by Cat Marsters
“Vam -- para --” she spluttered. “Dr. McCready, stop this car right now.”
“Nope.”
She reached for the phone clipped to her belt. With a quick glance, Finn fried its circuits.
“You’re kidnapping me,” she said.
“Yep.”
“This will not stand!”
“Yeah. You got a passport with you? We’re coming up to the border,” Finn said.
“No, I do not have my passport,” Sofie said stiffly. “I wasn’t expecting to leave the country today.”
“Oh, well, never mind,” he said, and saw the spark of hope in her eyes. Should he tell her he could ‘persuade’ the border officials to let them pass anyway? Minor mind control was easy to an Elf.
Nah, it was more fun this way.
* * *
“I do not like you,” Sofie said after Finn had charmed his way past the border guards, hotel receptionists, hotel manager, and the German policemen she’d secretly summoned while he was charming the bell staff. She had absolutely no idea how he did it -- all he did was twinkle those big brown eyes at them and repeat what he wanted them to hear… and they heard it.
Madness.
She was going mad.
Now she sat on a hotel bed with her arms folded, staring at her useless phone. No doubt he’d somehow been behind its sudden uselessness, too. She’d tried calling her office from the hotel phone, only to find that it, too, was mysteriously out of order. Leaving her room made Finn pounce on her -- what, was he waiting outside? The man was a maniac.
Now he stood in front of her, shaking his head.
“You can’t leave,” he said.
“You can’t make me stay.”
“No, you’re right. I can’t. But it’s not safe.”
“I am an officer of the law --”
“You think the Elfking cares about laws? He can’t even stay dead!”
“Everyone stays dead,” Sofie said.
“Yeah, try telling that to Masika.”
“Your ‘vampire’? Look,” she tried to be rational, “she may look like one, dress like one, she might have even had her teeth filed into points, but she’s not a vampire. There’s no such things as vampires.”
“Or Elves?”
He was teasing her. Dammit, the man couldn’t be bloody serious for a minute! Any second now, he was going to turn those sparkling eyes on her, grin that infectious grin, and try to charm her into…
She blushed hotly. He wasn’t going to charm her into anything.
She stood up abruptly and paced away from the bed.
“No. No such thing as Elves, either,” she said. Just because he had big eyes and a pointy chin -- he didn’t even have pointy ears, for heaven’s sake, and everyone knew Elves had pointy ears.
And they were blond. She was pretty sure they were supposed to be blond.
Finn put his head on one side. “What about werewolves?”
Her heart beat a little faster. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Didn’t you say you got my name from the Sundown agency in London?”
She frowned. “Yes.” All right, so the Sundown agency was known for being a little loopy. Paranormal investigations, indeed. Well, if people wanted to spend good money on things like that, it was their own silly fault.
“How did you hear of Sundown?”
“My cousin works there.”
His eyebrows went up. Dammit, did he have to be so -- so cute?
“Your cousin?” His face suddenly fell, like a little boy’s. “Oh no wait, it’s not Aura. You’re not Fae. Please tell me you’re not Fae.”
“I’m not Fae.” He was insane.
“Thank God for that.” He pantomimed relief. It shouldn’t have been so endearing. “Who’s your cousin? Been a while since I -- oh! I know, it’s Magda, isn’t it?”
Magda. Pretty, sensible, maternal Magda. If it wasn’t for her insistence that she was --
“Yes, Magda,” Sofie said heavily.
“Yes!” He punched the air. “You’re a werewolf! I knew it,” Finn crowed. “I knew you weren’t human. I knew it.”
“I am very much human!” Sofie lied.
“No, no, you’re not. Because if you were human, you’d have been coming on to me. But! You’re immune! Or, well, you seem to be.”
Her mouth dropped open.
“If you were human,” he carried on blithely, “you’d have taken off at least some of your clothes by now. I mean, usually I have to work hard to protect against all this. Class full of female students? Nightmare! Spend all my time concentrating on getting them to keep their clothes on. Of course,” he looked nostalgic for a moment, “sometimes I let my guard down. It’s hard, you know.”
