Sanibel Seduction - Vampire Werewolf Menage (Fanged Romance Series Book Four) (11 page)

So that’s what he was going to do.

He waved a hand over her sorry latch, easily opening the back door and stepping inside. So lush was her scent! It was everywhere now. Inside his mouth, his nose, his body awakened after centuries in a way only a true mate can accomplish.

Here she was right before him.

Here he was right next to her.

Finally, he drew in more of her, filling his lungs with Azure Malloy. Now, he would be able to detect her in any direction within miles. She wouldn’t get away. Hopefully, she wouldn’t try.

He stared at her from above. At first glance, peace eased his werewolf. Healing roughened fragments floating in internal disaccord for so long, Gage had forgotten their painful edges. He absorbed her sleeping state, watching as her full lips parted on little sighs or incomprehensible mutterings, allowing the tone of her voice to stroke his ears. She was so incredibly lovely. Below perfectly arched brows, her thick lashes cast dark crescents under her eyes, though he did not know their color. Her hair was darker than midnight, inky as a Scottish werewolf. His heart pounded as he discovered each feature more incredible than the next. Her cheekbones were high and perfectly curved, soft and kissable. He stroked the back of his claw over her left cheek, wanting to follow it with tiny kisses.

His canines throbbed insistently, his werewolf reminding him of what he needed to do. If she were ever to get out of scenting range again as if he would let that happen but if she were taken from him., Well, he had to insure against that. And there was only one way to have that kind of insurance policy. On this night, he would drink from her flesh, a communion with his sweet treasure.

He kneeled next to her, longing to study her naked form, but instead, covering her with a soft quilt. Her fragrance brushed his palate and stroked his cock. He allowed her blood to call him in a way only true mates could and he salivated for her, truly hungered. Studying the pale arch of her throat, he pushed a few inky strands away, combing them with his claws. He nuzzled her shoulder, easing in on her throat, and licked a slow line down her jugular before sinking his long daggers into her delicious depths. She jerked upon impact, fluttering her eyes before going back to sleep.

Never again would he live without this, without her.

A satisfying swallow followed by another and another.

Gage groaned, completely ravaged with a need only she could fill. He reached inside his pants and ruthlessly squeezed his cock on the last draw. He rolled his palm over his tribal inflixx - rows and rows of piercings bored through the underside of his penis - and dreamed of bringing her to come with them. At that thought and her flavor, he exploded yet again, filling his palm with his seed - now, Azure’s seed. He pulled his hand out and curled it around her nape – mindful of his claws, gently but effectively rubbing it into her skin, and combining their scents in the most primordial way.

He bent his golden head and tongued his mark, nipping and sniffing the brand she would never see, but all other immortals would find it from afar.

From this day forward, Azure Malloy belonged to Gage MacGelton.

And God help anyone who thought otherwise.

Since returning from Scotland, she was a physical mess. Her joints ached. Frequently, her skin started burning right before it suddenly chilled. Other times her body dipped into a dark eroticism she never knew she had. Often it was so severe she was ashamed of herself.

She pushed her quilt back and shivered when her toes hit the tiled floor, not because it was cold in Florida today, far from it. Her body was missing something. But she didn't know what that something was.

Noises echoed from the front stoop.

Whack. Whack. Whack. Ring. Ring. Ring. “What the?” Azure groaned wearily. “It’s my day off. That should mean something.” She managed to spill a glass of water that she’d left next to the bed. After nearly slipping in its contents, she threw her sheet on the floor to soak it up. “Gotta wash today anyway,” she said to no one. How much had she drunk? “Don’t remember getting this wasted,” she still spoke to no one. Whack. Whack. Whack. Ring. Riiiiing. “Mother fuck… Hello? Abby?” Her realtor slash friend was on the other end. “You’re at the front door. Okay, I’m opening it.” She stared down, making sure she had something on. She didn’t. She found a robe she’d hung over the back of a chair and cinched it.

With shaking hands, she unlatched the door and could’ve sworn she was hit by an overzealous dog, but it was just Abby. “How can you be so chipper this early?”

