Harper Hall Investigations Complete Series

by Isabel Jordan

  Sure you didn’t. I fucking hate liars.

  Well, she'd managed to shock him yet again. “I have no reason to lie to you.” And just to throw her off her game—which was admittedly better than his own—he added, “And what an unladylike turn of phrase.”

  Bingo. Apparently Miss Bartone hadn't been aware that centuries-old vampires often had certain...talents that younger vampires lacked. Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open.

  But true to form, she regained her composure quickly. “You’re not invited into my head either, Hunter, so stay out of it.”

  A chill—and not the bad kind—skated down his spine as he leaned against her doorjamb. “I enjoy hearing my name on your lips.”

  A commotion down the hall (rattling keys and squeaky sneakers on the cheap vinyl flooring, mostly) kept him from hearing her next thought.

  “Security knows you’re here," she said. "You’d better go or else our little deal’s off.”

  He winked at her. “They won’t even know I’m here.”

  Her skepticism was clear as she crossed her arms over her chest and watched him, silently.

  A security guard—Curtis, his nametag read—raced around the corner and yelled, “Freeze!”

  Hunter glanced at the .22 Curtis was pointing at his chest. Getting shot with it at close range would do little more than annoy him. “You missed the intruder,” he said, pitching his voice an octave lower than usual. “He’s long gone. You’ll want to disable the alarm now.”

  He looked back at Mischa and smirked at her slack jaw and widened eyes. Curtis’ expression went completely blank. “Sorry to disturb your work, Miss Bartone,” he said, voice devoid of any emotion or tone. “The intruder is long gone. I’ll just go disable the alarm now.”

  No wonder my slayers hadn’t stood a chance against him. He probably convinced them to kill themselves! Wait a minute...

  “You son of a bitch,” she hissed. “Did you use mind control on me to—“

  He raised a hand in supplication. “No. The truce truly was your idea. The extremely stubborn and strong-willed seem to be immune to mind control,” he added pointedly.

  And then it was like a black curtain fell over her thoughts. Amazing. Not many humans could block his telepathy. She was a surprise indeed.

  “I think you need to go now before I decide the truce isn’t such a wise idea after all,” she said, glaring at him over the top of her glasses.

  He smiled. He couldn’t help it. Then he felt the mental wall she’d erected crumble a bit around the edges, allowing him to pick up her thoughts again.

  With a smile like that, he just might be able to exert some control over me.

  If his heart still beat, it would’ve skipped at that point.

  “Now that is truly good to know,” he murmured a moment before he grabbed her wrist, yanked her into the hall and pressed his lips to hers, quick and firm.

  She was going to push him away. He could sense it. His disappointment was surprisingly crushing, given he’d only just met her.

  He regretfully pulled away and disappeared on her at a pace he knew the human eye couldn’t follow. He’d just reached the outer gate of the compound when he heard her shout, “Truce is off, you asshole. If I ever see you again, I’ll kill you myself!”

  Hunter laughed out loud. “We’ll see, love. We’ll see.”

  Chapter Ten

  Hunter sat down on the edge of the bed beside Mischa, wet washcloth in hand.

  Her eyes opened and fell on him, a little glazed. Her brow furrowed. “Am I dead?”

  He raised a brow and wiped her forehead, hoping the cool water would help her regain a bit of her focus. “Technically, yes, you are.”

  A ghost of a smile played about her lips. “Yeah, I guess I am. I guess I mean…am I dreaming? Is this real?”

  She looked so hopeful and trusting lying there. In his bed. Where she belonged.

  He gave himself a sharp mental slap across the face. Don’t go down that rabbit hole again. “You need blood,” he said bluntly. “Not the bottled crap. Actual blood.”

  A frown line creased her smooth brow. “The bottled blood has all the—”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” he interrupted. “The bottled blood has all the nutritional requirements vampires need. I’ve seen the commercials, too. The fact is you can mostly survive on the bottled blood. But when you do something stupid—like getting hurt or drunk,” he paused for effect, “you’ll need real blood to recover.”

