He grimaced. “What’s so funny? You know what? You need to be spanked.” As if to punish her, he sat on the bed, positioned her on her stomach, draped over his lap, and gave her fanny a light smack. The sound reached her ears a split second before the sting registered in her brain. She yelped, not so much because it hurt, but because it caught her by surprise. Then, because she liked it, she wagged her hips back and forth, an invitation for another.
He was quick to respond. The strike was as hard as the first one. But the next several became progressively softer until he was gently caressing her stinging flesh. His fingers slipped into the cleft between her buttocks, teasing her anus. Then, those naughty digits slid down lower, to tease her pussy and clit.
She wrapped her arms around his leg and gritted her teeth against a shudder. Burke knew exactly how to touch her, how hard to strike to produce just the right amount of pain to drive her crazy. And then how gently to touch her to drive her even more mad.
Warm wetness pulsed from her pussy to slick the insides of her thighs. She rocked her hips up and back, eager to rub away the wicked ache his tormenting was stirring between her legs. “Fuck me,” she pleaded.
“Gladly.” He eased her off his lap, undressed and then sat on the foot of the bed, coaxing her onto his lap. She knelt with her knees positioned on either side of his hips, her pussy hovering over his erect cock. He held it in his fist, pumping up and down until a pearl of precome collected on the tip.
Burke nibbled on the tickly spot just below her armpit, producing a quiver of pure, indulgent pleasure.
Miko came up behind her, pressing his stomach against her back, and sliding his arms around her sides until he had his hands closed over her breasts. She let her head fall back against his chest, closed her eyes, and surrendered to the powerful men stroking and kissing her to oblivion.
Life as an Origo was oh. So. Gooooooood.
Burke held her hips, supporting her weight as she slowly impaled herself on his thick cock. A moan rushed up her throat. With his penis buried deep inside, she wrapped her arms around his neck and slowly circled her hips like a belly dancer, grinding her slick folds against his pelvis. His fingers dug into her soft flesh. He dropped his head forward and nipped her collarbone, murmuring sweet promises against her warming skin.
Now, this was the way to spend an eternity! She had to be the luckiest woman alive. Once, she’d figured she’d never find the right man for her. Now, she had not only one Mr. Right, but two. And they were both so very right.
While Burke lifted her hips, pulling her up until only the tip of his thick erection remained inside, Miko kissed a searing path down her spine. Fingertips teased her anus. Burke’s hips rocked upward, once again thrusting his penis deep inside her. Over and over he drove into her, and over and over she murmured, “Ohmygod, ohmygod!” Miko kissed and tickled and teased. Pulses of heat rushed through her body. Pounding, urgent desire drove her to the brink of release.
And just as she was about to soar over the crest, Miko caught her hips between his hands, pulled her roughly off Burke’s cock, positioned her so that she was bent over Burke’s lap and entered her from behind.
Oh yes, this two-guy thing was for her.
She rocked back and forth, slamming into Miko’s groin, the sexy slap of her ass striking him adding yet another sensation to the flurry already driving her to madness. Her deep breaths became little panting gulps. Her heart pounded against her breastbone, and the telltale flush of heat swirled in her stomach.
“Yessssss!” she screamed, giving herself over to an intense orgasm. But before the delightful pulses of bliss had eased, a loud bang sounded at the door. Miko jerked away, spun around and snapped his fingers, instantly dressing himself and her.
“What the hell?” Visibly confused, Burke jumped to his feet. He snapped his fingers mid-stride as he raced to the door, magically donning a pair of jeans and a shirt. “What’s going on? Hang on!” Just as he was about to reach the door, it flung open.
“Shit!” Miko cursed, lunging in front of Sylvie, who suddenly realized she was standing dazed and motionless as a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming semi. He backstepped, taking her with him as a horde of men stormed into the room.
Although Miko’s bulky bod blocked her view, the slamming and scuffling, shouting, crashing and thumping told her things were getting ugly fast. At the sound of Burke cussing, she tried to inch around Miko’s right side to sneak a peek. Was he okay? What was going on?
