by Various
A snort of surprise and his fingers stilled. He narrowed brilliant yellow eyes at her. ‘What a terrible liar you are. If you were my student in lying, I’d have to change my name so no one ever found out I’d been your teacher. Still, this is human fucking 101, so spread your legs, candidate twenty-nine.’
He freed her from the arm around her waist and slipped his fingers from her sheath, but she only dimly registered both as she frantically tried to remember the least sexually satisfying position from class, one that would allow her to keep control and not shift to demon form.
She watched as he stripped his jeans off and stepped out of them, his heavy-lidded gaze on her raw with expectation.
Control. She needed to be on top so she could control the depth of his thrust, the pace and the angle. But how to get him there? How to force a six-foot-plus, thousand-year-old arch-demon, meaner than cat’s pee, on to his back?
She shuffled forward on her knees, smiling.
He raised a withering eyebrow.
With a sigh she gripped his shaft and his gaze flew to her hand as she fisted his cock, his sneer washed away by hungry need. She pumped her hand up and down his length with deliberate languor, delighting in the way his gaze lost a little more purpose and intensity with each stroke, grew a little more vacant with each squeeze.
With her other hand she took his and tugged. ‘Come down here.’
He dropped to his knees, the sight as awe-inspiring as an angel felled in mid-flight.
His body so close she could bury her face in his thick column of a neck, could feel the oven of his muscles radiating heat, she breathed in his light, dry scent and watched his face tighten with each milking motion of her hand, watched his wild struggle not to succumb to his body’s need, to her control.
It was a dangerous thing, this ability to beguile with the human form; it went straight to a she-demon’s head and almost made her forget she was fooling with a millennium-old arch-demon who wanted her to fail. Almost.
She took her hand from his cock and gave him a sharp shove with both hands and grinned as he toppled onto his back with a chuff of surprise.
Pouncing on him before he could recover, she knelt, straddling his chest, and stared down at him. Every young demoness, she reflected, should have the opportunity at least once to be in the wholly satisfying position of sitting buck-naked on an arch-demon and rubbing the proof of her arousal on his chest.
His ochre eyes, once haughty, stared at her with a mixture of awe and confusion at her unspeakable boldness, an expression she found at once delicious and adorable. Oh, she’d never dreamed she’d enjoy her exam so much, not in a million years.
She rubbed her palms over the broad planes of his shoulders, stroked him, tweaked him, kissed him, ground herself against him until his eyes glazed over in a half-crazed haze of horniness.
Pheromones. She learned about them in class, but seeing them in action kicking Marchosias’s mighty butt was a different matter. Oh, how her frail human body’s pheromones had turned the tables …
She wriggled lower down his length, hips taunting, and leaned forward to push her breasts towards his face and offer him a mouthful. She gripped his face between her hands, trying not to drown in the warm honey of his gaze, which was focused, most surprisingly of all, not on her nipples but on her eyes.
‘What’s your name?’ His words so ragged, so out of sorts at his unwilling arousal, stirred her more than the furnace of his breath on her breast.
Her name. Did she feel inclined to give it? He didn’t care a fig about her name a moment ago when he tossed his careless comment at her about failing candidates …
Still, the same firm lips that had sneered at her were now almost begging her for mercy. Perhaps she could afford to be generous? Or not.
‘What do you care?’ she mocked, just to see his reaction, just because she’d never get another chance to talk to an arch-demon that way.
And, oh, the anger. His eyes hardened to tourmaline and fingers bit into the pillow of her hips, turning cruel. She ate it up. She didn’t want to be given any quarter on this battlefield; she wanted him proud, mean and hard as ever.
His hands forced her further down his body, skin dragging against skin each delicious inch of the way until the head of his cock nudged her folds and he whispered to her. ‘Feel that, my nameless friend? That thing poking you, that’s your downfall.’
She smiled. What a dramatic turn of phrase he had. ‘We’ll see. My name is Vanth.’
