Chapter 12

With Zee wounded,I was happy to take the reins, even with Reynard watching from the shadows. I kissed down Zee's jaw, his neck, and skimmed my tongue across his collarbone, tasting that uniquely warm sweetness of demon.

He loosely gripped my forearms, holding on, and purred in appreciation.

Maybe it was all in my head, but with Reynard's gaze on us, the electric lust that always buzzed between Zee and me had sparked to life in seconds, scorching my veins after just a few touches. It could also be that we hadn't been intimate since freeing Zee from Seb, but it felt like more.

Then I remembered the wards, and my curse. And its risk. I straightened, straddling him.

Zee's face fell. "Oh fuck, what now?"

"It's just... So, uhm..." I scratched my nose. This was going to get awkward. And I really, really wanted this to happen, but also... "There's this thing."

"Fuck. Unless its fatal, can't it wait?"

I blinked.

"It's fucking fatal?" Zee flopped his head back. "Is it worse than magic jizz?"

"Adam?" Reynard's voice poured from the dark and ran like warm honey down my spine.

"Oh my fuck." Zee breathed in. "Baby, you're so fucking bright I don't care if it's gonna kill me. I'll die happy."

He'd told me about the parasitic sperm, so... "So, there's this thing. With me. Just a little thing. A tiny little problem, really."

"Problem?" Reynard's voice poured through me again, and Zee groaned, which in turn, had my veins filling with lava and my dick aching hard. This was fast becoming one of those domino situations, where one reaction led to another—or was it a snowball? A really hot, steaming snowball.

"Kitten, talk to me or fuck me. But do something, before I flip you over and hammer you like a tent peg."

Reynard's grumbling growl ramped the energy in the room up to eleven.

Zee arched. "Fuck, vampire, stop with the growls or I'll give you something to growl about."

"Victor." I twisted, still straddling Zee, and found Reynard in the chair, his eyes shining in the dark. "If anything odd happens, you need to stop me, okay?"

"Odd, such as . . . ?"

"Like... I don't know... maybe... if my uh... the glamor I'm not admitting to wearing begins to fail or a totally random and not in any way related curse kicks in and tries to kill Zee?" There. I'd said it. I dropped forward, and smacked a kiss on Zee's mouth, silencing whatever his reply would have been. His eyes had blown wide, but he couldn't ask me what I was through them, so it was all good.

Reynard growled, "I'll protect you both."

Zee grabbed my arms, and pushed me up. "You're fucking cursed?"

A nervous laugh fell from my lips. "Oh, it's just a silly thing." I lunged to kiss him again, but he turned his head.

"Who cursed you, Kitten?"

"I did." I dropped forward and kissed all the rest of his questions away, swallowing them deep, where they could never be spoken. He didn't respond, not at first, just glared while I tried to eat his mouth, but then I shoved my hand down, under his belt, and wrapped my fingers around his heavy cock. What had he said? Everything was so much easier when the answer was sex? Well, this was that. He'd probably try and ask questions later, but for now, there was only room for one thing between us. Or two very hard things. And I had hold of his.

I broke the kiss apart. He breathed in, about to blurt out a hundred questions.

I pressed a finger to his lips. "Don't ask, and I'll go down on you."

Zee rolled his lips together and mimed zipping them shut.

Good, because I needed more of him in me, and I needed it now. I fumbled with his fly, the job of freeing him so much harder when he was as hard as an iron bar. But I did eventually unwrap him, then shuffled downward, off the bed, onto my knees between his, and swallowed his generous dick down.

"Oh fuck." Zee's nails sank into my hair and scraped my scalp.

There was no way I could take all of him. My hand and mouth would have to be enough. From his growls, he seemed to like it—and then there was the added factor of Reynard's glare on us both. Watching. I couldn't see him, or sense his emotions like Zee could, but I could feel the weight of his gaze, and knew he was there. Did he like what he saw? Did he hate it, hate himself? Each new thought ramped my own desire higher.

"Fuck, Kitten, your mouth is even better than your ass."

I rolled my eyes up, and caught sight of the crackling energy sparking through his wings. Then the obvious hit me. Zee was powering the expanding wards. Not me. The snapping shocks between us was that sharing of energy. The lust he gorged on gave him significant power. Zee was the inordinately powerful Lost One, and my curse—and secret—was intact.

"Fuck, baby, imma come if you keep that up, and I don't think our little friends care whether it's your mouth or ass I come in."

I bobbed my head, sucked him down, and brought him to the panting edge of climax, half tempted to swallow his parasitic sperm. But Zee caught me under the chin, and popped me off. His gritted, sharp teeth demanded I finish, but his eyes were pained.

