Dragon Game Page 12

  I took him inside until I couldn’t take him anymore, then removed my hand from his balls and wrapped it around the base of his shaft. I squeezed it and pumped up and down even while I continued to bob my head, and he let out a long, low sound. It was such a damn sexy sound I felt myself getting even wetter than I already was, and I wouldn’t have thought that was possible.

  “No more,” he gasped at last. “No more or I’ll …”

  I teased him by making one more circle around his shaft with my tongue. His cock throbbed again, and I tasted more pre-cum in my mouth. When his dick throbbed, his abs convulsed, too, and I loved the way his eight-pack rippled. He craned his head and grit his teeth, and cords of muscle stood out on his thick neck. I knew he was struggling hard not to come.

  “Not yet,” I said, pulling back. I blew on his dick, as if to cool it off, and looked up at him, all quivering muscles and intense eyes. He had been right on the brink.

  I leaned back in the bed, spreading my legs, and he dropped to his knees before me. His cock rubbed my opening as he bent over me, and he kissed me on the lips even as the head of his shaft shoved, just an inch, inside. I moaned into his mouth and threw my legs around his waist, just barely managing to hook my ankles together on the other side.

  “Is this what you want?” he said, shoving just a little deeper into me.

  I nodded and ran a hand up his abs, relishing his tight muscles, and paused in the valley between his mighty pecs. I could feel his heart beating fast and strong beneath my fingers. The gleam of sweat beaded his brow.

  “I want you,” I said. “Now.”

  “Will you lay a spell on me if I don’t?”

  I snorted a laugh, not very lady-like. “I might! Now put that thing inside me right now or so help me—”

  He grinned and shoved himself inside me. I bit the inside of my cheek to prevent crying out. He pushed in deeper, stretching me, but even though it hurt a little the pleasure was so intense that hardly mattered. I closed my eyes, delighting in the feel of him. He was huge, bigger than any man I’d ever had before. I could already feel my vaginal muscles quivering around him. He pulled back, then rolled his hips, stroking into me. With every pump, he thrust deeper and deeper. He filled me completely, or what I thought was completely, and then his cock throbbed with a titanic pulse, stretching me even more.

  “Yes,” I heard myself say. “Yes.”

  I opened my eyes to see him bending over me. That intense, sexy look was back on his face, and I could see his eyes shift colors as he kissed my breasts and trailed kisses up my neck to behind my ear. I moved my hips, taking him deeper, then pulling back, then deeper again. We matched rhythms, going faster and faster, harder and harder. The bed rocked beneath me, and I had to adjust my balance to keep it quiet.

  The pressure built and built in me again, carrying me to maddening heights, and finally I couldn’t take it anymore. I bit his chest to stifle my cries as I exploded around his shaft, and my orgasm triggered his own. He groaned and went rigid as his cock throbbed inside me, again and again, shooting hot jets deep into me. His seed filled my core. Still entranced in my own aftershocks, I kissed his sweaty chest and ran my hands through his hair.

  Both panting, we collapsed to the bed, and I draped an arm across his chest as we recovered. His seed trickled out of me, and I had to fight a naughty desire to slip a finger down there and taste it. Fae jism!

  “Wow,” Nevos said, turning his head sideways to peer into my eyes. “That was intense.”

  I kissed the side of his chest. He had wrapped an arm around me, bringing me in close, and despite the nearness of danger I had never felt so protected.

  “That was wild,” I said, then confessed, “I’ve never done anything like this before.”

  “Me, either.”

  I studied him. I almost thought I believed him.

  He yawned. “Well, I’m exhausted after that. You want to sleep here?”

  “Yes, please. I couldn’t move if I had to.”

  He grinned. “That’s what all the ladies say afterward.”

  I laughed and punched his arm. He laughed, too. That made me feel even worse about what I was about to do.

  Shortly we settled in and he started to breathe deeply and regularly. When I knew he was asleep, I slipped out of bed. I hadn’t lied. My legs were still shaky. He had been really, really good.

  Would Davril be as good? Better?

  You’ll never know if he finds out about this.

