Aaron's Kiss Series Boxed Set (Books 1 - 7) (86 page)

~CHAPTER FOURTEEN~

She was looking at another building and was surprised when her phone rang. The only people who had this number were the queen and the one who served her. Neither Griff nor she used phones, and neither did Tristan.

“Hello?”

“I have a contract I’d like fulfilled immediately. I’m willing to pay a substantial bonus if it is done within the next seventy-two hours.” She didn’t recognize the voice. The voice modulator negated that anyway, but she did listen for clues that always gave the caller away.

“This is a printing shop; we don’t do contracts. And we are temporarily out of business until we can set up another location. I’m sorry for your inconvenience, but I have the name of other…”

“Bullshit! I know what you are and what you do. Now you will do as I say. I will send you the things you need to kill this man. You also should understand that there are consequences if you don’t. Unde
r
stand me?”

Bailey understood just fine and disconnected the line. When it rang again, she let it go to voice mail.

When she picked up the message after she finished going through the building, it was to hear about a select few of the contracts she had fulfilled over the past six months. There was information on who, where, and how much she had been paid to do each hit. There were also references to her relationship with Tristan and to the Kiss of Aaron MacManus. She was given a phone number to call immediately or everything would go to the media, and then she could see how she handled that. She contacted Griff to trace the number and her phone, and then she dialed the number.

“This is the Printer, who is this?” She asked, knowing that whoever it was might not answer. But some people were incredibly stupid when asked a direct question and she was hoping for that.

“I’ll do the talking, and you, you will do the listening. In less than one hour after we disconnect, you will get an email giving you all the information you need to do this hit. I expect it to be done without any problems, or you contacting anyone else except for your freak you have working for you. If I even hear of a whisper that you have, I will kill you.”

“You think it will be that easy? Better yet, what makes you think I’ll even care whether or not you kill me?” She didn’t really, but lately, just lately, there seemed to be a little more to look forward to. She wasn’t going to say it was Tristan, but she was beginning to look forward to him contacting her for his next meal.

“Then I will hit closer to your black heart. Tristan will die; I will take his head and make it look like you were the one to murder him. His family is royalty; do you think they’ll be happy with just your death? Their money and connections alone will be able to hunt you for years. No, they will make you suffer in ways you cannot imagine. Do the hit, or else.”

“Fuck off. I work for myself, and about Tristan? Are you fucking kidding me? I’m his food source, nothing more to him. He can barely stand to be in the same room as me.” The scream that came through the line had her pulling the phone away. Bailey was surprised by that, and made a mental note to think about it later with the other information she was writing down about the call.

“Food source? You’re his fucking mate, his mate for all time. He will die without you to feed him. I will not tolerate you belittling him again. If his death won’t bother you then I will take out the precious mate of the master MacManus and his two brats. Let’s see how long you live with their deaths hanging around your skinny little neck.”

First she was willing to kill Tristan, now she didn’t want her to belittle him. It was the children that got her, though. Children were innocents. Bailey had no doubt that this was a woman now. And she would be someone close to Tristan and the Kiss. Keeping her talking proved to be fairly easy as she was a gabby sort of thing.

“I’m no one’s mate, not now, not ever. And if you think Tristan gives one shit about me then you’re nuttier than a fruit cake. You send your contract, and if I decide to take it, I will. I don’t care about the media, or anything else you think you might be able to blackmail me with. Bring it on, girl.” She disconnected the line and snapped the phone in two, removing the battery as well. With a quick look around, she dropped it on the ground and sent a small bolt of energy to it, firing it on the spot. There was a slim possibility that she was as good as Bailey was, but she doubted that.

“Griff, we have a problem. Let me know if you receive anything via email about a rush job. I’m sure I just heard from one of the people who had us tracked. Did you get anything on the trace?” S
he was calm, but pissed.

“Yes, mistress. Right away. I couldn’t trace the location, but the tracer picked it up as being local. It is a toss-away like the ones we generally use. As for the caller, did you get anything? Oh and the building you are in is ideal for what we need. There are already lines going in and the basement is finished. What would you like for me to do?”

