Good As Dead (Dying To Meet You Book 1) (8 page)

A red stain flushed across her chest and crawled slowly up her neck at his provocative words, but she managed to shelve her embarrassment. “I don’t care how you do it, as long as you finish what you’ve started. I need…I want…I ache…” The soft ragged sound of her voice wouldn’t have been perceptible to anyone but a vampire.

“I know, baby. I’m going to make it all better.” Having said that he flattened a palm against each of her thighs and spread her wide, before his mouth descended.

He was as good as his word. His tongue circled, stroked, and flicked before his mouth suckled at her core until she was mindless with pleasure. He was creating a throbbing, pulsing hunger between her legs that grew with each swipe of his talented tongue. The sensations were indescribable. It was as if her world had been lived in black and white up until now, and suddenly someone had found an artist’s palette. Mercer was colouring in her body, but he was doing it outside the lines because brilliant explosions of reds, yellows, pink and purples were lighting up her brain. Her legs began trembling violently and all the muscles of her body began to tense in anticipation of something incredible. She coasted upon a deliriously hedonistic precipice for the longest time until he raised his head up, and spoke.

“And that’s about where we stop…until I get some answers.” He bit down upon her leg to snap her out of the delicious haze he had created.

“You bastard,” shrieked Lainey who hadn’t seen that coming, so now all she could do was pant out little bursts of frustration as she gasped for air. Struggling to sit up on the bed mostly so she could hammer her fists at him, he easily countered her action with a hand on her stomach.

“Who are you, Lainey Hargreaves? I’m trying desperately hard to figure out how someone so small and innocent-looking can have so many people on her back determined to kill her.” His fingers ran up and down her thighs lightly, and she found the light pressure annoying after the deliciously intense feeling of his mouth on her.

“I believe we’ve had this conversation before,” she ground out, her tone brittle and terse.

Mercer looked at her and grinned. “I do believe we have, but you never had the right incentive to answer them before. Now you do.” To add weight to his words, his tongue once again flicked at her clit and her hands immediately went into scratching mode, going straight for his face.

Deflecting her hands, he grabbed hold of her wrists and slammed them above her head. Sliding the weight of his hands down to her elbows, he slid back down her body and let his hot breath tease her sex. Struggling and squirming to the best of her ability, she knew there was no way she would ever break his hold, but she continued for a good few seconds in order to burn off the toxic energy, which had overtaken her. It also gave her time to think, time she needed to wriggle her way out of this mess.

“I’ll make you a deal.”

“You’re not in a position of power so there’ll be no deals.” He blew soft volcanic heat inside her body, and then suckled her clit to add insult to injury.

The words she wanted to speak started to dissolve but she swallowed, took a deep breath and cleared her throat.

“Actually, I am in a position of power. I have the information you want. If I don’t co-operate you have nothing.” She eyeballed him with as much venom as she could muster.

“You’re
not
in a position of power. For starters, you’re underneath me and I promise you, if I give you three or four hours of this kind of torture, you’ll tell me everything I want to know.”

“Three or four hours?” Lainey’s voice had gone back to a barely there whisper because the thought of that much erotic torture had her brain exploding.

He nodded and tilted his head thoughtfully to the side. “You forget I’m a vampire. I don’t need sleep. I don’t need to eat for at least three or four days and my stamina is legendary. If I really wanted to prove my point, I could keep this up all day although you’d probably collapse in exhaustion after five or six hours.”

Lainey paled at that thought and she couldn’t help a grimace, but her resolution did not waver. “Or I could just hold my breath and faint on you, every time you start to bore me with this ridiculous nonsense.”

“Now hang on a minute,” said Mercer and his grip on her wrists grew tighter as his face darkened. Lainey closed her mouth and held her breath to prove her point. She knew the vampire would be able to hear that her regular breathing had stopped, and she wondered what he’d do. She didn’t have to wait long to find out.