  I sighed, staring down at the sleeping Nevos. He was so gorgeous, so brave and commanding. It was a shame he was on the other side. Hell, one of their leaders!

  I had to do what I had to do.

  I pulled my cat burglar outfit back on and crept out of Nevos’s bedroom. Now time to find the knob.

  Chapter 13

  Angela’s lair was dark and silent as I slipped like a shadow through its halls. I could feel her magic everywhere. Magic traps had been installed in every nook and cranny. Fortunately Nevos had rendered me immune from them on the way in. But the ones upstairs? I wasn’t sure about those.

  I went slowly. Cautiously. Everything could be riding on what I was about to do. That is, if I could even do it.

  The floorboard squeaked under my foot. I paused, stiffening. I glanced all around. I was almost to the staircase.

  No one appeared to drag me away, so I inched forward. I reached the spiral staircase and started upward. My legs were still wobbly, and it was so dark even my shifter senses had difficulty picking out the way. Obviously this was some sort of magical gloom. Angela would have a ring or a bracelet or something that enabled her to see in it just fine. She must “put out the gloom” every night after a certain time, like a curfew for her guests. No blundering about after 2 a.m., assholes. Something like that.

  Going more cautiously, I inched my way up the stairs. My belly churned, and bile stung the back of my throat. Fear had laid a cold clammy claw around my throat. Shit, this is a bad idea, Jade. Getting laid I can understand, but getting killed is a no-go. Turn back! Turn back!

  I shoved the cowardly voice in my head down and continued on. I reached the main level, the floor that apparently served as Angela’s living area, or at least her guest area. From here the stairs would either take you up or down. I glanced around, peering into every shadow. I expected to see a bunch of feathery heaps where the Razor Wings were camped out, or maybe the eyeless witches, but I saw nothing.

  Not daring to breathe a sigh of relief, I continued upward, moving with all the grace and silence my abilities allowed me. Don’t fail me now. My skin crawled as I neared the third floor, what had to be Angela’s level. Her lair. The taste of bile grew even stronger in the back of my mouth, and I swallowed convulsively. When I reached out to grip the guardrail of the stairs, I saw that my fingers were trembling. Suck it up, girl! You got this!

  I so didn’t have this. This was, like, epically bad. My game had taken some weird turns, and now I was compelled to see this thing through. Or else.

  Or else what? Just what the hell was the knob, and what did it do?

  Hoping I would find answers, I forced myself to the top of the stairwell. Here at last I was on the top level of the spooky treehouse. The darkness pressed even thicker here, more opaque and more cloying.

  The stairwell had come up at the end of a hall, and several doors branched off from it. An especially large doorway loomed at the far end, just visible in the darkness. Probably Angela’s suite, I thought, but I wouldn’t put it past her to use a fake-out room, either. To go into that room could be to be lured into a trap.

  I hunched low and moved away from the stairway. I crept extra slowly now, aware that there could be more magical booby-traps that I wouldn’t be immune to. Sure enough, I sensed one right ahead of me: a force field spanning the breadth of the hall, sealing off any part of it past this point.

  I concentrated hard, sensing it fully, then extracted one of the new spellgredients from my utility belt. The resin from the drool
of a certain poisonous frog. I mixed that with the pulped spores of a magic mushroom, then said a spell under my breath as I cast the combined powder at the force field. It shimmered brightly, startling me, and for a moment I thought it was going to hold. If it did, I was screwed. I didn’t know any spells more powerful than that one. Maybe Ruby would have, but not me.

  The shield dissolved, and I slumped in relief.

  Still on high alert, I edged forward. I passed a doorway and held out my palm to sense what was beyond it. I’d gotten a bead on the emanations of the knob everyone was so excited about, and I was pretty sure I would be able to sense it again. Hopefully it would be somewhere other than with Angela. I didn’t want to have to tangle with her if I didn’t have to.

  Nothing. At least not behind that door.

  I moved on. I checked the next room, then the next. Twice more I disabled magical traps. At last I hunched beside the door at the end of the hall. Closing my eyes, I held out my hand, trying to pick up a tingle …

  Bingo!

