Claimed by a Demon King (17 page)

“Sable,” he implored and his hands claimed her shoulders. “No more.”

He pushed her back and stared down into her eyes, his bright crimson in the low light.

“Let me touch you.” He caught her arm, pulled her onto her feet, and caged her against the wall with his body. He shifted his hand, wrapping it around one wrist and then the other, and pinned them both above her head.

He had done that in their other shared dream too.

He wanted to be in control.

Or did he like how doing that made her arch against him?

The full length of her body pressed into his and he rubbed his hard shaft against her belly.

“Going to touch you now.” He lowered his hand, frowned and growled when his fingers met leather. “Need you naked.”

Before she could respond, he had broken the zipper of her leather trousers and had ran a claw along the stitching. He tugged and she gasped as the rest of the stitching gave, and he was lucky this was just a dream and he hadn’t just ruined her favourite leather trousers by turning them into a pair of chaps.

He groaned and palmed her mound through her panties and she forgot that she was mad at him about something and gave herself over to sensation instead. His hand was hot on her, pressing, demanding, and it thrilled her. He had been rough in their last dream, battling her for control, his wickedness matching her own. She wanted him like that again.

Sable raised her legs and had them around his waist before he could notice. She locked her feet and yanked him against her, trapping his hand between them. The first flex of her hips tore a groan from his throat and the second had him pulling his hand free and forgetting his desire to touch her.

He ground against her instead, driving the full length of his shaft along her cleft. Sable pressed the back of her head into the wall and rode each thrust, moaning as the head rubbed her sensitive spot.

“Naked,” she whispered, urging him into going through with the thought she could see flickering across his eyes.

He growled, ripped her cotton knickers from her, and impaled her in one deep, commanding thrust.

She cried out, the sound echoing around the alley and mingling with Thorne’s grunt of bliss.

“Thorne,” she moaned and he held her hip with one hand and her wrists with the other, keeping her at his mercy. She rocked on him as much as she could, urging him to let go and give her what she needed from him. Pleasure. Bliss. Ecstasy. A moment of sheer madness. “Your female needs.”

He growled and his lips claimed hers in a soul-searing kiss that melted her bones and left her liquid and compliant in his arms. He pumped her hard, stroking every inch of her with his long length, each thrust taking her a little higher.

The brick was rough against her back, adding a touch of pain to her pleasure together with Thorne’s tightening grip on her wrists. She moaned with each hard meeting of their hips, her breath mingling with his.

“Sable… Sable… Sable…” he chanted her name like a prayer and she found herself doing the same with his, uttering it each time their bodies met, willing him to keep going. He thrust deeper, possessing all of her, and she arched into him, using her feet to force him to roughen his strokes and take her harder.

She wanted to feel his strength.

She wanted to lose herself in him and never find herself again.

She wanted to become one with him.

Madness, but in this moment, she wanted his fangs in her throat and that ultimate connection to him.

She wanted to know what Olivia had and wanted it for herself, with Thorne.

“Thorne,” Sable whispered and it was as if he had sensed her need, as if he was so attuned to her that he knew her thoughts and her feelings, and what she was afraid to ask.

He released her wrists and buried his face against her neck, kissing it hard and teasing her. She didn’t want teasing. She wrapped her arms around his head and he clutched her backside, pumping harder with each stroke, adding another hint of pain to the pleasure boiling through her veins.

Just as she thought he didn’t know her deepest, darkest desire after all, he sent her shooting into the stratosphere.

His fangs sank hard into her throat, pain blazed a trail across her flesh from the centre of his bite and her blood ignited, detonating the tight ball of heat in her belly.

Sable shrieked and clawed his shoulders as she convulsed against him, every inch of her on fire and tingling, trembling. A full body orgasm that left her boneless and shaking, and left her mind reeling and ears ringing.

Thorne pulled hard on her blood and another explosion rocked her as he climaxed, his length pulsing and hot jets of seed filling her. With each jet and each pull on her blood in time with them, another bomb detonated within her, ripping another cry of ecstasy from her throat. They grew in intensity until she couldn’t take any more.

