Lover Avenged (Black Dagger Brotherhood #7)(100)

That flat, pale face broke into a serene smile. “But how would that work for you? It would be destroying the very tools with which you wish to best your enemy. Not a logical step for any ruler to take.”

Lash’s cock tingled at the tip, respect turning him on, though he refused to acknowledge the fact. “You know, I wouldn’t think the king would need help. Why can’t you just do the killing yourself?”

“There are extenuating circumstances, and benefits to making it appear as if the demise occurred outside of my influence. You will learn, over time, that machinations in the background are at times far more effective than those you conduct in full view of your population.”

Point taken, though again, Lash wasn’t going to give props.

“I’m not as young as you think,” he said instead. Fuck it, he’d aged about a billion years in the last four months.

“And you are not as old as you believe. But that is another conversation for a different time.”

“I’m not looking for a therapist.”

“Which is a shame. I’m rather good at getting into the heads of others.”

Yeah, Lash could see that. “This target of yours. Is it a male or a female.”

“Would it matter?”

“Not in the slightest.”

The symphath positively beamed. “It is a male. And as I said, there are unusual circumstances.”

“How so?”

“He will be difficult to get to. His private guard is rather fierce.” The king floated over to a window and looked out. After a moment, his head turned as an owl’s would, rotating on the spine until it was nearly facing backward, and then his white eyes flared red for a moment. “Do you think you can handle such a penetration?”

“Are you a homo?” Lash blurted.

The king laughed. “You mean, do I prefer lovers of my same sex?”

“Yeah.”

“Would that make you uncomfortable?”

“No.” Yes, because it would mean that he kinda sorta had the hots for a guy who swung that way.

“You don’t lie very well,” the king murmured. “But it will come with age.”

Fuck that. “And I don’t think you’re as powerful as you think you are.”

When the sexual speculation disappeared Lash knew he’d hit a sore spot. “Beware the waters of confrontation—”

“Spare me the two-bit, fortune-cookie bullshit, Your Highness. If you were filling out that robe with a good set of balls, you’d get rid of this guy yourself.”

Serenity returned to the king’s face, as if Lash had just proven his inferiority with the outburst. “Yet instead I’m having someone else take care of it for me. Far more sophisticated, although I don’t expect you to understand that.”

Lash dematerialized right in front of the guy and locked his palms around that slender throat. With a single, brutal thrust, he forced the king up against the wall.

Their eyes locked, and as Lash felt a probe into his mind, he instinctively shut the entryway through his frontal lobe.

“You’re not unlocking my trunk there, *. Sorry.”

The king’s stare grew red as blood. “No.”

“No what?”

“I do not prefer lovers of my own sex.”

It was the perfect shoe to drop, of course: the implication being that Lash was staying close because he was the one who liked cock out of the pair of them. He let go and stalked around.

The king’s voice was now less snakelike and more factual. “You and I are rather well matched. I believe we shall both get what we want from this alliance.”

Lash turned and faced the guy. “This male, the one you want dead, where do I find him.”

“The timing must be correct. Timing…is everything.”





Rehvenge watched Ehlena put her clothes back on, and though getting her back into that uniform wasn’t exactly what he wanted, the show of her bending over and slowly smoothing her stockings up her leg wasn’t half-bad.

Not. At. All.

She laughed as she picked her bra up and twirled it around her finger. “Can I put this on now?”

“Absolutely.”

“You going to make me take my time again?”

“I just figured there was no rush on the hose.” He smiled like the wolf he was feeling like. “I mean, those things run, don’t they—Oh, f*ck me…”

Ehlena didn’t wait for him to finish talking, but arched her back and pulled the bra around her torso. The little shimmy she worked as she reclasped it in the front made him pant…and that was before she drew the straps over her shoulders, leaving the cups wedged under her breasts.

She came over to him. “I’ve forgotten how to work it. Can you help?”

Rehv growled and pulled her in close, sucking one nipple into his mouth and working the other with his thumb. Just as she gasped, he flipped the cups into place.

“I’m glad to be your lingerie engineer, but, you know, it looked better off you.” As he jogged his eyebrows at her, her laugh was so free and easy his heart stopped. “I like that sound.”

“And I like making it.”

She stepped into her uniform and pulled it up and then fastened its buttons.