Virgin Daiquiri (Last Call #4) (2 page)

The woman surveyed the bar patrons with an
almost defiant expression. Her dark eyes met his and widened for a
split second before she turned away quickly.

Michael eyed the demons circling the dais.
“Who is she? Do you know?”

She did look familiar, but Leo
couldn’t put his finger on why. “Not a clue. I suppose I should
find out, though. For Bernie’s sake.”
Yeah, Bernie’s sake.
It was as good an
excuse as any.

Two demons hurried out of the way as he
approached the bar, both casting him annoyed looks that were as
close to insolent as they would get. Leo ignored them and took the
steps two at a time. “What’s going on, Bernie?”

Before the bartender could answer, the woman
-- who barely came up to his shoulder -- cleared her throat.
“Excuse me. Bernie is trying to be subtle about this, and I’m sure
you will be, as well, but… Could you both just please mind your own
business so I can take someone upstairs and lose my damn
virginity?”

Leo pretended to ignore her even as his body
vibrated from her proximity. “What’s got her so hot to get a man
between her legs?”

Bernie grimaced, and the brunette arched an
eyebrow at Leo. “I like the prospect of making it impossible for my
family to kill me and ratchet up their delicious evil powers.” Even
as her lush red lips formed the words, she hooked a hand into his
belt and pulled him closer. “It makes me hot.”

Distracted as he was by her mouth, he didn’t
notice her lift her glass. He didn’t notice anything, actually,
until she smiled and poured the frozen drink down his pants.

The music didn’t stop, but all movement on
the dance floor did. The regulars of Last Call caught their
collective breath and watched as Leo stood frozen in place while
fruity slush dripped down his legs.

It really should have killed his erection,
and he was more than a little pissed off when it didn’t. If
anything, he was harder than ever. But then, he’d always been a
sucker for a challenge.

And she was apparently a good one. The
mention of virgin sacrifice meant she belonged to one of the
prominent magical families that dominated New York, fighting
meaningless little battles to gain the slightest advantage. But
human sacrifice was the darkest of all magics, and someone with
that sort of blood would never have made it through Last Call’s
wards, unless…

Leo glanced at Bernie again and lowered his
voice, hoping to keep his words from any members of the gawking
crowd who happened to possess superhearing. “She’s the Dumitrescu
girl, I take it?”

“
I am,” she answered,
holding out her hand as though she hadn’t just dumped a drink on
him. “Caitlin Carlson.”

She was a little bit insane, and it was
making him hot. He took her hand and teased his thumb along the
backs of her fingers in the slightest caress. “Caitlin Carlson. Do
you know why everyone’s staring at you?”

Her bland expression didn’t change, but he
felt the slight shiver that ran through her. “Because they figured
out my identity before you did?”

“
Because you just dumped a
frozen drink down the pants of a seventeen hundred year old demon.”
He turned her hand over and traced his finger along her palm.
“Luckily, all of the rest of the demons salivating over you are
scared sick of me. Ben considers me a tolerable sort of fellow and
fairly trustworthy. So if you’re determined to go upstairs, you
should bring me with you.”

She pulled her hand free of his with a
laugh. “Then you must be Leofric.” Her gaze roamed over him,
and the corner of her mouth tugged up into a smile. “Ben’s right.
You look like a surfer. Bernie?”

Bernie started a little and cleared his
throat. “Tall, blond, built. Surfer, sure.”

“
Not that.” Caitlin held
out her hand.

He made a noise somewhere between a sigh and
a groan, but he reached under the bar and retrieved a key card.
“Why couldn’t you have pulled this stunt while Ben was in
town?”

“
Because destiny is
complicated.” With those cryptic words, she plucked the card from
Bernie’s fingers and headed for the back steps, toward the
elevators.

Leo shrugged at Bernie and flashed him a
grin. “I’ll be good, man. Last thing I want is to get kicked out of
my favorite hangout.”

“
Sure, I’ll tell Ben that
when he comes for my head.”

“
You do that.” Leo winked
and strode past the bar, still trying to convince himself he was
only going upstairs to save the girl from herself.

It was such bullshit even he didn’t believe
it.

Caitlin’s hand shook so badly it took her
three tries to call the elevator. She dealt with practitioners of
black magic every day, but demons were beyond her realm of
experience. She tried to stay far away from dark magic as a rule,
and demons were about as dark as you could go.

A moment of doubt shook her. Was she
mistaken about her vision? Usually, her precognition was reliable,
and it had led her to Last Call tonight. The dream had been clear
-- a room, Caitlin, and a man above her.

What she hadn’t realized was
that the tall, buff and naked man in her dream was a centuries-old
demon.
Mistaken identity?

If so, she’d be screwed, in more ways than
one.

He stepped up behind her as the elevator car
dinged its arrival. The doors slid open, and she felt a warm,
gentle hand at her back. “You sure you want to go through with
this?”

“
I’m sure.” Caitlin didn’t
want to talk about this being the only way to ensure her safety,
didn’t even want to think about. She boarded the elevator and slid
the key into the panel. “You coming?”

“
Mmm, if you let me.” He
gave her a wicked smile and followed her into the elevator, where
he leaned against the wall and studied her. He didn’t speak again
until the doors closed. “Are you scared of what you’re going to do?
Or are you scared of me, of what I am?”

