Matt… Malcolm moved away along the line of tables without another glance in his direction. Like a lot of the staff he was human, so Tiny didn’t have to worry much about being snuck up on. Carefully, he opened his palm again, hoping the marks would be gone.
No such luck. They were still there, as plain as if a tattooist had taken a needle to his skin. Not tattoos, he decided, pulling the skin this way and that. They didn’t move like tattoos on the skin. Tiny had enough of those, although his demonic blood broke them down after a few weeks, and he kept having to go have them redone. So he knew how a tattoo reacted on the skin. No, these marks were under the skin somehow…
He sighed and closed his palm. He knew what they were. Vampire marks.
Somehow Cassia had marked him. Tiny’s expression set, his lips compressing into a thin, hard line. The question was… why?
* * *
“No, no, no. You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Cassia wailed as she studied the palm of her hand and the symbols etched across the skin for all the world to see. Symbols which would tell another vampire she’d bonded with a mate.
She looked up and into her bathroom mirror, haunted brown eyes staring back at her. This wasn’t happening, it couldn’t be happening. She didn’t need or want a mate.
Especially not when…
“No!” The blood drained out of her reflection’s face. There was only one way a vampire bonded with his or her mate -- the combination of sex and blood. The only guy she’d had sex with recently had been the sexy as hell demon at Moonlight & Magic.
“Crap. This is not good.” She couldn’t be bonded to a demon. She shouldn’t even have given him the bloody time of day, let alone gotten down and dirty with him.
Cass stared at the marks again, hoping they’d have already faded, or better yet, been a figment of her imagination. No such luck. They were still there, clear dark symbols against her pale flesh.
Her brow furrowed. How had she managed to bond to him? She’d made sure there hadn’t been a blood exchange. Because, whilst there were a few things she could think of more unpleasant than being addicted to demon blood, they were the sort of things she never intended to try out -- like getting her arms and legs ripped off by a were-dragon, or heading on into the dark plains to find a Medusa to irritate.
Somehow, though, even without the blood exchange, she had bonding marks all over her palm. How the hell… Was it even possible to bond with a demon? More importantly, how was she going to keep quiet about the fact she had?
Realizing she was still staring at herself in the mirror Cass dropped her gaze to the offending marks again. Perhaps she could just cut her hand off and have done with it? No, that would hurt like hell.
She’d once had to regrow the tip of a finger after an accident with a Keres demon and an industrial steel press. That had been bad enough. She could only imagine what regrowing the whole damn hand would feel like.
As soon as the idea occurred to her, though, it wouldn’t let go. She had to get rid of these marks somehow, but cutting her hand off wasn’t the only solution. Padding barefoot back into her bedroom she sat on the bed and pulled the lamp over so she could get a better look at the marks.
Ignoring the small quiver in the region of her heart, she studied her palm.
Bonded mates were rare. Every vampire girl dreamed someday -- if she was lucky -- she would meet Mr. Perfect and wake one evening with these marks on her hand. Cass hadn’t been born a vamp, but even she’d bought into the romantic dream of a bond-mate.
Using her fingertips she manipulated the skin of her palm under the light. The mark wasn’t on the skin, more under the skin, like something had been inserted there.
Her full lips compressed into a thin line.
Turning, she grabbed her purse from the other side of the bed and rifled through it. In the chaos that reigned supreme in the bottom, she located her knife. Pulling it free from the bag, she released the blade with a practiced flick of her finger and considered her palm again. This was going to hurt…
* * *
There was blood on the air. Tiny might not have been a vampire, but his senses were still acute enough to pick up the scent of new blood. Not surprising since vampires were a form of demon, just not one from this world.
Tiny didn’t know the full story as to how they’d ended up in this world, and he didn’t much care. It was a secret both races kept religiously. It was also the reason demons and vampires didn’t get along; they were too alike.
Tiny checked the card in his hand again and looked up at the apartment building. It had taken him a while to track her down, but there weren’t many people who could remain hidden from a demon of Tiny’s power for long. What did surprise him was the fairly “normal” looking building. Didn’t vampires need to sleep in their graves? Or was that another myth interfering with the facts?
The scent of blood got stronger, a sweet, almost tantalizing scent. Tiny’s nose twitched. It smelt good, good enough to eat. His stomach rebelled at the same time his mind rejected the idea. He wasn’t a bloodsucker, no way, no how. So no blood should smell that good.
He climbed out of the car, his tall frame unfolding from the seat and stretching as he eased muscles cramped from the long drive. Never having driven for so many hours straight, he was in agony, but driving had been the quickest way here, and he’d needed speed. He’d only managed twenty-four hours off work. It was the most he could swing at late notice without telling Jaren what he needed time off for. An explanation he couldn’t give. Tiny couldn’t see the vampire-hating incubus being understanding about his need to track down a vampire he couldn’t get out of his head.
