Covet (2 page)

“Can you describe her?” Javier suspected that Callum would be able to manage that at least. He had an eye for detail, especially when it came to human females. The prettier the better to him.

“Tall, reddish brown hair... fiery... great tits... and had the strangest golden eyes.”

Javier stopped dead. Callum paused with his hand on the wooden door, holding it open, and looked back at him.

Lilah had hit Victor?

Before he could ask Callum more about it, a female member of staff appeared out of the gloom on the other side of the open door. She bowed her head to Callum, who still held the door, and then Javier and walked through. Javier’s gaze tracked her, his head tilting to one side as he took in what she was wearing.

“Do you like it?” Callum said and when Javier looked back at him, he was smiling, all trace of anger and concern gone from his eyes. “I thought it suited the theatre more and it means the staff can move around during the performances without being an eyesore for those attending.”

Javier turned back to stare at the woman again. She stood near the glass doors, speaking to one of the male staff as he polished the windows.

“I leave you in charge for a month, and you change the uniforms?” Javier couldn’t quite believe it. Callum thought that the incident with Victor was a nightmare. This was a nightmare to Javier.

The male uniform hadn’t changed much. The material of the black formal outfit the man wore was a little finer than before, and the cut was tailored now so it fit snugly to his figure, but the long tail of the jacket still made him resemble a butler.

The female uniform.

Javier couldn’t stop staring at it.

It looked as though Callum had gone to a sex shop and bought out every French maid uniform they had. The puffed sleeves of the black dress were lined with black lace, and the neck scooped so low that Javier was surprised he couldn’t see her nipples. Perhaps he could if he was close enough. The lace that trimmed the material there was probably obscuring them from this distance. The horror of it didn’t stop there. The previous uniform dress had reached the ankle of the wearer. The new one barely reached mid-way down her thighs, revealing creamy flesh and long over-knee black socks. The only thing that had remained the same was the black pumps and the colour.

If he saw Lilah in such an outfit, it would be the death of him.

And he had to find her and find out why she had punched Victor.

The Devil help him, he wasn’t going to be able to resist her any longer.

It would be a miracle if he even managed to utter a single question before finally succumbing to his need for her.

Callum’s intent gaze on him roused him from his thoughts and he turned a blank look on him.

“You don’t like it.” Callum let the door drift shut. “We can change it back. I just thought it gave the guests something to look at between acts. Antoine thinks it’s a good idea.”

“I like it,” Javier lied and forced another smile. “We should speak to Victor before Antoine comes down to speak to the performers prior to the show.”

Javier hoped that Victor would tell them everything and then he wouldn’t need to find Lilah and speak to her. Callum opened the door again and Javier strode down the dimly lit black corridor with him, heading for the area to the side of the stage where stairs led up to the offices and hallways led backstage and off to the staff quarters. They were almost at the end of the hallway and out into that brighter double-height expansive room when several females crossed before him. Lilah was among them, carrying a broom and a red plastic box of cleaning equipment, her dark chestnut hair twirled up in a bun at the back of her head.

She said something he didn’t hear to the three other women and then broke away from them and struggled to open the heavy wooden doors that led to the area in front of the stage in the theatre. Her broom knocked against the door when she managed to open it, fell from her grasp and clattered on the floor. She cursed softly and Javier echoed her in Spanish when she let the door close again and bent to retrieve her fallen broom.

The frilled black skirt of her dress hid nothing from view as she picked up the broom, her back to him. He stared at her bottom and her black knickers, blood pounding in his temples, his hunger for her kicking back into life and threatening to seize control of him. He pictured crossing the scant few metres that separated them, sliding his hands over the firm peachy globes of her backside, and drawing her back against the raging erection tenting the black material of his tailored trousers beneath his jacket.

Lilah straightened so fast that he jumped and she whirled to face him. Her cheeks coloured, rosy and dark, and the startled edge to her round eyes captivated him. She blinked, shuttering her beautiful golden irises, and then dipped in a curtsey. Her gaze stayed downcast this time, her head slightly to one side, so the cord of her neck remained taut and tempting.

“This is the one, Javier,” Callum said and Javier almost barked that he knew that already and barely stopped himself from throttling his friend for interrupting his perusal of her neck.

He cleared his throat instead. “I will deal with you later.”

Callum moved on. Javier remained where he was, his feet firmly planted to the dusty floor, his eyes glued to her, waiting to see her reaction.

Lilah’s gaze slowly rose, bringing her head up with it. When it touched on his, the colour on her cheeks darkened and he forgot to breathe. He stared at her, mesmerised, lost in the black abyss of her dilated pupils.

Enthralled.

She didn’t take her eyes away from his as expected. She held his gaze, steady and unafraid, no trace of fear in her scent. The way she looked at him spoke of desire and he had a hard time telling himself that he had to be imagining it. Her bond with her master made it impossible for her to feel anything for Javier. The gentle rhythm of her heartbeat called to him, luring his gaze down to her cleavage, and he fought his desire to step closer so he could reach out and run a lone finger over the luscious curves of her breasts. Touching her would only bring her pain. He couldn’t. No matter how much he needed to have her warm soft skin beneath his fingertips and know the feel of her at last. It would hurt her. He didn’t care. No. He did care. If it hurt her, he would stop. He would never harm Lilah. To pain her was to pain himself. He cared about her too much.

“Are you coming?” Callum’s voice shattered the spell she had cast on Javier and he glanced at him and nodded.

When he looked back, the door was closing and Lilah was gone.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose, drew in a long deep breath, catching the enticing scent of her in the air, and followed Callum backstage.

Later.

He would be in her presence. Alone.

And he wouldn’t be able to resist her any longer.

If it hurt her, he would stop, but he needed to touch her.

He needed to know the feel of her and her taste.