  The knob was on the other side of that door.

  I opened my eyes and stared at it. I could hear nothing, sense nothing from the room beyond the door other than the knob. Damn it, I was going to have to go in and just pray it wasn’t Angela’s bedroom.

  First I inspected the doorknob of the room. Shockingly it was unlocked. That was either a very good sign, a sign of Angela’s overconfidence, or else a very bad sign. Hoping it was the former, I reached out, grabbed the doorknob, which was surprisingly cool under my fingers, and turned it. I held my breath as I cracked the door. Nothing jumped out at me and no alarms blared, so I opened it further, wide enough so that I could see what was on the other side.

  It seemed to be a suite of rooms, with a short hallway leading to a larger chamber with more doors coming off of it. I slipped inside and closed the door behind me.

  Deep breath.

  Turning, I pressed my back against the wall and skulked toward the larger area. I passed a doorway I hadn’t noticed earlier. The shadows were very thick. Fortunately nothing grabbed me from its shadowed interior; the doorway was open.

  Ahead I began to hear sounds. Not only was visibility muted here, but sound was, too. The sounds seemed to be chanting … some sort of spell? Interesting. Angela must still be at the “working”, as she had called it. A common enough word, really. Something witches and wizards used to describe a complicated spell or series of spells. Why did she have to perform a spell on the knob? And I was only assuming that’s what she was doing.

  Curious but as tense as I had ever been, so wired I wasn’t even blinking, I moved forward. I came within sight of the larger chamber.

  Sure enough, Angela stood in the middle of it, right before a stone pedestal with a crimson pillow on it. The knob rested on top. Angela did have style, I had to give her that. Wearing the same red dress as earlier, she gestured and thundered, and the room shook at the power of her exertions.

  “Curum thurugris listrum!” she shouted. I could hear the volume of her words now. The magic muting them had been dispelled with proximity. As she spoke, she waved a wand before the knob, and it glowed green. Her skin was flushed and her auburn hair sweaty. She’d obviously been at this for awhile. Judging by the bright glow of the knob, she must be nearly finished with her working.

  Shit. That meant there was still a chance to stop her before she completed it. And that meant I would have to do something stupidly heroic.

  Why couldn’t I have picked an easier line of work?

  I unholstered my small crossbow from my hip and centered the aim on Angela’s back. I hated to shoot anyone in the back, but Angela was too powerful for anything less than a surprise attack. It was a shot in the back or nothing.

  I took a step forward, getting a better aim … held my breath … started to squeeze the trigger …

  I stiffened as cold sharp metal bit into the soft flesh of my neck.

  A man’s voice said in my ear, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

  Nevos.

  Gently, I lowered the crossbow and turned to him. His face was tight and hard to read, but I sensed hurt there.

  “How stupid did you think I was?” he said.

  “It wasn’t like that,” I said.

  “I knew you were a thief. But I thought you had some honor.”

  “No, really, it wasn’t …”

  Behind me Angela’s chants had ended. I heard her sharp footsteps as she strode toward us. Angrily, she spun me around, grabbed the crossbow and smashed it against the wall. It shattered into a thousand pieces.

  “You little slut!” she said. “Did you really think you could kill me and take it for yourself?”

  “Well, I was hoping.”

  She backhanded me across the face. Pain flared through me, and I fell backward. Nevos caught me, careful not to stab me with his knife, then set me on my feet again. I wobbled and blinked up at Angela, who was a few inches taller than me. She glared down at me out of that cute freckled face. She looked younger than she had even earlier, younger even than Blackfeather.

  As if to think of that name had summoned some recollection, Angela’s eyes widened in shock. “You!” she said.

  My glamour must be fading. She could see my real face now.

  Nevos turned my head and swore.

  “A glamour!” he said. Then, sadly, “You look even more lovely now, Jade. If that is your real name.”

  “Oh, it is,” seethed Angela. “Jade McClaren. One of the McClaren sisters. I was wondering how many Jades there were when we were introduced. She’s the one that killed my daughter!”

  I didn’t drop my eyes. “I was aiming at you.”

