Taste Me (6 page)

Lukas ground his teeth together so hard that Bailey thought his jaw would shatter. “We haven’t gotten to physiological considerations yet.”

Jack picked up the explanation of procedures. “The floor is General Availability, so anyone with a ticket has access. Second floor is reserved seating, a little pricier. Council members and their immediate families will be congregated up here.” Jack indicated the third floor VIP boxes at the rear of the venue, facing the stage. “The younger ones will probably creep down to the floor before the night is over, so we’ll have to keep our eyes open.” He reached into his briefcase, pulled out a small hinged black box, and pushed it across the table. “Here. You’ll need this.”

Bailey opened the box and looked at the tiny earpiece and matchbook-sized receiver with an integrated clip. “I don’t recognize this technology.”

“Now that the Council has cleared you, you’ll have access to technology you’ve only dreamed about,” Jack said with a smile. “That,” he said, indicating the small box, “will patch you in to Sebastiani Security restricted communications tonight. You’ll be able to read up on it later,” he said, recognizing the interested gleam in her eye. “We don’t have time right now. We have”—he looked at his watch—“less than two hours to give you a cultural crash course. Species strengths, weaknesses, susceptibilities…”

“How about protocol?”

Sasha looked at her with an odd expression on her face. “What?”

“Hey, this Council stuff might be old hat to you, but tonight I’m meeting royalty. And everything I know about protocol comes from networking books. Or the Goldie Hawn movie.”

“You held Annika’s hair out of the toilet when she puked the other night. You’re sitting with two Council members right now, people you work with every day. One of them is your best friend. It’s way too late for protocol, sweetie.”

Bailey froze.

“C’mon, don’t freak out on us now,” Sasha said, grasping both of her hands again. “You know us. At least, you’re starting to know us. You already know that Lukas is an annoying grouch, you’ve known Jack forever, and you ogle men’s asses with The First Daughter.”

“True.”

“Back to the matter at hand, ladies,” Jack said. “Time’s tight. Claudette asked for a personal favor, council leader to council leader. We don’t have a choice here.”

“Our families go way back,” Sasha added, examining a chip in her purple nail polish. “I live with Scarlett and Annika. Claudette practically moved in after Mom died and helped raise us.” She turned her head to her brother. “Did you know that Dad and Claudette are finally doing the deed?”

Lukas winced.

“What?” Sasha shrugged with a grin. “I’m happy about it. I don’t know why they waited so long. And it’s so cute to see her doing the Walk of Shame out of Dad’s place in the morning.” She giggled and singsonged, “Dad’s getting la-id.”

“So saying ‘no thanks’ really wasn’t an option, no matter how much you might have wanted to,” Bailey said to Lukas.

Lukas stiffened. Sasha looked at Jack, and then Lukas.

Bailey sat back in her chair and spread her hands. “Okay, guys. What’s up?”

“Sorry. You have to cut us a little slack here,” Lukas said. “This is only the third time in history this information has been shared—”

“And Captain Sphincter here is just a little uncomfortable discussing our species’ susceptibilities,” Sasha said, indicating her brother. “
His
susceptibilities.”

If possible, Lukas’s jaw clenched even tighter. Bailey feared for his teeth.

“Okay, Incubi Physiology 101,” Jack broke in smoothly. “You might notice that both Lukas’s and Sasha’s nostrils are twitching right now.”

They both immediately stopped.

“It’s not a twitch,” Sasha said, crossing her arms over her chest. “You make it sound like I’m Samantha on
Bewitched
or something.”

“It’s a definite twitch,” Jack informed Sasha, then turned back to Bailey. “Incubi and succubi absorb emotional energy for sustenance. They do this unthinkingly, autonomically. If it’s there, they absorb it, like humans breathe air.” He kept his eyes on Bailey, his voice clinical. “Absorbing positive emotions is pleasurable, absorbing negative emotions is not. When they’re feeling pleasure themselves, they emit pheromones which others around them find pleasurable.”

“Creating a feedback loop?” Bailey asked.

