“Did you take her clothes?” He barely restrained his laughter. It wasn’t funny, of course, but he’d been faced with an angry, naked Penelope, and that memory was funny.
“I borrowed her cape. Quit with the avoidance.”
“Are you truly so cross with me?” he asked, touching his fingertips to her face. Her eyebrows knit under the slight tapping of his fingers.
“Are you trying to see my face?”
“Yes. Do you mind?”
She shrugged, but her features smoothed out. After a few moments, the tension left her body, pressing her just the tiniest fraction tighter to him. “Does that work? I always wondered when I saw it in movies.”
“I haven’t any idea what it’s like in movies, but it’s working now. Perhaps because I could never forget how you look.”
She hunched her shoulders. Her voice was sheepish when she said, “Yeah, guess you’ve never seen a movie. I’m sorry.”
He hated the sympathy, but he would use it to his advantage. “Maybe someday I will fully regain my sight, and you can take me to one.”
Penelope ran her fingers into his hair, her nails scratching lightly against his scalp, and the sensation skittered the entire way down his body to his toes. She was so warm, her blood so close to the surface, he could smell it in her veins. His fangs ached. His sight would be restored in a matter of minutes if he gave in and bit her, but he wouldn’t allow himself to. Not only would it disrespect her and everything between them, he wasn’t positive he could stop himself before he drank her dry.
Grave shifter blood was like an opiate, stronger than human blood, its restorative properties an addictive jolt. Galen had no interest in being addicted. Even without her blood, he was already drawn to Penelope, not as a moth to a flame, no, that he could handle, toy with even, but like a wounded predator to a campfire, seeking sustenance, warmth, and maybe even shelter.
Even without his sight, he felt her eyes boring into his. Moving cautiously, giving her time to refuse, he settled his body over hers. She slid her arm around him, the nails of that hand scratching his back in rhythm with the hand still in his hair. Her thighs pressed to his, his erection bumped against the damp hot core of her when she lifted her hips.
“Teasing me, are you?” he murmured, giving in just a little, shoving his hands into her hair, gripping tight.
She made a small sound in her throat and his resolve crumbled further. He leaned down, licked the pulse point at the base of her neck. Tilting her head back with a tug on her hair, he sucked gently at the sensitive spot under her chin, then began a slow exploration over to her ear.
“It’ll be daylight soon,” she said, voice rough.
He grunted in agreement. No use arguing facts. He’d be asleep, in the dead slumber of vampires, before he was anywhere near started with what he wanted to do to her.
“What were you protecting me from?”
Galen dropped his forehead to her shoulder. “You’re like a hound with a bone.”
“Yep. I’d say more of pit bull, though, chomping out every last bit of yummy juicy marrow.”
Galen’s lip curled as his gag reflex jumped. Not that he had anything against the meal, but her relish in the details scraped against his sensibilities. “Perhaps you’ve spent a bit too much time in the colonies.”
“Ummm…it’s a country. And I like it there.”
“Yes, your abrasiveness fits in quite well.”
“Uh-huh. What were you protecting me from?”
This time Galen did heave a sigh, forcing his non-used lungs to pull in air, letting it burn for a moment, and then expelling it. He’d buy her a pit bull if they made it out of this alive, just so she could share its bones instead of chomping on his.
“Elsbithy has discovered a way to draw the regenerative powers of grave shifters for his own use.”
Under him, she froze. “How?” she finally gasped.
“I almost had it figured out when we met. The Council kept sending shifters to assassinate him, despite my missives to stop. When I met you, dancing on the table in that seedy tavern, I just couldn’t take the thought of him getting hold of you as well.”
He put a finger across her lips. “Only that’s not why you were there.”
She smiled. Her lips stuck slightly to his finger as she did and it sent another wave of desire over him. “Grave shifter, one. Three evil dukes, zero.”
“And a few dozen hellhounds, if memory serves.”
She shrugged that off. “You were temptation enough for me to stick around though.”
