Tempest of Vengeance (26 page)

“Of course I do!” I exclaimed. “I’m happy for
you both. Besides, I owe you a lot—”

“You don’t owe me anything,” Terian said with
an odd look in his eyes. “Not anything.”

What does he mean by that?

“But Sun would like that,” Terian added
quickly. “She loves gift cards of all kinds. I’m not sure why, but
she does.”

“Then I’ll get one for you both,” I said with
a smile. “Take care.”

I left his lab, and promptly ran into Jenny
in the hallway. “Sorry!” I said, and she gave me a smile in return.
I gave her one back, thinking while I still disliked her, it wasn’t
her fault Theo had left me for her. And this meeting was opportune,
as I’d wanted to talk to her. “Walk with me?”

She gave me a nervous look, but came with me.
When we were outside, I stopped, and leaned against the nearest
tree. Jenny looked at me uneasily.

“Do you have your phone?” I asked.

She gave me an odd look. “Sure, but—”

“Get it out.”

Jenny produced her phone, and I began
speaking slowly, so she would have time to enter the information as
I related it. “Theo’s birthday is sometime in May. He won’t tell
you about it, but that’s when it is. Please make him a cake of some
kind, and throw a party.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Jenny said
abruptly. “You think I need your help to keep him happy? Or are you
tired of your vampire, and want him back now?”

I glared at her.
If I tell you the truth,
that you’re only alive now because you were practice for me, you’ll
be singing a different tune about dear old Theo.

Be nice, Sar. It’s not her fault, not any
of it. And Theo’s been hurt enough. Everyone has been hurt
enough.
“I care that Theo has a party every year on his
birthday, and a Christmas tree, and—”

“We have a tree,” she interrupted snottily.
“I’m sure your children told you?”

“They did,” I replied, nodding. “I’m pleased
you have one for him. Tell me also if you want any recipes that he
likes, Cia knows most of them, but—”

“So now you want to be friends?” Her voice
was half anger, half disbelieving.

“No,” I said coldly, letting all of my anger
flood my words. “I’m not your friend. But despite he’s an ass, I
want Theo to have what he didn’t most of his life, especially when
he’s lost his best friend.”

“Terian is his best friend.”

“He is now,” I said in clipped deliberate
tones. “Once they were mortal enemies. Danial was his best friend
for over a decade.”
Until I came along, and ruined everything,
anyway. Sigh.
“You’re coming into this saga late, Jenny. I’m
doing you a favor here. But you don’t want it, that’s fine.” I
turned to leave.

“Wait,” she called. “You need to know
something. Theo intends to go with Elle and T to your mother’s
house for Christmas, tonight. And he’s asked me to go, too.” She
forced a smile. “I’m sure you don’t want us to bump into each
other.”

Understatement of the year.
“I’ll be
there tomorrow, then. At night, so Devlin can come. So it doesn’t
matter if you go with them tonight. Be prepared for a few comments
from my mother though.”

“Theo already warned me,” Jenny said,
nodding. “I’m intending to be very, very quiet.”

“Good,” I said curtly, and left.

I returned home to Hayden, and went directly
to Titus, who was waiting for me in his basement lab. He looked
over the potion Terian had made, and determined that it was fine to
use. I asked him point blank why it had taken Terian so long to
make his, and Titus so little time, when they were for the same
thing.

“Because of his blood, and also that he can’t
do dark magic as easily now,” Titus said patiently in his bass
voice. “You come to me from now on, Sar, and I’ll make these for
you. Terian is most likely going to be moving away from doing
almost all magic for the next few years, if not forever. It’s good
he has his job with Theo. His days of making most of the
sought-after potions are over.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, feeling bad and not
knowing why. It wasn’t my fault.

Titus gave me a long odd look, as Terian had,
then he hugged me gently. “Don’t be,” he said. “You’ve been a good
friend to him. You did what he needed you to. Terian can let you go
now, Sar.”

I gave him an odd look. “Is there something
going on here I should know about?”

“He can be happy with Sundown. He’s finally
realized you were never going to be with him, no matter what
happened. And that’s good, that he’s moving on.”

I nodded. “Yes.”

