Chapter 2 Kal #2
He could turn on his pheromones whenever he wanted.
She’d be practically helpless then. He hated how tempting that idea was as he drained his cup.
The whiskey loosened him up a little and when he glanced down Tess was staring at him like maybe he already turned on his pheromones.
She sat down on the bed and took off her shoes and socks, setting them aside.
“Turn them on,” she said, standing up again. The corner of her mouth turned up, and she stepped in closer. “Go ahead. I’m asking you to. Turn them on.”
Turning on pheromones was as easy as swallowing.
The glands under Kal’s ears twitched and he could sense the pheromones radiating from him.
It affected Tess immediately. She gasped a little and her eyes dilated as she approached him.
The implication of what was about to happen made Kal harden in his jeans.
“That feels good,” Tess whispered. She was close enough to touch, and she didn’t hesitate as she rested her palms at his tight abs, feeling them through his shirt.
She slid her hands up his chest and around his neck.
“ Please.” As if to make utterly clear her intentions, she stepped away again and shimmied out of her tight jeans and her underwear.
He breathed in, his cock aching for release.
He picked her up, and she wrapped her legs around him as they kissed.
The odd part, to Kal, was how familiar it felt.
It was meant to be a casual dalliance; just two people who had seen some shit together communing, using sex to feel a little better about their shitty circumstances.
It was that, but it felt like more. Kal wrapped his arms around her as she explored his mouth with her tongue.
Her kisses were wet and deep. He found himself chasing the taste of her and then pulling away again, too curious for the taste of her skin as he licked a line down her throat.
There was a perfectly good bed right there, but Kal liked how she felt wrapped around him.
He followed his impulse and braced her against the wall, their breath mingling as she scrambled to help him unzip his fly and pull out his cock.
He wasted no time, guiding himself inside her and feeling her tremble.
Her plush lips parted and he bit one lip and then the other as he filled her.
He held her up against the wall with one hand, the other massaging her breast through her shirt as she pressed into him.
The tight heat of her engulfed him, and he found himself losing control, the humming connection between them sending him close to the edge.
He grabbed her around the waist now and quickened his thrusts and she nodded, breathless, and seemingly unable to speak.
“ Tess,” Kal managed to say, and she screamed as he pounded into her one final time before he came, filling her, still rocking against her as she clung to him.
She was shaking through her own orgasm and they came down together, entwined.
He kissed her softly and rested his forehead against hers, both of them still trembling a little before he finally let her down.
“Stay with me tonight,” Tess said. Her voice was too high and soft. He could tell she was afraid to ask it of him and it made him want to stay.
He didn’t answer, instead he toed off his shoes and stripped off his shirt before crawling into her bed.
She climbed in after him and he spooned up behind her, the feel of her little body in his arms as satisfying as the sex had been.
He felt as if he’d been chasing something inside her and he wasn’t sure if he found it yet. He hoped she’d let him.
“You’re not like other Vampyren at all,” she murmured.
“I bet you say that to all the boys,” he cracked. He’d picked that phrase up from a human he’d known on-the-run who flirted with him and let him take her blood sometimes.
She giggled at that and he smiled against her neck as they both fell asleep.
* * *
The rapon the door jerked them both out of their sleep and Mark’s voice rumbled from the other side of the door.
“Kal?” Mark said. “Are you in there?”
“Oh shit,” Tess mumbled sleepily. Kal kissed her hair absently, as if after only one night they were now a couple.
It certainly felt that way. “I’ll talk to him.
” He climbed over her in the bed and his too large limbs spilled out on the floor.
He chuckled at himself as he got to his feet, rubbing his eyes as he went to the door of Tess’s dorm.
His hair had come loose from its braid and his jeans were unbuttoned and unzipped, revealing the triangle that led to his groin.
He wasn’t wearing a shirt. But it was only his brother at the door and he sniffed, rolling his neck as he threw the door open.
“Markole,” Kal said wryly. “You need something?”
Mark looked him up and down with raised eyebrows. “That did not take long.”
