CHAPTER FOUR
O liver teleported back to his room in The Institute mansion and let out a curse.
Fuck.
He threw back his head and ran his hand through his hair.
What a fuckup.
Before he’d teleported away, he’d done a patch job on the window lock. Thank God the glass hadn’t broken.
Piper had climbed back into bed and curled up, as he’d instructed her to. He’d stood over her for a moment taking in her dark long hair fanned out over her pillows, and now she wasn’t able to speak, her beautiful face reflected peace. She nearly looked like a well-mannered member of society.
He knew differently.
She was a pain in the ass.
There was no way he could focus on work until he did something about the rod in his pants, so he ripped off his clothes and stepped into the shower in his bathroom. Soaping up his body, he closed his eyes and recalled the moments her legs widened, and she’d slipped the vibrator beneath her boxer shorts.
Oliver palmed his cock and slid his hand up and down tightly.
Skillfully, Piper had circled her purple device through her moisture and moaned into the night air. Then he’d heard her turn up the speed.
He cupped his balls and groaned, slamming his other hand on the shower wall.
Bit by bit she’d pressed it inside and her body had arched into it, eager for more. Eager for him.
That was when he’d fallen inside.
Time to change the ending. At least in his head.
He imagined himself flying over to her bed and ripping off the little red shorts. She would gasp as he tied her wrists and kept them up and away so he could taste her as he pleased.
Making his way down her body, his mouth suckling her nipples, she would cry out. Then his hands would spread her wider, his breath hot at her core as she begged for his mouth.
Fuck.
Jerk.
He was close.
He needed to see the rest. To see her come. His tongue would lengthen to taste her wet, glistening pussy as her hips lifted.
And... he came all over his hand.
Oliver groaned almost painfully as he stroked the last of it out. Every goddamn day he’d been doing this.
It had to end.
Thinking about Ari’s mate’s sister was not going to end well. Piper was a distraction, and they had a lot going on right now.
He wasn’t going to disappoint Ari.
“You are a disappointment, boy.” Oliver recalled the moment he heard those words from his father. They were some of the last.
He wouldn’t make that mistake again.
Not for a female.
Not one that wasn’t his mate, and neither Piper nor Angela Glass were his mate. Angela had been nothing more than a neighbor. Her husband had worked with his father. Most of the humans in the hood thought Oliver was his father’s brother, visiting from New York because of the age. He was in his early twenties by that point and his father a mature vampire. None of them ever looked older than thirty so most just told humans they were siblings.
It was the year 1959, and their street looked like something out of Pleasantville. His father worked the nightshift with Angela’s husband, Bobby, at the Ford manufacturing plant.
They often got together for barbeques and after one fourth of July party it had been clear that Angela was not happy in her marriage. Her eyes on Oli’s biceps was one big giveaway but when her gaze had drifted south, he’d been sure.
Their eyes had met, and then she’d bitten her lip.
It hadn’t taken much from there.
His father had gone to work and his mother to a book club group, when a quiet knock on the door had interrupted him reading a book. When he opened the door and saw her standing on the doorstep in a pretty Sunday-type dress, neither of them had said a word. He’d just opened the door wider, and she’d come inside.
“You shouldn’t be here, Angela, darlin’,” Oliver had said.
“I know.”
He’d stepped forward, frowning, and lifted her arm. The short-sleeved dress had revealed the bruising he’d spotted on her before. “He do this to you?”
She nodded.
Oliver had shaken his head, furious.
“You need to leave him.” Even he knew it wasn’t that simple.
“Please, I just want—”
“I know what you want.”
Fast-forward thirty minutes and she was lying underneath him, panting as she came down from her second orgasm.
Twelve hours later and his father was yelling at him.
“She’s a married woman. To Bobby, for God’s sake. What were you thinking? I’m ashamed to call you my son.”
“He’s fucking beating her,” Oliver had yelled back.
“So, you fuck her?” his father had retorted. “How is that going to help her? So selfish.”
“What in the Sam Hill is going on here? Please, both of you. Stop.” His mother had tried to break up the fight.
