Geared for Pleasure (35 page)

Cyrus could see her rage was not aimed at him. “What is it, Phina? Tell me.”

She turned back to him in surprise when he used the shortened version of her name, sloshing liquid out of the container. “Raj Ellsworth. He is here, in the palace. His stink is everywhere.” She started to pace. “There’s no time to tell you everything, but you should know. A member of the Raj covets the queen’s maid, Nephi. He enjoys hurting her. Torturing her. Without Queen Idony’s or my protection, she will not survive him. She has always been too gentle to fight.”

“Nephi?” Cyrus had always been fond of the quiet Felidae. She was shy, but utterly loyal to the queen. “I take it you know her.”

Seraphina nodded jerkily, setting the absencea down. Her clawed hands flexed. “She is my sister. Our queen has kept her safe, out of
the mines and out of the hands of Ellsworth. Now everything has changed.”

It made sense now. “The Khepri…
She
is why he sent you to the palace?”

She’d stopped pacing to stare intently at the door. “The queen protects all those under her care. Even in her absence she and the Khepri mean to honor that promise. Nephi will be safe if I can get her back to the ship. To Hadi.”

Her mission had not been for any trinket or possession. She was here to steal back her sister. Seraphina’s connection to the queen was finally beginning to make more sense. Of course Queen Idony would protect an innocent Felidae if it were in her power. “How did the queen find out?”

Her reply was so low Cyrus had to lean in to hear her. “Ellsworth tours the settlement once a year to ensure we are all being treated well, to count those with child among us for the census. He brings a science minister who bears a device to trim our claws to the nub. It is more humane, he insists, than the permanent removal forced on our kind on Maithuna.” He placed his hand on her arm in comfort and she allowed it, showing him the depth of her distraction.

“When my elder sister, Nephi, came of age, Ellsworth noticed. That year we were given more food and ale than the other miners. Our bedding was restuffed and the roof of our mound home repaired. The next year he attempted to rape her inside our home, but she resisted. I was too inexperienced then to fight so I called for help. A few weeks later a noblewoman requested Nephi specifically as a caretaker and servant for her child. It meant more rations for the rest of us so she agreed.” Her lips curled back in a silent snarl at her memories. “Her visits home grew shorter. We could smell the blood on her. The injuries. I learned that while members of the Raj are forbidden from taking Felidae into their homes by Theorrean Law, he could bribe another to do it for him. He had been tormenting her
with the noble’s permission. Forcing his attentions on her. The only way I could get out to help her was to find a bribe the noblewoman could not resist. It was known she was rather fond of the queen’s emerald lotus ring.”

Cyrus caressed her arm almost absently, studying her face, his heart wrenching at the story she was laying out before him. “You meant to steal from the queen to bribe a noble? But how, if you could not get into Queen’s Hill?”

Seraphina shrugged. “I was young, I could do anything. And there were tunnels. Tunnels no Felidae had ever made, small but perfect, and leading out to several openings in the Twin Mountains. One extended down nearly half the Yazata range. There is also one that leads directly to the outcropping facing the Copper Palace.”

Her voice had softened with remembered wonder and disbelief. “I did not see the queen sitting in the shadows when I entered her room and began to search for the ring. When I finally saw her, she did not call out for help. She simply smiled. She was so beautiful, her eyes so wise. She asked me why I had gone to so much trouble, so I told her, not believing it would change anything. Nephi became her personal maid that very night. Under the queen’s protection.”

Seraphina stepped away from his touch and wiped her face. “We have no time for this. I’m not sure why I told you but—”

“I’m glad, Phina. I am
honored
that you told me. That you trusted me. The queen chooses her friends wisely.” And he had, perhaps, judged Seraphina too harshly.

“How big is your wardrobe, Sword?”

Her question brought him up short. “The armoire? Too excessive in my opinion. My clothing hardly fills one sec—”

She covered his mouth and walked him backward in its direction. “Someone is coming. We need to hide.”

He reacted in an instant, reaching behind him to open the wardrobe door. His arm curled around her to pull her inside and he saw
her tail lash out to tug the door closed behind them. In that same moment, he heard loud voices arguing outside his door.

