Jackson (5 page)

The heady scent of the man and the sex filled Audrey’s head, and her thighs trembled as she tightened them around him and lifted her hips. With each penetration she could feel the orgasm building inside her, just out of reach, and soon she wanted it so much she whimpered and writhed.

Jackson smiled a little and bent his head to whisper to her. “I feel your wanting, my lovely one. Your little pussy is trembling with it.” His thrusts grew faster and wilder. “I want you to bathe my cock with your pleasure, Audrey. Give it all to me.” He shifted his arm to raise her upper torso, and then bent his head and took her breast with his mouth.

His tongue laved her aching nipple as he shafted her over and over, his penis pistoning into her now, and when he dragged the edge of his teeth over her nipple Audrey cried out and let go, her climax exploding and shattering her. She clenched all around him as her body arched from the intense sensations. Jackson held her down and kept his penis planted firmly inside her, his rigid shaft swelling even larger as he watched her face. When Audrey collapsed, shaking and almost mindless, he made a rough sound of satisfaction.

“Now I have you,” he said, growling the words, and pushing deep.

Audrey felt his penis swell even larger before he groaned and it jerked inside her. In that moment she wished he was naked inside her, so she actually could feel the silky warmth of his semen flooding her clenching tissues.
 

Jackson didn’t fall on top of her, but clamped an arm around her hips to keep their bodies joined as he rolled onto his back. Audrey rested her cheek against his heaving chest and listened to the strong, rapid throb of his heartbeat, and sighed when she felt his hand gently stroke her back from her nape to the top curve of her buttocks.

“What are you thinking?” she had to ask.

“You are a little goddess. I have never felt such release. You need a bigger bed.” He hesitated, and then muttered, “And I should not have done this.”

“You shouldn’t have?” She lifted her head to look at his troubled expression. “You scared the daylights out of me, searching my house and yelling at me and saying all that weird stuff about powers and witches.” She rested her chin on his sternum. “Why am I cuddling with you instead of calling the cops?”

“You showed me your heart, and this is what was in it.” He traced the line of her nose and then rubbed her lower lip. “Do you want me to go?”
 

She kissed his finger. “No.”

“Good.” He rolled her onto her back. “Because I’m only getting started.”

AFTER SPENDING SEVERAL minutes studying the manicured gardens surrounding the park fountain, Hannah Gardener allowed her driver to help her out of the backseat of the limousine. She hated coming to Portland, but she refused to do this anywhere near the estate. Her guards also climbed out and took discreet positions at the best vantage points. Each man held his weapon drawn and ready to fire at her signal.

“Park across the street,” Hannah told the driver as she drew on her wrap, which had been so heavily enchanted it crackled against her shoulders.
 

She walked to the fountain at an unhurried pace, her head held high and her hands relaxed. Long ago they had declared this place neutral ground, but she knew Henri Marquette would never dare attack her anywhere, not while she possessed the only treatment he would ever have for his bizarre condition.

Not that she would continue supplying it to him forever.

Hannah used her lace handkerchief to dust the edge of the fountain’s marble basin before she perched on it and crossed her ankles.
 

“I can feel you watching me, Templar. Come out before I grow bored and leave you to rot for another month.”

A strange shape emerged from the shadows and skirted around the fountain to approach her. Marquette tried to disguise his hunchbacked, twisted form with a heavy wool cloak, but his lurching step and the scraping sound of the foot he dragged across the walkway made it plain he was crippled. The ancient knight halted a foot away from her.
 

“You took your time, you harlot from Hell. I’ve been waiting for hours.”

“Now, now,” Hannah chided. “No exchange between us should begin with insults and aspersions of my faith.”

“I will say whatever I wish,” he snarled.

“While I could call Rome and inform your brotherhood of the curse you’re carrying.” She offered him a brilliant smile. “And how I’ve been helping you endure it.”

A claw-like hand covered in black wool swiped at the air between them.
 

“You would not dare.”

