Rumor was he knew what a female craved before even she knew, and anyone who experienced the bliss of his sometimes gentle, usually savage touch was never the same again. Watching him, Glory had begun to believe that.
She’d fallen completely under his spell, haunted for days by his mesmerizing image. She’d yearned to have him in her bed. In her shower. On her floor. Wherever. She hadn’t been picky. She’d just wanted him. Desperately and unequivocally. She’d wanted him naked, slipping and sliding into her, no one else, wrapped around her, cherishing her. She’d wanted her name on his lips, his taste in her mouth. Until . . .
Her hands clenched into fists. You aren’t supposed to think about this!
The memories flooded her, anyway. A few months ago, she’d overhead him tell Hunter that one woman was the same as any other, and love was for idiots. Since they shared the same mind-set—love sucked giant elephant balls!—and he didn’t care who he slept with, she’d decided to go for it and throw herself at him.
Pleasure was seriously lacking in her life, and she would have given all of her powers—well, rather, all of Evie’s powers—to have him look at her with desire. Just once. That’s all she’d needed, all she’d wanted.
So she’d gone to his house in nothing but a trench coat and heels. And yeah, she’d flashed him.
He’d taken one look at her and laughed. Laughed!
“Go home, little girl,” he’d said. “You don’t know what you’re playing at.”
“I’m twenty-three, not jailbait, and I’m anything but little, as you can clearly see. I’m here for a few hours of fun, that’s all.”
“Okay, let me put this another way. Get lost. You’re not welcome here.”
“I’m—I’m not your type, then,” she’d stammered, mortified to her very soul. In that moment, she’d understood. Even though he’d said any woman would do, he’d meant any pretty woman would do.
His gaze had become hard as it perused her. “No, you’re not my type.”
He could have spared the remaining tatters of her feminine pride, but another woman had walked up behind Glory. Kaycee, a girl who had graduated a few years ahead of Glory, had obviously craved the same thing as Glory, despite the fact that she’d come with a basket of fruit to “sell.” Just as she’d been in school, Kaycee had been tall and thin and pretty. And Falon had allowed that pink-skinned married fairy hooker inside before shutting the door in Glory’s red-hot face.
Remembering, Glory gnashed her teeth together. “I will destroy his male pride,” she said, determined. “I will teach him what it’s like to feel unwanted and ugly.”
But she spent the next hour staring at the notebook, mind blank. Shit! How did a girl teach a man that kind of lesson?
Just write something. Anything! Pretend this is one of your novels and test the pen’s powers. Let’s see, let’s see. Roman solider? No. Falon didn’t deserve to carry a sword. But she saw all kinds of possibilities in that time period. Gladiator? Oh, yes, yes, yes. Gladiators were slaves, and she really liked the idea of Falon in chains.
Closing her eyes, she pictured Falon pacing the dirt floors of a barred cell, sweat rolling down the sculpted muscles of his bronzed stomach, pooling in his navel and dipping lower. Fresh from fighting, blood splattered him.
Licking her lips, Glory shifted against the covers. The scene continued to open up in her mind, painting her thoughts with its descriptions. She sucked in a deep breath and forced her hand to write what she saw . . .
Falon was lying in bed, cool, dry, staring at the ceiling of his bedroom one moment and inside a dirt-laden cell the next, pacing back and forth, sweat pouring from him. Shocked at the sudden change, he tried to stop. His feet kept moving as though they were no longer connected to his brain.
What the hell?
Moonlight slithered around him as he passed a crudely crafted bed, then an equally crude bench, kicking dirt with his sandals. Sandals? There was a metallic tang in air. The rustle of chains could be heard beyond the cell, as could moans of . . . injured men? Pleasured men?
Confusion slithered through him.
“Yo. Falon.”
Hearing the husky female voice, he spun and faced the cell’s farthest set of bars. A lone woman stood behind them, shadows covering her face. Glistening white cloth draped her, and gold flowers glinted from her left shoulder and hem. A chain belt circled her waist, cinching the drape around her and revealing slender curves. The scent of pampered, eager woman and desire drifted from her, sweet and exotic.
His body hardened in hated desire. Hated, because only one woman had that effect on him lately.
“Glory Tawdry,” he said through clenched teeth. “I should have known.”
“Great Goddess, it worked!” She clapped her hands, and he could easily imagine her smiling that sultry, white-toothed smile of hers. “I hope you don’t mind, but I decided to write myself into the scene.”
“Scene What scene?”
“This one.” As she spoke, she stepped into a ribbon of that golden moonlight.
He couldn’t help himself. He sucked in a heated breath and drank her in. Long, red hair framed her pretty face—the most sensual face he’d ever seen. Her eyes were large emeralds flecked with gold. Her nose was gently sloped, her cheeks pink and perfectly rounded. Her lips were luxuriant and red, utterly magnificent—but they would have looked better moving over his body.
You know better than to think like that, you walking penis! “What do you mean, you wrote yourself into the scene? What is this place? How did you get me here?”
Her sculpted brows rose. “Didn’t Hunter tell you?”
“Tell me what? I haven’t spoken to him in days.” His friend had stopped coming to Knight Caps, the bar he owned and where Falon bartended, preferring instead to spend every moment with his revenge witch. Disgraceful, if you asked Falon.
“Evie must have distracted him,” Glory said with a laugh. “Damn, but I do love my sister.”
That laugh . . . God, it was magical. Almost melted his fury. Almost. His gaze circled the cell. “What have you done to me, Glory?”
“Nothing much. Yet. This is just a small taste of my revenge.”
Revenge. He didn’t have to ask why. The night she’d come to his house, flashed him every one of her spectacular curves, and nearly felled him, he’d resorted to the only thing capable of saving him: cruelty.
His gaze met hers, and something hot filled his veins. This time, it wasn’t fury. She looked utterly pleased with herself, and the look was good on her. Good enough to eat. She must have sensed the direction of his thoughts because she backed up a step. A pause stretched between them, layered with awareness. Sizzling with need.
There was something about her that appealed to the beast inside him. Something dark, dangerous, and bone deep that awakened urges inside him he’d thought long dead. Tender urges, savage urges.
Do not think like that, idiot! He’d made the mistake of willingly dating a witch twice. Once because he’d wanted the woman, once because he’d needed the woman. Both experiences had scarred him for eternity. The relationship with the first, Frederica, had not ended well, and the damn woman had cursed him with impotence. And no amount of Viagra or stimulation had fixed the . . . limpness.
Falon had been forced to give up a year of his life acting as a slave to Penelope, the second witch, to win his freedom. In return, Penelope had challenged Frederica, who quickly lost and finally reversed her spell. Had the return of his manhood been worth it? He wasn’t sure. Penelope had not been an easy mistress. He’d cooked, cleaned, run errands, supplied her with orgasms and massages, balanced her checkbook, punished her enemies, and fixed her TiVo. So yeah, he fucking hated witches! They always abused their powers.