“You aren’t human. She’s not your mate. You cannot disappear with her and solve all her problems.” His father continued with his judgments.
“Fine. I’ll kill the bastard,” Oliver said.
“Jesus F. Christ.” His father had looked at his mother. “Can you hear this kid? Who raised him?”
Oliver had shaken his head. “I am not a goddamn kid. I am twenty-three years old.”
“A baby vamp.”
His fangs had crept out and his father had shaken his head.
“You’re a disappointment, Oliver. A man does not fuck around with another man’s wife,” he’d said. “I’m going to bed.”
A man doesn’t lift a hand to a female. That had been his last thought as his father walked away.
That night, he’d woken to the sound of his mother wailing. The cops were on the doorstep. His father had been the victim of a gunshot wound, right in the goddamn heart. Anywhere else and he would have healed himself.
Not in the heart. Knife, sword, bullet. It was all the same.
Damage that organ and a vampire was dead.
He’d never gotten the opportunity to prove to his father that he was a good male.
A worthy male.
He’d stayed to take care of his mother, but within two years she had taken her life, as mates did.
They couldn’t survive long without the other.
Oliver had packed up and moved to Las Vegas, where he’d filled his life with drinking, fucking, gambling, and fighting.
He’d even tried to numb the pain with human drugs, but they did nothing but make him feel nauseous. Still, the drugs had connected him with some bad-ass guys and even hotter women.
The city was the perfect place for a vampire. During the day while he slept, most people thought he was sleeping off the effects of the wild nights.
And they weren’t wrong.
Still, his life was going nowhere.
He fought drunken idiots working as a bouncer at the Golden Nugget casino and sunk his cock into fast women. The gig was filling his pockets nicely but doing nothing to prove he was any better than his father had said he was.
Until Ari.
Ari Moretti had turned up one day, dressed top to toe in Pierre Cardin that Oliver knew cost more than he’d make in a year.
He’d instantly recognized him as a vampire and a powerful one. The male had gone about his business, checking into the hotel, and attending meetings. For two nights, he watched the powerful vampire meet with influential casino bosses and other dangerous people.
And he knew the male was watching him back.
One night he’d been out on the strip just hanging with some guys, keeping an eye on a group of local girls—who were trashed—when some out-of-state cars had rolled in.
His body had stiffened, sensing something instinctively, and he’d nudged his pal.
They both turned as Ari and two of the local mob bosses walked out of the casino. Suddenly he’d heard the windows in the vehicles being wound down and the slide of gun barrels being pulled back.
Semi’s.
Think fast.
Take out the gunman or save the people around him?
His eyes darted to Ari’s, and the male nodded at him and then the cars.
Got it.
Oliver had turned back to the still-moving vehicles and found the gunmen.
Plural.
He pushed his pal to the ground and moved. Fucking fast. He couldn’t stop the vehicles or get the humans, but he could get to the metal.
In one, two and three, he whipped the weapons out of their hands and sped down the alleyway, dropping them into the dumpster.
Job done.
Everyone around him was confused and stunned. He’d put on the same act and played along.
Later that night, Ari had sought him out and drew him into the shadows. “Not many males can move like that.”
Oliver had smirked, enjoying the praise.
“Oh great, another fucking smart-ass.” Ari had rolled his eyes.
Oli’s eyes had narrowed. “Excuse me?”
“I have a proposal for you,” Ari had said, ignoring the question. “But you’ll need to clean your act right up. I can change your life if you want it.”
Fortunately, he’d been smart enough to do just that.
Now he’d been given the incredible opportunity to not just be an assassin at The Institute, but the head assassin. A job he’d been promoted to because Ben had resigned.
The title was not yet earned, but Oliver was determined to prove himself.
And he would.
Piper and her sweet, damn pussy needed to just get out of his goddamn mind. He wasn’t going to fuck this up. He would prove to Ari he was worthy of this job if it was the last thing he ever did.
And yeah, fucking Ari’s sister-in-law was definitely not on his to-do list.