Page 77 of A Study of Blood and Ichor

“You didn’t ask?”

“It would have made no difference. Regardless, they won’t be coming back again.”

“Were you planning on telling me at all if I hadn’t asked?”

“I thought it of little importance seeing as you are safe as long as you are in my home. No one will be able to touch you here.”

“Do you expect me to stay here forever?”

“That’s not what I said.”

“But that’s the truth, isn’t it?”

Vain pressed his eyes shut and pinched his lips together before snapping both back open again. “That is not what we agreed to in our deal. I only asked for the pleasure of your company for as long as you would have me.”

“But I’m really just a pet to you, aren’t I?”

“Ava—” Vain started, his voice low and hushed as his eyes softened. He reached out to me, but I brushed him aside with one hand.

“This is not my home,” I snapped. “This will never be my home. And I won’t let you string me along like I’m nothing but a dog you keep on a short leash. Go fuck yourself, Vain.”

I was grateful my voice hadn’t wavered once. Smug satisfaction flooded my chest at the ire burning in Vain’s soulless black eyes. At the same time, that anger he refused to vocalize set a pang of dread deep down in my gut.

“Thank you for the drink, Alastair,” I said without another look in Vain’s direction, then stormed out of the lounge, hoping I had wiped the smirk clean off his arrogant face.

TWENTY-ONE

Ava

Anger seared through my chest as I worked my way through the pulsing crowd back toward the elevator so I could escape to the penthouse. I still held onto a sliver of satisfaction whenever I remembered the sour look on Vain’s face before I had turned away. That look had been better than anything.

I climbed the staircase and was almost at the elevator when the sounds of muffled grunts came from nearby. I slowed to a stop outside a door that had been left open a small crack, and eyed the plaque labeled “Employees Only” before inching closer to peek inside.

The supply closet appeared to double as a storage room. Spare furniture sets, loveseats, barstools, rugs, and lighting fixtures were scattered about among the piles of soaps, mops, and cleaning products stuffed into buckets or along the cluttered shelves.

Again, the faint smacking sounds came from further back in the room, accompanied that time by a strangled moan. I strained my eyes as they adjusted to the shadows, and I held my gasp as I caught sight of the dark shapes moving through the shelves.

Three of them were tangled together on top of a velvet couch, bare skin flushed and slicked in sweat. Nesera moaned again, the sound ringing out louder this time. She was lying between the two men from earlier. The one who had thrown the first punch and had been left with a bruised cheek lay beneath her. She whimpered as she writhed on top of him while the other man with the bloodied lip thrust into her hard from behind at the same time.

Her long nails dug into the man’s chest below her as Nesera bent forward, taking them both deeper. Each moan rasped as they escaped her throat between every gasping breath.

I shouldn’t have watched. I should have turned away and went straight for the elevator, but I couldn’t look away from the pure ecstasy that tugged at the cambion’s lips and the corners of her eyes as they rolled back.

The man behind Nesera gripped the fabric of the dress bunched around her waist as he rammed himself again and again into her ass. His hands scraped up her back until they were fisted around the gold chain that dangled between her horns, holding them like reins. He yanked on them, pulling her head back and sending her over the edge in turn.

Nesera’s eyes went half-lidded, and her mouth dropped open as she rode the initial waves of her orgasm. And when the man yanked again, her eyes shot open and locked straight onto mine. Her expression held no flush of shame or embarrassment. Instead, her smile only grew wider at the sight of me watching her come, and it took everything in me to tear myself away.

I whirled to escape toward the elevator, but I was immediately met with a hard wall of muscle. Vain had put himself squarely in my path, his chest blocking me from reaching the exit. How long had he been standing there? And how much had he seen?

“You’re quite flustered,” he teased.

Oh, he had seen plenty. I was too taken aback to speak.

“Did you like what you saw?”

There was no point in answering him. I had no doubt he could tell how turned on I was. I was sure every emotion was written plainly on my face. He might as well have been able to read my mind.

Maybe it was because I was still so aroused, but I couldn’t help but notice the angles of Rory’s face as Vain’s dark eyes peered down at me, our chests nearly pressed together. But when I moved to sidestep around him in the hallway, he prowled closer, advancing on me slowly until my back was pressed against a door opposite the closet.

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