“Buy it, but haggle. I can see that it needs some work, but very little. There aren’t close enough neighbors to disturb us, but see what we can do about purchasing them as well. I don’t want to take any more chances. And we are not going to honor anymore leases. Contact me as soon as you get the contract and it printed up. And other than a female who may or may not have connections to the Kiss that Aaron MacManus is currently master of, I got a few phrases that I might be able to track. Also, I caught some jealously for Tristan St. James. See if we can find a jilted lover or two for him as well.”
She wasn’t going to think about how much it was hurting her to think he may have someone who wanted him back and would kill to have him.

The contract came in twenty minutes later; the money was not as much as she would normally get, but the bonus more than made up for the difference. It was the name on the contract that stunned her. She had just been hired to kill Bradley Wolff, alpha wolf.

Two hours later, Bailey was back in the realm hiding in the shadows waiting for the queen to make an appearance. She had been waiting for nearly an hour when Mel walked passed her. Reaching out, Bailey spoke to her.

“You need to leave this area and go to a secure location for me to speak to you. I have an issue that concerns you and yours, the children of Sara and Aaron MacManus for one. There are eight men currently residing in your infirmary that Griff and I sent there because of a breach in security on our end. They are connected. You have a breach in your security, your grace, and it may be the death of your family. Will you meet me?”

“Yes. There are beings here who can track you even now. Let me wait for my father. He can shield you and I won’t need to use any traceable magic.”

They waited in the hall, Mel looking at the floral arrangements with an assistant going over the colors and fussing with them. Bailey just waited, not giving a good fig if the white ones were too close to the yellow ones or not. And who even cared if the roses were better-looking next to the lavender.

She looked around the open field outside the doorway and noticed for the first time that there were fields and fields of wildflowers, all of them in neat patches according to color, type of flower, and height. She smiled and thought that Tristan would love this, all the neat little patches. It was like a big, organized blanket. Her smile didn’t last long, though, thinking what a mess she was and how he was forever trying to neaten her up. Maybe the woman who was on the phone was just as organized as he was and they were a better match. 

“Daddy, I was wondering if we could take a ride. It’s such a beautiful day and I need a break.” He had come when she had called for him, only knowing that she needed a shadow deeper than she could make without drawing attention.

