Shiela Stewart - [Darkness 04]

by Charming the Darkness (epub)

  “You’re holding my hand.”

  “Huh?”

  She stopped them both and took his other hand in hers. “You’re holding my hand. That’s sweet.”

  His brow lifted and his lips curved up. “Yeah? Does that mean you want to have sex with me now?”

  “Oh, Danny.” Shaking her head, she dropped his hands and walked off.

  “What? What?” he asked repeatedly as she walked away. He had no idea what the problem was.

  Chapter 14

  Trinity was in the middle of explaining to Raven and Basil why she’d frozen Jonah and Cooper and refused to release them when Dante entered the room.

  “I was minding trying to get some rest, as Cooper had ordered which, okay, pissed me of. No one orders me to do anything. When I hear these two going at it again down here. Jonah was arguing with Cooper about his vacuuming while Jonah was trying to work. Cooper went into his usual, “if you didn’t make such a mess I wouldn’t have to clean up after you,” and Jonah retaliated. I had to do it to spare my sanity.”

  Basil tilted his head to the side and let out a long breath. “Darling, far be it from me to tell you what to do, but—”

  “Then don’t,” she warned Basil with a hand held up in his face.

  “But…” he continued despite her warning. “this can’t be healthy for either of them.”

  “And Jonah is still healing,” Raven supplied, looking worried as she stuck close to Jonah.

  “But it’s so quiet without them bickering. Stress isn’t good for the baby, remember?” Trinity thought nothing of using her daughter in defense.

  Basil, however wasn’t going for it.

  “Release them, Trinity.”

  She shot him a nasty look before doing as he’d insisted. “Oh fine, but do something to keep Cooper occupied. He’s driving everyone insane, cleaning this and picking up that. Make him stop before I have to do something drastic.”

  “I’ll take him to the house and have him tidy up the construction mess.” Basil kissed her cheek, gave her belly a rub. “Now let them go.”

  Trinity sighed, rolled her eyes to the ceiling, then released them. And then she waited for the backlash.

  “Stop doing that!” Jonah warned her with a raised fist while Cooper gave his jacket a stiff yank.

  “Stop giving me a reason to.”

  “It wasn’t my fault. Mr. Clean there should know by now to leave my stuff alone.” Jonah sent Cooper one hell of a heated look.

  “Um…mind if I break in here with some interesting news,” Dante interrupted, stepping in the middle of the arising argument.

  “Anything you have to say right now is a blessing,” Basil sighed, granting Dante a sunny smile.

  “I hear you.” He cleared his throat when Trinity sent him a snarl. “We have a new player in town,” Dante informed them.

  “What do you mean?” Trinity asked, rubbing a circle on her belly. Her daughter seemed to be restless these past few days.

  “I ran into Danny and a friend of his who just came to town to find out anything she can about the Ritual of Darkness. She claims she wants to end it.”

  “Get out!” Jonah chimed in.

  Dante shrugged his shoulders. “That’s what she says.”

  “You doubt it?”

  Dante turned his attention to Basil and replied. “No…well, maybe.”

  “Because she’s with your brother?”

  Dante turned furious eyes to Cooper. “No, because she’s new to the city and she could just be saying she wants to end it. We don’t know her, now do we?”

  “So how’d she get to hanging around with your brother?” Jonah asked, shifting his weight from one foot to the other while resting on his cane.

  “I never asked. It didn’t come up,” he explained when Basil gave him a look. “She just said that Danny was helping her.”

  “Your brother, helping her?” Basil asked with a suspicious undertone.

  “Don’t start on him again, Basil,” Dante warned, moving right into Basil’s face.

  To save both men from getting their handsome faces pummeled, Trinity stepped between the two. It seemed everyone was on edge these days. “I think we should look into this a bit more,” Trinity added.

  “The next time I run into my brother, I’ll ask more questions.”

  “If we’ve concluded our business, I would like to return to my vacuuming,” Cooper spouted, receive a nasty look from Jonah.

  Trinity held up one hand, stopping what she knew would end up as another round of arguments. She just didn’t have it in her to deal with another round. “Either of you start this up again and I’m freezing you indefinitely.”

  “I’ll get my guy out of your hair, love.” Basil kissed Trinity on the cheek, then escorted Cooper from the room.

  “He started it,” Jonah added under his breath but not so quietly that Trinity hadn’t heard it. She shot him a nasty glare.

  “I think it might be best if you came with me, Jonah.” Hooking her arm through Jonah’s, Raven shoved him from the room.

  “I could duct tape their mouths for you, if you’d like,” Dante offered.

  “It’s tempting, but they’d only rip it off. The sooner we get back to our place the better.” She let out a long breath, trying to ease her tense nerves. “You getting along any better with your brother?”

  Dante picked up a glass globe sitting on the front desk in the main entrance of the Digital Domain and tossed it up and down while catching it seamlessly. “Every day he talks to me is a good day.” He shrugged, setting the globe back on the desk. “All I can do is keep trying.”

  She laid her hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “For your sake, I hope it works out.”

  ***

  “I don’t like stealing,” Starla informed Danny as he drove them back to the house they were now calling home.

