by Arthur, Keri
Still, I hedged. “Why would you even let me attempt to extract him?”
His smile never touched his eyes, and it was a strong reminder that no matter how much I liked this vampire, he was first and foremost a Directorate man. And in that moment, I knew the answer to my question, before he even said a word.
“I want you as a guardian, Riley. You have the potential to be as good as, if not better than, your pack mate.”
“That doesn’t exactly answer the question.” But it did, all too clearly.
“It’s a test, a taster, if you will. I’ve known lots of wolves over my lifetime, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you all have one serious flaw. Though for Directorate purposes, it’s something of a plus.”
“And that is?”
”You’re all adrenaline junkies.”
I snorted. “You aren’t even in the right ballpark with that one.” Yet even as I said it, Talon’s image came to mind. Wasn’t half the thrill of being with him the sensation of walking a knife’s edge? That at any moment, his wildness could snap and become truly dangerous? “So this is the test you have when I won’t take the test?”
“Exactly.”
“You can’t force me to be a guardian.”
“I won’t have to. It’s inevitable, Riley. You and Rhoan are two peas in a pod—and you were both born for this type of work.”
A chill ran through me at his choice of words. It wasn’t chance. Nothing was ever said by chance when it came to Jack. He knew Rhoan and I were twins. “I’m not a killer.”
“All wolves are killers. It’s just that in today’s society, the urge is well controlled.”
“That’s like saying all vamps are killers.”
“All vamps are. Some just manage to channel it into other areas.”
Like becoming guardians and killing with the approval of the state. I shivered. “So basically, you’re saying that you intend reeling me in bit by bit.”
“Yes.”
“And the offer of help tonight—what strings come attached to it?”
“That you promise to take the test sometime in the future.”
“Sometime? You’re not setting a limit of when?”
He grinned. “There’ll be no need to. You’ll come to me eventually.”
“You don’t know me very well if you think that.”
“I know you better than you know yourself,” he said, his cold gaze burning with a certainty that chilled my soul.
He knows what we are. I licked my lips and hoped like hell the intuition was wrong. “Okay, you have a deal.”
“Good. Drop by the office and I’ll give you full details about Moneisha.”
“I have some things to do first—could be a few hours.”
“I’ll be here.”
“Surprise, surprise,” I muttered.
He chuckled, and hung up. I slipped the Mercedes into gear and cruised back to the city, making it to Talon’s as dusk began shifting toward true night.
His house—though calling it a house was a misnomer when it was so damn big I could see several levels clearly above the fifteen-foot fences—sat on a leafy acre right in the heart of Toorak. I drove up to the wrought-iron security gates and said my name into the speaker. The gates slid silently open.
The driveway snaked through stately elms, past manicured lawns, and finally presented the Old-English–style mansion in all its glory. It was a truly beautiful house, but it was a little hard to believe that only one man lived there. Obviously, Talon had more money than he knew what to do with.
I parked in front and climbed out, feeling more than a little out of place in my old work skirt and sweater. The door swung silently open as I climbed the steps, and the red beam of a weapon scanner swept down me as I stepped through the door.
A security cam buzzed as it swung around, and I raised an eyebrow. “Why all the gadgets?” I said, sure there’d be microphones here somewhere.
“A millionaire can never be too careful these days.” Talon’s husky tones seemed to come out of thin air. “Take the stairs, first door on the left.”
I did as ordered. The door slid open as I approached, and the room I entered was an office big enough to play football in. The walls were a cool, dusky blue, and the furniture chrome. Talon was sitting at a desk down the far end. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and I very much suspected he wasn’t wearing any pants, either. A bottle of champagne and two glasses sat to his right.
“Stop,” he ordered softly.
His aura hit me, snatching my breath, making my legs feel boneless. He was heat and longing and need, and I’d never felt anything so potent in my life. It had me ready for him in an instant, but the unease I’d felt in the car earlier increased. What he was projecting couldn’t possibly be natural.
“Strip,” he continued in that same, flat tone.
I kicked off my heels, then, with his gaze a fever that flamed my skin, did a little, teasing dance as I took off my sweater, skirt, and undies. By the time I’d finished, it wasn’t just his aura making me ache, but my own desire.
He took a deep, shuddery breath, then reached for the champagne and poured two glasses. “Walk to the desk.”
I strolled toward him, provocatively exaggerating the sway of my hips. The closer I got, the stronger his hunger burned, until it hit my senses like a blow and made my head spin.
He slid a glass across the chrome. “Down it.”
“You don’t have to get me drunk to have your wicked way with me.”
“This is the best champagne you will ever taste, and it will fuel the evening I have planned for us.”
There was nothing seductive in his words—they were said as a statement of fact, a choice in which I had none. And while in some ways it aroused me all the more, that deep-down sense of unease grew.
“I’m due at work by nine.”
“Then you are mine until eight-thirty.”
I couldn’t help a smile. Given the heat he was projecting, the next hour and a half was going to be one wild ride. I picked up the champagne, raised the glass in toast, and downed it as he drank his. It might be the best champagne ever made, but it went down as badly as the cheap stuff and made my head buzz even more.
