Chapter 22
Chapter
Twenty-Two
Lizette
“ I ’m not in trouble?”
Humiliation still coats me, head to foot. I can’t believe I came in front of Dante.
I can’t believe I got off yet again by calling Knight Daddy . Oh, I more than get the illicit thing, and how it makes me feel both dirty and his to control. Submissive.
He doesn’t even look like a guy who gets off on taking control. But he is. In his way.
That soft edged thing over steel. I like that side, the one that makes me want to sigh and just be.
Just like I like the indulgent Daddy. I want to give over to the regular Knight, too. But it’s sexual, colored by lace and silk. And it makes me both fuzzy, painfully hot, and on the edge of too much, as well as just melting inside with lust.
I’m also betting he’s a “take all the control man” out in the real world, too.
My cheeks flame hot, and I shift on my seat. I just… I wish the devil hadn’t caught me. I wish the dark thrilling knell of his words weren’t ringing through my head .
How can I lust after three people?
Even if they are the pack alphas. Or?—
“Stop thinking about getting your girl rocks off, Angel,” Dante says as he motions for me to sit. “That goes for the rest of you.”
There’s the nickname again—Angel. I haven’t confronted him about it or asked him to stop calling me that, but even I can see the dichotomy of the name he’s given me and his own.
Reaper slides in through the door to Dante’s office, silent, and to those less observant, a creature carved of ice and emotional flatness. But I can see it. The flicker of curiosity. It’s like sparks lingering against my skin, a tiny uptick in heat.
I press fingers into my hot cheeks.
“Stop thinking that shit, Angel,” Dante murmurs low and my breath hitches. “We can all feel it from you.”
Horror and embarrassment streaks through me. I know the mark is affecting us in some way, but they can sense my desire for them through it, too?
Oh, god.
Knight catches my eye as misery threatens to swallow me whole, and he winks, setting off a thrill in me.
“You don’t want us thinking about getting our girl’s rocks off?” Knight asks. “I don’t think I have any.” He turns to Reaper. “Do you have any?”
Reaper just gives him a mild look, then glances to the devil in black. “Dante?”
Dante pinches the bridge of his nose. “Just sit. Both of you. All of you, and stop fucking around, Knight.”
“Am I in trouble?” I ask again, as I push my hands under my thighs.
I’m still in the dress I changed into, and honestly, even though it’s big and shapeless in a comfy way, it’s still showing thigh, and I can feel the slide of Knight’s fingers as they ride up my inner thighs to my pussy .
Dante just raises a brow, like he knows where my thoughts went. Dammit. I need to stop that.
“Am I?” I ask again. Then something horrible comes to me. “Are you making me leave?”
“No. To your last question, Angel.”
A shiver passes through me.
Dante finally settles his gaze on me, and it burns deep into my soul. He’s definitely the devil, because the sheer brimstone and sexual fire in that look sears my flesh. Brands me.
Oh lord. What if he does make good on those nasty, hot words to me in this room that time? What?—
His gaze drops to my mouth.
He knows I’m thinking of his rules, his threat. Or was it seriously a promise?
I know he’s thinking of it, too. It glitters, like burning stars.
“The first?” I ask.
“Now that,” he says, “is a different conversation.”
Reaper’s gaze touches me, and I swear it softens a little before he looks at Dante once more.
And Knight…he winks again, this time with a proprietary smile. I try to breathe, but it’s hard.
Everything in me is hot, alive, my blood hitting my pulse points hard. And there’s one more thing.
Something I can’t ignore.
It could be psychosomatic. It could be just because of me and Knight, and my body still tripping on endorphins. It could be the closed space of the office.
Or it just might be them.
Or me.
The mark on my throat throbs. It’s working overtime and sending out tendrils of need and want and wicked desire. And I think it’s doing that because the three of them are in here with me.
I’m not up with any of the pack knowledge beyond the fact I’m an omega and go into heat. Just the bare bones. I’m coveted because of what I am. Dad told me I needed to keep away from regular jobs. And to bond with someone for love. Down the line. My choice.
This…This throb isn’t something he told me about. I guess I don’t blame him because who wants to talk about the ins and outs of sex with their daughter?
But he never mentioned it, and now…now it’s like this throb has a direct line to my clit.
All three of them are causing this overtime beat in me.
I don’t dare tell them that because what if it’s bad? What if it isn’t normal?
Worse, what if it makes Dante deem me too problematic?
He already went out on a limb today. Dealt with my problems that arrived in the form of the Council.
