Bound by the Vampire Queen (20 page)

“No,” he said. “But even a beautiful, powerful vampire queen can get her feelings hurt. Even in front of a make-believe audience.”

She sighed, gave a delicate snort. “It has been many, many years since I haven’t been viewed… as someone to respect. I had forgotten how it feels not to have that. Perhaps it’s worse than never having such power at all, because to be accustomed to it and then have it stripped away so suddenly…” She shook her head. “Before Cayden struck you, she
did
have the power to hold me. If I knew the magic better, I’m certain I could have stopped her from changing me. Some part of me knows all of it, like memories that only need to be recalled. It’s coming to me in bits and pieces. But right then, I was helpless. It was how I felt that awful day in Council chambers when they took your life. That rage and fear…”

Her nails dug into his arm, as it was still not an easy memory for her, for either of them. “This was different, more selfish. I was a student in front of a classroom, being mocked by the teacher, and all I could think of was myself and the rage that I was being treated this way. For one, pitiful moment, without any other obvious choices, I wanted to disappear, just like a humiliated child. She made me feel hideous. I’m beyond angry at myself for giving her that power. I’m a thousand years old, and should be far past such things. Yet damn it, once again, these past couple years…”

Her voice lowered, and he heard the minute tremor. Pain like this was always wrested from so deep within her. It was something she had great difficulty even letting him hear, let alone herself.

“Sometimes I think I will never find that strength, that calm center again.”

“You’re a thousand years old, my lady. That means you haven’t been treated like a child for a very, very long time. You had a moment of vulnerability. It doesn’t make you chronically vulnerable.” Cupping her face, he let her see the truth of it in his gaze, as well as the firm belief in his wide open mind.

She traced his lips as he continued to speak, his sensuous Mistress who never tired of touching him, and he hoped to God she never would. “I’ve had the pleasure of putting my mouth on every inch of your Fae form, every sleek inch of silver skin. I’ve felt those deadly talons of yours rake my back to draw blood in your passion, your fangs sink into my flesh. I can tell you I get fucking lost, mesmerized by your magnificence, in whatever form you are.” He lifted her hand then, nuzzled her palm and gave it a nip, his eyes glinting. “Even as I’m also very cognizant of the woman, her strengths and weaknesses. I love all of you, my lady. She’s playing a game. We’re playing along, trying to figure out the end goal. That’s all. The rest is bullshit.”

Lyssa frowned. “She’s afraid of something about me and you. No. Not afraid. Angry. Defensive.

Keldwyn directed her toward this gauntlet idea, but she wants me to fail whatever test she sets. And that’s not just for the ‘benefit of her people.’

Whatever this is, it’s personal. Keldwyn gave us another clue with what he said just now. This is about Rhoswen and me, not the Fae.”

“Yeah. Heaven forbid he should spit it straight out rather than holding it all in. Constipated fairy.”

“I wouldn’t suggest calling him that,” she said. “But in all fairness, it’s obvious he walks a very thin line here. There are rules that we don’t know, and I think there are things he can’t tell us straight out.” She paused then, teasing his mouth with her fingers. As she traced the bottom lip, she pressed her finger on his sharp fang, giving him a small taste of blood. He sucked her finger into his mouth, dipped his head as she stroked through his hair with the other hand.

Leaning in, she let her lips cruise along his temple, her nose flaring to take in his male scent.

“What else is bothering you, my lady? Her forcing your change isn’t the biggest thing on your mind.”

“Yet you chose to address it first.”

He shrugged. “The small est problem is usually the one you place in the forefront, while you try to sort out the bigger things. I was giving you more elbow room.”

“I don’t know why I bother to tell you to stay out of my head. That intuition of yours already picks up enough to make it redundant.” Her gaze darkened with a trace of sadness. “I don’t regret what I’ve become with you, Jacob. But it has… weakened me, somehow. I’m afraid I don’t have it in me anymore, to be as cruel and merciless as I need to be to fence with the Queen Rhoswens of the world.” He raised a brow. “My lady, if someone threatened me or Kane, you’d flay the skin from their bodies and let them beg for death. Then you’d rip their heads off. Literally.”

“True.” She nodded. “That does make me feel better.”

