Tempt the Stars
Page 29

It was hard and hot and unbelievably heavy. Mircea wasn’t small, even soft, and like this he was both eye-widening and somewhat terrifying. At least normally. But right now there was none of that. Just this, just gasping breath and raw need and pulsing, unfulfilled ache, and I was actually going to explode, to come apart at the seams, to go completely insane if he didn’t—
“Oh God. Yes.” That’s what I’d wanted, what I’d needed, not my own touch but his, the feel of him as I wrapped my legs around his waist—
And almost fell off. My back was against wet, slippery tile, my front was against soapy, slippery vampire, and any moment now, I was going to land in an undignified heap. And given my experience, probably on my butt. But then Mircea slid strong hands underneath my thighs, boosting me up, bracing me with his body as he pushed into me—
Carefully, as he hadn’t been just moments ago. He was slowing down, being cautious, holding back. And I didn’t want that.
“No,” I gasped, even as he held me, so, so carefully. Like I was china, like I might break. When I wanted to break; I wanted to feel. “Not like that. Like before.”
“I’ll hurt you.”
“You won’t.”
But Mircea was being stubborn. “My fantasy, my rules,” he told me, shifting position, getting that last half inch . . . just there. . .
“That’s cheating,” I gasped. “And it’s my fantasy.”
A dark eyebrow quirked, causing a miniature cascade down one sculpted cheek. “Forgive me, dulcea, but I believe this is my fantasy, which would explain why you are being difficult.”
“You like it when I’m difficult?”
“I like you any way,” he murmured into my ear, dark, wet hair falling around me as he sped up—
But not enough.
Long, thick strokes were more maddening than satisfying, and I’d about had it. “Damn it!” I tongued his earlobe. “Do what I tell you!”
He slowed down even further, a long, sensual glide. “Make me.”
I bit down on that tantalizing bit of flesh, and felt him vibrate against me. Oh, he’d liked that, had he? “Harder,” I ordered.
“That is cheating,” he muttered, but the pace sped noticeably up.
I bit his neck next, right at the spot where hard shoulder met strong throat, and he barked out a laugh. “Now I know I’m dreaming.”
It bled a little, but the water washed it away. I bit higher next time, closer to the point where he’d left his mark on my own neck, and felt him suddenly go rigid against me. And then shove me into the wall and take me, with a reckless abandon that left me breathless and aching and gasping and—
“Cassie?”
I did jump that time, and gave a shriek, almost falling on my ass. Because that hadn’t been Mircea’s voice. It took a disorienting second of clinging to the soap dish to process the fact that a) those had been Marco’s deep tones, b) they were outside the shower, c) there was no one in here except for me, and d) I might possibly be going crazy, but that wasn’t exactly news.
“Are you all right?” Marco demanded.
I didn’t answer. I wasn’t sure I could. I was panting like a freight train and my eyes were crossing as I struggled to suppress a really inappropriate orgasm. What the hell?
“Cassie?”
I swallowed, staring at the fogged-up door, where the light from the bedroom was mostly blocked by Marco’s Roman profile. He was looking at the wall, despite the fact that even vampire eyes couldn’t have seen much in here, because he knew how I was. They all knew how I was about bodily modesty, which was stupid considering how much of the time I ended up naked, but there you go.
But he wouldn’t be outside for long, if I didn’t manage an answer. Preserving what was left of my modesty wasn’t his job; keeping me alive was. And I’d almost died in the bath once before, because people hadn’t wanted to disturb me, although how I would manage to kill myself in a shower was debatable. But let’s face it, if anybody could . .
“Cassie.” And okay, that had the “you have exactly three seconds to respond before I charge in and save you, so if you don’t want saving, you better damned well speak up” tone. And since I was still sprawled against the wall, body tight and shuddering, I decided that might not be a great plan.
“I . . . yes. Yes.”
“Are you sure?” He didn’t sound convinced, and I couldn’t blame him. My voice had been a broken croak.
I cleared my throat and tried again. “Yes, I—I’m fine.”
“Okay. It’s just you’ve been in there awhile.”
Yeah, I guessed so. My fingertips were going pruney, and I felt more than a little waterlogged. Along with really, really confused.
I swallowed. “I was just about to get out.”
“All right.”
“Marco . . . you . . . haven’t heard from Mircea tonight, have you?”
