by Kim Knox
There. The scent of a male.
I stopped and willed my beast silent, needing to focus. Cool air washed over me, prickling my skin. Behind the closed doors lining the wide corridor, the hurried beat of too many hearts, soft groans and the wet slap of bodies had my breath short. Some had already found partners to see in the new year.
I swallowed, the pulse of sex finding the beat under my own skin. Crushing my eyes shut, I denied the memories filling my thoughts, of the wild release of November Eve. Of my first new year, when two strangers had initiated me into the celebration. I failed as the memory of entering a darkened room, heavy with the scent of desire, swept through me. Strong hands slid, slipped over my body, pulling free my clothes. In the endless hours before dawn, I’d became lost to the heat, the ecstasy of so many fingers, mouths, cocks caressing, sucking, penetrating my flesh—
I scrubbed a hand over my hot face, fire stirring my beast with the ache to fuck. Damn it, I had to focus on the male’s scent, find him and fuck him into submission.
“So this is what you like.” A long male body pressed hot against mine. Large hands caught my fingers and lifted them, pinning them to the silk-covered wall. I groaned at the press of my breasts into a hard, muscled chest. How the hell had I missed him? “To lurk and listen.”
“Jager…” His name was a sigh, of bitterness or relief, I didn’t know. “Kneel.”
His laughter rumbled. “Are you serious, Tate?” His mouth hovered over mine, his breath sweet and hot. I ached to close that short distance and taste him. “Do you really think I’m that easy?”
I lifted my focus from the insane temptation of his mouth to his eyes. “Yes,” I said.
The corners crinkled and a spark of amusement gleamed. “I’ll enjoy sliding the silver collar around your neck. Then I’ll push you down onto your knees and fuck your mouth.” His solid erection rubbed against my abdomen and I tried to ignore the pulse of need, thick and heavy, low in my belly. “Deny that’s got you wet, Tate.”
“Deny you don’t want to taste me.”
He caught my wrists in one hand, the other free to explore the length of my body. His thumb brushed against a pebbled nipple and I hissed. Dropping his hand lower, he started to bunch the silk of my dress. He exposed my thigh, my hip and his fingers slid across my belly. Muscles shivered under the slow brush, the light scrape of his nails under my navel.
I sucked in a breath, my gaze fixed on his. Heat flared in the darkness of his eyes, promising power and wickedness. His thumb pressed lower, lower until he teased my clitoris. I gasped and Jager’s mouth covered mine, his tongue hot, sweet and I arched my hips into his clever fingers. He tasted…addictive. The first kiss deepened, melted into another and I moaned. I needed to fuck him against the wall and then he would fall to his knees and that oh-so-talented mouth would find me—
He pulled back, and his hot whisper brushed my ear. “When you’re my escravo, nothing about you will be denied to me.”
The words jolted sense back into my brain. I licked my lips and gave him a wry smile, ignoring the growl of my beast that wanted Jager buried deep, deep inside my body. “Of course, you’re making the assumption that I plan to hunt you.”
“Aren’t you doing that right now?”
My smile grew. “I was happily listening to an orgy. You pinned me to the wall, Jager.” He stilled. I had him. I’d made no move on him. I, as the hunting queen, was the one who had to initiate contact. “A little too eager to fuck me, perhaps?”
His hands slid away and he stepped back. The loss of his warmth almost had me shivering but I kept the smile on my face. Quick fingers smoothed down the front of my gown.
“Thank you for firing my blood. I’m sure my mate will appreciate it.”
His mouth thinned and his hands balled into fists. I had to wonder whether this was the first mistake he had ever made. And in front of a lowly reiver, too. I patted his cheek, his skin smooth and warm under my fingers. “Better luck with the next reiver.”
“I still have time. We’ll see how long you can resist me.”
I laughed. “Arrogant much?” I lifted an eyebrow. “But then the same could be said of me.” I glanced down at the thick erection straining against his trousers. “Something’s got you hard.” I flicked a hand back down the darkened corridor. “Go and play with your escravo, Jager. They may have a use for you.” Fury pulsed off him and my beast delighted in it. My grin widened. “Go on, run along now.”