Thirty minutes into exam time and he hadn’t made her lose human form yet, though she hadn’t made him come either, and to pass the test she must. For a demon can only steal a human soul at that moment of fused fever between two bodies. But. Only. In. Human. Form.
He sat up, no longer obedient, and all she could do was quiver in anticipation of the rough ride instead of taking control as she should. Where was her ambition now? What of her lofty dream of joining the elite cadre of demons trained to steal souls from the careless lips of men, on God’s very own green earth, right under the noses of angels? What of her hunger for another century of existence for each soul scalped?
Where was her ambition now? Why, in his thick, blunt hands. The hands between the junction of their flesh, gripping his shaft, searching her out, searching for a way in.
She rubbed herself playfully along his length, heard a harsh intake of breath, smiled at the way his whole body tightened and coiled under hers, smiled a little less at the wave of lust that cramped her insides.
His head poised at her entry, she teased him once more, gyrating her hips hula-hoop fashion to frustrate his cock. His hot, swollen head was too big to slide in without a large serving of stillness on her part.
‘Quit that,’ he hissed, then, in a low whisper that was almost a groan, ‘stay still, Vanth, please.’
Please. Oh, how nice, what nice manners from her haughty demi-prince amongst demons, and what lovely desperation those manners hinted at, lovely desperation for her. Pleasure heated her from the inside, radiating to prickle her skin. Very well, she’d be still, but on her terms.
She pushed his hand away from his shaft, wrapped her own hand around it and marvelled anew at the hardness grown from soft flesh, the battering ram encased in silk pulsing hot under her fingers. His big hand closed over hers, guiding her hand up and down his length with strokes rougher than any she would have administered, and his eyes narrowed to mere slits.
Breathing laboured, he watched as she tightened her legs around his waist to raise herself slightly before settling her pussy square on his cock and bearing down a good, purposeful inch. His groan was heartfelt, bone-deep, obscenely masculine in her ears, almost enough to distract her from the inch of cock crammed so tightly in her cunt that a bead of sweat formed on her brow. She was stretched around his cock so snugly that if she merely touched her clit she would shatter into a million pieces.
‘Give me another inch,’ she whispered, enchanted by the fact that her examiner, at this point, was beyond speech, looked half out of his mind with his teeth gritted and jaw clenched, and she was further enchanted when he obeyed with a single inch instead of trying to bury himself to the hilt.
But even two inches of Marchosias and his shallow thrusts was a dangerous thing and with a dry swallow she registered the beating of black wings just beneath her skin, demon spikes longing to spring from her back, claws itching to bud from her fingers and toes, her gums aching with the pressure of teething fangs. No – she closed her eyes – no, she must hold on.
The hips below hers stilled and, when she opened her eyes, she found her haughty arch-demon watching her, concerned. ‘Too much? Are you too close? What do you need?’
To pass, she wanted to say, but she knew that wasn’t true, what she wanted more than anything else was for him to lose himself in her and then for her to chase after him into that forest of oblivion. If he had a soul, she’d want that, too.
Instead she told him to lean back, and then she spread her thighs wider, o
nly gasping a little when he clapped a hand over the outside of each thigh and stroked her, muttering her name like a promise. With intense focus she gripped the base of his cock and jerked him as she took him a little deeper, a little harder, a little faster. So this was melting, having no direction but his flow of incoherent words, the urgent undulation of his hips against hers, no greater need than to feel him thick and hard inside her, filling her beyond full.
A string of admirably earthy curses, a series of uncontrolled thrusts and his deep shuddering release flooded her with heat.
She’d passed her test; she was now legion.
But her focus remained on the flesh joined with hers, still hard as she writhed on him reaching for her own peak.
Lost, she was lost in the desire pooling, desire bubbling, desire crippling, the wild yearning for completion. It came, slinging her over the edge in waves of contracting pleasure, and with it her wings sprang from her back with a snap, like a sail unfurled. A storm of sensation penetrated every cranny of her being until her fingers sprouted claws and her fangs lengthened to graze her lips as she shuddered out her climax.
Marchosias blinked, ran a slow hand up her thigh, eyeing her wings. ‘Well, we may need to work on that before we send you out on your own.’
