A Muse for Mishka (Wiccan-Were-Bear #12) (7 page)

“No,” he said, trying to hide his smile. “You
look delicious.”

She giggled and leaned against him, wrapping
her arms around his neck and going onto her tiptoes. “Delicious?
I’ve never been called delicious before.”

He kissed her cheek. “I’ll plan to call you
it often.”

She looked up at him, a soft smile curving
her lush mouth. “I like it when you call me ‘my heart.’”

Brushing his knuckle lightly along her jaw,
he said, “You are. If it were beating, it would beat only for
you.”

“Complimentary and romantic. You’re a double
threat.”

The coven had been instructed to meet in the
War Room after the club closed. Sunrise was in ninety minutes, and
while most of the coven members lived in the club, there were some
who had chosen to live outside of the club and would need to leave
in time to beat the sunrise.

Mishka raised a hand, and the quiet murmuring
from the coven ceased entirely. Behind him stood the inner circle
and the band. Both groups had seamlessly joined together to support
them, and Mishka could feel how much that meant to his mate.

“As many of you witnessed yesterday evening,
I have found my beloved mate. This is Harmony Celeste. She is a
muse, and as my immortal, beloved mate, she is now also mistress of
the coven. Her friends join our coven as well, as honored members,”
he said, gesturing to her band mates.

Mishka’s inner circle clapped, and the band
and coven joined in swiftly. Harmony smiled brightly and winked at
Mishka, stepping away to greet the members of the coven as they
came to meet her. He watched, from not too far a distance, as she
and her bandmates shook the hands of every coven member. Judging by
the sincere smiles of the coven, he knew that his people had
graciously accepted her.

By the time the last coven member had met the
small group and exited, it was nearly sunrise. Mishka’s desire to
take his beloved to bed overrode the need for decorum. He swept her
up in his arms with a soft growl. She squeaked in surprise and then
laughed as she threw her arms around his neck and hugged herself
close.

“We’ll talk at sunset,” she called to her
group. To him she said, “In a hurry?”

“To get you to our chamber and out of this
far-too-short dress?”

“I knew my butt was hanging out!”

“If it were, I’d have slaughtered every
unmated pair of eyes that gazed at your lovely curves.”

“There you go again being all sweet,” she
said, resting her head on his shoulder.

“Just for you.”

Chapter 8

Mishka held her with one arm as he entered
the code for their chamber door and then hurried inside. He laid
her down on the bed, his hands sliding down her sides slowly until
he reached the hem of the dress.

“No panties?” he murmured softly as he pushed
up the dress slowly. Her legs were bare save for the stilettos
she’d borrowed. She wasn’t normally a no-panties sort of girl, but
being around Mishka made her feel over-the-top sexy.

“Would you have acted differently if you’d
known one way or the other?”

He leaned over, resting one knee on the bed
next to her legs as he continued to push up her dress. “I don’t
know. Maybe. I might have been tempted to slide my hands under your
dress and play with your beautiful body.”

“You could do that anyway,” she said. She
could feel the cool air of the chamber clashing with her heated
skin. Being with Mishka made her body overheat in the best of
ways.

He hummed, flicking his golden gaze to her
face for the briefest of moments before returning it to her lower
body. Pushing the dress up past her hips, he growled softly as he
bared her naked body to his gaze, the lack of panties feeling
scandalous and risqué.

“You drive me wild, beloved,” he said,
bending low to brush his lips over her flesh, his tongue flicking
out to gently probe her clit.

“You make me feel so wickedly wanton.”

“I’ll slake your thirst, anytime,
anywhere.”

His eyes darkened, the gold turning molten as
he inhaled slowly and exhaled with a growl. He pushed her thighs
apart roughly, and she gasped, her heart pounding as her breath
hitched in her throat.

“This is mine,” he growled, climbing between
her spread legs and lifting her lower body from the bed. He held
her pussy close to his mouth, her legs bent over his upper arms as
he slid his tongue into her. She felt his fangs scrape gently
against her flesh, and she cried out at the pleasure that spun
through her. He fucked her with his tongue, holding her immobile,
half on the bed and half in his arms.