The sudden slide of his fangs gleamed in the low light. My pulse jumped and the soft spice of my scent spiraled through the cool air. Jager’s hard chest lifted as he drew in a deep breath. “Run,” he muttered, his low voice no more than a growl.
“I’m the hunter here, Jager. And I choose not to hunt you.”
Shadows melted and in a single heartbeat he pinned me to the wall again, his fingers tight bands around my wrists. My heart missed a beat. Damn, he was fast. His mouth hovered over my neck, the nearness of his fangs to a major artery pounding hot need through my body. “I’ll have you right here, sour your sweet body so any other male will think it an offense to fall before you.” His tongue teased my skin, tracing the quick beat of my blood. “Tell me you don’t want me to fuck you. That you don’t want to be mine.”
Mine. My beast reared and I had to wrap an iron will around it, stop it from hooking my leg around his and rubbing myself against his erection. Mine… “You want me? Get down on your knees.” I shoved against him and wrested myself free. I was a bloody queen—no man threatened me. “Well?”
Jager ran his tongue over his fangs and they slid back into his mouth. He gave me a tight smile. “I’m the natural first son of the Queen. Do you really think you’re worthy of me?”
The base vampire in me wanted to rise to the challenge, declare I was and throw him hard against the wall. But I had more sense than that. I had to hunt a man I could conquer, after all. “Trying to impress me, Jager?” I closed the distance between us and ran a light finger over his lower lip. The remembered taste of him burned on my tongue hotter than essence. My head tilted. “Beg…and I’ll hunt you.”
Jager stepped back from me, his eyes glittering.
I wet my lips and found him watching the deliberate slide of my tongue. “Then down through the centuries you’ll always wonder, won’t you?” My scent drifted through the air, wrapping around us, and Jager pulled it into his body with every deepening breath. “Wonder how wet and tight and sweet I am. How it would feel to fuck me ’til I screamed.” My smile curved. “Because you will wonder…but of course you’ll have your escravo, so compliant, so happy to please.” I backed away, every inch a labor as my beast fought me. “Only my mate and favored tanao will know what you never will.”
His mouth had thinned again. “By dawn, you’ll be one of those compliant women.”
More steps separated us and already I was losing him to the gloom of the corridor. His scent still tugged at me but I fought it. “And yet you don’t sound so confident of that.” I waggled my fingers in a short, sarcastic wave. “November Eve is a time of release, Jager. A time to have fun, to revel.” I smirked at him. “And I know I will.”
Turning, I sprinted down the long corridor. Through the soft moans drifting beyond closed doors, I heard a distinctive low growl. I couldn’t help the grin.
Kester would kill me. I’d started to hunt Jager.
The corridor, after more twists and turns, fed into the summerhouse. Glass stretched around me, exposing the room to the silver gleam of the moon and thick star shine. Heavy palm trees stretched up to the sloped roof, brushing thick fronds against the sheets of glass. The soft swish of the leaves drifted over me. Warm, damp air, thick with life-energy, slid heavy into my lungs and brought with it the scent of a male. Not Jager, but a cool, light aroma, with just a hint of decadence. Something about it seemed familiar and my beast growled. The sound echoed and the scent changed, grew sharp, and through the darkness, his heartbeat quickened.
“You’re no
t Zara.” A British accent and he had the earthy touch of a tanao. “So, good evening, Lady Tate.”
A smile pulled at my mouth and I padded over the cool tiles. “Well, you have the advantage on me.” I directed my voice to the far corner, where a profusion of exotic climbers still hung heavy with night-dark flowers. “You are?”
“Neron, Seventh Risen to Her Majesty, Queen Ionna.”
So, one of the Queen’s early tanao, around when Zara was born…and reluctant to have her find him. I brushed past a twisting vine, my eyes growing used to the gloom. The tanao’s heat and heart pulsed through the life-energy of the plants. “What’s of interest here, Neron?”
“Before I became ever-living, I was a plantsman. This summerhouse is my creation. The Queen finds it therapeutic.”
Affection warmed his voice. A shaft of moonlight cut through the roof, slicing the dense knot of vegetation and I could just make out a blond head. Light edged his smooth features. The Queen had created a man of carved classical beauty in turning Neron, evidence of her early power. “So you’re hiding?”
