by Emily Dawn
They share a look and then head straight for me. I school my features and put a magical shield up to block out the incubus’
energy.
“Lenna Blakely?” The vampire asks with a slight lift to his left eyebrow.
“That’s me.” I reach my hand out for a handshake, but he surprises me by turning it over and kissing my knuckles. My eyes widen in surprise, and I yank my hand back. Who the fuck does that any more?
“Sorry. Old habits.” His eyes fill with mirth as he watches me squirm under his intense gaze. “Aleksandr Zaytsev.” He gestures to the shifter, “Ross Baker,” who gives me a shy smile and head nod.
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“Vance Jacobson.” The incubus says, giving me a firm handshake and very obvious once over.
“What can I help you with? I assume you are who contacted me for an item location and acquisition?” I say looking at each of them for affirmation.
“Yes, can we sit in one of the booths in the back? I want to discuss this more privately.” Aleksandr says. He sweeps his arm out for me to lead the way to back of the bar where a row of semi-circular booths sits with walls partitioning them from each other. I slide off my barstool, grab my bourbon which Ruby must have refilled while I wasn’t paying attention, and walk to the last booth, in the back corner of the bar.
Vance slides into the booth first, followed by Ross; I slide into the other end only to have Aleksandr surprise me by sitting beside me, forcing me between him and Vance. Vance has already made himself comfortable by manspreading and resting his arm on the back of the booth behind me. I shoot him an annoyed glance, and he fucking winks at me. I try to work up a growl of annoyance, but my wolf just purred. What the fuck is that about?
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Aleksandr leans over and whispers, “better behind your head than on your leg.”
Before I can even form a retort another drop-dead gorgeous male is sliding into the booth beside him. He’s got to be just as tall as Aleksandr but with chocolate brown hair and bright blue eyes. He smells like a campfire and has an intense scowl on his face. He must be elemental because on top of the campfire smell I get a bit of ozone. He’s recently used magic, and it’s wafting off him making my senses go crazy.
“Alright,” I tap my fingers on the table, “tell me what you’re looking for.”
“We’re looking for the Saudade amulet. It went missing shortly before the war. Before that, it had been kept in the archives of the Supernatural Library here in the city. It has a moonstone in the center and runes carved into the setting. It allowed the wearer to travel between realms without using a portal.”
My mind is spinning. This is too coincidental. They’re talking about the same amulet I’ve been researching. The same amulet that should be housed in the library I work at. What are they playing at here? “Okay. I’m familiar with it and can work 15
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on finding it.” I can’t come out and confront them yet. I decided to see how much they’re willing to pay for it. “My starting rate is $100,000 and goes up if I run into trouble or have to leave town to find it.”
“Done.” Aleksandr says. “We do have one condition, though. This isn’t a solo job for you. We’ll be with you the whole time, working all the angles.”
“No. I work alone. Always have and always will.” I throw back my remaining swallow of bourbon and gesture for him to move. He doesn’t move, so I look to the incubus and shifter who also don’t move. “Look, I am not interested in a team job. Now, someone get up to let me go, please.”
“$250,000 for the job plus expenses paid.” Aleksandr levels a hard gaze at me.
Damn. That’s a lot of money, and now my curiosity is piqued. I will not agree to those terms right now though. I need to know why this is so important to them. “Why is this so important to you?”
“Do you always ask that of your clients?” The nameless elemental barks at me. Well, this guy is an ass. “This is a waste of 16
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our time. I told you she wouldn’t be able to help us.” He rolls his eyes and stands up.
“I didn’t say I couldn’t help you. I said I wouldn’t.” I state matter-of-factly. “I’m perfectly capable of finding the item on my own. I’ve been doing this for years. Teams aren’t my thing.”
“How about this,” Vance leans over, invading my personal space a releasing a bit of sexual energy, “you go home tonight and sleep on it? We’ll be in touch tomorrow night.”
