Vampire Mistress (4 page)

She didn’t fall. Anwyn had time only for that brief impression as the beast she’d thought she’d lulled into a temporary peace came to savage life again. As he did, he tore the railing right out of the floor. Lithe as she was, she should have fallen ignominiously on her backside, because she’d spun her own enchantment. Having this dangerously powerful man on his knees, his head in her lap, had made her wish she could stay like this for the whole session, just soothe the rabid monster in his soul that called to her. That was her weakness as well as her strength. A lion tamer, Daegan had called her, on more than one occasion.

The most terrifying part is you have no fear of the lion,
cher
. He fascinates you. No matter how close you come to his fangs and claws.

Well, she was pretty damn close right now. Gideon caught her upper arms before she could topple, cleared the debris he’d created and slammed her up against the wall in the recessed stained glass alcove. The small fountain toppled, splashing water across their feet. Glass shattered behind her, the stained glass as well as the backlight bulb, sparks popping.

Despite that cacophony, he’d done it all in one superbly graceful movement that told her exactly what this man did for a living. He killed. It was a calling, not a profession. His deadly grace came from more than practice and experience; it was natural instinct, a terrible gift of the gods. Even if her courage didn’t falter, her body had the sense to tremble.

He shifted her into the corner, away from that jagged bulb, and kissed her, hard, fierce, his fingers biting into her arms. He wasn’t seeking pleasure, but brutal domination. Her feet weren’t on the floor. His thigh pushed between her legs, holding her up, riding her on flexing muscle; his cock ground into her hip. His split shirt slid off his broad shoulders, exposing part of his chest, the hard cords of muscle in his throat.

His lips were drawn back, teeth clashing with hers. During those few harrowing moments, she forced herself to calm docility, despite the desperate thumping of her heart against her rib cage and the unexpected spike of arousal the grip of his hands and press of his body incited. She didn’t reject his kiss, merely waited him out, waited for him to realize she was neither resisting nor accepting. She hoped that James and the security guards were obeying her orders, which were to leave them be unless she gave the prearranged signal for assistance.

Mostly, though, she thanked Goddess that Daegan had already left. That was all she needed, a testosterone match between a pissed-off vampire and an enraged vampire hunter.

Gideon drew back, his breath coming fast, his eyes cold and hard. His mouth was a rigid slash, wet with hers. During the kiss, he’d shifted one hand to the base of her throat. Gazing at him, she knew he was feeling her rapid pulse beneath that grip. “Gideon,” she said softly. “Put me down. You are hurting me, and you are hurting yourself. I won’t tolerate either one of those things in here.”

His lip curled in a half snarl, but it was silent. A quiver ran through his limbs, and she saw the muscles in his neck work, his shoulders bunch. The hands clenched on her, enough that she wondered if she would have to use that signal after all. Then he moved.

Not to obey her, not exactly. He shifted his grip, so he was beneath her legs and back, and lifted her out of the broken glass. Fortunately, his hard biceps pressed below where her shoulder had hit the stained glass. He carried her away from it, putting her on her feet next to the wing-backed chair. Then he stood there for a moment, staring at her. He was a tall man, more than six feet, but with her heels, the height difference was reduced. His hands crept up from her waist, his fingers tangling in her hair, almost like a child playing in his mother’s curls, only the movement of his fingers inspired entirely nonmaternal feelings. He slid along the surface of the camisole, the heat of his touch burning the skin beneath the thin barrier of cloth.

This man was not a submissive. There was nothing innate about it to him. She’d sensed that from the beginning. But what had fascinated and drawn her was what she felt now, in full, raging demand. He was seeking a form of submission, of surrender, that didn’t have to do with whips and chains and kissing the sole of her shoe. It had to do with service and loyalty, with something so absolute the soul, not the mind, was the one pleading to be called into service.

She’d said she had a theory about his sense of chivalry, the type of man he was. Even in his rage against Tara, he’d confined his violence to the objects around her, and defensive maneuvers only. By opening him up, Anwyn had pushed him closer to direct violence than he’d probably ever committed against a woman. She could tell, because it was in the damning self-condemnation in his eyes, the tremor in those large, dangerous hands that held her.

The world outside Atlantis was one of intellectual, self-righteous cynicism, which mocked acts of nobility. It scorned the notion that there was a definitive right and wrong, a structure of morality and code of honor. In such a world, the soul of Gideon Green was quite lost.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last, his voice rough, a wounded lion’s growl. “I’m going now. I’ll come back and pay later, but I won’t bother you again.”

