The Warlord Wants Forever (4 page)

Or she’d had him.

Manipulating them, playing them, making them believe she lived for them alone in order to have them do her bidding were her m.o. Furie had once asked her, “Why would you ever send a man to do a woman’s job?”

Confused, Myst had answered, “Because I can.”

The problem with Oblak’s vampires was that they had no appreciation for her whatsoever. At least Wroth liked to look at her.

For them, the blood superseded al, and she could neither withhold it nor capitalize on it. Though the eyes of every creature in the Lore turned a certain species-related color with intense emotion, theirs were permanently, wholy red from sucking the life from their victims to the very marrow—not from merely drinking as these Forbearers feared. One kil put them in a downward spiral, because with the kil came the bloodlust riding them to do it again and again. Then the subsequent accumulation of their victim’s memories over the years drove many of them mad.

Yet for the last four nights, Ivo and his men had never drunk from her, vacilating, examining her as she had yawned with boredom. She’d snapped to Ivo, “Get dental with me or don’t, but make a damned decision.” His eyes had slitted with menace, his red gaze a contrast to his pale face and shaven head, but in the end he’d avoided her blood, thinking her madness might be catching. Worked for her. In fact, she’d never in her life been bitten.

She wondered what it would have been like to have Wroth take her neck last night when his pupils had flickered black with want. She was an awful person, she knew it, weak with perversion to even entertain these thoughts. Probably the only Valkyrie on earth who’d ever fantasized about a vampire. She frowned. No. There’d been one other….

Myst tapped her chin, wondering if she should tel the Forbearers that they forwent for realy no reason.

Neh.

Maybe if the scrumptious general continued to be nice to her she’d hint a little. She had heard of him back in the day. Of course they’d had a correspondent in the field folowing that war and she’d reported back that Wroth had been big and brave and deliciously ruthless to his enemies. Though the Overlord had lost in the end against a much larger force, he’d bought his people at least a decade of protection.

Myst and her sisters had sat by the hearth, sighing over tales of his deeds as though ogling an issue of Tiger Beat. Myst remembered that she had felt loss at the news of his defeat because she’d known it meant the death of a great man. But he’d made a comeback, and, in person, he hadn’t disappointed. Except for the fact that he was now a mortal enemy—or rather, an immortal mortal enemy. Oh, and a leech.

She tried the door to his room, just in case he’d decided to trust her, but it was locked—though not mysticaly reinforced like her cel was. She could easily have broken it down, but she didn’t have to be back in the dungeon until dawn. So she took her time dressing and piling her hair up in a way she thought he’d like, and stil had time to root through al his things. Though she kept her eyes from the shiny jeweled cross, lest she get sticky-fingered with it.

Digging through his clothes, she realized she liked how he dressed, his style modern but stil aristocratic somehow. And she loved his scent and his careless but sexy hair.

She’d roled in the bed with one of his big cable-knit sweaters, her face buried in it, uncaring if he returned and found her like that. But he never showed, and instead two guards had arrived to escort her back down as per his orders.

They wouldn’t meet her eyes.

Wel, shite, they knew something she didn’t. Wroth hadn’t kept her as she’d hoped. She was in trouble, and she suspected she knew why. If you do happen to have

information, I can get it from you, he’d said.

When they closed the cel door behind her, and she realized she was the only one in the dungeon, her fears were confirmed. The low beings here—those who made up the Saturday night creature-feature underbely of the Lore—had been taken away, no doubt to be tortured and kiled.

She was the only girl left on the dance floor, but not for long, she knew, because none of the others would’ve talked. Of course, she’d threatened to peel them, and their families, for revealing any information, and there was a reason that “And may you never feel a Valkyrie’s breath at your back” was a drinking toast among the Lore. The vampires might come and take one’s vilage, but the Valkyrie would creep in, hiding under a bed to take one’s head from one’s pilow. Their word was law.

Which left her…She looked up when she heard boots clicking over the stone.

“Listen carefuly, Myst,” Wroth said as a guard opened her cel before leaving them. “I’m going to ask you questions about your kind and about the different factions in the Lore. You must answer them or I’ve been ordered to get the information from you by force.”