“Stop scaring her, Dante. And while you’re at it, stop being a prick,” Knight says.
“Angel’s scaring herself.” Dante turns to me again. “What’s got you pulling in on yourself?” He pauses. “Well?”
I open my mouth but then I just shake my head, and he sighs. Reaper’s gaze shifts to me, and for a moment, I’m caught in the black abyss of his eyes, an abyss that’s so alive it steals my breath. And again, I think I see a glimmer of something soft, secret, and just for me.
Or maybe I’ve lost my mind.
There’s that, too.
“I caused trouble.” The words are out before I can stop them.
“If you mean getting down and dirty with Rusty Knight here?—”
“Hey!”
“—then yeah, you did,” Dante says, ignoring Knight. “But if you’re talking about the fucking Council? Angel, they’re a constant thorn.”
I frown. “But you sent me downstairs…”
“Precautions.” Dante leans back against his desk, tapping a hand against it. He’s all in black, a suit. Jacket’s on the back of the chair and the sleeves are cufflinked, and his tie is silk, the vest’s got a geometrical pattern, in tiny raised ridges.
It’s the outfit of a suave criminal. Of dangerous intent. And it fits him to perfection.
I drag my gaze away and look at my Docs as I try to stabilize myself. Because I’m going haywire.
The three of them pull me in different directions like they’re touching, teasing, stimulating me. And it threatens to spin the world off its axis.
“I got the message to keep things on the down low.” The low, quiet tones of Reaper soothe in ways I don’t understand. It’s like he can calm the frightened creature in me. Speaks to the darkness I feel when I get lost. Because it’s where he dwells. “Were they after Lizette?”
“Gonna say maybe. Which we need to take as a yes. The woman, Susan, kept it vague as shit. Fine by me. I speak that language.” Dante pauses. “But, assuming it’s a yes, we need better security.”
“Dante?” One word, from Reaper.
“Add more people?” Knight pushes past, his fingers skimming my thigh, drifting over my hand as his gaze hits mine, all warm and sweet syrup I could drink from forever.
It lasts a second but it’s mine for a lifetime, that private look and touch.
It lasts a moment, and then he’s behind Dante’s desk, on his laptop, punching in something. “I can get people, trusted people. Weapons or no weapons?”
“Julien and I are weapons.” Reaper pulls out a packet of cigarettes and shakes one out. “I’m fucking lethal.”
“I want some scouts, people who can keep an eye on the streets, ears to the ground. And one or two hidden security types. No weapons,” Dante says. And I hear the unspoken yet . “You and Reaper deal with that.”
Knight looks up, frowning. “I don’t need?— ”
“Get Reap’s input, Knight.” Dante rubs a hand over his beard. “But I mean something more subtle. Cohesive. Julien and Darcy are good, they stay here or on the floor of our home if we go there. Knight, set up a schedule with our other pack members for them to pair up in coming and going. Minimum two people. I know we all do our own thing, but it’s time to act more like a pack. Run together in small groups. Get the scheduling sorted.”
His gaze touches on me, but it’s dark, glittery, and gives me nothing but contemplative heat.
“The real issue is us. We do it too. One of us stays here, we all do. If we decide to go home, we all do. And that brings me to Angel, here.”
The bottom falls from my world.
“You’re getting rid of me,” I breathe.
Irritation flashes on Dante’s face. “No, I’m not. And even if I wanted to, I don’t think I should. You’re important to the Council.”
“But…you said…”
He cuts his eyes to me. “I said she kept it vague as shit. She talked of kids looking for adventure, troublemakers and how places like this could fall under the Council’s watchful eye. There was a lot of other crap, but when someone comes in with all that? Then they’re looking for you. So, Angel, you’re stuck with us, and we’re stuck with you.” His gaze travels over me. “If you’re wanted by them, you’re useful to us.”
Not exactly words of kindness. Then again, Dante never said he was going to offer me that. I nod. “Like a bargaining chip.”
The corner of his mouth rises. “Maybe.”
Knight’s displeasure thickens the room’s tension. “Dante?—”
“Shut up, Knight,” he says.
“Fucking Council,” Reaper says. “But if Lizette’s important then she should stay with us, where we can protect her, and we need to get to the bottom of why.”
“Because I’m an omega?”
All of them look at me and Knight speaks. “No. It’s because they’re showing interest. More than they would normally, from jumping on you the moment you came to their attention and the mate they found you, to turning up here, where you showed up.”
