by Lexi C. Foss
“No. I’m not.”
He hummed thoughtfully as he walked over to one of the small couches and took a seat. His movements were all so smooth and regal, and when I paired them with the other traits I’d noted, a suspicion began to form.
“What brings you to my club, chérie?”
“I— “
He held up his hand in a command for silence, one that I sensed was rarely disobeyed, if ever. I curled my fingers into my palms, suffocating the instinct to snap at him, and perhaps stab him with my stake. It wouldn’t kill him…but it would make me feel better. My face remained impassive and I waited for him to continue.
“Before you answer my question, I should warn you, my tolerance for people who lie to me is extremely low.”
Something in his expression gave me pause. In that moment, he reminded me of Jude, and I suspected he would never give out information that wasn’t specifically requested. I asked Jude if he knew what time it was once and his reply was, “Yes.” It was maddening.
I was at a bit of a crossroads. Did I give up my pretense for the most part and hope he appreciated the honesty and gave me the information I sought, or should I assume he was bluffing? The last few days had been truly exhausting, and my patience was wearing thin. I settled with option one, except I continued to veil my magic—who was pretty pissed at being kept in the dark. First, I needed to confirm a hunch because it would shape the nature of my strategy.
“May I ask your name first?” I kept my tone polite, but dropped the sweet and innocent tone.
He smiled, making his already striking features absurdly appealing. Such was the nature of the vampire, to lure their prey, but this guy had to have been gorgeous as a human. “You may.”
“Yolki-palki,” I cursed under my breath. Obviously, this conversation was going to test the limits of my temper.
The man raised an eyebrow again and hummed thoughtfully. “Perfect Russian accent as well. My, my, you are an interesting one, mon crevette.”
I rolled my eyes. Being called a munchkin wasn’t new to me, nor did it bother me. “What is your name?”
“Lucien,” he answered as he leaned back and put one arm along the curved back of the settee. “And yours? Roxy simply doesn’t seem to fit.”
His name sparked something familiar, but it danced out of my reach before I could grasp onto it. “My name—“ It hit me. Lucien De La Coeur. He was French vampire royalty. Suddenly, his arrogance, the power he exuded, even the way he spoke, made perfect sense. “My name is irrelevant.”
The French vampires had a habit of keeping to themselves and not becoming involved in anyone else’s shit. Which meant it was unlikely that revealing anything about myself would make its way to the Russian Vampire Dynasty, but I couldn’t be too careful.
His face clouded at my refusal and I felt the gentle push against my wards when he tried to use compulsion to gain my acquiescence. When I didn’t respond, grooves appeared on his forehead as his eyes narrowed, and his lips flattened.
“Who are you?” He leaned forward, his probing stare intense. “I believe a better question is what are you?”
Ignoring his question, I began pacing again. “I’ll get right to the point. I’m searching for a vampire named Dorian. He is not like your kind. He’s vulnerable to sunlight and all of the typical items that humans believe in—garlic, stakes, and all that shit. He’s been on a killing spree and I’ve been given the job of turning his ass to ash.”
Lucien tapped a long, elegant finger on his lips as he studied me, before asking, “And why would you think I would share this information with you?”
I noticed he hadn’t denied knowing Dorian. Or of him, at least. As I calculated what I knew about him and the current situation, I made a split-second decision. “I could give you all sorts of reasons, but they won’t be what sways you,” I predicted, earning a small smile and a glimmer of respect. “You’re going to help me because then I’ll owe you a favor.”
The vampire threw back his head and laughed. I waited with a sigh. Once he was done, he gave me another smile, but this one was full of condescension. I was about to make him choke on his ego and it was going to be my own brand of fun.
“I’m of the impression that you are not quite sane, chérie. But you’ve been very entertaining, so I’m going to let you leave here without even a single taste.”
“Collecting an IOU from me is rare, Lucien. And trust me, it’s something you’ll regret turning away.” I could see that he was about to laugh again, and I gave him my own wicked smile, anticipating his shock.