At that, he smiled. “For several decades.” He lowered his head until his lips were just touching hers when he spoke. “That’s a strong temptation.”
“Why didn’t you stop him?”
He set his forehead to hers. Two pit bulls. “I didn’t know how. He grew stronger quickly. Too quickly. It wasn’t until he requested some odd changes to the designs of the catacombs that I had enough clues to start putting it together.”
“Changes?”
“There was a room he wouldn’t let me into. Said it was only an extra office, away from the bustle of the main buildings. Turns out, it was where he was performing the ritual. He would bring me bones, never a complete set, and ask me to inter them in separate chambers. Eventually, I realized they were the bones of shifters, and he wanted them separated so they couldn’t rise. But close enough he could use them to draw the power from the next one.”
“So you made sure he couldn’t use me by making me too weak.”
He nodded, knowing she’d feel it. “My deepest apologies for that. I regret hurting you, for you thinking I betrayed you. But I couldn’t have bore it if he’d really killed you.”
Under him, she fidgeted. And gods help him if it didn’t just turn him on all the more.
She cleared her throat, ducking her chin as she turned her head to look out the window. Penelope was as good at accepting apologies as compliments, apparently. He pressed his lips to her temple. “If it makes you feel better, you can knock me around a bit.”
She whipped her face up so fast their noses almost slammed together. “He blinded you for helping me.” It wasn’t a question. It was a story he did not want to tell, so he nodded again.
For the first time, she touched his face, just a brush of fingertips under his eye. “How does one blind a vampire anyway?” She tried to choke back the sympathy, he refused to think of it as pity, but her voice caught. He needed her to trust him, to feel connected to him enough to follow his plan. Telling her would accomplish that.
“You have a pair of your pet demons hold him down as you strap him to a table, then you open a hatch in the cairn, wait for the sun to rise, and then focus a magnifying glass over one eye and then the other.”
“You were asleep when it happened?”
Dashing the hope in her voice was almost cruel, but it would serve his ends. As he was better now, and her feeling sorry for him grated his nerves, he made his voice light. “Not even dozing. I doubt any sleep is deep enough to dull that sort of pain.”
She gasped, tried to sit up, but he put a hand against her shoulder and pressed her down. “No need for indignation, my dear. He’ll be run through with a sword soon enough.”
Running her hands down his back, then up, over his shoulders and down his arms, she sank back into the bed. Her touch soothed, but also aroused.
“Then he starved you.” It was a whisper, her thinking aloud as she put the pieces together. So he only nodded once more, nuzzling her neck to let the smell of dandelions push away the memories.
“How did you escape?”
He let his hand roam down her body, then absently toyed with the hem of her shirt. “After a century or so, his wife wanted a plaything. He was tired of her sexual demands and figured I fit the bill.” Penelope went tense beneath him. Jealousy? He could use that to his advantage as well.
“He also needed someone to care for the catacombs. He didn’t trust that whoever the Council would send would be
amenable to his designs. I played along, feigning fragility even as I grew stronger. In the meantime, I built new chambers, new passageways, ones with secrets. I moved the bones of the grave shifters. Eventually, I figured out the ritual. It wasn’t too hard to escape, actually. In those days, Elsbithy had to go to London to conduct business. No computers or phones back then. The Lady Elsbithy liked to play…games. I left her tied to the bed one night, told her dinner was waiting for me in the catacombs, and walked right out the front door.”
She laughed then, deep and rich. “He must have been furious.”
“Been sending demons after me ever since.”
“He had demons at the Estate? Right under the nose of the Council?”
“Yes. It was his way of thumbing his nose at them. One of many, actually.”
“That’s bold. He must be pretty secure in his powers.”
“Very bold. Extremely arrogant. That will be his downfall.”
She poked his ribs. “Speaking from experience?”
He kissed her hard and fast. “I have spent time rethinking my ego, yes.”