When he stepped back, she reached out, hooked her hand in the waistband of his jeans. Her knuckles brushed his abdomen, her sharp-edged rings scraping his flesh under the cotton shirt. Holding his gaze, the color of midnight skies that never felt a hint of sunlight, she closed her other hand on the shirt collar where it hung low and tugged. The split back made it easy to take it off his long arms, over the lean muscles that rippled like strong river currents. Since she hadn’t cut the shirt all the way down the back, it got caught at his hips, but she stepped closer, worked it free of the waistband and let it fall to his feet, around his boots.

Broad chest, gleaming shoulders, a lightly furred abdomen that couldn’t hide the striations of hard, tough strength there, either. Maybe he’d used a gym to get to a certain point, but she was looking at a warrior. Her lips pressed together at the scars. She knew what she was seeing. After all, in a former life, she’d been an emergency room nurse, having a front-row view of man’s violence toward man, and toward himself.

Gideon Green bore scars from bullets, knives and punctures. There were burns, faint tracks along his rib cage that she knew would originate in the back, because they came from a brutal flogging, not meant for anyone’s pleasure but a true sadist. Without the scars, he would have had a beautiful body. It was still a work of art, though, the cost interwoven with the potential.

“Stay completely still. Don’t move. I’m going to show you the right way to get a kiss from your Mistress.”

He looked puzzled, but then she closed those several inches and brought her lips to his, staring into his eyes. His body constricted under her touch, her fingers resting on his chest and at his waist, all that lovely bare male skin. He kept his eyes open, gazing into hers, and she breathed into his mouth, brushed her lips over his, tasted them with a delicate tracing of her tongue, until she started to feel him sway toward her, the tortured pain in his gaze flickering with something else.

She stepped back as his hands were lifting to close over her body. He could have stopped her, but his fingers merely slid along her waist and hip as she backed away.

“I require two things,” she said. “That you tell me the truth, consciously. I will, on occasion, forgive the unconscious lie, the one you believe yourself, but I will dig it out, force you to face it. Outside this room, you can be a liar. Most of us are, to be what we need to be. But here, I only accept the truth that comes directly from your soul.”

“That’s not what I want.”

Wrong, angry man
. She arched a brow. “It’s what I want that matters, Gideon. Remember? I’m in control of that.”

“What will you do to me, if I let those women tie me up?” His pulse was up again, she noted, and the fingers were clenching, but from the very question, she knew his mind was circling around the temptation of it, his need to surrender. It made it harder to keep her voice steady.

“Whatever I want. Your choice is to trust me, even if you’ve never trusted anyone in your life.”

“Why should I do that?”

The truth was there, but she almost hated to say it. The look in his eyes would break a Goddess’s heart, let alone a mortal woman who found him too irresistible to be safe.

“Because you have nothing left to lose.”

4

G
IDEON stood there. As his eyes shuttered, looking inside himself, she gave a signal to the cameras. Otherwise, she held her position, knowing if she moved, it could break the moment in several different ways.

Ten minutes later, he was still standing there, but his gaze had focused back on her, disturbing in its intensity. She didn’t flinch, though. He didn’t break the link when the door opened, either, though it cost him, his shoulders twitching.

“An Amazon brigade?” he asked, that defensive flash back in his eyes.

“No. Something different for you.”

Gideon turned then to discover the three women she’d summoned were not Dommes, but three club slaves. Natural submissives employed by Atlantis to help wherever they were needed on the underground floor. All three were completely naked except for collars, their three different body types all tempting to the male eye.

Janet was a Renaissance beauty, with full hips and belly, heavy breasts and wavy golden hair long enough to belong to a fairy. It was twisted into a tail, the barrette fastened to a ring at the back of her silver club collar, while the rest of the locks tumbled down her back, brushing her pale buttocks. Charlene was slender, small breasted with just a hint of hips, a willowy beauty with pale green eyes and elfin features. Ella was the classic hourglass, the kind that would cause every man on a beach to get hard, watching her sway and jiggle her way down the sand in a scanty bikini. Her red hair was caught up on her neck, whereas Charlene had close-cropped hair that only enhanced the elf impression.

The one thing they all had in common was a vulnerability that was entirely nonthreatening. They would do her bidding without hesitation, while a man who was any gentleman would hesitate to do anything to thwart them.

She nodded to Janet. “Take him into the bath chamber. I want all his clothes removed. Chain him there and oil his body. I’ll handle any other preparations.”

From the wry resignation laced with a tad of desperation in his face, she saw he understood how well she’d outplayed him. So she spoke in a quiet, almost gentle tone. “They’ll obey me without question, Gideon, so don’t resist. I’m trusting you not to harm them. Is my trust misplaced?”

He shook his head, a sigh lifting and dropping his wide shoulders. She nodded. “Then I’ll join you shortly.”

When Janet took one of his hands, Ella the other, he stared down at their fingers, holding his scarred, strong ones. The women, irresistible nymphs, smiled at him. Janet emitted a sudden, playful trill of laughter, a girl’s giggle, and then they were tugging him along, headed for the bath.

