by Lyn Gala
“What?” Brady panted. He sucked and nibbled at her earlobe.
“Pants,” Paige said, arching her back again as she tried to get to her belt.
“Shit. Oh yeah.” Brady slid off her, but one of his hands found her small breast and traced the edge of the nipple like it was the most fascinating thing in the world. Paige sucked air through her teeth as her whole body tightened. Her pussy ached and she could feel the warm, wet heat between her legs.
“Pants,” she said again, shoving at his arm. She hadn’t been this horny in years.
“Sorry,” he said after a half second of Paige trying to squirm her way out of her pants while reaching around him. He shook his head like a dog coming out of the water and then he slid his hands down her stomach to her waistband. Leaning close, he placed a kiss on her stomach before starting to unbuckle her belt. He pulled the belt loose and then unbuttoned and unzipped her pants to show her white underwear and the dark shadow of hair below. Brady pulled her pants down and Paige kicked them to get them off as Brady ran reverent hands over her thighs.
“Brady,” she cried out. Foreplay was nice…really nice…but she was hot and aching for more. Brady gave her a wicked look and then leaned in close and sucked her clit right through the white bikini underwear. Paige cried out and fisted her sheets as Brady sucked harder, his teeth running over her slit before he sucked her right through the fabric. Squirming, Paige reached for him, her fingers catching his short dark curls, but then his fingers reached under the panties and sank deep into her. Paige’s brain whited out for a second. Time skipped like a needle losing its place on a record and then her underwear was gone and he was on her, thrusting deep into her.
“Fuck yes. More,” Paige cried and Brady moved faster, their bodies slapping together as every downthrust filled her, his weight pressing down on her clit every time their bodies met. Paige hooked her heels behind his legs and pulled him in closer with every thrust.
Moaning in time with his movements, she felt her whole body tighten as her orgasm started. Reaching up, she clutched at his strong arms as he drove his cock in harder and harder. He came deep in her, his back arching so much that he looked like he was doing yoga, his face twisted with pleasure. Paige cried out. Her body stiffened and shook with the effort until she fell back against the sweat-soaked sheets, her breath coming in jerky gasps. With a final sigh, he pulled out of her and collapsed on the bed next to her.
Paige panted, her breath slowing and her body shedding some of the fever heat as she tried to recover.
“Can I touch?” Brady whispered his question.
Paige opened an eye and found him looking at her with this intense concern. “I think you just did.”
“No, can I keep touching?”
“Officially weird question.” She would have said more, but she just didn’t have the breath.
“When I’m done, sometimes it hurts when someone keeps touching,” he whispered as if it was a secret. “But I want to touch every bit of you. I want to hold you and feel your heart pounding.” Laying his head next to hers on the pillow, he let his hand slide down over her stomach until his fingers found her slick cleft and then he worked his fingers gently against her clit.
Paige moaned and squirmed as the echoes of her orgasm sparked through her body, sending shivers of pleasure through every nerve. She had no idea what had provided the impetus for their impromptu sex scene, but she wasn’t complaining. If she’d known he was this good in bed, she might have dumped all her moral standards earlier.
“Thank you,” Brady whispered. His fingers were still buried in her cleft, but he had finally stopped moving them and the blood was starting to move back to Paige’s brain.
“You’re welcome,” Paige said with a little sarcasm. “I’m pretty sure I enjoyed it too, although I expect the guilt to move in soon.”
“Why?” Brady sounded honestly bewildered.
“Brady.” She stopped and just looked at him. “That was out of control.”
“Uh-huh,” he agreed happily. He gave his fingers a little wiggle and Paige shivered with the last lingering traces of pleasure.
“I have never done that.” She ran her hand over his shoulder. He was so strong and beautiful and dangerous, and sadly the last trait just made him so much handsomer. He’d been cute when he’d been her trainee, but now…now he was like chocolate and she sucked at resisting the urge to devour any and all chocolate within reach. She wanted to devour him.
“Done what? Had sex? I’m not buying that. I mean, you’re tight, but you aren’t exactly a blushing virgin.”
“We didn’t use a condom. We didn’t even stop and talk about what we were doing.” Only now did Paige realize how out of control she’d been. Brady was scared and horny and she was supposed to put the brakes on any stupidity. Instead she’d hit the gas.
“I didn’t want to talk,” Brady said. He pushed his fingers deeper into her and Paige arched her back and moaned as her body hungered for more. He was definitely not rolling over and going to sleep, which was the norm for most of Paige’s lovers.
“I can’t believe I slept with a trainee,” Paige said to herself more than Brady.
Brady didn’t answer her immediately. “I’m not really a trainee anymore.” He slowly pulled his finger out of her, and sadly, Paige just wanted to grab his hand and put it back between her legs. Instead, she tried to focus on the conversation and not her body’s willingness to channel its inner slut.
“So are you giving up on being Brady Ross?”
“If I do, you get the bonus of keeping your ethical standards intact,” Brady pointed out with one of his grins. He rested his hand on her stomach and Paige could feel her own sticky juices on his fingers.
“Oh yeah, under your theory, I just slept with a one-day-old,” Paige pointed out. “Excuse me while I go arrest myself for pedophilia.”