“If you even think of trying that, I’ll douse you back to life with ice-cold water before I turn you over my knee and spank the hell out of you.”

“Huh. You’re the one with hell inside you, and if I keep holding my breath and then faint, spanking me isn’t going to be much fun.” She smiled sweetly.

“Think again. I’ll just resuscitate you back to life each time with my lips, teeth, and tongue.” His look might have made a lesser mortal cry, but Lainey was made of sterner stuff.

“You get two questions, vamp, which I’ll answer to the best of my ability. Then I get my orgasm. That’s the only deal I’m making—take it or leave it.”

Mercer made a point of looking at his watch and a huffed out a long, slow breath between her thighs. Lainey wanted to scream in frustration but knew that would not be a good move from a bargaining point-of-view so she swallowed it down, and waited.

Finally, and reluctantly, he gave in. “You’re lucky we have to move in a couple of hours, else I might have tested that feisty resolve of yours. As it is, I’ll take my two questions and run, if you’ll pardon the pun.

“Ask away,” she said dryly, wondering how long she could keep up any kind of conversation with the sexiest male in the universe between her legs. She sent a little prayer heavenward fervently hoping for short questions.

“What do you do?” His teeth nipped at her thigh.

She jumped, and then growled. “Swear a lot, especially when arrogant vampires can’t seem to take no for an answer.”

He didn’t reply to that comment but simply took her clit in his mouth, and sucked hard.

Gasping aloud with tears of pleasure and pain falling from her eyes, she managed to whimper, “I’m a doctor.” Her hands swatted ineffectually at his head, which didn’t move an inch, although the pressure upon her clit lessened.

Mercer hummed against her thigh, apparently lost in thought. The vibrations did terrible things to her libido—terrible and magical things.

“Seems like a pretty innocuous profession to me. I was expecting arms dealer or drug smuggler, to be honest. Now you’ve thrown me.”

She snorted. “If I was either of those two, the underground world of London would be welcoming me with open arms rather than trying to kill me.”

“Not if you’d double-crossed them,” he replied.

“Do I look like a double-crosser?” She gave him a faintly incredulous look.

“You look like a pain in the ass,’ he said, before letting his tongue perform a slow figure of eight upon her sex. Her thighs began shaking once more.

“You’re not exactly sweetness and light yourself,” she moaned, unable to stop herself from pressing her body into his mouth.

However, he didn’t give her the satisfaction. Pulling away, he asked, “So how come all these people want you dead?”

“This is your last question,” she ground out after three attempts at speech. “You sure you want to go with that one?” The last word was lost on a whimper.

There was another hot breath of air upon her as he appeared to consider the matter and she mewled pitifully. Then she heard a succinct, “Yep.” She felt his lips form the
P
sound, and could have cried at the sweet contact.

“I’ve developed a cure for cancer.”

He brought his head up, a surprised expression on his face. “Surely that would earn you something like an OBE or dame hood rather than a shot in the back of the head?”

He honestly looked puzzled.

She snorted. “You underestimate drug companies and the profits they make from manufacturing medicine—now gimme my damned orgasm!”

Mercer smiled at her, baring a full set of bright white teeth complete with pointed fangs, and then stood up. He wiped his mouth slowly upon his wrist and shook his head.

“Nooo…you promised!” She didn’t care if she was wailing. Her whole body pulsed and ached with desperate need.

“I did no such thing. You said, and I quote, ‘You get two questions, vamp, which I’ll answer to the best of my ability. Then I get my orgasm.’ I never promised to be the one to deliver it. You can sort yourself out because I don’t negotiate with terrorists.”

Enraged, Lainey looked for the first thing she could throw at him. It was the bedside telephone. Giving the cable a vicious yank to unplug it, she hurtled the thing towards the vamp with as much force as her trembling arms could muster and stormed off to the bathroom, slamming the door closed behind her.

