Chapter 8
Leandro
Although I usually took breaths when I was in the human world to make it look like I was one of them, I didn’t now, and focused instead on the coffee in my hands. Otherwise I was in danger of breaking my own rules.
Being this close to Anais when she was wearing so little and still bearing the heavenly scent of her own arousal was difficult. I just wanted to pull her into my arms and tear off the last of the clothing she was wearing. But I couldn’t.
Not only were we out in a more public part of the apartment, but she hadn’t given me any indication that she wanted it. Even if she was aroused, I couldn’t be sure she was turned on by me. It was clear she had been before I arrived. It made me wonder what she was thinking about.
She had reacted to my touch, as she usually did, but that wasn’t a big indicator either.
Yet all I could think about while she was sitting opposite me and considering my plea for help was grabbing hold of her, bending her forward over the table, spreading her legs and playing with her pussy until I’d given her several orgasms and turned her into a spent mess, then finally taking her from behind and enjoying the body I’d been tormenting for hours.
Several times I had to shift position and force myself to remain seated so I didn’t get up and pull her into my arms. For the last few minutes she had focused on her coffee, not saying anything, and I had no more information to give her.
“Can’t you get a team together another way?” she asked after taking another mouthful of her drink.
I shook my head. “Not unless you want me to follow my uncle’s advice and make an army of turned faster than this other vampire is.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t a group of turned that new be hard to control and not all likely to follow you?”
“Exactly. I’d be making lots more turned than I would get to recruit or use, and have to train them if I wanted them not to just go on a killing rampage. And, well... you know what that would do to the human world around us.”
“That would mean the murder of even more humans and a lot of turned out of control. I assume they would at least be in a different country. Somewhere in Europe?” She folded her arms across her chest, covering the nipples that had been visible under the thin fabric of her top.
It took all my self-control not to reach across the table and gently unwrap them so I could see the contours of her chest once more. And then stroke those sensitive nubs through her PJs just to see how she reacted. I wanted her, so badly.
“Leandro? You’re staring.” Her words drew me back to the present moment and I gulped, finally tearing my eyes away from her torso. It must have been obvious I was gawking at her body. It was the first time I had ever lost my composure around anyone in a long time.
After taking a breath to steady myself, I dared to look at her face again. “Sorry. You’re a distraction I enjoy, but I should behave more like a gentleman. To answer your question, I am likely to turn them here in the US if I am given no other option.”
“You would definitely turn some, then?”
I nodded. “I don’t want this to seem like blackmail, but I will do whatever is needed to protect my clan and the Brethren I am part of.”
She drank the rest of her coffee and got up to get some more. “I understand. Then you had better tell me what this mission would entail.”
“Mission?” another voice asked. Both of us swiftly turned to see a young woman standing in the doorway. She had a loose ponytail and was also wearing PJs, but she had a dressing gown over the top that kept her far more modest than Anais was.
As soon as she saw me her eyes went wide.
“It’s okay,” Anais said, getting to her feet. “He’s... Leo, the one I was telling you about earlier.”
“The vampire is here?” A second woman came up from behind, and not far after her was a young man with floppy hair and a strange gait.
I looked at Anais, hoping she would explain them. They were all human and I would have thought they were her team, but she had already told them about me. Or at least, one of them.
“What brings you to our team house?” the second woman to arrive asked.
Frowning, I stood up as well and backed up, trying to keep them in my sight, but not able to do so when Anais was on the other side of me. Had this been a trap?
“It’s all okay,” Anais said again, coming around the table to stand near me, exposing herself to my strength.
If I’d wanted to I could have killed her, even fed on her, and there was nothing the other humans could do about it.
“This is the vampire that I told you all about. He needs our help. All our help.”
“Our help?” The nearest woman came into the kitchen, but only far enough that the rest of the team could come inside the room as well. They stayed clustered at the other end.
“I do,” I replied when Anais looked up at me.
“I’m Leandro. Leo for short. I met Anais on a mission several weeks ago, but what we thought was a done job isn’t.
We dealt with one small set of defectors.
