Quench (4 page)

“These are much better to kick your ass with if I have to.”
Viv couldn’t keep the smile from curling her lips.

He leaned back into her. “I know how to wipe that look from
your face. I much prefer the smoldering, sexy one you had a few minutes ago.”

“So what do you plan to do about it?”

His mouth smashed into hers and his incisors nipped her
bottom lip. After kissing her deeply, he collected the spot of blood with his
tongue.

“You taste good.” He straightened his shirt and appeared to
fondle his balls a minute longer than necessary when he situated his swollen
cock in his pants.

It was her turn to chuckle.

The breath left her body in a whoosh when he carried her
quickly into the night sky.

“Drop me, bastard, I’ll kill you.”

“Viv, we’re both already dead.”

She joined in his infectious laughter.

Exhilaration lifted her spirits, made her forget she had
momentarily lost the ability to fly. Alek winged her through the night sky so
fast her voice disappeared on the wind and her thick hair whipped against her
cheeks.
Should have plaited it.

I like it loose.

Why had that simple statement made her so happy?
I’ve
never traveled like this before.

I’ll have to carry your ass around more often.

Don’t get cocky, I’m not always going to be at a
disadvantage.

Hang on, honey, enjoy the ride
. He sped up and in
moments dropped down in a secluded part of a brightly lit parking lot.

“Welcome back to the Looking Glass. This time I’ll make sure
you see everything.”

Finding seats at the bar, Alek arranged with the bartender
to get a private room. Finishing their drinks, they went back to wait on
dinner. Human food held no appeal for vamps. But tonight Viv was starving. A
bloody steak danced around in her head like visions of the fucking plum fairy.

When the door of the private room opened hair bristled on
the back of her neck. A pretty blonde carried the tray over and set it on the
table. Snow leopard shifter.

“Hey, Alek, it’s been a while.”

“Hol, this is Viv. Viv, Holly is the manager here.”

Going to stand by the open door, Viv said, “Thanks for the
food, see ya.”
Whoa, where did that come from?
Not rude, never mean
unless she had to be, the harsh words she spat out surprised the shit out of
her.

“Honey, you won’t have a problem with me.” The shifter
smiled and left a tad quicker than she entered. Viv wanted to bump her in the
ass with the door.
Bitch
.

“Didn’t take you for the jealous type?”

Her cheeks grew hot with embarrassment at seeing Alek’s brow
slant up in disbelief. Unable to resist the warm smell of fresh blood emanating
from the meat, she was drawn to the table.

“Yeah, well, neither did I but we’ll see how you do when you
meet one of my exes.”

“Hol and I weren’t a couple, Viv.”

“I don’t care.” Yanking off a piece of steak, she chewed it
thoughtfully and licked her fingers dry. Delicious. Processing the new feeling,
she was unsure of what to say or do next. Viv wasn’t used to eating real food.
Must be the cat’s blood because damn, she wanted more. And was she jealous?
Hell
yes.
She turned back to face Alek, who still stared at her. “Don’t ever
touch her again. I’ll drain your striped ass.”

Snagging another large piece of meat, she swallowed it
whole. Grabbing her neck, she sputtered and coughed until his hand thumped her
on the back, causing the chunk to dislodge and fly from her mouth.

“I’ll have to show you how to eat. It’s something even a cub
knows.” He shook open a napkin and wiped her mouth before he planted a kiss
there.

Viviana choked again. Not on meat this time but the
implication of his words. She’d heard about mating with the Kind. No way was
she going to be a goddamn hairy-assed cat. No way.

“Alek, everything going on here,” her arms motioned in the
air, “I hope you’re not thinking we’re
draga
or something? We’re not
mates.” Shoving hands through her hair, she wished it was braided so she could
feel more like the killer she was. She tried to calm herself. “Shit, I’m not
cut out to run on all fours.”

“Relax, we’re having fun tonight. Okay? I don’t expect
anything from you.”

“Yeah, well, just thought I’d mention it.” She rubbed her
sweating palms down her thighs. Not a normal vampyre reaction either. The
warmth and flushes she’d started to feel, now sweating, these weren’t things
her people did. It just didn’t happen. Cats went into heat, not vamps. They
were coldhearted, dead, damn it.

“No one will make you do something you don’t want to do.”
His eyes became vampyrelike and narrowed to red slits. “My true mate, my
draga
moja,
will want to be what I am.” His eyes burned into her. “No need to
worry that description fits you, huh?”