They saddled up and rode out and away from the grounds twenty minutes later. Bailey hid in the mane of the larger horse as a barn mouse, hoping that no owl decided to make a snack out of her.

~~~

“I agree with Bailey on this, love. No one else should know. If too many people are aware, especially since she is sure that it is someone who knows the house, then the children are a risk as well. No, she’s right.”

Mel’s dad had been brought in simply because he wasn’t budging without knowing why he had been pulled from his computer. He was so intrigued by the Internet and all he could find.

“But there are already at least nine others involved, all against Bailey.” Mel looked down at the little mouse on her horse. “No offense, but can you handle that many people at once?”

Mel just couldn’t imagine why anyone would want Bradley dead. He was a good man and his family had been caring for the Brotherhood of Gray for several generations.

“If we play this right,” Bailey said through their link. “Then we can catch all the players involved and the ring leader as well. If there is even a hint of what we are doing, the whole thing falls apart and Bradley ends up dead anyway.”

“What of the ones we now have? What do I do with them knowing that they are in on this contract? I can’t just let them go without punishment.” Mel was worried about what would happen if they escaped to the human realm. “They have disobeyed direct orders of this kingdom concerning humans.” 

Bailey had told her how they had broken into the offices above her print shop, gathering information about her and the others she had worked for, and how she was now being blackmailed for the hit. She had also explained why she thought it was a woman calling the shots and not a man. Mel had the guard just outside the infirmary, but not with them yet, explaining that with that many people sick at once, she didn’t want to run the chance of it being a plot against her.

“Nothing. If you do, then you will alert the leader or they will. You have to trust me on this, your grace, I know what I’m doing. Anything we do from this point on will be watched, and not only will it be watched, but someone may lose their life if we screw up.”

Mel could hear Bailey’s frustration. She knew the girl was right, but that didn’t make it any easier to take. People were going to be killed; she had no doubt about that. It was the people who may be killed that had her terrified. And she couldn’t do a damned thing about it. “So tell me the plan. I want to know every last detail.”

Bailey groaned and James flopped back onto his back. This was going to be a long morning.

~CHAPTER FIFTEEN~

“I swear, where I’m taking him, no one will be able to feel his presence and no one can breach the area. He will be safe.” Bailey had said this same thing a total of twenty-three times since sunrise. Her head hurt, she was tired, and she just wanted to be left alone to be able to do her job.

“I know you’re frustrated. I can feel that, but do you realize what is going to happen once everyone thinks that he is dead? They are going to come for you, and when they do, I can’t help you because you made me promise to stay out of it. Damn it, Bailey, what do I tell Tristan?” 

Bailey looked up sharply and saw the look of
oh shit
on Mel’s face. “What do you mean, what do you tell Tristan? Have you been talking with Tristan? About me?” Her heart rate picked up fast, and her mind was dizzy with the things she could be telling Tristan about her. “Your grace, what have you been telling Tristan?”

“He came to me through Sara. It was just after you told him what you were. He was upset and didn’t know what to do about you. We wanted to help him.” Mel shifted again.

“So you and Mrs. MacManus, what, gave him advice? Told him how to tame me? What?” Bailey was hurting. These women, they had helped Tristan, and he now had a woman willing to kill for him. Maybe she was going about this all wrong. Maybe the queen was part of the plot to get her killed.

“For the sake of all the Fates, you don’t really believe that, do you? Why would I try and have you killed? You are a value to us. We need your skills.” 

If the queen thought she was helping, thought Bailey, she was so wrong. These people had been in her life since the beginning, she just realized. Tristan being able to contact her by her cell phone, him knowing where she was at all times. Things were beginning to fall into place and Bailey wasn’t at all happy about it. She had a fleeting thought that maybe they had arranged her to meet him but dismissed that immediately. No, the Fates had done that; otherwise Bailey wouldn’t have this strange connection with him. But it still smacked of interference from this woman.

“When this is over, and if I live, I will never do another contract for you again. Never. You should have kept your mouth shut and out of my business.” Bailey gathered her things from the room and left the castle. Mel’s pleading followed her all the way out into the human world.

~~~

“Fine Printing, may I help you?”

“Griff?” Tristan had been trying to contact Bailey for several hours. He wasn’t worried, not yet at any rate. She could block him when she was working. He didn’t like it, but he was trying hard to understand. But now, he needed her.

“This is Fine Printing, may I help you?” Tristan noticed that the voice had gotten harder.

“It’s Tristan St. James, Bailey’s mate. I’m trying…she told me to contact you if…I was trying to find her. Do you, can you tell me where she is?” It was like Oliver Twist begging for more, please, he thought. Damn it, what the hell had gone wrong?

“My lord. Yes, my mistress is here. We are setting up the new offices. The equipment arrived a few hours ago and the men have gone now.”

“I couldn’t reach her. She’s blocked…I mean, can she come to the phone?” Tristan was hungry. He’d waited nearly two weeks this time. It was childish on his part, he knew, but he also knew that if he saw her, they’d argue and he didn’t want that either.

“That is my fault, my lord. I’ve taken the liberty of warding the building so that no one will know when we are in residence. It seemed much safer after the last time. She is here, but I am loath to wake her. She has not been sleeping well.” Tristan could hear the tone in his voice, and felt that he had deserved it. 

“I need to see her, Griff. Do you know when she might be rising? I could come to her if that would help. I don’t want to take her from her work.”

That wasn’t true. He wanted to take her from everything. He wanted to hide her away and have his way with her until she was too sated to work. Then when he was rested, start all over again.

“She has been sleeping soundly for about twenty hours now, sire. As I said, she has not been sleeping well and what little sleep she gets seems to be fitful and not restful. Also, I believe she needs to feed as well. She has been a little slower of late.”