Turned, who thought they could take on the Brethren and help free other turned from being forced to stay in the shadows and spare human lives as much as possible. ”
“This is Tess, Naomi and Alan,” Anais added, pointing to her friends in turn. “They’re my new vampire hunter team.”
I nodded and tried to relax my body, but it was hard to be relaxed when they were all staring at me as if I was going to devour them and they were considering shooting me for it.
“Why don’t we all sit down and Leo and I will explain everything that has happened and what he needs us for now.”
“We’re actually going to do a mission with this guy?” Alan asked.
Anais put her hands out before the whole team could start talking at once. “None of you will be forced to do anything. Leo has come to ask for our help. I’ve agreed. But each of you can make your mind up yourself. I know it’s a lot to ask.”
“If you’re going, so am I,” Naomi replied. “But are you sure we shouldn’t just kill him? We’re supposed to take out vampires.”
“Turned, actually. Nowhere in our mandate does it declare that we should kill Brethren and the original race.” Alan folded his arms.
“No one is going to be killing anyone.” Anais looked at me and reached out to take my hand. “You can relax, Leo. You’re safe here. They won’t try to kill you. I promise.”
I let out a chuckle, but cut it short when I saw their faces.
Relaxing a little, I looked over at the other three.
“I appreciate the sentiment, but even together, the three of you aren’t going to be strong enough, or swift enough, to kill me.
Not even if you work together. I’m not a turned, and there is a very good reason your little academy doesn’t send you after Brethren. ”
“But Anais killed one of your kind,” Alan continued.
She shook her head in response before I could deny it for her. “No. I killed a very powerful turned, but Ludis wasn’t Brethren. Leo’s right. None of us, even all four of us, with everything I know, would ever be able to stop him if he wanted to kill us all.”
“Comforting,” Naomi replied, but she went over to the coffee machine as well and grabbed a mug. “I’m going to assume that since we’re not already dead and you seem to have a massive crush on our Anais, we’re safe for now.”
I opened my mouth to deny having a crush on Anais, but instead I looked at the object of my affections. It was so much more than a crush.
“Leandro is here on business,” she replied, but her heart rate had increased and some of that blood had gone back to her cheeks. On top of that, her body was close to mine and I was certain she grew more aroused once more.
Without thinking, I stepped closer to her.
“This is more than business. I don’t have a crush.
I am asking for your help. And for that of your team.
But I didn’t come here to be mocked for having needs and wants of my own and appreciating the skill, dedication and attraction of a human far better than those around her. ”
Anais looked up at me before she smiled, the expression slightly lopsided.
“Well, you two love-birds, then, need to tell us what’s going on so we’re all on the same page and we know what danger we’re facing.” Naomi made everyone coffee, including me and Anais.
I considered sitting back down again, but there were only four dining chairs and I didn’t want to deprive the team of a place to sit…
or get that close to them. No matter how brave Naomi was acting and how much Anais and I tried to reassure them, they were still nervous.
The least I could do was give them space.
The team all sat at the table so I leaned against the kitchen surface, not too far from the coffee machine.
Over the next few minutes Anais repeated everything I had told her so far and detailed some of our mission from before, giving her team all the information they needed to know what I might be asking of them.
Eventually she was done and the four of them turned in their chairs to look over at me.
“Is that everything?” Anais asked.
“For the most part. I have a turned who is helping me, but he’s not a fighter. He knows his relics.”
Naomi leaned in to get a better look at me. “Are you saying that there really are objects that seem to have magical powers?”
I couldn’t resist chuckling at her question. “You believe in vampires. Is it so hard to also accept that certain sorts of magics might be real? Although there’s probably science to explain the relics. I just don’t understand it. I’m not an expert in relics.”
“But you are an expert in stalking a human until she agrees to be your pet?” Naomi responded.
After lifting an eyebrow, I shrugged. “I’m a fighter, a fixer, and I like to enjoy my time when I’m not doing what the Brethren need me to. If what I want to do is your team leader, I’m not going to deny it, lie about it, or have that desire be made into a joke.”