“Essence gives me heartburn. I prefer this.” He lifted a small cup, took a sip from it and sighed. “Wormwood tea. Drunk here, surrounded by all this pure life-energy.” He grinned and the gesture was infectious. “Invigorating.” He lifted a pale eyebrow. “Want some?”
The bitter scent drifted through the heat and something in it lifted my heart, had it beating harder. I gave him a rueful smile. “I have to have a clear head.”
Neron watched me over his little cup, his blue eyes gleaming. He drained his tea and shook the dregs over the nearest plant container. “Yes, you do. I smell Jager on you. Be careful, Lady. He’s played and caught too many reivers.”
He stepped out from the swathe of thick planting. Neron stopped and a curious smile curved his mouth. The sudden gleam of fangs against his pale lips caused a hitch in my chest. Liquid fire surged through my veins and the warm air heated my scent.
“But I can see why he wants to play. Your spice burns the blood.”
Oh, if Jager hadn’t slid under my skin, then Neron with his pale perfection would have been worthy of the hunt. My skin prickled and something in Neron’s gaze, a wry humor, put a deliberate sway to my hips as I moved forward. Then I felt it. The other heart beating out of rhythm with ours, a heart I knew. I lifted an eyebrow. Neron had a wicked streak I liked. “I could make it hotter.”
“Neron, leave now.” Jager’s rough order rolled over me.
He gave a short nod. Neron was the Queen’s tanao and had to obey her son. He stopped beside me and gave a deep bow. “An honor to meet you again, Lady Tate.”
I let out a slow deliberate sigh, my gaze flitting over Neron’s blond perfection. Jager’s heartbeat thickened. Good. He had to learn who was in command. “My only regret is that we were so rudely interrupted.”
Neron’s eyes glittered and the beginning of a smirk cut his mouth. “Indeed, Lady.”
“I said out.” Jager’s command came with an undercurrent of his beast. “Now.”
Neron bowed to me, bowed to Jager from where he stood in the open archway and left the summerhouse.
I glared at Jager. “So you plan for me to be the first queen to be neither escravo nor mated by dawn?” Smoothing a hand down over my hair, I turned to a smaller door opening out into a narrow, arched corridor. Chill air washed through the sheer silk of my gown and I held down a shiver. The odor of several males twisted around me, younger vampires only decades since their queens turned them. Nothing like the ancient power of Jager, but their fresh, keen strength whipped through my blood. Any other November Eve, I would have found them and thoroughly enjoyed them.
Jager stalked me, catching up with my fast pace. His boots echoed over the old, damp stone. “Don’t worry, Tate, you’ll be escravo. My escravo.”
My laughter rang around the stone walls. “I’m on the scent of three fresh, young tanao. I’m sure they’d be eager to please and welcome the prestige of being a queen’s consort.”
“This is all hot air.” Jager’s soft, deep voice flowed through the silence of the stone corridor. “You’re hunting me, Tate. No boy with the grave-soil still clinging to his skin would satisfy you.”
“I’m hunting you?” I glanced back. The hot glare of a spotlight washing white light over his features, created a stark, shadowed mask of his face. “Do people usually hunt by walking away from their prey…at high speed?” I smirked at him. “You, I have no interest in. Too old, too hidebound,” my smirk grew, “too used to being your mother’s lapdog.”
He growled, the white gleam of his fangs making my gut tight. No one had the right to be that beautiful, and the primitive part of me, my beast, demanded I stop right there and jump him.
“Lapdog?”
I stopped and turned. The fury rolled off him, a thick wave of anger that surged through me. I willed control and kept the sharp grin on my face. “Aren’t you?” His dark eyes gleamed with fire and a hint of his primitive self watched me. I felt it. The heat of the beast at his heart, glorious, ancient. My own beast ached to growl, to sink sharp fangs into his heart and make Jager ours.
I soothed it with promises. Brute force wouldn’t win a man like Jager. He had to be played, as he planned to play me. The rewards if we won almost had the beast purring. But the danger if we lost terrified me.
Tilting my head, I softened my smile and saw the mistrust flitter across his features. “Now, run along, Jager. I’m sure there must be something in ancient lore about hounding a reiver like this.”