Was that a wink?
“But you see, you’ve not come on to me. Not for a single second. You don’t seem remotely interested. And the only women who don’t respond to all the magnetism and stuff are paranormals. Werewolves and the like. And if your cousin is a werewolf -- well, it’s a pretty strong gene…”
“We’re not related by blood,” Sofie said stiffly. “My mother was adopted.”
“Oh,” Finn said. He looked crestfallen for a minute then he shrugged. “Well if you’re not a werewolf, then you must be… hmm, a witch?”
“No! I am a normal human being! And I’m sorry if my lack of desperate attraction to you is offensive, but you know, I’m just not attracted to lunatics with enormous egos and kidnapping tendencies!”
Finn’s eyes seemed to get bigger for a moment as he regarded her sitting there, heaving with anger, her fists clenched and her face hot.
“Right then,” he said. “So you won’t be affected if I stop guarding against all this?”
“Absolutely not,” she snarled.
“And if we take a walk through the hotel lobby, you won’t be offended when women throw themselves at me?”
“You’re disgusting,” she said, but when he extended his hand to her, his eyes twinkling, she found herself taking it.
I’m human, she told herself as he led her from the room. Entirely human. Nothing but. Werewolves don’t exist. It’s preposterous. Magda is just a little… crazy, that’s all. All those mad people she works with, she’s just a little affected.
The hotel was huge, with banks of elevators down to the lobby. Sofie spent the short ride with her arms folded, glaring at Finn, who grinned back. She told herself she was just going down to the lobby to see how easy it would be to escape, but in all honesty she was looking forward to seeing those women just ignore him.
There was a convention of some kind going on in the hotel, and even at this late hour there were swarms of people around. Most of them were women, and she caught several international accents before the words became apparent to her.
“Oh my, will you look at him?”
“Honey, I’d leave my husband for him.”
“I’d leave my girlfriend for him.”
Sofie blinked, but before she could locate the source of that last comment -- a female comment -- a woman tottered up to Finn on high heels and curled her arm around his neck.
“Hello, gorgeous,” she purred in Italian.
Finn just let his eyes slide sideways to Sofie. She narrowed hers in return.
“Let me buy you a drink,” said another woman, this one English, sliding her arm around Finn’s waist.
“I’ll buy you the whole bar,” said an American, pushing herself against his back.
“I’ll give you whatever you want,” promised a German girl with pouty red lips, which she used to blow kisses at Finn. He smiled back, but it wasn’t the infectious grin he’d used on Sofie. It was just a polite smile.
“Thanks ever so,” he said, “but I was just heading back up to my room to have lots of sex with my wife.” He indicated Sofie, who felt herself the recipient of a dozen glares.
“But she looks ever so frigid,” the English girl said. “Have sex with me instead.”
“No, me!” the American insisted, strok
ing his chest.
“I can promise you the best sex of your life,” the Italian said, her eyes half-closing and her hand slipping down to massage his crotch.
Yes, his crotch. In full view of everyone. Especially Sofie, who was determined not to react. Clearly he’d arranged this all in advance. They were friends, or actresses or something.
Except, she realized, that it wasn’t in full view of everyone. So many women were gathered around them that it’d be impossible to see what they were actually doing to Finn. The male guests and staff weren’t really paying much attention.
The Italian woman was whispering something in Finn’s ear as she stroked his cock through his clothes. Sofie felt her face heating up as she saw it grow into an obvious bulge.
“Hey, don’t hog him,” the American said angrily. “I want some too!” So saying, she unzipped Finn and took his penis out.
“No, mine!” the Italian cried.
“Oh, big boy!” the German purred.
“Come to mama,” the English girl said, dropping to her knees. Sofie took half a step forward then stopped, sure Finn would do something. But he just let the English girl take his penis in her hand and guide it greedily into her mouth.