“I thought it might.”

It was simple accumulation, he knew. The constant vigilance, being away from home and Kane, what lay ahead of them. He could help her with that, by giving and taking at once.

Dropping his head, he kissed her collar bone, exposed by the stretched neckline of his shirt. He nuzzled her there, gave her the tip of his tongue, then the press of a fang. She made a quiet noise of assent, and her hands tightened on his biceps as he pierced the vein, taking a slow draw that he felt all the way down to his groin, particularly when her body responded as well, her hips shifting so her bare ass rubbed against him, and her nipple drew up hard and tight against his palm as he cupped her breast.

When she shifted, he accommodated her, moving together as she straddled him. He withdrew his mouth long enough to manage the switch, but then he sank back in, his bite penetrating deeper as she opened his jeans. The moment her fingers closed around him, it drove away the memory of Rhoswen’s cold touch, though he remembered his lady’s eyes, the way she watched with that Mistress’s expression as another woman handled him. A look that said,
He’s mine. You touch him only by my consent.

Thinking of it, feeling her claim both mentally and physically, he hardened further, growing strong and thick, ready to serve her.

All mine.

All yours, my lady.

She was in no mood for foreplay. She pushed herself down on him, and he swallowed an oath with her blood at the tight, wet heat of her. Clamping her legs around his hips, she drove him in deeper. In response, he slid his hands under the T-shirt, kneaded her ass to rock her upon him, making sure he was giving her clit the rhythm it needed for the fast, intense climax she wanted.

You won’t come, Jacob. I want you hard and wanting when you service me and Rhoswen later tonight. I want her to burn with jealousy at what belongs to me, what she cannot take, no matter how she tries.

A dangerous game, my lady.
He answered it with danger of his own, a deeper thrust, a concentrated look as he pushed her up to that pinnacle. He let her feel how he could not only take her there, but, when circumstances were different, he could take the reins from her, push her over and set the pace. And give her mindless pleasure worth the surrender.

Her head dropped back on her shoulders as the climax rippled through her cunt. Jacob gritted his teeth, barely holding his resolve against the stroke of heaven-sent muscles around his cock. So slick and wet, such a fucking mindless friction. He knew she did it on purpose, making it as agonizing as possible, but he still exulted in her cries, the way her hands dug in, holding on to him. That sinful mass of black shining hair teased his thighs as she dropped her head back, exposing her throat even further, irresistible to a vampire, or even a human servant, so aware of the deep meaning to it. But he left her throat for a different feast, mouthing her nipple through the T-shirt and ratcheting her climax up another notch, from a yearning cry to an outright scream that was echoed by a nearby dragon’s roar, the lowing cal of a unicorn stallion.

When she finished, he was breathing hard, shallow. She had her arms clasped around his shoulders as she got her own breath back.

Wrapping his hands tightly in all that hair, he took her mouth in a long, urgent kiss. Making a sound of pleasure in his mouth, she squeezed down on him so he groaned, enduring the torture, fighting his own desires.

“All mine,” she whispered again, catching her hands in his hair as well to hold his face steady, stare at him.

“Forever, my lady.”

The knock on the door disrupted them. The attendants, arriving with Lyssa’s bath. Jacob remembered then that they also intended to “prepare him,” whatever godforsaken thing that meant. All he knew was he was fiercely glad he’d been able to give her this, have her to himself, before all of it happened. Lyssa gave him a knowing look as he set her off him gently, helping her straighten the T-shirt before he rose. Refastening his jeans with careful precision, he strode, somewhat awkwardly, to the door.

Oh, hell no.
Standing outside the door were two large Fae males, taller and broader than himself.

They had the pointed ears and aristocratic looks of Fae court members, but they wore nothing more than a pair of short half tunics and steel collars emblazoned with the signet of the court. One had shining red hair, the other one jet-black. The jet-black one gave a half bow. “I am Patrick and this is Lorar.

We are attendants for the Lady Lyssa’s bath. We also have clothes for her.”