  “That part’s not in the commercials,” she mumbled.

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Do you have bagged blood?”

  He’d needed every bag Harper had put in his fridge to recover from the months of starvation in prison. He shook his head. “You’ll need to drink from me.”

  She blinked, obviously struggling to keep up with the conversation. “Are you suggesting that I…feed off you?”

  He’d expected her to sound appalled at the idea. She didn’t. She sounded…interested. It took every remaining ounce of his restraint to stay out of her thoughts. At this point, he’d give his left nut to know what she was thinking, but at the same time, there was a part of him that knew he was better off wondering.

  He gave her a curt nod. “Wrist or throat?”

  She tried to sit up and failed, falling back on his pillow with a muttered curse. “Is there really no other way?”

  He shrugged. “You could drink bottled blood. Wait this out. You might feel better in a few days. Maybe not.”

  Her frown line deepened. “A few days? I start a new job for Harper tomorrow.”

  Yes, her job. Chasing down bail-jumping, dangerous vampires. He couldn’t express how much he loathed the idea of her putting herself in danger like that.

  But she wasn’t his to protect anymore. Not that she would’ve listened to him even if she was.

  In answer, he offered her his wrist. “You’ll feel better in moments.”

  And he’d be in hell. She had no way of knowing it, but a vampire’s bite was pure, unadulterated pleasure. Damn near orgasmic. So while she was simply feeding, he’d be struggling to retain control and not jump her like a rutting beast.

  Which, technically, he was kind of doing now anyway, so…maybe he’d really be no worse off.

  Fuck, now he was arguing with himself. That couldn’t be good for his mental health.

  She shot him a skeptical look. “I didn’t think vampires could feed from one another.”

  “They can’t. You can feed from me only because I’m your sire. Your blood—your human blood—is a part of me from when I changed you. It will always be part of me.”

  Just like my stupid, pathetic heart will always be yours.

  Her gaze turned serious as she wrapped her slender fingers around his wrist. “Are you sure?”

  No. Not at all.

  He nodded slowly.

  Chapter Eleven

  The tiny pop of his skin breaking under the hesitant pressure of her fangs was weirdly…sensual. Her eyes flew to his and she found him watching her, unblinking. A muscle in his jaw jumped as she pulled gently on the wound.

  The taste of his blood was heavenly. Like nothing she’d ever tasted. Heat and strength and wild energy…it was unfathomable.

  “Harder,” he said through clenched teeth. “Take more.”

  He hissed when she sucked harder. His already dark eyes darkened further, with pain or pleasure, she had no idea. She stopped caring as his blood, which tasted better than any human food she’d ever had, filled her mouth and rolled down her throat.

  She’d been a vampire for months, and everything about her had sharpened in that time. Her vision, hearing, strength, and speed improved exponentially. Her skin became smoother, completely unlined, and almost luminescent. Hell, even her hair healed itself, becoming thicker and fuller with not so much as a single split end in sight. But as she continued to take Hunter’s blood, she realized the enhancements she’d already experienced were only the beginning.
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br />   Suddenly she could hear every heartbeat in the building, as well as a few on the street. And the smells! God, she could smell hot dogs sizzling on a street vendor’s rolling grill that was at least half a mile away, the earthy scents of soil and lake water from the park she knew was five miles away. And Hunter’s skin…

  The scent of his skin under her nose was stronger than she’d ever realized. Spicy and sweet at the same time, and when mingled with her own scent, it was sheer perfection. Orgasmic. He smelled like…

  Mine.

  With a growl she released his wrist and knocked him flat on his back onto the floor. She crawled on top of him and sank her fangs into his neck.

  Vi’s advice about working against her instincts fled in the face of this new, almost primal need take what was hers.

  To take him.

  He muttered something she didn’t quite catch before one of his hands slid into her hair, holding her head at his throat, and his other hand started moving restlessly over her shoulder, her back, before finally coming to rest on her hip.