“Yes. That incubus sex myth?” Sasha flicked a challenging glance at Jack. “Fact.”

Bailey’s brain was clicking, processing. “How…?”

“Your guess is as good as ours,” Lukas said. “The best we can tell, our species can process and utilize a type of energy that humans can’t.”

“Like a sixth sense.”

“Yup,” Sasha responded with a smile. “It’s not magic by any means. Just because I can discern”—Sasha gazed at Jack, let her eyes travel over his face and upper body—“lust in the air doesn’t necessarily mean I can tell who’s feeling it. But sometimes, just by process of elimination, it’s pretty easy to guess.” She curled her legs in her chair while Jack’s face went tight. “I just know if it’s there, I absorb it. And it feels really, really good.”

Oh my God. They could tell what she was feeling? When she was pissed off? Aroused? By sniffing? Sniffing the air? Bailey put her hands to her own burning cheeks.

“We try not to be invasive about it,” Sasha said with a shrug. “It just… is.”

Jack rubbed his neck. Bailey was pretty sure he was counting to ten. “So, tonight’s show,” he finally gritted out. “The club holds nearly a thousand people. No humans tonight, other than you and me. Weres, vamps, hundreds of incubi and succubi in an enclosed space, drinking, dancing, having fun. And where there’s fun, there’s pleasure, and where there’s pleasure, there are pheromones. Now, factor a siren into the equation—a siren who interprets and amplifies emotion with her song.”

If Bailey understood Jack correctly, Scarlett’s voice would ratchet the pheromone level sky-high.

“Yes,” Sasha said, her voice dripping with anticipation as she confirmed Bailey’s suspicion. “It’ll be bacchanalia.”

Lukas abruptly stood. “Can you take it from here, Jack? I have some work to do.” He stalked to the door without waiting for an answer.

“Um, good-bye!” Sasha called to her brother’s back. She stood up to follow him. “He can be such an asshole.”

“So can you,” Jack snapped. “You know how hard this is for him. Andi’s assailant shoved some nasty shit down his throat not twelve hours ago, he’s had no sleep, and Scarlett’s show is the last place he wants or needs to be. But he’s doing it. He’s sucking it up and doing it. So back the hell off.”

The silence hummed.

“Bite me,” Sasha finally muttered. But it was said without heat.

“You wish.”

Sasha’s eyes wandered over Jack—all over Jack. Bailey felt a tug between her thighs as their eyes locked in battle. She barely stopped herself from writhing against the leather seat, and she was just sitting on the sidelines.

Sasha smirked. “Don’t forget to take your meds,” she reminded him airily as she followed her brother. “Catch you later, Bailey.” The door slammed behind her.

“Meds?” Bailey finally said.

“There’s a drug that humans can take to make them less susceptible to the pheromones.”

“Hmm, handy. Something that Sebastiani Labs conjured up?” At his affirmative nod, she sat silently for a moment. “Is Lukas okay?”

Jack reached across the table and turned off the overhead projector. “He’s under a lot of stress right now, but he’ll deal with it.” He looked to the door, and sighed in relief. “It’ll be easier to explain this now that they’re gone. I swear, she picks on him for entertainment. I hope Lukas can catch a nap.”

She could use one herself. In the last hour, she’d found out humans weren’t alone in the universe—hell, weren’t even alone on Earth. She’d learned her boss was an incubus, and his sister a succubus. She’d learned her best friend was a member of a Council governing Earth’s non-human species. “So, this is what all the secrecy is about.”

Jack raised his eyebrows in question.

“The rooms at SebSec that I can’t badge into. The servers and files I can’t access.” She looked away from him for a moment. “I thought you didn’t trust me.”

“I trust you implicitly. But Lukas and the Council were a little more challenging to convince, and it wasn’t my secret to share.” Jack rose and sat in the chair Sasha had just vacated. He looked her in the eye. “I’m so glad you backed away from that firewall when you did.”

“Yeah, well, it was close,” she muttered, “and we both know that at one time I probably wouldn’t have.” They both sat in silence, let it wrap them comfortably. “Wow,” Bailey finally said.

