Sundown & Serena (24 page)

“Taste me!” he groaned. “Taste yourself on my
skin, how much you liked what I did to you!”

I stroked him faster, deep throating him. He
climaxed hard, shouting, pushing me down to take all of him in as
he released everything he had left into my throat. After only a few
jerks, Kev slipped out of me, collapsing back onto the bed, as I
got to my feet. Tired and breathing hard as I was, I still got my
robe and put it on.

I was creeped out by what he had said and
done to me, no matter that he hadn’t hurt me at all and I’d really
enjoyed the game. He had been so turned on by my performance that
the entire fantasy had taken only about ten minutes.
How long has he been thinking about this? Was Devlin’s woman
really the reason, or was that just the catalyst that finally made
a secret smoldering desire so powerful that it became an undeniable
obsession?

I sat at the edge of the bed, but didn’t
touch him. After a few minutes, Kev took a deep breath, and sat up.
“That was great,” he said in a relaxed tone. “You were just like I
wanted you to be. Will two hundred extra cover it?”

I hadn’t expected that he’d effectively
double my take home nightly pay for only ten minutes worth of
fantasy.
If they’re all as generous, maybe
bondage is worth considering.
“Yes.”

“Will you do this again for me?”

“Yes,” I assented. “I enjoyed myself. But not
any rougher than you were, okay? And the safe word stays the
same.”

“Agreed,” Kev said, handing me two hundreds
from his wallet.

“One other thing,” I added, making sure I had
his attention. “Keep this to yourself for now. I don’t want anyone
getting any more ideas than they’ve already asked about. I don’t
mind doing this for you, because the extra money is good, and you
didn’t hurt me. But in all honesty, I want you to know that I don’t
think I can do this night after night.”

“I’ll keep it to myself,” Kev confirmed.
“Most of the guys are pretty straight-laced, so they shouldn’t ask
for something like this. Our time won’t always be like this,
either, when I come to you. I’ll want just oral sex usually, with
occasional regular fucking now and then. But I’d like this once
every few weeks, if you don’t mind. I’ll let you know when I want
it, and I’ll pay you extra those times, like I did tonight. That
fair?

“Yes.”

Kev walked closer to me, and gave me a gentle
kiss on the cheek. “Thanks, Serena,” he said, and then he left,
closing the door behind him.

Chapter
Five

Life went on like that for the next month. As
Nick had said, once the men got used to me being available to them,
their demand for me every day slackened. In fact, Vince was the
only one who came to me every day without fail. Matt and Nick were
close seconds, coming to me every few days. I got to know those
three faster because I spent more time with them than the
others.

But where Matt and the others were only
around me when they wanted sex, Nick and Vince seemed to want to
spend time with me, even when they knew we weren’t going to have
sex. We sometimes sat in the sun, working on our tans, or swimming
in the ocean. Some nights we’d sit on my balcony, drinking beer (or
harder stuff, for them), though we never drank very much, only one
drink a night at most. Sometimes Kev joined us, though that wasn’t
often.

I wondered about the drinking, as I sensed
that they wanted to drink more than they did. But I didn’t figure
out why they were so restrained until a night in mid-October.

I’d come in from the beach. It was later in
the day, almost sunset. I’d seen Devlin’s daily woman come in
before me, and hung back, not wanting to talk to her. I knew after
that night I’d never see her again. Once he spent the night with
them, they were never asked back. I didn’t understand where they
kept coming from, but decided it was some arrangement that Kev had
set up when he was in Rio.

Once in a while, I didn’t see a particular
woman leave. That she hadn’t left at all occurred to me. That
scared me a little, but I told myself that I’d just missed them
leaving. If Devlin was killing them, I didn’t want to know.
Cowardly as it was, I wanted to keep my head in the sand and mind
my own business, because for the first time in my life, I truly
felt happy. But after that night, I couldn’t deny the truth any
longer.

I’d gotten to my room, taken a bath, and was
just settling in bed. With no appointments that evening, I was
looking forward to some uninterrupted reading. Then I heard
screaming. Bolting out of bed, I threw open my door.
It’s coming from outside.

I grabbed my bathrobe, and crept downstairs.
The screaming continued.

