The vampire seemed to mull this information. “So you’ve never been able to do whatever you want in bed?”
“Correct.” He longed to twine his tongue with another’s as they traded moans of pleasure. He hungered to go down on a female for the first time, to taste her warm honey, straight from the source. He swallowed. He could with this one. “But you learn not to miss what you can’t have.” A lie.
She gave a bitter laugh. “Bullshit.”
“You sound like you speak from experience. What do you miss that you can’t have?”
She studied the sash on her robe. A dead end.
For now. “Tell me about Nïx.”
Josephine raised her face. “Why are you hunting her?”
“I’m an assassin by trade.” He’d been a killer for longer than he’d been a whore. “She’s my target because she seeks to bring down me and my allies.” She’d bring down the entire Gaia realm and all its connected planes if she continued unchecked.
“Who are your allies?”
“Brothers. Not by blood, but by choice. We’ve banded together for most of my life.”
“But they’re not dark fey?”
“They’re immortals of all different species.” Though they had little in common on the surface, each Møriør sought something in Gaia.
When asked what he desired, Blace had cryptically told Rune, “I want my blood.” Typical for a vampire, he supposed.
Allixta intended to find and punish the rebellious witches who’d settled there.
Sian refused to specify, would only say, “In Gaia lies my future.”
Before she’d been recruited into the Møriør, Allixta had cursed Sian with a spell that caused unbearable agony. Delirious, the demon had muttered about a treacherous fey girl with one amber eye and one violet.
Maybe Sian yearned for vengeance. He was the only being Rune had ever met who despised the fey as much as he did.
And Orion? Their liege intended to stop an apocalypse. . . .
“Enough about me, Josephine. I don’t even know where you hail from.”
“Earth,” she said. “Texas initially.”
That explained her drawl. “You’re not afraid of the vampire plague in the mortal realm?” She was probably immune; she’d withstood his poison easily enough.
Yet she looked as if she’d never heard of the sickness that had wiped out females of her kind. “Very little frightens me.” She rubbed that necklace.
“Those are bullets.”
She dropped her hand. “So?”
Did she keep them because she’d been shot? Rune’s fangs sharpened, the demon in him rousing protectively. His fey half was quick to point out that Rune himself had contemplated beheading her—and still hadn’t decided Josephine’s future. “Who shot you?”
“It doesn’t matter. It was a long time ago.”
“Those are modern bullets. How long ago could it be?”
She jutted her chin. “It’s past.”
“I wonder if your friend Nïx grew angered when someone fired a gun at you. Perhaps an oracle like her could have warned you what would happen? Or was she busy granting wishes to others?”
Josephine merely stared at him.
“Tell me how you met Nïx.” Nothing. “Did your parents die in the last Accession? What was your family name?”
Silence.
“You won’t answer any of my questions?” He sighed and rose. “I have other ways of making you talk. On that note, it’s time for bed. . . .”
NINETEEN
Jo stood and turned toward the fire, keeping her back to him. Time for bed?
After her shower, she’d tested her ghosting, and yes, she could possess him, even in his super lair. If he tried to force himself on her, she had a place she could hide.
Inside him.
He’d been a world away from her previous shells. She’d sensed his power from their first meeting, but inside him, she’d been cocooned by his strength. She’d even perceived his warmth. His heartbeat had lulled her—
Was he removing his boots behind her? He was stripping!
Don’t turn around, don’t turn around. “What are the other ways you’ll make me talk?”
“They involve sexual torture.” His voice had grown huskier.
Huh? “Are you going to use whips and chains on me?”
“Only if I think you’d like that.” He was so matter-of-fact, as if her participation were a foregone conclusion. “More generally, I’ll use orgasm denial.”
Just as he’d done when manipulating that nymph. Once the blonde had agreed to do his bidding, he’d rewarded her with orgasms. Good girls get rewards?
“Until you give me information about Nïx, I’ll edge you for hours, for days even, if that’s what it takes.”
She frowned at the flames. He said that like it was a bad thing? Before last night, her hookups had always ended with her instructing her partner how to get her off, him failing, and her saying, “Oh, for fuck’s sake” and then doing it herself.
Taken all together, her sex life totaled about forty minutes, less than an episode of Walking Dead.
Three guys. Seven times. Afterward, she’d always wished she’d watched TV instead. A year or so ago she’d quit altogether.
Edging would mean Rune actually got her to edge. For hours.
And every second she was with him meant he wasn’t out hunting, wasn’t accidentally shooting innocent Valkyrie acquaintances.
Where do I sign? If she neared the brink, she could seduce him to finish her. She might not have tons of experience, but her shells had, and she watched people going at it all the time. If she factored in his thrilling reaction to her bite, Jo figured she could throw him for a loop.
The way she saw it, they were basically about to fight each other, scrapping for the upper hand—except it’d feel good.
She was amped! Her only worry was that Rune wouldn’t hold out long enough to make it interesting.
“Ah, your heart beats faster, female. You’re right to fear this. Your secrets’ lives are about to end.”
God, his voice. Husky but rumbling. Her breaths shallowed. Don’t look. . . .
Naturally she did. When had she ever not looked?
He stood beside the bed, unbuttoning his shirt. In the courtyard, she’d seen his mind-blowing ass and a side view of his dick. After her hook-up with him, he’d pulled up his pants so fast she’d gotten only a glimpse of the full package. But she’d never seen his chest.
His shirt gaped open, revealing tattooed runes. One circled his navel, another stretching across his collar bone. As her gaze swept over his chest and rigid pecs, her nipples stiffened, straining against the material of her robe.
In the firelight, his skin was tan, except for a few lighter-colored scars over his chest and abs. Those marks—taken together with his tattoos—just made him look like more of a badass.
His jeans were low-slung, revealing the trail of black hair leading down from his navel.
“My heart’s beating faster because I’m ready to get busy,” she said, removing her necklace and setting it on the table. The only thing she could tell him about Nïx was that she couldn’t tell him anything about Nïx. Yet Jo liked all the focus on the Valkyrie and not Thad. She’d keep it that way. “But if you want to keep talking instead of doing?”
Surprise crossed his expression. “And of course I’ll deny you my blood.”
Oh. Not so good. If anything else were at stake, she’d sing like a canary for his blood.
But more was at stake.
She would be winning tonight. And when she did, maybe she could score her freedom as well. If she could just get him to accept a wager. . . .
“Come to bed, Josephine. We’re both adults. We both know what’s about to happen. I haven’t even nicked my skin.” When he shrugged from his shirt, his torso flexed in a drool-worthy display, every sinew contracting. His shoulders were broad, his arms long and strong—