  “You’ll get used to it.”

  “I don’t think so. I need to give back for what I’ve taken. I could plant a tree when the darkness is gone.”

  “Yeah…you do that.” Danny smirked. A tree. She was a riot. Had she noticed there was no sun? “So, I got a question for you. How do you plan on breaking the spell of darkness?”

  “I need to find Chaos, I guess.”

  He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat of the music playing softly in the CD player. Whoever this vehicle belonged to had good taste in music. “And how do you plan to do that?”

  “I could do a locator spell.”

  “A what?”

  “It’s a spell used to find something or someone. But I need something of his in order to do it properly. I don’t suppose you have anything of his kicking around?”

  He had nothing of Chaos’ but the scar from Chaos’ ring. “Sorry, can’t help you there. Okay, so let’s say you find him. Then what?”

  She scratched her leg, drawing Danny’s eyes to her sexy long legs. What he wouldn’t give to run his tongue along her thigh. “I do what needs to be done to break the spell.” She turned her head to look at him. “Can you handle that?”

  He shrugged but didn’t give her a definite answer. He wasn’t sure how he felt about it. Breaking the spell involved killing Chaos. As much as he was hurt over Chaos shunning him, he wasn’t sure he wanted him dead.

  Or did he?

  “You have incredible legs.”

  When smiled at him, her entire face softened. “Thank you.”

  “The rest of your body’s pretty hot too.”

  She let out a long heavy sigh.

  “What?”

  “You should have stopped at the compliment on my legs.” He turned the corner of the street they were staying on.

  “What’s wrong with telling you your body’s hot?”
r />   “It’s the way you said it.”

  He pulled into the driveway. then decided that wasn’t such a good idea and parked on the street a few houses down. He didn’t want to draw any unnecessary attention to them by announcing the house was occupied. “All I said was that you have a hot bod. What’s wrong with that?”

  She threw her hands up and groaned.

  He had no idea why she was so annoyed this time. “I’m at a loss with you.”

  Her only response was a shrug. “Why’d you park all the way over here?” Starla asked as she climbed from the vehicle, grabbing a few grocery bags.

  “So the vamps and werewolves don’t see someone living here and decide to invade, hoping to find humans. Which they would…one at least.” He hoisted the three foot mini fridge from the back of the truck and carried it to the house.

  “Oh…I never thought of that. Smart. Maybe we should keep the lights off then too. I should have picked up some candles while we were shopping.”

  “See, stealing’s not so bad after all, is it?”

  She grunted in response, then shifting her bags, held the door open for him.

  With an applicative nod, Danny carried the cooler into the house and was greeted by an anxious Killer. “I got you litter and a box so just hold it a little longer, ‘kay?”

  “How do you know what he’s saying?” Starla wanted to know, bending to give the cat a scratch on his head.

  “Didn’t you know? Vampires can communicate with animals.”

  Her eyes shot up to his, wide. “For real?”

  He burst out laughing that not even her narrowed look could stop. “Man, you are gullible.”

  “That’s not very nice.”

  “Yeah, well. He either wants one of two things. Food or a place to piss. It’s not hard to figure out.” He really should have kept her going. Might have been fun letting her believe he could communicate with his best pal.

  “And how do you know he hasn’t peed or pooped somewhere already?” She set her bags on the counter while Danny set the fridge down on the floor.

  “I don’t. I’ll get the other bags and you can unpack.”

  “Gee, thanks.” She scooped the cat up, gave him a kiss, then proceeded to unpack.

  It only took one trip to grab the rest of their supplies and the first thing Danny went for was the blood. He ripped it open with his teeth while grabbing a cup from the cupboard. Starla kept herself busy while he poured a full cup and downed it.

  “What does it taste like?”

  He set the empty cup down, licked his lips before replying. “Like blood. You ever sampled some maybe when you cut yourself?”

  She nodded. “Occasionally. But I don’t drink it. It’s different licking the blood from a wound or sucking on your finger if you prick it.”

  “I suppose so. I’ve drank it for so long I never really think about it.” He poured another half cup and drank it with the sole purpose of just tasting it. “It has a bit of a copper taste to it, and a sweetness. Each blood type has its own taste and each person it came from has their own taste. This person is B positive and I would have to say had a cholesterol problem.”

  “How can you tell that?” she asked with amazement in her voice.

  “It has a bad after taste. Kinda muddy. I can usually tell if the person was healthy or not after drinking their blood.”

  “Did you drink from a lot of humans before the darkness?” she asked cautiously as she put the food they’d picked up away in the cupboards.

  Danny smiled to himself, dipping his fingers in the empty cup of blood then sucking it dry before responding. “I had my share of humans in the day.”

  “Willing or non?”

  “Scared?”

  “No.” She held her chin out.

  Bullshit! “Both,” he informed her, purposely putting a deeper edge to his voice.

  “Have you ever killed a human?”

  He could tell that was a tough one to ask. “Yes.”

  She stayed silent for what seemed like an eternity before she finally spoke. “How many?”

  He touched her arm and was both surprised and disappointed when she didn’t flinch. “Why do you want to know how many?”

  “Just curious.”