My magic fluttered, excited to knock the arrogant, royal smile off of his pretty face. I removed the spell shielding my magic and let it flow through me. A shimmery lavender aura surrounded me, and the room filled with power. Chyort vozmi. That was bigger than I remembered. I managed to hide my reaction to releasing the full scope of my magic. It had been so long since I’d let it completely out of its cage that it nearly knocked me on my ass.
When Lucien’s face was properly astonished, I reined it back in and mentally sighed. Use it or lose it took on a whole new meaning. Not that I would lose my power, but clearly, I was no longer as adept at controlling it as I once was.
“It seems I have misjudged you,” Lucien commented, his voice and tone sounding almost bored, but his blue eyes held excitement.
A man who covets power, even when he rules an entire country. Shocking. “As long as you don’t require that I kill or torture someone, I will owe you a blank favor. Do we have a deal?” I prompted impatiently.
Despite the pull of the mating bond, Jax and I hadn’t established a closer connection through the first step in the claiming. And yet, I could have sworn I could feel his control about to snap.
“We do,” he confirmed. “Philippe will give you everything we know about the imbecile.”
Now that he had gained something so valuable, I wondered if he would stop talking in riddles and decide to assuage my curiosity. “Did Philippe know I was playing a game from the beginning?”
A corner of Lucien’s mouth ticked up. “To a certain degree. He sensed that something was off, but with your beauty and the very strong, tempting smell of your blood, he decided to hand you over to me to deal with. Although, it was unlikely that he would have bitten you.”
I raised a brow and shoved my hands onto my hips. “Why not?” I huffed, feeling slightly offended which was beyond ridiculous.
“You don’t know, do you?” he surmised.
“Are you in the habit of asking questions you don’t want to know the answer to?”
Lucien’s smirk grew into a smile as he regarded me with humor and admiration. “You are quite the delight, little witch,” he said with a chuckle. “As intelligent as you are, I’m surprised you haven’t noticed that you are absolutely drenched in the scent of a shifter.”
My jaw nearly dropped, but I caught it at the last second. Jax hadn’t bit me, how did I smell—
“Bozhye moi,” I breathed. He’d been all over me earlier, not just with his mouth between my legs, but his hands had been everywhere, and I’d practically rubbed up against him like a cat in heat.
“In fact, here he comes now.” Lucien lifted his chin toward the door, and I saw Philippe leading an enraged Jax up the stairs. He met my eyes through the glass, and they were almost completely wolf, making me shiver. I had no idea why the idea of Jax being more animal than man was so fucking hot, but arousal dampened my underwear and tingles of anticipation skittered over my skin.
“He seemed very close to shifting into a feral wolf and since we have no quarrel with shifters and no plans to start one by touching one of their mates, we invited him to collect you.” Lucien stood and his tone was dismissive as he strutted toward the door.
I would have been insulted at his insinuation that I could be “collected” by anyone, but I was stuck on his casual referral to me as Jax’s mate. “What prompted you to come to that conclusion?”
Lucien halted and smiled, o
nce again gazing down at me as though I were an amusing child. “The connection between you is so thick, I doubt many miss it. And shifters are not often so possessive over one who is not their mate.”
Jax yanked the door open and stalked into the room, his eyes never leaving my face. They flashed human for a moment, the blue swirling with a dangerous warning, before I was again looking into golden orbs that weren’t any happier with me.
“The information you requested is in this folder,” Philippe announced. “I trust you’ll keep it to yourself.” I bowed my head in thanks, though I didn’t take my eyes off of Jax. Only the soft sound of the file landing on a velvet upholstered cushion was heard before the swoosh of the door closing indicated that we were alone.
Jax was silent, his eyes boring into me and his body vibrating with emotion.
My head dropped back as I looked up into his stoic face. I was in a fuck ton of trouble.
“I was able to get what we need,” I told him brightly, pretending I didn’t feel the tension shrouding the room.
He growled and took a few steps closer to me.
