Wicked Pleasure (10 page)

While she'd been thinking, he'd been dressing. Once dressed, he grabbed his jacket and headed for the door. “Oh, and I'd stay away from Wade, Fo. I can't guarantee that I could put you together again.”

Kim couldn't believe it. He was leaving. Just turning his back so she could pick up Fo and test exactly how demonic he was. A real demon wouldn't take that chance. She had to know one way or another.

“Whoa. You don't leave this room without telling me what you are.” Oh, please. She wasn't going to race across the room and tackle him. Was she? The image of his bare, buff body teased her memory. Not a totally bad idea.

Stop it. Get a grip.
There, she was focused again.

He paused with his hand on the doorknob. “I'm a demon of sensual desire, Kim. I thought you'd have figured that out by now.”

Breathe, breathe, breathe.
“An incubus?”

His harsh laughter mocked her. “Not hardly. An incubus has choices. I don't. And I don't sneak up on women while they're sleeping. I lay everything out while they're wide awake. Maybe that makes me a little more honest.” He started to turn the knob.

What had happened to his demon's mantra—deny, deny, deny? Somehow he couldn't work up the energy to think that through. She'd either let him walk or pick up Fo to end his existence. Right now, Brynn didn't much care which. Her choice.

“Come back and talk to me, Brynn.” She sounded calm, but he felt her fear and uncertainty as an acid trickle along the edges of what passed for his heart.

Strange. He didn't usually feel any emotions after the compulsion other than his own frustration and despair. And he never cared enough about the women who did or didn't claim his body to tap into their emotions.

She didn't know it, but she was giving him that oh-so-rare gift, a choice. And he'd lied about not caring what decision she made. He always felt self-disgust after the compulsion ended, but he no longer hated himself enough to invite destruction.

Brynn had pretty much figured that Kim wouldn't use Fo to end his existence after he'd put Fo's tiny bits and pieces back together again. He'd based his belief on the gut feeling that she was one of the few Vaughn family members without a shriveled raisin for a conscience.

He weighed his possible responses—keep walking and let her think he was pond scum who got off on offering sex to every woman he met, or go back and explain that he had no options.

Turning back was the coward's path. Since he had no defenses against the compulsion, he'd compensated by taking pride in his strengths. Throughout his existence he'd never begged for sympathy. He did what he did and then walked away. The women who turned him down could think what they damned well pleased. And the ones who used him? They didn't remember it as a real event, so they didn't matter. Only since coming to the Castle of Dark Dreams had he lowered his defenses enough to allow a few friends to know about the compulsion. But never an outsider. No, he definitely had to walk away from Kim.

He turned back. And that surprised him enough to keep him quiet until he'd dropped onto the couch. Kim sat in the chair across from him. He smiled. “Keeping the table between us?”

She pulled Fo to her side of the table. “Keeping Fo between us.” Kim didn't return his smile. “Let's talk about your job description. When did you first realize your calling?” She pushed a strand of hair from her face.

Now that he'd decided to tell her his story, he'd make it short and get his dumb butt out of here. Because opening up to a Vaughn couldn't have a good ending. Kim might not hunt him down, but all she had to do was tell one of her relatives, and he'd have to run, kill, or go down. Not the kind of choices he had in mind.

“I woke up in an inn five hundred years ago knowing I was a demon and that I was the proud owner of a compulsion. If I stay with a woman for more than an hour, I have to offer her my body. If she accepts, I'm hers until she can't do it anymore.” He shrugged. “Usually a few hours, maybe a night. Once it's over, I have the power to make her think it was all a dream. If the woman turns me down, I'm home free until the next time.”

Kim frowned, a line forming between her eyes. He fixed his gaze on that line.

“And if you try to resist the compulsion?”

“Pain. Lots and lots of pain.”

“How about if you go off by yourself for a while?”

“After a few days away from women, more pain.”

The crease between her eyes deepened. “Can't you resist the pain?”