“This early? Sweetheart” – she pulled back, glancing at her watch – “it’s noon.” She held a cheap bottle of champagne up. “And past time to celebrate.” She shook the bottle like an idiot, riling the bubbles up, so Azure took a few steps back.

“Uh, I better lay off the booze,” she said with a dry throat, dehydrated from too many drinks. Which must have been way too many since she didn’t recall drinking that much. “What are you celebrating?”

A thumper drove by, drowning out what she was about to say, so she waited until the car passed down the street. “Someone bought this place!” She jumped up and down, clapping her hands loudly until Azure’s teeth snapped.

“You haven’t shown it in months,” she nearly choked, moving away from Abby to brew up some coffee. Click. Click. Click went her high heels on the floor, grating on Azure’s last nerves. It wasn’t Abby’s fault that her skin was burning
again
, and she shouldn’t be irritable with her because she had drunk too much. Azure was an adult, and she had to own up to her self-induced hangover. A Strange hangover. Very strange. So she tried her best to carry on a conversation. “How does someone just buy this…” – dump – “place sight unseen when there’s so much to choose from? So much
better
for someone to choose from, so pardon me for being skeptical,” she rambled on, staring over the coffee maker at some mile-high weeds growing around the neighbor’s chain-link fence. But Azure didn’t think they were weeds at all.

Abby pulled out the paperwork and a wobbly chair, settling herself at the breakfast table. Azure wasn’t too far gone to notice her fixed glare. “Nick said you didn’t actually drink much. I thought you would want to hear this marvellous news.” Her eyes widened. “I mean, Azure, you’re getting the full asking price.”

Azure felt her mouth gape, so Abby helped her in a chair. “Full asking price? As in the one we never changed from a year ago?”

“Yes!” She started clapping again, but Azure snatched her hands.

“Explain.”

“A mega rich mogul is turning it into some kind of halfway house for released prisoners or paroles or something to do with former druggies. Who cares? He’s paying top dollar. He could have offered half, and you still would’ve made out in this economy. Considering your banked savings and that this place doesn’t have a mortgage, we’ll be able to find you a charming little condo in a better neighborhood just as we planned more than a year ago. It’s incredible, right. Azure? Hey, are you alright?”

“I am stunned,” she whispered. Abby eyeballed the drizzling coffee maker, stood up and poured a cup.

“Maybe you should drink this.” She shoved half a cupful under her nose. “You look pale.”

“So,” Azure started when she sat back down, dimly recalling sitting at the table with her mother when they were discussing her funeral plans. One of the worst days Azure had ever had. She couldn’t even look in her mother’s old room. Couldn’t sleep in
her
old bedroom without remembering all the good times, when her mom was healthy and full of life, chatting away while sitting on the end of her bed when Azure was getting ready for a date with Will. “Yeah, I’m shocked, but ready to move on.” Now that she faced the actual moment. “Oh, and I’m grateful for your hard work, Abby,” she added as an afterthought.

Abby’s face softened. “Okay, here are the terms: He pays full price. No waiting for a mortgage to come through, he can wire it into your account the minute the ink dries.” She cocked an arched brow while tapping the paperwork with a blood red nail. “But you have to move out.”

“I get the jest of that, Abby. When you sell someone your home, you have to move out. Understood.” She took a scalding sip of coffee. It was the cheap stuff and the bitter aftertaste reminded her of varnish.

Her friend shuffled the papers, for the first time looking nervous. “There’s always give and take when someone doesn’t haggle on a price. They want something in return.”

“More than the house?”

“More than the house,” Abby answered with a wobbly smile. “Like, sometimes they ask the seller to pay their realtors fees. Or they may ask you to include the furnishings.” She looked around and shook her head.

“Out with it. What does the buyer want, Abby?”

“You to move out today.”

“What!” In her panic, she knocked over her coffee. Abby was quick to grab a dishcloth, blotting up the spill while she explained. “He said he needed an assistant for the week, just to help hire some people to run this place. I mean, it’s tiny, with only eight workable rooms. But a staff led by a psychiatrist, maybe Nick, is needed here. Just a week.”

“He’s really going to do this?”