The pleasure overwhelmed her, overloading her senses.

She shuddered with the last one, weak and shaking in Thorne’s arms. Her hands slipped down his arms. He was trembling too and breathing hard against her throat.

He whispered something in the demon language and she caught only her name, but whatever he said made the marks on her throat burn and her body come alive again, blistering hot and tingling.

“Look at me,” Thorne whispered.

She tried to prise her eyes open to obey that husky command.

It was too much.

Sable slipped into darkness.

And shot up in bed.

She slapped her hand over her throat, breathing hard and fast, her eyes wide and fixed on the wall. It was blurry, her focus turned elsewhere, locked on the level below her and a room there.

A vicious roar shook the floor and she tensed.

Thorne.

She scooted from the bed and ran to the mirror on her dressing table, her heart thundering against her ribs. She dragged her hair aside and her breathing slowed as she danced her fingers over the smooth untouched skin of the left side of her throat.

The relief she had felt faded as a pair of dark red spots bloomed on her skin.

Son of a bitch.

Another roar sounded, louder this time.

Heavy footfalls joined it, growing in pace and volume.

Thorne.

Sable rushed to the door to hold it closed and had her hands on the wooden panels just as it burst open, sending her stumbling into the dressing table. Thorne’s crimson gaze swung her way, wild and dangerous, and her heart slammed against her chest. She clutched the table behind her for support and glared at him.

He advanced on her, a picture of menace and determination, a man out to finish what they had started in that dream. His gaze flickered to her throat and he frowned, cocking his head to one side as he halted.

The accusation balanced on the tip of her tongue died as confusion lit his scarlet eyes.

Hadn’t he known that he could claim her in their vision?

She touched her neck but felt no marks there.

Sable scrambled for the antique mirror and held it up. The marks were pale and faded into nothing as she stared at them. Why?

She had awoken before Thorne could complete the claim. Was that why the marks had now disappeared?

She didn’t feel bonded to him. Not that she knew what it would feel like. Olivia said that she could feel Loren though, and maybe demon bonds were similar. She couldn’t feel anything from Thorne other than confusion and a lingering touch of anger, and it was her gift telling her of those emotions.

He reached for her.

The bells tolled.

“What’s happening?” Sable looked towards the arched windows lining the other wall to her left. It was pitch black outside. Still night. The bells weren’t ringing for a meeting.

Thorne curled his fingers into a fist and snarled, “We are at war.”

CHAPTER 11

S
able was angry with Thorne, and not just because he had almost claimed her in their shared dream. She had almost forgiven him for that, convincing herself that he hadn’t realised that he could do such a thing and hadn’t intended to ensnare her in a bond she didn’t want.

No, what had her really angry with him was the fact that the moment she had finished dressing, he had grabbed her and teleported them both to the courtyard. The people already gathered there had drawn their conclusions about her and Thorne the second they had set eyes on them and really, she couldn’t exactly be angry with them or argue that it wasn’t what they thought.

Not when her hair was all over the place and Thorne was wearing only his leather trousers, and had failed to tie them up.

He tied them now as he barked orders to his men in the demon language. Didn’t that look just great?

The vampires and werewolves snickered behind her. The demons looked ready to pay up on the bets that they had placed barely a few hours ago, but were eyeing her closely, paying particular attention to her neck.

Sable kept it covered and glared at them.

Thorne hadn’t even given her a chance to grab her weapons.

She turned to head back to her room.

“Where do you go, Little Mortal?” Grave said from right beside her and she whirled to face him, bringing her arm up at the same time, ready to block him.

He didn’t attack.

He quirked a single eyebrow at her gesture and then she sensed his focus intensify and knew he was listening to her racing heart.

“Jumpy tonight, are we not?” He reached his arms above his head, closed his eyes and loosed a low moan, as if he took great pleasure from the stretch.

It was then she realised that he was only wearing black boxer shorts.

