Grace Page 7

  Her fantasy of making love in a box whilst everyone around them was unawares came back to tempt her, playing over and over in her mind. She nibbled along his jaw, her eyes closed. A rumble of pleasure came from deep in the back of her throat as his hands smoothed up under her skirt. Just the touch of his skin against her bare legs, his fingers stroking up over her ass, bared by her thong underwear, was enough to set her off. The deep need she couldn’t seem to control when he was around came to the fore.

  Pulling at his shirt, she tried to undo the buttons and kiss him at the same time. He laughed, stilling her hands.

  “Whoa there, Gracie. Anticipation…” he told her, reaching up lazily to undo the buttons along his shirt.

  “Screw anticipation,” she whispered against his lips, desperate to get her hands on him. “In fact, screw screwing anticipation, I want to screw you.”

  He shuddered and his eyes closed for a moment. When they opened, the longing look was gone, replaced by pure heat. He smiled, opening the last button, the fabric of his shirt falling open and revealing his smooth chest and washboard stomach.

  “If you want me, Gracie, take me.”

  She didn’t need his soft order. She pushed his shirt over his shoulders and halfway down his arms. With a wicked grin, she left it there, the fabric pinning his arms in place. It was a trick he’d pulled on her the other night, pinning her arms with her own top. Then he’d spread her legs and used his delightfully talented tongue on her until she’d screamed his name in pleasure, her climax so intense she nearly passed out.

  “Grace.” Her name came out sounding more like a warning. She grinned unrepentantly as she slid from his lap, her hands going for his belt buckle.

  “Payback’s a bitch, isn’t it?” She replied with a wink.

  ***

  Jaron’s mind still reeled as he slid behind the wheel to drive them home. Home. He almost smiled at the thought. He’d not considered any place home for years. He moved around a lot, a new city every ten or so years, to stop people from realising he wasn’t actually ageing. Eventually, he’d even had to go through the elaborate charade and pretend he was his own son. He already had the paperwork in his safe for his next identity, Dragomir Conrad.

  His lips quirked slightly as he twisted the key and the engine roared to life. Yet another change Grace had wrought in him. Along with his indecisiveness. Normally he made a decision and stuck to it. Normally he would have already left. But Grace kept throwing him curveballs, things like the little scene in the box earlier, and he was sticking around like a bad penny.

  Next to him, Grace strapped herself in. Dragomir. He hadn’t used that one in a while. It was, in fact, his name. Jaron Conrad Dragomir. Very dark and Carpathian-sounding. Which was exactly why he hadn’t used it for centuries. But people these days were less suspicious of eastern European-sounding names, their fear of vampires and werewolves replaced by a fear of serial killers and a spot-inspection by the tax office.

  Whilst it gave his kind a bit of a break, the change was sad to see. Along with their fear, humanity had lost something else. A sense of the wondrous, the belief that sometimes magic could happen. Like tonight.

  Magic had happened tonight, clichéd as that sounded. When he’d drawn Grace into his lap he’d intended to seduce her, take the fantasy on the surface of her mind and make it real. However, Grace had had other ideas. She’d taken over and seduced him.

  He pulled out into traffic, the powerful car responding to his every movement. Deep in thought, he focused on driving and getting them home safely. He was used to being the aggressor, the one in charge. So when Grace had pinned his arms in the shirt, he’d been surprised, then aroused.

  Fuck yeah, that had been a turn on. His cock sprang to life in his pants again at the memory. He planted his foot on the accelerator, desperate to get home and finish what they’d started. Next to him, Grace squeaked as he wove in and out of the traffic, driving at breakneck speed until they left the city lights behind them.

  “Jaron. You’ll get us killed!” She protested, one white-knuckled hand gripping her seat belt, her other hand scrabbling for purchase on the door as he threw the car into another bend.

  Jaron laughed but took pity on her. She wasn’t to know that his reactions were razor sharp, he could drive the car at top speed and it still felt like a Sunday afternoon stroll to him. He slowed the car to a more reasonable speed, one that wouldn’t attract the attention of the local cops, and smiled across at her.