“Torture? Ordered? Can’t disobey Kristoff for me?”

“Myst, you know I’d be dead if not for him. My brothers and friends as wel. My life has not been my own since that night.”

He was actualy serious about this. But then Myst hadn’t been kidding either when she’d said that torture realy pissed her off. She’d been giving Wroth preferential treatment because he was, like, a celebrity in martial circles, but now he’d taken a plunge into vampirism—and she needed to remember that. She’d push and cajole to the end but after that…Bring it, leech. Stil bubbly friendly, she said, “Wroth, you could help me escape—”

“I swore my fealty and I’l see my order through. Answer or you’l face the consequences,” he said. “I’l begin with the most basic. What are you?”

“Pussy Cat Dol?” she asked, immediately doing a slow headshake at his look. “Judge, jury and executioner.” He scowled. Her eyes lit up. “Transient! What? Realy. No?

Babe in Toyland?”

“Damn it, Myst, just answer the questions. Then you can come back up to my room.” He lowered his voice and curled his finger under her chin. “We can sleep together again as we did today—”

“But you don’t understand that torture would be easier for me than to go back to the Lore as an informant.” She’d no longer be an A-lister, an “avoid at al costs” enemy.

She’d lose her status as a creature with which one did not fuck.

“My brother has tried to get information from the others—”

“But they didn’t talk either, huh?” Did she sound smug?

He seemed to shake himself, hardening his resolve. “You’re leaving me little choice.”

Wel. She was about to experience first-hand the Overlord’s ruthlessness she’d admired, because apparently he’d decided she was an enemy just when she’d thought they were getting kinda cozy.

Way to hurt my feelings, Wroth. She sniffled. Now I’l realy have to kil you.

With his thoughts constantly on her throughout the night, he’d staled for hours, as much as he could, waiting til nearly dawn, ensuring it would at least be brief.

“You’re realy going to do this?” she asked as she turned from him, moving into the back corner.

Her shoulders were shaking, and he suspected she was laughing. When he crossed to her, taking her arm and turning her, he was shocked to find genuine tears streaming down her heartbreakingly beautiful face. “Wroth, I thought we had an arrangement.” She cast him a brows-drawn look of betrayal.

She wasn’t feigning this. In her wild, mixed-up mind, she had thought they were…friends?

The cel wobbled and he braced himself, frowning that she seemed not to notice. Just aftershocks from last night.

He didn’t want her to hurt. But her eyes blazed with it, raw and true and bare. He was actualy seeing her—Myst with her false swagger and play peeled back. This was a facet of her, but it was finaly Myst, and suddenly he found it unbearable as each tear fel. He flinched when one dropped to her cheek, flinched as if he’d been hit. Another shake al around him.

She turned from him and appeared to wipe her face. When she turned back, she was blatantly sexual, as though she’d donned a mask once more.

“Myst, I don’t want to hurt you, but you must answer my questions. This isn’t a game.”

She gave him a look of utter disbelief. “That’s exactly what this is. You want to know about the Lore? Learn this lesson wel—we are al pawns.”

The castle shook around him, and while he glanced around wildly, she remained undaunted. No, it was not the outside shaking.

The sound booming in his ears like an earthquake was coming from…within him. “What are you?” he demanded again.

Her face never lost its expression of vague distaste even when her hand pressed gently against his chest—to feel his heart stutter then thunder to life. Because he’d finaly seen her and recognized her for what she was….

“Apparently, I’m your Bride.”

“I was wondering if I could get you to turn for me,” Myst purred to him, as he struggled to hide his shock.

She’d found him to be a cool, disciplined man, but she’d heard a new heartbeat was deafening for these unblooded vampires, the sudden rush of sexual desire

overwhelming, their breaths unpracticed and rough at first. With soft touches, she eased him against the wal. His eyes were half-lidded as she rubbed up and down his chest.

“How does the air in your lungs feel?”

He inhaled deeply. “Cold. Pressure, but it feels good.” He looked at her with such gratitude for blooding him.

They always did.

“How does your blood feel, heating and moving?”

“Stronger. It’s…searing.”

