Page 19 of The Vampire's Thirst
As she brought it down, the temperature dropped, a chill breeze hitting Dax’s face as she drew power from him like a witch. He flew off the bed, and his body slammed into the wall so hard plaster crumbled. Dazed, he pushed off, brushed dust from his chest, and shook his head. “What the hell!”
Chapter Five
“Letthe guys handle those.” Skyler Maxwell, a Blood Coven descendant and Alliance chief legal officer, patted her administrative assistant’s shoulder.
Instead of bending to grab a packed box, Anna straightened. “We have so much to carry out.”
“Sit and relax. Kole hired a bunch of oversized Aeternals to load the stuff onto trucks. Our task was to pack. Let them do their jobs.”
A demon entered the office at that moment, twisting his body to squeeze enormous shoulders through the doorway. He brushed a boyish lock of brown hair out of his eyes. “What next?”
Anna pointed to the corner, a mischievous grin lighting her face. “Those.”
The guy bent over with his tight backside exposed to their view, flashing muscle as he lifted three heavy boxes.
Both women winked at each other.
“You’re right, boss. This is much better.” Anna sat on a chair, cocked her heels onto a box, and shimmied her skirt up to show more leg. “Did you get a load of those thick arms? Of course, he has nothing on your Kole.”
Another mover strode into the room, his eyes scanning Anna’s legs. “Those?”
She nodded. Once he left, laden with boxes, the admin assistant clicked her stilettos to the floor. “I might have to help him.”
“You do that.”
Skyler patted her sleek bun, not a hair out of place. The employees were scattering, some to less well-known Alliance offices on Earth but others to Scath where the Scion Firebrands offered to provide quarters for the human organization which assisted Aeternals. Each Alliance employee’s veins contained a smidgeon of nonhuman blood, most of it from the time of the Schism over fifteen hundred years ago. Barely a drop in the old DNA bucket.
Skyler glanced up, sensing her mate before she saw him. His innate power nearly knocked her over as he thundered into her office, his boots pounding on the tile.
“Frisca, what the fuck’s taking so long?”
No romantic greetings from her man. Still, he took her breath away, her gladiator with his stony jaw, buzz-cut hair, and blazing red-gold eyes, an animus demon whose fire burned near the surface. And talk about thick muscled arms. No one beat Kole in that department.
He swept those arms around her and, with a hand to the back of her head, pressed her against his solid, mile-wide chest where she was warm and safe.
“You’re messing my hair.”
He tugged on her once-neat bun. Pulling her head back, he pressed his lips to her mouth. No gentle kiss. His tongue urged entry, and she gave it willingly. After making her heart thump madly, he deserted her. “Now your lipstick’s messy, too.”
“So are you.” She wiped a red smudge from his mouth.
“I’m taking you out now.”
Kole excelled at barking orders. But she didn’t always obey. “I’ll be the last to leave my offices, demon. Don’t even think about telling me when to go.”
He gave her his lopsided grin which usually got him his way.
Not this time.
“Stubborn female. Then I’ll help.” He stacked five heavy boxes, lifted them, and lumbered toward the outer office.
Skyler shoved stray papers into an empty container. Contracts for a new company, trade agreements, things she loved working on every day. She hoped to run her operation from Scath or to find a safe location on Earth.
Kole returned, the air vibrating with his energy. “Anna’s out. Ditto Laura, your paralegals, and your assistants. All the boxes are loaded and headed for a remote portal. All other divisions have vacated. You’re next, Frisca. Am I going to have to carry you?”
Skyler trailed a hand along the familiar wood of the doorway, looking around to say goodbye. Here was where a techy betrayed the Alliance by selling gateway locations to Dante, a human who turned out to be Ram’s father-in-law. The Englishman, a co-conspirator with Cerberus, created his own small army to get back at the satyr Firebrand whom he blamed for his daughter’s death. The greedy mole compromised not only several portals but possibly Alliance headquarters.
Here was where her grandfather and father had worked as chief legal officers. Here was her first job out of college. Here was where the board appointed her as her father’s successor when he died. It may not have been the life she would have chosen, but she had molded it into something good, something worthwhile.