Chapter 6

Trouble

The human did not speak to him upon exiting the bathroom where she had remained for the better part of an hour, which suited Mercer just fine. The peace and quiet gave him time to mull over a few things. Her explanation on why she was a wanted woman might have explained why humans would want her dead, but it didn’t cover the vampire who had taken her blood recently. There was something missing. It also didn’t explain her reluctance to sleep with him. All humans, without exception, were unable to resist him sexually. Unless the other vampire’s blood was interfering in some way but judging by her response to him, there was another reason she was reluctant to bed him. The dots were not lining up, and they certainly weren’t connecting.

When the bathroom door opened, she emerged fully clothed. Turning to face her, as if it would help his decision making process in some way, he was entertained to find a bright red flush covering her face which had worked its way down her throat. It seemed his little hellcat had done exactly as ordered for a change, and had managed to have a thoroughly enjoyable time washing away her troubles.

“Nice orgasm?” He’d regret breaking the silence later, but he couldn’t resist the barb.

Her head whirled around to glare at him as she snapped, “Quite sufficient, thank you very much.”

She had once again folded her arms over her chest, which was a pity, but her eyes captured his attention instead. Ice-like sparks flew from them directing a good degree of malice his way. Mercer grinned knowing she wasn’t impervious to his charms.

“I want my bra and panties back. Now.” Her hands tightened across her chest and her voice had taken on a stubborn tone.

Flexing the fingers of his right hand, he regarded her with a puzzled air. “I thought we had this conversation already, you know the one about you not being in the position of power and all.”

She glared at him. “I don’t think we established that all at. You’re just an arrogant, pig-headed vampire who’s been on this earth far too long. You need to start listening. If you don’t give me my underwear back, I’ll notify the
goons
, as you so sweetly call them, and they’ll be here in under five minutes.”

That got his attention. “You’re bluffing.”

He switched the television on and found the French channel,
Canal Plus
, quietly waiting for her reaction.

“Try me,” she purred, and the look of disdain on her lips was one he did not like. If she was bluffing then she was a consummate actress, but the odds should have been against that.

She said nothing more, and so he had no choice but to endure the drivel on the television instead, which happened to be a cross between horror, drama, and science fiction. The irony did not escape him. Blood curdling screams and alien species aside, he decided that her threat was worth putting to the test. If she wanted to feel the heat, he was more than happy for her to step into the frying pan. There was always a chance that it might help reveal some much needed answers.

“Then go call them, sweetness, but just remember they want you dead.” He did not look at her, instead pretending to be engrossed in the TV series in front of him. Looking at his watch, he carefully took note of the time whilst his ears pricked up, attuning themselves to the smallest of sounds.

“You’re going to regret this.” Her face was an implacable mask of stone, and he found himself rather impressed at her acting ability.

“We’re probably not going to live through it, so at least I won’t have to regret it for very long.”

She examined her fingernails, determined to avoid his gaze. Thank God, it was a lie, for that was as sure a tell as any.

“You’re very good but not quite convincing enough,” he drawled, letting his body relax a little.

“I’m telling the truth.” Her eyes were immediately on his and she did not blink.

Hell, maybe it wasn’t a lie after all. He’d had hundreds of years practise at reading women, and suddenly it had all gone wrong. Trust your instincts, he told himself, looking at his watch once more. “It’s been three minutes.”

“I said five.” Her tone was pithy.

Mercer decided that she looked quite adorable when angry. Unable to keep his gaze from lowering to her mouth, he watched her tongue moisten her lips in a nervous gesture. Was she afraid of him?
You damn well should be
. Well, he’d play along with her little charade. “So you did,” he replied carefully.

“Just out of curiosity, do you have a contingency plan?” she whispered, her voice carrying a sudden sense of urgency.

Her lashes fluttered darkly around her eyes, and he found himself oddly drawn to her. The cinnamon tang of her scent, the remembered sweetness of the first sip of her blood before it went bad, and the feel of her lips on his all had his body tightening in desire. It should have interfered with his acute senses, but somehow it ended up sharpening them.