As he speared her over and over, he rubbed
her clit with his finger, driving her toward a hard climax. He held
her roughly, growling as he licked her pussy and flicked her clit
until everything inside her twisted with pleasure and she screamed
his name.

He drank her down, practically purring as he
fingered her slowly and brought her climax to his lips. Lowering
her body to the bed, he undid his belt and pants until his cock was
free, the thick length making her mouth water. He looked feral, his
eyes dark and wild, his lips glistening with her arousal.

Grasping the hem of his dress shirt, he tore
it open, buttons scattering. She reached for the straps of the
dress, but he stopped her, tugging them down until the dress was
caught at her waist, her breasts freed. He kissed her, drawing her
close with a bruising kiss. She slid her hands into his hair,
tugging away the band and freeing the dark-blond locks.

He lifted from her mouth and straightened,
fisting his cock. She grasped her knees and rolled over,
straightening her arms and spreading her knees. He cupped one cheek
and spread her apart farther, moving forward until their bodies
nearly touched, his thick cock brushing against her wet pussy.

“Fuck, I want you,” she groaned, grabbing
hold of the wrought iron headboard.

He pushed in, just until the thick crown of
him was inside. “Not as much as I want you.”

She tossed her hair over her shoulder and
looked back to watch his face as he guided himself slowly and
deeply into her center. He looked awestruck and possessive, his
fingers digging into her bottom as he watched. She groaned as he
thrust in suddenly, bringing their bodies flush.

“You’re mine,” he said, growling the
words.

“Hell yes.”

Watching Mishka’s desire flare brightly as he
moved within her made her whole body shiver. He pulled his cock
from her pussy and then plunged in. As he fucked her hard and fast,
she held his gaze. Releasing her tight hold on the headboard, she
touched her clit. She gasped at how sensitive she was, but she
wanted to come with him.

“Yes,” he urged. “My Harmony. My beloved.
Mine.”

She rubbed her clit in time to his thrusts,
pushing herself forward as pleasure warmed her from the inside out.
She felt her climax pool in her belly, twisting little fingers of
pleasurable fire all through her. With a shout, she came, her body
locking down on his as stars lit her vision and her voice
cracked.

He followed her, shouting her name. With a
chuckle that was all male, he pulled from her body and wrapped his
arms around her, taking her gently to the bed and curling around
her.

“That was amazing,” she whispered, still
shivering from the pleasure.

“
You’re
amazing,” he said, kissing her
ear and her throat, where her pulse still thundered.

Rolling to face him, she cuddled close and
tilted her head to kiss him. When their lips met and parted, she
sighed happily as their tongues touched and slid together. He slid
his hands up and down her back slowly. “I can’t believe how lucky I
am to have found such an amazing mate,” she said.

“I’m the fortunate one,” he said, curling his
finger under her chin and lifting it until she was looking at him.
“You’re powerful and gorgeous, and you’ve made me feel more in a
day than I’ve ever felt in all my five hundred years. I’m entirely
besotted with you, Harmony. As far as I’m concerned, the sun rises
and sets because you want it to.”

Her cheeks heated as she smiled. “If it were
up to me, it would never rise again.”

He kissed her once more and then sat up
enough to draw a blanket from the bottom of the bed to cover them.
After extinguishing the light, he slid his arms around her and held
her close. She’d never felt so safe or so loved in her life. This
man, this beautiful, deadly vampire, was the only one who would
ever have her heart.

* * *

That night, Harmony left Mishka in his office
with his inner circle, and she met her bandmates in Wyst’s
apartment to discuss the club and the band’s future.

She looked at her closest friends and said,
“I feel like we should first talk about the fact that Cleveland has
a wolf pack and a falcon nest.”

Tamar’s brows rose. “Why does that
matter?”

“I’m just putting it out there.”

Bridge flopped down on the couch next to her.
“We’re our own group, Harm. It doesn’t matter that our kinds are
around the area. We all left the group life for our own reasons,
and I don’t think any of us want to go back to that.”

Wyst put his oversize, booted feet up on the
coffee table, settling back in an overstuffed chair. “Do you think
that the only reason we’re with you is because we haven’t run
across our own kind during our travels?”