Then he looked over at her. “You see,” he said. “I just can’t stop them. We-ell, I could,” he said expansively, “but basically if a woman is desperate to give me a blowjob, who am I to stop her? Mm, that’s very nice, sweetheart.”
“You’re disgusting,” Sofie said, and seeing her opportunity, turned to leave the hotel lobby. Finn was surrounded by women and couldn’t possibly stop her.
Except that he could, and he did.
“Okay now, that’s very nice, but stop,” he said to the girl sucking his cock, and started pushing the women away. “I only want to have sex with one woman and she’s about to leave the hotel.”
All female eyes turned on Sofie.
“He’s lying,” she said.
“No, he’s not! He wouldn’t lie!” cried the American.
“Don’t say such things!” the English girl yelled. Her lips were swollen and slick with saliva and other things Sofie didn’t want to think about.
“Get her!” yelled someone else, and then the tide turned on Sofie.
Panic hit her -- a mob with pitchforks and flaming torches, run, fight, kill! -- and she turned to flee when a hand grabbed her arm and yanked her faster than she thought possible back over to the bank of elevators. Away from all the screaming women, some of whom were now topless, reaching out madly to hurt her. And to pleasure Finn.
Who, of course, had hold of her.
He gave her a wink as he darted toward the first elevator that opened, then shoved her in and pressed the ‘close’ button before anyone else could follow them.
Except that one woman did, the gorgeous Italian, and she immediately threw herself on Sofie, biting and punching and clawing.
Which almost made Sofie laugh, because when it came to bitch fighting, she really had the edge.
This close to a full moon, she didn’t have a lot of control. She’d have annihilated the Italian bitch if Finn hadn’t physically separated them, pulling the other woman away and murmuring soothingly in her ear.
“But she doesn’t want you. She’s disrespecting you. She must die,” the Italian sobbed.
“Yes, yes, she’s just a little confused. She doesn’t need to die,” Finn assured her.
“Unlike some people,” Sofie spat, not sure who she was most disgusted with. Those women in the lobby, like bitches in heat; Finn, just letting them fondle him to make a point; or herself, fighting with a strange woman over a man who was clearly a lunatic.
The Italian girl was sobbing into his chest now. Or was she nuzzling? Sofie looked away in disgust, but then wished she hadn’t, because when she looked back the girl was on her knees, eagerly sucking on Finn’s cock.
“Stops her yelling,” he explained to Sofie, as if the woman was doing no more than tying her shoe.
“You’re disgusting,” Sofie said, trying not to get turned on by the sight of his thick, dark red cock disappearing between the woman’s plump lips. She’d never seen a woman give a blowjob before, not even on film. Hearing the wet sucking sounds, seeing the tightening of Finn’s face in pleasure, watching the gentle thrust of his hips all turned her on more than she’d ever have expected. Her nipples tightened beneath her sensible sweater. Wetness pooled between her thighs. Her breath came faster and faster. A hot, musky scent hypnotized her. The smell of pure sex.
Then the elevator pinged for their floor and both she and Finn stared at the display, startled. Snatched out of her shameful fantasy, Sofie bolted the moment the doors opened and ran to her room, letting herself in and rushing to the bathroom to splash cold water on her face.
Had she really just watched another woman give a blowjob to the man who’d kidnapped her? And had she really just enjoyed it?
Finn’s madness must be catching.
Chapter Four
Finn considered taking the Italian back to his room to finish what she’d started, but his heart wasn’t really in it. That look of shock on Sofie’s face just before she’d fled had taken the fun out of it. The fun which had been all the greater for watching her face as she watched him. Watching her enjoy it. Watching her discover how erotic it could be.
So he sent the poor bewitched girl downstairs again, shut himself in his room -- wishing he hadn’t been gentlemanly enough to book separate rooms -- and concentrated hard to make sure Sofie was in her own room and not running away before he closed the bathroom door and stroked himself to orgasm. It wouldn’t be fair to go and visit Sofie with the mother of all erections. He felt bad enough about his behavior anyway.