“You left the Queen’s Sword alone to
wash up
? Are you insane, man?” Cyrus did not recognize the voice, but Berhnard certainly did. So did Seraphina, if the tension in her body was any indication.

“Sir, did you want him to suspect something was amiss? The Raj, he may accept, but the absence of the Chalice? Besides, it was difficult to concentrate, what with that lowborn and wretched looking-urchin who has come today with her hand out. I had only thought to inform the queen that Her Majesty might prepare to greet him. She has already suffered so from their betrayal.”

Betrayal? Cyrus stiffened but Seraphina kept her hand over his mouth and leaned into him, telling him without words to take care. To keep silent.

Was this what Berhnard had been led to believe? That Cyrus and Dare had betrayed Queen Idony? That it was the reason she seemed so changed?

“He is not here, lackwit. He could be, even now, on his way to make an attempt on your queen’s life. I will ask her to dispose of you when this is done, Berhnard. You have been nothing but a thorn under my skin since this started. I would pluck you out.”

Berhnard’s voice was high and panicked. “I’ll find him. I will have the Wode in the palace search every room. I will not let you down, sir.”

Phina’s gaze had narrowed to brilliant green slits as she listened to the men. She definitely recognized the other man’s voice. He was amazed he could see the color of her eyes, even in the shadows of the armoire. She was so damn beautiful, whether she was covered in soot and grime or naked as sin on the Siren. He could hardly breathe from the need that hit him like a booted heel in his chest.

Her gaze focused on him and her lips parted. “Close quarters,” she whispered in explanation. “You’re more affected by my scent.
They are gone now. I just want to make sure they don’t come back before we find another way out of here.”

It wasn’t Felidae pheromones. It was
her
pheromones.
Her
scent. Her eyes. She could have died. There could be no escape from this palace alive and all he could think about was being inside her again. Her breasts against his chest. Her hands on his skin.

“Seraphina.”

Her arousal could not have come at a worse time. Her family was in jeopardy, as were Cyrus and the queen. She was here to save her sister from unthinkable abuse. That knowledge should cause her to hate every creature with a prick. She was trapped in a closet with a man who had every right to despise her. A man she still desired more than any other. More each day. Beyond reason.

And the one responsible for his mysterious disappearance from the Siren and subsequent hardship in the Avici was here, reprimanding a member of the palace staff. Muller was here.

It made no sense. He had money, yes, but all of it was ill gotten. His influence was over the criminal element, not the nobility, but even that influence was not impressive. He was a middleman. Petty. This could not be
his
plan. Someone else was winding his gears.

Her need was winding hers. Even as she thought to push away, she rubbed herself against Cyrus. The few uniforms that hung around them smelled of him. She was drowning in his scent. And it was getting stronger with his heat. His arousal.

She felt his tongue caress the palm she’d forgotten was covering his mouth. Her other hand slipped between their bodies to grip his hard cock.

He groaned and Phina smiled. “Shh, Sword. You do earn your name, don’t you? I wish we had time for a demonstration.”

There were Wode walking up and down the halls outside the
room, opening each door they came across. She could hear them. Damn it. Without the right equipment, Cyrus would never be able to leave the way she had come in. She wished she had told him to keep the rope.

They would have to wait for the guards to move to another wing. Wait with him this close. Touching her. Wanting her. “Maybe we do have time after all.”

She lifted her hand and replaced it with her lips on his. Her body tingled at the contact. His taste. She’d been unsure if she would ever feel this again. After their encounter in the galley—as much a release for their anger as their passion—she had believed he was done with her.

When he became the aggressor, his kiss eating at her mouth, his own hands seeking beneath her loose clothing, she knew he wasn’t done. He still wanted her.

She loosened her grip enough to unhook a few of his pants buttons. The fabric opened and she slid her hand inside, the heat and hardness branding the sensitive skin of her palms.

Phina recalled that first night on the Siren. How easily she’d submitted to him. How powerful his effect on her had been that she’d given him what she took from so many—she’d knelt at his feet and taken him deep into her mouth.

