Spider-Touched

Seven

TIR surged out of the water to go to her, the gentle first lover he had been giving way to something darker, more primitive, as the promises he’d made to himself roared to life with the sight of her bare mound.

“Lie down,” he ordered.

Color bloomed in her cheeks. But her nipples beaded, making him hunger for a taste of them.

She sat, drawing her knees to her chest, her movements graceful. The erotic fear he read in her and her subtle disobedience heightened his desire.

Tir crouched in front of her, a male in his prime, his thighs splayed, affording her a view of his thick erection and heavy testicles.

If he hadn’t been sure of his own ability to discern the nature of others, he’d have thought she had to be a gifted witch to affect him so profoundly, to do what no human female had ever done before, harden his cock and take away his will to resist.

He tangled his fingers in her hair, tightened them until she tilted her head backward, exposing her neck in an unconscious show of submission.

The scent of her arousal swamped him, told him she would accept a dominant lover. And his lips pulled back in silent anger at the thought of any other male having her.

He pressed his lips to her throat, feeling the wildness of her heartbeat there—a primal fear mixed with the desire to mate, both of them knowing he could easily kill her. Both of them knowing he wouldn’t.

Because of her, he wore no shackles. Because of her, sunlight danced on his skin, flirting with shadows as a breeze dried him, reminding him he was physically free for the first time in memory.

He wouldn’t let the desire he felt for her enslave him, he told himself, kissing upward until he covered her mouth with his, swallowing her cry before he took her breath and gave her his. He’d been at the mercy of humans for centuries. Now he had one of them completely helpless, subject to his will.

His tongue dominated hers. His fingers slid through raven-black hair, tugging, pulling her backward until she lay sprawled on lush green moss. It took more effort than it should have to keep from following her all the way down, from covering her body with his and thrusting inside her again.

Her hands found his chest, delicate fingers going unerringly to his nipples and sending an icy-hot spike of need straight to his cock. His hips bucked and his buttocks clenched, echoing the throbbing desire of his penis to impale and thrust.

“No,” he said, freeing her hair to take her wrists in his hands and pin them to the ground at her sides.

She was a warrior in her own right. He’d seen the evidence of it—in the corpse of the dragon lizard she’d fought and killed as well as in the courage she’d demonstrated in remaining to unlock his shackles while the guardsmen drew closer. Yet she was fragile compared to him, so very mortal. He could easily crush the fine bones of her wrists. But he knew that even in the throes of passion, he wouldn’t.

She was safe from him unless she proved to be his enemy. And even then, he’d take no pleasure in exacting vengeance.

With a moan he left the sweet temptation of her lips. Her breathy protest and the needy sound of his name as she whispered “Please, Tir” were a song that made him want nothing more than to please her.

He kissed downward, to a dusky breast capped with a dark, puckered nipple. Her back arched when he laved it with his tongue then took it between his lips and began suckling.

The scent of her arousal deepened, the desire she felt sliding past mental barriers and hitting him in waves, melding with his own. He was torn between freeing one of her wrists so he could take the nipple’s twin between his fingers, or continuing to restrain her, keeping her at his mercy.

He delayed the decision, kissed across her chest to capture the other nipple. She shivered underneath him, her hips lifting, angling so her wet cunt lips brushed against his thighs where he knelt between hers.

The feel of her hot, smooth mound eradicated every thought but the one that had his lips leaving her breast and trailing downward toward the feminine folds waiting for him. At her abdomen Tir forced his mouth away from her. He lifted his head, testing his control by doing nothing more than looking.

She was intoxicating. Exquisite.

He wanted to memorize the sight of her bare cunt, its secrets unfolding for his pleasure, its lips glistening, hungry for his kiss and the feel of his tongue slipping between them to thrust into her heated core.

It was torment to remain motionless, especially when her hips rose in carnal offering, bringing the scent and heat of her so close he had only to flick his tongue out to taste her.

Tir shuddered, resisted giving in to her. He wanted to pin her thighs to the ground, to see his hands holding them open. But he knew he’d be lost if he freed her wrists.

