The Viper, page 23
They had no idea what a rarity it was, that the Gray Wolf presented herself as corporeal, that she welcomed anybody into her place of repose. That she was willing to be of aid.
But then that was his clan’s spiritual tradition. Not the vampires’.
“What the hell happened to him?”
It was a hot minute before he realized he was being addressed, and as he swung his eyes away from the Gray Wolf’s shelter, he wasn’t sure what to tell his cousin, Lucan.
“It’s true, then,” the male prompted. “The Viper has taken him.”
“Not taken him. He is the Viper. They are one and the same now.”
The vampire he didn’t know, who’d been injured the night before, paced the periphery, the kinetic energy in that body bubbling, boiling, but not aggressively. He just couldn’t seem to stand still.
Callum glanced around, looking for his male. Not that the guy he’d given a blow job to was his. That Vampire had been there a moment ago.
“So it wasn’t just a myth,” Lucan murmured.
“No, it wasn’t, Cousin.” Callum glanced back at the tents. “Where’s your female?”
“Still sleeping in there.”
“You can stay here, you know. For as long as you want.”
Lucan nodded. “Thanks, but we have work to do.”
“Do tell.”
“We’re going to go back to the camp. We need to free everyone.”
Well. If that didn’t get a wolven’s attention. “You’re serious?”
“We are.”
“And what are you going to do with all those males and females?” Callum glanced at the hut again and wondered what was going on inside it. “I mean, how many of them are criminals?”
“Not many. Not all.” His cousin glanced at the other two former prisoners. “But first, we wait to see if Kane is okay.”
Translation: We wait to see if he loses his shit after his female dies because he tried to save her with his vein.
And people thought destiny didn’t have a sick sense of humor.
“Well, looks like you’ve got yourself a situation, Cousin.” Oh, hell. Why couldn’t they get a break. “Anyway, good luck with that—and you’re welcome here. Always. If you’ll excuse me? I gotta take care of some stuff.”
It was a lie, of course. He had nothing to do but wait around, like everyone else, to find out if the vampire female died. Or rather… to see how long it took her to die.
As he passed the fire pit, there was a flare of warmth and a brief waft of woodsmoke, and then he was on the far side. The rest of the clan were out doing their nightly things, living their lives, passing among the humans if they wanted to. The dens here were one among several places for his kin to live, and with that hotel being built across the valley and the threat it had created, he wasn’t surprised things were so quiet.
It was a blessing, actually. The good thing about wolves was they were pack animals. The bad thing about wolves was they were pack animals. Strangers, even if they were invited into the territory, tended to make people uneasy.
Especially if the Gray Wolf was on the premises.
Ducking into the entry of his cave, he willed the torches mounted on the stone walls to flare. As light licked across the narrow, uneven passageway, he followed the turns out of habit, his mind back at the garage’s underground hideout.
“How does someone see the dead?” he muttered. “What, you just walk into a place and they’re standing there with a Hello, My Name Is on? Theresa-fucking-Caputo of the bloodsuckers. Goddamn.”
When the belly of the cave unfurled itself, he stopped and looked around. The bed was nothing more than a cantilevered platform covered with furs, and his trunks and supplies were right where he’d left them. In the back, the natural spring, which was heated through some geological mystery, burbled along as usual. The fire pit was cold, the ashes from when he’d been there the day before last.
Nothing out of place. So why did he think it had been redecorated?
That fucking vampire really needed to get out of his head.
Callum undressed quickly. He always kept changes of clothes on the mountain, in case he needed them, but he didn’t think of this cave as his home.
He’d used the garage hideout as a fuck palace and munitions dump.
The hunting cabin was his I’m-trying-to-be-classy place.
And he had a bog-standard, nearly human, basement apartment with a TV and Internet access for when he needed to connect with the outside world he really couldn’t be more than an observer of.
Because, hello, to him An American Werewolf in London was a documentary, not fiction.
It would be nice to have a proper home.
Before he got into the spring, he took a couple of lengths of wood, set them in the fire circle, and willed them to light. As cheerful orange and yellow flames set up shop on their source of spruce-sustenance, and the filaments of smoke rose up and dispersed into the cracks in the rock ceiling, he felt like he wanted to scream.
So he went to the water.
Lowering himself into the pool, he found the weightlessness soothing, and he pulled himself around to his favorite spot, the smooth contours of the naturally sheared stone like a seat honed just for his body. Letting his head fall back, he watched the play of light.
That fucking vampire—
Sure as if he had called the very male into existence, a figure that resembled the one he couldn’t get out of his mind for too many reasons stepped out of the passageway and into the cave proper.
Callum lifted his head. “Is she dead then?”
They were going to have a tiger by the tail if anything happened to that female.
When it happened, that was.
“No.”
As the male stared across the fire, Callum became very aware that he was naked in the spring. “So what are you doing here.”
