My Wicked Enemy (23 page)

She felt Nikodemus disengage from her body, and when she could see him again, he knelt in front of her, back straight, hands resting on his thighs. She blinked, and when she opened her eyes again, he shifted the way Iskander had. Solidly there, yet elusive in the shadows so that she had to pay attention physically and mentally in order to see him.

His fingers, resting on his thighs, ended in gleaming ebony talons, and his face was all severe lines and austere planes and hollows. Unyielding and possessed of none of the delicacy of his human shape. His nose slanted down to his cheeks with a wild and aggressive plunge. Teeth gleamed like ivory between lips that took a harsh turn at the edges, despite the lush and sensitive lower lip. His body was male, hard-muscled and broad, yet he retained at least a suggestion of the elegant proportions she knew from his human form.

Iskander stood, and she caught a ripple in the moonlight as he shifted and then vanished, only to reappear as a part of her connection with Nikodemus. Nikodemus’s eyes turned more blue than gray, and on his cheeks faint blue stripes glowed. She reached out a hand until her fingers touched him. The pads of her fingers brushed over exquisite softness, supple skin that warmed her own. More than once when Nikodemus blinked, she lost sight of him altogether. If she weren’t touching him, she might have believed she was alone. His heart beat strong under that impossibly soft hide. When she moved her hand, her ring finger slid over his nipple.

His head dropped back, and he arched his torso toward her. She obliged the silent request by bringing his nipple to a peak. His breath hitched in the back of his throat, and he growled. In her head, she felt Iskander, twinned with Nikodemus. Her answer was to lean forward and touch her tongue to Nikodemus’s nipple. His hand left his thigh to hold the back of her head. She moved forward, between his spread thighs, resting her hands on his shoulders. His nipple peaked again under her tongue. The shape of his hand on the back of her head felt wrong. Head-rush wrong.

He put a palm on the back of her head, but the other hand molded the curve of her lower spine. Not fingertips, but talons rested on her back. Talons. She shivered, and between her legs the heat grew unbearable. He had a way of arching his fingertips so that just the pads caressed her. The slightest adjustment set the curved talons against her skin. She looked down and saw his ink-black arm around her waist, not touching now except for one talon making another circle in her navel. Nikodemus was foremost in her head, but Iskander was there, too. His other hand pushed into the small of her back, moving toward her shoulder blades until she arched again. Both hands now, traveling the line of her shoulders, along her arms to her hands. The entire time, he and Iskander were in her head, taking up her emotions and sharing theirs.

One of his thighs slid between hers, moving outward and separating her legs, and he was pushing to get inside her. Her pulse hammered, and her sex quivered with anticipation of his body. She cried out because he wasn’t getting inside. He grabbed her by the hips, got himself placed at her entrance, and pushed hard. Harder. The head of his cock slid in. He didn’t wait for her to relax, he just drove in hard. Harder. She was wet for him, ready for his power. Her entire being ached for him, and her belly raced with him and his drive into her.

Above her, his chest heaved, the burst of air from his lungs sounded in her ears, and then, when his head dipped, his breath flashed hot against her shoulder. Her skin slid against his hot and leathery hide. He shifted his weight to one arm and leaned away to cover her bare breast with his palm, tightening his fingers on her until she felt the prick of his talons.

Dangerous he might be, but she trusted him. She just did. He thrust hard, wonderfully deep. In her head he brought her along with him. Desire rose in her, as hot as his skin, as hot as fire. He pulled out of her and, on his knees brought her up to him, his erect cock between them. With a snarl from deep in his chest, he lowered his head. His hair brushed her shoulder before whispering along her side. She looked up and met the silver-blue rounds of his irises. His emotions flowed through her. Her breath hitched from the impact. He felt in flashes of red-orange heat.

She slithered free of his grasp, and before he could touch her again, she sat up and put her hands on his chest. For a moment, Iskander’s eyes looked back at her, but then his eyes flashed back to familiar gray. Black eyelids closed over his eyes when she pushed him until he lay on his back. He bent one knee and slid his calf around the inside of her thigh. She wanted to explore him until he was as aroused and desperate as she was. She wanted him to feel pleasure.

Everywhere she touched him, muscle was close beneath his skin, and she was wet, so wet and aching for him. She kissed his neck and worked her way down to tongue his nipples. His body bowed against hers, and he, with a hand cupped to her backside to steady her, slid a finger between her legs, into the dampness of her. She cried out.

Silence filled the attic. He let go of her and pushed up enough to raise his torso and look at her. His legs remained twined with hers. Black-to-silver-to-blue eyes held hers, wary. He settled his weight on just one arm to grab her chin with the other. Nikodemus sat up all the way, and she slid down to his lap. He spread his thighs and opened her over him, but far from his cock. He slipped his hands between them. She thought at first he meant to lift her over him, but he didn’t. Both his index fingers dipped into her, sliding in wetness. Her breath hitched. He worked her inside with his fingers and outside with his thumbs until she was teetering at another release. Each rise to that peak came faster and harder and less controlled. Hot breath puffed against her cheek when he leaned forward and whispered, “Tell me you want this, Carson.”