The tall demon snorted to himself. Yeah, Jaren was more likely to slap him in a straitjacket and cart him off to the paranormal equivalent to a mental ward. Probably slap him around a little en route for his sheer stupidity. Jaren was one demon who held the ancient enmity between vampire and demon close to his heart.
He heard her before he saw her, a feminine muttering emerging from the other side of the door as he approached the building. He smelled her before she came into view. The fragrance of a new wound hung on the air like an exotic fragrance. Tiny’s brow furrowed. What was up with him? He’d never been this sensitive to fresh blood before.
The door opened and she was there, a frustrated expression on her heart-shaped face which disappeared when she saw him. Her eyes widened in recognition and anger.
“You!”
“Me?” Tiny leaned one shoulder against the doorframe. By the gods, she was glorious when she was mad. Her eyes flashed with fire, her features came alive and even her hair crackled with energy.
“Yeah, you! You’re the bloody problem!” she snapped, advancing on him and jabbing him in the chest. Tiny noticed two things at the same moment. One, her eyes were wet with what looked suspiciously like tears and two, her hand was bandaged.
He grabbed her wrist, careful not to put any pressure on the dressing over her palm. His eyes narrowed as he registered the placement. “What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
Anger hit him broadside, washing over him as he twisted her palm upwards and stripped the dressing away with quick, efficient movements. She struggled, swearing at him, but Tiny ignored her as he revealed her palm. Or rather the mess she’d made.
She’d tried to carve the marks out of her palm. But she hadn’t managed it. Blood oozed around the ragged edges criss-crossing her palm and in one section the skin was missing completely. Almost as if she thought by removing the skin she could remove the mark. It hadn’t worked; the mark was still there in the flesh below. His lips compressed as he looked up at her, his gaze glittering and hard.
“Doesn’t look like nothing to me. I was going to ask you what these were,” he said, holding his own hand up, the palm decorated with similar markings. “They’re obviously not something good if you tried to do this. Fancy cluing me in any time soon?”
“Go screw yourself.” She snatched her hand back, cradling it against her chest as she pulled a clean handkerchief from her pocket to use as a dressing. Worry threaded through his chest, winding around the anger. What were these marks and why had she tried to get rid of them in such a drastic manner?
“Tell me.” His hands curled around her upper arms to drag her hard against him. Perhaps a little harder than he intended, but when the result was her br**sts pressing again his chest in such a manner, he wasn’t going to apologize.
She flicked her hair back over her shoulders and glared up at him in challenge.
“Or what?”
Tiny dropped his head back, his eyes closed as he prayed for strength. This woman was going to be the death of him. “Never challenge a demon.” His voice strained, he counted to ten, a hundred… hell, he might as well go for broke and make it a thousand.
“Why?”
He jerked his head up, the look in his eyes feral and dark. The fierce challenge in her eyes wavered for a moment, as though she was unsure. As well she might be.
Demons weren’t the most stable of creatures, and being in the arms of a pissed-off, sexually frustrated demon probably wasn’t the best place in the world to be. Tiny smiled as he watched the realization enter her eyes.
He slid a large hand into her hair and cupped her nape. The bones of her neck seemed so delicate and fragile as his large fingers stroked them, applying pressure to tilt her lips up to his. “Because,” he breathed through lips barely a hair’s-breadth from hers, “we like it. It gets us… me… hot.”
He took her lips, biting back a groan at the sensation. They were like cool silk beneath his. Luscious and full, they quivered for a moment under his sensual assault, but the softest brush of his tongue against her lower lip had her opening for him.
Triumph washed through him like the incoming tide. Tiny murmured in pleasure, and drew her deeper into his embrace to deepen the kiss. It felt good -- felt right -- and to hell with anyone who said it was wrong.
When he lifted his head a moment later, they were both breathing raggedly.
Need and something else, something softer Tiny didn’t want to define, raged through his blood. It urged him to pull her outside into the darkness in the lee of the building, and slake the thirst which claimed him.
Their eyes locked in a long moment of shared, stunned realization. Tiny watched the darkness flare in her eyes, matching the darkness racing through his own body. She wanted this as much as he did.
“Your place? Or mine?” The question was more of a plea than he wanted to think about. Naked need and longing rang in his voice. He wanted her and he didn’t care what he had to do to get her where he needed her, on her back under him.
She didn’t answer. The seconds ticked by as she studied his eyes, her own going from one to the other as though looking for the answer to an unknown question. Finally she nodded, her lips pursed for a second before she smiled. “My place, on one condition.”
“Which is?”
“This time, I’m in charge.”
Chapter Five
Cass, what the hell are you doing? This is such a bad idea. The thoughts circled in Cassia’s head as she turned to lead her demon lover back up to her apartment. How he’d found her, she didn’t know, but as soon as she’d seen the marks on her palm she’d known he would come for her. Bonded mates couldn’t stay away from each other for long. Not even, it seemed, when one of them wasn’t a vampire but a demon instead.