Her sore throat wheezed on the air she breathed. “Look,
don’t take offense or anything but I’m not exactly sure what that means.
Yesterday I liked what we did. But it was sex, pure and simple.” Her shoulders
flinched in reaction to the bead of sweat trickling down her spine.

“Hey, you’re sweating. I’ll ask Hol to turn up the air.” He
spun on his heels and headed toward the door.

“I’ll scratch her eyes out if she comes back in this room.”
Christ,
I did not say that.

“Yes, you did.” Alek rubbed his hands together before
pushing one through his striped mane. He prowled back across the room, stood
toe-to-toe with her. “Pull the claws in, honey. Makes you look like a wild cat
and that turns me on.” Grasping her shoulders, he lowered his head to her neck,
where he licked and nibbled on her pulse. Set her freezing-cold blood on fire.

“Alek, don’t, please,” she begged, fear gnawing at her insides.
Her pussy clenched and sent cream sliding to the seat of her already wet
panties. Normally commando, after what happened last night, she thanked God
she’d fabricated a pair. Hands shaking, Viv was suddenly more afraid of what
would happen if he stopped.

“I’ll never stop. I want you,” he murmured softly against
her neck. “Whether you choose to have claws or not doesn’t matter to me.” His
head came up and their eyes clashed. The vampyre red gone, lust flared in his
emerald depths. “I smell your desire.”

Too late to stop but she tried once more. “Aww, hell,
please—”

He cut her off.

“Yeah,
please
take me. I’m yours tonight, Viv, pure
and simple.”

Alek scoured her face intently as she made up her mind.
Force wasn’t something he’d use and he would put to death any male who
mistreated a woman. It was hard to watch hesitation play across her features.
Thoughts skittered in every direction around her mind and he couldn’t grasp a
single one.

He waited as each drop of sweat forming on her delectable
body sent her aroma floating through the room. She smelled like heaven.

“I can give you everything you need.”

It killed him to see her pink tongue peek out and move
across her lips, kissable lips that beckoned to his. He hunched his shoulders
to loosen the kink that had settled there while he waited.

He’d never force her but neither would he let her go. Viv
owned him and she didn’t know it yet but she was his. Never intending to let
things go this far, Alek was unsure of his next move.

“Viv, let me make love to you. Just once more.” Her need
slammed into him like a sledgehammer. That’s all it took. He moved his arms
around her waist, pulled her tight in his embrace and whispered, “I’m thirsty,
honey.” Could she,
had she
quenched his thirst for the prince’s blood?
Alek hadn’t thought about him for hours. All he thought of was having this
woman in his arms and making her…happy. Giving her what she wanted, what she
needed. The idea of being with her always, keeping her to himself, made his
heart soar. With Viv in his arms, for the first time in years Alek felt free.

Her head lolled to the side, baring her jugular. His fangs
lengthened, ready to take what she offered. His tongue ran along her shoulder,
lapped at the base of her neck until she trembled.

“Do it, taste me.”

His teeth sank slowly into her sweet flesh, punctured the
vein and he drank. Her life force flowed into him, rushed to every depleted
cell in his body. The cats purred, stretched and preened. Each getting what
they wanted—blood, Viv’s blood.

Alek clutched her ass, brought her hard against the bulge in
his slacks. Not ready to remove them yet, he enjoyed the feel of her mound
pressed to him.

Finished, he licked the pinpricks closed. “You’re so sweet.”
His lips touched spots from her collarbone to the vee at the front of her
leather vest. His tongue tasted and teased behind her ear and back down the
vein he’d just fed from.

Her hands pushed between them and nudged his shirt up.

No, not yet. Let me hold and feel you against me just
like this.

“How is it you slip so easily into my thoughts?” she asked.

Because you’re mine
. When she stiffened he said
aloud, “For as long as you want to be.”

Her hands had reached his nipples and she pulled them
roughly.

“You want to play rough?” He lifted one of his hands from
her butt and returned it.
Thwack
. Her pelvis lurched forward, molding into
his dick. “Ahh, you liked that, huh?”

“Think I might like anything you do to me.” She ground into
him, sending shivers down his spine. “Let’s see if I can find something
you
like.” Viv bowed back and pulled his shirt up and over his head. Lowering her mouth
to his pebbled nipple, she sucked it.

“Damn, I’d say that’s something.”

She wasn’t done. She bit down hard, drew blood and her
tongue circled the tender peak. “Did I find anything else you like?”