He rolled his eyes and Paige realized that much of the red had faded. His eyes still didn’t look quite like his old eyes—the brown was too pale and faded—but the white was almost white. “But it’s not like I’m actually one day old. I’m a demon. I might be thousands of years old,” he pointed out. Then he frowned. “Wait. That makes it sound like I should be arresting myself for pedophilia.”
“Oh yeah, because you walking into the station to fill out an arrest paper would go so very well.”
Brady gave her the same grin he used to give her in the middle of the station when he’d volunteered them for some crap duty. “Can you imagine their faces?” he asked.
“I can imagine their heart attacks.”
“Yeah, I’ll just explain that I’m actually a life-force-seeking, blood-drinking vampire,” he said. The grin faded and the old pain showed through. He laid down next to her and stared at the ceiling.
“Hey.” Paige punched him in the arm. “You came to me. You came here, not to corrupt a soul or steal life force, but because we’re partners. Paige Silver and Brady Ross are partners.”
He shook his head. “It’s not the same. Just listen—”
“I’m listening.”
“No, you aren’t.” Brady propped himself up on one elbow. “You’re waiting for me to say something stupid so you can jump all over it. Just stop and really listen.”
“Fine. Give me your whole dumbass theory and I will listen to the entire thing before shooting you down.” Paige got a foot under her quilt and pulled it up enough so she could grab it. It was chilly.
“Being a vampire is not giving me any powers of intimidation over you, is it?”
She looked at him. “Hell no,” she said firmly.
Brady grinned at her for a second. “Fine, but listen to the whole theory before shooting me down here.” He paused, visibly struggling to find words. “It’s like someone moved out of a house—like you moved out of your house and the next person moved in and found you’d installed handicapped rails in the house.” He stopped and glared at her. “Don’t look at me like that. I know I’m not making a lot of sense.”
/>
“Oh you’re giving yourself too much credit. You’re not making any sense at all,” Paige pointed out. “And you’re ruining an almost perfect sexual encounter.”
“Perfect?” His face lit up with a huge grin and Paige rolled her eyes.
Turning on her side, she gave him a good poke in the stomach. “So, let’s hear your dumbass theory.”
His grin didn’t quite vanish as he started again. “So I moved into this house, and the previous owner installed handicapped rails, and I don’t mind handicapped rails, so I just leave them in there.”
Paige waited for the rest. “And?”
“That’s it.”
“Brady, your theory is missing a theory.”
“Paige, I’m not Brady. I don’t think I ever was. I don’t feel anything for Brady’s friends or family. I don’t want to go comfort his parents. I don’t feel like a Brady, and when I look in a mirror, I know one thing. It’s not me.”
“But—”
“But the house I moved into has handicapped rails, and I really like handicapped rails, and I can remember Brady calling his best friend and talking about how hot his training officer was. And I like that feeling, so I keep it even though it’s my house now, not Brady’s.”
A shiver of cold fear killed the last lingering wisps of satisfaction as Paige realized what Brady was saying. He was insisting that he wasn’t Brady, that she’d just had sex with someone she’d met hours ago, that her partner was dead and she was naked, in bed with the demon that had moved into the house after Brady moved out.
“But—”
“God, I wouldn’t hurt you. I still like you. I remember every day you had with Brady. I know how much he loved you. Lusted maybe, but the feelings were real and I can feel them.”
Paige pulled her hand back, half expecting him to grab her.
“Maybe I’m not right, but the more I say it, the righter it feels,” he said in an almost apologetic voice. Paige stumbled off the bed as she ran out of mattress before running out of a need to get some distance. Brady watched her, his amber eyes full of confusion. Paige reached for her bedside table slowly, but then Brady was moving—scooting across the bed to reach for her.
With a gasp, she turned and darted for the bathroom, slamming the door and throwing the lock. Her chest ached and Paige grabbed her robe off the back of the door. She had to think. She just had to think.
Chapter Nine
“Paige, are you okay?”
“Not that you’d notice, no.” Paige sat on the toilet and fought an urge to start throwing up. What the hell was wrong with her? She’d slept with Brady. She’d slept with not-Brady, which was a whole lot worse than sleeping with Brady. She ran her hands down her stomach and felt the slight stickiness where Brady had rested his hand against her flesh. Her traitorous body insisted on tightening with some shadow of pleasure even now.
“Would you open the door?”
“No,” Paige said firmly. She braced herself for the crash as he came through the door. After seeing what he’d done to her basement lock, she didn’t have a lot of illusions. The silence weighed on her more than she could take. “Are you going to break it down?” she asked.
“No,” Brady answered.
“Why not?” Paige blurted out.
“Because then the door would be broken.”
It was such a stupid answer, such a Brady answer, that a small sob caught in Paige’s throat and she leaned back so that the cold edge of the toilet’s tank pressed into her back. What the hell was she doing? Jim’s words echoed in her mind, but as much as Brady claimed that he wasn’t Brady, he still didn’t fit the mold that Jim described. He wasn’t an out-of-control monster who just wanted to kill her.
“Paige?”