“Ever been kicked in the balls?” He knew his smile was just a baring of his teeth. “No, guess not. It's a man thing. You'll just have to use your imagination. Not much chance of resisting it for more than say . . . three minutes.”

“How did you survive for five centuries?” The horror in her voice shocked him into meeting her gaze. The few women who'd discovered the truth about him had one of two reactions—disgust or fascination. None of them gave a damn about his take on the whole sexual compulsion scenario.

Her eyes were soft with sympathy.

Not the response he'd expected. Not the one he wanted. “Don't waste any pity on me. It didn't take me long to develop a few coping skills.” Very few.

“Like what?” She leaned forward, her gaze intent on him.

Didn't she know that her clear green eyes hid nothing, not her interest or her feelings? Suddenly uneasy, he looked away. He focused his attention on the two plants that sat on a small stand beneath one of the arrow slits. He didn't know their names, but they had to be disappointed. They expected more from him. Too bad he wouldn't be here when Kim found out about them.

But she'd asked him a question. He raised his gaze to meet hers. “I was a little more subtle than usual with you.” And if he could figure out why, he'd feel a lot more in control.

“Subtle?” She didn't try to hide the disbelief in her voice. “Yeah, I guess if you think a ten-point quake is just a ‘subtle' tremblor. Me? I thought there was a whole lotta shakin' going on.”

Brynn took a quick glance at his watch. Better keep track of the minutes this time. “Here's how it usually plays out.” He purposely met her gaze, letting the heat and hunger shine through. All fake. Then why didn't it feel fake? His cock thought it felt damned real.

He watched her swallow and let his gaze slide down to the smooth curve of her neck. Eric would appreciate a world-class neck like hers.

But he wasn't the only one with sliding-gaze syndrome. Hers was slipping and skipping down his torso, but it came to a skidding stop when it reached his arousal.

He'd use his erection as part of his demonstration. Purposely, he spread his legs, stretching the material of his jeans taut across the bulge of his cock. “When I make the mistake of losing track of the time, the compulsion hits me. It's instant arousal. Getting naked and offering my body is part of the compulsion. I don't have any choice. But I
can
decide how I'll offer myself.”

Kim looked wary now. “And I assume the
how
is meant to be a major turnoff?”

He didn't need to do this.
Sure you do.
Because for the first time in hundreds of years, he had a hard-on that wasn't compulsion generated. He couldn't want one particular woman when he belonged to any female who put in her hour and said yes to his offer. It would hurt too much. And he was into avoiding pain wherever he found it. So yeah, he had to do this. Gross her out before he started liking her for her mind.

Rising, he walked around the coffee table to stand behind her chair. He could feel tension along with excitement thrumming through her. Her scent was of warm, sunlit beaches and dark, tropical nights. And when the hell had he started noticing what women smelled like? It must be the whole opposites attract thing, because if he had a scent it was of rocky cliffs and blinding ice storms. Not compatible.

“Normally, I'd just say . . .” He couldn't help it. He bent down, ran his tongue over the sensitive skin behind her ear, and laughed softly as she stiffened. “Want to fuck, babe?”

Brynn waited expectantly for her to cringe away from him. She didn't. Instead, she turned her head to study him with cool green eyes. “Does it work? Do they turn you down?”

He shrugged. “Not often enough.”

“I have an answer to your question, Brynn.” Fo's eyes somehow managed to express deep thought.

“Question?” Brynn had forgotten what he'd asked.

“You wanted to know if Kimmie should use me to destroy you.” Fo paused as if contemplating the ethical enormity of her decision. “It wouldn't be right for her to make me destroy a being who'd saved me from death. I might not survive the trauma. Kimmie would have to put me in a mental health facility at enormous expense.”

“Thanks, Fo.” Interesting. Fo thought of herself in human terms—dead as opposed to inoperative.

Kim's cell phone rang, stopping any possible rebuttal to Fo's reasoning. Kim got up and walked to her bed. She pulled the phone from her jacket pocket, then looked at him expectantly. She thought he'd leave. No chance.