“Oh yeah.” He walked backward and pressed her back to the
glass, Alek pushed the button to raise the privacy screen. “Look.” He spun her
around and pressed her tight against the glass. Was she a kindred spirit? He
could have ventured deep into her psyche, seen what she liked but Alek needed
to feel her sensation firsthand. Watching someone touch another person
intimately was stimulating and it fed his animalistic side. Viv had a wild
streak, a dormant beast waiting to be let out. Alek wanted to be the one to
release those emotions, bring them to the surface. “You like what you see?”

The couple in the performers’ room was deep in their act.
Viv hissed her delight.

On her knees in the bed, the woman took all the man’s shaft
in her cunt. With a good side view Alek and Viv watched it push in and pull
out. The man had one hand on the small of the female’s back, one buried in her
dark hair. Her head craned back and turned to face them. A look of pure bliss
danced on her face.

Watching turns you on.

It wasn’t a question. He’d felt her heartbeat kick up a
notch.

Yes.

She poked her ass against his cock and a drop of cum slipped
from his dick. Alek struggled to refrain from taking his clothes off with
magic. He wanted Viv to do it for him. Piece by piece.

Pulling her away from the glass, he reached around and began
to undo the low-cut black leather vest. Reaching its last snap, he took it off.
He turned her to face him and started with her pants. Once undone, he eased
them over her hips and inch by inch down her long, shapely legs.

“I’m developing a dislike for spiked boots.” He chuckled as
he bent to take one then the other off. She leaned back on the glass. Alek
tossed the boots across the room. Pants followed and landed in a nearby chair.
Standing, he gazed at her naked except for a lacy red pair of panties. “Fucking
beautiful.” He reached into her underwear and pushed his fingers through her
moist folds. “And, damn, you’re wet.”

“Ooh, Alek, don’t tease me.” Viv jerked on his fingers.
Arching back, she took them in her channel.

He used his other hand to work and pinch her nipples into
hard peaks. “Am I teasing you?”

“Yes.” Her fingers fumbled with the button at the top of his
pants. Finally opening them, she reached in and grabbed his dick. “But not for
long.”

Air whooshed from his lungs when her cool fingers captured
his length.

Enough.

The rest of their clothes were gone in an instant.

“Cheater,” she murmured.

“Didn’t want you to have to tangle with my boots.” He
whipped her back around just in time to see the man shoot a string of cum on
his partner’s ass. “Baby, we missed the show. Guess we’ll have to have our
own.”

Flipping her back to face him, he told her, “I want you,
Viv.”

“Show me how much.”

Alek grasped her behind in his hands and lifted her. “Wrap
your legs around my waist.” His painfully engorged cock slipped right into her
wet canal. “God yes.” His knees flexed as he started to stroke in and out of
her pussy. Back to the glass, there was nowhere for her to move. Her arms wound
around his neck. Eyes closed, she began to pump her body up and down on his
shaft. In minutes she had him ready to pop. No way would he come without
satisfying her first. “Viv, open your eyes, look at me.”

Midnight-blue eyes flashed open, her pink tongued darted
out, wet her lips. She spoke softly, “Show me all of you.”

Alek stopped moving but still held her tight, kept his cock
buried deep in her pussy. There was nothing he wanted more than to show her
everything. How would she react? No. She’d already said she didn’t want to be
his mate, already told him what she gave was only for now. But would that be
enough?

“You want only tonight, that’s what I’ll give you.” Bending
his head, he lapped at a peaked nipple, circled it with his tongue until he
sucked the bud into his mouth.
Sweet
. “If you want me to stop I will.”
He released the nub and moved to the other side. He nipped it with his teeth,
teased it with his tongue. “Tonight’s all you want, it’s all I’m offering.”

Arching her back, she ground her pelvis into his crotch. “I
want you!”

“You got me, baby girl.” Slowly he pulled his cock out, just
as slowly he eased back in her pussy. Again and again. Slow. Tonight he’d give
her all she desired. Tomorrow, if Viv wasn’t there it would be just another
godforsaken day and he’d live with it like he had all the other days. “You’re
so fucking hot, so good.” His lips covering hers in a long, passionate kiss, he
nipped her.

Pushing deep, thrusting hard, this time Alek didn’t let up.
Sweating, she slipped up and down the glass surface each time he entered her.

Come for me. Come with me, honey.

Now…oooh Alek.
She keened in his mind as her pussy
throbbed around his thickness.

Give it to me.

She did. Cream slipped past his cock as she squeezed and
milked him every time he surged in and pulled out. Unable to hold it any
longer, his orgasm slid from his tight nuts through his cock and poured into
her pussy. His head dropped to her shoulder, air puffed from him in short
gasps, sending strands of her platinum hair back and forth across his cheek.