She smiled, smiled because she knew what her haughty arch-demon was really saying, that he wanted her again, wanted her many times before she went anywhere. In crusty arch-demon speak, he was flirting with her.
Laura May’s Candy Man
Giselle Renarde
When she got to the restaurant, there was a huge banner over the door. It read, ‘Happy 40th Birthday, Laura May!’ She very nearly turned tail and ran, but she knew Marjorie meant well. Anyway, there would be friends at this gathering she hadn’t seen in more than twenty years. Marjorie had even managed to track down people Laura May had been to high school with. She wasn’t big on parties, but it behooved her to attend one thrown in her honour.
She walked through the door to a chorus of ‘Happy birthday, Laura May!’ and even a few shouts of ‘Surprise!’, though it wasn’t a surprise party. So many faces, so many people she hadn’t seen in years. She searched them for the one she wanted desperately to see, but he wasn’t at any of the tables. Maybe Devon wasn’t coming. Last time she’d asked Marjorie, he had yet to confirm.
‘It’s great to see you,’ she heard herself telling old co-workers and friends, people who’d lived in her dorm at university. Everybody had come. Everyone but Devon.
The birthday girl got a special seat near a table that was piled up with gifts. ‘I thought you said no presents.’
‘It’s your fortieth,’ Marjorie said with a shrug. ‘People want to make it special for you. You’d do the same.’
‘That’s true,’ Laura May agreed.
She’d already celebrated with family on her actual birthday. This weekend party was strictly friends. Marjorie had rented the entire restaurant because she’d invited so many people. Thank goodness such a high percentage had RSVPed. Laura May would have felt like a total loser if nobody showed up.
‘Did you hear from Devon?’ she asked, trying to sound casual.
Marjorie must have heard the anxious quiver in her voice. ‘No, he never got back to me. Why do you care so much about Devon anyway? Got a little high school crush on him, do you?’
Laura May glanced around quickly, making sure no one from her high school was within earshot. ‘In high school I had a crush on him, sure. Who didn’t?’
‘I didn’t,’ Marjorie chuckled.
Laura May rolled her eyes. ‘We didn’t go to the same high school.’
Marjorie knocked back another drink. ‘I had a crush on my geography teacher, Mr Kazberg.’
Laura May sipped the good wine Marjorie had ordered. ‘Ahh, unrequited love.’
‘Who said mine was unrequited?’ Marjorie asked, waggling her eyebrows.
‘You’re bad.’
‘Badder than you know, kiddo.’
Shaking her head, Laura May glanced around the room. There was ephemeral music pumping through the stereo system, but she could barely hear it over her friends’ insistent chatter. She was glad they were having a good time. Who could resist drinking with old pals?
‘Do you mind if I mingle?’ Laura May asked her friend. ‘There are so many people here, and I’ve barely spoken two words to some of them.’
Marjorie raised an eyebrow. ‘The wallflower’s finally in bloom, is she?’
‘Guess so.’ In truth, she wanted to probe her high school alumni for information about the missing Devon.
With a plate of appetisers in hand, Marjorie made her way to the grown-ups who had once been teens. More than twenty years since Laura May had seen most of them. Unbelievable! There were days when Laura May didn’t feel much more than twenty. The years flew by so fast. Too fast.
‘Hey, guys. How’s it going?’ She put on her party smile and tried to be entertaining.
The women who’d once been girls squealed and hugged her, got the Happy Birthdays out of the way early so they could all reminisce about the golden years.
‘When we were teenagers, my dad used to say to me, “These are the best years of your life,” and I never believed him.’ Courtney of Kenmore High bobbed a tiny umbrella in her cocktail. ‘Now that my kids are in their teens, do you know what I’m saying? “These are the best years of your life. Don’t let them pass you by.” And do they believe their old mom? Nah, they’re just like me. Kids think they know best.’
The conversation veered in the direction of other people’s children, which Laura May always found alienating. People without kids couldn’t truly understand people with them, and vice versa. Laura May truly believed that.