She palmed his erection through his pants, and his entire body jerked as he threw back his head to yel out. She was almost as shocked. She’d known Wroth was very wel endowed, but hard, he was overly so.

Like Demon or Lykae endowed.

He held her hand in place over his shaft, making her fingers curve around it as he slowly thrust against her palm. Her body softened when she imagined the onslaught of need clawing at him. In a sensual whisper, she asked, “And how does this feel when it hardens and distends?”

“Good,” he grated with a shudder. “So damn good.”

“It’s been three centuries? Wel, you are due I suppose.” She unzipped his pants just enough to wiggle her thumb inside and rub the broad tip of his penis, making it grow slick. His eyes roled back in his head. “I can only imagine how heavy and tight this feels, throbbing with pressure, close to exploding.”

“Why are you doing this to me?”

Because I can.

Soon he would have no more thought than an animal. His eyes were growing black. She stroked his length through his pants, relieved she would never have to take his uncomfortable size within her body. Five, four, three, two…

Wroth attacked, groaning, and he was surprisingly strong as he pinned her arms over her head. He kissed her, deeply, possessively, seeming to brand her with his kiss. He left her panting when he bent down to lick her nipples, sucking at them through her blouse. His other hand cupped her sex.

With a growl, he yanked himself from her, and took her elbow. “Come with me.”

Damn it, dawn neared. Where were they? She had to keep him here. “No, Wroth,” she said.

“Won’t claim my Bride in a dungeon.”

“But I can’t wait,” she cried. “Tel the guard to leave.”

“No—”

“Wroth,” she gripped his shaft hard while whispering in his ear, “my body weeps for this thrusting inside me.”

He belowed out that order, then tore open her blouse and bra, suckling and tonguing her nipples roughly. Involuntarily her back arched, pressing her breasts into his gorgeous lips. When had she begun undulating her hips for him?

“I’ve waited for you,” he bit out. “So long I’ve waited.”

One hand pinned her wrists above her, the other shot up her skirt and ripped her panties completely from her. His fingers roved, hot and slow over her, teasing. He knew exactly how to set her on fire, using the moisture from her own body to slide his thumb around her clitoris in slow, slick, mind-numbing circles.

“So wet,” he rasped against her breast. “As soon as I saw you, I wanted it to be you.” His lips took her hardened nipple, sucking on it til it throbbed. He turned to the other one for the same attention.

Myst made a decision then. There was simply no way she was going to miss this.

She moaned in truth, unable to control herself as lightning fired outside in conjunction with the emotion inside her. When he plunged one finger into her, withdrew, then thrust two deep within her, she wanted to come around them. He slid them into her unhurriedly but with enough force that she was rocked to her toes each time.

She arched her back more, wanting to offer up her breasts. She spread her legs, taking his fierce touch. “Don’t stop,” she panted, so close, aching to reach for his shaft.

But he’d captured her hands above her.

“Never.” He thrust harder, until she didn’t know if her toes even touched the ground, then he spread his fingers inside her as if preparing her for his size. Her head fel back and she moaned at the overwhelming feeling of fulness.

She raised her leg to lay it over the knee he’d placed against the wal as if just for that purpose. Spread to him, she ground her hips wildly.

At her ear, he rumbled the words, “Come for me, milaya.”

“Ah, yes…Wroth,” she moaned again, about to succumb to his stroking. She gave a strangled cry and climaxed with a fiery, wet pulsing that staggered her and made him groan as if he had as wel.

“I can feel you come,” he grated while she clutched him, roling her hips against his masterful touch until she was too sensitive to continue. But he didn’t stop until she was mindlessly moaning his name in his capturing arms.

When she was spent, she sagged against him, stil weakly undulating for him. Her nipples were wet and achy from his tongue.

He cupped the back of her neck and yanked her up to face him, gazing down at her with lust, but his words were more. “I wil be good to you, Myst. I wil protect you.

You are mine.”

He was saying these things because he was about to shove into her with that huge shaft, to claim her. A true vampire’s Bride. He took her leg and clutched it to his hip, about to free himself.

Her half-lidded eyes had just widened with true alarm when she heard the merest whisper at the gateway to the dungeon.