“You’d be surprised what I’m capable of.” She primly placed her folded hands on her knee. “Of course they would never forgive you for consorting with a Wiccan whore. What is the punishment for that again?” She pretended to think. “Decapitation? Being tossed in the temple’s fiery furnace? Or something less expeditive and much more agonizing?”

He jabbed his crippled hand at her. “Shut up and give me the potion.”

Hannah opened her clutch and removed the vial. “I have it right here.” She placed it on the basin beside her. “Now what did you bring for me?” She couldn’t resist fluttering her eyelashes at him. “Something to die for, I hope.”

He hurled a small, black velvet pouch at her, and she caught it neatly before untying the strings and pouring the contents into her palm. The large, glittering canary diamonds still pulsed with the souls of the men who had slaughtered each other while fighting over them, and when Hannah closed her fingers over them she felt their trapped energy squirm frantically against her palm, and with her other hand clasped her charmed pendant.
 

Marquette seized the potion, tilted his head back and crushed the thin vial in his fist so that the now-glowing contents spilled into the ragged hole of his mouth.

Take from me age and age’s pains, so what was once may be again,
Hannah thought.
So may it be.

As she absorbed the energy from the precious gems, Hannah felt her breasts lift and her face smooth, and the nagging pain in the small of her back vanish. Ironically Marquette was always so wracked by the violent changes wrought by her potion he never detected her using the gems he brought her to work her own restorative spell.

 
Once the delicious power she had drained from the yellow diamonds settled into her center, Hannah ignored Marquette’s capering and groaning as his spine straightened and his muscles bulged. Instead her thoughts strayed back once more to the night she had been betrayed by her best friend.
 

Sister, what have you done?
 

What was necessary.
 

Hannah hadn’t meant to stab her best friend with the enchanted blade used to sacrifice the child, but Justine had hurled a killing spell on her, and in an attempt to deflect it she had buried the dagger in Justine’s heart. Everything went black, and when Hannah regained consciousness she found herself wedged between the body of the child and her best friend, her limbs aching with a terrible coldness.

She’d gone to Mariah, who had been horrified to hear Hannah’s tearful confession of coming upon Justine Mather after she had sacrificed a child to the moon, and how she had taken her best friend’s life while defending herself. Her mentor had helped her disguise the murders by putting the boy and Justine into Justine’s car before causing it to crash and burst into flames, but the Magus Corps had still sent an officer to investigate. Hannah had convinced him that the murder of Justine Mather had been in defense of her life, but thanks to her mentor she had been saddled with looking after Justine’s teenage daughter.
 

We
must assure that the child does not follow in her mother’s path,
the investigator had told Mariah.

Let Hannah look after the girl,
her mentor advised.
She grew up with her mother, so she will know what signs to watch for.

The worst moment had been a few weeks after the murders, when Hannah found the first strands of silver in her glossy hair. Mariah had later confirmed that the spell Justine had cast before dying had stripped Hannah of her immortality, and she had begun to age like any other human.

“At last.” Marquette threw off his cloak to reveal the tall, handsome warrior he had once been. His hooded eyes shifted down to his left hand, which remained twisted beneath his glove. “It was not enough this time. I need more.”

Hannah disguised her own astonishment over the potion’s failure by looking down and pouring the gems back in the pouch. “That is all there is.”

“Liar.” Marquette seized her by the wrist and dragged her to her feet. “You will give me the formula––now.”

She lifted her hand in a languid signal to prevent her guards from closing in.
 

“You will take your hands off me, Henri, or the deliveries end, and I leave you to rot.”
 

He dropped her arm as if it scalded him.
 

“I can smell your fear,” he said.

“You smell my Chanel.” She placed the pouch in her clutch. “I will need time and privacy to prepare another draught. You may meet me here tomorrow night at the same time.” She patted his broad chest. “No charge for the additional treatment.”

Hannah felt Marquette’s eyes on her as she sauntered back to her limousine, but once she was safely inside she dropped her facade and opened her clutch to examine the inside lining. When she found no sign that the vial had leaked she snatched out her mobile and frantically dialed.