“Jesus… put something on before I retch.” Sable turned away from him, and not only because she really didn’t want to see Grave mostly naked. If Thorne saw her looking at Grave, then he really would kill the vampire.

She smiled as that part of their shared dream came back to her.

“Thinking about your lover?” the vampire said as he moved around her and clearly he had chosen to ignore her and was determined to piss Thorne off.

Sable turned on the spot but he kept moving, forcing her to keep turning in order to avoid looking at him. “None of your business, Bloodsucker.”

“You smell like sex… but which male seated himself twixt those lovely thighs?”

Sable refused to blush. “Back off, before I make you back off.”

Grave laughed and it was haunting, a chilling sound that she prayed she never heard again. Loren and Thorne were right. He had no sense of humour. Someone had killed it and she had a feeling it had been a woman, because women were treacherous, apparently.

“You lack weapons, Little Mortal.” Grave kept pace with her and she began to get dizzy.

“The female asked you to leave her alone,” a deep male voice said from right in front of her and she glanced up to find Bleu towering over her, his dark purple eyes stormy and violent and his pointed ears flaring back through his wild black-blue hair. She edged her gaze to her right, to the black blade he held over her shoulder and no doubt against the throat of the vampire behind her.

Sable edged to one side, away from the sword, and bumped into Thorne. He caught her arm and pulled her against him, away from the two males, and growled, his crimson eyes flashing dangerously.

“I believe I warned you not to approach my female,” he said and she wasn’t sure whether he was talking to Grave or to Bleu.

Or both men.

Bleu sheathed his blade at his waist and stared hard at Thorne.

“It is unwise to take Sable from her room when she is unarmed.” Bleu dropped his gaze to her and lifted his other hand, and her eyebrows rose. Her weapons. He offered the shoulder holster with her throwing knives in it, and her belt with her blade and crossbow. “When the alarm sounded, I went to my prince and Olivia, and he tasked me with bringing you down. You were not there and someone had damaged your door. I feared you had been attacked when I saw your weapons on the dressing table… but it appears I was mistaken.”

She took the weapons from Bleu and shirked Thorne’s grip.

“Thank you.” She didn’t dare tack on Bleu’s name to her words of gratitude. Thorne was liable to lose his head and do something stupid. She could feel him glaring at her already.

She put her leather shoulder holster on and her hands trembled as she smoothed it down over her t-shirt and then tied her belt around her waist.

“Perhaps I was not mistaken. You seem shaken… and I do not believe the vampire is responsible.” Bleu was treading on thin ice and the look in his eyes said he knew it and he wanted to push Thorne.

Men
.

“Speaking of bloodsuckers. Now I’m not so unarmed…” She reached for her blade and frowned when she saw that Grave had made his exit while they had been occupied. He stood off to one side with his men, buttoning a pair of black trousers. He paused, looked over his shoulder at her, and grinned. “Bastard.”

“Are you well?” Bleu said and flicked a glare at Thorne when he growled.

Sable held her hands up and stood between them, hoping to keep them both quiet for a second, preferably before they ripped each other’s throats open with their fangs.

“I’m fine. I’m half asleep and need coffee—” Her eyes widened as Thorne dropped into a black portal beneath him and Bleu’s expression darkened. He muttered something under his breath and green-purple light traced over his body. He disappeared too.

Double men!

Loren and Olivia appeared right in front of her and she jumped and pressed her hand to her chest.

“Holy hell… a little warning next time.” Sable scowled at Loren.

Loren looked around the courtyard, as if she hadn’t spoken. “Where is Bleu?”

“Don’t ask me. There was a thing with Grave being an arsehole and Bleu stepped in to help me, and then Thorne showed up… and then I tried to keep them from killing each other and then they both disappeared.”

Thorne reappeared right beside her and the sweet heavenly scent hit her straight away, carrying bliss through her tired bones.

Coffee.

He held the clay mug out to her and grinned, and damn she wanted to kiss him when he looked as if he might burst with male pride.