Powerful Awakening [L.U.S.T. 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (10 page)

“Then you’ll do this, too?” Jefferson asked.

“What is it exactly you want us to do?” Gideon countered.

“Find the terrorists, get to the bottom of who’s behind it, and neutralize the threat.”

“Neutralize how, Mr. Secretary?” Michael purposely used the man’s title.

Jefferson’s expression turned hard, cold, and determined. “If this becomes a war, it will be one of your kind before it becomes ours. We want to keep it that way. Therefore, you do it as you see fit, Mr. Delacroix.”

* * * *

Andrew handed the keys to the valet outside Club Lust, bid the young human thanks, and rounded the car to join Chrystal on the sidewalk. The club had opened an hour ago, but a crowd of waiting partiers still stretched outside the building, forming a line that appeared to have no end.

“I think we’re in for another long wait tonight,” Chrystal commented, her gaze following that line to where it snaked around the corner of the building.

Andrew hooked an arm around her waist and turned her toward the door. “Not this time. I’ve got inside connections, remember.”

She tipped her head back to look up at him. “Why didn’t you use them last night?”

“Element of surprise. I honestly didn’t know how well my showing up here would sit with Michael.”

“Before we go in, I want to ask you something.” She stepped out of his embrace, catching his hand and lacing her fingers with his as she pulled him away from the crowd. She turned to face him, her gaze searching his face. “Would it upset you if I asked to talk to Michael alone tonight?”

Was that what had been bothering her? He’d noticed she’d been unusually quiet since he knocked on the door of her suite this evening.

“No. Would it upset you if I asked to talk to him alone first?” He’d already planned to corner Michael tonight. Gideon would surely be inside the club. He could watch over Chrystal, make sure she stayed safe, while Andrew talked with Michael. They’d left so much unsaid last night, so much unexplained, and, soon, they had to tell Chrystal everything as well.

The corners of Chrystal’s lips kicked up, the amused smile lighting her face. “Planning to warn him about me?”

Andrew laughed, wound his arms around her waist, and drew her against him. “Hell, no. No one warned me about you. Why should I give him a heads-up?”

She flatted her hands on the front of his shoulders and skimmed them up and around to lace her fingers at his nape. “Just so you know, I’m not asking for private time with him so I can jump his bones.”

Andrew dipped his head and brushed a kiss to the tip of her nose. Maybe it was the wrong time to say it, but he couldn’t resist letting at least a little of the truth spill. “Just so you know, I wouldn’t mind if you did.”

Chrystal pulled her head back, her eyes full of surprise as she stared at him. “You’re serious.”

Andrew didn’t look away. “Yes, I’m serious.”

She opened her mouth, closed it again, licked her lips, then gave her head a quick shake. “Why?”

Andrew lifted a brow. “Do you want complete honesty?” He waited, his pulse pounding rapid-fire through his veins, for her to nod her head yes before he answered. “Because I want to jump his bones as badly as I want to jump yours again.” Even though her eyes widened, he could see he didn’t shock her as much as she was attempting to let on. “But, you already guessed that, didn’t you?”

She winced. “Suspected is probably a better term. That doesn’t explain why you would be okay with
me
having sex with him.”

Because it’s right. Because you’re supposed to be with us. Because you belong to us and we belong to you.

Andrew didn’t say any of that. He might have let a little of the truth out, but it wasn’t yet time to let the whole bucket spill. “How about if I told you what would really get me off is the three of us together?” There, it was a part of the truth, even if not all of it.

“You’re serious,” she said again, but her eyes didn’t get wider this time. Instead, their mocha color darkened the way he’d noticed they did when she was aroused.

“Yes, I am.”

“Jiminy Crickets,” she breathed and Andrew couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re going to have to give me a minute to think here, because, wow!”

Andrew gave her that minute, deciding he would let her have her private time with Michael first. He used that minute to tap into his mental connection with Michael, an ability he hadn’t realized existed until he’d been on the dance floor with Chrystal and Michael last night.