I got closer to the side where the courtyard
was, and saw the source of the screaming. Vince and Kev were there
holding Gerry, as Lash whipped his back raw.

I watched for a few minutes in horror, and
then Lash abruptly coiled his whip up. “Let him go,” he hissed.

Vince and Kev dropped Gerry, and he lay there
sprawled in a small pool of his own blood. He was healing, but not
as fast as he should.

“You fall asleep again, or get drunk again at
your post, or any other time again, and I’ll whip you until you’re
dead,” Lash hissed coldly, looking down at him. “It’ll take you a
long time to die that way, Gerry. I know, because I’ve had to do it
before.” He paused. “Don’t make me do it again.”

“I won’t!” Gerry said in a raw squeal.
“Please, I won’t!”

“Take him inside,” Devlin ordered, coming
into view. He was dressed in white again, his fair skin and light
clothes almost shining in the gloom next to his black dressed
guards. “See to his back.”

“We’ll patch him up,” Lars said, lifting
Gerry. Vince went with him.

Kev turned to Lash and Devlin. “You need me
to take her back to the city? You’re usually not out here so fast,
Boss.”

“I’m done with her,” Devlin said with
finality. “Lash will take her where she needs to go, Kev.”

I felt a shiver, and didn’t breathe, knowing
my worst fears were confirmed.
The woman he was
with tonight must be dead. Had he needed to kill her, to drink
enough blood to sustain himself?

“Okay,” Kev said, turning away. “I’ll keep
his watch while he’s busy. I’ll call you, Boss, if anything
happens.” He walked over and picked up a discarded huge
semiautomatic rifle with a scope that was leaning against a tree
and strode out of sight.

Lash turned back to Devlin. “Thanks,” he
hissed. “It’s past time for me. But I didn’t want to ask you.”

“I know,” Devlin said carefully, his usually
casual, easy manner of talking oddly strained. “Come to me after,
and I’ll help you shed, like usual.”

“Thanks,” Lash said in a gruff tone. Then he
followed Devlin to his bedroom.

When they were gone, I went to the kitchen,
and grabbed a box of Oreos. If I couldn’t drink, I was going to
lose myself in some hydrogenated chocolate. I needed a mental
escape of some kind because by the sounds of it, Lash wasn’t just
burying the body, he was doing something else to it. Whatever it
was, I sure as hell didn’t want to know.

* * * *

The law of being drunk didn’t apply to
everyone, however. The next night, I came down to see Lash
finishing off a bottle of Laphroig on the veranda. Now he didn’t
act drunk at all; a human wouldn’t have noticed anything out of the
ordinary. But I smelled the scent of him was slightly altered, and
it was obvious to me in how his hands moved just a little slower,
and how he wobbled very slightly in his seat when he shifted his
weight in the chair. Yet when Lars came in, Lash stood up fast,
looking immediately like he was in full control. “What is it?” he
hissed.

“I want to go into town,” Lars pleaded. “I
need some smokes, Lash.”

“That all you need?” Lash hissed
sarcastically. “I know you were into coke before, Lars. I see any
of that shit here, you’re dead meat. You know it’s Devlin’s life if
we’re discovered here.”

“Just smokes. I’ll pick up some for the other
guys, too. And for you, if you want.”

“My woman’s got that taken care of,” Lash
hissed arrogantly. “But ask Kev, if he wants you to go for him this
time into Rio. If he says yes, then you can go.”

Lars gave him a grateful smile, and hurried
off. I surmised that he went, as I didn’t see him for several days.
Kev was there, instead, watching from Lars’s usual position on the
roof with the high-powered rifle.

* * * *

A day after Lars left, Nick came to me, and
asked me point blank if I’d consider taking a potion, to be a bear
for him and Vince.

I looked at him in surprise. “How? I’m not a
werebear.”

“But you are were, Serena. You could handle
us making love that way.”

Nick was very persuasive when he wanted to
be, or when he wanted something from me. But I admitted I liked him
best of my lovers, and I usually gave in when he asked me for
something, whether it was a new sexual position or just a back
rub.

“How?”