Though he was tempted to snarl and close the door in their faces, Jacob stepped to the side so his lady could see them. As he did, the two shifted forward into her line of sight, revealing two even more brawny males behind them. One golden blond, one with platinum silver locks. They gave him a nod as well, though the platinum one’s eyes were a little too appraising. “We are Arthmael and Cadr, here to make you ready for Queen Rhoswen’s pleasure,” he said. “You will come with us to the preparation chamber.”

Jacob flashed his fangs. “I’m not leaving my lady unprotected.”

Arthmael raised a challenging brow, displaying none of the guarded courtesy of the first two. “Think we can’t make you do so, vampire?”

Jacob braced himself on the doorframe. “If your queen’s preparations for me include leaving my bloody corpse on the floor in here, then let’s get it over with.”

Patrick gave Arthmael a quelling look that actually seemed to have an effect, suggesting he had the higher rank of the two. Making a polite gesture toward Lyssa, he spoke to her. “We are Her Majesty’s personal attendants. She does you a great honor, offering you our services. You have my word our only charge is to help you with your bath, not to harm you.” He glanced toward Arthmael and Cadr.

“These two are general attendants for the castle, appropriate in rank to handle your servant’s preparation.”

Making it clear no honor was being done for him, and the guarantee of no harm wasn’t on the table. It was the wrong tact. Lyssa’s jade eyes cooled. “I believe you, Patrick,” she said. “However, since it sounds like my consort is not afforded the same protection, he will stay here. He was well trained on how to prepare himself to serve my needs. I think he can manage well enough for your queen.”

“But if you really feel like you need to hold up my dick while I wash it, you might be strong enough to handle that.” Though Jacob slid an indifferent gaze over Arthmael, he did note the male’s intimidating build. The guy could likely squash a dragon into a shoe box.

Patrick maintained a look of great patience on his well -sculpted face. “Madame, your consort is not being singled out. Queen Rhoswen is a creature of powerful high magic. Even when a Fae is chosen to share her bed, certain preparations must be made to protect that Fae, as well as to guide him to ensure her maximum pleasure. The chamber where they will take him is in a temple. Arthmael and Cadr are guardians and priests of that temple.”
Apparently there weren’t enough biker bars in the Fae world needing bouncers.

Lyssa gave him her usual mildly exasperated look, but then Patrick sealed the deal. “You can speak in the vampire’s mind, and he in yours, correct?” At her nod, he gave her a half bow. “You will be able to maintain that communication throughout. You can witness his preparation through his mind. If he is your servant in all ways, I think experiencing that will please you.”

It was already inevitable, but knowing the mind communication would stay intact pretty much cinched it. Jacob knew as well as his lady that the four servants provided another opportunity to gather information. He still hated it. It went against every warrior instinct he had, as well as that unfortunate possessiveness she chided him about. But he’d learned early in the vampire world that there was no way to adjust every situation to suit his preferences.

We have to take some risks, Sir Vagabond. If it was not for the fact you are worried about my well-being, you’d go with them without argument.

Oh, I wouldn’t say that, my lady.

He noted that Lorar carried her change of clothes in his arms, a deep green and gold robe with sparkling embroidery that would enhance her already overwhelming beauty. He didn’t see any clothes in
his
attendants’ arms, an ominous portent.

Removing Catriona’s pendant, he placed it in his lady’s hand for safekeeping, knowing she’d put it away in their small bag of belongings. Then, before he turned himself over to the platinum and gold bouncer twins, he stepped toe-to-toe with Patrick.

“You do not cause her a moment of distress,” he ground out. “Not one, or I cut your fucking heart out.” The man had dark, dark eyes, with a frisson of silver in the sclera. He cocked his head, his lips curving with a trace of male malevolence. “Our only desire is to give her pleasure. Mindless pleasure,” he added courteously.

Great.
He calmed himself with a vivid imagining of tearing their arms off, but made a bow to his lady.

Call me if you have need.

Leave your mind fully open, Sir Vagabond
. Her gaze strayed over his two attendants, then back to his body. In her eyes, he saw remnants of the desire they’d enjoyed right before the group’s arrival.
I
might like to look in on those preparations.

It was difficult to decide what irritated him more. Two muscle-bound Fae helping Lyssa with her bath, or the two helping him “prepare” himself. Despite their spirited exchange, once out of the room, Arthmael became far more businesslike.