Had Miko known what was about to happen? Had he intentionally stopped the Binding from working, so that they wouldn’t die if Burke was killed?
Two men had Burke pinned to the floor, flat on his stomach. Because of the angle, she couldn’t see his face, but what she could see sickened her. The two men were battering his head, shoulders and back with black metal rods.
He went completely still.
Was he dead? Oh God. Her insides went ice cold then blazing hot. Someone screamed, someone female.
Miko spun around and, sweeping her into an embrace, crushed her against him. It was then, as the shrieking grew muffled, that she realized it had been her. She clamped her eyes closed, wishing it was as easy to shut out the image of Burke lying still as death from her memory. She shuddered. Tears ran unchecked from her eyes, coursing down her cheeks and dripping from her chin.
“Excellent work, Miko,” someone said.
Excellent work? She wanted to spit at whoever had said that. This wasn’t good work. It was terrible. They’d just beaten an innocent man unconscious. A man she loved.
Unable to hold back the rage, flared hotter by the added hurt of knowing Miko had somehow contributed to what happened, she wrenched herself free from his embrace. “Bastards!” Spinning, she kicked the man closest to her. Her foot made contact with his knee and there was a satisfying crunch, but she didn’t bother looking to see what -- if any -- injury she might have caused. At the moment, her focus was on Burke.
The two creeps who had beaten him senseless were now hauling him to his feet, but his head hung limply. His body flopped as they dragged him toward the door.
“Burke! Ohmygod!” It was hard, but she fought her way between several men to get to him. She caught his hand in hers and squeezed. Be alive. Just be alive. “Burke?”
Nothing. His hand was cool and lifeless in hers. His head remained slumped forward.
The men holding him yanked, forcing his hand from hers. Desperate, she lunged forward, to grab any part of him she might reach. Arm. Hand. Leg. Whatever. But a split second before she touched him, someone caught her from behind, jerked her arms back.
“Miko?” she screamed. “Ouch!”
Whoever had her was holding her tightly, to the point of pain. Panicking, she twisted her upper body, trying to see who was holding her. Whoever it was, he now had both wrists held in one steely fist, had wrapped an arm around her waist, and was rushing her toward the exit.
She just knew she didn’t want to go outside with whoever was manhandling her. Frantic, she dug her heels in and fought to free her hands. Didn’t help. She jerked and kicked. Nothing. She screamed and fought.
Despite her thrashing, she was forced outside and into a black car with tinted windows. Finally, while fighting for her life -- kicking, punching, clawing -- she caught sight of the man who’d smuggled her outside. She didn’t recognize him.
“Why?” she whispered, breathless. “Where are you taking me?”
“Miko asked me to take you to his car so you wouldn’t be hurt,” the man responded calmly. “Sorry I had to be so rough, but you were fighting me, and I didn’t want to take any chances you were going to get in the middle of something again. You got this close to having your skull crushed.” He gave her a friendly, reassuring smile. “Miko’ll be out as soon as we wrap things up inside.” At the sound of a voice on his radio, the man shut the car door, turned and ran back toward the building.
A split second later, another man approached the vehicle. This one sh
e recognized immediately. It was the man from the bar, the one who’d been there with Miko. She wished she could remember his name but she was drawing a blank.
He pulled open the door and motioned for her to follow him. “Something’s happened. I need to protect you.” When she hesitated, he added, “It’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.” He leaned forward and unfastened her seatbelt. “It’s just a temporary thing, until we can sort out the facts.”
A sickly chill swept through her body, followed by a wave of nausea. She wrapped her arms around herself to hold back the shudders wracking her body. “What happened? Is Burke okay? And Miko?”
“They’re both fine. But there’s been another threat on your life and Miko felt it would be better to get you out of here immediately.” He led her to another car, identical to the one she’d been sitting in, opened a rear door for her and shut her in before taking the driver’s seat. “We have another safe house not far from here. I’m going to drop you off there, and he’ll follow as soon as he can.” He started the car, and pulled away from the apartment building.