‘What about that guy … what was his name?’ Laura May was desperate to inconspicuously bring the conversation around to her high school crush. ‘Devon. That’s right. Remember him?’
‘Oh, that’s a sad story,’ Tabar said, shaking his head slowly. ‘Car crash, maybe three years ago?’
Laura May’s stomach twisted in knots. Outwardly, she was too paralysed to speak.
‘What, he died?’ Courtney asked.
‘No, no.’ Tabar shook his head.
‘Oh, thank God he’s OK,’ Laura May said, almost without thinking.
‘Well, I wouldn’t say that.’ Tabar stared into his lager, tugging on the bar mat to move the glass. ‘He’s in a coma, has been all this time.’
‘Holy fuck,’ Courtney gasped.
‘A coma?’ Laura May choked on the words, so simple and short, but complicated as hell. Her throat ran dry. Her brain buzzed like a beehive, and it hurt. God, it hurt.
Laura May spent the remainder of her party in a bereaved daze. She’d had such high hopes for the night. Hell, she’d pretty much planned on going home with Devon. She’d even worn her lucky panties with the cut-out heart shape and a dangling rhinestone in the middle. A little part of her was angry at him for not being there, and that anger was her greatest shame.
There was only one moment she really remembered after that. Marjorie insisted she open her presents in front of everyone, just like little kids at birthday parties.
‘None of this was necessary,’ Laura May told her guests. ‘But thank you, everyone. You’re all so generous.’
Most of the gifts were generic, given that they came from people she hadn’t seen in decades. After she’d set them aside or placed them back in their gift bags, she couldn’t even remember what she’d just opened. Marjorie’s gift was the rare exception.
‘You shouldn’t have, Marjorie!’ Laura May shook her head as she took her best friend’s gift in hand. ‘You’re already paying for this party.’
‘It’s just an itty-bitty gift that reminded me of you,’ Marjorie said with a wolfish grin.
Laura May tore into the wrapping paper. When she saw what was inside, her cheeks flushed. It might as well have been a vibrator.
‘I figure it’s been so long since you had a man arou
nd the house that I’d buy you one.’ Marjorie cackled, but laughter from the crowd of guests was sparse. Laura May was not amused by the anatomically correct chocolate mini-man. Not in the least.
‘What?’ Marjorie carried on. ‘This guy’s much better than a flesh-and-blood man. He’s super-tasty and he doesn’t sweat or make stupid jokes or hog the remote. And he’s a “candy man” so you he’s going to buy you nice things.’
Inside, Laura May was raging. She wanted to scream and swear, slap Marjorie in the face, anything to show the woman how rude and mean and inappropriate this gag gift was. But the anger subsided almost as fast as it came on, replaced promptly by a debilitating sadness.
When Laura May tried to speak, all that came out was a whisper. Despite her intense emotion, the only words she could bring herself to say were ‘Thank you’.
The first thing she did when she got home was toss that ridiculous, enraging little man in the garbage. Well, he wasn’t so little, truth be told. His chocolate cock hung so low he looked, at a glance, like he had three legs. OK, that was an exaggeration, but it was unrealistically huge. But even that was no reason to keep him. The chocolate was probably waxy and gross. She tossed it in the trash, packaging and all.
She’d left her own party unreasonably early, sneaking out when Marjorie was in the bathroom. No sense attracting attention to her departure. In fact, she’d left most of her gifts back at the restaurant. She wasn’t sure why she’d brought the candy man home at all.
The drink had gone to Laura May’s head more than she’d realised. Once she’d kicked off her heels, her head started spinning. Her eyelids were like iron. Fully dressed, she draped herself across the couch and fell fast into a dreamless sleep.
A rap at the door awoke her and she sat bolt upright. At first, she wasn’t sure where she was. Laura May very rarely slept on the couch. When her eyes adjusted to her surroundings, she crawled off the couch and dragged herself into the hall. She stood there, staring at the front door, wondering if the knocking she’d heard was real or imagined. Maybe Marjorie had noticed her absence and hunted her down.