Shadow Rites

There were two other vehicles in the circular turnaround in front of HQ, both armored vamp-mobiles. Katie and Grégoire—Leo’s heir and second-in-line heir, both of whom were his dinners and his lovers (vamp feeding and sexual habits almost always combined the two), were here and were parked in front, which was strange. Eli said, again without my asking, “The back entrance is closed for security upgrades. We’re still installing the new traffic spike system under the porte cochere.”

“Still?”

“Problem with the timer. It’ll be finished by tomorrow, EOB.” EOB was end of business. Meaning by five or six o’clock p.m. Eli got out of the limo without the driver’s help and shut the door. He stood with his back to us, ostentatiously studying the grounds, giving me a moment alone with Bruiser. Who gripped my upper arm and pulled me across the seat, my bottom sliding across the leather with ease.

“I’ve missed you,” he whispered into my ear as the privacy partition rose silently between us and the driver. Bruiser’s arms went around me and my head went back. The heat of an Onorio’s body warmed my skin. The scent that had always meant Bruiser, combined with the new notes that said Bruiser the Onorio, filled my senses. His mouth opened and his teeth grazed the tendons and muscles that connected shoulder to head.

Inside me, Beast quivered with interest. Big-cats’ mating rituals included the female being bitten just there, or behind the ear, and held still while the mating took place. It was a pseudosubmission that Beast would never allow unless she wanted the biter as mate.

Along with her interest was my own reaction that was never very far from me, the memory of being held down while Leo forced a blood meal off me. Bruiser was trying to help me through it, past it, and he was doing a great job, as the minuscule gush of fear had already morphed into something hotter and more demanding. I slid a leg up over his and he lifted me onto his lap, straddling him.

His cheek and nose skimmed my neck and up to my ear. “Do you remember the first time we went to a party in this limousine?” he asked.

Ohhh. Yeeeah . . . Us on the floor, one of his hands down my top and the other up my skirt. If I hadn’t been wearing a weapon strapped to my thigh, we might have gotten more than just frisky that night. The weapon had sorta stopped that. I hadn’t been supposed to carry a weapon into the party of vamps and their humans. “Mmmm,” I hummed in response.

“Are you wearing a weapon tonight?”

“Um-hum.” My mouth found his and I sucked his tongue into my mouth, pulling him close, until his need was pressed hard into the center of me. I shoved my feet around his backside and locked my ankles, nearly knocking us to the floor. Again. Bruiser braced his legs on the seat across from us, grabbed the back of my head with one arm around me.

“If I never told you,” he growled, grinding us together, “I hate pants on you.” He kissed me so hard our teeth clacked together, and my lips swelled with the pressure. His heated scent filled my nose. I pulled him to me with one hand and slid the other into his dress shirt, sending a button flying, ricocheting inside the limo. Beast growled. The sound came out of my throat in a vibration that demanded.

And Eli knocked on the glass.

Bruiser cursed foully, promising a terrible death and dismemberment to my partner. I laughed against his mouth, my breath fast huffs of interrupted need.

The knock came again, along with a fainter click. Over the loudspeaker the driver said, “Forgive me for intruding, sir, but Mr. Younger has informed me that the Master of the City is awaiting Miz Yellowrock. With some impatience.” I heard that distant click again as the driver returned us to audio privacy. I could have sworn he was laughing.

“We,” Bruiser gasped, “will pick this up the moment I return from searching out the magical imperative of the brooch. And I don’t care if I have to drag you out of a business meeting with the Witch Council, the Mithran Council, and the governor. We will finish this.” Bruiser’s heart was thumping madly against my chest. It had been a while for us. I eased away from him, unlocking my heels and sliding to the seat beside him. He held my eyes for a moment, the look promising much more than any words could, his eyebrow quirking up. Just the one. I felt my belly do a slow roll. “You ruined my shirt,” he accused much more mildly.

“Just one button.”

“Do you intend to sew the button back on?”

“Nope. I intend to destroy another one as soon as possible.”

Bruiser barked with laughter, smoothing my hair back again. He rearranged the stakes he had misplaced in my bun. Kissed me again, much more softly and gently. “He will smell me on you.” He was speaking of Leo, who had once upon a time claimed me for himself, until it was explained to the master suckhead that I was neither territory nor a slave. He had claimed Bruiser too, but that was before becoming Onorio had freed him from the chief fanghead.

“Good,” I said. “Old guys sometimes need reminders about who belongs to who. Whom. Whatever.”

Bruiser stilled, his brown eyes holding me. “And do we belong to each other?”

I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say to that. We were exclusive. But the relationship hadn’t gotten to the three-word-phrase, four-letter-word state yet. I love you. Which thought totally terrified me. I looked down, straightening my clothes. “We’re still finding out.” With that cryptic statement, I grabbed my lipstick that had fallen out of my one good pocket and opened the limo door.