She looked up and willed her focus to remain on his face, but it wasn’t easy, because of the way he kept disappearing into shadows. “I do.”

“Warlord,” he whispered. “Say that.”

“Touch me, Warlord,” she said. She watched his hand, long-tapered fingers ending in talons, settle around her breast. “Please, I want you to touch me.” He did. “More,” she said.

He put his other hand to the side of her head and pressed until her throat stretched taut to one side. With a talon, he scored her skin and fit his mouth over the breach. His arms wrapped around her, folding her against him as he turned her onto her belly and caressed the nape of her neck. Like Iskander had, he stroked the spot at the top of her spine, and she nearly came apart. He curled a hand around her waist, holding her. And then he was inside her head with Iskander. Desire ripped through her like fire, scorching her, taking everything there was of her and burning it away in the heat. She howled as he pulled his body over hers. One arm snaked around her waist, pulling her upward, against his belly.

“You can take this,” he said. All her sensations, physical and emotional, redoubled.

His cock was enormous and hot, but she was wet for him, and when he put himself to her, he slid in smoother than she expected. And harder. And slower. And better. Along her back, the heat from his body kept a layer of sweat between them. His hair fell over her head like a black veil. Other than the sounds of their bodies sliding and meeting, they were silent. No words at all. He used her mind the way he used her body, taking, absorbing, wringing her out. Orgasm welled up in her, threatening to break until she screamed and begged him to finish it before she simply shattered. She begged him to make her come, and God, his cock pounded her, hard and hot, but she did not break.

When she came back to herself, Nikodemus was there, a comforting, familiar presence in her head. Iskander had separated from them. She still sensed him, but not as fully as before. She pressed a kiss to Nikodemus’s collarbone, and he slid an arm around her and held her tight.

Iskander said, “Fen’s gone.”

“Is she gone because she’s in a snit over Iskander being mine now, or for some other reason?” They sat at the table and, after hashing it out a bit, they figured out that Fen had disappeared at roughly the same time Carson had brought Iskander back.

Magellan’s witch, for fuck’s sake, a woman he’d once wanted to kill on sight, had brought back two fiends who’d been cut off from the kin. Once was maybe some kind of freak accident. But twice? A mageheld and a fucked-up blood-twin. Beside him, Carson slipped her hand into his.

“Think about it,” Carson said. “If a fiend is mageheld, he can no longer connect with fiends who aren’t, isn’t that right?”

“Yeah,” Nikodemus said slowly.

“And you can’t feel him anymore, right? When we came here, you could feel them. Iskander and Fen, right? They seemed fine because you could feel them?”

“Sure,” Nikodemus said.

“Of course,” Harsh said at the same time. Iskander leaned against his chair, arms crossed over his chest.

Carson looked at Iskander. “But you and Fen, Iskander. Didn’t you guys make a package deal? Not separate, but one?” she said, cheeks coloring, She glanced at Nikodemus but quickly looked away. He wished he could be impolite and just go looking for what was in her head right now. He did the next-best thing and pulled her closer. Her fingers curled around his, and she gave him a tiny smile that about slayed him. “So, maybe I’m wrong, but don’t you feel blood-twins as if they’re one entity instead of two?”

“Where are you going with this, Carson?” Nikodemus asked. He was getting a bad feeling about this. Really bad.

“Two of them, sensed as one.” She frowned, staring hard at Iskander. “But what if one of them is mageheld? What happens then? Do you feel nothing from them, or do you only feel the one that isn’t?”

“Shit,” Nikodemus said, because he totally saw what Carson meant. “She means we mistook Iskander for Iskander and Fen. We assumed what we felt when we got there was a pair of blood-twins. She’s saying, what if Fen was mageheld all the time?” He looked to Harsh. “You knew them before—did they feel different to you?”

“Yes, but you could see something had happened to Iskander. I thought whatever was wrong with him was the reason they felt different, and besides—”

Nikodemus cut him off with a wave and brought his thoughts back. “Our first order of business is to find out where the hell Fen went and why.”

“We don’t know if Fen ran,” Harsh said.
Poor sap,
Nikodemus thought. He just didn’t want to accept that his former lover was probably mageheld. “Or, if she did run, why she did so. Her location and current state of mind are unknown.” He tapped his fingers on the table. “It’s possible severing Iskander from Fen has harmed her. She may be outside somewhere. Hurt. Or too confused to get back.”

“Iskander,” Nikodemus said. “What happened to send you off the deep end like that?”

Iskander bowed his head, eyes shut tight. He took a breath, and when he straightened, his eyes were pure blue flame where his pupils ought to have been. “I don’t know. Not with certainty. It was sudden.”

“Were you and Fen together at the time?”

He shook his head. “For months, I could do nothing, say nothing. Feel nothing. What is the human word for this?” He frowned. “Catatonic.” He looked around the table. “Fen kept me from dying.” He pressed his palms on the table, fingers spread, and watched Nikodemus from lowered eyes. Cobalt fire burned in his pupils. “Do you really understand about blood-twins, Warlord?”

