Sweet Ruin (Immortals After Dark 16)

They nodded. The blonde said, “We know tricks to speed things up, you see.”

He’d been forced to learn those same tricks as well. A memory arose of Queen Magh telling him, Please your customers, cur. Or perish.

Through a wave of revulsion, Rune flashed the nymphs a practiced grin. “May you never use those tricks on me. . . .” He trailed off, his ears twitching. He glanced around, sensing the vampire’s nearness. But he would’ve scented her if she were close.

Damn it, why couldn’t he stop thinking about her? Could her mesmerizing still have a hold of him if she wasn’t even here?

“We’ve got some info for you,” Brook said. “Will you pay us handsomely for it?”

“Indeed.” He was the Møriør’s secrets master now, and nymphs knew much.

“It’s about the female you were with earlier,” Dew said with a shrewd look. “The one we heard rocking your world.”

Brook added, “The whole parish heard it.”

He didn’t bother with a denial. “Continue.”

“What do you know about her?” Dew asked.

“Very little. Tell me.”

“We think”— Brook lowered her voice—“we think she’s a vampire.”

“What gives you that impression?” he asked, feigning ignorance. “She doesn’t smell like one.”

“We’ve seen her in a fight.” Brook shivered. “She hissed, she had fangs, and her eyes turned black. It’s why we’ve never tried to seduce her.” Few species would harm a nymph, but some vampires craved drinking them dry.

What if they had seduced Josephine? He pictured her sleeping with them—and, of course, himself—at the same time. Imagining any combination of attractive tarts servicing him and each other would normally be a pleasant musing.

This one filled him with irritation. He would be plenty for Josephine to handle. Nymphs would just muddy the waters. He pointed out to them, “Black eyes and fangs could mean demon.”

Brook smoothed her hair behind a pointed ear. “But she doesn’t have horns or wings.”

Dew nodded. “We’ve gone our whole lives without seeing a female vampire, and now the streets seem to be teeming with them. There’s a Valkyrie halfling one, and a Dacian one, but she’s sick with vampire plague—”

“Do you know where mine resides?” Mine. He almost laughed. That was a word he would never apply to a female.

“I think somewhere in the city,” Dew said. “She comes to the Quarter to pick pockets. She’s a klepto. One time I saw her wandering around in the pouring rain, seeming sad. She looked desperate to steal from someone.”

Josephine had said she’d stolen from him because she wanted to know him. Apparently, she knew many. The little wench could make a man feel cheap. If he let her.

And what in the hells would she have to be sad about? She was a beautiful, powerful immortal.

Dew smiled slyly. “You want a repeat with your vampire, don’t you?”

A repeat? Josephine’s fangs piercing his neck again? While she pressed her taut nipples into his chest and clawed him . . .

He shrugged, even as his cock jerked in his pants. “I seek her for business only.” Once she returned for her necklace, all would be well. Time to cleanse my palate. He swooped Brook into his arms.

She squealed. “Someone’s already raring to go.”

They didn’t need to know his erection wasn’t for them. “When am I not?”

“Rune, your neck!” She stared wide-eyed at it. “You have . . . she bit you?”

Dew pawed him. “Let me see!” Her jaw dropped at the bite mark. “That’s so filthy. And hot.”

Gods, it was.

Brook said, “She couldn’t drink your baneblood, though, right?”

“Of course not. Just nipped me with her fangs.”

Dew said, “Still, a bite! She’s a gutsy one for piercing your skin. And you’re a dirty dog for letting her! We knew you walked on the wilder side, but that’s wicked! Can we watch next time?”

“Maybe.” He cast them his crooked grin. “But only if you’re very good girls.”

TWELVE

What. A. Skank.

Jo gaped from her spot inside the courtyard wall. This guy was the biggest manwhore she’d ever seen.

And a thief to boot. The bastard had lifted her most prized possession—from her freaking neck—and she’d never noticed! When she’d seen her necklace in his hands, she’d almost attacked. But she couldn’t risk a capture, and she didn’t know what other stunts he was capable of.

She would be forced to wait here until he got so caught up with those nymphs that he didn’t perceive her own thievery. Wouldn’t take long. The females were climbing him like a rock wall.

They thought it wicked for a vampire to bite a dark fey. They thought her pervy.

Her stomach clenched when he pulled Brook up into his arms and the woman wrapped her legs around his waist.

Jo decided then and there to get more sexual experience. If she’d been around the block, this wouldn’t sting as much. Those nymphs didn’t suffer jealousy. Rune had said “jealousy” like it was a dirty word.

But Jo was jealous. The connection she’d thought she’d experienced with him had been one-sided.

What was new?

He palmed the back of the nymph’s head and drew her to his neck, to the unmarked side. “Here, dove, give us a nip. You won’t break my skin.”

Jo straightened. What the hell?