Mortal Temptations (7 page)

“I don’t feel anything
but
you.”

“Good.”

Her pussy was hot and full. She started to reach for him but was pulled up short by the silk tethers and made a noise of frustration.

Did Nico take pity on her and loosen her hands? No, he kept pleasuring her with his feathers, never touching her with his hands.

“I’m going to come,” she cried. “I want your mouth on me. Please.”

“Are you sure?” Nico the torturer asked.

“Yes.
Please.
”

He smiled, his feathers still rubbing her, tickling, teasing. Just when she thought it would be too late, he leaned straight down and fastened his mouth over her. He sucked on her nub, nibbled and teased, then delved his tongue straight inside her.

Patricia jerked at her bonds, feet going crazy on the bed. She came and came, pressing her pussy to his wonderful mouth, crying out as his tongue tantalized and rubbed and sucked.

Patricia writhed one last time, Nico holding her hips in his strong hands while he lapped her.

“Thank you,” she gasped, then she crashed down onto the bed, the waves of her climax rolling over her.

Nico laughed again, his voice so dark. He rose, his hair tangled, his eyes burning with a strange light. He wasn’t human—the bed filled with feathers was evidence—and the fire in him was different. Powerful, heady, dangerous. It was like touching lightning.

“You’re beautiful, Patricia,” he murmured. “You taste like ambrosia.”

“Thank you,” she whispered again. Or thought she did. Oblivion hit her within moments of her climax, and she fell into the hardest aftersex sleep she’d ever experienced.

When she woke again, her hands had been untied and a sheet pulled over her body. The shower pattered quietly in the bathroom, and a bedside lamp cast a small circle of light over the bed.

Andreas was leaning against the bedpost at the foot, smiling at her.

YOU look happy,” Andreas said.

Patricia gasped and tugged the sheet to her chin. “What are you doing here?”

“I live here. This is my bed.” He lounged even more negligently, his light blue eyes tracing the outline of the sheet.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“About four. Club’s just closing.”

“Oh, shit. I need to get home.” Patricia started to sit up, then clutched the sheet closer, remembering she was naked beneath.

“I’m sure Nico would be delighted if you stayed,” Andreas said.

“What about you? Would you be delighted?”

“Oh, yes.” His look turned predatory. “I think I would.”

“I was joking.”

“I’m not.”

She studied his hard body in jeans and a T-shirt, the Andre’s logo stark on his chest. The paw print meant him, she realized. His leopardness.

“You’ll want your bed,” she began, hoping he’d take the hint and leave so she could get dressed.

“Not necessarily. There’s another bedroom upstairs, in case we need it.”

She looked at him in surprise. “Do you and Nico usually sleep in here together?”

“Sure.” He shrugged massive shoulders. “Why not? It’s a big bed.”

The thought of the two of them curled up, large, muscular bodies filling the bed, made her mouth dry.

“Nothing. It’s just that . . .”

“I’ve been hanging around with Nico for over two thousand years. There’s been plenty of times we had to sleep together for warmth and protection. Not that we hit the sack at the same time every night. There’s always something to do.”

“Inscriptions to find. Dyons to fight.”

“Something like that.”

Patricia drew her knees to her chest and circled her arms around them. “Why do you think this particular inscription will help you?”

Andreas’s eyes went bleak, as though he were trying not to hope. “Because there are hieroglyphs on there that might refer to Nico and me. I’m willing to have this Egyptologist you find translate it and find out.”

“It’s worth a shot, you mean.”

He nodded, his white black hair catching in the lamplight. “It may be nothing. We’ve had false hopes before.”

She hugged herself a little tighter. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

“Part of it was our own damn fault. We liked to enjoy ourselves too much. Like now.”

“You think Nico is enjoying himself too much with me?”

“No. I think I am.”

She stilled. “And what do you mean by that?”

“I’m enjoying thinking about snatching that sheet from you and looking at your lovely body.”

Her hands automatically clenched the sheet. “That wouldn’t be fair to Nico.”

“I said
look
. Not touch.”

Patricia’s entire body heated. Andreas was already gazing at her as though he could see right through the sheet, and she didn’t know why that excited her so much. She liked Nico and wanted to be with
him
, not Andreas. She liked Nico’s laugh, his smoldering eyes, his touch, his caring.

But she suddenly wanted Andreas to look at her.