He offered me another and I shook my head, knowing I’d probably throw up if I had a second glass.
He pressed a small button on his desk. A slot opened close to me, and a folder appeared. “Your information on Evensong and its owner. But you can look at it later. Right now, I want you. Come here, little wolf.”
At that moment, I felt like a lamb confronted by a very large and hungry wolf, and for the first time in my life, I wasn’t sure I actually liked the sensation. Or that I wanted to be there, with him.
Or was it simply a matter of the champagne affecting my head more than I thought?
Swallowing to ease the burning in my throat, I walked unsteadily around the desk. His golden body gleamed under the caress of the lights, and hunger slipped through me, mingling uneasily with reluctance. There was no emotion in his face, nothing in his eyes beyond lust, and his erection seemed positively huge. Huge and blurry. I blinked but it didn’t seem to ease the sudden fuzziness. He grabbed my hand and pushed me back against the desk. As my rump hit the cold metal, he nudged open my legs and thrust into me, deeper and harder than he ever had before. I groaned, trapped between pleasure and pain as he began to pound into me. The heat of him, smell of him, swirled around me, through me, and sweat broke out across my brow. The champagne sat uneasily in my stomach and I knew if he didn’t ease up, I’d throw up.
“Talon, stop.”
He grabbed my hips, his fingers digging into my flesh as he held me still and kept grinding into me. Even the wolf in me was beginning to dislike the sensation. I grabbed his hands, intending to push him back, but my grip felt weak and there was a strange buzzing in my head, making it hard to concentrate. Worse still, the light and the office seemed to be fading in and out of existence.
He came, and
that was the last thing I remember clearly.
Chapter 5
Awareness drifted in and out, as if I were caught in a fragmented dream. Voices swam around me. Lights as bright as the sun burned into my eyes. Something cut my arm, and pain seared deep. Farther down, cold touched my stomach, sliding around like ice. The pain in my arm eased. Then, for a while, there was nothing but darkness.
When the fragments gradually returned, they formed a picture of rising pleasure. I drifted on silk, writhing and moaning, my skin on fire and every muscle screaming with pleasure. Hands stroked me. Heat filled me. Every inch of me quivered under the relentless assault, until I couldn’t even breathe because the need for release was so strong.
I woke, to discover it was no dream. Talon was on me, in me, and I had the oddest sensation that I’d just been betrayed in some basic way. But the thought quickly fled as the convulsions began, curling through me like a tidal wave and pushing me into rapture. He came with me, but still he pounded into me, as if determined to ensure that every last drop of his seed spilled into me.
Eventually, he collapsed and rolled to one side. “You are amazing, little wolf.”
I didn’t feel amazing. I felt confused. Looking around revealed red walls instead of blue. Bedroom furniture rather than office. When had we moved there? I glanced at the clock on the bedside table, and saw it was close to eight-thirty. An hour and a half had passed and I couldn’t remember any of it.
“We’re in your bedroom?”
He turned on his side and rested his hand on my belly. “We’ve also been in the living room, the games room, and even tried the kitchen, because you said you were hungry.”
There was an ache behind my eyes and a bitter taste in my mouth. I frowned and rubbed my forehead. “This is going to sound strange, but I can’t remember any of it.”
He grinned. “I think the champagne went straight to your head. You were pretty damn wild for a while there.”
He was rubbing my stomach, his gesture possessive more than sexual, and for some reason, it disturbed me.
I grabbed his hand and threw it off me, and even that small movement had an ache rippling through my muscles. He obviously wasn’t lying about the number of times we’d made love. But he was lying about something, I was sure of it.
I flipped the silk sheet aside. “I need a shower, then I have to go.”
“En suite’s to the right.” He paused until I found the right door, then added, “Come back later tonight.”
I turned on the taps, then, once the water was steamy, stepped into the shower. “As I told you before, I promised to be with Misha tonight.”
“So come back afterward.”
There was no way I was coming back to this house. It might contain the warmth of many colors, but it was cold. And I had the uneasy feeling something beyond sex had happened here, something I should remember.
“I promised Misha I’d stay with him.”
“Then I pray something distracts him, because I want you to be mine, and only mine, this phase.”
“Exclusive?” The thought made my body ache more than it already was. “I don’t think so.”
“Just one phase, not forever. I have a desire only you can fulfill.”
I snorted softly as I washed off the soap. “Me and your seven other lovers.”
He walked in as I turned off the taps. He tossed me a towel, then crossed his arms and leaned against the door frame. “The others haven’t hair your magnificent color. Nor do they have your strength.”
“Which is why I imagine you have seven of them.”
He grinned. “And they certainly don’t have your lushness. I want that lushness. I want—” He stopped, and his sudden smile was distant.
I had the strangest feeling that at that moment, he wasn’t really with me, that he was lost somewhere in dreams that just might have dire consequences for my health. Which was daft. Talon was often ruthless, but I didn’t think he’d hurt me.
“What I want, I get, little wolf.”
He wasn’t getting anything more from me. Not this evening, anyway. I tossed the damp towel into the hamper, then said, “Are my clothes still in the office?”
“Yes.”