Even if that one taste was all he could ever have.

Even if it signed his death sentence.

L
ilah didn’t pause to watch the show as she cleaned the boxes, preparing the red velvet seats for the coming week. She pulled another of the covers off the plush soft seats and hit it with the palm of her hand to beat out any dust that had managed to creep under the protective cream material. The murmur of the crowd below drew her attention to them. She pressed her hands into the small of her back, stretching her spine, and sighed. Preparations for the new season were always tiring but she had been working harder than ever tonight, hoping that Callum would notice and that Javier’s punishment would be less severe because of it.

She wasn’t sorry that she had hit Victor. She was surprised.

She had expected him to stop her or evade her fist. He must have been more caught up in what he had been doing than she had thought.

Lilah removed the cover off the final chair in the elegant gold and red box, folded it and set it down on the pile near the red velvet curtain that shielded the private area from the corridor that ran between all the boxes. During the main season, the aristocrat vampires used the boxes, separating themselves from the elite who sat in the rows of seats filling the theatre below. She had never cleaned the boxes before.

She ran her fingers over the carved wooden top of the hip-height wall around the box. Antoine had arranged the cleaning of the exterior and repainting of the interior during the closed period so the cream paint was perfect, highlighted with beautiful gold that one of the decorators had told her was real. Only the best for the aristocrats.

Lilah leaned against the edge of the box and looked down at the crowd as they watched the show on the grand stage to her left. How did the aristocrats feel when they sat up here, looking down on their weaker kin? Was that why they preferred the boxes? So they could look down on vampires they believed were weaker and less worthy than they were? She had never understood the sense of separation between them. To her, it didn’t matter how pure their blood was or what lineage they were from. They were all vampires.

She had never believed in their existence until Lord Ashville had found her on the streets and forced his blood down her throat, bonding with her and claiming her as a sort of slave. His blood in her veins linked her to him but she hadn’t seen him in a long time and she didn’t care. She hated him and wished she could break free of his rule, had tried to escape his mansion many times, so many that he had grown tired of her and sent her here along with another of his humans. She hadn’t realised what sort of place the theatre was until she had caught her first glimpse of the show. She had blushed a thousand shades of red and hadn’t been able to take her eyes off the stage, watching the perversion playing out on it, the bloodletting and debauched erotic acts.

Lilah was used to it now and rarely stopped to watch, and she made sure that she was never in sight of the stage during the final act. The first time she had witnessed that, she had discovered the true nature of vampires. The scent of human blood had driven them into a frenzy, both the vampires on stage and those in the audience. It had even reduced the aristocrats, with their fine airs and graces, to slavering beasts, their red eyes bright and sharpened fangs dripping with saliva.

That was the reason why she didn’t understand the separation between elite and aristocrat. When it came down to it, all of them hungered for human blood and couldn’t resist the smell of it. They were all beasts in human form.

A brief flicker of golden light drew her gaze down to the door below the boxes opposite her, close to the front of the stage. The door slowly shut and she shifted her focus forwards, past Antoine where he stood to one side watching the show, blending into the darkness that edged the theatre, to the vampire who had exited from backstage.

Javier.

It was dark where he crossed the theatre using the strip of open red carpet between the raised black stage and the front row of the audience, but she knew it was him. She would recognise his fine athletic figure anywhere and the haphazard mess of his sandy brown hair. His suit jacket was gone but other than that he hadn’t changed from when she had seen him earlier. Her heart had lodged in her throat when she had looked up to find him there, watching her, his rich chocolate eyes intent on her and stirring heat in her veins. She had thought he would say something about what she had done, would berate her in front of everyone, and had even braced herself for the hard edge his words would have. When he had spoken, his tone had been surprisingly soft, warm with his Spanish accent lacing the words. She could listen to him forever, sometimes drifted away when he was issuing orders to the staff first thing in the evening and last thing in the morning, imagining him speaking close to her ear. Just the memory of his voice had her heartbeat accelerating, a flush of heat sweeping over her skin. Her teeth teased her lower lip. She had to stop torturing herself like this. Javier would never do such a thing with her. He had taken care of her over the past two years but he took care of all his staff, whether they were vampire or human. She wasn’t special to him.

Lilah leaned forwards, following him until he disappeared beneath her. Was he coming up?

He had said that he would speak to her later about what she had done. She both feared it and looked forward to it.

She picked up the broom again, intending to sweep the floor so she would look busy if Javier was coming to see her, but her gaze caught on the show.

Three men were pleasuring one woman in the middle of the luxurious red and gold stage set, all of them vampires right now, but she knew that would change before the final act. It was early in the show. With each act, things grew a little more risqué and a lot darker. The moans of the four vampires writhing naked on stage filled the theatre, the rapt audience watching in silence. The woman sat reclined on a red velvet armchair, her legs splayed over the arms and a man between them. Another stood to one side of her, one hand tangled in her blonde hair, holding her mouth to his cock as he thrust into it, his other hand on the erection of the man behind the armchair, pumping it as he kissed him. Lilah tried to drag her eyes away but found that she couldn’t when another two women joined the group, both of them human and both of them under the thrall of two of the vampires on stage. She could tell it by their glassy expressions. They walked calmly forwards on black stiletto heels, their sheer feather-trimmed baby dolls barely concealing their breasts and the black leather thongs they wore. Two of the naked men broke away from the vampire female as the third man pulled her onto her knees on the armchair and thrust into her from behind, causing her to cry out.

The two female humans approached the male vampires who held them under their thrall, teetering on the heels now, a hint of nerves flickering on their faces. The males were lessening their control over them, letting them see where they were and that an audience was watching them. The scent of their fear would satisfy the gathered elite and the humans would still be under the vampires’ spells enough that they wouldn’t think to escape.