"It's fine," I growled. I shoved him back again, determined to get my fill. If he had magic sperm with teeth, so be it. I was doomed anyway.

Zee caught me, scooting me up with him, so we were eye to eye. "No, it's not."

This time when I straightened, I stayed on the bed, straddling his legs, and pumped his cock in my fist. His tail snaked in, trying to get at my dick still trapped inside my pants. But I wanted him to come, wanted to see his body arch, his skin flush, his nipples peak, and his wings blaze. I wanted to watch all of him come undone in my hands.

"Adam." Reynard's smooth voice, suddenly close, touched me like his hands might. "Permit me this indulgence?"

Whatever he wanted, I was into it. "Yes."

His hands settled on my hips, which meant he stood behind me, against the bed, and between Zee's knees. Mercy, this was blazing hot.

Zee's tail swept up, and coiled around Reynard's wrist. If Reynard noticed, he didn't reveal it. His breaths fluttered at my neck, the bite imminent.

What was he waiting for?

Yes, now!

Zee's chest heaved with every ragged breath. His eyes were open, flicking between my face and Reynard's. He kinda looked furious, but in a ravenous, desperate way. I still pumped him, sensing he was close.

He clutched the bedsheet either side of him, scrunching it in his fists, and flung his head back. Cum dashed his chest, messy and wonderful. I salivated, wanting to lick him clean, but then Reynard's fangs plunged into my neck and my own cresting pleasure surged, lighting me up. With Zee ablaze in purple fire under me, I came so blindingly hard that all thoughts vanished, leaving just the brilliant feeling of Reynard's fangs sliding into my neck, as if his dick was buried deep, and it was all I could do to cling to consciousness, sandwiched between the two most important, brilliant, and dazzling people in my life.

I woke in Zee's bed, smooshed among bright, velvety cushions. My body thrummed, pleasantly warm and drowsy, and I listened to two mummering voices without really hearing the words. Zee and Victor. Talking. Not arguing or slinging insults. Actually talking. This was nice.

But then I caught the words curse, and duke.

They were talking about me.

Oh dear.

Keeping my eyes closed, I willed my heart to slow. If they thought I was awake, they might ask questions about the curse, and the glamor, and why I'd shackled myself in both.

But I didn't want to lose them.

I squeezed my eyes tighter and breathed. Don't ask, don't ask, don't ask.

The bedroom door clicked.

I waited, afraid to look and find Zee staring at me, armed with a million questions.

The bed dipped, and Zee's warmth scooped me up from behind. His arm lay over my waist, tucking my back against his warm chest. "Don't worry, Kitten. I'd cut my own wings off before ever hurting you."

I swallowed and opened my eyes, but I couldn't see him behind me. "I'm not afraid of you. It's..."

"The truth you fear? I know. And like I said, I don't care what you are." His deep, melodic voice soothed my frayed nerves. "Whatever it is, it fixed my fucking wing. Look!" He flung his wing out as I turned, and flexed it so wide the leathery membrane stretched. No bullet hole, no scar. "As good as new. Fucking amazing, is what you are. That's all I care about."

He wasn't going to ask. Not today. But tomorrow, the next day? "You were just talking about me? I heard you."

"Yeah, well... " The wing tucked back in. He shrugged. "Fancy Fangs is concerned about the curse you let slip. He wants to help, and so do I, but that doesn't mean you gotta tell us shit. Also, what we did last night was the hottest fucking thing I've ever gorged on. Like, a billion times hotter than the kinky shit I used to sink my dick into at Razorsedge. A trillion times hotter. Why the fuck did you not tell me Daddy Fuck-Hard is a corked bottle of lust about to pop? Combined with you? I think I broke something. Thankfully, not my dick, since you had hold of that."

"I thought it was obvious?" I snuggled back down, and heaved his arm over me again.

Zee sighed and his words fluttered against my neck. "He's so fucking into me."

I snorted. Finally. "Yah think?"

"He has it so bad for you too. It's fucking him up."

I grabbed Zee's hand and laced his fingers with mine, over my heart. "He needs to know he's safe. Can we do that, you and me?"

"Kitten," he huffed. "The only time he ever has to worry about me is if he hurts you. I've already whipped my eighteen-inch sword out for him. If I'd wanted His Lordship hurt, I'd have done it the first time he stepped from the hotel wards."

"Speaking of the wards." I twisted in his arms again to face him, nose to nose. Oh my stars, his honest eyes, his sassy smirk, his handsome face. My heart swelled, and my dick too, but snuggling right now was more important than sex. He was gorgeous and silly and powerful and mine. "Hey."