He knew he couldn’t trust her not to touch him, to tangle her fingers in his hair and force him to her mound. And unlike the unwanted women who had tried to entice him by rubbing themselves against his face while he was held motionless by chains, with Araña he’d be a willing prisoner.

On a groan Tir closed the distance, pressed his face to her cunt. He inhaled her. Savored her. Lost himself in the ecstasy of hot flesh and slick arousal.

His head spun with the scent of her. His cock head grew wet and his heart raced.

She rocked against him, tormented him even as he tormented her. Begged with words and movement for him to suck her hardened clit, to pierce her with his tongue.

Fire scorched through his penis in warning, and he fought to keep his hips from jerking, refused to hump the air like the small dog a long-ago captor had been overly fond of. He ran his tongue up her center, felt the clenching of her channel as she tried to capture him and pull him in.

Silky, slick folds deepened in color with his touch. The tiny hood of her clit pulled back, drawing his mouth to it. She cried out with his possession and yet fought to get away from the pull of his lips with the same desperation as she fucked the tiny organ through them.

Tears streamed from the corners of Araña’s eyes. Desire ruled her.

She’d never imagined such pleasure was possible. Each lash of Tir’s tongue, each suck sent need spiking through her, sharp as a razor-thin blade and just as dangerous. Time and time again he held her on the edge of desperate climax, in a place of exquisite agony and unbearable pleasure, only to deny her its release.

He became all that mattered in her world. And when he allowed her to come, she only barely remained conscious as wave after wave of unparalleled ecstasy washed over her.

It left her boneless, weak, her helplessness stirring instincts of self-preservation. She shivered when he pressed a kiss to the spidery mark that now lay demon-inked on her mound.

The act reminded her he wasn’t human. It sent her emotions into turmoil as her mind raced to build walls around her heart and soul.

He lifted his mouth from her cunt. Dark blue eyes glittered in a face of otherworldly beauty. She couldn’t look away as he crawled up her body and took her again, sharing the taste of sex and submission with her as he did it.

Afterward he rolled to his side, taking her with him so they lay together in lazy contentment. Her fingers traced a line of symbols on his arm, strange glyphs and sigils, none of them recognizable.

They weren’t the punishment tattoos given to a lawbreaker. She’d lived among the outcast and criminal for ten years; she knew what those marks looked like.

“What do they mean?” she asked when her fingers reached his shoulder.

His eyes became hooded, just as they’d done when she asked him what he was. He answered with a question of his own. “How is it I saw you in a dream, and then you were waiting to free me?”

Her hand fell away from his shoulder, but he caught her wrist, his fingers a shackle. The suddenly hard lines of his face did nothing to detract from his beauty. If anything, they compelled her to answer.

“The demon mark causes me to have visions,” she said, giving him a small part of the truth.

His gaze moved to the spider now resting in the curve of her neck. He studied it, eyebrows drawing together in a concentrated frown as he freed her wrist in favor of brushing his fingertips over the mark.

“I once knew what this meant,” he murmured. “How did you come by it?”

“I was born with it.” The truth and yet not the truth, but Erik was the only one she’d ever revealed the spider birth dream to.

“You were branded because of it?” Tir said, reclaiming her hand and taking it to his mouth, pressing a kiss to the scarred flesh.

The gesture was so tender and unexpected she ducked her head to hide its impact on her. “Yes.”

“And the scars on your back? They are also because of the mark?”

“To beat the evil out of me.”

He carried her hand to his chest and left it there, then cupped her chin in his palm, forcing her to look up and meet his eyes. “When I’m free of the collar my enemies have enslaved me with, I will hunt down the ones who hurt you and kill them.”

“They’re already dead.”

“You’re sure?”

“I saw them burn,” she said, shivering, remembering.

She was twelve again, seeing the righteous fervor in the eyes of her parents and the clergyman as they prayed over her while she sat tethered in a chair much like the one Tir had been in.

The room sweltered from the fire in the fireplace. The brand glowed red as it was lifted from the flames and brought toward her.

