Pleasure of a Dark Prince (25 page)

He finally cracked open his eyes. “But look all you like. Happy to show you the whole package again.”

“Funny, Scot.” When she’d awakened to a cloudless dawn, her first thought had been that she needed to run—MacRieve would be closing in on her! Then she’d remembered the night before.

She’d already been caught. Yet her worst fears hadn’t been realized—because he’d vowed not to take her. Relaxing a shade, she’d quietly turned to watch him at rest, inwardly sighing at the magnificent male she shared a bed with.

“How did you sleep?” He gazed at her, studying her face.

She would give anything to know what he was thinking. “Surprisingly well.” Like the dead, actually. Odd for her.

“That so?” Why was he staring at her like that?

She tucked her hair behind her ear. This was so awkward. Was he thinking about last night? Recalling how she’d looked naked? Or what they’d done?

The only time she’d been intimate with a male, besides MacRieve, she’d experienced a wedding, dawning horror, and torture. Now she didn’t know how to behave.

MacRieve was looking at her like she was a puzzle he intended to solve.

But when the smell of bacon wafted into the cabin, his lids grew heavy. “Smell that, will you? Wish you ate. I’d feed you like a queen. Or at least like a princess.”

She
could
eat, but refraining was an inherent form of birth control for Valkyrie.

Ah, gods, was she
planning
on having sex with him?

“I guess I’ll have to eat your meals to hold up my end of the bargain,” he said. At her raised brows, he added, “Our deal was that I’d keep your cover if you sated me. For a night like the last, I’ll keep your cover
a lot
. Speaking of which, I thought I should inquire—are you ready for me to claim you yet?”

When she glared, he said, “I’ll give you a few minutes to think about it.”

“MacRieve!”

He stood, not caring a whit about his nudity—or his semihard erection. In fact, he stretched in front of her, his muscles tensing and relaxing, playing all over his body. He cast her a grin over his shoulder. “Oh, and how about
now
?”

Her lips quirked, but she hid it. “No, werewolf!”

“It’s just a matter of time, Valkyrie—”

“Goddamnit, Chuck, what’d I tell you?
” rang out from above decks. It was Travis, somehow sounding even more drunk.
“Ship’s fine just the way she is!”

MacRieve raised a brow. “An intrigue. The Lykae in me needs to investigate that, and the bacon. You get a reprieve.”

As soon as he donned his worn jeans and a T-shirt and padded barefoot out of the cabin, she hurried from the bed, intending a quick shower.

The door reopened; she froze, naked. MacRieve’s lips curled into that lupine grin. “Forgot this.” Absently patting around for the bowcase, he ogled her up and down. When he’d snagged the case, he said, “Doona move till I get back.”

Once the door closed again, she heard him mumble outside,
“Woman’ll be the death o’ me.”

She released a pent-up breath, hurrying for the bathroom. MacRieve continued to surprise her. Last night, he hadn’t done more, hadn’t tried to seduce her. He’d kept his part of the vow, and since she would certainly never agree to more—especially out of bed—she thought she could handle this arrangement with him.

Yes, a short journey with the Lykae, and if she could stay in control of herself, she’d have some extra muscle who knew the area to help her.

After a hasty shower, Lucia dressed, some imp making her choose a babydoll T-shirt and some of the shorter shorts she’d packed. Feeling more optimistic than she had in memory, she lightly lined her eyes with kohl and brushed on lip gloss.

She was just about to set out when her gaze fell on his bulging duffel bag. He wasn’t the only one with a marked curiosity. She knelt beside it, rooting through his belongings. Aside from clothes, she found a large leather bundle with knotted ties—and two condoms.

For other women? They must have been. Valkyrie couldn’t get pregnant unless they took steps to, and they had no need for safe sex. Though Lucia had no right to be jealous—she’d sent MacRieve away again and again—the idea left her unaccountably envious.