The sun was about to break. He could feel sleep claiming him, his eyelids growing heavy. “It took me a long time to reach the Council. Even longer before they listened to my plan, believed me that I wasn’t conspiring with Elsbithy. Then I had to find you.”
“Why me? There are other shifters who could carry out the assassination.”
He smiled against her cheek. It was too much effort to lift his head. “But you see, my lovely Penelope, you got away. It’s you Elsbithy wants to kill most of all.”
Chapter Six
It was never too late for breakfast as far as Penelope was concerned. Fruit-filled crepes, bacon, and juice as she watched the sun begin its descent to the west. One more night until they shifted into the Estate. She was going to soak up as much food, sun, and air as she possibly could.
She’d risen in the early afternoon. Galen had succumbed to sleep as soon as he dropped the bombshell that Elsbithy was lusting for her death. The heavy weight of a sleeping vampire made breathing difficult, but she’d welcomed the security of it while she processed that little nugget.
Well, she knew why the Council sent her the summons. Elsbithy’s arrogance would let them both waltz right into his trap. She shoveled the last bite into her mouth and tapped the tines against her chin as she chewed. While she’d shopped in the village earlier that day, enjoying the colorful clothing and lively conversations of the people around her, her doubts returned.
Should she trust the Council? No effort had been made to find her after her last visit to the Estate. She wasn’t the first grave shifter thrown to the wolves for some greater good. Five hundred years of freedom made one thing very clear. She wanted to live. She wanted the other grave shifters to live too.
Tossing the fork to the table, she stood, stretching her arms over her head and twisting to crack her back. The pull warmed her muscles, the little vibration shooting through her clearing her mind. She would listen to his plan; weigh the pros and cons even. Plans were all well and good, but when fighting for one’s life, Penelope knew sometimes it was best just to wing it.
Cool water sluiced over her as she dove into the pool. The weightlessness of the water was different than what she felt while resting. Here she had a body, a solid physical form. Something about that pricked at the back of her mind. The further a grave shifter was from a shiftable grave, the more solid they became. The easier to kill. But the crypt wasn’t that far, and small islands like this had cemeteries, marked and unmarked, everywhere. Not to mention the occasional hidden murder victim. More than one of those had saved her over the centuries.
She surfaced for a deep pull of air and pushed back under, loving the caress of the water as she swam. It also gave her time to mull over everything he’d said the night before.
She wanted both Elsbithys on a spike.
Her stomach churned at what Galen had endured. She’d wanted to hurt him, yes, for the way he’d betrayed her, but to do so out of vanity was another matter. Or for sport, as Elsbithy so enjoyed.
Drumming her fingers on the ledge of the pool, she watched the sun dip below the horizon. Galen would wake soon. If his plan worked, and they managed to kill Elsbithy, she’d have to kill him as well. Assassinations were assassinations, and that’s what she did best.
But the order didn’t make much sense, if his objective in almost killing her had truly been to protect her. Surely he suspected the Council sanctioned his assassination as well, even if he hadn’t read the summons. They weren’t known to forgive and forget, and technically, he had built a means for shifters’ deaths. Maybe he had a contingency plan to save his hide. He’d had enough time to think one up.
So she decided to trust him. The last rays of the sun faded, and lights began to twinkle from the boats bobbing on the water below her.
“Good evening, my dear.” His voice was still rough with sleep.
She turned, stretching her arms against the edge of the pool to keep herself above water. Across the pool, he leaned in the marble archway into the villa, the cotton pants he’d worn all night wrinkled and hanging low on his hips.
Desire hummed through her body. The ethics of assassination were hard. Thinking about the jealousy of other lovers was hard. The odds of her surviving another night were hard.
Her gaze raked over his body. Galen was hard too.
Lust? That was easy. At that moment, Penelope was all about easy.
She crooked a finger as she pushed off the wall, gliding across the water toward him. “C’mere.” Her voice was husky and barely audible over the gentle lap of water in her wake, but he heard her, moving toward the edge of the pool in an easy lope. He hunkered down before her and held out a hand.