“Yeah, it’s a lot to think about,” Jack agreed. “There are aspects of their world that I’m still trying to learn about, to absorb. But tonight, all that has to be put aside. Scarlett’s safety is the priority.”

“What is Lukas so uptight about?”

“Lukas has a genetic anomaly which forces him to taste and smell emotions as he absorbs them. He’s battered by stimuli 24/7, and a lot of it isn’t pretty.”

“Kind of like emotional synesthesia?” she asked, referring to the sensory integration disorder which enabled some humans to see numbers in color, smell music, and taste scents.

“Yeah. He doesn’t talk about it, but the bottles of antacids scattered around the office speak for themselves. And yes, before you ask, he and Scarlett have a history. He’ll be struggling tonight.”

Bailey pursed her lips. “So, let me get this straight. Basically, the Underworld Council is coming to an orgy.” She started giggling as she tried to imagine some of humanity’s historic rulers doing the same, but stopped as a horrible thought struck. “Is Dick Cheney a vampire?”

Jack blinked. “Not that I know of.”

Bailey took the mouse from Jack and clicked on the “Species” link. “What do I need to be on the lookout for? Cliffs Notes version, please.”

“The werewolves tend to be vocal, physical, and exuberant, and will probably shed clothes as the night goes on. The vamps might flash some fang, but most of them aren’t about to strip off in public. The valkyries have been officially reminded that they can’t fight in the building. The sirens shouldn’t be a problem, unless they band together and start singing along with Scarlett. Jesus, I hadn’t thought about that one,” he muttered, grabbing his mini-comp and tapping a note. “But in terms of crowd control, the incubi and succubi will pose the biggest challenge. They’re the most vulnerable due to their susceptibility to siren song, but they emit pheromones which loosen everybody’s inhibitions.”

“No meds?”

“So far, the pheromone meds only work for humans.”

And only three humans in history knew of their existence in the first place. Damn it, Jack had allowed himself to be used as a lab rat.

Jack clicked deeper into the website, explaining what he knew about the species. Bailey took mental notes on the areas where she needed to spend more time, do more research. And as the facts and factoids scrolled by, she learned Earth’s unvarnished history: how the Underworld Council’s guiding hand had been poised behind countless thrones, influencing events to their benefit, and about how many of
humanity’s
accomplishments weren’t actually humanity’s at all.

But it was the small facts that mesmerized her: that vampires’ mythological aversion to the sun was simply because they were allergic to the sun’s UV rays; that incubi drew energy from the aurora borealis, and that pictures of the aurora were prominently displayed in most incubi homes—rather, Bailey thought, like some Christian homes featured pictures of Jesus or Mary, or of that old guy praying over a loaf of bread; that sirens had an affinity for water and waves, and a lot of them kept tabs on America’s big surf breaks, dropping everything when word of epic waves went out over the surfer’s grapevine; that werewolves were the only species capable of shifting physical form; that all of the species could breed with each other, and could breed with humans.

And had, for generations.

Incubus clubs. The Underworld Council. Siren song. Sexual feedback loops. Jack continued on, and the web pages kept scrolling by.

Finally, the information all started to swirl together. Bailey held up her hand in the universal gesture for enough. Buffer overflow. Her mind needed to rest.

She tucked her small hand into Jack’s big one. Humanity wasn’t alone. And neither was she.

As Lukas left the conference room, he ran into Scarlett—literally bumping into her, full body contact. She ricocheted against the wall.

“Jesus.” He instinctively yanked her to his body as she rebounded, and every inch of her, from her knees on up to her torso, imprinted itself on his body.

The seconds hung. She finally shoved back—hard, like she’d been defibrillated—but he didn’t let go of her arms.

“Are you hurt?” The taste of flat orange soda swam onto his taste buds.
What the hell?
What happened to the mandarin champagne that tingled on his tongue whenever Scarlett was in the vicinity? She was barely registering, her energy pulsing so low he literally had not sensed her coming.