  She backhanded me again. This time I flew against the wall. I rebounded and punched her in the jaw. She took the blow and kneed me in the stomach. I doubled over, gasping, the taste of vomit shooting into my mouth. I reached for one of the pouches on my belt, but Nevos’s strong hands grabbed my arms and stilled them. He pulled me back up against his body, and his hot breaths teased my ear.

  “I was hoping you were being honest with me,” he said. Genuine regret filled his voice. He had liked me, then.

  I spat blood at Angela’s feet. “Then you shouldn’t have hooked up with her,” I said. “And with her Master.”

  Angela sneered. “You don’t want her, Nevos. She’s the partner of your brother.”

  “What?”

  “That’s right. I’ve made a great study of her, as much as I can, anyway. I’ve had my spies ferret out as much information as they could. I was hoping I could discover where she lives and steal her and her sister away, and thereby get my revenge. I didn’t manage that much, but I did learn some very interesting things.”

  “Such as?”

  “She was made an honorary Fae Knight and was partnered with your brother. I believe one of her goals, other than stopping us, has been to find Vincent Walsh and steal back the ring containing her fire. After getting her revenge on him, that is.”

  Nevos’s voice was soft. “So you didn’t lie about that, at least.”

  I let out a breath. “You’ve got me. Now what are you going to do with me?”

  * * *

  I screamed as fire consumed me. Every cord of my body stood rigid, and I shook with pain. My lungs were sore from screaming. At last the agony retreated, and I gasped and shuddered. My cat burglar outfit was shredded and clung to my sodden body, and my hair fell in wet tangles to either side of my face.

  Angela stalked back and forth before me, fury warping her features. In one hand trailed the flaming length of a magical whip. Composed of mystical fire, it inflicted the agony of flame without actually burning me. That would kill me too quickly, and Angela wanted this to last.

  “Bitch!” she shouted. “Murderous whore of a she-beast!”

  She lashed her whip again, striking me across the chest. I arched my back and screamed. My hands were bound above my head, and I hung from the ceiling of one of the rooms I’d passed on the way to
the Chamber of the Knob. It didn’t surprise me at all that one of them was a torture chamber.

  “You took my only daughter from me, and now you will know my pain,” Angela went on.

  Through gritted teeth, I said, “I’m sorry about Blackfeather. She shouldn’t have gotten in the way. She was worth ten of you.”

  She screamed and lashed me again. The fire coursed along my side. I tried not to cry out, but the pain was too great. Shuddering, I glared at her, wishing Nevos were here. He had argued against torturing me. Of course that probably meant he was simply in favor of executing me, but that sounded better than being Angela’s plaything.

  Only, as it turned out, it wasn’t merely my physical pain she was after.

  “Tell me, you whore,” she said.

  “Tell you what, cunt?”

  Strike! When the agony retreated, she said, “Your sister. Ruby. Tell me where to find her and I’ll stop.”

  I sucked in a breath, let it out. “So that’s your plan, is it? You want to torture Ruby to death in front of me? Think that will make things even? Well, it won’t. I’m sorry. I’ve lost loved ones before, and I know how therapeutic the idea of revenge is. But loss is just something you have to deal with.”

  “So you would turn down Vincent Walsh if I offered him to you? I think not.”

  She had a point. “Ruby is innocent.”

  “So was Blackfeather.”

  “She helped you in both Voris Cemetery and the raid on the Palace. She probably killed plenty of good people to further your mad quest.”

  Strike! Pain consumed me, like waves pounding a rocky beach, then gradually ebbed. But I knew another wave would come soon enough.

  “Ruby has assisted you on plenty of your criminal jaunts,” Angela said. “She’s no innocent. Now tell me where she is!” She coiled her whip arm, daring me to hold out on her. “Tell me now!”

  With all the courage I still possessed, I met her livid gaze. “Go. To. Hell.”

  She screamed. The whip came down. White-hot agony wrapped around me, smashing me into a million splinters, then glued me back together again only for me to go through it all again. Angela lashed me and lashed me until all I knew was pain.