Closing his eyes, he remembered her flushed cheeks, her parted lips, the way her breath came fast and shallow as she watched his cock being sucked. Damn, what would it be like to have those lips wrapped around him? Her fingers instead of his?
When Finn came, it was with Sofie’s image in his mind, and her name on his lips.
When he knocked on her door there was a pause before she opened it. She didn’t meet his gaze, just stood there in a hotel robe, her long hair loose and her face bare of makeup, and said, “Yes, Dr. McCready?”
As if nothing had happened.
Dammit.
Hell, she looked sexy with her hair loose. His cock started rising to attention again.
“I wanted to apologize,” he said, and was about to go into greater detail when she surprised the hell out of him.
“Accepted,” she said.
“I -- I’m sorry, what?”
“I can’t say I approve of your lifestyle choices,” she said, her voice empty of emotion, “and I certainly don’t approve of the public indecency. But so long as you don’t involve me, then I truly don’t care.”
Finn opened then closed his mouth, speechless for possibly the first time in nine thousand years.
“I’ll stay here tonight,” she said. “It’s too late to go anywhere, and besides, I’m tired. I’ll head home in the morning. Thank you for your help with the case.”
And with that she closed the door, leaving Finn to just stare at it.
* * *
In the morning he presented himself bright and early at her door. Not having slept all night, he’d heard every movement she made on the other side of the wall, every sigh, every toss and turn, and his body had burned to be there with her.
Was this what it was like for human men? Wanting a woman who just wasn’t interested? And why did he want her anyway? Sure, she was beautiful, and under that conservative suit was what he suspected to be a rather wonderful body. But he’d seen more beautiful women. Hundreds of them. Women who actually seemed to like him, moreover.
He sighed and knocked on her door. Must be the challenge of it. Couldn’t be anything else.
Sofie answered the door, holding her finger up for silence and darting back to pick up the phone by her bed, which apparently she’d had mended. Finn lea
ned in the doorway, eavesdropping shamelessly.
“Excuse me, sir, it was the maid service. Dresden, sir. The consultant I was meeting yesterday was diverted here, his plane was very late. So we stayed the night in a hotel. No, of course I don’t expect the department to pay for it.”
Finn frowned. That wasn’t very fair.
Her boss was clearly an asshole.
Sofie was silent a while as she listened. Her face was impassive, giving nothing away -- and then he saw a flicker of something that looked like alarm, before she smoothed out her features again.
“Moravia, sir? But that’s hundreds of kilometers… it will take hours to --”
She was interrupted again. Finn listened, but she had the phone pressed so close to her ear that even his superior hearing couldn’t make anything out. Idly, he checked out her excellent legs and the way her skirt pulled tight across her thighs as she sat on the bed.
Her hand tangled in the phone cord, wrapping the wire around her little finger until the tip turned white. Her face remained still, but Finn wasn’t fooled. Her boss was asking her to do something she really didn’t want to.
She glanced at the clock and swallowed. Then she said, “Yes, sir. We’ll leave right away. Oh, and sir -- there’s a problem with my phone, it’s not working properly.”
Her eyes flickered in Finn’s direction. He took his own phone from his pocket and waved at her.
“But I’m sure I can use Dr. McCready’s phone to contact you. The number?”
This time her glance was more deliberate. Finn called up the number on the screen, and she read it out to her boss.
“I will call with a report,” she promised, then pulled the cord tighter around her finger as her boss said something else. “I-in person? I -- yes, I will make every effort to -- yes, I’ll be back in Prague tonight.”
She shot Finn a filthy look, then seconds later put down the phone and flowed to her feet. “Time to go,” she said. “We have to drive to Moravia, which is the other side of the country. That is, once we’ve got back into the country,” she added tightly. “And then back to Prague tonight. So there is no time to be lost.”