  He lifted her chin with his fingers and kept his eyes focused on hers. “Curiosity killed the cat.”

  As if he understood, Killer meowed and pawed up at Danny’s leg.

  “Right, I was supposed to set up your litter box.” He released Starla’s chin and grabbed the box and bag of litter. “Come on, Killer.”

  “Danny,”

  He angled his head as he ripped open the bag of litter. “What?”

  “I think I’d like to have sex now.”

  Chapter 15

  With a proclamation like that, was it any wonder he was drooling? Dropping the bag of litter, Danny stood up and gave his head a shake. “Did I just hear you right?”

  Starla set the cans she held in her hand down on the counter and walked to him. “You heard me correctly.”

  “Now? For real?”

  She laughed. “Don’t spoil it. Just kiss me.” Taking his face in her hands, she drew him to her mouth.

  She was warm and soft and wet and that was only her mouth. He couldn’t wait to get into her shorts.

  “Not here. One of the bedrooms,” she urged, nudging him back.

  “Sure…okay.” He could handle that. Horizontal was good too. Taking her hand in his, he led her to the first bedroom at the top of the stairs. Seeing the kiddy race car for a bed and the mess of toys on the floor changed his mind pretty quickly. “Next one.”

  With a girlish giggle, Starla hurried along with him to the next bedroom.

  “Much better.” It had a queen-sized bed in dark brown satin, surrounded by some sort of flimsy material draped from ceiling to floor. He pulled her through the opening and pushed her towards the bed.

  Starla held her hand up, stopping him from going any further. “Condom.”

  “Seriously?”

  Her brow lifted in response. “Yes.”

  “Fine. Fine.” He pulled the wallet out of his back pocket and leafed through it for the condoms he kept tucked inside. “Got one,” he announced, holding it up for her to see. He tossed it on the bed and went right for the buttons on the wooly sweater she’d picked up on their shopping trip.

  “I don’t want it fast.”

  “What?” he gasped, his hand urgently opening what felt like a dozen buttons on her sweater.

  “Ever heard of foreplay?”

  “Honey, most of the women I was with it was put it in, get it off, then pull it out. Foreplay was not an option”

  “If you want this to continue you’ll slow down.” She took hold of his hands in hers and pulled him down to her for a kiss.

  He was rock hard and, as it was, he probably wouldn’t last two minutes with her and she wanted it slow. She was going to kill him. Since he had no other choice, he obliged. She rolled onto her side, taking him down with her. Danny liked the way she kissed. It was a slow movement of lips and tongue that sent electrical surges of need jumping through his body. He just couldn’t resist touching her.

  Continuing to release the buttons on her shirt, Danny contemplated just ripping the damn thing open and taking what he so desperately needed. But he had a feeling if he did that, she’d push him away and that was the last thing he wanted. If he wasn’t able to get inside her now and relieve the throbbing in his loins he knew he’d go mad.

  So he took it slow.

  Her breasts were so soft and her nipples were so hard. He cupped one full breast in his hand and gave it a squeeze. The moan she emitted vibrated inside his mouth driving him crazy. Wanting more, he began twirling her nipple between his forefinger and th
umb, and when she moaned a little louder and the vibration increased he decided going slow wasn’t so bad after all.

  He wondered what else he could do to make her moan.

  Sliding his hand down her chest to her shorts, he made quick work of undoing the snap and lowering the zipper. Her tongue twirled in his mouth, toying with his own while her lips melted against his in a kiss so arousing he thought he might blow a load here and now.

  Biting down on his arousal, he slid his hand beneath the silk of her panties, feeling the soft, silky swatch of hair just above the apex of her core. As he dipped his fingers lower, she parted her legs. That’s right, baby, you know you want more.

  Her hands slipped from his hair to his chest, undoing the buttons on his shirt in a quick, fluid motion. The sensation of her nails scraping along his chest was one he’d never felt before. And he was damn certain he wanted more. Diving between her legs, he stroked the damp folds of skin that eagerly awaited his touch.

  She moaned, his mouth vibrated, and his dick twitched. Sweet God, he wanted inside of her now.

  Then her hand slid to his jeans and, with a quick tug, she had the snap opening and the zipper sliding down. The instant she touched his cock his eyes rolled back and he shoved his fingers deep into her slippery invitation.

  “Oh…yes…” Her head flew back in her joy and her body arched off the bed. Her hand gripped him so tightly he thought she might pop him.

  He pumped her pussy with his fingers, enjoying the way her body writhed against his hand and the pure excitement etched on her face.

  She was truly beautiful when she came.

  He needed her now!

  Pulling his hand away, regretfully, he yanked his jeans down, tore open the condom and slid it on his engorged cock. Her shorts came next.

  “Slow,” she reminded him.

  “I have to have you now, Starla, or I’ll go mad.”

  “Slow,” she repeated softly, her eyes never leaving his.

  “Damn it, woman.” Taking a deep breath, he grabbed his dick and guided it to her opening. She was glistening with moisture and all he wanted was to pound himself deep into her core. Instead, he pressed only the tip inside. Her eyes softened in a dreamy look that he found absolutely spectacular.