Opal (Rare Gems Series Book 4) (18 page)

The records were true. All of them. Not only were they true
, but he could not find a single bit of information that said that he was their son, a man born to them at all. There was no birth certificate, no records of his baptism, nor was he able to find a single thing with his name on it. Until he’d gone to the cemetery again.

Way in the back, about as far as one could get from where his family was laid to rest
, was a grave marker. A single stone that only said the name “monster” on it. The dates, his birth date as well as the day he’d come to see them, was all that marred the lovely stone. He’d had to find someone in the offices to help him.

“
Yeah, when I first worked here about forty years ago, I asked the same thing of the boss. He told me that it was an empty grave of some family around here. I looked until I thought my eyes were going to fall from my head until I found it. Last name was Stone. Some man by the name of Alfred. They said he’d been some sort of child molester or something. The family put that there, I was told, as a reminder to them not to mention his name ever again. They sure must have hated him. Nary a person come back to put a single flower on the grave either, in all my years here.”

Fletcher looked around his new home.
It was funny after all these years for him to be calling himself Alfred Stone again. Smiling, he thought about how his father, the lying son of a bitch, must be rolling in his grave about now.

How you sleeping?
The voice, almost sounding like it was in the dark room with him. Fletcher sat up from the mattress he’d brought down here from the single bed upstairs. He was just reaching for the ball bat he’d brought down with him when whoever it was spoke again
. I’m thinking not so well. Did you have a nice visit with your relatives? I’m talking about the ones above ground now, not the ones you visited at the pretty little cemetery.

“
Who is this?” He looked around harder, seeing things he knew were not there as well as hearing every little tweak the house made. “Show yourself to me. Stop being a coward and come out where I can see you.”

The laughter filled his head and that was when he realized who it was.
Crane. The motherfucker had somehow found him. But to speak to him…Fletcher started to ask him how he was doing that. But the man spoke before he could.

You have been very naughty again, haven
’t you, Fletcher? Or are you going by your birth name, Alfred Stone Junior? Did your parents call you Junior? I bet they did.
A movement to his left had him standing up as Crane continued.
I never met your sister, but her daughter is a hoot. Have you figured out yet that I told her you’d be coming around?
Fletcher wondered then if she was a plant too, but dismissed that altogether. Crane wouldn’t have been that cruel.
Yes, I would have. But she really is your niece. A very nice woman too, unlike some of her relatives. And in the event you didn’t know, I’m speaking of you.

“
What have I ever done to you? I mean, other than trying to take your mate. She didn’t get eaten by me, did she?” He pulled the bat closer to his body and looked around again. “Where are you? Come here and we’ll talk this out. Maybe we can strike up a deal.”

Deal? With you? I think not. What am I doing here? And by here, I
’m assuming you mean by being in your head. I have to make sure you are caught in the act of killing someone before I can bring you in. And you know as well as I do what they do to people like you when they’re brought to justice. It’s swift and very final. Do you think they’d let me do the beheading?

“
I’m not going to kill anymore.”
Not until you and I meet up
, he thought. “Just come here. You’ll see I’m turning over a new leaf. I have a nice house and no equipment in the basement.”

So I can see.
A finger of fear trailed down Fletcher’s spine and he pulled himself tighter into the corner.
There is something else you should know. Ursula and Ysane are both looking for you. Ysane claims…and I’ve no doubt of her statement…that you killed two of her kind. Did you? After being warned not to? Did you kill two of her sisters?

“
It was all Marvin.” Crane laughed again, this time making Fletcher think that the man had gone off his rocker. “He has paid the price of killing them, so why should I be bothered by them too? I’ve not touched any of the faerie since Marvin passed on.”

Crane
suddenly appeared right in front of him. He knelt down and jerked Fletcher’s head back when he tried to get away. The red of his eyes, the white of his fangs shone brightly in the darkness of the room, and made him seem more evil than anything Fletcher could have ever conjured up. When Crane pulled him up, using his throat to do so, Fletcher knew fear like he’d never felt before.

“
Marvin was killed by Ursula because Ysane asked her to. Do you know how she kills vampires? You’ll wish for the sun, beg for her to remove your head from your shoulders and cry, whimper like a small babe before she lets you die. If she lets you die.” Fletcher felt his bladder let go and heard the sound of his urine as it slipped from his body and hit the hard floor beneath him. “You’ll do that as well. Piss yourself over and over while she does to you what…nah, worse than what she did to your friend. Ursula will make you suffer in ways that will go down in history. Would you like to know what she did to him?”

“
No. I beg of you. No. Just…let me go. Don’t tell her you found me. Don’t let her know anything of the kind.” Crane dropped him and Fletcher fell into his own piss. “You’re going to let me live?”