“Devlin said he could have a potion for you
here by tonight, if you agreed. It’s not cheap, half a month’s pay
from each of us to cover it. But it’s getting to the point we can’t
deal with not getting any in bear form.”

Negotiation time.
“What will you do for me?” I said, folding my arms across my
chest.

Nick gave me an odd look, then he sat down on
my bed. “Are you asking me to take you as my mate?” he asked in an
unsettled tone.

I flushed redder than I ever had in my life.
Finally, I got out, “Mate?”

“If you are with me and Vince as bears and in
human form, and I give you something after, and you take it, you’ll
be my mate,” Nick explained, sounding very nervous. “That’s were
law. It’s what the mated bears who live here did with the women
they call their own.” He swallowed again hard. “With bears, more
than one partner is allowed in a mating. Males usually outnumber
females three to one as a rule, so it’s males that usually share
one female. So even doing what you do, it would be allowed.”

I still couldn’t get any words out, sudden
feelings I’d never felt before now flooding me.
What would it be like to be someone’s mate? Nick’s
mate?

“But I’m not ready to be mated,” Nick added
carefully. “I like you a lot, Serena, but if that’s what you’re
asking, I can’t do it.”

Make light of this, before
he does think that’s what you meant.
I cleared my throat.
“That’s not what I’m asking. I was just teasing, really. But what
you’re asking is a lot. I wanted to know if there would be any
extra perks.” I softened my words with a smile.

“Please?” Nick said, taking my hand. “I’m
going crazy, Baby, not being able to
.
”

Pleading won’t be enough by
itself. But you can come to that conclusion on your own,
Nick.
I tuned him out for a while, thinking. Did I want to
do this?
Not really.
But what would it be
like to finally know what it would be like to be animal? Sex did
bring out my animal side, as I sometimes changed partly during
orgasm, though that had never amounted to more than temporary claws
and a little fur that rapidly melted away as soon as I relaxed.
This way I’d finally find out. Plus I didn’t have to pay any of the
cost, which must be extravagant. “How? And I mean, how will you get
the potion? From who?”

“Devlin’s got a magic man,” Nick said
eagerly. “A sorcerer, back in the states. He’ll make it, and get it
here tonight.”

“And what, I’ll take it, and turn into a
bear? For how long? Will I remember anything?”

Nick considered. “For three hours, tops,” he
said slowly. “That’s the limit, I believe. But as for what you’ll
remember, I’d think it would be everything. Bear brains are big, so
memory wouldn’t be compromised at all when changing form. But I’ll
ask to make sure.”

Hearing that, I decided that here was
something I wanted that was worth being bear. “Okay then. But on
one condition.”

Nick looked at me warily, and waited.

“I’ll expect the same from you at some point
in the future. And from Vince, too.”

“To be fox for you?” Nick said, looking at me
strangely. “Or coyote?”

“Either,” I said with a shrug. “But I want my
animal side sated too, if the time ever comes when I am able to
change form.”

“It would be odd. But it’s still a predator,
I guess. So sure.”

“I will too,” Vince said from the doorway,
beaming at me. Then he turned to Nick. “Let’s get to Devlin, before
he hangs up with Titus!”

Nick kissed me, and left, almost running out
the door. With a last smile, Vince followed him.

The next evening, I took the potion Vince
offered me, swallowing it in a single gulp. And absolutely nothing
happened.

I gave them a look after a few minutes had
gone by. “Am I supposed to do something?”

Nick shot a questioning look to Vince.

“Turn, both of you,” a cool voice called
loudly.

Kev strode toward us, bare-assed naked.
Before the other men had time to say a word, he grabbed hold of me,
and bore me to the ground. I squirmed, trying to get away from him,
and then felt his skin began to ripple. I went still as his body
changed, getting bigger. Hair was brushing my bare arms and my
ankles. I screamed, but instead of my scream, I let out a guttural
roar.

My body was changing, too. I sprouted fur and
claws, my body suddenly huge, so tall and wide! I rolled to my
feet, swiping at the huge male next to me.
Because he is huge, and the scent of him is heavy in my nose.
He’s not proven himself. I’ll not let him have me until he does. Or
the other two bears, either, who are snarling at him.