“Now hang on a minute. Let me get this straight. You’ve called the goons but if the goons come, you want to escape with me? Excuse me if I sound a little confused.” His knuckle grazed his lower lip backwards and forwards, and he contained his smile as he watched her eyes drinking him in.

There was a strained pause as she summoned up her reply but finally, with a shake of her head, she snapped herself out of the daydream that was playing out in her mind. It was with some effort that she finally managed to speak.

“It depends on what they look like and whether I can reason with them. If there’s a good chance I can wear underwear, I’ll take my chances with them. If they don’t look friendly, I’ll probably stick with you for the time being.” The sentence seemed to tire her, and the high line of her shoulders appeared to deflate.

“Hedging your bets…I like it. Four minutes, darling, are you sure you’ve called them?”

“Positive. What is the escape plan by the way?”

He pondered the question for a moment. “I jump out of the window. You jump out of the window.”

“That’s your contingency plan? You must be joking. We’re ten stories up!” The high line of her shoulders was back and her expression was horrified.

“I’m a vampire. I’ll land on my feet, and I’m more than capable of catching you.”

“You’d need to fire a rocket up my ass to get me to jump out of a tenth story window, even if there was a fifty-metre wide sodding bouncy castle beneath me.”

“I’d need more notice for that.” He looked at his watch and just then, felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. “Your five minutes is up,” he said with a smug look, and taking a relaxing breath, he slid his cell out of his pocket to read the text message that had just come in.

Get out now
.

The message was from Lucius, and he knew from experience that when a text message like that came through, there was no time to react.

“Fucking hell,” he whispered, his smug smile disappearing into thin air.

Everything seemed to happen at once as if time sped up. In the blink of an eye, Mercer had upended the double bed against the door and stood with his back shielding Lainey as he rushed towards the large square window. In two blinks, bullets began pelting through the walls until the plasterwork resembled a moon-landing site. There were flying chips of concrete and glass, and a thick cloud of choking dust was everywhere. If that wasn’t bad enough, Lainey began screaming at the top of her lungs and the sound rattled the teeth in his jaw. He slammed her into the floor. The reason for doing so was twofold. One, it would knock the air out of her lungs hopefully putting a stop to the screaming and two, it would save his back from being filled with more lead than the plumbing for a Roman aqueduct.
Fucking hell.
This was second shirt he’d ruined in less than twenty-four hours.

Mercer covered her ear with his mouth, knowing she’d find it hard to hear with the racket that was going on, and said, “It’ll be ten seconds before they force their way in here. I’m going to break the window, and jump. You’re going to count to two, and then follow. Doesn’t matter which direction you jump in, I’ll catch you. Just try to make sure you go feet first.” He took a moment to be thankful that she was not currently wearing heels. There were enough holes in his body at this particular moment in time. “Nod yes, if you understand.”

There was no answering nod. He suspected she hadn’t quite figured on the warm welcome she was getting. He also had no illusions that she’d be going home with them in anything other than a body bag.

Slamming his fists through the glass, which already contained bullet holes, he made a large opening. The ragged edges were going to be mean upon exit, but they had bigger things to worry about right now. “Okay then…that’s about big enough for both of us to fit through.” He had to yell just to hear his own voice, and that was saying something for a vampire.

Lainey didn’t move a muscle beneath him in response, and that wasn’t a good sign. If she was going into shock then he’d have to move onto plan B, and that was considerably riskier than the original.

When the tirade of bullets stopped, Mercer flipped Lainey over and peered into her eyes. He found them heavily dilated, and her breathing was rapid and shallow. If he wasn’t careful, she was going to pass out on him. “One question,” he said in gentle tone. “If you knew how much they wanted you dead, why on earth did you contact them?”

