by Kim Knox
“You will kneel before me.” His voice echoed over the stone walls, raw, hard and the ache to taste his power burned through me. I resisted. “This isn’t over. Before dawn, I will have you.”
Chapter Three
The fresh scent of the young tanao broke through, whipping with it cool, damp air. The Queen’s country house had an extensive network of cellars, where the youngest turned would gather. They still needed contact with earth, stone and the comfort of darkness. I would find a young consort, one eager to please me.
Behind me, Jager’s measured footsteps echoed over the walls.
I stopped and glared at him. “You’re dismissed, Jager.”
His brief burst of laughter prickled over my skin. “That’s not how it works, Tate. You’ve marked the male you intend to hunt. You can’t hunt another.”
“Watch me.”
Jager gripped my arm, fingers digging into muscle. Shadow lay heavy over his face, but I couldn’t mistake the pulse of anger surging through him. My beast unfurled. She liked the taste of his fury. “You can’t hunt another.”
“And I told you. I’m a queen.” I wrenched my arm free. “Now, it’s been fun, but you want another slave. So wait ten years for the next reiver.”
He cursed and a muscle jumped in his jaw…but then an eerie calm broke his anger. “Our Queen has ordered this.”
My stomach dropped and I stared at him. The five quiet words punctured me. He’d been ordered to make me his escravo. His fingers slid from my arm and I fought the urge to wrap my arms around my body, protecting me from the unexpected pain cramping my gut. It hurt. To him I was an order to be obeyed. Nothing more.
My beast flared and the anger and indignation burst through me. Heat surged through my muscles and with it the desperate urge to run. Run, hide, scream into the darkness about how unfair it was, but I had to obey the Queen. We all did.
I gripped the wild, petulant emotions that filled me. They couldn’t rule me. Whatever I became after, at that moment I had the pride and dignity of a queen. I let out a slow breath and a smile tugged at my mouth. Seemed I still had the need to be sarcastic, though. “Jager, the obedient son.”
His jaw muscles tightened. “Every one of us is bound to the Queen and must obey her in all things.”
“Even who you fuck? So this is what you do? Enslave queens because your mother said so?”
“No.” His heart thudded slow and I felt the weight of his lie lifting from him. “I wanted my escravo, needed to have them subservient to me.”
I’d thought his previous words had cut deep, but his dismissal, his rejection, twisted a knife in my gut. “This must be torture.” I couldn’t keep the sarcasm from my voice. I’d marked a man who didn’t even think me worthy of being his slave. I wanted my beast to growl, to fight, to give me something other than the agony of my humiliation, but he’d wounded her too. She was a knot of pain deep in my soul. Bastard.
I lifted my shoulders. I could never turn this man. He would never kneel at my feet. “Why?” I smoothed a palm over my hair, but the gesture didn’t calm me. “Why did the Queen order this?” I had to know. None of us could disobey her will. Well, we could, but a vampire wouldn’t live long after.
Jager let out a slow breath. He glanced behind me, his eyes narrowing. “Not here.”
“Why?”
“Because I won’t discuss state business in a tunnel.” He stood back and waved his hand back toward the summerhouse. “After you, Tate.”
I willed myself to walk past him and retrace my steps to the summerhouse. “I suppose I’ve saved myself some humiliation. If I’d given in, become your escravo at the first touch, then I’m sure you’d have shoved this as well as your dick into my face.”
“You would never have known.”
I snorted. “And that’s supposed to make it better?”
The warm scented air of the summerhouse drifted through the cold bite of the stone corridor. It had been only minutes since I’d flirted with Neron and felt the power of being a hunting queen. Now I was under orders to be Jager’s unwanted slave. His hand brushing my spine jolted me forward into the glass summerhouse. “Where are we going?”
“My apartments.”
“And we still have to…” I waved my hand vaguely, brushing over the feathered fronds of a low palm. Something that had always crept out from my most secret desires had suddenly become a reality, but the thought of sex with Jager had my stomach cramping.
His fingers teased a slow path up my spine and I hated that a rush of heat fired under my skin. My beast wanted something out of our humiliation. “We must seal the bond, Tate.”