When he was out of view, Anwyn’s own shoulders drew back at last, trying to relieve her discomfort. Pressing another button, she moved stiffly through the narrow staff exit and into an antechamber that paid staff could use to give themselves a break, while allowing them to still view the room, unseen. Madelyn was already there with the first aid kit.

“Well, that was exciting,” she said dryly. “You’ve lost your mind, haven’t you?”

Anwyn grimaced, pulled her long hair forward and presented her back to the other Domme so she could examine the glass shard lodged in the tender flesh inside her shoulder blade. “Damn, I loved that angel,” she grumbled. “It was an original, too. Don’t fuss, Maddie. It hasn’t hit anything vital. Just pull it out straight, clean the wound, put some adhesive over it and I’m good to go. I’ll change tops so it won’t distract him. I’m lucky he was too worked up to notice it. He has a protective streak.”

“Yeah, I noticed how he carried you over to the chair like you were a porcelain doll. After he nearly impaled you.” Maddie shook her head, withdrew the shard with a firm but constant pressure that gave her the minimum amount of pain, though Anwyn still sucked in a breath. “You amaze me, how you figure out the tough ones like that. Be careful, though. You’re nowhere near home free with that monster. You wouldn’t have caught me giving him free sessions. I’d charge him double.”

“Sometimes it’s about more than that.”

Being a Mistress had long ago become an art form to her, but as the club’s owner, she picked up the brush only if she felt the canvas was specifically for her, too intriguing to pass up. This underground level was as much an extension of her nature as it was to cater to the hard-core needs of others. It was successful because she understood the need to reach that savage cutting edge, where civility and rules didn’t apply.

When she was in this kind of mind zone, her staff knew she didn’t have patience for explaining what she was doing or why, so Maddie had subsided. While she worked, Anwyn tilted her head to watch the monitor, which showed the fully tiled bath chamber. Eye bolts for chains or ropes were embedded in a variety of positions, some on tracks that could be locked or adjusted. Jets activated from all angles, and there were multiple detachable showerheads. Next to it was a deep hot tub that could be used as a dunking area, if sensory deprivation was preferred.

Ella had guided him to sit on the wall of the tub so Janet could remove his boots. She straddled his legs one at a time, her ample rear within touching distance, the pink, glistening folds of an aroused and lubricated pussy visible, an additional aesthetic pleasure as her buttocks tightened to remove the boot. When she shifted to remove the other, Gideon’s fingers brushed her backside. Anwyn suppressed a smile as he snatched his fingers back. She knew better than to assume he’d realized he hadn’t been given permission to touch. Instead, like a stubborn child, he refused to let her see he was getting unwilling pleasure out of his surroundings. Of course, a man’s cock didn’t know how to lie.

Janet chose that moment to pull a little harder, so that the boot came off fast. She tumbled back. When he caught her on his lap, she smiled impishly into his bemused face before she slipped off, giving him a provocative little wiggle. It almost made him smile back, an automatic reaction, though he was too worked up to relax that much.

The hint of that smile disappeared when Charlene had him stand. She had a silver manacle and chain, which made Gideon stiffen when he saw it.

All three women were trained to handle a client who became violent, knowing when to back off, how to protect themselves for the key few seconds before security could enter. It had always been sufficient, because she did vet the applicants so thoroughly. When a client was stripped down to raw emotions, most would still hold on to impulse control, even if it was by their fingernails.

But Anwyn was keenly aware of Madelyn’s attention, her doubts, and she cursed herself for letting them infect her. When she’d asked, “Is my trust misplaced?” and Gideon had shaken his head, she’d known for certain that they would be fine. No, she hadn’t expected the reaction that had put glass in her shoulder, but this was different. There was nothing threatening to him about these three women. He wouldn’t hurt them.

Though his body was abruptly as tense as if a vampire had sprung up in front of him, he let Charlene raise his wrist, fit the manacle around it. What probably helped was that the chains appeared thin. He’d believe he could break them, if needed. But the chains were titanium. The bolts to which they would be attached were embedded into a concrete and steel rebar block behind the tile. Even Daegan might need a few moments to get loose. For a mortal, it wasn’t going to happen. She held her breath as Charlene ducked under his arm to lift his wrist and cuff the other arm. She did her job well, brushing intimately against him on one side as Ella moved in front of him to unfasten his jeans. As her fingers played over the button, slipped it free, Charlene turned the control so the chains tightened and his arms were drawn out to his sides and up, muscles stretched out in his upper body, a mouth-watering display of male flesh.

However, the show was far from over. When Ella brought the zipper down carefully, they discovered the pleasing fact that he wore no underwear.