She cringed at the remembered sound of her cries and pleas, her recitations of scripture denouncing evil as she begged them not to press it to her skin. But they did it anyway.

The brand seared her flesh, leaving only pain and rage, a desire to stop the torment at any cost. Caution and fears for her soul were lost to agony. In that moment she’d been beyond caring about consequences. She’d wanted the pain to stop and the restraints burned away so she could escape the chair, the house, the settlement.

She’d used the gift she’d never dared reveal for fear it would be more proof she was destined for the fires of Hell. She’d called the flames and they came in an explosive gust. And because her parents and the clergyman were between her and the fireplace, the fire consumed them, filling the air with their screams just as they’d filled it with hers.

Tir wondered where her memories took her. Her emotions were a roiling mix, horror and fear, hatred and guilt, hurt and loneliness and confusion.

The intensity of his need to comfort her nearly made him resist the urge to lean forward, but it was only a fleeting thought, lost as soon as his mouth was on Araña’s.

Her sweet moan was enough to make him crowd closer, until she was on her back and he was on top of her, his tongue rubbing and twining with hers.

It was pointless to deny his physical desire for her. Lust burned away any possibility of being with her and not touching her.

He wanted to keep her with him. Told himself it was only to sate his carnal hunger and help him navigate a world he’d never moved about freely in. But part of him remembered his attempt to leave her earlier, how a tightness had gathered in his chest, silken strands of unnatural worry weaving, encasing his heart until he finally stopped and turned back toward the path she’d taken. And that part both feared she was part of a trap and considered the possibility that her presence wasn’t an accident, that she’d been sent by some unremem bered ally to help him.

Tir lifted his mouth from Araña’s. He stroked the smooth skin of her cheek, brushing his knuckles over the spider now resting there, so thoroughly a part of her he couldn’t feel where it began and ended.

Imprisoned as he’d been in the back of the trapper’s truck, he had only been able to follow the events leading to his physical freedom based on what he heard. It was clear Araña and the others were waiting in ambush. “Who are the others to you? The Were and the gifted human?”

“They’re strangers who offered me shelter last evening when I escaped the maze.”

Shock reverberated through Tir. It wasn’t the answer he’d expected. “You didn’t know them before?”

“Until yesterday I’d never been to Oakland.”

Her grief slid over him, a deep swell of anguish that rose from the black depths of her eyes and then receded as she got control over it. “The dragon lizards were meant to be used against Weres in the maze, including Levi’s brother. Rebekka’s gift is to heal both Weres and animals. That’s why they ambushed the trapper’s truck.”

He rubbed his thumb over the spider, making the connection from an earlier answer. “You saw it in a vision?”

“I saw the graveyard the truck would pass through. I knew what it held and thought it would pass through today.”

“Where’s your home?”

She blinked rapidly and looked away from him, locked down her emotions so tightly all he felt was the strength of her will. “It’s days away,” she said after a long pause. “I’ve got business in Oakland to attend to, and before I can leave, I need to reclaim the Constellation.”

“Your boat?”

She swallowed. Nodded, then said, “It will have been confiscated by now. I need to get her back before I can go… home.”

“From the guardsmen?”

She gave a slight shrug. “Or the pier owner. We had to take a public berth in the port. The dockhand warned us if there was any trouble the boat would be impounded along with everything on board her.”

“We?”

“My family.” The grief broke through her mental barriers, revealing its source.

“I will help you avenge them,” he said, knowing they were dead. “And I will help you recover your boat.”

Araña didn’t say anything as the wild ride of her emotions and the events of the day caught up to her, leaving her feeling unsteady and unsure. She was intensely aware of Tir’s weight and the feel of his skin against hers, how much she already craved his touch, how easy it would be to not think, not feel anything but the physical pleasure he could give her—to forget he was a supernatural being whose life span was probably measured in centuries, if not longer.

“Why?” she asked, looking at his face again.