“Whether I want to or not?”
“Oh, you want me.”
The promise in his voice washed bittersweet through me. And I couldn’t deny my primitive half still ached for him. His hot hand on my lower back burned through the thin silk to my skin. I swallowed, unable to stop the ache tight in my flesh at just that simple touch. The man had made me insane for too many years.
Jager leaned in close, his breath brushing my ear. Goose bumps flashed over my skin. “And you’ll have me. All of me. I promise you.”
The doors to the royal apartment opened before us, ancient hinges creaking as the ebony wood swept over gilded tiles. The Queen’s inner sanctum, a place where only her children and favored tanao lived, stretched out before me. A great domed atrium with more double doors leading off them. My heart thudded. How had I got myself into this? But I hadn’t, had I? Queen Ionna had sent her son after me. Even if I’d had no interest in him, Jager would’ve hunted me down.
“Fast work.”
I froze at the soft, cultured voice and the humor that undercut it. Zara, his sister. I didn’t turn around, but stood with Jager’s hand stinging the base of my spine. She knew what her brother had to do, and thought it funny.
“Gloating doesn’t become you,” Jager said.
Zara glided in front of me, her silk gown caressing the gilt tiles. Tall and dark, she almost held the same incredible beauty as her brother. Almost. Something around her mouth and jaw appeared oddly sharper, increasing as she gave me a smirk. “I’m just congratulating you, Jager.” She tilted her head, her long hair tumbling over her shoulder. Her dark gaze flitted over me, bright, condescending. My beast uncurled, licks of her anger firing my skin. I wasn’t escravo just yet. “Though there’s still a burn to her. Tut, tut, Jager. You haven’t fully tamed her beast.”
“Zara, shouldn’t you be hunting?” He sounded calm but the hard press of his fingers against my spine screamed his tension. “You need to find someone worthy.”
“There are several.” She glided behind us on silent feet, her lush body moving with liquid grace beneath her sheer gown. “They’re making it too easy, which is no fun at all. I may go for one of the old ruling house. They’ve always hated us. Should be more of a challenge.”
I glanced at Jager and found his mouth thinned and a hard light in his dark eyes. “Don’t fuck this up, Zara.”
Zara’s pulse jumped at her throat and anger rolled from her. “You’re the weak link in this plan—”
“Zara…” Jager growled her name, fury licking under his words. My skin prickled and for a quick instant even his sister stayed quiet. “Go hunt.”
“And you, do your duty.”
The sharp reproof in her voice cut through me. Was I his duty? The reiver he had to turn to an escravo on the orders of his mother. For what reason? So that his sister would have the single glory of facing the sun as it crawled over the horizon, standing alone to receive her new province from her mother?
“Tate.”
Jager’s firm touch at my lower back had me stumbling forward across the atrium. Zara had gone, drifting back down the long gallery and away from the royal apartments.
“Am I your duty?”
More heavy doors opened, swinging back against pale, silk-lined walls. They closed behind us with a soft whoosh of air. Jager, too, let out a slow breath. He shrugged out of
his jacket and padded over the thick carpet to the circular sitting room at the end of the short corridor. No thick velvet or heavy, baroque furniture for him. Soft golden light splashed over sleek dark furniture and I watched as Jager threw his jacket over a long couch.
“You’re my duty,” he said.
And that broke my thoughts on his taste in interior design. He tugged his tie loose. I tried not to think about what would happen now, what had to happen by order of the Queen… Naturally, I failed. Jager exuded sex and power and I couldn’t ignore that combination.
He popped his cufflinks and rolled white sleeves up his forearms. The simple sight of his flesh had a warmth sinking low into my belly and my beast wanted more. Jager looked up, his dark eyes narrowing. My scent softened the sterile air. “Despite everything, you still want me.”
No gloating tainted his voice and that made it worse. It would be easier to hate him, but it would be ridiculous to deny the need I had to get him naked. I shrugged. “Yes.”
A brief smile tugged at his mouth. Something in it, an intimacy, a connection between us, kicked my gut.