  “There, that better?”

  She swallowed and nodded, looking less green now. “Much, thank you. What got into you? In a hurry to get back or something?” She gave a little, nervous laugh.

  He looked at her, dropping his amiable mask and letting her see the need and desire inside. Deliberately, he sent her a scene from earlier. She wouldn’t know where the image had come from. Thanks to their link, forged by her taking of his blood, it was easier for him to slip in and out, inserting the image directly in her mind.

  Her on her knees, reaching for his belt buckle and releasing his straining cock…her small, pink tongue as it flicked out and swept over the sensitive head.

  He smelled her arousal the instant her body softened. The sweet scent flooded the cramped confines of the car to drive him mad. His hands clenched on the steering wheel again. Desire hit him broadside. His nostrils flared as he tried to get himself under control. He stifled the groan that came to his lips and tried to act normal.

  She rolled her head back against the headrest and looked at him. It was all Jaron could do to keep the car on the road rather than pull over, throw the seat back and take her right there in the damn passenger seat. He flicked a glance at the back seat in the rear view mirror. Perhaps... No, he was not taking her in the bloody car like some hormone-driven teenager.

  He kept his eyes on the road, feeling her interested gaze on him. She reached out, smoothed her hand down his shoulder. He slid her a sideways glance, pretending he had no clue what was on her mind.

  “Hey babe,” he murmured, the easy modern phrase sounding a bit odd as his accent thickened.

  Her smile broadened as her hand crept downward. She’d made the connection between his accent and his state of arousal. Damn it. She stroked down his stomach, and his muscles contracted automatically. In his pants his cock strained, as if trying to get closer to her hand.

  And then—Oh God—her hand reached his cock. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel as she stroked him through the fabric, examined the length and breadth of him, as if gauging the strength of his arousal. He was hard, so fucking hard he felt like he was going to burst any minute.

  “Gracie...” He warned, having trouble concentrating on the road ahead with her hand in his lap. Especially when she started to play with his belt buckle. She wouldn’t go down on him, not in the car…would she? His cock pulsed, desperate to feel her mouth on him again. He’d had blowjobs before, of course, but rarely, and none had ever seemed to enjoy it as much as Grace did. That was the real turn on. The pleasure she took in giving him pleasure.

  “So, pleased to see me, I take it?” She purred in his ear, out of her seatbelt and moving closer. Distracted by her, Jaron slowed the car down as a van pulled onto the road ahead of them.

  “You know I am,” he said as she kissed his jaw and along the side of his neck. Her hand whispered over his straining erection, stroking but not fulfilling. “You keep this up and you’re going to find out exactly how pleased I am to see you.”

  “Oooh, tough talk. You man enough to back up your words?”

  “You want me to stop this car and bend you over the hood to fuck you?” he asked, slowing the car to a crawl as the van in front slowed.

  “Great,” he muttered, “Some people should really learn how to damn drive.”

  “Rawr. Scary Jaron.” Grace giggled, still curled up around him as she kissed along his neck. Kisses interspersed with little nips from her blunt human teeth. His eyes rolled back in his head, pleasure exploding throu
gh him at the sensation.

  “Harder.” His demand was a ragged whisper filled with dark need. Not until she complied with his request did he realise how dangerous a game they’d begun. Just one proper bite and he’d lose control. He slammed his foot on the brake and grabbed her hand.

  “Holy shit, Grace; you’ll be the death of me.”

  He locked gazes with her, her hand caught in his between them. His body was rigid as he fought for control. All he wanted to do was drag her into his arms, press her lips to his throat and make her bite him again. Damn it, why shouldn't he? Hadn't he spent enough time alone?

  But before he could move a muscle the door was wrenched open and a harsh voice said, “We can do this the easy way or the painful way. Personally, I prefer the second but it’s your call.”

  ***

  Grace trembled and fought back the terror, the hysteria that had closed off her throat, making it almost impossible to breathe, to speak.