He didn’t pretend not to know what she was asking. “I need your help as well. This is your world more than mine. Avenging your dead and recovering your boat is a small price to pay if because of you I’m able to translate the tattoos on my arms. They hold the answer to getting the collar off my neck.”

She thought of his hooded eyes when she’d asked about them. “You don’t know what they mean?”

“If I once did, I no longer do. This land was a vast wilderness yet to be discovered by Europeans when the last acolyte sat next to me restoring the faded writing.”

Her heart gave a hard beat then slowed to a painful throb. She glanced away, telling herself not to be foolish and weak. She’d known there was no future with Tir when she lay with him. She’d taken his cock inside her with no expectation that he would remain with her even through the night. And now he was offering…

Her cunt clenched, giving its answer. Her mind hesitated. She knew only too well how few important books had survived in the aftermath of The Last War.

Hadn’t she and Matthew and Erik lived well by selling their services as thieves to rich men who loved to play the game of stealing one another’s treasures, including books? “What if the information is lost?”

Tir nuzzled her cheek, and with a thought she found the spider beneath his lips. “I believe I’ll find what I seek in Oakland. Otherwise I don’t think you would have found your way into my dreams.”

Araña had only to remember the moment his eyes opened, his gaze meeting hers deep in the vision, followed by the shimmering touch of soul against soul, to believe he was right. “I’ll help you,” she said, agreeing, shivering with renewed ecstasy as he rewarded her answer by joining his body to hers—and doing it over and over again after darkness drove them into the shelter of the lair.

IT was well after midnight when the werewolf crept closer to the wrecked remains of the truck. He remained cautious, alert for scents that might hint at booby traps.

The stink of guardsmen was everywhere. They’d fanned out, split into groups.

Some of them followed the path he’d taken in order to stay close to the werecougar and healer. Others had gone in the same direction as the once-chained man and the woman who’d managed to free him. None of the guardsmen had gone far.

Cowards. From the safety of their trucks and helicopters they reigned with their guns. But they didn’t have the courage to take their fights into the forest, where the question of who was the most efficient predator would be settled with their deaths.

They’d left Hyde’s body to rot, and the scavengers had already made a meal of it. Little remained. Still, the werewolf paused when he reached it. He lifted his leg and urinated on the bloody, shredded shirt and gleaming rib bones.

He stopped midstream, wanting to finish the task in human form, and once again attempting the change. He whined as, this time, muscle and bone reshaped themselves.

The change was excruciatingly slow and painful, feeding the terror he’d been carrying with him, that the witch-cursed silver wire he’d worn around his neck for almost a day would result in his becoming caught between two forms when he tried to regain his human one.

He fell onto his side, writhed in dirt and leaves and torn bits of Hyde’s flesh until finally it was done. And then Raoul looked down the line of his body and laughed. He was whole, his limbs ending in fingers and toes, his skin free of fur.

His hand went to his cock. He stroked himself, savoring the scent of the trapper’s death—his father’s death—though he hadn’t been sure of it until Hyde stood in front of the cage, gun lifted, taunting him, intending to kill him.

Raoul turned his head. Eyes more wolf than human contemplated the bloody strips of torn clothing, the bones not yet carried away by scavengers.

He fantasized about his return to the compound. Imagined mounting his father’s wife, claiming her just as he would everything else belonging to his sire.

A snarl escaped thinking about the way she’d been forced to remain overnight in the prisoner’s cage. He’d caught the scent of semen when he finally returned to consciousness as a wolf. If her womb thickened with child, he’d rid her of it, just as he would have rid her of Eston if he’d been freed during the wreck as the hyenas and dragon lizards had been.

Better that he hadn’t. Part of Raoul recognized that. He’d seen the way Hyde used the toddler to tether the mother.

He could decide later what to do about his half-brother, whether it would be smarter to return to the compound with him and receive a hero’s welcome, or leave him at the place where the healer intended to take him in the morning.