“I think we can head back to the apartment for the night.” He didn’t seem to be buying my ignorant act.
Another growl and two steps closer. It would only take one more step to be toe to toe with me.
“So, funny story— “
Jax lunged and grabbed me by my biceps, lifting me off of my feet and carrying me over to one of the settees. The next thing I knew, I was bent over the back, my tunic and coat flipped up, and my pants yanked down.
No way was he going to—
Crack.
27
Jax
I stared down at the handprint on my mate’s pale white skin and both my wolf and I growled in approval. I was so fucking angry. And jealous. And possessive. And so damn scared. If anything happened to Rowan, I wasn’t sure I’d survive it.
The need to mark her was consuming me and my wolf was baring its teeth and snapping, lunging at me, urging me to bite. He wanted me to sink my teeth into her flesh over and over until she was covered with my brand. I raised my hand again and brought it down with another loud crack! Rowan had been silent after the first spank and I assumed it was from shock. This time, she gasped and struggled to get out of my grip, but I was too far gone, and my legs held her in place from behind while I kept an iron-like hold on one of her hips. I spanked each globe twice more while Rowan struggled and cursed a blue streak in Russian.
I loved seeing anything on her body that claimed her as mine, as did my wolf, but this wasn’t enough. It wasn’t calming the onslaught of aggressive emotions that had created a perfect storm inside me.
“Jax! Let me up, govnyuk!”
“No,” I growled. My next words were said in a dark, lethal tone. “Do you have any fucking idea what it felt like watching my mate hand herself over to dangerous, cold-hearted bastards? To know how treacherous this was and fight every fucking instinct I had to protect you because you are so fucking stubborn. And you refuse to rely on anyone but yourself? I watched that motherfucker put his hands on you. His lips, Rowan. Another man’s lips were on my mate.” Saying it all out loud was riling me up even more. “You deserve a fuck of a lot more punishment than the red ass you’ll be sporting tomorrow.”
She struggled some more, but her fight only added lust into the mix and I was tempted to force her submission. But that was the ultimate gift from a dominant wolf, and I wouldn’t throw that moment away because I had no doubt that Rowan would be a strong, stubborn, beautiful, crazy as fuck, dominant wolf. Her submission wouldn’t come easily.
Still, I needed something. I couldn’t handle the urge to claim and mate that was riding me so hard it sometimes took my breath away. And my wolf... I suspected before that he could somehow sense the spirit of the wolf inside Rowan and the more time we spent with her, the more I was convinced of it. He was ferocious in his demands, not only because he saw Rowan as ours, but because he wanted her wolf, and he was becoming more and more desperate the longer I went without claiming Rowan.
“Jax, you bastard! What the fuck?”
I shoved her down with a hand on her back, lifting her sweet little ass higher. I was about to mark it again when I saw the sheen on her inner thighs, and I inhaled deeply. Fucking hell. She was getting turned on by this and I’d been so focused on her punishment that I hadn’t smelled her arousal. I slapped each cheek once more and a tiny moan escaped her lips before she began to yell and curse again. I was always hard around my sexy mate and I doubted that would change much, but right now, the mating urges kept me hard and ready to fuck. The sight of her need coating her thighs and the delicious little sounds she’d made. They brought the lust slamming to the front of my mind and body. My cock was like steel and swollen to a point where I hissed in pain any time I moved, and the fabric of my underwear chafed the sensitive skin.
I backed up just enough to yank up Rowan’s pants, then grab her and spin her around. My mouth crashed down onto hers.
The kiss was brutal, carnal, and raw. I was beyond finesse. My heart was hammering in my chest and I was filled with untamed need.
Rowan’s arms went around my neck, clinging to me like her desperation matched my own. My hands palmed her ass and lifted her high enough for her to wrap herself around me. She moaned when her center settled over mine and her hips surged forward, rubbing against me in search of relief.
“Fuck,” I grunted. “I’m losing control, baby. You have to stop.”