No, not
unaccountably
. She’d never denied that the Scot’s kisses were like a drug to her. Just listening to his raspy brogue made her want to sigh. From the earliest moments with MacRieve, she’d felt possessiveness toward him….

She thought she heard someone coming and stuffed everything back in his bag.

A second later, he burst through the door. “You showered without me again? You’re underutilizing me.” Before she could reply, he asked, “You ever see a caiman before?” When she shook her head, he said, “You want to?”

“Uh, sure?”

At that, MacRieve ushered her out of the cabin, with his gaze pinned on her and filled with curiosity. He gave her a grin, looking like a crafty wolf.

And she couldn’t help but feel like a henhouse he planned to raid….

TWENTY-EIGHT

When Garreth had returned to the cabin, Lucia was wearing a small top that molded to her pert breasts and the shortest shorts he’d ever seen her in.

As if she needed anything else to attract his attention.

Add to that his earlier glimpse of her naked body, and he was going to be randy all day, pacing the decks till tonight, when he could bring her down below again.

Unless a storm blew up. Never had he prayed for rain as he would be today.

Now, on their way to the third-floor observation deck, Garreth was right on her heels as they climbed the rusted iron stairs. “Since I was on my best behavior last night,” he murmured at her ear, “I bet part of you is wondering if you ought no’ have approached me with this deal earlier.”

She glanced over her shoulder with a raised brow. “As if you would’ve settled for this in the beginning. You had to experience a year of nothing for this to be appetizing.”

She was likely right about that.

When they reached the deck, Damiãno was just heading down. “
Bom dia,
” he said pleasantly.

“And good morning to you,” Lucia replied with a smile that made Garreth want to eviscerate Damiãno.

Garreth jerked his chin up, the gesture in no way a greeting. In turn, the man narrowed his eyes before descending the steps.

“Am I going to have to separate you two?” she asked when they were alone on the deck.

“No’ if he watches his step,” Garreth said in all seriousness.

Once he’d ushered her to the railing, he closed in behind her, making her tense against him. He knew she would consider this crowding, but he couldn’t help himself. “See it there?” Over her shoulder, he pointed out a four-foot-long caiman lying atop a water lily. “It’s a juvenile.” Sporting a bony ridge over ruddy eyes and a black body, the creature lay with its mouth wide open, jagged teeth exposed. “They’re like a sharper alligator. Physically. Don’t know about mentally. Though they do seem to be wilier.”

Deftly slipping to Garreth’s side, she asked, “How big do they get?”

“The largest one on record was twenty-five feet. But Schecter’s right—there are bigger ones way upriver.
Much
bigger.”

“You brought me out to see the caiman, and I’m almost more amazed by the water lily underneath it. It’s huge, like a table.”

“
Victoria amazonica.
They get larger and grow thicker farther upriver as well.”

She gazed around. “How far did we travel over the night?”

“I believe we’re on a patch of the river where the map was missing, so who can tell?” They hadn’t passed a boat all morning. “But far enough out that we’re going to start seeing more and more river creatures. Pink dolphins and giant otters.”

“It sounds like make-believe,” Lucia said, leaning back against the rail. She’d plaited her caramel-colored hair over her ears, but glossy curls tumbled free across her shoulders and around her elven face. He imagined those curls spread over his pillow as he mounted her lush, wee body, imagined them wrapped around his fist as he took her from behind—

“So what was Travis up in arms about?”

“Huh?”
Inward shake.
“Uh, apparently the captain has a standing order that no improvements are to be made to the ship, which—by the look of this wreck—is rarely countermanded. Charlie can fix things, but he’ll get his knuckles rapped if he does more.”

“That’s strange.”

“Oh, aye.” There was a lot of strangeness about Travis. But the human responded to cash.

Garreth had already bribed him to head in the direction of Rio Labyrinto.

Yet though Travis was an odd bird, there definitely was something up with Charlie. While his sister Izabel seemed confident and open, he had a quiet, awkward demeanor. Today, he’d looked pale, sickly even. Garreth couldn’t put his finger on what was
off
, just knew something was.