Slowly she skimmed the sheet from her torso, then leaned back on her elbows and pushed the covers all the way off. She stretched out her legs and lay there, stark naked, for Andreas to see.

His blue eyes flashed, quick volatility that was instantly masked as his gaze roved her from head to foot. He lingered at her breasts, and she felt the nipples rise for him, then his gaze dipped to the dampening tuft between her thighs.

Patricia parted her legs and let him look, going so far as to lick the tip of her fingers and touch them to her clit.

His erection was evident in his pants, but he simply leaned on the bedpost, folded his arms, and studied her.

“Very nice,” he concluded. He pushed himself away from the bed and ran his tongue over his lips. “Keep the bed,” he said softly. “I’ll sleep upstairs.”

Giving her a final, lingering look, he turned and left the room.

Patricia let out her breath and scrubbed her hand over her face. That had been—incredibly erotic. She’d come close to orgasm feeling his admiration on every inch of her. She’d never let a man look at her like that before, and now she’d played with one man and spread herself in front of his best friend not an hour later.

Then she realized that the shower had stopped—had stopped some time ago.

She looked up in alarm. Nico leaned against the bathroom doorframe, a towel around his waist and water droplets all over his shoulders.

“Nico,” she whispered.

Hurting Nico was the last thing she wanted. She didn’t understand why she’d wanted Andreas to look at her body; she understood none of this.

“I’m sorry,” she said, remorse biting her. “I couldn’t seem to stop myself.”

“I know.” Nico flicked off the light in the bathroom and came through the darkened room to her. He sat down on the bed and slid one hand across her bare hip. His towel-wrapped body was incredible, and her own body throbbed for him again.

“This is how it happens,” he said. “You want me first, then you’ll draw Andreas in until he becomes fixed on you. You’ll have us both until we’re so tangled we can’t get free without pain. And then it’s over. You move on, and we eat our hearts out.”

She listened in dismay. “That is
not
what’s going to happen.”

“It’s the way of things.”

“I am going to find a way to set you free, Nico. So that if we want each other, there’s nothing in the way, and we know it’s real.”

“Maybe.”

Patricia started to scramble up. “It will be real; I swear it. Now, I have to go. I have cats to feed, a store to open in a few hours—”

His hand on her hip tightened. “Stay.” His eyes went dark. “Sleep with me tonight. I know a great place for breakfast, best bagels in Manhattan.”

The incongruity of a demigod, son of Dionysus and a nymph, on the lookout for a really good bagel made her laugh.

“All right,” she conceded. “I’ll stay. My cats will never let me hear the end of it, though.”

“I’ll send Andreas to look after them. He likes cats.”

She started to smile again, then Nico pulled off his towel, and she got lost in admiration of his body. “I hope you mean he likes to pet and feed them.”

“I do.” Nico slid under the covers with her and shut off the bedside light. “He’s a pussycat at heart, I told you.”

“Sure,” Patricia said numbly. “I believe you.”

But she had to admit snuggling down in the warm bed with Nico, kissing him good night, and spooning back against him, was worth the price of a couple of pissed-off cats.

NICO’S great place for breakfast turned out to be outstanding. It was one of those incongruous storefronts that didn’t even try to compete with the trendy restaurants of the day and served its customers in a small space of home-baked goodness.

Nico ate a full breakfast while Patricia nibbled a bagel, both as comfortable with each other as though they’d been together for years. Patricia still was not sure what she felt about her encounter with Andreas or about Nico’s proclamation that she’d ensnare them both and leave them high and dry.

Patricia knew she had faults, but being a siren wasn’t one of them. Breaking up with someone because they’d grown apart or couldn’t get along was one thing; using and discarding someone was something else.

She’d also not been sure how good a cat minder Andreas would be, despite Nico’s assurances. But when she’d popped in on the way to breakfast with Nico, she found the water bowls topped off and Red Kitty curled tightly around his favorite toy. Isis sat guard as usual, sphinxlike on the bottom stair.

“He likes cats,” Nico repeated after they’d left Patricia’s apartment again. “Cats like him.”

“You do know that I’ve never met anyone as bizarre as the two of you, right?” she asked as they sat across the booth from each other. “Even when I dated another psychic.”

Nico sipped his coffee. “Glad to know I’m unique.”

“That’s one word for it.”