“Okay.” She had a niggling feeling this man hadn’t told her the whole truth, but she wasn’t exactly in the position to demand any more information. She’d have to wait for Miko.
He’d get a good grilling. The way she saw it, things were looking really bad. For all of them. But especially for Burke.
The niggling feeling morphed into a serious case of the jitters when she noticed there were no handles to open the back doors. Locked in. Like a criminal.
“How far away is the safe house?”
Bringing the car to a stop in a parking lot, next to a big white van, her unofficial chauffeur twisted, giving her an empty smile she assumed was meant to reassure her. “Everything’s going to be okay. Trust me.”
* * *
Miko sensed something wasn’t right about sixty seconds too late to do anything about it. He’d been too distracted by the chaos to keep a close eye on Sylvie, but now that the proverbial dust had settled, he could think of nothing but finding where she’d gone.
If she was hurt, he’d never forgive himself.
It had only taken a little over a half hour for Miko to put a stop to the senseless beating his fellow officers had launched on his bound mate, secure Burke, and take him down to a waiting vehicle for transport back to Burke’s homeland in eastern Europe.
Miko still hadn’t pieced together all the facts in Burke’s murder case. But it would have to wait until he made sure Sylvie was okay.
It was too soon to panic. He didn’t see Hadrian at the moment. He guessed his brother had probably just escorted her outside where she’d be safe.
If only he’d been able to protect her from the trauma of watching Burke’s capture. There’d been no other way. The decisions he’d had to face. Impossible choices between love and duty. Heartrending.
Miko rushed out of the building, his gaze sweeping the scene outside as he ran. There were several unmarked Excoluni vehicles scattered about in the parking lot. He headed for the closest one, inhabited, as it turned out, by an old friend of his brother’s, Tom Cizak.
“Have you seen a woman? About this tall with long blond hair?” he asked the officer.
“Yeah. She was a little shaken. Hadrian put her in his car, I think.” He motioned to the car parked closest to the street.
Thank the gods. She was safe. The burning in Miko’s gut eased. The fact that he’d reacted so strongly to her disappearance bothered him more than a little. He’d had no reason to suspect something bad had happened to her. She’d been surrounded by Excoluni officers he trusted with his life, not to mention his brother. Yet he’d been damn close to panicking. Why?
As he approached the vehicle, the driver’s side door swung open and Hadrian stepped out. Brows lowered and mouth twisted in confusion, Miko’s brother slammed the door shut. “What’s up?”
Miko motioned to the car. “I just wanted to make sure Sylvie’s okay. She was pretty upset.”
Hadrian’s brows scrunched even lower. “She’s not with me. Petrov told me you asked him to take her to your car.”
Now, that confused him because he did not remember saying any such thing. “Really?” He glanced over his shoulder at his car.
“Yeah. I was about to take her with me, but decided, since I had to go back to the station to make preparations for the prisoner, I’d better find someone else to babysit her. I didn’t think twice about letting her go with him. Dyre Petrov has been a friend to both of us for years…”
“Sure. Okay.” Ignoring his brother’s continued reassurances, he turned, waved a farewell and headed for his car. His heart thudded heavily in his chest, a reassurance that she was probably still alive. At least for now.
He was overreacting. Hell, maybe he had told Petrov to take her to his car. Things had been so crazy, he’d probably shouted at least a half dozen different commands without even thinking about them. In a crisis, he’d learned to operate on auto-pilot. To act and react without thinking too much.
Approaching his car, he glanced up, catching the vehicle transporting Burke turning out of the parking lot, headed for the closest underground Excoluni facility, about an hour’s drive away. Time was running out for Burke -- and possibly for both Miko and Sylvie too. The jury was out yet on whether they’d succeeded in completing the Iugum. Because he hadn’t felt the effects of Burke’s beating, he suspected they hadn’t. But since Burke had not been killed, he couldn’t be absolutely certain. Injuries were temporary, only slowing a vampire down a little. Within minutes, broken bones, stab wounds and ruptured organs could be healed. Perhaps that was why Burke’s bound mates had not felt any pain from his injuries?