But I didn’t stop her, I thrust into her, aiding the friction and causing bolts of pleasure to shoot through me, tearing a growl from deep in my chest. I wasn’t sure if it had been my wolf or me.
Rowan’s head fell back, and she moaned again, drawing my eyes to her mouth where they traveled down to the perfect skin of her neck.
“Jax,” she whimpered. “I need…I’m so close.”
I couldn’t look away. And maybe I could have stopped what I knew was going to happen, but I wasn’t going to. “You’re mine, Rowan,” I grunted. “And I fucking need everyone to know it, baby. I can’t wait any longer.”
Her body tensed, but not from my words. She was teetering on the precipice and I wasn’t far behind her. She ground her pussy on my cock, and I lost it. My head dropped to the area where her neck met her shoulder and like a man possessed, I sucked on the tender skin before nipping at the spot. Rowan cried out and I struck, sinking my teeth into her soft skin deep enough to draw blood. She screamed and hurtled over the edge, her body wracked with spasms as she climaxed.
I felt my orgasm rising in me like a raging fire, clouding my mind with nothing but the feel of my mate in my arms and the taste of her blood on my tongue. I came hard, my shout muffled in the crook of her neck.
A feeling swept over me, a refreshing sensation that helped to cleanse away the cache of violent emotions that had been ruling me. My wolf was howling loudly in my ears, ecstatic about what had just happened. The relief lasted until I pulled my mouth from her skin and stared at the mark I’d left on my mate. There was a satisfaction at knowing the bite was semi-permanent, which meant it would be very clear that she had a mate. But the first claiming mark was more symbolic than anything, though it did strengthen the mating bond. Either one of us could reject the claiming until the second stage was completed. Only if that happened would the bite eventually fade.
The purple aura had glittered around Rowan when she came again, but I noticed that it was twice as strong and a deeper color this time. I considered whether it might have something to do with my bite, but it wasn’t something to delve into when we were in the proverbial lion’s den.
As the color faded, I licked my claiming mark one last time before raising my head and settling my eyes on Rowan’s beautiful face. I was more determined than ever to make sure that the mark never faded like the glow.
28
Rowan
What the hell just happened?
My head was spinning from the best orgasm I’d ever h
ad in my entire life as Jax set my ass on top of the couch’s back and held me in place so I wouldn’t fall. There was a gentle throbbing on my neck that was harshing my buzz and I unwound an arm from Jax’s neck to place my hand over the spot. When my fingers brushed over indentations, I froze.
“Did you bite me,” I rasped. My throat was dry, and the words felt like sandpaper. But not because I was angry…which was fucking terrifying. My body, sated beyond belief thirty seconds ago, was quivering with desire. The wound felt warm, almost feverish, and tingles were spreading from it to every part of my body, no matter how small. My heart was still pulsing rapidly, but the tempo increased, and a hot ache grew in my core. I should be pissed as fuck and instead, all I wanted was for him to fuck me fast and hard while biting me all over again.
“Yes.” His response was absolutely unapologetic.
For the love of all that is Witchcraft, you should not be fucking aroused by this, Rowan!
“I thought you said you wouldn’t do that without my permission.” The question lacked heat as it was simply that, a question. It wasn’t packed with anger or accusation; I wanted to understand why he did it.
And then I wanted him to fuck me up against the glass wall.
“A claiming can only happen if both parties are willing, baby. This is just my way of reminding you and letting every other fucking person who looks at you, know that you belong to me. Until we take the next step and our scents begin to mingle, this is my only brand of ownership.”
“Belong? Ownership?” I interjected a sharpness into my tone that I wasn’t feeling…because I knew I should. In reality, those words had only increased the throbbing in my sex and the sensitivity of my skin. I wanted to tell him that no one owned me.
Then have him fuck me on the floor until neither of us could walk.
“Bozhye moi, get your mind out of the damn gutter.” Apparently, I hadn’t said that quietly enough because Jax buried his head in my neck and his shoulders began to shake.