He had gripped her hair, not to force her, but to touch her, and she had given him everything. Wanted to please him.
His
pleasure, not hers. It was the kind of feeling she had been told signaled to female Felidae that they had found their heart’s mate. It had terrified her then.

It still did.

Phina came back to the moment with a moan when he tore his mouth away from hers and covered the dark rose nipple he’d revealed by pushing up her overlarge shirt.

She bit her lips, knowing she had to stay silent. Had to not shout
at the violent need that was clawing through her, burning her from the inside out as she stroked his thick shaft. She wanted him inside her. Needed him.

He slid his thick-fingered hand inside her pants, past the belt that held the
ton
, until they rested on the damp patch of fur between her thighs. He hummed at the softness of it, curling his fingers in it and tugging while his teeth tugged her hard nipple.

Ecstasy. Phina’s eyes felt as though they’d rolled back into her head, her body arching, thrusting into his hand. Begging him for more.

Her heartbeat filled her ears, drowning out the world outside. All her attention was focused on his touch. His fingers slipped through her arousal, circling and teasing until she was sure she would scream loud enough that Queen’s Hill would echo with her cries.

She squeezed him tighter. Warning. Begging. Cyrus growled and slid his fingers inside her. Not enough. It was not enough.

He lifted his head from her breast, taking her mouth to muffle her needy whimpers when he pumped two, then three fingers deep inside her sex. His rhythm mimicked her sliding grip on his erection and she keened softly against his lips, biting at them, letting his tongue distract her.

She sucked it deep and hard into her mouth, knowing he was remembering, too. Wanting her mouth on him. Wanting to feel her clinging to him as he took her without worry that anyone could hear.

His touch was as desperate as hers. No anger. No resentment. Just passion. Phina reveled in the change. She rocked her body against his, scraped her nipples across the rough fabric of his shirt and increased the speed of her strokes. Pleasuring him the only way she could in this confined space. Every way she could.

Yes. Moons, yes.
She could feel it from the tips of her ears to the balls of her feet. Lava-like heat coiled in her belly and her tail quivered with excitement. Just from his touch. Just from—

“Cyrus.” She muttered his name when she wanted to shriek. But she knew he felt her restrained passion. Felt her drench his hand, her muscles grip his fingers tight enough to bruise as his touch singed her. Sent her into the flames.

She was still quaking with it when she dropped to her knees in the wardrobe, dragging herself away from his fingers and mouth to wrap her lips around the head of his cock.

She craved him. Craved the taste of him in a way she could not explain. She wanted him to find his release this way, wanted to take his essence inside her.

“Phina. Damn, Phina—
love
.” His hands were in her hair again and his whisper was harsh with pleasure and surprise.

He was close. His scent was strong. Male and Wode and Cyrus. Hers. He smelled like hers. She could smell herself on the fingers he’d slid into her hair and it mingled with his taste.

She breathed out slowly and lowered her mouth, mindful of her sharp teeth, until her lips were nestled against the base of his shaft. Her tongue traced a veined line and his hips jerked in reaction.

Yes. Let me taste you. Please.

He answered her wordless request with a sharp breath of pleasured pain. His hips thrust helplessly against her mouth once. Twice.

There it was. His taste. She swallowed it greedily, her tongue desperate to capture every lingering drop as his big body shook against her.

Phina was still nuzzling the heated skin of his inner thigh when he lightly tugged her hair, reaching down to cup her chin and raise her gaze to his.

His expression was regretful, but his voice was urging. “Seraphina, we have to hurry. I cannot hear them. I think we have a chance now.”

A chance for what? Her mind was clouded. His scent was fogging her thoughts.

He bent over and gripped her shoulders, hauling her into an upright
position. “Phina, you have no idea how much I would love to continue this, but you have a sister to save. And I have a dagger to get for the queen. Also, an escape should follow. I need your help for all of it.”

He needed her. They needed her. She looked at him and shook her head. She did not regret this. How strange. But he was correct, it was time to complete their task.