"Hey."

"Your eyes are beautiful, Zee. And your horns, the way they sweep. Your hair always smells amazing. And you feel… You feel like there's nowhere else I'd rather be than here, right now, with you. I know you know you're amazing, but you really are."

Warmth colored his cheeks. "You're cute. Half the time I don't know if I want to squish you or fuck you."

"Erm, thanks?" I snorted a laugh and propped myself against his bare chest. "So, anyway, the wards? Every time we've been intimate?—"

"You can say fucked, say it?" He pinched my cheeks, pouting my lips. "Ffffffuuhh?—"

I laughed, and pulled my head free, ruining his puppeting, and flopped down, tucked against his shoulder where I always seemed to fit, as though we were made for each other. "As I was saying. Every time we've been intimate, the power you've produced has boosted the hotel wards."

"My what now?"

I shrugged. "Power, I guess? I don't know. It's not like there's an instruction manual on demon and, uh, human relations."

"There is, actually. It's called the Wilson's Guide. But you tore the D's out." He booped my nose. "Demons were on those pages."

Ah. He'd suspected I'd been the one to remove a few offending pages. "You know, you're not as silly as you look."

"Don't let my exquisitely fuckable appearance and enormous dick fool you. I have an above average IQ."

"Right." I fought not to grin. I loved this fool. Loved him so much it hurt my heart. "When we're together, you and me, it boosts the wards. That's all I know. Madame Matase has noticed, but she doesn't know it's you. You're really powerful, Zee. The probably-should-be-registered kinda powerful."

"Nah." Zee rolled onto his back, and pulled me onto his chest. "You know what I know?"

"Hm?" I circled a fingertip around his nipple.

"I know whenever I've fucked other humans, it doesn't feel like it does with you."

"You must not have had relations with the right humans before."

"Uh-huh. You know what else I know?"

"Hm?"

"Not many humans can take on three demons outside Razoresdge and walk away unscathed, except for some bloody clothes in his laundry basket."

I stopped circling his nipple. He'd known about those demons I'd dispatched then. Had he known immediately, or had he worked it out after?

"And then there's the missing vampire duke," he went on. "The same duke the suckers got all bent out of shape about when we went to get Daddy Vampire back. Vampires are hard to kill. I know, I've killed a lot of 'em. You ever seen a rabbit kill a wolf? No, because it doesn't happen, Kitten. I don't think you're the prey in any of these scenarios. I think you're a wolf trying really hard to be a rabbit so nobody notices you've got teeth."

Tilting my head up, I caught him looking down his chest at me. "I'm just me."

He smiled, not buying it. "I'm just sayin', if the time comes when you need my help, the real you I mean, I'm here. I'll always be here for you. Rabbit or wolf."

"Okay." I snuggled against his chest, my heart and head wrapped in post-sex fluffiness. Usually, after having Reynard's fangs in me, I woke drained, but not this time. Maybe there was something important in the three of us and how it made us stronger? I'd think about it later. "Where did Victor go?"

"To set up a meeting with Kris's contact, Agatha de La Cour. Reynard Technologies is branching out into the illegal beauty business. I told him it won't fucking work. The fae didn't get to be San Francisco's number one crime syndicate by being dumb fucks. But Lord Fuck-Hard never listens because I think with my dick."

"Did he say that?" I assumed he had, since Zee had donned his Reynard voice, but it didn't sound like something Reynard would say.

"No, but he was thinking it the whole time behind his resting bitch face."

"So..." I finger-walked up his chest. "You two talked?"

"Nope. You passed out, we tidied up, made sure you were safe and comfortable, then I showered while he brooded in the chair, stewing in a fuck ton of emo vampire feelings."

"You didn't talk about those feelings?"

"Ha. Ha. Fuck no. He said it didn't happen. I agreed. Then he went on to say how curses are bad news blah blah, Daddy Vampire noises, protect Adam—duh—and he'd see to it the SSD left us alone."

"How's he going to do that?"

"Who the fuck knows? He's a shady fuck. I don't trust anyone who looks hot wearing fucking old-man suspenders."

"He does look hot in suspenders."

"So fucking hot. And that shit he does with his voice? Fuck. Me. I hate him."

"Yeah, me too," I fake agreed.

Zee huffed a laugh, and we settled into a comfortable silence, listening to the hotel groan and doors slam around us. I laid my head on his chest and listened to his heart thump. I had no idea what time it was, but I did know we needed to get back to work. Chef étrange wanted to discuss a new menu, Madame Matase had plans for renovating one of the old rooms we hadn't touched yet, and a few of the guests had complained about the noises in the attic, which meant I'd need to have a chat with Shadow. Then there was still the whole trying-to-stay-out-of-jail-by-working-for-Agent-Leomaris thing.