“One’s a coincidence, if you believe in them. Two,” Reaper says, “isn’t.”
“In the meantime, Angel no longer works upstairs.” Dante crosses his arms. “She just works down on the second floor. There’s plenty to do.”
I perk a little. I’d love a chance not to be the busser. He hasn’t brought up the singing rule so hopefully he’s dropped that. I’m not bringing it up. “Can I waitress?”
“They wear skimpier outfits.” Dante raises his brows.
“I don’t care.” I look at him in defiance. “They’re just clothes. I’ll do it.”
Dante pushes off the table. “The patrons often touch the waitstaff. You? No fucking way. We can’t let them touch you.”
I glare at him. “What if I want them to?”
There’s a ripple in the air, and it hackles with anger. I can prick my skin with the sharpness of the spikes.
“No fucking touching.” Dante’s voice is low and dangerous silk, the kind a man might let brush over skin before wrapping it tight around a woman’s neck to choke her into orgasm, or unconsciousness. I swallow. “Or you’ll really understand the word trouble.”
I don’t really want anyone touching me so I just nod.
I amend that. I don’t want anyone but them touching me.
“I don’t want her waitressing,” snaps Knight. “Too risky.”
“No one gets in without being vetted.” Reaper’s words are almost lost by the scrape of his lighter. A curl of smoke hits the air .
“Guess that brings us to the fucking birds and bees talk, kids,” Knight says as he looks heavenward. “We need ground rules.”
“Rules?” Reaper asks.
Dante nods. “I caught him knuckle deep in her pretty pussy and her coming all over his fingers yet again, so unless we want a permanent bond, or worse, fucking spawn?—”
I wince. “Spawn?—”
“Unless we want that shit,” Dante says, ignoring my sputter. “We need ground rules.”
“I don’t want children,” I snap. “I don’t want to be treated like a baby machine. I just want to live and make my own choices.”
“This is more for the men, Angel,” Dante says. “Because like it or not, babies are up to them and knotting.”
“The men.” I say it so quietly I don’t think anyone hears.
Dante turns to me. “If they knot and you catch, then welcome to fucking Babyland. You give off pheromones like you’re fertile enough for a hundred women. You can’t control that, Angel. No, the part you can control is if you open or close your soft thighs. That’s it. If they lose control…”
He shrugs.
“You’re talking as if you’re not included in this,” Knight says. “Shouldn’t the warning be for all of us?”
“I’m not planning on fucking her.” Dante glares.
“Your mouth says one thing,” Reaper says, “but your body says another.”
“So—” I start only to be cut off by Dante.
“And you’re not in heat, but Angel,” the scarred, earth-bound demon says, “your scent’s so potent it’s almost irresistible.”
“Like you,” says Knight. “I think you’d be that way even without your scent.”
And I melt for him .
“So, what do I do?” I ask. “If I’m staying, I’m happy to keep house, to work. And if I have to be abstinent?—”
“Says the fucking virgin,” Dante says.
“I will.”
“She’s ours,” Reaper says. “The mark links us all to her for as long as it lasts and that bite has staying power. As for abstinence?”
“You know it’s going to happen, Dante,” Knight says. “We all do.”
I look at them confused. “But I just said?—”
“We can take the risk away, Liz,” Knight says.
“Fine,” Dante mutters. “I’ll get the drugs.”
“Drugs?” I look at each of them. “Like the O-blockers?”
“There are other drugs. Your father couldn’t afford them or didn’t know or figured it should be your choice,” Dante says. “There are O-blockers and then there are what they call deferrals. It’s like O-blockers on steroids. You can’t get knocked up.”
“Then—”
“According to the Council, they can cause side effects, apparently. But you wouldn’t get pregnant,” Dante says.
“Anything, I’ll do anything to make sure I’m not at the mercy of men. If—If someone was to grab me like that Jake then…” I don’t finish. I don’t have to.
“Actually…” Dante exchanges a look with the other two. “Let’s remove that risk. Wear the mark on show. Enhance it—with make-up—” he says pointedly to Knight. “Make it known that, to all intents and purposes, you’re our property.”
“No one will dare touch you and since getting into the second floor means we’ve got their details, it should keep you safe,” Knight says. “It’s just an added precaution. You have us for your primary protection and it’s more than enough.”
Nodding, I take a sharp breath, hating the way the arcane sentiment zooms through me like a secret, delicious thrill .
“I’m definitely going to want that better job.”
Dante gives me a look that sends dark wanton sparks through me.
“We’ll talk.”