A Wicked Desire (Creatures of Darkness 3), page 31
He shuddered.
“And it just kept getting worse. Over time, I began to resent him. And I hated myself so much that it spilled over onto him. Selfishly, I shirked some of the blame onto him for not protecting her. I started resenting his ignorance and wanted him to hurt as much as I did...but I also wanted to spare him the pain of what I’d done. Like me, a part of him died with Lizza. Something in me still cared enough that I packed up my shit and got the hell away from him, from everyone. I left the clan entirely.”
He squeezed her tighter, but it didn’t hurt, and it made her feel as if she was somehow helping. “The day he learns the truth is the day he comes for my life.” In a dark tone, he added, “Maybe that’s what I want.”
She leaned back on her heels and gently cupped his face. “No you don’t.”
As if he couldn’t help himself, he placed his hands on top if hers, clasping her palms to his cheeks. “No?”
“You still care about Mace a great deal.”
He humphed and dropped his arms. “What makes you think that?”
“Because you waited till we found the plant before you even considered…you know…nature’s boiling pot.”
He flinched, looking as though he might want to apologize again. Instead, he stood and crossed the room to refill his drink. Cora pushed to her feet as well, but stayed where she was, just watching him, waiting for a cue to inform her what she should do next. She got the sense he both needed space and didn’t at the same time.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Mm.” He glanced at her over the rim of his glass.
“What made you decide not to…uh….” She blew out a long whistling noise while she mimed something falling and then splashing down with a bang.
“You’re joking about it,” he mused. “I suppose that’s a good sign. But you must still be livid with me.”
“I was before. I might be tomorrow. But today? Right now? I’m just glad you changed your mind. Not my ideal choice of ways to go, you know. Although, swallowed up by a volcano? Pretty epic end.”
He made his way to sit on the couch and leaned with one arm along the back and his drink in his other hand. She could tell his mood was still down, but he was trying to recover. “I didn’t decide not to,” he admitted. “I just couldn’t.”
She joined him on the couch, curling her legs under her and facing him. “Not that I’m complaining, but why?”
He shrugged as if they were discussing something as menial as his favorite brand of toothpaste, not an election between life and death, but a stream of regret that wasn’t hers skimmed her subconscious. “When you started to fall, I was…relieved.” He didn’t look to see her frowning. Just stared into his drink. “I thought perfect, now I don’t have to do it.”
She adjusted her position, pulling her knees to her chest, trying not to feel hurt. Her walls weren’t fully up, but they weren’t all the way down, either.
His head turned slightly her way as if he were registering the action, or maybe the emotion, but he didn’t look directly at her.
“But then something inside me screamed NOT YET. Screamed might not be the right phrase. Bellowed, maybe. I was there, catching you before I even realized I’d moved. And as I held you there, I kept trying to tell myself to let go. But then you gazed up at me with those guileless eyes. I could see how relieved you were, so damn trusting, grateful even. There was no doubt in your mind that you were safe in my grasp, which was, to be honest, rather alarming for me. For a moment, I couldn’t function. I was completely and utterly confused as to why you would feel that way. And then you smiled at me. You fucking smiled. I was floored. I couldn’t understand where this trust had come from.”
“I guess you did a really good job at fooling me these last few days,” she said archly. “Hook, line, and sinker.”
His head came around, and his eyes dipped to consider the distance between them on the couch. Then he reached out and pulled her close until she was leaning against him. “Then I fooled myself as well. Because as I see it, I’m the one who’s hooked.” He placed a swift, tender kiss on her lips.
Her eyes widened briefly, but before she could react, he resumed his story in a darker tone. “But then you realized what was happening. You looked at me with such... That betrayal in your eyes…it gutted me. And that wasn’t the crazy part. When I figured you would use your ability to control me again, I realized it wouldn’t anger me as it had before. It would have been a relief, actually. I think part of me craved it. As a punishment.”
“I should have,” she said on a sigh, contemplating his words. Her sense of self-preservation had taken a serious dump. “However, it’s kind of a good thing I didn’t, because then I would never have been able to trust you again. And if I was as ruthless as some people I know,” she cocked an accusatory glare at him, “I might have made you walk off the edge of that volcano as soon as I was out of there with the plant.”
He smiled at her, almost admiringly. Then took a long pull from his glass, losing that grin. “But you pleaded for Mace instead.”
“It’s why we came here.”
“While that induced recent jealousies, it made me realize you weren’t the monster I’d made you out to be.”
“Jealousies?”
“Mm. Back in Saraphine’s basement I saw how hard you fought for him. I knew even then that you love him more than anything. Probably always will.”
Cora wasn’t sure how to respond to that. She hadn’t exactly had a lot of time to analyze her feelings for Mace after she’d escaped the mine and had returned to the cottage. Then there was Bray. And now, apparently, Knox, to consider. Which was adding to her pile of what the fuck am I doing? Again, the thought, how could this possibly work?
Knox was still frowning, and she so badly wanted to comfort him. To reassure him. But reassure him of what, exactly? She was in uncharted territory here.