His fingers nearly met his thumb as he grasped her upper arms. When she continued to struggle, he loosened his grip slightly but didn’t let go, half-convinced her knees would crumple if he did.

Lukas tried to assess her appearance objectively: the dark circles under her eyes. The freckles sprinkled across her nose, stark against her chalky, pale complexion. The sagging neckline of the sweatshirt exposed collarbones pushing up against the backside of her skin. The black sweatpants she wore bagged at the ass. Even her blazing red hair seemed dim and dull.

What was wrong with her? What the hell had she been doing to wreak such damage?

“Watch where you’re going,” he growled, giving her a soft shake. “Did I hurt you?”

It seemed to take forever for her to lift her head and meet his eyes. And… yes, there she was. He surreptitiously swirled his tongue as mandarin oranges crept onto his taste buds, as her green eyes sparked to life. Even if her annoyance and anger were targeted at him, he’d take it.

But she hadn’t answered his question. “Did I hurt you?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

“Why ask if you’re not going to listen to my answer? Stop manhandling me and move out of my way,” Scarlett snapped, twisting her arms out of his hands and rubbing at them. “I’m late for a meeting.”

He gestured to her damp hair, pulled back in a messy ponytail. “Yeah, I can see what a priority it was for you. Lounging in the tub, making everyone wait. Jack and Sasha have a lot more patience with your crap than I do.”

Her delicious fury spiked. She stepped up to him and poked him in the chest with a finger whose nail was bitten to the quick. “Fuck you.”

His most fervent wish, put into words. Lukas grinned nastily. “Again? Hey, I’m game if you are.”

He felt his words hit, saw her lips wobble before she firmed them back up. What the hell was he doing? By unspoken accord, neither of them ever referred to the single, incendiary night they’d spent together so many years ago. Nope, it was the elephant in the living room that only they could see, and they ignored it with impunity. But with his unthinking, dick-addled words, he’d swung a fucking sledgehammer at the foundation of their carefully constructed détente.

Instead of turning her back on him, or flipping him off and stalking down the hall, she tipped her head to the side and just gazed at him. Like she actually might be… considering it.

Sweet zombie Jesus, what had he done?

She must be at the end of her rope, absolutely exhausted, because her eyes were taking the long route over his body instead of focusing on some far point over his shoulder, like she typically did when they couldn’t avoid talking to each other. Her gaze stroked him like a fingertip.

“So, you’re game?” she breathed. She sidled closer, stopping when her stomach was a mere molecule away from his violently aroused flesh. Her hands lifted, poised tantalizingly over his abs.

Lukas held his breath. Was she going to do this? Was he going to let her?

Yes and yes
. He bit back a groan as she leaned her slight weight against him. His dick cuddled into the layers of clothing covering her flat stomach, her hipbones digging into his upper thighs like tiny fingers. As he lost the battle and reached for her ass, to drag her more firmly against him, she slithered around him instead.

“As the great philosopher Mick Jagger once said, ‘You can’t always get what you want.’”

Before he was aware of doing it, he snaked his arm around her waist and pinned her against the wall with a forearm wedged right under her breasts. And time slowed to a crawl. They both stood there, breathing heavily, each of them waiting to see what the other would do. Her eyes snapped with annoyance, but her mandarin arousal effervesced on his tongue, filled his head. Scarlett might deny it with her eyes, with her words, but her body couldn’t lie about her desire. Reluctant desire, to be sure, he admitted to himself, but it was there, regardless.

She squirmed under his arm.
Shit, he was pressing too hard.
He eased back, her movements brushing the underside of her fleece-covered breasts against the sensitive hair on his forearm.
No bra.
He was actually touching her again—something he’d consigned to his memories, to fevered dreams which made him sweat through his bed sheets, and awaken with his hand moving on his hard, aching flesh.

Despite being pinned up against a wall, she wasn’t pulling away from him, wasn’t saying no. If anything, her taste was darkening, deepening, and her hips tipped toward his body as if pulled by a magnet. She watched his mouth with dilated pupils that practically dared him to do something, anything. When her soft pink tongue licked her chapped lips, Lukas could practically see his common sense shake its head, reach for the popcorn, and settle back to enjoy the show.