“The answer isn’t going to change but sure. We’ll meet tomorrow, same time and I’ll turn you down again.” I roll my eyes at him.
Aleksandr lets out a laugh. “He doesn’t get turned down often. What can we offer to make you reconsider?”
I mull that over, I’m almost already to agree as it is. I don’t need much. I can’t do my job as well if I can’t use my fae magic.
I’d also have to be extra careful not to let any of them scent it on me. “I’m not sure. Whatever you decide to offer it better, be good.”
I get nods from Aleksandr, Vance, and Ross. The elemental huffs and looks everywhere but at me as I scoot around the 17
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booth to exit. I can feel them all staring at me as I walk to the bar and layout two twenty-dollar bills for Ruby and give her a wave.
She wiggles her eyebrows up and down, suggestively at me, and I shrug my shoulders in return. I tell Stan goodnight as I walk past him and out to my car.
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Four
Aleksandr
I watch Lenna walk away; her hips full hips hugged tightly by her conservative knee-length skirt. She drops cash on the bar and says goodbye to the bartender and bouncer who’s moved inside the building to get out of the oppressive Midwest heat and humidity. I turn my attention back to my brothers. We need to discuss our next steps and how to get her to take the job.
“She is hot as fuck.” Vance says as he sits back down. “Do you think she’s who we’re looking for?”
“She’s definitely a powerful shifter. My fox practically rolled over for a tummy rub as soon as she touched me.” Ross runs his hand through his hair, and his cheeks turn pink. “I just won’t talk when she’s around.”
“She’s the one. I smelled a hint of fae when I kissed her hand. I wouldn’t have noticed it without doing so. The question is, how do we get her to accept our offer? I’m not sure she’s sold
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on working with us as a team.” I look over at Hayes to get his opinion. “Hayes?”
“I don’t like it. I can feel her power, and it isn’t natural. It was battering my shields, and she didn’t even know she was doing it.” He taps his knuckles on the table. “She’s definitely got the power we need to get and destroy the amulet though. How are we going to play this?”
“We can start by you not being a temperamental asshole.”
Vance shoots at Hayes. “You didn’t even introduce yourself; you just sat down with your resting dick face on.”
“Should I sit there, and eye fuck her like you were doing?”
Hayes raises his voice. The bartender shoots a furtive glance our way, and I kick him under the table as a warning. “Don’t you think you came on a little strong?” He lowers his voice but doesn’t lose the intensity.
Vance’s eyes twinkle, and he replies, “I’m an incubus, and it’s in my nature. She knew what I was the second I walked into the bar.”
“Everyone knew,” Hayes mutters under his breath with an eye-roll.
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“Okay, let’s all try to keep things professional with her until she comes around to the idea of working with us.” I can’t decide if we all should be here tomorrow or if only two of us should come. Ross is probably the most unassuming of all of us; people are always comfortable around him. Vance is having trouble controlling his energy, and it seemed to put her off. Hayes is intense and presents as an ass. “Ross see what else you can
dig up on her and shoot us an email tomorrow since we’ll all be working throughout the day. There’s got to be a way to entice her into joining us.”
We leave the bar, all the women watching Vance with dazed looks on their faces. He doesn’t even notice, totally off in his own world, likely thinking about Lenna. That’s got to be why his energy is seeping out like this. He’s going to need to work harder at keeping that held back. I look at Hayes and see his frown. I know he’s thinking the same thing. I walk up to my black SUV and slide behind the wheel. The guys climb in, Hayes in the front, Vance and Ross in the back. Ross grabs his tablet and starts looking for everything he can find on Miss Blakely.
Hayes turns on the radio and Imagine Dragons blasts through the speakers.
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The moment my gaze met Lenna’s I felt a pull so strong. Her blue-gray eyes so dark they almost looked black at first glance.
Her flawless skin over high cheekbones and sumptuous full lips.
