Chapter 9 | Garroway #2
“Is this where you disappeared to for two weeks when you left us, Garro, when you captured Dimmon Plank? You said it only took three days to track him down.”
Surprise colors my cheeks. “What—no! Honest. That was when my Loreblood power came alive. I wasn’t lying when I said I lost myself and became trapped in seeing through the eyes of animals. I stayed in Nuhav a while to try and hone the skill, not to smoke redcloud.”
By the tenderness of the smile on her gorgeous face, she seems to believe me. She pats my knuckles again when I glance over her shoulder fiendishly. “If you’d like to go . . . partake . . . I understand. I won’t judge you.”
My head shakes on its own, before the forlorn tone in her voice can reach me. “No. You’re here now and you’re all I need and want, sweet mistress. It was a bad idea coming here. You’re right.”
I make to leave the counter but her arm tugs me back—commanding and arousing in her strength. Suddenly, her curves are pressed up against me, swallowing me, and I thank the Damned for her touch.
A devious smile curls her lips. “If it’s me you need and want, I can think of something much better than redcloud to satisfy you, Garro.”
She kisses my chin, nuzzling up to me.
I smile against her cheek. My lips ghost over her ear. “You’ll be my drug, lass?”
“I’d much rather you stay addicted to me than to that shit holding you back.”
The barman returns to his side of the counter, annoyingly, and clears his throat as we cozy up to each other. “I just made Banooth stop his shenanigans, half-blood. Don’t make me boot you, too.”
Sephania giggles against my neck. I briefly wonder if the cloying scent of the redcloud hasn’t gotten to her, for her to be so abruptly lustful. It’s much too quick for her to be tipsy already.
Then I remember she’s been separated from me for three months, also. It’s a two-way street, and clearly she’s missed me as much as I’ve missed her. That notion makes me harder in my pants, more needful for my commanding mistress to do her worst to me.
I look at the barman with a stern glare and he rolls his eyes, hands splayed out on the counter. “Room three upstairs is open. You can have it half-off if you can be gone before daybreak.”
I smile wide. “Shouldn’t be a problem, Kep.”
Sephania whispers, “Unless I plan to trap you in there all day.”
I pout. “I’ve heard of worse tortures.” Stepping aside, I sweep my arm out in a bow, toward the stairs around the side of the bar. “Lead the way, Mistress.”
She takes a step past me, smirking and trailing her fingertips across my neck, making me so damned excited I’m about to burst out of my slacks. I hurry after her—
And nearly run into her back when she stops short at the base of the stairs. Her body goes rigid. The tension coming off her shoulders strikes me in the chest.
I snarl and bare my fangs reflexively, sensing danger, curling my arm protectively around Sephania’s middle. “Seph, what is it?”
She nods her chin toward one of the men sitting on the circular table we first passed, lounging with two others, speaking in hushed voices.
The man is unknown to me, an ugly specimen with a bulbous red nose, balding temples, and a sweaty pate. His lips move in a harshly and I can tell he’s saying nothing nice or quaint to his friends.
Sephania gulps and takes an unsteady step toward the stairs, trying to ignore this man. “Just someone I recognize is all. No need to make a scene—”
My hand circles tightly around Sephania’s wrist, catching her off-guard and making her gasp.
“Who. Is. He?”
My words brook no argument. Sephania looks from her clasped wrist to my face and sees the deadly expression there.
“A flesh auctioneer,” she says. “Name is Pukren. I watched him sell off countless young girls and boys to my old master, and to people much more disgusting than Lukain. At least Lukain meant to train the whelps. The other buyers, well . . .”
My nostrils flare. I have a feeling she isn’t telling me the whole story, which only brightens my anger.
I glance over my shoulder at the disgusting man named Pukren, who looks frail enough to snap in two.
He hasn’t noticed us looking at him—none of them have, lost as we are in the shadowy dim light.
Instinctively, I take a step toward the table—
Sephania puts a hand out and stops me. “Garro. What are you planning?”
I look at her, eyes roving up and down. My words come out clipped, not my usual jovial tone. “I’m suddenly hungry for more than one thing, little honey badger.”
She catches the meaning in my shimmering red eyes.
A feasting and then a fucking?
Almost imperceptibly, she nods. Sephania won’t try to stop me. Not when Master Skar, Vallan, and I have corrupted her so completely during our time together.
Her hand releases me. “You know,” she mutters as we both face the table. “There’s a very good chance he was responsible for selling me from the Diplomats to the Grimsons. As a liaison between Dimmon and Lukain.”
My blood boils, the ache becoming intolerable.
It’s exactly as I thought. She hadn’t told me everything. Now that she has, it’s impossible to keep my fury down.
When I say nothing, my fractured mind melding into a single curtain of red, Sephania hugs me tightly from behind. Into my ear, she whispers, “What say we take a seat back at the bar for a little while, my cub. See where the night takes us?”