“Go now,” Titus said coolly. “Your evil snake
is waiting for you. I’m sure he can’t wait to feel you in his
coils.”

Jerk.
I left him without hugging him
good-bye.

* * * *

By the time I got upstairs, showered, and
conditioned my hair, it was noon. I also took time to call my
mother to reschedule, notifying her of the impending “other woman”
coming tonight to her door. My mom said everything was fine, though
she hadn’t known Jenny was coming with Theo. The way she said it, I
hoped she didn’t say something nasty to Jenny if she happened to
catch her alone. She was clearly annoyed that her daughter had to
come another night because of another woman that her daughter’s
soon-to-be ex-husband was bringing on Christmas. I was just happy
Jenny had said something, before we’d all shown up together
tonight, and were forced to be nice to each other because of the
kids.

Devlin had already taken Venus to Titus’s
house for the day, to give Lash and me some privacy for the “snake
lovefest.” But he said he would be back in the early evening hours,
about six or seven. “That should be enough time.”

I’d rolled my eyes at his smirk, and told him
to get going. Then I went into our bedroom, took off my clothes,
and downed the potion. It was a little bitter, and kind of smoky
tasting. Slipping out Devlin’s bedroom door, I shut it behind me
and walked to Lash’s door, and knocked once. My legs went weak the
very next moment, and then I was down on the floor, feeling so
strange that I couldn’t move right because I suddenly had no arms
and legs, much less hands or feet. By some desperate flailing, I
managed to curl myself up in a haphazard pile, but going around
over and over had made me a little dizzy. I hoped to God Lash was
awake, and had heard me out here, or it was going to be a long
three hours.

A naked Lash opened his door, and looked down
at me, his face in shadow. I tried to speak, but my tongue just
came out and I hissed a little. Lash reached down to me, and picked
me up, putting some of me over his shoulder, and around his neck.
He closed the door, locked it, and carried me to the bed, where he
put me down gently. He stood there for a long moment, just looking
at me.

Could he tell it was me?
I tried to
preen seductively, and leaned back on the bed. But I didn’t have
any arms to steady myself, or balance with, and I ended up flipping
myself over on my back. I righted myself with a twist of my body,
glad I couldn’t blush in this form. I felt so annoyed with myself
for making myself look like an idiot that I hid my head under my
torso, feeling a little ashamed as well that I couldn’t control my
altered body, and I probably wasn’t looking in the least
attractive. At least he had to know who I was now.
Fucking Lyssa
probably knew just what to do.

I heard Lash dialing his phone, and speaking.
His voice seemed very loud when he spoke, almost like a vibration
inside my head. “Dev, did you know that Sar...”

I peeked out to look at him, relieved he
could recognize me.

“I wanted you to know that once I’m with her
this way, I will probably want her to do this again for me. And I
imagine she may want to as well, after this time. This is another
thing I will not give up, if she wants this from me, and I thought
it right to let you know that.”

His words were laced with strong
desire.
I stretched out my neck hesitantly, looking in Lash’s
direction hopefully. Apparently, he wasn’t turned off by the fact I
couldn’t move worth a damn.

Lash hung up his phone with a sharp click,
and put it aside. He came closer to me, drinking me in with his
eyes. “You’re so beautiful, Sar,” he whispered, deep emotion in his
voice. “So beautiful. Just like I knew you would be, if you were
like this.”

He shifted fast, and fell in coils to the
floor. I saw him coming up the bed, sliding on the sheets in his
hurry to reach me. Then he was coiling his much-longer body around
mine, hissing softly. Soon he was wrapped all along the length of
me, holding my body with his. He rubbed his head on mine gently,
hissing, and then he laid his head over mine.

I had expected something like this, but not
to feel as I did. Frankly, I had volunteered to do this for him,
because I knew he needed it, and I didn’t want him to go to someone
else for it. I didn’t expect to particularly enjoy making love as a
snake. But it seemed that I was utterly complete, that feeling him
like this around me was the best thing ever. I moved slightly in
his coils, and he hissed a little. I heard his excitement in his
hiss, and moved my body more purposefully, rubbing on him. He began
to contract his body around me, moving gently.