The line rang five times before Mariah answered. “Why are you calling so late?”
 

“Hold on.” Hannah pressed the button that raised the soundproofed privacy screen between her and her driver before she said, “Something went wrong with the potion. It didn’t restore one of the bastard’s hands.”

“I must have accidentally shorted it.” Mariah sighed. “Perhaps it is time to end this arrangement, dearest. We can contact the Magus Corps about the Templar’s threats. They will send someone to deal with him.”

“I’ve told you before, Marquette is too well-protected. If I don’t appease him he will hunt us down and kill us all before the Magus Corps can do a thing about it.” Hannah closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the padded leather seat. “Audrey is not coming to the shop this time. You’ve said too much to her.”

Mariah sniffed. “You have kept her ignorant too long. Once we bring her into our circle we can better control her development while keeping her power in check. It will prevent her from taking the dark path, like her mother.”

“How can we do that when she’s already convinced that you’re nothing but a crazy old bat?” Hannah shrieked.

“Calm yourself,” her mentor said in her sternest tone. “I know you are upset and frightened, but you will not speak to me so.”
 

“Forgive me.” Hannah lifted her French manicured thumb to her mouth and began to gnaw on the side. “I couldn’t leave things as they were with Marquette. I have to bring another dose to him tomorrow night.” When Mariah said nothing, she choked back a sob. “Please. If I don’t, he’ll be so angry. You know what will happen if I don’t give it to him. He will slaughter us all.”

“I will be waiting.” Her mentor sounded resigned now. “But you must bring the girl with you. Good-bye, dearest.”
 

“See you soon.” Hannah switched off her mobile and threw it to the floor before she screamed at it. “Fucking
bitch.
”

JACKSON OPENED HIS eyes to see Audrey’s peaceful face a few inches away. She still slumbered, but that wasn’t a surprise. They’d spent most of the night awake and entwined as they shared the most carnal of pleasures. His cock hardened as he thought of the last time he’d fucked her, standing while he bent her over the side of the bed so he could take her from behind. Her wet little pussy had been so swollen and heated it had enveloped him like a tight, silken mouth, and the position had allowed him to penetrate her to her core. Watching her beautiful buttocks jiggle with each deep thrust had been as arousing as reaching under her to cup her bouncing breasts and tease her sensitive nipples until she moaned and begged.

He knew he had to leave her so he could call into Command and explain that their suspected rogue killer was actually an untutored moon witch with the power to touch-heal, but her sweet scent and the lingering perfume of sex permeated the room, and filled his head with other notions. Carefully he drew back the soft white sheet draped over her breasts so he could look upon them one last time. His fingers itched to rub her nipples, which his suckling last night had left a pretty dark pink, and see if they would tighten for him again. He tugged the rest of the sheet away from her body to bare her belly and hips and legs, and the trim patch of dark curls covering the sweet notch between her thighs.

Audrey murmured something in her sleep and rolled onto her back, shifting her legs apart.

Jackson caressed her thigh with his hand, unable to look away from her now as his cock rose thick and hard against his lower belly. After all the times he had penetrated her last night she would be too sore to take him again, but he could leave her with one last luscious memory of him.

Carefully he moved over her and settled between her thighs, his hands stroking her hips until her eyes opened and she regarded him with a drowsy smile. “Good morning.”

“That it is.” He placed a soft kiss below her navel. “How do you feel?”

“Wonderful.” She touched his cheek. “What are you doing down there?”

“I wanted to kiss you awake.” He shifted down and turned his head to brush his lips against the inside of her thigh. “But your adorable little pussy distracted me.”

Her cheeks pinkened as she tried to sit up. “I should really take a shower first–”

“Stay.” He splayed his hand over her belly. “I love the scent of you. You smell like sex, and me.” Keeping his gaze locked with hers, he nuzzled her curls slowly before spreading her folds with his thumbs to expose her clit. “I want to kiss this sweet pearl, and lick it, and make you come on my tongue. Would you like that, my lovely one?”