Everything about her was lush; her curves perfectly displayed by her button-down blouse tucked into her tight, knee-length skirt. Shapely legs highlighted by her high-heeled black pumps.
She is stunning, but what got me was her assessing gaze as she took each of us in, no doubt identifying each of our races. The intelligence I could sense beneath her cool exterior; her no bullshit attitude.
I’ve lived for almost a thousand years and not felt something like that before. I’m by far the oldest of my brothers, Vance being somewhere between 400 and 500 years old. Ross, as a shifter, has a longer than a human lifespan, but he’s not immortal, and he is young, early 30s. Hays, as an elemental, also has a longer mortal lifespan, he’s in his late 30s but looks closer in age to Ross. I was turned after being the only survivor of the battle of neighboring villages in what’s now known as Kiev, Ukraine. My sire, Cassandra, found me bleeding out on the battlefield and took pity on me. She groomed me as her personal guard, and we spent my first three centuries roaming the realms together, taking whatever and whomever she wanted. I grew tired of her consistent cruelty and longed for a more human life.
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She let me go thinking I would return to her after a few years, but I found a human woman in Italy and fell in love with her.
Cassandra didn’t even give me a chance to leave her; she compelled me to stand helpless as she drained my love’s blood in a horrifically violent scene. She then left me to deal with the body and the mess.
“Alek?” Hayes snaps his fingers in my face. “You coming in, bro?” I realize I’ve pulled into the garage of the house we all share but have been lost in my thoughts.
“Yeah,” I look over at him smile. “This situation has me off a little.”
“If by the situation,” Vance makes air quotes, “you mean the woman with legs for days and an ass that won’t quit, same here, bro. Same fucking here. I’m going to head out to find somewhere to expel this excess energy.” He hops out of the car and disappears into the darkness.
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Five
Lenna
I walk into our apartment and call out for Hunter. He doesn’t respond so I assume he’s out. Sure enough, I walk over to make a quick dinner and see he’s left me a note on a plate in the fridge for me:
Lenny,
Eat this. I know you ate Lucky Charms for Breakfast. Eat something healthy. –H
Luckily for me Hunter is a great cook, so I know the chicken and veggies will be delicious. I pour a glass of wine and grab my plate to take into my office. It’s the only overtly feminine space in the apartment. It has the floor to ceiling glass windows with a killer view of the city skyline, a white lacquer desk, white tufted sofa, and mirrored end tables. There are teal and deep purple splashes for color on accent chairs and pillows. Two giant potted ferns sit on either side of my desk.
Emily Dawn
I settle in and pull up Google on my computer to see if I get any hits on the guys. I can’t go into tomorrow blind without knowing something about their background. A simple search brings up Aleksandr as an Intellectual Property attorney. He’s a partner at an international firm, and his bio says he’s originally from Ukraine. Vance is a general contractor, and owns his own business, presented multiple awards from the city for helping to redevelop the blighted areas. Ross is a part-time golf pro for an exclusive golf community north of the city. I didn’t get the name of the fourth man who came in late. I did, however, find a picture of them from the war. It appears as though they fought for the resistance together as an elite unit, even Ross, who looks so young in the photo. He couldn’t have been more than 15. My search doesn’t turn up much more than that, and I don’t think I need more. My intuition says I can trust them.
Moving onto the search for the Saudade amulet. It was made by a Portuguese witch whose lover left her to return to the realm of the Light Fae. She wasn’t strong enough to create a portal to follow him, so she, in a moment of desperation made a deal with a dark priestess. For the priestess to make the amulet, the witch needed to collect the blood of one of every major magical creature. She was mortally wounded while collecting blood from a vampire though and died before the amulet was 25
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finished. The dark priestess sold it to a vampire coven that used it to run through the fae realms, feasting on the blood of pureblood fae and decimating the populations of both realms.