  Before either could react, she and Jaron had been dragged from the car. Jaron had tried to fight but there had been too many of them and there wasn't much arguing anyone could do against a crowbar. Her initial thought—that they were being car-jacked—faded into fearful confusion when they'd been tied up and bundled into one of the vans.

  Grace flicked Jaron a worried glance. Slumped next to her with his head back against the wall, he seemed barely conscious. They'd hit him hard. Heavy purple bruising was already spreading along his temple and the side of his face. Grace winced just to look at it. It had to be painful.

  Jaron felt like a damn fraud, leaning against the wall doing a dying duck act. Sure his head ached; it took a hell of a blow to bruise a vampire. A blow like that would have crushed a human’s skull. Luckily, the thugs that had picked them up and brought them to this place—an abandoned warehouse, by the looks of it—were none too bright. At least two of them were high on something; he could smell the chemical sweetness in their sweat.

  He groaned and opened his eyes, meeting Grace’s worried gaze and feeling more of a fraud. He could end this in around ten seconds flat. The ropes around his wrists wouldn’t hold the weakest youngling, not even a new convert, never mind a five-hundred-year-old vampire. But despite the fact he could shred them like paper, something far stronger held him captive.

  Fear.

  No human could rip ropes like paper. No human would be able to take on seven heavily armed thugs. Hell, no human should have survived that blow with the crowbar but, thankfully, Grace didn’t know how hard he’d been hit. And the thug who’d hit him was one of the users. He’d just looked at the crowbar and shrugged. It had taken all Jaron’s control not to just rip his throat out and end it there and then.

  But then Grace would know what he was; or at least she’d know what he wasn’t. Jaron smiled at her, a weak smile to go along with his play-acting. She was so worried about him; concern and something else shone in her eyes. Something he didn’t want to recognise, but he did, the emotions in the forefront of her mind.

  Love. She loved him.

  Guilt twisted in his gut like a knife. She loved him, she was worried about him. And he was lying to her about who he was. What he was. But he couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Once she knew he was a monster, her love would die. She would run. Leave him as Julia had.

  “Are you ok?” she whispered, casting a nervous glance about to see if any of the goons were close by. Jaron had caught the way they were looking at her, the way the biggest of them looked at her, in particular, and his rage simmered.

  “Yeah, I think so.” He added a groan for effect as he blinked, faking the effects of a concussion.

  “Shut it you two.” The smallest of the thugs, a weasely looking guy, snarled from his perch on some crates nearby. Try as he might, Jaron couldn’t pick up any clues from any of them as to what this was about. The two high on whatever cocktail of chemicals they preferred were in their happy places so he ignored them. The others had just been told to pick them up and bring them here. He couldn’t get any other details from them, not even from the leader. They simply didn’t know. Their orders had come by phone from an unknown source. They’d been paid in advance with the promise of more if they delivered.

  “I still say we should do the girl.”

  A large man lurched in front of them, glaring down at Grace with undisguised lust in his eyes. Jaron felt sick at the images going through the thug’s mind. He’d thought he was a pervert because of some of the things he wanted to do to Grace. Things that involved silk bonds and soft whips, things he planned to introduce her to when she was ready. But the fantasies running through this guy’s head made Jaron’s blood freeze in his veins.

  Jaron’s lip curled, just the tiniest hint of a snarl as he locked eyes with the thug.

  “Don’t even think about it.” His voice was soft. He was tied up against a wall. To all intents and purposes there was no way he should be issuing threats.

  The man stared at Jaron for a moment then his eyes widened in fear. Jaron relaxed a little against his bonds. No matter how good a vampire was at concealment, humans were smart. The instincts that had dragged them out of the caves, although dulled by civilisation, were still sharp enough to recognise death when it looked them in the face.

  The goon swallowed, his gaze flicking from Jaron to Grace and back again.

  “You can ‘do’ what you like to her when I’m done. Not before.” The voice came from the shadows.

