Page 58 of Her Tortured Beasts

“I would never pay for it,” I say. “I like free samples. Short on cash, you see.”

She grins, shaking her head on her way inside as if she finds me amusing. Iamfairly funny, but not everyone can see it.

Then finally, the moment we’ve all been waiting for. The purr of a new Rolls Royce fills my ears, and I wait in anticipation for the doors to open and close in the carpark.

I frown, because a pair of footsteps, one booted and one bare, pad down the path to us.

They appear around the corner—just the two of them because no dragon needs bodyguards.

My being goes still. Because it’s something I do not expect.

And rarely does something happen that I have not expected.

Xander, his power roiling like black flames about him, leads Aurelia Boneweaver, naked as the day she was born, her hands crossed over her breasts to hide them, the mounds deliciously pushed up. Her cheeks are pink, her blue eyes sparkling with humiliation, and she must be thanking her lucky stars for her own grooming choices because black curls of hair hide her pubic area from the view of every shadow-hearted beast here.

If I hadn’t seen her naked a few times—including her heat when she was greedy for my cock in her mouth, a moment that will go down in history for me—I might have ended up on the ground before The Jewel. She has a body made by the Wild Goddess, perfect for a beast’s tongue and teeth. Perfect for a monster’s dark hands.

There’s a new golden collar around her neck that gleams like the sun. This one is studded with two sapphires, and between them is a single sentence, emblazoned in black, so it’s easy to see from a distance: PROPERTY OF DRAKOS ESTATE. Old blood crusts the edges of it because they’ve seared it into her skin.

Cursed dragon bastard.

Likely, a statement of power after his little meltdown at the wedding. And boy oh boy, is it working.

Mace is not going to like this.

“Ah, it’s the Lady Boneweaver,” I muse.

“You look like you belong in a theme park,” Xander snarls, his power sizzling like a barbeque just over his skin.

Ooh, he’s in a mood. A permanent one, by the looks of it. I can’t wait to see what fun this makes.

“Fancy that!” I say in mock interest. “You’d give an oven a run for its money, mate. Useful on a winter’s night, I bet.” I take a long drag from my cigarette.

Mamba snickers next to me and I grin at him.

“I wondered why you looked familiar,” Xander drawls at him, brushing microscopic lint from his shoulder. “Your son made amusing noises as he died.”

In the blink of an eye, General Mamba lunges towards the nasty dragon. Luckily, I’m faster and I manage to intercept. The serpent general slams into my considerable bicep.

“Now, now, children,” I say reasonably. “Today we come together and put our differences aside. Let the big scary dragon through. We can play later.”

Xander pretends none of the last thirty seconds happened and saunters on inside, his pet trailing miserably behind him. I watch her perfect, round, bare ass leave me.

Mamba glares at me from behind his mask. “You should have let me at him, Ghoul. I deserve blood for my son.”

“And you’ll get it,” I say, placing my ciggie between his lips. “You just have to wait a little longer, that’s all.”

I decide it’s best to leave him outside to calm down, but I head inside, eager to see the show on its way.

Chapter 33

Aurelia

I’d enjoyed being watched the first time I entered The Jewel of the Jungle. Hell, I’d even enjoyed being seen naked that one time when I’d had no spare clothes and I’d landed at that human service station.

But this type of entrance is something from a nightmare. It’s humiliating and degrading—everything it’s intended to be. My feet hurt from being denied shoes, and the skin of my neck is in rotten agony. Before dawn this morning, Xander had replaced my collar so quickly that I’d barely had time to protest before my screams of agony forced me to my knees.

He’d watched me writhe with no expression before commanding that I get into the car.

---