“Nothing if not honest, Tate.” The smile faded, his expression sobering. “And I should be just as honest.” His shoulders straightened. “The Queen walks at dawn.”
I flopped onto the neared chair and stared at him. Clutching my hand to my chest, panicked, my heart pounded under my tight fist. As a vampire neared the end of life the tolerance to the sun faded, becoming as fatal even to the natural-born as those freshly turned. I knew that even the ever-living died. Was Queen Ioanna really that old, that fragile? “She walks?” More thoughts flared. “And she only walks at a time a reiver hunts…” I closed my eyes, “as the crown passes on to that new queen.”
“My mother wants Zara to follow her. And a Queen’s word is law.”
I bit my lip. Yes, they had never meant for me to be a queen. If the ruling Queen died and more than one reiver hunted, then it forced a duel. “You didn’t want me fighting Zara.” A bitter laugh escaped me. “It would hardly have been a contest, you know, Jager. You could’ve saved yourself the effort of…” I waved a vague hand at him, “of this.”
“Your mother rules a tiny province, but it’s still on this island. An innate power is implied for any that rule here, you know that.” His mouth pulled into a grimace. “Whether it’s true or not.” He loosened his tie further, pulling it free of his collar and threw it over his jacket. His fingers moved to the buttons on his shirt. “You had a right to try for the throne.”
I stared at him, working his words through my brain. “Was there an insult in there somewhere?”
“Would I insult you, Tate?”
But my reply dried in my mouth. He’d slid free the last of the buttons and pulled the shirt from his back. Jager’s naked chest—something I’d only imagined. His skin gleamed as smooth and clear as honey and my beast ached to lick, to taste him. In a blink, a speed that surprised even me, I stood in front of him.
Would he be worth it? Giving it all up and sharing him? My stomach knotted at that thought. Sharing him, when he should have been my mate, meant only for me.
A trembling finger traced the defined muscles of his abdomen, the touch light but intoxicating. He twitched under my caress and I couldn’t help the growing smile. My beast released the softest growl. We both wanted him, however we could get him. I lifted my gaze to his and found the heat of his beast staring back at me. It had me swaying into him, the sheer, warm silk of my gown the only barrier. His hands slid hot down my back, and my chest hitched, need pooling low in my belly. “I want to lick you. Bite. Taste you.”
“Tate…”
“What?” I licked a slow path along his collarbone and he hissed. Jager tasted salt-sweet, a mixture that had my fingers inching around his waist, stroking over his hot skin. “I will be yours.” My admission broke an unexpected growl against his chest. Anger or satisfaction, I didn’t know. Maybe both. Open-mouthed kisses trailed down over the solid muscle of his pectoral, my teeth tugging at his nipple. Fangs pricked him and Jager’s moan had my nails digging into his back. “All yours.”
His hand fisted in my hair, holding my head at his nipple. I broke skin and lapped at the little beads of blood staining his chest. He tasted—I had to will myself not to sink my fangs deep and drink him—because he tasted, sweet, hot, like sparks of fire on my eager tongue. I groaned, wanting him horizontal and completely naked. “A bed. I need you on a bed. Right now.”
“Tate…”
I tore my mouth from his skin, blood slicking my lips, my tongue. “A bed, Jager. I—”
His mouth covered mine, the fierce kiss robbing me of all thought. He lifted me, hands firm under my thighs and, with my gown shoved up to my hips, I wrapped my legs around him, my arms linked behind his neck. His hot skin pressed against mine and I gripped him. Hard.
He broke away. “A bed?”
I ran my tongue over his lip, tasting the fading memory of the fire in his blood. “Big square thing? Mattress, sheets, pillows? Enough room to fuck you on?”
“I think I have one of those.” He strode back along the short corridor, more doors opening quietly over thick carpet. Soft lights flickered on, revealing a curved room dominated by a large four-poster bed. Jager turned toward it and the doors to the bedroom closed with a soft click.
“No expense spared.”
He laughed, the sound a soft rumble against my breasts. “We incorporated human technology into the house. They provide for us in so many ways.”