He felt a hole open in his mind, like a channel connecting him to Michael, and used his thoughts to speak for him.
Where are you?

In my office.

Are you alone?

Gideon is here. Do you wish to see me alone, lover?

Lover. Gods, Michael hadn’t called him that since they were both human. The endearment echoed through Andrew’s mind, traveled a speeding path straight to his heart, and filled his chest with emotion.

Andrew countered Michael’s question with another of his own.
Where is your office?

Take the back stairs down. Follow the long hallway to the door on the left. You will find me in there.

I won’t. She will. Send Gideon out. She’s headed your way. Oh, and tell your employees at the front door to let us in. We’ll be out here till sunrise if we have to wait in line.

Andrew heard Michael chuckle, then felt the connection close. He looked down at Chrystal and found her staring up at him with suspicion swirling in her eyes. Given the strength of the bond the three of them shared, it wouldn’t surprise him if she’d sensed what he’d just done. He was pretty certain she hadn’t heard the conversation, but she’d likely felt the energies of the connection.

“Your minute is up. From what I hear, Michael tends to stay in his office on the bottom level of the club when he’s here. I’ll get us inside and you can go find him first.”

* * * *

Chrystal followed the long, dimly lit hallway to the door on the left as Andrew had instructed her to do. She stopped outside that door, closing her eyes briefly as she took a deep breath, then squared her shoulders and knocked.

“It is open, my sweet.” Michael’s elegant voice drifted through the closed door like a sweet cherry gliding down a slide of whipped cream.

My sweet. He’d called her that last night. She angled her head as she reached for the knob, wondering how he’d known it was her outside the door.

He’s a vampire, dumb shit, remember?

The fact that she’d managed to momentarily forget that fact thanks to her nerves and hormones going bonkers over the idea of seeing him again had her rolling her eyes as she twisted the knob. She raised her mental shields for good measure, not wanting him to read her thoughts before she was ready to reveal them, and pushed the door open.

Her gaze swept the office as it came into view. The bulb in the overhead light was as dim as the one that lit the hallway. Stark white with splashes of blood red gave the color scheme of the room an expensive, stylish feel. A plush white sofa lined the sidewall, while a shelf laden with books occupied the opposite wall. A mahogany wet bar sat in the far corner near a matching desk with a high-back swivel chair behind it and twin guest chairs in front.

Michael stood between those guest chairs, his lean hips resting on the edge of the desk. His ankles were crossed, giving her a peek at his red socks that disappeared into black spit-shined shoes beneath a pair of black slacks. His arms were loosely crossed over his chest. He wore a staunchly-pressed, pleated white shirt that formed to every muscle in his biceps, chest, and abdomen in pristine perfection.

“If I promise not to bite, will you come further inside?”

Chrystal blinked and realized she’d stopped just inside the doorway, her hand still on the knob. She jerked her gaze up, slamming it into his, and noted the amusement glinting in his cobalt eyes.

“Maybe.” She forced herself to recover quickly, to call upon that part of her that was rarely afraid of anything and always ready to go after what she wanted. It steadied her, gave her strength and the ability to close the door behind her as she took several more steps into the room. The woman in her didn’t fear him. The secret, powerful being in her did. “You’ve got to give a girl a chance to check out her surroundings.”

He gestured to said surroundings with a graceful flourish of both arms. “Please, check it out all you wish.”

Chrystal made sure each step she took was steady and calculated as she detoured to the bookshelf, curious about his choices of reading material. She felt his gaze on her like a physical caress, moving up and down her back from her feet to her head in slow glides that stroked her flesh and awakened the desires that never managed to sleep for long when she was around Andrew, and now him.

“You have a lot of books on the Civil War.” She quickly counted four shelves, each book with a spine depicting a title of that time. Others on lower shelves seemed to be on various subjects and genres ranging from later wars to popular fiction.

“I find it to be one of the more interesting times of our nation’s history.”