“And I treasure you,” he said, giving her one of his smiles that made her blood heat. “I’ve not met a woman in eons I can show my true nature to. It is not easy for us, remaining hidden. We were thrust here against our will, yet we can’t openly be what we are. Most mortals don’t want to believe in the supernatural, not really. Not alive and walking among them.”

“I’ve never had the choice.”

“How long have you been psychic?” He leaned toward her, his attention intoxicating. When Nico looked at her, he truly looked at
her
, and it was obvious his mind was on nothing else. She’d never had that kind of attention from a man, and it was heady.

“I was about eight when I found out,” she said. “I’d always felt presences lingering on things and in places but never thought much about it. One day when my grandmother was visiting, she explained it was a talent not many people had, and that I shouldn’t talk about it too much. But it was a gift, and I should use it wisely.”

“Your grandmother was psychic, too?”

“I didn’t know it until that day. When I talked about her visit later that day, everyone looked at me oddly. She’d died the night before.”

Nico’s brows rose. “Interesting.”

“For some reason it didn’t scare me. She’d needed to talk to me, to pass on her knowledge before it was too late. I never saw her after that. It’s not like I can conjure ghosts or carry on conversations with dead people whenever I want. I’m just good at reading auras and figuring out what happened in rooms where there were strong emotions or reading the vibrations on a piece of furniture. Comes in handy in the antiques business.”

“Which you love.” He smiled, and her heart squeezed again. “I see it in your eyes.”

“I do enjoy the work,” she said, trying to sound offhand. “I like the excitement of a good auction; I like tracking down obscure pieces for clients, like the ostracon for Mrs. Penworth.”

“Why did she want it?”

“She’d heard about one that belonged to Cleopatra. She couldn’t get that one but wanted one like it. So I searched the market.”

Nico traced the edge of his mug. “If Andreas and I had come to you in the first place, you might have been able to find it for us.”

“Or the Dyon might have prevented me from finding out about the ostracon at all. You might have gone straight to the dealer, and I’d never have met you.”

Nico caught her gaze in one that was half amused and half anguished. “And I wouldn’t be in this deep.”

She laid her hand on top of his warm, strong one. “I don’t know what kind of women caught you in the past, but I don’t go through men like a hot knife through butter or leave a trail of broken hearts behind me. I think women who do that have intimacy issues. Or not enough to do.”

“Or they refuse to be hurt,” he suggested.

“You mean it’s easier to end a relationship before you start caring too much? I suppose.” She sighed. “But I don’t think it’s healthy to go through life never getting close to someone, no matter how much it might hurt later.”

He was laughing at her, his dark eyes dancing.

“What?” she asked.

“I notice that most of you humans can’t say the word
love
. It’s
relationships
and
intimacy issues
.” He pushed his coffee aside and leaned forward. “Everyone is afraid of love—deep, gut-wrenching, heartbreaking caring for someone else more than for yourself. Love, pure and simple. No analyzing the hell out of it, no sitting with a third person discussing
issues
.” He put his fist on his chest. “It’s raw, simple emotion, and without it, the world would have been a dead place a long time ago.”

“Oh.” Patricia liked how his eyes had gone dark and intense. “I’ve never heard it put quite like that.”

Nico lifted his coffee, breaking the spell. “Call me old-fashioned.”

Patricia called him sexy as hell. In her thirty-two years of life, she’d had male friends as well as female, and she’d seen that her men friends could love as deeply as her women friends.

But she’d never heard a man declare that love was as important as Nico just had. The fact that he could still think such a thing, after being so long buffeted by the whims of a goddess, warmed her.

He didn’t believe she’d be different from whatever women he’d had before, didn’t believe she could be. But she intended to show him. What she felt for Nico already went beyond sexual interest—although that interest was pretty strong.

She intended to prove to him that she wouldn’t be fickle, spell or no spell. She’d do anything to wipe away the sadness she saw deep in his eyes.

THEY walked back to Patricia’s apartment so she could call the Egyptology professor she’d located at Cornell. Nico slid his hand in hers as they strolled along the busy Manhattan street, and she enjoyed his strength and the feeling of protection he wrapped around her.

Once the call was made and the meeting arranged, Patricia packed a few clothes, put the cats in their carrier, and left with Nico for the club. They found Andreas up, in a T-shirt and jeans and drinking coffee, his white black hair mussed. He insisted he come with them to Ithaca, to her surprise and consternation, and not long later, the three of them plus cats were in a rental car heading north out of town.