She grabbed it and pulled him in, laughing. He surfaced and sputtered, which only made her laugh harder. He gaped at her a moment before shoving his wet hair from his face.
“Drowning amuses you? You are a sadistic little thing occasionally, aren’t you?”
Pressing against him, she trapped him between her body and the wall. “You can’t drown, Galen. You don’t breathe.” But she did, and she could see him shiver as her breath caressed his cheek. That she affected him so easily did something to her, something she didn’t want to give thought to right then, so she slid her skin against his in the silky water, delighted when he gripped her hips to grind against her.
“Forgoing the no touching thing, are we?”
She barked a laugh, leaning in to nip his earlobe, and then pulled it into her mouth to lave the sting. “We already did that last night.”
He spun them so fast it took a moment for her brain to catch up. Caged between his hard body and the wall, she should have felt trapped. Instead, exhilaration blazed through her veins. This adrenaline rush was better than the kill.
“Last night I wasn’t buried deep enough inside you to feel the air catch in your throat when you moan my name.” Galen’s voice rumbled as low and raw as the words, and instantly her body readied for exactly that, going soft and throbbing.
She grabbed two fistfuls of his wet hair and wrenched his face up to hers. “You’re not yet either.”
“I will be in five minutes.” His kiss was hungry, his tongue demanding entrance and taking possession of her mouth the moment she parted her lips. One of his fangs caught her tongue as she twined it with his, and she arched against him at the awareness it shot through her.
When she had to pull back to suck in air, she asked, “Five minutes? What’s taking so long?”
He smiled wickedly as he drew his fingernails down her body. Unerringly, he slid his fingers into the tiny bikini bottoms she wore, across the hard knot of nerves as he parted her folds, and then drew slow, shallow circles inside her. Not deep enough to do more than tease, she drove her pelvis against his hand, but he only pinned her harder with his weight.
Even wet, the stubble on his jaw scraped against her skin as he rubbed against her, flicking his
tongue against the curve of her ear as his fingers continued to torture her. “It’s been a long time, Penelope.” Damn, she loved how he said her name. “I want to feel you fly apart for me before I lose myself in this deep, wet, lava-hot heat of you.” As if there was a question about what he meant, he added a second finger, circling deeper now. Her body opened easily, the muscles already beginning to flutter and grasp for him.
Chuckling, he nipped at her ear. “I knew five minutes is all it would take.”
She may have growled then, but his thumb started to work her clit, and all she could hear was the blood rushing past her ears on the way to her core. Nails sinking into his shoulders, her nipples brushed against his chest as she bucked against him, tightening to painful as orgasm broke over her in a white hot rush.
“Hmm. I was wrong. Only took three.”
She slapped his ass, but between the water and her current state of spaghetti arms, it held very little force. He laughed anyway, grabbing the backs of her thighs and hauling her legs around his waist.
“I’m sure this is a very pretty little swimsuit,” he said, tracing his finger along the edge, goose bumps rising on the sides of her breasts. “But it must come off now.”
Penelope didn’t care that he didn’t bother with the knots, just breaking the strings and letting it drift away in the pool. His mouth was cool, like the water, but the suction he drew against her nipple pulled her right out of her post-orgasm stupor.
Hard flat muscle bunched under her palms as she slid them over his back, down into the water to grab two handfuls of his equally hard ass and pull him against her. He made a little groan of his own, giving the nipple not getting attention from his tongue a tug and then going to work on her bikini bottoms. Those too, he removed with a break of the strings.
She gave a yelp when he hoisted her out of the water and plopped her down on the chilled tile. Before she could protest, he knocked her back. She caught her weight on her hands, but when he pushed her thighs apart with his broad hands and tongued her, she fell back anyway. Waves of pleasure washed away the lights caused by her skull hitting the ground.
Grave Shifter: Shades of Black (Shades of Black: Grave Distinction Series) Page 4