Chrystal slowly turned from the bookshelf. She was making small talk, but it had a purpose. She looked at him, studying his handsome face. One wouldn’t know simply by taking in his pale complexion and black eyes that he was a vampire. Hell, in today’s society, with the way he dressed, she figured it more likely people thought him to be Goth.

Not a single wrinkle or scar marred his perfect face. It wouldn’t, though, with his powers to heal. If she were to guess without the knowledge her father had given her, she would have pegged his age as late twenties at most.

“My father is a World War I buff.” He had as many books on the subject as Michael did on the Civil War. Her father often told her how, despite the tragedies of the war, it was the greatest time of his life because she had been born.

Her gaze sharpened on Michael. Had he been born during the Civil War?

“I am very familiar with that war as well.”

The vision from the night before flashed through Chrystal’s memory, the scene of Andrew and Michael walking across an open, summery field toward her. She remembered noting the clothes they wore, thinking them to be dirtied and a much older fashion than what men wore today. She remembered Michael’s eyes, too, the way they had been midnight blue rather than black in the vision.

No, Michael hadn’t been born in the period of the Civil War. He’d been human then and, given the age he would now look for all of eternity, she easily guessed he’d become a vampire during that war. Which meant Andrew must have suffered his change at that time, as well.

“I wanted to thank you for the dance last night.”

“You are most welcome.” Michael easily rolled with the conversational shift, his gaze never wavering from her as he spoke. “Though I do beg you to please not make me do that again anytime soon.”

Chrystal lifted both brows and grinned. “Make you do it? I’ll admit, you tried to argue for all of a half a second, but you didn’t put up much of a fight after that.”

Michael nodded once, the corner of his lips twitching in a smile he didn’t allow to spread. “A fact Gideon was all too happy to point out to me a few hours ago.”

Chrystal couldn’t wipe her smile from her face as she dared to step closer to him. “Andrew warned me Gideon would get his kicks off teasing you about that for a long time. I suppose I should apologize for that.”

Michael unfolded his arms, resting his hands on either side of his lean hips on the edge of the desk. “Gideon will search to the end of the earth if need be to find something to tease me about. It is but one of his many joys in life. There is no need to apologize, my sweet.”

Chrystal clucked her tongue. “Just a need to wait a long time before I do it again.”

Michael chuckled. “Yes, if you would be so kind.”

Chrystal stopped between the twin chairs and curled her fingers over the back of the closest one. The urge to rush straight into his arms had hit her the moment she’d opened the office door. She stood within arm’s reach of him now and that urge had built to an almost irresistible state. “How long have you known Andrew?”

Again, Michael rolled with the conversational shift, easily keeping up with the swings. “We grew up together.”

“Where?”

“Here in Atlanta.”

Chrystal tilted her head and narrowed her eyes inquisitively. “You don’t talk like you’re from the South. Your tone has a faint southern drawl, but your speech is too perfect.”

“My parents attempted to raise Gideon and I with a properness not often heard in the South.”

“Does Gideon talk like you, too?”

Michael gave a half laugh. “Not even close, my sweet. Gideon is a man all his own and always has been.”

“The rebellious one, huh?”

“Something like that.”

He had an answer for everything. Chrystal would give him that. She’d gone from one question to the other, one subject to the other, and he’d yet to bat an eye or stumble over an explanation.

“Have you always lived in Atlanta?”

“I traveled for several years and lived abroad for a time.”

“And then returned to Atlanta to open a night club?”

Michael finally let the smile spread. “Something like that.”

“Where did you get the name, Club Lust?” She seriously doubted he would admit the club was a cover-up for his spec-ops LUST agency, but she gave it shot anyway.

“It seemed like an appropriate name. People go to clubs generally looking for a good time and potentially someone to spend that good time with, do they not? Longing. Urgency. Sensuality. Temptation.”

“L. U. S. T.” Chrystal bit her bottom lip and nodded. She seriously doubted that was what the acronym stood for in terms of his agency. “I get it. Lust.”

His gaze turned meaningful, hot, and dropped to her mouth for a heartbeat before he lifted it to her eyes once more. “Do you?”