When there was no answer from the guy, he tightened his own lips. “That was a bloody cruel thing to say, you know. Back at the hunting cabin.”
“I know. That’s why I came.”
There was another pause, and then the vampire crossed his arms over his chest. As his jaw worked like he was trying to chew his own molars to stubs, Callum felt the resolve to hate the bastard ease up a little.
“What the hell is your name, vampire.”
“Apex.”
Callum threw his head back and laughed. “Oh, they named you right. Top of the food chain, ready to eat anything, you are.” As he righted himself, he narrowed his eyes. “So are you here to apologize, then.”
“Yes.”
More silence. And Callum lifted a brow. “Well, get on with it, mate.”
“I’m… sorry.”
“And?”
The vampire, Apex, frowned. “I said it. I apologized.”
“That’s it? I’m sorry? That’s all you’ve got.”
“What else is there? That is the very definition of ‘apology.’ ”
Callum tilted his head to the side. Then he lifted his forefinger. “Question.”
“What.”
“When was the last time you apologized to anyone? Or are you so ‘Apex’ that you just don’t bother with courtesy and consideration?”
“Mostly, I kill people who are in the way.”
“Ah, so we’re not well versed in the common practice of apologies. Right. Well, let me explain something to you, predator. Usually there is context around the two words you’ve staked your claim upon. There is an explanation, a promise to do better, perhaps a plan to improve oneself.”
The vampire narrowed his eyes. “You want all that? Really.”
As the vampire stood in the firelight, dressed in that black uniform he’d taken off a dead prison guard… he was really quite sexy, his short hair, his glowing eyes, those broad shoulders and strong body the kind of package a wolven didn’t get to see very often.
And this awkward apology, sheepish thing was pretty frickin’ cute.
Abruptly, the soft water that moved with a natural current no longer felt like something to bathe in. It felt like hands on his body. Lips… on his body.
Caressing him in places he very much wanted this predator standing in front of him to get into.
“Actually, forget the apology,” Callum drawled. “I quite fancy something else from you.”
“I don’t sing. I don’t dance. And I can’t read.”
“I was thinking of something else entirely.” He crooked his finger. “Come here, predator. I’ll tell you what I want from you—or show you, if you prefer.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Inside the red hut, Kane shook his head at the old female. “No, no. Not me, you have to help her.”
He smoothed his hand over Nadya’s forehead again. She was even hotter than she had felt on the way here, yet her skin was as dry as the desert. On her face, he could understand how the scarring might prevent perspiration, but the same seemed true of her extremities where she hadn’t been hit with the acid.
“On the contrary, it is up to you and you alone if she is to survive,” the old female said. “You are the one who can draw the heat away from her. Lie down beside her, and put your naked flesh onto hers.”
“That will just make her hotter!”
There was a pause, and the expression on the mystical female’s face changed. But he didn’t care if he offended her.
Just as he was about to point that out, she looked over her shoulder to the exit. “Not tonight. Surely not tonight.”
“Madam,” he said sharply as he tried to be both demanding and respectful. “I need you to—”
“Stay in here,” she said urgently as she refocused on him. “And do as I tell you. You must put your skin upon hers—”
“It’s not going to work—”
“Then watch her die—it is your choice!”
The old female’s tone got through to him like a slap in the face, and he felt his brows pop up. “All right… I’ll do that.”
Not that she seemed to hear him. She went to the hut’s flap and lifted it partially. As she leaned out, he had a thought that she was testing the air for scents, but he wasn’t sure.
Turning around, she met him in the eye. “You must stay in here. I can protect you if you are under this roof. If you leave, you are on your own—and she will definitely not survive. It is your choice.”
Then the female ducked out. What happened next… Kane wasn’t too sure about.
The walls of the hut began to flutter, as if there was a wind swirling around outside, and then there was a vibration that came up through the earth, the kind of thing that entered him through his contact with the ground and traveled up his own body.
After that, everything went translucent: Sure as if a brilliant light were being shined on the exterior of the structure, the heavy fabric seemed to disappear, a red fog replacing that which had been solid.
Which was how he saw the old female change shape just outside the shelter.
One moment, she was up on two legs; the next, she went into a contortion, her shape changing until she was down on four paws.
As she threw back her head and howled, the eerie sound went into his bones and he looked down at Nadya. Things had taken a very paranormal turn, and that was saying something, considering he was a vampire—
An internal voice cut in: If you leave, you are on your own—and she will definitely not survive.
For a second, he was confused about its origins, but then the message truly sunk in.
“Nadya,” he said, “I need to lie with you.”
He started to remove his clothing, and as he bared his torso, he could really feel the heat rising from her, sure as if he were in front of a fire. Moving faster, he kicked off boots, peeled socks, pulled off his pants. No undergarments.
Staring down at his sex, he gave it a quick pep talk to not get peppy. This was medicine, he told the damn thing.
“I’m going to lie with you now.”
She moaned a little and moved under the towel. “Kane?”