I bit back a smile. Damn it, I didn’t want to like Jager, not now. “You haven’t broken the law, have you, Jager? Slept with what you ate?”
He lifted a dark eyebrow. “Sleep? No.”
A laugh escaped me. “The Queen’s son fucked food? Oh dear.”
Jager tried to keep his face straight but his mouth twitched. “They have no stamina. One little bite undoes them.” His teeth pierced the vein below my ear, pinpricks of sharp pleasure that had me gasping. I clung to him, willing him to draw blood, needing him to pull me into his body. He licked over the wound, easing the flow of blood into a slow, pulsing release. The curl, the lap of his hot tongue beat with my blood, sank through me, my thoughts dizzying.
I melted, and all too easily he eased me down onto the bed, his mouth never leaving my neck. He pressed his solid muscles against my body, his arms straining as he lifted his torso. His silky hair brushed my face and the rhythmic lap of his tongue beat an increasing ache through my body. No other man had ever bitten me and turned me into a boneless mass of need. Yes, a human would never survive him. I began to doubt that I would. “Jager…please.”
“You taste…” The soft groan of pleasure had my flesh tight. “I could spend the rest of my life eating and fucking you.”
My beast growled and I arched my hips, pushing against his erection. “You’re only eating.”
Jager’s laughter brushed warm breath over my wet skin. “Very true.” His tongue pressed against my neck, curling, before he lapped again. He let out a slow, satisfied sigh. “Get me naked.”
My hands moved without thought, pulling at the buckle and buttons of his trousers. I stopped and my beast hissed at me. “Please,” I murmured. “Say please.”
“Tate…”
I pulled at my gown, tugging it free of him and eased it up over my abdomen. My hand slid across my belly, knuckles brushing against the tight muscles of his stomach. I tapped my fingers against my mons, the tips flicking at his skin. “I’m wet, Jager.” I slid down, my fingertips playing just above my clitoris. I dipped, circling and the sudden touch swept an unexpected charge through me. My hips bucked, pushing me deliciously against his body and pressing my fingers harder, deeper. I groaned. “So very wet.”
Jager’s tongue had stilled on my neck, his breathing ragged. “No games, Tate.”
The rough command in his voice had my slick fingers rubbing fast. I arched against him, the back of my hand stroking low over his abdomen, teasing as I brushed hi
s straining erection. My breath came short, my heart beating out rapid thuds. The first tendrils of orgasm coiled low in my belly. “I’m not playing.” My fingers burrowed deeper into my flesh, aching to satisfy my need. “And since you won’t—”
“Please.”
He ground out the word against my neck, his fangs pricking me and forcing a cry against the sudden rush of heat. But my hands flew. The belt buckle, the buttons and a quick scrabble to push down the thick fabric…until my wet fingers gripped him. Jager groaned and pumped into my hand.
With a final long lick, he closed the wounds on my neck. The liquid fire in my blood ebbed, but only for a moment. His mouth covered mine, the copper tang of my blood warm on his tongue. A hand wrapped around mine, easing his cock down over my flesh, pressing, pushing, until with a groan, he sank into me.
I shifted my hips, urging him deeper. His mouth broke from mine, his lips finding the pulse in my neck. The heat, the solid muscle surrounding, holding me, had my heart pounding. I traced my fingers down the hollow of his spine, to tease the cleft of his buttocks. “See where saying please will get you?”
He smirked against my skin. “It just became my favorite word.”
Jager rolled his hips and sensation buffeted me, the fire licking again, low in my abdomen. He drew away and slid back, so slowly that it had me gasping. Damn him. I needed the release, could taste it, the burning ache of it, he just needed to…
“Your turn to say it.”
I didn’t hesitate, my beast wouldn’t let me. “Please…”
“Good.” The word was almost a growl and had my pelvis lifting up to meet his next thrust. “You’ll be mine, Tate.”
I met him again. He could think that, say that—I really didn’t care. I, my beast, wanted him now, hard inside me, fucking me ’til I screamed. “More.” I tilted my hips and locked my legs around him. My hands grabbed hold of muscled cheeks, urging him to thrust harder, faster. “Now.”