“Still here,” Paige said sarcastically. That seemed to give Brady pause. It took a second before he talked again.
“Did I bite you?”
“Did you what?” Paige hated how her voice went up an octave.
“Did I bite you…by accident…did I accidentally bite you?”
“No! I would have noticed if you were biting me,” Paige said. The second the words were out of her mouth, she wondered if they were true. Clearly, her brain cells were not firing on all cylinders today and she’d been more than a little distracted. Shrugging off her robe, Paige turned to the mirror and started studying herself for any marks. The white bandage covering her first bite mark still had the red stain from the blood seeping through and she carefully pulled the bandage away. Part of a scab stuck to the gauze, but Paige didn’t want to take time to soak it loose, so she just pulled.
The bite was horseshoe shaped with Brady’s upper and lower teeth making the sides of the horseshoe. The edges were red and puffy, but the antibiotic cream seemed to be doing its job for the most part.
If Brady had done that again, she definitely would have noticed. However, would she have noticed something smaller? She turned and looked at her back in the mirror. Her side was clear and so were her breasts. Feeling like an idiot, she grabbed her hand mirror and checked between her legs. She was pink and puffy and a little sticky, but no bite marks. Paige put the mirror back on the counter.
“You definitely didn’t bite me.” Yanking the drawer open, she grabbed for more antibiotic cream and another bandage. She had squirted the clear cream onto her sore arm before something occurred to her. “Why do you think you bit me?”
“Um…promise you aren’t going to freak out.”
“Brady,” Paige said in her darkest tone. The second the word was out, she realized she didn’t really have much to threaten him with, but pushing Brady around was kind of second nature. Maybe that was the reason he hadn’t killed her—he was just used to following her lead the way he was used to lusting after her. It wasn’t the most comforting thought because it meant he could turn on her at any time if he just put his mind to it.
“I feel better. Sharper, clearer.”
“You what?” Paige raised a hand to rest against the door. She wanted to open it to see the expression on his face, but a small barrier between her and a demon was better than no barrier at all.
“I can’t explain it.”
“Try.” Paige used her crankiest voice and Brady’s sigh was so loud she could hear it through the door.
“I was so confused and then I ate the chicken and things were clearer. I knew there was something wrong with the image in the mirror. I knew I wanted you. I thought I knew you were going to kick my ass for eating your chicken. But I could think. Before I ate the chicken, I couldn’t think at all.” He stopped and Paige waited for the rest of the story. She thought she knew where he was going, but it wasn’t a comfortable thought.
Leaning against the counter, she studied her reflection and tried to see if she looked older, if she had more gray hairs sticking out from the brown.
“And then after we had sex, I realized that I hadn’t been thinking clearly even after the chicken because only then could I really think. I can remember things, feel things. I realized that I wasn’t who I thought I was.”
Paige rested her forehead against the cool glass. He was suggesting he’d fed off her.
“Are you okay?” he asked again.
“Once again for those who have bad memories or for those who didn’t hear me the first time around, not that you’d notice, no.”
“I would never hurt you, Paige.”
Paige snorted. “Buddy, you fed off me and you have no idea if that hurt me or not.”
He didn’t have an answer for that.
Pulling her robe closed and tightening the tie, she went back to the toilet and sat down. Her guts twisted at the idea of facing Brady again, especially given this new information, but she couldn’t hide in her bathroom for eternity. She’d give herself two weeks before she starved to death in here.
“I know my timing here sucks—”
“You think?” Paige cut him off. “Yeah, it does. I would have liked a little warning before we slept together. I mean, sleeping wi
th my partner is bad, but sleeping with the demon that killed my partner…there’s not a word to describe the wrong.”
“I didn’t kill him.” There was a thump, and either Brady had thrown something at the door or he had thumped his hand against it. She held her breath, waiting to see if he was going to come through. “I didn’t kill him. I remember being him. I remember everything he felt. If I’d killed him, that would drive me insane. I couldn’t remember dying and being the one killing at the same time, not when I can feel what he felt. Paige, you have to believe that I wouldn’t have killed Brady.”
“You just moved into his house after he was gone,” she summarized. She gave a rough laugh as a bubble of hysteria pushed up her throat. “You’d never turn around and kill someone else, push them out of their body so another of your friends could come through, would you?” The sarcasm dripped from her words.
There was another pause. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know if that’s how it works or you don’t know whether you’d do that?” Paige suddenly wondered if Brady had a demon girlfriend he was body shopping for.
“I wouldn’t kill you,” Brady said in an offended voice. “I don’t know how it works, bringing a demon across.”
Paige snorted. “There’s a lot you don’t know.”
“I know.” Even through the door, Paige could hear that self-deprecating tone of voice.
She threw herself at the door and slammed both fists against the wood. “Stop sounding like him,” she yelled. She held her breath, terrified some neighbor was going to hear her and come knocking on the door.
Brady took his time answering. “I don’t know how to do that. I am what I am and Brady’s memories are part of that.”
Paige slid down the door and sat on the cold linoleum with her back to the wood. How the hell was she supposed to deal with this? She had a fantasy of going and asking her father for a bit of advice on living in denial. He’d perfected it.