“Well, maybe you shouldn’t be so cryptic as to invite her on a cruise and book her a room without so much as checking she wants to go before you do.” Naomi glared at me and I had to hand it to her, she was fiercely defensive of Anais—and that was a good sign. What she said gave me great concern.
“Booked her onto a cruise?” I asked, looking at Anais instead. “I didn’t book you onto a cruise. You stayed with me on our last mission.”
Anais shook her head. “I’m booked on one in a few days’ time.”
“That wasn’t me,” I replied. “Tell me everything.”
After gulping, Anais got to her feet and fetched a laptop from another room. For a few seconds I was left with her team, but we could hear her the whole time and none of us moved until she was back.
She quickly showed me the cruise details she had been sent and I could see that it wasn’t many days now until she was supposed to be on it.
“I swear I didn’t book this. Whoever did this, they can only be trying to trap you. Perhaps even trying to make you think it was me.”
“Well, it almost worked,” Anais replied, looking up at me. There was fear in her eyes, an emotion I hadn’t seen her show in some time. I wanted to pull her into my arms and make sure she knew I wouldn’t let anything happen to her.
There was no way I would let her go, and I knew I could reassure her. I hoped I could reassure her.
“If you had booked flights to go, I would have been alerted and followed you. Any cruise ship you would have gotten on, I would have come after you and looked out for you.”
To my surprise, she leaned in toward me and squeezed my arm. “That’s good to know, but we still need to decide what we’re going to do next. I’m assuming I should now ignore this booking and just not get on that ship?”
Although I opened my mouth to agree with her, I stopped myself before I could speak.
“We might be able to use this. If we know who is asking you to go on this and we go in knowing that you were invited by someone suspicious, we might be able to find out who, even see if they’re likely to be the one who took this relic. ”
“You want to put her in danger to get your mission done on a possible chance this is related? Use her as bait?” Alan asked, looking as if he was going to get up and come over to give me a piece of his mind.
Anais lifted a hand to wave him back to his seat. “It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been bait or put myself in danger to get a mission done, and not just for Leo. I’ve been bait for us as well, now and then.”
“Let me see if I can find out more about this,” I said.
“My contact might know if some of these turned are going to be there—or somewhere else, somewhere you won’t be.
It might give us an idea of how necessary it is to be on that cruise, but your starting port isn’t far from where the rogues are in Greece, and I don’t think much of coincidences. ”
No one moved as I pulled out my phone and sent a quick message to Petros. I didn’t know if he would be awake where he was, so many hours ahead of us that it was easily daytime and he was likely to be sleeping. Despite that, I had to try to find out.
No matter how willing Anais and her team were to work with me, I wasn’t going to risk her life if I didn’t have to.
“Okay. If we’re all done here and this is decided, can I go back to bed?” Naomi got up, her coffee cup only half empty. She walked right past me to put the mug in the sink and then hurried away.
Anais nodded and encouraged her other two mates to do similar, taking their mugs herself so they didn’t have to get as close to me. I didn’t move as she came close to put them in the sink with Naomi’s.
Before long we were alone together again and I could stop worrying about appearances. I pulled her into my arms and held her close, surprised she didn’t resist.
“Promise me that you’ll keep them safe on this mission,” she said, focusing more on me than anything else.
“I promise that unless I need to save you, I will do what’s needed to save all of them. Should the need arise.”
“Good, because I will make sure I am never in need of saving.” Anais smiled and slipped out of my arms. “If you’d like to stay out the day, I can make you a bed on the couch.”
Letting out a small growl, I nodded. I didn’t want to sleep on the couch but in Anais’s bed, right after I’d finished fucking her into a puddle, but she was making it clear that wouldn’t be an option.
For now, I guess I was staying with Anais. At least until we could figure out if this cruise invitation was related to the problem I had to solve or not. Then either way, we were going back to Greece together.
I might not be welcome in her bed yet, but given some time together, I had to hope she would eventually see the benefits of belonging to a true-blood. And until then, I planned on at least toying with her a little. Just not on our first night together again.