She shook her head. “I’m mated now. Things
are different.”

“They’re only different if we choose for them
to be,” Tamar said. “If you’re wondering about us finding our own
mates, we will when the time is right. I’ve always felt like I
found you – we all found each other – because of fate.”

Bridge nodded. “You don’t fuck with
fate.”

She sighed in relief. “I just don’t want you
to stay with me, with the band, because you think I’d be upset. I
want you all to be happy.”

“We’re all happy. We’d tell you if we
weren’t,” Tamar pointed out.

“Things are different than they were when we
first started out in the band. I’m more in control of my powers,
and now that we have a home base, we don’t have to be nomads. I
wouldn’t blame you for leaving, but I’m thrilled you’re
staying.”

For the next hour, she and her friends
discussed Fang21 and the band. As the new house band, they would
plan to perform two shows on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights.
She would only sing one show each night, and the boys would carry
on without her for the second show.

“Your hair is looking very blue. Are you
singing to Mishka?” Bridge asked.

“I did after we bonded.” She wrapped a lock
of hair around her finger and pulled it forward so she could look
at it. The blue was starting to fade slightly, but singing to
Mishka, with the strong emotions she felt from him because of their
beloved bond, had given her a boost she hadn’t expected. “Feeding
from him is like being supercharged.”

“How does he need to feed now that you’re
beloveds?” Tamar asked.

“Just once a week from me, and he’ll use
donated blood or SyBl the other nights.”

“What the hell is SyBl?” Wyst asked.

“It’s the brand name of the synthetic blood
they use.”

He arched a dark brow. “It sounds like a band
name.”

“Sorry, you’re stuck with Fluffy Venom.”

All three males wrinkled their noses. Even
though they knew why she picked the name, they’d never been on
board with it. Not that she had cared, frankly. It was her band,
and she claimed naming rights. Both were the names of her childhood
pets: Fluffy, a hairless cat who liked to steal Harmony’s stuffed
animals, and Venom, the guard dog her mother had secured when their
home had been burglarized. Venom, although he looked tough, was
scared of his own shadow. Fluffy was more likely to strike fear
into the hearts of intruders with her too-big ears and yellow
eyes.

“It will be nice to be the permanent house
band,” Bridge said. “We haven’t had a real home in years.”

She and her band had been together for ten
years, since she reached the pinnacle of her power at age twenty.
She’d still been learning how to use her power, and they’d been
really supportive of her all along the way. She was fortunate to
have found three guys who were musically talented and got along so
well.

“Cella said the club is open from sunset to
one hour before dawn. Every member of the coven works at the club
in one way or another, from handling deliveries to working the bar.
The club also employs humans, mostly as food.”

“Food?” Wyst asked.

“
Food
is the term the vamps give
humans who sell their blood.”

“Sounds like prostitution,” he said.

She shrugged. “They get paid really well. The
club pays them a flat-rate nightly salary, and they agree to allow
at least one vampire to feed from them each night they work. They
wear white shirts, and the club employs a ribbon system, which the
food wears to indicate which part of the body they want to be fed
off of, like their necks or their wrists.”

Bridge’s brow arched. “What other spots would
there be?”

“Inner thigh,” she said, “but it’s my
understanding that feeding from the inner thigh is reserved for
mated couples because it’s so intimate.”

She couldn’t imagine getting paid to let a
stranger bite her. She rubbed her fingers lightly over the place
where Mishka had fed from her to complete their bond. Without the
rush of pleasure she’d been under, she was certain the bite would
have hurt. A lot.

“What’s the sex deal here?” Tamar asked.

She, Bridge, and Wyst looked at him in
surprise.

He cleared his throat and laughed. “I mean,
do they let the food have sex with customers?”

“The rules are pretty loose,” she said.
“Cella said that there’s no sex out in the club, but if a vamp
wants to play with their food, there’s a common area near their
daytime resting chambers they can use. They don’t have sex out in
the open. They use booths with dark red curtains they close when
they’re using them. There’s a bench seat inside. She said that some
vamps don’t like to feed out in the club so they use the booths,
and sometimes things get hot between them, and they’ll play.”