“Some of the rich aren’t so bad, Azure,” she explained. “This guy is too busy to handle the fine points, and since he paid way more than top dollar, give him a bit of your time. Hell, it’s for the community.”

“Yeah, I’m just leery of those ‘too good to be true’ things.”

“I would be, too if I didn’t have it all in black and white.” She waved her paperwork. “For a couple of years now, he’s owned this penthouse that he’s finally moved into
today
.” She ignored an incoming text, keeping herself focused. “Very prestigious area, I might add. Anyway” – she thumbed through the contract, making sure nothing was soaked from the spill –“with his strained schedule, he’s asked that we come
there
to meet with him. I said that wouldn’t be a problem. You know these rich people.” She waved her hand around airily.

“No. I honestly don’t.” Will had become rich, right before he kicked her out. The only other rich people she encountered were those from the private detox facility she worked at, or their parents. “I would love to support a project like this, but I have a job I can’t lose.” And she’d grown to love it there.
“It’s a week tops.” She reached for the salt shaker, twirling it nervously. “He’ll work around your hours.”

Azure braced both palms on the table, smelling a rat. “You’ve already told him that I would do it.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” She said defensively. “We’ve had this house on the market for an eternity, and if it weren’t for Mr. MacGelton, it would stay that way.”

“Okay, okay, Abby.” Azure snagged the salt shaker, stilling Abby’s jerky movements. “I’ll bet that he’s an eccentric weirdo.”

“A compassionate one,” she chastised. “Well, I’ve only talked to his secretary. She doesn’t sound weird at all. In fact, she handled all of this since he’s so busy.” Abby held up the papers for emphasis. “Oh, by the way, you’ll meet him in a few.” She tacked on in a rush, “when you move in.”

“When I move in,” Azure repeated in bewilderment.

“Yup, his penthouse has two floors. You’ll stay in one of the many bedrooms. In between your work schedule, you’ll direct internal traffic and staff this place. Well, at least, whatever you can accomplish within a week’s time. Maybe you can work here afterwards.” She scrunched her nose. “Sounds easy enough.”

“MacGelton?”

“Uh-huh.” She leaned back in her chair.

“He takes this place off my hands, and I assist him for a week?”
“That’s the sum of it.” She pushed the papers Azure’s way. “Easy Breezy, if you ask me.”

Abby needed more incentive than her pitiful commission, “Come on.” Azure picked up the pen, signing in all the right places, before pushing the contract back across the table. “What’s really in it for you?”

“Besides seeing you get out of this place? His secretary has some other properties she wants me to negotiate on Mr. MacGelton’s behalf. If I work just one of those deals” – She placed both hands on her heart - “the commission would amount to two years of income for me. Two years.” She held up two fingers in case Azure didn’t understand what she meant. “And I know you won’t bail on me. We get our backs scratched in this deal. I need this opportunity.”

“Yeah, you do.” She swallowed roughly, not wanting to douse Abby’s opportunities. “So he’s a high roller in real estate?” Her house was clearly a charitable write off.

“Not that I know of,” she replied, shoving everything in her satchel. “He’s low-key, for sure. He’s the lead attorney for Jordan Marketing, a member on their board.”

“Jordan Marketing?” Azure’s mouth opened and closed like a landed fish. “You don’t say.”

“Are you ever going to talk to me again?” Abby plastered on a smile, nodding here and there as people sauntered by. Important people. And if you didn’t know they were prominent socialites, you could tell by their manner of dress and by how they looked down their noses at everyone else, but mostly Azure and Abby.

“Only if I don’t run into Will or his better half,” Azure snapped, pressing her hands over her nervous stomach. She’d thrown on a cream jersey dress and whipped her dirty hair into a pony tail. It was getting too long, and Abby said she didn’t have the time to wait while she washed and dried it. On the spot, Azure learned all about dry shampooing. Of course, she didn’t have the necessary baby powder in the house, so Abby improvised, pulling an ancient box of corn starch from the pantry and going to it. She rubbed the cornstarch into her scalp until she soaked everything up. Azure sensed these little, gluey lumps across her scalp, and they were itching.