He leaned in with his body, lightly and carefully fusing them together from torso to knee.
So thin,
Lukas thought. Christ, he could feel her very bones. Stroking her delicate cheekbones with his thumbs, he clasped her head in his hands. Scarlett latched onto his wrists—to stop him? To pull him closer? A whisper-soft moan escaped from her lips, giving him his answer.

It had been so long.
He lowered his head slowly, centimeter by centimeter, waiting for her to call a halt to this mutual psychosis. It would kill him to stop, but if she asked him to, he’d find a way to do it. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his waist and stood on tiptoe to bring her lips closer to his. Her hot breath puffed against his chin, and he leaned down to—

The conference room door opened not three feet from where Lukas plastered Scarlett to the wall with his body
.
Sasha eyed them both, raising a brow. “Scarlett, you’re finally out of the tub.” Her nostrils twitched, then she smiled mischievously. “Are you… coming?”

What the hell was he doing?
He peeled himself away. Watching Scarlett sag, then support herself against the wall sent every predatory cell in his body to howling.
Get away. Now
. “I’ve got work to do.” Lukas mentally swore at his sister’s knowing grin, her damn twitching nose, her horrible/fabulous timing, at his hypersensitive dick. He quickly turned away from them and stalked down the hall toward Sasha’s office.

It was too much to hope that his sister hadn’t noticed the erection tenting his jeans.

Reaching Sasha’s office, he barged in and closed the door behind him. Striding to the beat-up mini-fridge, he grabbed a Coke and gulped it, trying to wash Scarlett’s taste off his lips, out of his mouth. He shook his head to clear it, and acknowledged that—yes, even half-wrecked and wiped out—all Scarlett Fontaine had to do was breathe in his general vicinity, and he was as intoxicated, as addicted, as ever.

Nothing had changed.

He slumped into Sasha’s doll-sized desk chair, ignoring its squeaking protest. He’d probably bruised Scarlett’s upper arms with his grasp.

Again, nothing had changed.

***

As Lukas finished his phone call with Gideon, he heard the conference room door slam down the hall. Footsteps pounded, becoming less audible as Scarlett beat feet away from the meeting. He could taste her fury from here.

“Thanks for the update, Gideon. Keep in touch.”

Lukas ended the call and looked at his watch. Fewer than twenty minutes had passed since his sister had stopped him from doing something monumentally stupid, something he wouldn’t be able to take back. He didn’t quite have his equilibrium back, and he was kicking his own ass for leaving it to Jack to break the news of his involvement in tonight’s show to Scarlett and her business manager, Garrett Wilder.

Thankfully Gideon had called with an update, giving him something else to focus on, because he’d flooded Sasha’s office with pheromones she’d be able to read as easily as the children’s book
Go Dog. Go!

Damn it.

Okay, what had happened—had almost happened—with Scarlett really wasn’t that big a deal. Nothing had changed, really. He and Scarlett did not talk, didn’t interact in anything other than the most desultory fashion, and then only if forced to by the presence of others. They certainly didn’t touch. Touch lips, especially. Or grope each other. Like they just had.

He dropped his head into his hands.

Sasha’s high-heeled boots tap-tap-tapped down the hallway, and he quickly sat up and adjusted the front of his pants as the door opened. Sasha theatrically sniffed, then made a wafting motion with her hand that only Lukas could see while she finished her conversation with Scarlett’s business manager.

It sounded like Scarlett had left no one in the conference room with any doubt about how she felt about Lukas’s involvement in the night’s plans. The corners of his mouth kicked up as he envisioned the scene. At least he’d catalyzed some reaction in her. Even rage was better than that scary void he’d sensed earlier.

“We’re late for sound check,” Garrett was saying. “We’d better count Scarlett out. She was, um, quite agitated when she left the meeting, wasn’t she?”

“Let her work off her mad. We really don’t need her,” Sasha said. “All we really need to do is reacquaint the band with the sound system. Shouldn’t take long.”