  She groaned, pulling her fangs out of his throat and licking the marks she’d left behind. “Missed you so much,” she murmured.

  Her hands seemed to move of their own volition, tracing the familiar hard lines and contours of his chest, shoulders, and stomach through the thin cotton of his T-shirt.

  He lifted her off him just enough to kiss her, and she slanted her mouth across his, desperate for more of his taste.

  Hunter pulled her closer and groaned when she tightened her thighs on his hips.

  In the darkest recesses of her mind, something tugged at her. Made her think there was something they should be talking about. But that and all other thought fled as his tongue and breathless moans tangled with hers.

  They went to work on each other’s clothes with preternatural speed, fabric shredding and tearing in the melee. She shivered at the sheer, unadulterated pleasure of finally, finally having his bare skin against hers.

  He broke their kiss, moving his hands to her face so that she had to look at him. She moaned at the loss of contact and went for him again, but he held her back.

  “If you’re going to stop me, do it now.”

  Her lust-soaked brain didn’t understand his words, and it didn’t understand his tone. It sounded like a warning and a plea all at the same time.

  She licked her lips, tasting him, and his eyes followed the motion. “Don’t stop,” she choked out. “Please don’t stop.”

  ***

  Hunter muttered something that could’ve been a prayer of thanks, or a curse. They shouldn’t be doing this. She was half- crazed with the effects of taking real blood straight from a donor for the first time. It was possible she’d regret this as soon as his blood finished burning away the alcohol in hers.

  He should say no. Tell her to leave.

  She should say no.

  But she didn’t. She didn’t understand. His control was razor-thin, tenuous at best. He’d wanted her for too long to walk away and do the honorable thing.

  The first brush of her plump pink lips and fangs on his flesh had been his undoing. But if he was being honest with himself, he knew his fate had been sealed long, long ago. Long before she’d become a vampire.

  They’d made love before, when she was human. Tonight would be different. Tonight he didn’t have to hold back for fear of hurting her. She was as indestructible as he was. And if her scent and expression of raw, dazed need were any indication, she wanted him as much as he wanted her.

  She rocked her hips, rubbing along the hard ridge of his erection, the erection he’d had pretty much since her mouth had touched his. A moan slid from her lips and that was the end of him letting her control the situation.

  When he sat up, Mischa growled and tried to hold him down, using her fledgling vampire strength. But Hunter was much, much older and much, much stronger. He easily reversed their position, picked her up and tossed her on the bed, following her down in one smooth motion.

  She reared up, but he caught her wrists in one hand and pinned them above her head.

  “Now,” she said, straining against him, catching his lower lip between her teeth. Her voice lowered and she hissed, “Take me now.”

  He couldn’t agree more, but… “Did you just try and use compulsion to make me fuck you?”

  Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. She hadn’t even realized she’d done it. That was something they’d need to work on.

  Later.

  “You won’t need compulsion.”

  There was no time for foreplay. No time for murmured endearments and tenderness. There was only this.

  Taking.

  Taking what’s mine.

  With one hard thrust, he drove into her.

  He froze above her, his eyes locked on hers.

  Oh God oh God oh God. She wanted so badly to move, but couldn’t. She was terrified she’d ruin this moment, the moment where nothing they’d been through mattered. There was nothing but the two of them, locked together, exactly where they belonged.

  Mine.

  The tension in his face was mesmerizing, raw and primal. She clenched her inner muscles around him, and that was apparently all it took to break his control.

  His mouth came down on hers in a fierce kiss as he surged forward, sinking deeper into her. She thought she might have cried out, but couldn’t be sure. Her entire being was focused on him. On the way his chest slid against the softness of her breasts with every deep thrust. On the way his tongue mated with hers, mimicking the actions of their bodies. On the flex and pull of the muscles rippling under his smooth, taut skin.

  It was almost too much. Too intense. More intense than it had ever been between them.