Madelyn’s hands slowed in their ministrations on Anwyn’s back. Whatever else she thought, she and Anwyn were in perfect agreement right then, watching the girl push the snug denim down his hips, revealing the long, thick cock that practically breathed a sigh of relief as it stretched out, hard and erect.

The tip was glistening, and Anwyn could see where the inside of his jeans had gotten damp from his arousal. As Janet took over, taking the pants down his long legs, she let her full breasts drag over them. He drew in a breath, his hands tightening in the cuffs. Ella moved behind him, taking a pitcher from Charlene. Gideon shifted his attention to her, and then his cock jumped, his chest expanding as she poured the warm oil over his shoulders, letting it run forward and back.

“He’s beautiful,” Madelyn said. “In a hard, painful way.”

Anwyn nodded. He needed to eat more. The man had no body fat she could see, and while he was all striped muscle, food and less physical deprivation would give those muscles a smooth, sexy appeal, rather than the dangerous, lean appearance they had now. However, his eyes were his sucker punch. The burning gaze promised he could fuck a woman to death and leave her moaning for more, even if it was her last breath.

As Anwyn’s thighs strummed in response to a surge of moisture between her own legs, Madelyn put pressure over the wound, taping it down. Anwyn kept her eyes on the screen as three sets of female hands began to rub the oil over him. Shoulders, arms, back and then chest, down to his cock. Janet got that pleasure, her hands slick as she ran them up the impressive stalk, back down over his balls. While he tried to stay still, he of course couldn’t, twitching under her hands, letting out a groan as Charlene rubbed herself against his back, spreading the oil with her body as well as her hands. Ella knelt to do his legs. As she reached his ankles, she efficiently locked a manacle around each of them. Though that discomfited him, Char snapped his attention up when she pressed the switch to drop the chain with its collar cuff from the ceiling. Leaning against his back, letting him feel the press of her small tits, her pubic mound against his ass, she caressed his throat, then locked the collar around it. His quivering increased, such that even from her distant position, Anwyn could feel the effort it was taking him not to resist. He would keep his promise to her, but it was costing him. The overwhelming need to resist, that unreasoning rage, was building. She needed to get back in there.

Next time she wouldn’t deny herself the pleasure of putting on his restraints. It was one of the most arousing parts of breaking in a new slave. Being close enough to see and feel the body’s tremors as the male mind fought to obey the Mistress, capitulate to being rendered absolutely helpless. Next time, she decided she’d also have Janet remove the hair in his pubic region with a straight razor, something that never failed to simultaneously arouse and terrify a male.

As she’d foreseen, he was getting way more agitated now, his fingers flexing in his bonds, his body twitching as Janet locked the stainless steel three-ring harness over his cock. Her fingers stroked his turgid length before she gave him a naughty kiss on the end of the broad head, her tongue flicking out to take away the salty moisture. Then she attached another chain embedded into the floor to the ring underneath that harness, significantly inhibiting his movements.

“Wait,” he said, but Ella was already going up on her toes to kiss his mouth. It distracted him enough that she used that moment to take the ball gag from behind her back. In a deft movement, she slid it in, replacing her tongue. He thrashed, but it was already buckled around his head. Charlene, behind him, cinched it tight so it dug into the corners of his mouth, a relentless bit for a headstrong stallion.

“Taking care of that troublesome mouth of yours, Gideon,” Anwyn murmured.

“Didn’t seem to bother you much earlier,” Madelyn commented.

Anwyn had an amiable retort for that, but she saved it, because he’d reached the red zone. He hadn’t expected this degree of restraint, and now he knew just how caught he was. He snarled and jerked, flinched as he forgot his cock and balls were fastened to a ring in the floor. When Ella put the blindfold over his eyes, taking away sight as well as voice, his low-level growling turned into a desperate roar around the gag.

“He’s all yours,” Madelyn said. “Don’t know if you’re lucky or a fool, but watch your step either way. There’s such a thing as pushing a man too far.”

“Mmm.” They both turned as another staff member slipped in, bringing Anwyn the long-sleeved, formfitting stretch top Madelyn had requested over her headset as she administered the first aid. As Anwyn donned it, she knew Madelyn was right. She also knew the most delicious point of pleasure clung to the edge of going too far, that hovering line where pain and pleasure balanced, and the mind surrendered. She was better at finding it than anyone, maybe because she’d had to find it to save her own soul.

She wondered if she could help Gideon save his.

That bitch. Conniving, manipulative, let-me-the-fuck-go-now bitch.

His breathing was like a hurricane in his ears, blindfolded and gagged as he was. Everything told him to go postal, to rip the chains from the walls. The three rings on his cock were snug, disturbing and arousing at once, as if someone had metal fingers wrapped tight around it. But the collar, feeling that restraint as he tried to move his head, was the most disturbing thing of all. What the hell had he been thinking? He knew he couldn’t handle being trapped like this.