“You touched me.” The distance between us vanished and his body heat swept over me. He took my hand and pressed my right index finger to his lips, the contact running a shock under my skin. His mouth curved into a smile and satisfaction swept off him. “Feel that connection? You marked me, Tate.”
I traced the edge of my thumbnail under his lip. My heart thudded as my mind raced. Already, Jager had backed me against the cool stone of the corridor wall. His height blocked one of the spotlights, throwing his face into heavy shadow. His heat and scent wrapped around me and I tried to ignore the sudden rush of need that had my nipples hard and aching. “Hardly a mark,” I said, very aware of how close his mouth was to mine. I wet my lips and the soft liquid growl escaping him pulsed need low in my belly. His erection pressed hard against my abdomen. “More of a smudge. You’re grabbing at any excuse, aren’t you?”
“Bluff all you want, Tate.”
Heavy hands slid over my hips to pull slowly, inch by inch, the silk of my gown up over my buttocks. The constant brush of light fingers against my ass, the rush of cool silk against my skin and Jager, holding my gaze with a promise of such wickedness… My heart thudded and the ache intensified. I wanted him. And he knew it.
“Let me have you.” The soft words brushed against my lips and my body melted under him. Clever fingers caressed my skin, sketching lazy patterns, edging over each cheek. They slid further, slipping and playing with the damp curls between my thighs. Slow strokes and the tip of his finger pressed, pushed… I gasped as he sank into my tight, hot flesh. His finger stilled. “Let me in and I promise, I promise you such pleasure. An eternity of pleasure.”
He pressed little kisses over my jaw, edging down over my neck to the pulsing artery just below my ear. Fangs pushed against my skin, hard, sharp, pinpoints of assured ecstasy. So simple just to give in. My power as a queen, the heavy burden of it, I could let it all devolve to him and have no fears ever again.
Thoughts of Jager blanketed me, the surge of him in my mind, my flesh, all consuming. Two natural-born vampires… The sex would be incredible. I tugged at his belt, buttons, my fingers finding the solid heat of his cock. Jager’s head jerked up. He bit and laved his healing tongue over my throat, jaw, lips, my mind dizzy from the burning points of bliss. He stared at me, the beast in his eyes flared, and I circled my thumb over the sensitive head of his cock.
His arms tightened, trapping me against his body. “Say you want me, T
ate.”
It would be so easy to fall under his spell, and it was a spell. A heady magic that had trapped seven women down through the centuries. Seven. My beast railed against that. Share my conquest with other women? I didn’t share. I was a queen.
My gripping fingers slid down and then up and Jager started to pump into my hand. He growled, the soft, skin-tingling sound brushing warm over my lips. Jager buried his face in my neck, fangs almost, almost breaking the skin. His fingers stretched and pushed, eased deeper into my flesh. In and out, mirroring the slide of my palm over his cock. I crushed my eyes shut against the tight knot of desire in my belly, the hollow ache of my flesh, the need I had to shift my hips and sink onto Jager’s thick cock and ride him ’til I screamed. My beast growled, the escaping sound pushing Jager’s fingers deeper, his thigh shoving up hard against my pubic bone.
I could ride him and find complete bliss—just like all the others.
The beast within wrapped around my conscious thoughts. We hunted for ourselves, not to share Jager with weak-willed women. The growl I released then stilled him, a snarl of possession, of power. “Kneel.”
“No.”
I pulled my hand away from his cock and wiped my palm and fingers on the tail of his shirt. Pushing out, I loosened his arms and his fingers slid from my wet flesh. I stepped away from him, and eased my silk gown back over my exposed skin. My beast sat low in my soul, feeling nothing but pity for Jager, and I let that feeling show as I glanced over his disheveled clothes. He tucked his damp shirt back into his trousers and resettled the smooth material of his jacket over his shoulders.
I lifted my chin. “I release you from the mark.”
“You can’t do that, Tate.”
“I can do anything I bloody well like, I’m a queen.” And I turned from him. The air still burned with the scent of desire, need, and drawing it into my lungs, I wanted nothing more than to fuck Jager. But my beast and I were in agreement. Jager could fuck himself before he fucked us.