Annoyed, she turned her back to him, as though that would stop him from hearing. “Hey, Lynsay. What's happening?”

Pause.

“What? You're kidding. You can't.”

Pause.

“Absolutely not. Don't even think about it. I . . .” Kim blinked and pulled the phone away from her ear to look at it. “She hung up on me.”

“Who's Lynsay?” He could reach into her mind, but clattering around inside Fo's consciousness had tired him out.

“My sister.”

He waited.

“Good-bye, Brynn.” Her expression said he was dismissed.

With a slashing smile aimed at both Fo and her, he nodded and left, closing the door softly behind him. Kim collapsed onto the bed. Her very first morning at the Castle of Dark Dreams, and she felt like she needed to spend some quality time with her head buried under the covers.

But she didn't have time to hide in a dark place contemplating her navel. She had to call Lynsay back and stop her from coming to the castle. And Lynsay was bringing Uncle Dirk.
Who
was Uncle Dirk? Probably one of the far-flung Vaughn family members she'd never met. Lynsay said he'd contacted Mom and Dad with info about possible demon activity here.

Kim had to convince Lynsay she could handle things on her own. But since Kim had never even gotten within sniffing distance of the Demon Hunter of the Year award, Lynsay—who'd won it three times—might be a hard sell.

Kim rubbed the back of her neck to dispel some of her tension. No way did she want her family here messing up her first job as an architect.
Is that your only reason?

Fine, so she didn't want Lynsay to discover that Brynn was a demon. She owed him for Fo. Besides, he had enough problems without having to hide from rabid demon hunters. Lynsay and Uncle Dirk wouldn't spend even a second wondering if Brynn was truly demonic. They'd destroy him. It must be nice to have no doubts about the rightness of your cause, no twinges of conscience.

Nope. None at all.

The bottom line? She wouldn't help her family out demons in the Castle of Dark Dreams. Later on she'd think of a nice, satisfying rationalization—one without the name
Brynn
in it—that didn't sound like a betrayal of all her family stood for.

Exhaling deeply, Kim reached for her phone. But a knock on the door stopped her in mid-reach. What now? So far, she hadn't met one single normal human in this blasted place. No, wait. The guy who'd stomped on Fo seemed pretty normal.

Sighing, she climbed off her bed and walked to the door. Steeling herself for whatever might be on the other side, she pulled the door open.

Ohmigod! A man. A very
big
man. Kim tipped her head back and looked way,
way
up. She gulped. He was huge, all bulky muscle and dangerous scowl. His shaved head gleamed in the dim light, and his sleeveless T-shirt exposed some scary tattoos on his massive arms. When she finally dropped her gaze because she was getting a crick in her neck, she noticed he clutched a plant food container in one giant fist. She would've tried to slam the door in his face, but he'd probably just rip it off its hinges and eat it.

“Hi, Ms. Vaughn. I, um, hate to bother you, but I have to take care of the plants.” He shuffled his very large feet and looked uneasy.

See, now that blew her Jack-and-the-Beanstalk fantasy. Someone like him should never look uneasy. He should stride through life flattening small buildings and shaking the earth as he walked.

“The plants?” She glanced around and spotted them on the stand beneath what passed for a window.

“Yeah, I have a couple of jobs like taking care of the plants in the castle and spelling Sparkle when she wants a few hours away from her store.” He edged around Kim—as well as someone who was that big could edge—and walked over to the plants. “Hey, don't get the idea that these jobs are forever. They're just something to do until I get started in the action hero business.” He cast her a shy glance. “If you ever need an action hero, let me know. I gotta have lots of practice.”

“Sure. I'll keep you in mind.” How could someone that big sound so going-on-sixteen?

Kim trailed behind him as she tried to imagine little kids running screaming from the candy store while jelly beans fell unnoticed from their bags. He was one scary-looking dude.

“Do you have to take care of the plants
now
?” Kim shifted her gaze from him long enough to study the plants. Ordinary, bushy plants. Didn't look like they needed emergency care.