“Listen, dude,” I say and he cocks an eyebrow at my surfer slang, “I’m not here to fuck your friend again; I’m here to make a deal.”
“I knew I was right about you,” Vyce whispers, suddenly behind me, pulling back strands of blond hair with his fingers. Fuck. I hadn’t even heard him come up the stairs. And he had to have just come in; there’s nowhere in here to hide. Either I need to up my game or else this guy is just that goddamn good. “Potential client.”
He slides around me as Wolfe sits down at the desk, murmuring curses under his breath. Vyce perches on the edge of it and crosses his arms, mimicking my pose. His blue-turquoise-purple hair is styled the same as it was last week, and his red eyes shimmer with amusement. He’s dressed all in leather again, with a short-sleeved navy-blue leather tank, black pants, and black boots. To be quite frank, he looks like a kick ass video game hero.
“What do you want, Cameron Darke?” he purrs, smiling at me with a seductive edge. It’s sharp enough to cut.
“You learned my full name, good for you. There aren’t a lot of dhampirs in this area anyway.”
Vyce just laughs at me, the sound as dark as shadows in the night, black on black.
“You should tell that bartender girl to keep your identity secret,” Vyce says, putting a finger to his lips in a shushing motion. I ignore him and smile my own sexy little smile.
“I want to spin straw into gold,” I say and his dark brows go up. Behind him, Wolfe snorts. “For real though. And I want the transmogrification to be permanent. I know you’ve got the magic for that stashed away in here somewhere.”
“And how the hell would you know that?” Wolfe asks. “You don’t know shit. Get the fuck out.”
“Wolfe,” Vyce snaps, turning a look over his shoulder that’s all flashing teeth and irritation. “Enough.” He looks back at him and soothes his facial expression some. “You have inside information about the Stiltz family business, do you?”
“Let’s just say a little bartender told me,” I quip, lying through my fucking teeth. “She serves a lot of supernaturals, so gossip makes its way around. The Dragonfly is a hotbed for it. And anyone who’s ever heard of Rumpel Stiltz knows there was a woman once upon a time who asked him to spin straw into gold for her.”
“It worked, too,” Vyce says, standing up from the desk with a small sigh. “Coffee?”
I shrug, and he heads to the machine on the far side of the room. Even from here, I can tell it’s a fucking Jura, the Rolls Royce of coffee makers. Those things cost over a thousand bucks! I want it so bad I start to drool. When I become queen, first thing I’m doing is getting one. Shit, I’ll get an even better one, something professional, plus, a whole team of highly trained baristas to make drinks for me.
Crap.
I’m getting a little ahead of myself. Can’t help it though. Coffee just excites me.
“So, you want to be queen of House Verenim, huh? Have a crush on Vesnic, like everyone else?” he asks as he goes about preparing me a cup of coffee. I’m almost as excited for the java as I am to be queen. Also, I get to check out Vyce’s ass as he goes about making it. With those leather pants clinging to his tight cheeks, it’s a criminally delicious sight.
“Actually, I could give two fucks less about him. I’m tired of being poor, tired of living in shadows, tired of vampire scraps and sneers and bullshit. This is about power and respect.”
Vyce chuckles as the door at the bottom of the steps opens and I glance over my shoulder in time to see Sorrow making his way up. He doesn’t try to sneak like Vyce did, his boot steps loud against the carpeted stairs.
He grins at me as he hits the landing, coming to stand just in front and to the side of me. He purposefully rakes his blue eyes over me and shoves some red and white hair from his face.
“Damn, it’s good to see you again,” he says, smiling just brightly enough to flash a single fang. It’d be cute if he hadn’t come inside me and then scrambled out the door with no shirt on.
“I wish I could say the same,” I say, letting my voice get this icy coolness that I don’t feel. Fuck no. Standing here with Vyce and Sorrow, I’m hot as hell inside. My cunt is pulsing, my nipples are hard, and I feel like I could quite easily tear my clothes off and go at it right here on Wolfe’s desk. Hell, he can even watch if he wants. “Not in as big a hurry today, I see.”
Sorrow frowns and steps around me, heading for the Jura and stealing the cup from Vyce’s hands as he turns toward me.
“That was for our guest, asshole,” he says, but at least Sorrow does actually bring the cup to me.
“Peace offering?” he queries as I raise a blonde brow.
“You didn’t even make the damn coffee,” I say, but holy shit, his blood smells good, and I can’t resist reaching out to take the cup, just so our fingers can tangle together for a moment. Prickles of white-hot magic trace up my skin and then slide down my spine, reminding me of Sorrow’s tongue on my inner thigh, his lips on my clit, his cock buried deep inside of me.
Fuck.
My hormones are going crazy around these guys.
“Your weird tattoo have any reason for you making a run for it?” I ask and he shrugs, his red leather motorcycle jacket crinkling. He’s got on dark blue jeans and a white t-shirt that’s so tight I can see his erect nipples through the fabric when he moves.
“What are you doing here?” he asks, heading back over to the coffee machine without bothering to answer my question. The next mug he steals from Vyce’s hands, he takes for himself, breathing in the aroma of freshly brewed beans with his eyes half-closed. After a moment, he sets it down on the table and grabs a small creamer, tilting it into his cup until thick red liquid pours out.
Yup.
It’s blood with some sort of preservative in it to keep it from coagulating or going bad. Vamps call it red sunrise for whatever reason.
Me, I take my coffee black like a fuckin’ Mundane.
“Is this a booty call?” Sorrow asks, coming back over to stand next to me, his mouth twisted in a smile, the skin at the edges of his eyes crinkled. “Please tell me it’s a booty call and not a bargain you’re looking for.”
“Straw into gold,” Wolfe barks, sitting in the desk chair with his arms crossed over his chest. He’s wearing a black button-up with the sleeves rolled to his elbows and a two-piece waist coat with a silver vest on top and one underneath that’s as red as Vyce’s eyes. Wolfe catches my gaze, frowns even more severely than before, a shocking feat I didn’t quite think was possible, and then opens his laptop. “An expensive favor.”
“Why would you want that?” Sorrow asks as he moves over to the off-white sofa on one side of the room and lounges in it like it was put there specifically to fulfill all his needs—and he damn well knows it. But that’s normal. All vampires are like that: entitled, stuck-up, overconfident. It comes with the ten fingers and ten toes, straight out of the womb. “Oh, fuck, the king?”
“I want power and respect,” I say, somehow bothered by the idea of these guys thinking I’m in it to bag the king. I mean, he’s not bad looking so I guess we could shag? But it’s not my primary motivation. Hell, it doesn’t even factor in except for the fact that it’s not a total deterrent. “Queen of the Verenim Family House sounds like a pretty sweet gig to me.”
Vyce hands another cup of coffee to Wolfe and takes one for himself, sitting on the edge of the desk and lighting up a cigarette while his friend scowls menacingly at him.
“This is a big favor and a big price you’re asking,” Wolfe says, turning his raging glare over to me. If anything, it gets even meaner once it’s focused on my face. “We’ll have to consult Rumpel on this one.”
My heart shudders inside my chest, seizing at the mention of that name. Fuck. If that man ever finds out who I really am, I’m screwed. Maybe Harry was right about me coming over here.