Tristan’s whole body froze. Bailey needed to feed? No, he couldn’t have heard him correctly. He leaned his head against the wall were he stood. He calmed his voice as he asked again. “Did you say she needs to feed? Griff, does Bailey need to feed like I do?” Chanting in his head was
, no, no, no.

“Yes, my lord. Not as often, I believe, as you do, but she needs to feed at least once a week. More if she is hurt or weak. It is my understanding that she can no longer feed from anyone but you, am I correct?”

Tristan heard the panic in Griff’s voice and would have calmed him, but his own was rising. She was asleep and had been for nearly twenty-four hours. She was shutting down and he knew it. If she didn’t get some blood soon then—

“Griff, I need you to go and see if you can wake her. Give me the address and I will be there in seconds, but try and wake her.” Tristan was terrified. “Griff? Please keep her safe until I can get there. Please?”

“Yes, my lord. I shall. I am sorry. I did not think…I had assumed she was getting her nourishment from you.”

“I’m coming. I’ll be there very soon.” Tristan closed his eyes and willed himself there. He was outside the building within moments. He had to pound on the door for several more because he couldn’t come in without an invite, both the wards and being a vampire preventing him from entering.

Griff granted him access and he went to her. She was weak and her body had started conserving, shutting itself down when food wasn’t replacing what she used. The deep sleep had been necessary and had replenished her somewhat.

“You fool!” he screamed at her when she opened her eyes. “You nearly scared ten years off my life!” Tristan was mad, no longer as scared as he had been now that he could see that she was alive. He shook her hard, and he could swear he heard her teeth rattle together. She smacked his hands away weakly.

“Stop that, I’m fine.” She pulled away from him, only to stagger slightly. “So what, I forget to stop at Mickey D’s, so sue me. It’s not like I haven’t been a tad busy the past few days.” 

“You haven’t fed. You haven’t fed in nearly three weeks, and I know as well as you do that whatever the fuck Mickey D’s is isn’t going to cut it. You should have fed from me. Me, damn it.” He found himself pacing. He never paced, and made himself sit down.

“Oh, and who the fuck have you been feeding from? Huh? Got yourself a little snack and fuck somewhere else? I’ve been busy!” He was stunned to see her fangs. Her eyes had turned as well. Need, incredible need, slammed into him, making the beast in him surface and snarl for release.

He leapt from the chair and had her pinned against the wall in seconds. They were both breathing hard, their hearts pounding. He could feel it now, her hunger. His need jumped to a new level.

Tristan put his hands to her throat and his fingers against her pulse. Slowly, he ran his fingers down the long column of her neck and touched the collar of her t-shirt as it rested on both of her shoulders. His eyes were blazing when he met hers.

“Bailey, I want you. I want to make love to you, in a bed. I want to feel your body surrounding mine while I’m deep inside of you, your heat wrapped around me. I want to bury my cock into your pussy while you ride me and come on me, with me. Then I want to feed from you. I want to have you sink your teeth into my flesh and drink and long from me.” 

He pulled the shirt apart, ripping it from the collar to the hem. He looked down at her breasts, heaving now, cupped in a bright orange bra that barely contained their bounty. He hooked his finger in the front of it, extended a single claw, and sliced it open. Tenderly, he pulled the opening apart and she spilled from the confining material. 

Her breasts tightened and her nipples hardened as he gazed at them. His mouth watered and his fangs elongated, his need to taste, to bite, strong; his need to worship stronger.

“Touch…I want you to touch them.” He watched as her hands moved up her ribs slowly to just under the weight of her. Cupping her hands, she lifted them up and brushed her thumbs across the tight nubs of her nipples. Her moan shot through him, shot need straight to his cock.

“Tristan, I…what do you want me to do? I’ve never…I want to…it feels good.” She pushed them together and using her thumb and finger, gently pinched her left nipple and then rolled it between her fingers.

He bent his head and captured the right nipple with his lips, nibbling hard, biting but not breaking skin yet. When she arched her back and bowed toward him, he pulled back and stepped away. “No, not this time. I’m not taking you against the wall like an animal again. I want you beneath me, not writhing against the wall.” And he took another step back.