He almost hoped they hadn’t completed the Iugum.
If he failed to clear Burke’s name in time, and if they’d succeeded in completing the Binding, they’d all die. The clock was ticking. At most, he figured they had another twenty-four hours.
First things first, however. He couldn’t concentrate on investigating the string of murder cases Burke had been suspected of until he knew for a fact that Sylvie was safe. Now within feet of his car, he ducked down to peer in the window.
Empty.
His heart skipped several beats before launching in a wild gallop.
Maybe she was lying down?
He jerked open the door and searched the front seats then did the same with the back.
Empty.
His knees wobbly, he sat in the car and depressed the call button on his radio. The little voice in his head had warned him something wasn’t right. That nagging voice was now screaming. He called Hadrian, and Hadrian assured him Sylvie had to be okay. There’d probably just been a misunderstanding.
He could hear the guilt in Hadrian’s voice.
Knowing his brother, he was blaming himself.
He placed a call to Petrov, who said he had indeed walked Sylvie to the car, but had been called away immediately afterward. He had no idea where she might have gone.
Had she simply taken a walk? By herself? In the dark? When she was worried about Burke?
He couldn’t see that being the case, but just to make sure, he drove around the parking lot then circled around the block. It was a residential area. No convenience stores for her to duck into. No grocery stores.
Did she have a friend in the area?
He tried to recall their conversation as he’d driven her to the safe house. No, he was pretty sure she’d never been to this part of town. But desperate, he looped around several more blocks. When that turned up nothing, he called Hadrian to see if he’d learned anything yet.
Nothing, but he promised to keep trying. Miko could tell his brother was nearly as worried as he was.
Growing more desperate by the moment, he called Szader, the officer who was driving Burke’s car. He heard Burke speaking in the background as they talked but couldn’t make out his words. Next, he heard a lot of commotion, shouts, tires screeching. The tooth-jarring sound of metal st
riking metal at high speed, and then Burke’s voice on the radio, “Where are you?”
Oh, shit.
He was not going to communicate with a wanted felon on the radio. A felon who’d just done something to an Excoluni officer.
What the hell was Burke Langton thinking?
Chapter Fifteen
What the hell had Miko been thinking? He’d let Sylvie out of his sight? Lost her!
Burke cussed under his breath for the desperate act he’d been forced to commit to get free -- he’d attacked an Excoluni officer. Shitpissfuck! Now he couldn’t deny he was a felon.
But what choice had he been given? Sylvie was missing. He couldn’t trust Miko like he thought. What if he’d been right all along in assuming the murderer had been after her? And what if the bastard had her right now?
If anything happened to her, he had no idea what he’d do.
He punched the vehicle’s gas, speeding through a yellow traffic light. Most likely, Miko was still somewhere in the vicinity of the safe house, searching the streets for Sylvie. That’s where he needed to head first.
He couldn’t afford to keep this car for long, especially since he knew there was a GPS chip planted on the vehicle. At best, he figured he had an hour before someone with the Excoluni realized something was wrong. Sooner if the officer he’d bound and gagged somehow found a way to escape and phone in.
He glanced at the officer’s radio, which he’d chosen to keep so he could monitor communication. It seemed, at the moment, no alarms had been sounded. Yet.
It took less than twenty minutes to return to the safe house -- luckily he hadn’t been taken far before picking the handcuffs and convincing the Excoluni officer transporting him to pull over. The short drive, however, hadn’t allowed him enough time to cool off. The minute he spotted Miko’s car, slowly rolling down a residential street about a half mile from the safe house, a pulse of rage spiked in his gut.
He jerked the wheel, maneuvering the car into a tight one-eighty then pulled up behind Miko’s vehicle. His mate’s brake lights glowed red. Both vehicles’ doors swung open simultaneously, and both men exited, charging at each other like pissed off bulls. Miko’s face was nearly the same shade as his previously illuminated brake lights. The heat burning Burke’s neck, ears and cheeks suggested his were equally inflamed.
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