“I didn’t know how much they wanted me dead, and I didn’t contact them.” Her voice was so quiet even he strained to hear her. She was not in a good way.

When the goons suddenly began hacking at the wall, with what he could only guess were axes or machetes, her body closed up completely. Still staring at her, he assessed that the lights were barely on inside her head, and whoever had been in there was about to lose consciousness or throw up. It did not bode well and they didn’t have time to mess about.

Hotel walls were not built to last these days, and at their alarming rate of decimation, decisions were going to need to be made fast. Covering her nose and mouth to keep her from inhaling the rubbish, which was pouring through the air in thick waves, he didn’t try to decipher her cryptic comments. There would be time enough for that later. His complete focus was on what move to make next. Going out through the door was not an option so he was back to trying the original plan. He could only hope that she’d jump or that he could compel her to jump, but the success rate of that little number looked weaker with each second that passed.

The next option was pretty darn risky, but he reckoned there was a seventy thirty chance that he could pull it off. It involved throwing Lainey out of the window, and then diving out of the window himself so it wasn’t exactly ideal. If he did so, he’d need to catch her, and preferably not drop her, before they landed. He’d also have to hope there were no pedestrians about because landing on one after flying through forty metres of air was going to be a messy experience.

The double bed chose that moment to crash back down to earth as the wall began to disintegrate. There was no time left. Grabbing the aluminium case, he threw it through the gap in the window. Taking a deep breath he didn’t actually need, he placed his hands on Lainey’s underarms and tempering his strength a little, flung her body out the window, head first. On the plus side, his aim was good and he made sure she didn’t get any scratches on her way down to meet the sidewalk.

When the wall behind him fell, he took a good look at the nasty little army, which had been sent after the human. Their eyes widened when they saw him, and they began to aim their pistols in unison. Giving them a wink, he dived backwards, twisting in flight, trusting that his one-hundred and eighty pound frame would travel much faster than Lainey’s, whose slight frame couldn’t have weighed any more than one-hundred and ten. Giving himself an almighty shove with the balls of his feet, cracking what was left of the window-frame in the process, he pinned his arms to his body and accelerated down to meet the pavement. This idea was probably one of the stupidest things he had done in his life, and not akin to Titanic-like disaster proportions. Still, he had never done things by half. If they were going to die, this way was as good as any.

Impact

It was touch and go for a few microseconds. Even though he’d made sure his body was as aerodynamic as possible, the fall was going to be five seconds tops. That didn’t give him a lot of time to manoeuvre. Flattening his arms to his sides, he directed his body down feet first. He could see Lainey floundering about in mid-air, flapping her arms and legs around as if she thought she might fly. He had news for her…she wasn’t going to win any awards for her attempt. She was also screaming as if she was a semi-finalist in Thailand’s World Screaming Competition and to be fair, she had a chance at winning that one. His eardrums were about to explode.

When there was two seconds left to impact, he began to panic because he still hadn’t caught her. The concrete pavement was rushing up to meet them and the cracks between each paving slab were now visible. The early hour had kept most of the pedestrians at bay, but he could see the odd one or two scurrying on their way to work…none close enough to be mashed to a pulp, thankfully. There were far too many variables in this ridiculously stupid idea.

One second to impact and her head was level with his eyes. He grabbed for her neck, missed, and ended up with a fistful of hair.
Fuck
. It would have to do. Flinging his arm upwards with a good degree of force, he catapulted her upwards and felt several strands of hair tear away in his hands. He could only imagine how that might smart, but she had much more important things to worry about than an appointment with a hairdresser. Managing to get a hold of her backside as she came back down again, he felt his feet touch solid ground and crumpled his legs on impact. The kindness wasn’t for him. He could take the bone-shattering collision on straightened legs without any discernible damage, but she would snap right in two. In an attempt to soften the effect, his legs folded to the ground whilst he bounced her up again gently, and then cradled her body back down.