She decided to remain quiet.
“I was jealous of him that day,” Knox confessed. He took a quick pull from his drink. “As I haven’t encountered that emotion since my human days, I didn’t recognize the emotion at the time, but later it was hard to deny. Still, I tried to convince myself that somehow you were making me feel this way…this desire—”
“I would never!” Intentionally.
“I know that now.” His hand found her hip and began a light caress. “If that was your way, I’d be swimming with the fishes, as they say. Or even now I’d be Cajun style well-done.” Once more he smiled at her, leveling her with the full force of that sexy, carefree, yet somehow still cocky way of his. Her eyes dipped to his lips as she unconsciously licked her own.
“You look as though you’re wanting to forgive me,” he grated in a husky tone that found its way to her core.
She realized they were subtly leaning closer. His hand on her hip was inching around toward her inner thigh. Sneaky vampire.
She shook her head and leaned back. “There’s still one more thing I need from you.”
Before she realized what was happening, his big arm scooped her around the waist, and he shifted her body so that she sat atop him, straddling his lap. The move was so expertly executed he hadn’t even spilled a drop of his drink.
With a firm grip on her, he leaned forward, forcing her torso back so that he could set his glass down on the coffee table. Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around his neck to keep sliding off his lap, even though she knew he wouldn’t let that happen. But then he kept her suspended like that, hovering diagonally, her bent knees tucked at his sides while he held her up with the strength of just one arm.
His gaze was pure challenge, their faces mere inches apart. His lips curled in a self-assured half-grin. “Tell me what you need, and it’s yours.” Adjusting his hold around her body, he scooted her closer, fusing them together and forcing her legs to stretch wider to accommodate his big body. A blush rose in her cheeks as she felt the evidence of his arousal. It didn’t help that she only wore a pair of lose silk shorts and barely there panties under her button down.
Wicked vampire.
“Tell me what you want,” he demanded.
“You know what I want,” she breathed, unconsciously rocking her hips. Wait, there was something else they were supposed to be doing.
He grinned at her for a few seconds. “Yes. You want to steal my virtue. But first, I feel it is imperative that I prove my innocence before you seduce me into letting you have your naughty, depraved way with me.”
He settled back into the couch, bringing her with him. Her hands stayed loosely at his shoulders, and he clamped her waist in a way that made it clear she wasn’t going anywhere.
Then he gazed up at her with a slightly tighter expression than before. “Let’s get this mind invasion over with.”
Chapter 36
Cora was nervous—though, oddly enough, not because she was straddling a capricious vampire’s lap. She feared what she might find once she entered his mind.
In an attempt to get more comfortable for the task ahead, she settled closer to him, inadvertently rubbing against his crotch.
He gave a half grunt, half groan. “Don’t do that again unless you want me to rip these damn shorts off you. By the way, I was hoping you were just wearing a thong under this shirt. Or better, nothing at all.”
“Stop trying to distract me,” she chided, even as his words jacked up her arousal. Her palms were flat against his temples the way she’d been taught. “I need to concentrate.”
“You know, there are better things we could be concentrating on, like my three-part apology whereby I make you come during each installment.”
She gritted her teeth to keep from smiling, then cleared her throat in a scolding way as if to say “behave.”
Of course he didn’t. As she tried to mentally drill into his head, his hands began subtly caressing her thighs.
She was about to admonish him again, but there was a tension in him that gave her pause. Something in his expression made her wonder if he was just as nervous as she was, if not more so. As a point of habit, Knox was a man used to being in control. Having her, of all people, take that away must be like a special kind of hell for him. Touching her like this might be part of his coping mechanism against the unwanted feeling, like a distraction.
Too bad it was working to distract her as well.
Straightening her spine, she worked to ignore his warm, calloused hands reverently stroking her skin. She closed her eyes, and subconsciously posed the question to which she sought the answer: had Knox been responsible for Ms. Windshaw’s demise?
Though she expected to affirm his innocence very soon, a nagging doubt skittered along her nape, and it brought her out of the moment.
Along her thighs, his impish fingers breached the hem of her lose shorts, inching devilishly toward the swells of her backside.
“Knox,” she warned.
Undaunted, he shoved past the weak barrier of the fabric and took her cheeks in a firm grip, nearly making her eyes roll back in her head. Then he brought her to her knees on the couch so that she was flush against his torso, forced to gaze down at him.
At her perturbed look, he feigned an innocent expression. “Just finding a better position for you to work.”
“You’d better behave or I’m going to get off entirely and stand behind the sofa.”
His face twisted in mock horror, and his grip tightened on her backside as if to keep her in place.
With impressive fortitude, she stifled a moan, knowing it would only encourage him. And after several heartbeats, she was still struggling to breathe evenly and keep her hips from rolling for a bit of that mind-bending friction she so desperately craved.
“A little heavy-handed with the punishment, don’t you think?” He seemed to understand where her head was at and clearly wanted to keep it there. Lightly, he rubbed the tip of his nose along her collarbone, his seeking hands on a naughty path. He hissed out a curse, sounding as if he were in pain. “You are wearing a thong.” The pads of his fingers brushed the crevasse between her cheeks, right where the thin strip of fabric ran.