Raoul’s thoughts lingered for a moment on the healer and the Were. They were going to be his best chance at recapturing the being their companion had freed. He hoped he’d be able to track them to the place they called home—after they got rid of Eston. He’d left them when he realized Eston would recognize his human form and show no fear, making them suspicious of him and eradicating any advantage he might have if he needed to use them.

Raoul stood, cock still in hand. He widened his stance and let loose another stream of urine, pissing on what little remained of his father, shaking the last drops from his penis when his bladder was empty.

He stepped over the shackles that had once held the prisoner, the being he’d thought of as a human-demon from the moment they’d found him alive in the foothill settlement, imprisoned in a church basement, his clothes bloodied and torn as if he’d been massacred along with the rest of the people there but had come back to life. He’d smelled human then, too. But no ordinary man would have survived whatever happened to the settlers.

The presence of the priest at the compound the day before, arriving with the men who’d taken the lion when they left, was enough to confirm Raoul’s belief that the tattooed man was a demon kept trapped in a human body by the sigil-inscribed collar.

Finding the dead dragon lizard next to the creek was added proof. The woman couldn’t have killed it; no human armed only with knives could have.

Raoul was glad the guardsmen hadn’t recaptured the human-demon. If they had, there would be no chance of getting him back, no point in lingering in Oakland. They’d be the ones to make a profit.

He’d only risked returning to the ambush site in order to scavenge clothing and the cash Hyde thought was so cleverly hidden. Now the sight of the truck stripped of its useful parts, blackened by fire, enraged him.

The human-demon was all that remained of the valuable cargo, and if he didn’t hurry, he’d lose his chance to collect what was rightfully his. The man left behind to travel with them to Oakland had probably already reported to the priest what had happened.

It would be easy enough for the priest to learn from the guardsmen that the prisoner had escaped. By daybreak tomorrow, those in his pay would be hunting the human-demon.

Raoul gnashed his teeth in frustration. Working for the Church was out of the question. They’d use him and then call him an abomination before making sure he met his death.

He had no way of gauging the human-demon’s strength, but the chains and restraint chair along with the dead dragon lizard were warning enough. From the tracks he’d followed, it seemed that the prisoner had split away from the woman who’d remained behind to unlock his shackles. He’d gone a couple of miles before turning around and backtracking, then following the female and rejoining her.

It didn’t surprise Raoul. In the wolf’s form he’d smelled the desire between the two of them when they first saw each other.

It was probably the woman’s blood that had drawn the dragon lizard. Drops of it lay along the trail leading away from the truck, and he’d caught the scent of it when she first appeared after the ambush.

As with Hyde’s corpse, the scavengers had already gotten to the dragon lizard’s carcass. It was hard to tell exactly how it had been killed.

There were slashes. Raoul had seen that much. He thought the demon might be powerful enough even in a human form to possess talons when the need arose. It would explain why his wrists had been shackled on short chains to his waist.

Regardless, the demon-possessed human lusted enough for the woman to follow her. Knowing it gave Raoul an advantage.

He could use her in setting a trap. He could use the healer and the Were as well. But he still needed more help if he was going to recapture the prisoner and deliver him to a buyer.

The most logical place to go was to the maze. Who else besides the Church would be interested in acquiring a demon-possessed human?

Once he’d gone with Hyde to one of the gaming clubs that didn’t screen for nonhumans during the daytime. They’d watched on a big-screen television as Anton’s demon hunted the maze.

Anton and his assistant Farold wouldn’t question his story about surviving an ambush. They’d seen him with Hyde before and thought he was human—or if not, they didn’t care.

Telling them about the loss of the dragon lizards would add credibility, as would the Church’s interest in the prisoner. Involving them would mean the loss of at least half of his profit, if not more.

He hated the thought of it, but he didn’t see any other way. If the priest’s men located the human-demon first, he’d get nothing.

Raoul finished searching through the items thrown from the truck by guardsmen as they tore it apart looking for things of value. He rolled the salvaged shirt, pants, and shoes into a bundle then changed back into the wolf’s form so he could travel through the night. His father’s things weren’t the right size, but they’d allow him to slip into the red zone at dawn and go to the maze.