Chapter 14
Xander
Goodbyes aren’t necessary, but I knew our disappearance wouldn’t go unnoticed. Benjamin blocking our path was not an obstacle I anticipated, however.
“We’re calling it an early night,” I say lightly, willing him to accept the non-explanation.
“You ought to stay.” Benjamin’s hooded dark eyes are intent on Autumn. “The night is only just beginning. Your amant certainly isn’t tired already.”
“She isn’t our amant,” I say roughly, even though every instinct of my body is encouraging me to claim her, protect her. I want to hide her from his gaze.
Benjamin shakes his head. “If she isn’t your amant, then you ought to share. Blood banquets are for sampling our human pets.”
“Not this one,” I say, tightening my arms around Autumn.
Before Benjamin can respond, Will strides forward, hand outstretched. “Thank you for your hospitality this evening. I’m sure we’ll meet again soon.”
Frowning, Benjamin shakes Will’s hand. Will uses the gesture to pull Benjamin to the side, out of my way, so that I’m able to carry Autumn out of the ballroom.
“Wait—” Benjamin starts to say, but I’m already hurrying toward the front door of the mansion, my feet barely touching the parquet floor, Will at my back.
Autumn blinks in the eerie yellow light shining from the porch lantern. “It was so dark in there.”
“Yeah,” I say gruffly.
“I can walk, you know.”
“Yeah.” I don’t set her down, though. I won’t feel good until we’re far away from this place.
We quickly walk to our cars, alert for the sounds of pursuit. Gaius and the others are busy with the banquet, I suppose, although I half-expected Benjamin to raise an alarm. I half-expect more stakes to come flying through the darkness, like they did in that alley.
I still haven’t phoned Neve to tell her about Maxim. I hope I only imagined the attachment in her voice when she spoke of him.
As Will gets behind the wheel, I bundle Autumn into the passenger seat, buckle her in, close the door. I wait for the click of the lock telling me she is safe, then I stride to my own car and start it up so I can follow them back to the library.
The tightness in my chest eases with every mile I put between me and Gaius’s mansion. The lights of the city are a comfort instead of an annoyance, the scents a relief instead of an assault on my senses.
Finally, we reach the library parking lot and pull into our spaces.
Will is out of his car in seconds. He must have asked Autumn for a minute to speak with me, because he stands between our cars and doesn’t open the door for her. She doesn’t try to get out.
I carefully step out of my car and close the door behind me.
Will wears an accusing expression. “You brought her with us to send a message to Gaius.”
I nod.
“What the fuck,” he says.
“You did hear me say someone tried to kill me tonight?”
His frown deepens. “Again? They just tried that…” He thinks for a moment. “…Four days ago.”
“That one was a warning. This was a real attempt.”
“It was Gaius?” he asks.
“I don’t have any other ideas. I don’t know if he truly expected the attempt to be successful. But those stakes were fucking real.”
“And so your solution,” he says, taking a step away from his car and toward me, “was to bring Autumn to the banquet. She’s not a pet, she’s not a pawn. She’s a human woman who needs our protection—”
Autumn’s door opens and she steps out. Her gorgeous mouth is pinched with consternation.
“Please,” she says, taking one of my hands and one of Will’s. “Please don’t fight anymore. You both did what you thought was best. And it’s too late, it’s done.”
She lets go of my hand and immediately I miss her contact. She reaches up to cup Will’s cheek, the gesture so tender it makes my chest hurt.
His gaze flickers to her neck. “He never even healed your bite,” he growls.
“It’s okay—”
Her words end in a gasp as he bends his face to her neck and licks over the wound. That sweet little gasp goes straight to my dick. I want her. I’ve wanted her all along, and I want her now.
And I’ve learned my lesson. I’m not going to hurt her again like I did before. The thought of her feeling emotional pain because of me is too much to bear.
“What are you doing, Will?” I say, moving closer to them both. “That’s my bite to heal.”
He freezes, his hands gripping Autumn’s arms. Then he murmurs, “All right?” in Autumn’s ear.
She nods and gives me a shy look.
I take her hand, tug her toward me. Will relinquishes his grasp and she stumbles a little as she comes to me. I steady her, grip her hair and tilt her head back.
That slender throat is exposed. The punctures from my fangs are already fading, thanks to Will’s interference, but I lock my mouth on them anyway, kissing, licking, gently sucking at Autumn’s skin. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough that she’ll feel it.
I switch to the other side of her neck, doing the same but sucking a little harder.
Possessive fucker that I am, I’m hoping to leave a mark.