I am a little disturbed that a vampire is so invested in finding this amulet. Fae blood to vampires is like chocolate to humans, decadent, addictive, and delicious. I’m going to have to play this close to the vest until I’m sure of their intentions. I’d already started researching where this amulet could have gone, and I had a decent file going. I shouldn’t need to use my fae powers to acquire it so that wouldn’t be a risk I’d need to take in front of the guys.
I save everything I have to thumb drive and head out of my office down the hall toward my bedroom. It also has the floor to ceiling windows with automatic blinds that move with a command from my iPhone. The wall behind my bed is exposed brick. My bathroom has marble counters and backsplash. I took space from the closet for a stand-alone tub to be added. I walk over and start filling it and add a lavender bath bomb. Steam curls off the water as I step into the delicious heat. The water is so hot it almost burns, and my skin turns pink. I take a sip of my wine and lean back to let myself boil away all the stress and anxiety from the day.
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As I lie back in the water and close my eyes, my mind wanders to four intriguing men I’ll be seeing again tomorrow.
The amount of sexiness in that group of males is off the chart.
I’m going to need Vance to reign in his incubus energy. Just thinking about it shoots heat straight to my core and my fingers trail up my thigh from my knee where I imagine his fingers gently exploring. I close my eyes and circle my finger around my clit slowly and lightly. I imagine Aleksandr’s hands exploring my breasts as he kisses me slow and passionately. I feel a pinch on nipple and look down to see Ross gently nipping my other breast. Vance slips his finger inside me while swirling circles around my clit with his thumb. Suddenly, I feel Aleksandr’s fangs on my neck where he waits for me to consent; I nod slightly and moan as he sinks in and takes a deep draw. Then my mouth is captured my Ross, and he kisses me with an unexpected intensity. Vance removes his fingers and plunges into me in one deep, slow stroke. Another set of hands reaches for my hips and rubs my clit while Vance increases his pace, his breath quickening. I burst into an intense climax, and my eyes fly open. My chest is heaving, the air and water cool against my heated skin. What the fuck was that? I’m still shuddering through my climax.
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I pull the drain plug and step out of the tub on wobbly legs.
It has to be energy from the incubus. It was wafting off him as soon as he walked into the bar. I don’t even bother dressing after I dry off. I crawl into bed naked with my h
air still up in a messy bun. That dream was too intense. I hope it doesn’t continue to happen while we work together. Especially since all signs point to travel being necessary for this job, with them in tow. I fall into the best deep sleep I’ve had in months as soon as my head hits the pillow.
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Six
Lenna
I awaken to my alarm blaring at six in the morning. I call out for Hunter again, when he doesn’t immediately respond I know he must have found someone’s bed to share last night. Lucky him. I might need to do the same after this job is finished, especially after that dream last night. I’m satisfied but hungry for more. I can hold it together for a few weeks. Focus on staying completely professional and aloof. I definitely can’t let any of them know my secret. Aleksandr is old enough to tell what I am so I need to be very careful. I probably shouldn’t even be close enough for him to smell me. One slip and I’m looking at a death sentence and my family life sentences in one of the dark realm prisons.
I check my phone and see three messages. One from Hunter, he won’t be able to do any training with me, obviously. One from Aleksandr confirming tonight. The last one is from my ex-boyfriend, Liam. Someone at the bar must have told him I was there last night. I have no desire to deal with him right now. He
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was bad news from the first look but I have shit taste in men and ended up wasting two years with him. I broke up with him six months ago after he threw me into a wall in a fit of rage. He’s a mountain lion shifter and has more brute strength than I do.
That’s when Hunter and I really stepped up my training sessions. I haven’t lost any of my curves but I have added muscle tone.
Since Hunter isn’t home I’ll just settle on swimming laps in our building’s pool. I throw on my one-piece athletic suit, grab goggles, a swim cap, and towel and head up. No one ever uses the pool in the mornings so I have it all to myself. I do a shallow dive in and start with slow freestyle laps. I pick up the pace after I hit 200 meters and switch to the butterfly stroke for 400 meters.