  Grace’s head snapped up in recognition. Her head still reeling at the savage threat in Jaron’s quiet voice, she didn’t have time to collect herself for this new shock. She knew that voice. Or she thought she did. Usually it was a whining, complaining voice directing snide comments at her. Now it was filled with hatred and purpose.

  “Fayte?”

  Her cousin’s tinkling laugh filled the cavernous room as bully boy stepped out of the way. Her heels rapped against the concrete as she walked across to stand over Grace, her features twisted and ugly.

  “Surprised to see me, cousin dear?” She taunted.

  Grace struggled to breathe as she realised what had happened, as she realised the truth. Fayte had organised this. She’d actually organised for Grace and Jaron to be kidnapped. Christ, they could have been killed. Jaron nearly had.

  “Why?” Grace asked. She knew Fayte didn’t like her, but surely this was taking things a little too far? “Why would you do something like this?”

  Fayte laughed, a bitter sound that echoed around the large room. The sound fell flat but she didn’t seem to notice, amusement in her eyes as she looked at Grace.

  “Oh, come on, you can’t be that bloody dense, surely? You’ve been the bane of my existence from the moment you were born. So pretty, so delicate. So fucking perfect.” She spat. “I thought I’d dealt with you but you even screwed that up for me. Do you have any clue how expensive it is to arrange a car accident these days?”

  Grace’s jaw dropped. Her car accident. The terrible, tragic accident which had stolen her life, stolen her dancing—at least until Jaron had come along—hadn’t been an accident at all?

  Fayte’s face screwed up as she snarled. “I go to all that expense and planning to get you out of the way and you bloody survive.” She sighed heavily then grinned. “But that was cool; I could live with that if you couldn’t dance. Knowing I took away the one thing that meant more than life itself to you gave me pleasure.”

  She leaned down, her breath hot against Grace’s face.

  “But you couldn’t even stay the pathetic cripple, could you? You had to go and recover somehow. Then you fucking sack me. Me. Who are you to sack me?” she asked, her eyes wild, the rage in them visible for the world to see. Spittle flecked the corner of her mouth. Grace couldn’t stop looking at it. Fayte was always so perfectly made up, always fretting and checking her makeup to make sure it was perfect, so the tiny slip made things seem worse. Fayte would never allow such a slip, not without being out of her mind with rage, anyway.

  Fayte’
s eyes gleamed with malevolence. “This time it’ll be different. Last time, I let you live. But not this time. Oh, no. This time the job gets done right and you’ll be out of my hair for good.” She straightened up and looked around at the thugs who had brought them here.

  “Have your fun, and then kill them both. Dump the bodies as we discussed.”

  Chapter Eight

  Silence blanketed the warehouse after Fayte walked out. Shocked into silence by the sheer lack of expression in her cousin’s last statement, Grace sat staring at her retreating back. She might have well have said ‘take the trash out when you’re done’. It chilled Grace to the bone. But not as much as the slow grins spreading over the faces of the thugs as they looked at her and Jaron.

  Correction. At her. They weren’t looking at Jaron at all. A cold shiver of dread wormed its way up her spine. Without a doubt she knew they weren’t getting out of here alive. Earlier, death had seemed the worst thing that could happen, but now she realised otherwise. She shrank closer to Jaron as if he could protect her. There were worse things than death, all of them shining back at her from lust or drug-crazed eyes. By the end of the night, Grace knew she’d welcome death.

  Jaron shifted beside her, agony in his face. “I’m sorry, love,” he whispered, “I’m sorry it had to come to this...”

  Grace shook her head. A sad smile curved her lips as she looked at him, memorised every line of his face. She had her memories; whatever they did to her she would try to escape to them. Go to a happier place to escape what was happening to her.

  “It’s not your fault,” she told him. “This was nothing to do with you. You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, that’s all. I’m sorry you had to be involved.” Why couldn’t they have picked another night, a night when she was alone? Why did Jaron have to die with her? But perhaps… He didn’t.