Nemi offered a worried twitter.Shit.The last thing I needed was to be exhausted, and so fucking horny that my mind was shot.
My survival with this crew relied on me being in perfect and precise control. This was the furthest thing from it—a betrayal from within. As another pulse shot through me, I cursed. The merc to my left had his hand on his crotch, rubbing while he groaned. “Ain’t gunna make it to the bloody brothel,” he muttered as he began to hump his hand.
“One early won’t matter,” stated another, with his hand busy beneath his cloak. “It lasts for hours.”
Hoursof losing control over one’s body in the presence of lethal mercenaries. Even if we were supposed to be on the same side, it wasn’t something I wanted to be doing.
I needed to get away from them.
After our visit a couple of hours earlier, thecasa de putas’smanagement was unusually eager to please. Slade took us in, and the owner’s wife was very attentive. Understandable, considering it would be a while before her husband could walk.
“I want them all, for the entire night,” Slade told her. And she nodded as if that was the best idea in the world, instead of denying her an entire night’s proceeds.
The mercs pounced eagerly on the waiting females. One sidled up to me, and her hands slipped under my cloak. One stroke and every nerve I possessed burst into flame.
“Ooo, you’re an eager one,” she purred, and then fluttered her eyes at me. “I’d ask if you want me, but I have my answer.” She leaned close, brushing me teasingly with her breasts. “Say please, and I’m yours.”
My stomach clenched. Her request rang like a subtle power play. I wanted to get my rocks off. Very badly. And for just a moment, I wanted to lose control. To just let the night unfold…
But it was all rather pointless if I ended up dead. Which I just might, if I ceded control to the Poletuber juice. Buried in lust, my guard would drop…
So I gritted my teeth, and hissed, “I always call the shots. And I don’t say please. Ever.” My earcuff kept tingling, as if I was allergic to the metal, but all I could think of was that I had to get out of there. My pelvis arched helplessly into her hand, but I grabbed her wrist and removed her fingers from what throbbed beneath them.
She pouted. “What’s wrong?” Her eyes followed Nemi, and the hummingbird darted out from my shoulder to scold the prostitute with a series of angry-sounding chirps.
I looked across the room and met Slade’s gaze. It was fastened on me, assessing. Yet he’d waved away the female attentions himself.
“Just not my idea of fun, sweetheart,” I drawled, and moved toward Slade. He watched me approach, his lids dropping.
“You got sleeping quarters for me?” I asked.
“You aren’t staying?” He looked from me to Nemi hovering around my head, and back again. Both his expression, and his voice, were totally deadpan.
“This isn’t my kind of party,” I said.
“You don’t like females?”
I took a deep breath. My survival depended on developing a connection to this guy. And sometimes the truth was the best way to break down barriers. “I don’t like losing control. And this juice is all about that.”
He detected the honesty in my reply, and his eyes lit sapphire. “Be back by dawn, boys,” he called to the mercs vanishing up the stairs.
“Aww, boss, won’t be done by then,” one dared complain.
Slade pinned him with a glance. “Not negotiable.”
Reluctant nods all around.
Rigid and aching, I followed Slade out the door and back into the night. With Nemi once again on my shoulder, I trailed along in silence as he took us to the stronghold.
It was a smaller place than the one in Drosfi. Moss clogged the walls, and the rain cascaded off the steep roof to form puddles throughout the courtyard.
The guards at the front gate dipped their chins to Slade. It was a relief to get under cover, and we shook water off our cloaks.
My entire body trembled with the power of what coursed through me, so it was all I could do to not rub myself against the closest wall. Slade must have picked up some of it.
“Poletuber juice is powerful stuff.” He eyed me. “You may come to regret your choices.” Then he guffawed at his little pun.
“All I regret,” I ground out, “is not bashing that fucking Dire in thecojones.”