Maybe I’m not welcome in her bed for the long run—she might still be too angry about how I treated her before.
But I want her to remember this. I want her to remember me.
Autumn
Xander’s mouth on my neck—it’s what I wanted before the banquet. Slow, sensual. The bite he gave me outside of Gaius’s mansion was too short. Now, he’s taking his time, worshiping my neck with his lips, tongue. There’s a touch of fang, sharp and exciting.
They sandwich me between them. Right out in the open, in this parking lot. Sure, nobody’s around, and the lot is protected by shrubs and a stone fence. Just the same, this isn’t exactly the privacy of their library.
“Shouldn’t we go inside?” I ask, my words halting because now Xander kisses one side of my neck, and Will the other.
I don’t really want to move—moving would mean we have to press pause on this activity, and I don’t want to stop, I don’t want to pause.
I need to keep on feeling this, exactly like this.
“Do you really want to go inside?” Will asks. “Or would you rather be a deviant little girl out here? Imagine if someone looked over the wall and saw you like this. Shameful.”
A fresh wave of arousal comes over me and I shudder in their arms.
“Answer him, mouse,” Xander says.
“Stay here,” I whisper, embarrassed as the words leave my lips. “I don’t want to move anywhere.”
I’m rewarded by Xander dropping to his knees and lifting my puffy skirt over his head. He finds the waistband of my panties and tugs them down my legs, his fingertips hot against my skin as he goes. I stare into Will’s face and reach up to twist my fingers through his messy, dark brown hair.
“I love this mouth,” Will says, leaning forward to kiss me.
His tongue plunders my mouth at the same time Xander gives a long, wet lick to my pussy. I gasp into Will’s kiss.
“Feels good, what he’s doing to you?” Will asks.
I nod. “Yes, Daddy.”
“Tell me. Tell me what’s happening beneath your pretty dress.”
“He’s—he’s licking me.”
“More details, love. Fast or slow?”
“Slow. He’s sucking a little at my skin.”
“Vampires suck,” Will says with a smile.
“And—”
Xander chooses that moment to tongue my clit.
“Fuck,” I moan.
“What did he do?” Will asks.
I frown. I don’t want to narrate it, I just want to feel it.
“Tell me, little love,” Will says, “or I’ll tell him to stop.”
No, no, he can’t stop. For the love of everything in this world, he cannot stop.
“He did something to my clit,” I say, clinging to Will’s shoulders so I don’t fall.
Will stares at me, his blue eyes dark, almost black, in the faint city lights coming into the parking lot. “Be specific.”
“I’m not sure.”
Xander does it again.
“It’s like a fluttering—oh, fuck, he’s doing it faster.”
Xander chooses that moment to add his fingers, sliding them over and then into my tender flesh, crooking them against the front of my walls, hitting that very perfect spot. I don’t have long before I come apart.
“Yes,” I gasp. “He’s—he’s fingering me now, too. Oh, fuck, I’m going to—”
Will captures my mouth with his, drinking in my moans of ecstasy, swallowing me down while Xander does the same at my pussy, lapping up my arousal, plundering my pleasure. I shake in the aftershocks of the orgasm, unable to do anything but cling to Will and struggle to breathe.
In a move too graceful to be human, Xander emerges from beneath my gown. My panties are in his hand and he quickly shoves them into his pocket.
“Right out here in the open,” he says, sounding satisfied, “you came on my mouth, mouse.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“We want more from you,” Will says. “Can you do that for us? Can you let us play with you more out here?”
“Yes, Daddy,” I say, eager to please them like they pleasured me.
“Such a sweet, dirty girl,” he says with a smile.
Xander bunches my skirt around my waist. His touch on my skin is careful, reverent. “You’re such a deviant little thing,” he croons. “Which is so perfect for your deviant lovers.”
My face warms in a combination of embarrassment and pride. He did both at once, demeaning and praising, and I love it.
“I’m going to fuck your beautiful mouth,” Will says, cupping my cheek. “And Xander’s going to sink into that sweet pussy. That all right with you, love?”
“Yes, Daddy. But you aren’t going to bite me?” I ask. They’re so close, but they haven’t yet, and they usually ask or let me know first.
“It isn’t about blood tonight,” Will says. “It’s just about you, love.”
My heart swells in my chest. He might be a wicked vampire, but he is the kindest, sweetest man. He takes care of me. I might love him for that.
Xander unhooks the straps at the back of my dress and Will is able to tug down the bodice enough that my tits are out, obscenely propped over the top of the fabric.