“
For now.” As Crane disappeared, light blazed in the room for several seconds before it faded out. The heat of it, the brightness of the light, made his skin burn and his body ache. When he was in darkness again, he held the bat to him as he crawled back to his corner. Fletcher Fleming was going to die, and he doubted very much it would be a slow easy death. Crying himself to sleep, he wished that he’d simply met the sun the day after he’d been turned.

~~~

The store was opening in the morning. How she’d gotten talked into this happening now instead of after she finished her orders was beyond her. Opal moved around the room making sure that everything was priced and marked accordingly, and that there was not a speck of dust on anything. She stopped to stare at Sloan when he stood leaning against the wall near her counter.

“
You did a fantastic job. And you did it all in just under three days. I’m very proud of you.” She nodded and looked around. “I guess you’re still mad at me about the orders.”

“
Overnighting everything was extremely expensive and a waste of money. I told you that we could open in a month and you said you thought now was better. Why did you do it?” He stood up, then moved to the display she and her grandmother had set up. It looked like something straight out of the forties…a modern kitchen for a hard working woman.

“
Did I tell you that I had this in my house at one time?” She didn’t answer him but watched as he picked up each item…the old fashioned egg beater and then the flour sifter…before putting it back the way she’d had it. “I never used it, but occasionally someone would come along and cook something for the staff. I didn’t even know these things were in the warehouse.”

He moved to
another display, this one from the early fifties, complete with a television set that weighed nearly as much as she did, and surprisingly still worked. He touched the screen, then the chair that sat in front of it. She’d unearthed a set of soft drink bottles to set beside it that she had to really fight with her grandmother to sell. Her grandmother had loved that brand when she’d been younger.

“
Why are you here?” He turned to her slowly and she felt her need for him spike. He didn’t move toward her but stood watching her as she put her hands on the counter to steady herself. “Sloan, why are you being so nice to me?”

“
I’m in love with you.” She shook her head and he nodded. “I am. I didn’t think it would be possible for me to love, never dreamed of it happening to me. Not after all these years. But here you stand, and I’m so deeply in love with you, all I can think about is that you’re mine for the rest of my life.”

“
There have been others that you probably said you loved as well.” He shook his head as he took a step in her direction. “You’ve never told a woman you loved her? I find that hard to believe.”

“
Yet it’s very true.” He was still moving in her direction, a slow, sexy walk that had her mouth dry and her pussy soak at the same time. “I’d like to take you right where you stand. Get down on my knees and pull your panties down from your silken body and drink from you.”

She
knew that he could smell her arousal, and she opened her legs just a little wider for him. When his nostrils flared, she felt her wolf stir along her body and rumble against her. Sloan touched his mouth to her forehead as he lifted her skirt up her thigh.

“
We can be seen in the window.” He laughed a little but didn’t stop what he was doing. When his finger slid beneath the elastic of her panties, she moaned when he slipped a finger into her wet folds. “Sloan, you’re going to make me come.”

“
That’s what I want.” He dropped to his knees, then buried his face into her thighs. Opal had to hold onto the counter while he pulled her panties down her legs and then off her feet one at a time. By the time he laid them on the floor beside him, she was ready to scream. “I’m going to eat you.”

Opal nodded and watched his face as he leaned
into her. She started to close her eyes against the overwhelming feeling he was giving her, but he told her to watch him. Sticking out his tongue, he licked her, opening her nether lips with his tongue and sliding it over her clit. Opal cried out when he began to worry the small nubbin with his tongue.

“
Come for me.” Her body imploded as it did what he commanded. Twice more he ordered her to come, to have her fall apart then be put back together. Opal’s legs were no longer strong enough to hold her when he stood up. Lifting her up, he sat her naked bottom on the counter and stepped between her legs. “I’m going to fuck you now. And when you come this time, I want you to bite me hard. Mark me.”

“
Yes.” He tore his pants open and she reached for his thick cock. Wrapping her fingers around him, she watched as he moved to and fro as if he were already deep inside of her. When he put his hand over hers, she looked up at him. “I’d like to taste you this way.”

She moved off the
counter and onto the floor in front of him. Taking him into her mouth, she moaned at her first taste and nearly cried out when he began moving in and out of her mouth as he had her pussy so many times since she’d met him. Opal felt him touch the back of her throat twice before she swallowed him down past the tight muscles, and was rewarded with his low growl.

“
Again. Do it again.” She loved the taste of him, the way his salty cum filled her mouth each time he moved in and out of her. When she cupped his hot balls in her hand, she nearly cried out again when he tore her from his cock and stood her up. “Turn around. I have a need to fuck you like a wolf.”

Her own wolf snarled at her. She did as he told her
, but her wolf wasn’t happy about it. As soon as he entered her, he took her hard from behind, his big hand wrapping around her hip. His other dug into her pussy and tugged hard at her clit just as he sank his teeth into her shoulder. Opal screamed out her release, then came a half dozen more times as he fucked her with his cock and fingers. She was ready to beg him to stop when he came deep within her.

Her
body, exhausted from what he’d given her, seemed to renew its energy when he pulled from her quickly and stepped back. His wolf took him so fast that she had only a second to realize that her wolf was coming too. She let her wolf slide over her in much the same way he’d moved in and out of her only moments before.

He growled at her when she tried to move away.
But his wolf was scaring hers and he must have realized it. When his wolf reached for her this time, she moved closer to him, but not in a position where he could take her. Instead of ordering her to do as he wanted, he held her under his massive paw until she calmed.

I
’m sorry.
She looked up at his chocolate eyes and could see that he was very sorry.
I seem to have no control over this beast yet.

She snugg
led her wolf up to his and he held her. Her body, her wolf, wanted him now, and she was nearly purring to him to take her. As he mounted her, gently this time, she laid her head to the floor and gave herself to him. As soon as he entered her, filling her with his cock, she came, howling loudly as he took her hard and fast. As soon as he sank his canines deep into her shoulder, she came again, this time letting the darkness take her. The last thing she heard was him howling out his release as he filled her again and again. Opal was well and truly his mate.

Chapter 1
1

Annabelle tried her best not to be excited about the pretty chair. But she was still just a little angry with Allen. He’d…he was crude to her. Not that she hadn’t given some thought to sex, but not with him. Not with her grandson-in-law’s father. It was just too—