I had never been held this completely. I
gloried in feeling him everywhere about me, his muscles so strong,
and yet so gentle. Then I felt him inserting part of himself into
me. It was both familiar and not. It felt right, and yet strange.
The feel of him gently moving, touching me everywhere...

I shuddered in climax, feeling something so
alien and yet so familiar in its power. This wasn’t like any orgasm
I’d ever felt before, and it went on and on, as he kept moving
gently around me. I let out a loud hiss of pleasure, and he hissed
back at me, his sound almost strangely like encouragement. I hissed
again as the climax ebbed, and again, he hissed back to me, though
this time there seemed to be pleasure and contentment in the
sibilant sound.

In the next second, he was sliding the lower
part of himself over mine fast, contracting in rhythm around me.
His hissing was intense, his purpose single-minded in the urgent
way he moved on me. He contracted hard around me suddenly,
squeezing me tightly. I writhed frantically, scared he might crush
me in his coils. In the next moment, he loosed his grip on me, and
I relaxed in his embrace.

He didn’t uncoil from me, or take himself out
of me. He just rubbed his head on me as he did before. I felt him
again contracting gently around me, and as before, the feeling felt
wonderful and totally encompassing. With a passionate hiss, I gave
myself up completely to ecstasy.

This went on for the next two hours. Lash
brought me to climax, again and again. Unlike human sex, each
orgasm was as intense as the last one had been. I had never before
made love so intensely, over and over with no rest for so long a
time, and finally, my body just gave out. I passed out asleep in
his coils after the twenty-seventh time, utterly exhausted.

The metamorphosis back to human awakened me,
spurring Lash to change form as well. Slowly our arms and legs
materialized, as we became human once more, our bodies still
embracing. Spent, I looked up into the dark eyes of a very human
Lash, and smiled weakly. He eased me up on the pillows beside him,
and put his arms around me, spooning me. I lay in his arms for a
while, just resting. I felt like I’d run a marathon, and I hadn’t
done that much work. He must be exhausted, even being were.

“You were right,” I sighed, stretching
happily. “Coiling together did feel good. You felt so wonderful
wrapped around me. God, you were so good, Lash. It felt so
amazing—”

Lash didn’t move, comment, or look at me. I
froze, and looked away, filled by a terrible thought.
Had I felt
bad? Moved wrong?
I cringed a little. I hadn’t known how to
slither at all. Maybe I was supposed to coil around him, too? “Did
I not do it right?” I whispered. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t sure how to
move.”

“You were perfect,” Lash whispered, running
his hand down my side, and hugging me close. “You felt wonderful.
You did just what a female snake should, which is mostly just hold
still, but then fight just a little, near the end.”

It was in his voice how relaxed he was now. I
hadn’t ever heard him this relaxed in all the time we’d been
together, in almost all the time I’d known him. He’d needed badly
to get release as an animal. I opened my mouth to ask him why he
hadn’t just asked me to do this for him, and I realized he had,
when he’d told me about Theo. It hadn’t all been him being a good
friend. He’d hoped someday for me to do this for him, even back
then. That was what Devlin had meant by his comment, and I
understood why. That he’d needed me to come to him like this,
willingly without him asking, maybe to know that I’d meant what I
said. That I really loved him.

Lash sighed heavily. “Why did you do this?”
he said finally, sounding irritated. “I was going to stay away from
you, not be your lover anymore like you asked me to.”

“I knew how much you wanted it,” I whispered.
“I wanted to be with you that way, to see what it would feel like.
You always talked about it with such desire.”

“Was that the real reason?” Lash interrupted,
stroking my face. “Wasn’t it just that you couldn’t have me? That
I’d said we were done that made you come to me as a snake? You know
me, Sar, know how much I wanted that. You knew I wouldn’t be able
to resist having you, when I saw you as a snake. That I needed it
so bad I wouldn’t be able to say no, even if I wanted to.”

It was in his words that he didn’t remember
last night at Davy’s at all. But I did, and that made his sarcastic
words a little easier to take. “The real reason was I’m in love
with you,” I said. “And I wanted to be with you like that, to know
what it felt like, why you liked it so much. And I ordered the
potion after that first night we were together, because I knew you
were going to need this from me.”