His gaze turned ravenous.
Sexy vampire. Her body betrayed her with a shiver. She imagined his fangs were descending at this very moment. The temptation to offer her neck was nearly impossible to resist. But somehow she managed.
He smiled. “You’re ’bout ready to forgive me, aren’t you?”
“Nope,” she said airily, trying to sound unaffected.
“If you want me to beg, I’ve learned an excellent technique…using my tongue.”
She mentally groaned, beating back a cavalcade of desire. She knew what he was doing…aside from trying to get her mindless with need. “You really don’t want me looking into your head, do you?”
He frowned and let her drop back down on his lap, though he kept his palms planted firmly on her ass. His voice turned coarse. “You’re not going to like what you find in there.”
She laughed at that. “No kidding.” At her sardonic tone, one of his eyebrows lifted. “I’m not stupid. You obviously had some malicious thoughts toward me. I can only imagine all the ways you imagined offing me.”
He glanced away in contrition.
“But you and I are trying to start anew, right?”
He faced her once more, hopeful. At length, he gave a tight nod.
“Alright then. We have to get past this first. So no more trying to distract me. Okay?”
He gave another curt, almost reluctant nod, but his hands remained glued to her rear. She realized it gave him a measure of comfort, and she secretly like him touching her like this.
She closed her eyes and refocused on her task.
It happened faster than she expected.
She was suddenly ripped from the comfort of his lap and thrown into a shadowed place. The middle of a street? It was night. She attempted to catch her footing on the asphalt, but then realized she was disembodied and had no need for balance. Staples like physics had no place in this pseudo realm.
She glanced around.
At first, all she could make out was the street, lit by an obscenely bright, yet not quite full moon. Then, as if by a painter’s hand, the rest of the scene unveiled, and recognition hit. Saraphine’s shop, Wicked Wares, was just ahead on her left.
A stooped figure emerged from the shopfront.
Was that—?
Yes. Ms. Windshaw’s gray hair nearly glowed white under the moonlight, haloing her features. The elderly woman jammed her key into the lock and then twisted, obviously closing up for the night. After shoving the key in her purse, she started across the street, straight for that alley…where a man-shaped silhouette slinked in the darkness, still as the night that concealed him.
If it hadn’t been for the very slight movement of his head glancing toward Ms. Windshaw, Cora wouldn’t have known he was there. She wanted to scream for the old woman to watch out, but this was a memory, and she could only observe.
Ms. Windshaw halted in the middle of the road and turned toward her ostensible form, canting her weathered face to the side.
A spark of adrenalin flittered through her bloodstream. She knew Ms. Windshaw wasn’t actually looking at her, but it was eerie, nonetheless, to have a dead woman looking so directly at her as to have the pitter-patter of little ants marching up her spine.
Likely the old woman had merely heard a noise from her direction, a critter digging around in one of the trash bins that edged the street.
“Ghosts in the night,” the old woman whispered ominously, glancing side to side. “Beware the man with the black eyes who seeks the matching set.”
Back in the airship’s cabin, Cora’s skin prickled with gooseflesh, and the vision blurred. Cora ignored her visceral response and redoubled her efforts, focusing her mind, and solidifying the vision once more.
Ms. Windshaw straightened, brushed off her tawny polyester dress, and pivoted to resume her trek toward the alleyway—where her lifeless body had been found days later…where a darkened figure currently lingered!
Dread burrowed through Cora, and she imagined a horrific scene could very well play out before her eyes. She recognized that brutal silhouette, thick with muscle. He was hunched as if waiting to pounce.
No! I was so sure! I don’t want to see this—
As if split down the middle, the world tore away like mulberry paper. For a moment, an otherworldly darkness that surrounded her. But then, as before, images began to take shape—
Standing just outside the cottage door, she sniffed the night air, surprised to find the scent of a mortal female wafting from within. The fragrance, though faint and mostly carried away by the wind, was titillating, sweet and floral, and tinged by a clean, soapy perfume.
In that knowing, omniscient kind of way that accompanied some dreams, Cora instantly understood she was seeing as if from Knox’s perspective, and by the looks of the moon, it was a different day entirely.
She considered the previous scene, which had been more like an out of body experience, trying to figure out why she was here in this different memory. Had she just been about to witness Ms. Windshaw’s horrible end? It had been Knox standing in that alley. Of that she had no doubt. Had her outcry stopped the scenario from playing out…because she was afraid of the truth?
She crumpled the thought and shoved it to the bottom of a mental bin, concentrating on what she was viewing now.
A hand that was much too masculine to be her own reached out to open the cottage door. Inside he spotted a svelte female in baggy clothes lying face down on the couch with a pink towel wrapped around her head.
That’s me, Cora thought.
Knox stepped into the room, curious. Without looking at him, the woman said in an airy voice, “I never would have taken you for a closet romance novel junkie.”