“Where are the others?” Lucia asked.

“Rossiter is pacing in his cabin. Izabel just finished up with a gourmet breakfast. Schecter was slinking around the stern scouting for a place to ‘deploy’ his ‘sonic lure.’ I asked him if that’s what the kids were calling it these days, but he dinna get it,” Garreth said, and her lips quirked. Rubbing the back of his neck, he added, “But we’re being watched.”

“I know. Can you scent anything?”

He shook his head. “Sensory overload.” The last time he was here, the same had happened to him; it took him weeks to familiarize himself with all the new scents. “Guess we’ll just need to be ready for anything.” He gazed out over the churning water. “I bluidy hate this place.”

“Tell me what you know about the river,” she said. “Tell me some more
dangers
.”

“Dangers, then? In the jungles all around us, there are indigenous tribes. They stay hidden—you’ll never see a hint of them on this trip. And they’re peaceable unless provoked—such as when some git like Damiãno goes hunting for them with a Polaroid. Then they’ll rise up with a fury. No’ to mention the fact that the poisons they concoct make the feys’ look mild,” he said. “Did Nïx give you any indication what the dieumort would be? Maybe it’s a poison.”

“No indication. But I suspect it’s an arrow. Otherwise, why would she dispatch me, an archer, down into the jungle to retrieve a weapon I don’t know how to wield?”

“True.”

“Are there natives on the Rio Labyrinto?” she asked, her demeanor so guileless, as if she hadn’t just slyly segued to what she
really
wanted to know about—the location of the labyrinth.

“No. But there were long ago. I stumbled upon the ruins of a necropolis.”

“A city of the dead?”

“Aye, with temples and crypts surrounding a huge tomb,” he said. “Everything you read says there are no ruins directly in the basin. The river fluctuations supposedly made building there impossible because any site would be under forty feet of water half of the year. But this necropolis was constructed in a bowl, with mammoth stonework levees all around it—really advanced stuff.”

“If the inhabitants are gone, then why is it rumored that no one returns?”

“Probably because it’s infested with giant caimans,” MacRieve answered. “That and
matora
.”

Lucia frowned. “A bull eater?”

“Aye. Sucuriju Gigante. The giant anaconda. Rio Labyrinto is teeming with them.”

She raised a brow. “You’re saying they exist outside of J. Lo movies?”

“I saw several of them that stretched more than eighty feet, their bodies as thick as an oil drum. They’re everywhere. Well, almost. They liked to sun themselves atop the levee walls but never descended into the city.”

“I can’t believe they’re real. And that Schecter’s…
right
.”

“Aye, primordial sizes. You never get the sight of an eight-ton mating ball out of your head, that’s for certain.” He gave a mock shudder. “The snakes can strike with a speed that would boggle your mind. Even an immortal could no’ fight one off if it wrapped around the arms.”

“So anyone unlucky enough to find Rio Labyrinto—which you said is possibly the gateway to El Dorado—would be eaten by various reptiles?”

Shoulders back, he said, “Except for me.” He looked as if he’d just stopped himself from thumping his own chest.

“Did you
see
the lost city of gold?”

“Nay, but in the necropolis, most of the hieroglyphs depicted shining treasure in some manner.”

“And?” She waved him on. “More details, please.”

“After you, Lousha. I ken you’re no’ telling me everything you know about the god killer.”

Seeing no harm in sharing her theory, Lucia said, “I told you I suspect it’s an arrow, but I think it’s a golden one. Hence my interest in El Dorado.”

“Why gold?”

“The goddess Skathi uses golden arrows. And all through history, they’ve been wielded by great archers. It seems… fitting that an arrow with so much power would be incomparable,” she said. “Now tell me more about El Dorado.”

“Should I reveal all so you can dump me sooner?” he asked in a scoffing tone.