It could have been worse.

We eventually agreed to drag ourselves out of bed. Zee was going to try his hand at making cocktails so the bar could reopen, and I had admin to organize.

We spent the rest of the afternoon buried in running the hotel, and it was early evening by the time Reynard reappeared.

"And what may I get for you, Your Royal fucking Highness. I can make a Dirty Martini, Mojito, and Manhattan. I looked them all up on the internet and got bored after the M's, but that still makes me a self-certified expert in fancy beverages."

Reynard sat at the bar, considered Zee's almost-polite greeting, and said simply, "Tea, please."

"Tea?" Zee rolled his eyes, then his horns, and would have rolled his wings too, had they not been hiding so he'd fit behind the bar. "Fucking tea? What the fuck? No wonder Tom Collins was so fucking grumpy. Underappreciated and overworked. This shit is an art, and Daddy Vampire wants tea." He continued to grumble, found a teapot, a cup of hot water and a teabag, and dumped all three in front of Reynard. "Make it your-fucking-self, Your Grace. Next!"

Zee didn't see how Reynard's lips ticked, but from the stool next to him, I did. Reynard might actually be enjoying Zee's outbursts.

"It's almost like having Tom Collins back," he remarked, fixing his tea with precise hand motions.

"Almost," I agreed, and sipped my whiskey with its paper umbrella. Every drink Zee made came with a colorful cocktail umbrella. He also wore a cocktail umbrella tucked behind a horn. "Zee mentioned you're going to meet Agatha de La Cour?"

"We are going to meet her, yes. You and I. I've already spoken with her over the phone and made the necessary introductions. We're going to examine the goods in person. I want you there as my personal assistant."

"The fuck?!" Zee reappeared, tail lashing. "There's no fucking way you're taking Adam to a meet-and-greet with a syndicate crime boss. The last time you took him out, your leech family kidnapped him. Remember? We had fucking words. You got all bitey while I had my tail around your neck."

"Those were atypical circumstances and if you recall, you were also there, and did not prevent Adam from being taken either."

"Excuse fucking me? Erm, whose wife was it again? Wait, what was her name? Hm? Baroness something. Wait, I got it." He clicked his fingers. "Oh yeah, Baroness Reynard. Is my name Reynard? No. Do I have a wife? Or fangs? No. I do not."

"Frankly, I doubt anyone would commit to a relationship with someone as flippant and foolhardy as you."

Zee blinked, then narrowed his eyes. "Marriage is an archaic contract. Who needs a piece of paper to say they love someone? Oh wait, vampires do."

"Marriage is two lives or more, combined for the greater good."

Zee fluttered his lashes. "How'd that work out for you, Your Royal Highness?"

Reynard merely glowered back. "I wouldn't expect a demon to understand."

"Because of my dick for brains?" Zee fluttered his lashes. "You wanna take this outside for round two?"

"You did not best me last time, demon?—"

The wards tingled. Oh dear. They were getting worse.

"So!" I announced, cutting off the dick-swinging match. "I am going as Victor's PA to meet with Agatha de La Cour. Won't that be fun?" I grinned as they both stared at me. "I assume we'll be collecting evidence for the SSD while we're there?"

"That is correct."

"What if they recognize Adam from Kris's fuck up?" Zee said.

"Unlikely, as Agatha was not present when you were locked in the freezer. Everything is in place?—"

"What am I doing?" Zee asked. "What's my role? Sexy sidekick?" He fluttered his lashes. "Mean-as-fuck warrior? Hopeless flirt? I got range."

"Your unique services are... not required," Reynard said, innocently sipping his tea.

Zee folded his arms. "You saw what I was able to do with one karaoke video and you still doubt me?"

"This is a delicate and nuanced matter. There is no place for a..."

"Say it."

"For a sex demon."

"You fucking know I'm more than that but you can't handle it. It's easier to put me in a neat little Demons Are Bad box you can close the lid on, so you don't have to question your own fucked-up beliefs." Zee leaned on the bar, bringing himself much closer to Reynard. His smile grew. "But sure, you're cutting me out because of a fucking nuance." Zee strutted off to serve another customer, his point made.

They really did still have a long way to go.

Reynard didn't meet my eye, and instead sipped his tea. "Adam, if you're willing to participate, we're meeting Agent Leomaris at the docks at eight p.m."

I nodded, and hoped after tonight this whole ordeal would be over, so we could get back to the business of managing the hotel. And each other.