Garrett finally noticed Lukas sitting at Sasha’s desk and came into the office to shake his hand. “Lukas,” he said. “I heard about Andi. How is she? Are you any closer to finding who did this to her?”

No, because I’m stuck here babysitting your client.
“She’s holding her own,” he answered.

“She’s too damn stubborn to do anything else,” Sasha added.

“Yes, that she is.” Garrett put a hand in the front pocket of his tailored Italian pants. “Well, despite Scarlett’s feelings on the matter”—he exchanged a rueful glance with Sasha—“I’m glad you’ll be on board tonight.”

“She knows that it would be flat-out stupid to not have every hand on deck.” Sasha glanced at Lukas. “And when Jack told her it was Claudette who’d requested additional security coverage…” She shrugged. “There wasn’t much she could say. Which pissed her off even more.”

Lukas felt a muscle tick in his jaw. While he appreciated Sasha’s oblique message, he wasn’t about to hide behind Claudette’s designer skirts. And first things first. He nailed Wilder with his gaze. “What’s wrong with Scarlett?”

The werewolf hesitated, clearly about to say “nothing,” but changing his mind. “I think she’s just… exhausted.”

“You think? Isn’t it your job to know?” Lukas leaned forward, and the chair squeaked in protest. “And what the hell are you doing about it? Jesus, anyone can see she’s about to drop, that she’s nothing but skin and bones.” He voiced one of his concerns. “Is she using?”

“Using? What, drugs?” Garrett’s laughter was spontaneous and genuine. “Hell, no. She was ready to fire her last drummer because he wouldn’t go to rehab and get help. He died before she could do it.”

“Eating disorder?” Lukas suggested. “Has she seen a doctor?”

“Her appetite’s been off a little, and yeah, she’s lost some weight. But bulimia? No. There’s no way you can live on a tour bus and keep something like that a secret. She’s been getting plenty of sleep, staying hydrated, not partying.” Garrett sighed. “She says she’s fine. Being she’s a competent adult, I have to take her word for it.”

“Why the hell would you do that? Her judgment’s obviously not worth shit right now.” Lukas pushed the vase of mums sitting on the corner of Sasha’s desk out of his way. Their cheerful color annoyed him. “Why didn’t you cancel some dates, make her take a break?”

“You seem to be under some mistaken impression here,” Garrett replied dryly. “I work for her, not the other way around. She wanted to stay on the road, so…” he gestured with his hand, “we stayed on the road.”

“And you couldn’t influence a weakened, shaky woman to change her mind?” Lukas said as he stood up, not even attempting to hide the derision in his voice.

“Lukas.” Sasha stepped between them.

Garrett budged Sasha out of the way. “No, he’s right, Sasha. Scarlett insisted we stay on the road, finish out the bookings. I don’t know why, but there it is. The good thing is that the tour is over after tonight’s performance. She’s home, and she can rest. If you have questions about Scarlett’s health, you need to ask her yourself.”

Garrett’s PDA chirped. He extracted it from the breast pocket of his suit jacket, glancing at the small display. “Tansy,” he said to Sasha. “She’s asking if sound check is being pushed back.” He quickly text-messaged a response. “If we don’t go now, Tansy will drag those boys of hers off for some afternoon delight. Then the rest of them will scatter and I won’t be able to find anyone for hours. We have to go. Now.”

“Start walking. I’ll be right behind you,” Sasha said.

“If you happen to see Scarlett before I do, please let her know I need the set list as soon as she can swing it. God knows where her head will be at tonight,” he muttered as he left the office. “We could be listening to anything from Gregorian chants to Marilyn Manson.”

Sasha pursed her lips as she watched him walk away. “That is one excellent ass.” She shut the door behind her and rolled her shoulders.

“He’s lucky I didn’t carve it into rump roast.”

“He’s just doing his job, Lukas. Cut him some slack. You know how stubborn Scarlett can get.” Sasha made a beeline for the lime green crushed velvet love seat. “I need to sit down for a few minutes.”