“Yes,” he said urgently. “Yes, it’s me.”
“Help me…”
“I will. I have to lie down with you.”
Nadya lifted her arms up, rolling herself back and forth on the pallet.
“Here I am.”
Gritting his teeth, he shifted down and stretched out next to her. Immediately, she settled against him, her body like cozying up to a rock that had been baking in the sun, the dry heat warming him as if, sure enough, his flesh was a sponge for it.
The ragged sigh she let out suggested that it wasn’t all in his mind, that what the old female had told him to do might work.
“I’m just going to get us sorted,” he said awkwardly as he moved arms, shifted legs, positioned them better.
And that was how, for the first time in two hundred years, he came to be naked with a female.
No, that wasn’t quite right. Cordelhia had never been fully nude the few times they had been together. She had always declared the need for her modesty by retaining her silken nightgowns, and of course he had wanted to honor whatever made her feel more comfortable.
Besides, though he had wanted further closeness from his shellan, he had never been sure whether that was just the nature of sexual acts—or whether it was specific to his mate. Not that the answer to that would have mattered. He had just wanted Cordelhia to be happy, whatever that entailed.
“Shhh,” he said as he ran his hand up and down Nadya’s shoulder.
He wasn’t sure whether he was trying to calm her… or himself.
This felt wrong, to lay with another female.
It also seemed very, very right—
Just outside the red fog of the hut, he heard another howl—after which there were voices, males talking with urgency back and forth.
They were under attack, he thought. From who, though?
That was yet another question that did not require an answer. Not right now, at least. He could only hope that Apex, Lucan, and Mayhem would help the wolven.
“I’ve got you,” he whispered as he closed his eyes.
The heat that entered his body was unrelenting, to the point where he was convinced that he was going to have more burns. But as long as Nadya came out of this somehow, any suffering on his part would be worth it.
* * *
Inside the wolven’s den, Apex stood on a precipice, and the temptation was to jump into the rather miraculous natural basin that, given the steam rising up, had some kind of underground source of heat: The male in the undulating water was staring up with an invitation that was unmistakable, and the urge to get in there with him and find out what else could happen when they were in private was irresistible.
“Your name is Callum.”
The wolven nodded. “What have you been calling me in your head? I’m just curious. To me, you were That Vampire. Capital T, capital V.”
“I haven’t been calling you anything.”
“You sure about that? Even when you weren’t sleeping today.”
Apex took a step forward. “I didn’t have to give you a name.”
“No?”
“I just remembered what you looked like down on your knees in front of me.”
The vibration that purred up and out of the male in the pool was an enticing sound if Apex had ever heard one—and then Callum’s hand disappeared under the churning surface of the water. As he bit his lower lip with sharp white fangs, his eyes glowed.
“What are you doing, wolf?”
“Would you like to see, predator?”
Oh, fuck, yes. “Show me.”
The male rose up from whatever ledge he was sitting on, and in the firelight, the muscles of his shoulders and chest gleamed, the droplets of springwater falling from the contours of his torso. But not everything was easy to see. The level in the pool was such that Apex was merely teased by the sight of a strong hand wrapped around a shaft that was long and hard.
As the wolven stroked himself, his forearm flexed and relaxed, the veins popping, the strength erotic as fuck.
“Do you like this, predator.”
“Yes…”
“Good. I like you watching”—the male’s breath caught—“me.”
That hand moved faster, and Apex started to feel the stroking in his own cock, as if by some alchemy, the touch was transferred across the distance between them.
“Tell me… something… predator…”
God, he couldn’t think. He was consumed by watching the water level flirt with the hand job, the revelations and obscuring a peep show that made everything more captivating.
“What,” Apex breathed.
The wolven stopped what he was doing—a total travesty of nature in Apex’s view.
“You’ve never been with a male before, have you.”
Apex opened his mouth. Closed it. Then figured, fuck it. “No, I haven’t.”
The smile that came back at him was slow and very, very satisfied. “How fun. I look forward to this even more.”
With that, Callum began jerking himself off properly, the pump hard and fast, the head of his cock breaking out of the surface of the pool, the wolven’s head falling back, his lips parting, his rib cage expanding and contracting—
The orgasm was delicious, kicking come out into the pool, and Apex had an irresistible urge to jump in and capture it all, swallow it down, feed off the release.
But he didn’t move. Even as his eyes consumed the pleasure and his mind swirled with anticipation, just as his body hungered to spin the wolven around, push him face-first over the lip of the pool, and mount him from behind—
His ears were hearing something that wasn’t right.
Off in the distance, there was a howling, the sound loud enough to carry down the passageway to this private fuck cave the wolven had very clearly put to good use before.
And then came the shouting.
That got Callum’s attention. His head snapped back to rights and he looked toward the head of the rock tunnel.
“What is it?” Apex demanded as he got out his gun.
“Hunters. Motherfucking hunters.”