Tristan picked her up in his arms and when her bare breasts rubbed against his shirt, he felt the heat as though she were touching his bare skin.

“Where is your bed, Bailey? I don’t care if it’s halfway around the world, we are going to make love in a proper bed.” After three tries of her voice not working, she gave him her address. They were there in seconds.

He sat her down on her feet next to the big bed. Of course it wasn’t made, but right now he didn’t care. All he could think about was her, her body, and them.

“Help me undress. But we’re going to go slowly. We have all night. And I plan to spend it inside of you.”

He watched as she brought her shaking hands up to his tie and worked at the knot. When she was shaking so badly she couldn’t undo the buttons, he wrapped his hands over hers just to calm her. When he felt them work easily again, he slid his hands down her arms and encircled her tiny waist.

“I want to…can I taste your skin, Tristan? I want to lick your skin and taste you.” Her fingers running through the hair on his chest were hot and making him hotter with her tentative touches and caresses. “Your blood is so hot to me, and when I taste your skin on my tongue, it’s everything I can do not to take a bite of you.”

“I want you to do what you need, what you feel. I’m as much yours as you are mine. Touch me, Bailey, taste me. I’m certainly going to do the same to you.”

Her fingers toyed with his nipple until he thought he’d scream, and then she ran her tongue around the dark areola before taking it into her mouth and sucking. When he hissed his approval, she pulled away. Cupping her head, he pulled her back. A frown furrowed her brow.

“Christ, don’t stop. Please, don’t stop. I love your mouth on me. The way your tongue heats my flesh everywhere it touches me. I want you to bite me, Bailey, bite me hard.” 

He felt her teeth scrape against his swollen peak, then her tongue rasped wetly over it before she sank her fangs deep into him. His growl was deep, rumbling through his chest and out his mouth. He let her drink from him there, let her taste her first of many bites he hoped they’d share tonight.

He pulled her to his body and crushed her breasts to him. Cupping her ass, he pulled her tighter against his cock and rode her up and down him while she continued to caress his body. When she wrapped her legs around him, he lowered them to the bed, him nestled between her thighs.

“Please, our pants, we need…oh, Tristan I want you inside of me.” She wrapped her armed tighter around his neck as she moved harder into his groin.

“I want this to last. If I get you naked now, I won’t be able to stop from entering you.” He moved against her again, pushing into her and pressing her into the bed.

“Next time, you can make it last next time. Inside of me, please, Tristan. I really need to feel you inside of me. I want to feel your thick cock stretching me, filling me. I want to feel you touch me deep inside, then your cum, I want to feel your hot cum shooting inside of me, filling me. Please?”

He rolled to his back, stripped the belt from its loops, and had his pants down and off in nanoseconds. He was pulling hers down her legs and standing before her naked body mere seconds later. His cock was straining straight out from his body, hard, thick and hot. She licked her lips as she stared at him.

“Roll over.” When she didn’t move, but continued to stare at his now weeping cock, he picked her up and sat down with her across his lap. “You are going to pay for that, my dear. My control is nearly gone. Your disobedience must stop or you will face the consequences.”

He was going to spank her. Actually spank her! She struggled to sit up, to get off his lap but he held her down and smacked his hand hard against her bare ass cheek. She stopped moving. He slapped again, harder this time.

“When I give you an order, I expect it to be obeyed without question, understand?” He rubbed the area he had hit as he spoke to her.

“Fuck you, you miserable prick”

He brought his hand down again, watching as his handprint reddened her pale skin. “Bailey, I mean it. I will spank you until you tell me you will obey me.” He could feel her juices gathering on his thigh, and he slid his fingers beneath her. Gathering some on his fingers, he rubbed it into her reddened ass, smoothing and soothing as he went. He pulled his hand back and spanked again, harder this time.

She wasn’t trying to get away now; she was rising up to meet his strikes. He could smell her arousal, heavy and thick around them. He moved in, gathered more of her cream, and moved it along the slit, opening it for his fingers.