“
I’m scared of a lot of
things.” She shrugged and tried to ignore the stab of heat his
smile sent through her. “You’re the least of my worries at the
moment, if that helps.”

He pushed off the wall and moved toward her,
slow enough to give her plenty of time to avoid him. When she held
her ground, his smile widened and he braced one hand against the
wall next to her head. “Am I? I’m not sure if I should be relieved
or a little bit insulted.”

Caitlin swallowed hard and focused on the
strong line of his jaw. “Considering most of my worries want to
kill me, I recommend relieved.”

“
Yes, and that’s my
problem.” One warm finger slid under her chin, coaxing her head
back until she had to meet his gaze. “I don’t make it a habit of
going to bed with unwilling women. And I’m not sure this counts as
willing, when the alternative is death.”

She laughed because she wanted to moan.
“That’s cute. And terribly condescending. If you’re that worried
about it, I suppose we can go back downstairs and I can find
someone with more flexible sexual morals.”

“
Condescending?” His hand
landed against the wall on the other side of her head, leaving her
trapped as he leaned down until his eyes were on level with hers.
“You like pushing your luck, don’t you?”

She’d lived every day in more
danger than the demon before her presented; Caitlin knew it on a
visceral level. “Is that what I’m doing? The way I see it, I
have
decided. I came here
instead of picking up some schmuck off the street. And I’m not…”
She felt her calm, vaguely amused façade crack a little. “I’m not
unwilling.”

His lips almost touched hers, then
retreated. “Your body’s not. What about the rest of you?”

She caught herself following his
mouth as it moved further away. That he could weave a spell over
her so easily was shocking. “For someone who’s supposed to get off
on corrupting innocents,
you
seem rather unwilling.”

The elevator coasted to a stop, and Leo
straightened with a lazy chuckle that heated her blood. “You don’t
know much about demons, do you?”

“
No. Most of the evil I see
is of the human variety.” She snatched the key card and checked the
room number as she hurried out of the elevator. “Five-twelve. Know
where it is?”

“
End of the hallway. Last
door on the right.” She hadn’t heard so much as a footstep to
indicate he’d followed her, but his voice came from just behind her
left shoulder. “Demons aren’t inherently evil, you know. We’re not
scared of holy objects, we’re encouraged to take the Lord’s name in
vain as often as possible, and there’s even one demon in New York
who volunteers at a church soup kitchen. Most of us have our vices,
I admit, but just because our job is to corrupt and cause chaos, it
doesn’t mean we all do it with equal enthusiasm.”

“
I stand corrected, then.”
He was tall and broad through the shoulders, and it felt like he
took up the entire hallway. “Where do you fall on the spectrum?
Love your job or hate it?”

“
Neither. I just flat-out
don’t do it. Work’s a drag. I’d rather play.”

Yet here he was, about to spend at least
part of his night guiding a nervous virgin through her first sexual
encounter. Caitlin wrinkled her nose at him as she opened the door.
“Then what are you doing up here with me? There are plenty of
better playmates downstairs.”

“
Sex is fun.” He touched her
lower back again and nudged her over the threshold. “You’re hot.
And it’s been a few hundred years since someone dumped a drink on
me on purpose.” The door closed behind them with a soft
click
. “Of course, that means I need a shower first. Fruity
drinks are sticky.”

Guilt and mortification nearly overwhelmed
her. “Sorry about that. Uh, take your time. I’ll wait. Or did you…”
She cleared her throat and nodded toward the bathroom door. “Did
you want to just do it in the shower?”

Leo studied her, his green eyes unreadable.
Then he tilted his head to one side. “You can join me in the
shower, but I’m not going to fuck you there.”

Frustration stabbed through her, but Caitlin
just tugged her shirt over her head. “Why not?”

His gaze dropped to her chest, and he smiled
as he leaned down to pull off his boots. “Because a shower’s a
lousy place to lose your virginity. You’ve been watching too much
porn.”

“
The virginity is
technical.”
Don’t blush, don’t you dare blush.
“Just because I’ve never had a man
inside me doesn’t mean I’m… untried.”

“
Uh-huh.” When he was
barefoot, he padded across the room in the direction of the
bathroom, discarding his shirt along the way and leaving her with a
breathtaking view of gorgeous shoulders and a smooth, muscled back.
“I’m not a mortal man, cutie pie. If anything in your underwear
drawer could compare, demons wouldn’t get laid so much.”

Even in her skirt and bra, she forgot to
feel self-conscious as she followed him. “Are all demons as
conceited as you, or does it come with age?”

He spun without warning, and she
almost collided with his bare chest. His belt already hung open,
and he unbuttoned his pants as she watched. “I’m not conceited. I
really
am
that good.”

Caitlin bit her tongue until it bled to keep
from whimpering. She’d planned on approaching the loss of her
virginity with practicality, as something that had to be done, and
might as well bring a bit of pleasure. She hadn’t dared to hope for
the kind of transcendent ecstasy he promised.

The prospect made her wet, and she realized
she was staring at his hands and the hard outline of his cock
through his daiquiri-soaked pants.

Caitlin jerked her gaze back up to his face.
“Okay, you might be that good. Just in case, though, I think I’ll
go ahead and start. Enjoy your shower.” She turned on her heel and
stomped out of the bathroom, desperate to get out before she
embarrassed herself by grabbing him.