“And that is?”
“Just down the hallway.”
There was amusement in his expression, cold calculation in his eyes. I liked neither, and wasn’t sure why. I’d seen both often enough in the last two years. Talon was an extremely successful businessman, and arrogance had always been a part of his makeup. Until very recently, it had never bothered me.
He followed me up the hall, a heat I could feel but not hear. I found my clothes, and the folder was with them, but before I could get dressed, he slipped behind me, his hands snaking around my waist to pull me back against him. He was hard again. He might be a wolf, but his hunger and his rate of recovery were definitely abnormal.
“Let me go, Talon.”
“Tell me why you won’t stay with me.” His breath caressed my neck, and a second later, his teeth grazed my earlobe. This time, it wasn’t pleasure that shuddered through me, but annoyance.
“Because I don’t want to.” I elbowed him hard enough to force a grunt. He backed away, and I got dressed. “And because occasionally it would be nice to have a bit of foreplay before sex.”
He crossed brawny arms, his expression an odd mix of amused tolerance and steel. “I thought you liked it hard and fast.”
“I do. Sometimes. But it would be just as nice to take some time.”
“Then meet me for breakfast. We’ll eat, flirt, fool around some, then do the hard, passionate sex.”
I hesitated, but the truth was, the moon had me in its grip, and when that happened, it was simply easier to be with partners I knew than starting afresh with strangers. And as much as I enjoyed Misha, Talon was right. Misha couldn’t do to me what Talon did to me. Couldn’t satisfy me in the same way. It was an addiction all right, but his type of danger was far different from the one Jack was trying to force on me.
“I don’t know.”
“Then let’s agree to just breakfast, and we’ll see what happens from there.”
I hesitated again, but only briefly. Addiction or not, I couldn’t walk away from Talon. Not when the moon rode me like this. “Where?”
“The Kingfisher, in Collins Street.”
The Kingfisher was one of Melbourne’s boutique hotels, and from reports, spectacular. It also wasn’t that tall, scraping in at nineteen floors. “Okay. But I also have to go to work and I’m not sure how long I’ll be there. I can’t give you a definite time.” But not because of work, and not because of Rhoan. I needed time to recover from his demands.
“So call,” he said, as he escorted me to the door.
But before I could escape, he pulled me close and kissed me. There was nothing gentle about it—it was a possession, an affirmation of right, and left me both shaken and stirred.
Yet relief was all I felt as I drove out the gates, and the sheer depth of it made me determined that I was never coming back to his house. And maybe, just maybe, it was a sign that after the current moon phase, Talon and I should part ways.
I glanced at the time, saw it was close to nine, and dug around in my bag to find the phone so I could call Misha and tell him I had to stop by work. There were several voice messages waiting.
I hit the replay button, and Misha’s rich tones filled the air. “Hate to do this, Riley, but it looks like I won’t be able to keep our date tonight. My sister’s had a car accident, and I’ve been called home. I could be gone for over a week. Keep the car until I get back. I’ll call you.”
The message had been recorded just after six—which wouldn’t have been that long after I’d blanked out after drinking Talon’s fine champagne. I hoped Misha was okay. Hoped his sister was okay. Wished he’d left me a number so I could get in touch with him.
I hit delete, then moved on to the next message.
“Riley, it’s Quinn.” The warm, sexy lilt in
his voice caressed my skin as sensually as a touch. What was it about this vampire that affected me so? I didn’t even know him, and yet I’d wanted him, even before the fever had hit. Which was strange, because I’d never felt an attraction that strong to anyone who wasn’t a wolf.
“I’m not sure why you’re running from me, but I am a friend of Rhoan’s, and I seriously believe you’re both in danger. We need to talk.”
He paused, and I could hear music in the background. It sounded like Presley’s “A Little Less Conversation,” which probably meant he’d been at the Rocker when he called.
“Meet me on the Casino steps at eleven.” He hesitated again, then added, “There’s more going on than what you think. Meet with me. Please.”
The call intrigued me, that was for sure. But until I’d talked to Jack, there was no way in hell I was about to risk going anywhere near Quinn.
I drove to work. Jack looked up from the computer screen as I entered, and his gaze widened.
“Darlin’, you look like shit.”
“Thanks, boss. That’s always nice to hear.”
He rose, grabbed my arm, and pushed me into the chair. “No, I mean it.” He caught my face in his large hands, and stared at me. “Your irises are the size of footballs. Have you taken something?”
“Champagne that didn’t agree with me.”
“This is more than that.” He grabbed the phone and ordered a medical team down to our floor, pronto. “I’ll get them to take a blood sample, because I think you’ve been drugged.”
Only one person really had the chance to drug me, and really, why would he bother? He was getting what he wanted. Yet I remembered the memory loss, and, as much as I didn’t want to, I wondered.
“It’s just a bad reaction to champagne.” I wasn’t sure who I was trying to convince—myself or Jack. “It’s happened before.”
In fact, this was the second time in as many months, though on the other occasion it hadn’t happened so quickly. But I’d lost several hours, at least. I was going to have to stop drinking Talon’s fine champagne, because it definitely didn’t agree with me.