  “So wet,” he murmured against her collarbone. “So tight. Mine.”

  She gasped as his fangs pierced the skin between her neck and shoulder, and with that, she plummeted over the edge.

  She came hard, screaming his name, arching beneath him. She struggled to loosen his hold on her wrists so she could touch him, but he held tight, watching her intently as the seemingly endless waves of her orgasm rode her hard.

  But he didn’t slow down. Hunter lifted her hips with his free hand so that every deep, long stroke ground against her clitoris. Every stroke was like a brand, proving his earlier declaration.

  Mine.

  Her second climax hit so hard and fast that she was completely caught off guard. Her entire body clenched, the paroxysm even more powerful than before.

  He followed her over the edge a moment later with a primal, guttural sound as she writhed beneath him.

  He let go of her wrists and collapsed on top of her. They stayed silent for long moments afterward. Him lying on top of her, deliciously heavy, as she trailed her fingers lightly up and down the muscled planes of his back.

  Reality crept back into her sex-soaked brain slowly, but insidiously. They had so much to talk about. So much to set straight. So many wrongs to right. She hadn’t even apologized to him yet for her desertion after he turned her.

  “Hunter, I—”

  “No.”

  She blinked. Um, what? “But I didn’t—”

  “I said no.”

  And with that, he pulled out of her and flipped her over. She grabbed the edge of the mattress as his weight settled on her again.

  “We’re not talking right now,” he growled in her ear.

  She gasped as he slid into her from behind. Her fingers tightened reflexively on the mattress. “Okay,” she choked out, helplessly arching her hips back against him. “No talking.”

  And, as it turned out, he was true to his word. They didn’t talk for the next eight hours.

  Chapter Twelve

  Doing the walk of shame was one thing. But doing the walk of shame, sans underwear, into your place of business? Well, Mischa figured that was probably walk of shame rock-bottom.

  Waking up alone was bad enough. Throughout their entire eight hours or so together, the only words sh
e’d exchanged with Hunter were of the “Oh, God, yes, right there, don’t stop, harder, harder, faster, more” variety. He wouldn’t really allow anything else. Every time she’d tried to talk to him, he’d shifted positions and fucked her to distraction.

  Not that she’d minded at the time, of course. But now, she was pretty sure they’d exhausted every position in the Kama Sutra, and she was still no closer to apologizing to him, thanks to his disappearing act while she’d fallen into an exhausted, sex-drugged slumber.

  She’d waited around for him as long as possible, hoping he’d just stepped out and would return shortly. But after an hour or so, it was clear he was purposefully avoiding her, and she had to get to work.

  So, she’d been forced to steal a T-shirt from his closet (her clothes looked like they’d been shredded by a pack of angry badgers) and walk-of-shame it upstairs to Harper Hall Investigations.

  “Say nothing,” she’d growled as she walked past Benny, Leon and a slack-jawed Harper to get to the bathroom, where she kept an emergency change of clothes.

  Her time as a skip-tracer had taught her that any manner of disgusting things could happen to one’s clothing when apprehending bail-jumping vampires and shapeshifters, and having a fresh set of clothes handy was always prudent.

  Half an hour later, freshly changed and with the stench of humiliation forcibly scrubbed from her skin, she sat with Harper, Benny, and Leon, discussing the case of the missing beauty queens.

  “So, Barbie has worked it out with the judges so that you’ll make it through every elimination until the winner is chosen. Of course, if we solve this thing before then, you’ll be disqualified. I’ll make up some cover story for you.”

  The glitter in Harper’s eyes spelled her doom, so Mischa quickly said, “I get to pick the reason for my disqualification.”

  Harper pouted. “Party pooper.”

  Better to be called a party pooper than to be publically disqualified for posing for a smackthatbigass.com webcam, or for offering to blow the judges, or whatever horrific story Harper came up with. It was always best to never give Harper creative freedom over, well, pretty much anything.