Had he been human his knees would have buckled. Holding Viv,
his cock still in her, was a dream come true, something Alek had thought he
would never have. He wanted to hold her always. Keep her breasts pressed to his
chest, her nipples glued to him.

“I’m not thirsty for him when I’m with you,” he whispered.

Realizing too late what he’d said, he shielded his mind but
Alek couldn’t take the words back.

Son. Of. A. Bitch.

What had come over her? Viv had never been jealous a day in
her life. Vampyres didn’t have that bone in their body. Unless… No, she refused
to entertain the idea. No. No. No.

Yes, her soul screamed back at her.

Shit.

Draga. Dragana.
Either word, she knew what it meant. Mate.
Vamps had life mates too.

I will not be part of a pride of freaking cats!

Had it not been for Phoenix Viv would have transported herself
so far from the cat in front of her she’d forget him.

That was a lie. Viviana would never forget Alek.

Her head pounded as she struggled to keep him from her
thoughts.
Think
. All she had to do was think rationally.

He had stood before her, waited so patiently for her to make
up her mind. If she’d said no what would he have done?

It had been all over when he’d asked to make love to
her—just once more. Her need to mate with him overrode everything. And boy had
he made love to her.

Pressed against the cool glass, Viv clung to him, her legs
wrapped around his waist, his cock still in her satisfied pussy. She stroked
his back and pushed her hands into his thick multicolored hair. His breath came
in rapid gasps against her shoulder as he gathered himself.

This is my mate.

Thoughts ran rampant in her head and she missed the words he
whispered, hadn’t been able to read them. Something about being thirsty?

“Umm, babe, no offense but my mind was still on what you did
to me so I missed what you said.”

“What?”

One sharp word
. Damn, why is he pissed
? “Did you say
you were thirsty?”

“Uhh, yeah, I could use a glass of wine.”

“You’ll have to put me down first.”

His brow quirked up. “Right.”

He carried her to the bed and they both fell in and
stretched out. Viviana looked around the room. It resembled the one she’d used
with the brothers the night before except there was no sofa, only a bed, and an
ornate cabinet that held towels, some lotion and oils. A highly polished wooden
table stood in one corner with a few chairs. This was a voyeurs room and
depending on what turned you on you could watch or be watched through the
two-way mirror with the push of a button.

A bubble of happiness floated through her—he liked to watch
too. She had pegged him as a performer. The urge to put on a show for the
couple in the other room had sneaked from his mind to hers while they watched.

“You wanted wine?”

“I’m fine. We should get back. Sun rises in a few hours.” He
turned on his side and gazed at her. His fingers traced a heated path down her
belly. “I love your brown skin and don’t want to see it burned.” His eyes
followed his hand but he seemed distracted.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Viv.” He pulled his hand back. “Let’s get out of
here.”

Dressed instantly, they left the room and walked through the
bar. She peered around for the manager, who was nowhere in sight.
Good
.

Stepping into the cool desert night, Alek stopped. “Wait
here, I’ll be right back.”

Jealousy flared in her chest and she worked hard to tamp it
down. Nothing she could do if he wanted to see the manager. Deep in thought,
she ignored the sound of the door opening.

Viv leaned against the wall, unable to do anything other
than wait. Of course, she could walk back to the mansion.

“Need to get somewhere?”

Goddamn it. Usually vigilant, she had allowed the creature
to sneak up on her. Not good. She sniffed and tried to search his mind to no
avail. Viv did get one thing—the rank odor of transgressor, one who had
recently slipped over the edge. Pumped up on human blood, he held his vampyre
form well.

The Kind species had their own rogues and somehow this one
had slipped unnoticed into the club. Alek, in his preoccupation with whatever
he had to do, had missed the vile scent of the gaunt being. Any strong warrior
would have picked up on it immediately.

“Fresh blood.” His smile twisted into a grimace. “Always
makes us stronger.”

Transgressors were dangerous, unpredictable street vermin
who roamed at night. Known to drain man or beast of blood, they would assume
their beastly form and gorge on the flesh. The more blood and flesh they
consumed, the more uncontrollable they became, and eventually they lost their
ability to change from their beast. Pursued endlessly by Reign warriors, the
creatures died painfully in the form of whatever animal they were.

Handsome as hell, the diseased cat would be a formidable
opponent. The hair coloring told her cheetah or jaguar. Making note of the
thin, whipcord-hard body beneath a cotton t-shirt, Viv confirmed cheetah. As
cat or a man they were wiry and fast as hell. This one possessed strong vampyre
abilities. She’d failed to keep her shields in place and he’d read her mind.