His voice carried a hint of growl. Iskander with his magic restored was a formidable creature. The stuff of nightmares. As part of a whole blood-twin, he and Fen must have been righteously scary. Iskander sat straight, leaving his hands on the table. The muscles of his upper arms tensed. “My sister was trying hard to bring us back. More than once she nearly succeeded. I was lost. Alone, and I have never been alone.” He took a breath. “And then you came. I felt you, Warlord. I felt Harsh and even Carson.”

“We have to consider the worst case,” Carson said.

“Yeah,” Nikodemus said slowly. He didn’t like where this was heading.

She looked at him. “She knows you’re meeting with the warlords, Nikodemus. If she’s mageheld, then whoever it was, he probably knows, too.”

“We have to call off the meeting,” Nikodemus whispered.

Harsh shot from his chair. “It’s too late.” He looked at the three of them. “They’re already here. They called about five minutes before you came downstairs.”

“How much did Fen overhear?” Nikodemus asked.

Harsh sighed and started pacing. “I’m not entirely sure.”

“We know Rasmus and Magellan are here. We should assume one of them has control of Fen.” She leaned toward Nikodemus, earnest concern on her face. He liked when she got all intense like this. “What if they have the warlords already?”

“Then we’re fucked.”

“Unlikely,” Harsh said. “They’d rather take us all at once. Me. Carson. Nikodemus.”

“Plan A,” Nikodemus said. “Harsh, you contact one of the warlords while we’re driving into town. If we’re lucky, you’ll get a hold of someone who’ll relay a warning.” His mind raced with scenarios.

“No guarantees of that,” Harsh said.

“Plan B is we show up and do the meet-and-warn in private.” Plan A was best-case scenario. Unlikely as hell, but you never knew. “Harsh, you’re with Iskander on the meet-and-warn. Carson and I will set up the mages to think the meeting’s someplace else at some other time. If it works, keep the warlords occupied long enough for me to deal with Magellan and Rasmus.”

“Is there a plan C?” Carson asked.

“Yeah.” He grinned. “We improvise.”

How Fen disappeared was explained when they opened the garage. Nikodemus slammed a fist against the garage wall. “She fucking stole my car!”

Their only choice was the rusty pickup parked behind the barn. The keys were gone, but Iskander hot-wired it, and in eight and a half minutes, they were on the way into town.

Carson rode in front with him, and Iskander and Harsh got comfy in the bed. He was going to rip Fen a new one if there was so much as a scratch on his Mercedes. There was a reason Nikodemus favored expensive new cars. The Chevy was a heap, and some of the coils in the seat poked through the material. A bungee cord held the radio in, and another kept the glove box shut. When Carson fastened her lap belt—the pickup was too old to have shoulder belts—he gave the Chevy some gas and they bounded down the driveway. Without, it felt to him, the benefit of the modern invention of shock absorbers. Through the rearview mirror, he saw Harsh on the phone.

In town, Nikodemus pulled the pickup into a parking lot behind a bar called Kodiak Jack’s. Perfect. While Carson wrestled the passenger door, Nikodemus disconnected the wires. When he got out and closed the door, the driver’s-side window plunged down. He used his palms to bring it back up. “A bar’s as good a place as any to fake a meeting,” he said. “Too many humans for anyone to pull serious magic. Safer for everyone. Any luck, Harsh?”

“No.” He handed back Nikodemus’s phone.

“Plan B it is.” The wind off the Olompali River lowered the nighttime temperature several degrees. He was glad for the coolness. The truck’s window slid down again, but this time when Nikodemus brought it back up, it wouldn’t stay. He shrugged and left the truck with the window open. “You’d have to be fucking desperate to want this piece of junk, anyway.” Nobody smiled. Harsh dusted off his trousers.

“Harsh,” Nikodemus said. “You’re the point man on the warlords. Make it look good. Iskander, you’re his backup. We’ll meet you there if we can. Everybody got it?”

Harsh and Iskander nodded. Three fiends and a witch, and nobody was worried she’d betray them. They all knew she was rock solid.

Nikodemus grabbed her head between his hands. “If there’s trouble, you improvise, okay? If we get separated, don’t forget you’re a witch. You come across any magehelds, they can’t touch you. Sever them if you can. If there’s trouble and you can’t pull, get the hell out.”

Who was he kidding about this? She was totally under his skin. Like it or not, he was emotionally, physically, and psychically committed to her. He pulled her up onto her toes and kissed her long enough and hard enough that he almost forgot they had an audience. When he stopped, his hands tightened on her. Her eyes went big and wide. He waited, but all she said was, “I’ll be careful, Nikodemus.”

It was kind of stupid for him to be standing here afraid to say what he really meant. “You get yourself hurt, and I’m coming after you to knock some sense into you, you hear?”

He wondered if she knew that meant,
You’re the only one for me, Carson. The only one
.

They watched Iskander and Harsh walk away.