Page 16 of Bottoms Up
I smiled and pressed my cheek to his chest, even knowing he couldn’t warm me. “I’m invited to a Girls’ Night Out thing in twoweeks. I hope we’ve resolved the demon issue by then, so I don’t have to worry about running into the asshole.”
The sexy fucking asshole who promised things I didn’t want to think about, but I wasn’t ready to talk about that yet.
“Kirsten and Cora will be there. I’m sure they’ll stick close and keep you safe if we haven’t figured something out by then.”
His faith in them was comforting.
“What are we going to do between now and eleven?”
“I’m going to watch you eat while we’re trapped downstairs,” he said with a smile in his voice. “Once it’s dark, we’ve added an ax-throwing area to the side of our archery range. I thought we could throw axes and play with the compound bows.”
He traced slow circles on my back, his cool hand calming and intimate. “Kirsten has throwing knives, and she’s offered to show you how they work. If you like them, she can show you how to wear them concealed, so if the demon approaches and knocks everyone out but you, you’ll have a way to annoy him. She says you won’t be able to kill him, but you might make him leave.”
I nodded. “Thank you. I haven’t carried a gun in a long time. I have several, and I keep my carry license active, but I’d need to go to the range and practice before I’d trust myself with one in public, where I might actually need to use it. Once I became part of Mythic Beast, we had security around us all the times I might’ve carried, so it hasn’t been necessary.”
“Guns are loud. Knives are silent.”
His voice dropped even softer, a barely-there vibration against my skin. “I just need to know we’ve done everything we can to keep you safe.”
Chapter 5
Ten days later
Dark Haven: Senatus headquarters
The rotunda was silent, save for the hush of air and the weight of waiting. Though it sat just across the Mississippi line from Memphis, the Senatus headquarters bore little resemblance to anything American. Polished marble floors gleamed beneath carved wooden ceilings. Crimson banners draped the walls, interspersed with ancient weapons — not decor, but memory. Everything here whispered of age, of blood, of rules written long before the founding of this continent.
The chamber was empty but for four figures.
Jupiter stood regal, perfectly still in a charcoal suit and gold-threaded vest that might’ve been looted from the Louvre. His dark eyes revealed nothing.
The Prince of Darkness leaned against a marble column, boots crossed at the ankle, clearly amused by the whole affair. Deep, ruby red eyes burned under dark lashes. A blood-red dress shirt tucked into inky crocodile-skin pants that clung indecently to thighs and an impressive package. Moments later, he was sprawled barefoot in a high-backed, ornate chair that hadn’t been there before — all coiled elegance and deliberate arrogance.
Even without a shapeshifter’s nose, Kirsten could scent the smoky brimstone still curling off the Prince of Darkness’s skin,but she’d been to Hell and back more than once, so she didn’t cringe or wince. She’d learned the art of the poker face from her vampire friends over the years, so she stood quiet, poised, unreadable. Her red hair coiled into a bun at the base of her skull, her pantsuit flowed around her in muted earth tones, and her deep forest heels were planted firmly on the marble floor.
Nathan stood behind her and just off to the side — close enough to protect, distant enough he couldn’t be accused of hovering. He was still as stone, dressed in a flawlessly tailored charcoal suit over a black shirt, presence sharp as claws. His gaze swept the room like a lion surveying his territory: calm, calculating, carnivorous. Power simmered just under the surface.
Power radiated from every direction, sunlight and smoke. Yin and yang.
They all waited for the fifth to arrive.
No one moved. No one asked his boss where he was. No one offered to retrieve him.
No one wanted to waste a power-play on impatience.
A door at the far end of the room burst open.
Xaephan didn’t walk so much as glide, long legs eating the distance with a lazy grace that made heat gather in places it shouldn’t. His dark, honey-bronzed skin gleamed under the lights, obsidian hair pulled back from high cheekbones, every step coiled in sensual threat. But it was his eyes that changed the air, flickering from molten gold to soul-snaring brown, laced with shadows of the darkest fire, like he already owned every sin in the room.
He wore a loincloth, wielded like a weapon he knew damned well would add to the painful arousal of everyone in the room. The Lord of Lust’s powers affect everyone — wanted or unwanted, the body responds.
He stopped in the center and focused on Kirsten.
“Chère, it’s good to see you in the flesh again.”
She shook her head and gave him a wry smile. “I wish I could say I don’t feel the same, but we’d both know it wasn’t true.”
“You spoiled all my plans by becoming the Erlkönigin. What a pity.”