“ Markole,” Kal said, narrowing his eyes. The corner of his mouth turned up, betraying his amusement. It was not so bad to be teased by his brother. “What is it?”
“There have been Lucian spotted about a hundred miles from here,” Mark said. “I need all the men I can get. My unit’s been called down and Loren’s. Well, you haven’t met Loren yet. You will.”
“Ah…” Kal shook his head. “I deserted my unit. I’ve told you this. I show up to fight alongside you, I’ll be arrested and executed.”
“No, you won’t,” Mark said. “Who would report you? Loren and I are the commanders and we’re not going to. We just need men. Kal… it’s the Lucian.”
“Alright, alright,” Kal grumbled. He was older than Mark, by just a few years. It never felt that way, though. Mark had always been more serious and more dutiful. But Kal had admired that about him, even if now, he feared it might get him killed. “Let me get my shirt.”
When he turned around, Tess was already dressed and watching the two of them with a matter-of-fact expression. She was holding his shirt and boots and now she handed them to him with a nod. “Try not to get killed, okay?”
“I’ll do my best,” he muttered, and leaned down to kiss her on the cheek, running his thick fingers through her short hair.
Mark was in a rush and Kal found himself hopping in the hall as he struggled to put on his boots and follow his brother at the same time.
He had not fought with a real unit in so long.
There was a risk of not just getting killed but embarrassing himself but he couldn’t think about that now as his brother marched down the hallway with Kal stumbling after him.
“This is Loren,” Mark said later, once they’d climbed into the Humvee full of men.
“He’s on the regional Council. Actually, he’d like to talk to you and Tess about that creche when there’s a chance.
” Mark threw a pile of armor at Kal to wear and he caught it neatly with a little grunt before gaping at Loren, who looked more intimidating and much more by the book than his brother.
“You’re on the… Council?” Kal said sickly.
The other men were ignoring them, all seeming pretty on edge about the possibility of facing Lucian. Mark, Kal, and Loren huddled at the back of the Humvee on the little bench, speaking in hushed whispers.
“I’m not going to tell them you’re a deserter,” Loren said, waving a hand. “I’ve been working with the resistance myself. That’s why I want you and Tess to report on what you saw at that creche. I think there’s a chance they’ll actually listen.”
“I don’t,” Mark muttered.
“Listen, I was up for execution by the Council,” Loren said.
“Now I have a seat on it. Anything is possible. We’re stirring things up over there.
If the old leadership tries to run this world business as usual, the Lucian are going to slaughter us all.
Wehaveto work with the human populace. It’s a matter of survival. We just have to get them to see that.”
“Alright,” Kal said, pinching the bridge of his nose. The thought of speaking to the Council was about as enticing as this potential battle with the Lucian was, but if it would help the children he saw mistreated in the creche, he couldn’t really refuse. “Fine. I’ll do it. I assume Tess will too.”
“Okay,” Loren said, nodding. “That’s sorted out. Now about these Lucian…”
The battle turned out to be a lot of hurry up and wait.
Loren had been given word that the Lucian were camped out in the thick woods of rural Indiana.
Finding them while remaining unseen was difficult enough, but hiding in a ravine while wearing the bulky armor of a Vampyren unit reminded Kal of how little he missed being a soldier.
“There aren’t very many,” Mark whispered to Loren, as they peeked over the edge of the ravine into the thick woods where a small number of Lucian were sitting around a fire, gnawing on what appeared to be the limbs of some large deer.
“They must be scouts,” Kal said. “They’re mostly out west, right? They’re sending scouts.”
“Well, they’re not going back where they came from,” Loren said.
He motioned to his men at the end of the line to sneak around to the other side of the campfire.
They were far enough away that their scents and commotion wouldn’t alert the Lucian.
That was one of the first things Kal had heard about them.
You had to stay back,wayback, because Lucian were as sensitive to scent and motion as they were stealthy.
And when you attacked, you had to move fast.
“We move on my mark,” Loren whispered.