I assure you they are never innocent.”

Starling was not
available by phone, so Carl left him a message. He thought the message was so cryptic, he doubted the brave dark angel would respond. He knew he was doing it for Molly’s safety, but he still knew at some point he would have to make a stand against this witch, and hoped Molly could give him some help in that department.

“I need to see you, Molly,” he whispered into the phone. He could see her sitting on her stool behind the reference desk, her pink ass spread into the folds of her skirts. He wondered what color panties she wore or if perhaps she had gone without them again, something that tented his pants as he sat behind the wheel in his parked car. Was this her glamour, now coming through the phone? New powers? Or was it coming from his own imagination, from somewhere down in the pit of his soul that craved the young witch.

“I was worried when you didn’t come by. I can leave early. Are you at home?”

“On my way there now.”

“Okay, I’ll tell them I’m sick and meet you there, say in thirty minutes? Have to stop by my place to get some things.”

Molly, you won’t need any things. I want you naked, in my arms.

As if she heard his thoughts, she added, “I bought some new oils I think you’ll like.”

“Hurry. I need you,” was all he could think to say. He rubbed down his fly to calm his erection, but it only made it worse.

“Yes, I can feel that. It’s what I love most about you,” she said and hung up.

Good to her
word, Carl heard her car drive up just as he stepped out of the shower, his second of the day. He applied the lemon cologne to his cheeks. With the towel wrapped around his slim waist, he opened the door to his redheaded white witch and immersed himself in her scent, the feel of her flesh molding around him.

She reached under the towel and took hold of his cock, squeezing the length of him, moving her hand up and down from his sack to the tip, where she plied her thumb over the smooth surface and spread the droplet that had formed. He pulled her inside and slammed the door, pushing her body against it, kissing her neck and then plowing into her mouth with his tongue. His hands pulled back her fiery hair and he kissed her cheeks, her eyes and then plundered her mouth again. She squeezed his balls and moaned as his cock searched for her flesh. She raised her knit top over her breasts with one pink hand, and kneeled. She unclipped her bra and held her two breasts together, letting his cock root between them as she pushed and squeezed her soft flesh around him. The sight of the tip of his penis protruding through the top of her perfect mounds almost made him come, and he jerked as another drop of moisture appeared.