“No, it’s a little early for him to check in. There’s a time difference between here and New York, you know.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“I’ll tell him you’re fine if he calls. Get some sleep, Cassie.”
“I’ll do that,” I said, staring at my empty shower.
After all, tomorrow was going to be hell.
Chapter Fourteen
Hell, it turned out, looked a lot like Vegas.
Not the neon, glitz-and-twinkly-kind. More the arid-sand-littered-with-desperate-people kind, but still. There was a vague sort of familiarity to it. I wondered why a certain green-eyed demon had never mentioned it.
Of course, he hadn’t mentioned much, I thought angrily, just as the guy at my side went sprawling.
There was nothing to have caused it that I could see, except for his own dusty pair of Pradas, but he hit hard nonetheless. I stopped abruptly and went into a crouch, afraid we’d just tripped some ward or other his senses had missed. But I guess not. Because a second later, he flipped over, sand clinging to one side of an elegant profile, and stared at the pale blue sphere I’d decided to call the sky. And cursed inventively.
I took a swig from the too-warm water in my canteen and waited it out. “Do you want to ride the camel thing?” I asked when the tirade finally tapered off.
The only answer was another spate of cursing.
“Guess not,” I said, and passed the canteen to the third member of our trio, who finished it off in one hearty swallow.
“Did you just drink all the water?” Casanova demanded, struggling to sit up. Only to have the beast’s ratty tail smack him in the face.
I’d have had some smart-aleck response to that. Something about Casanova being a vampire and not really needing water. Or about the likelihood of his spilling it, considering his current lack of grace. Or about the fact that we’d gone to a lot of trouble to find someone willing to sell us one of the camel things just so he could ride instead of staggering through the dust like a drunken frat boy.
But Caleb just looked down at him impassively. He did impassive well, along with big, black, bald, and intimidating. In fact, I hadn’t seen anything Caleb didn’t do well, except for putting up with Casanova’s histrionics. I guess war mages were made of sterner stuff. At least, war mages willing to go into hell to rescue a buddy were. But even Caleb’s patience was starting to wear thin.
As a dusty boot to Casanova’s couture-clad posterior made plain. “Get up.”
Brown eyes that were currently neither rich, nor mellow, nor enticing glared up at him from under a fall of silky dark hair. “If you’d release this infernal spell, I wouldn’t be on the ground to begin with!”
“A hobble spell doesn’t keep you from walking,” Caleb said, crossing his arms.
“No, it keeps me from walking properly. Or running, which I might damned well need to do!”
“It wouldn’t have been necessary if you’d volunteered.”
“Oh, of course!” Casanova said, fighting with the voluminous robes that we’d bought off a fellow traveler to cover up his Armani. “Of course this is my fault! Of course it is. I can’t imagine why I wouldn’t volunteer to walk into hell!”
Caleb just continued to look at him. As one of Pritkin’s oldest friends in the Corps, and the only other person besides Casanova who knew who he really was, he’d been a natural addition to the rescue posse. Casanova had been less so—a lot less—but we needed him. Or, more precisely, we needed the camouflage his body provided to our guide.
Said guide was looking at him in mild reproach at the moment. “I’ve told you—you aren’t in any danger, Carlos,” Rian said, using his birth name. I’d gotten the impression that she found his pretensions a bit trying. “A host is not responsible for the actions of his demon. If we are caught, I will tell them I forced you—”
“I was forced,” he said viciously. “No one in his right mind would be here otherwise!”
Rian didn’t comment. She did that a lot. It was probably why she and Casanova had managed to maintain their relationship for so long. Of course, the fact that she chose to manifest as a beautiful black-haired, vaguely Persian-looking woman, with huge dark eyes, honey-colored skin, and ruby red lips probably hadn’t hurt.
And unlike her host, Rian had volunteered to help out. She’d known Pritkin a long time, from his days as a young man at his father’s court, and she’d always been sympathetic to his situation. Which was lucky, since getting into said court was turning out to be more complicated than I’d thought.
Casanova, on the other hand, clearly felt that he was better suited for lounging around someone’s boudoir than for slogging through hell. Not that he was slogging particularly well.
But he did finally drag his six feet of outraged litheness off the sand.
“How much farther?” he demanded.
Rian glanced at the sky. “Don’t worry, I’ve timed it perfectly. We’ll reach the city by nightfall. I’ll need to merge with you at least an hour before that, or risk being detected.”