Smolder (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #29)(54)



“Concentrate on the man in front of us, while I work on creating the physical illusion.” I turned my face away from the blindfold of Jean-Claude’s hair to the man who was waiting for us. Graham knelt above us, and I knew what the pain in his face was now: desire. He was as close as he’d ever gotten to me, but he stayed where he was, waiting for us to tell him what to do next, and maybe not trusting himself to move until he had permission. He met my gaze and the look in his eyes was frantic with need. He closed them as if afraid what I saw in his eyes would piss me off like it had in the past. If he’d been his usual lecherous self earlier tonight, then it might have, but he’d done his best to be a gentleman in circumstances that most men wouldn’t have been able to manage.

I reached my free hand out for him. He glanced at Jean-Claude, who said, “Do not look to me, look to her.” Graham looked at me then, his face a mix of desire and confusion; he wanted to touch me but hesitated trying to find words to ask. I helped him. “Feel how wet you’ve made me.”

He used two fingers to stroke over my most intimate parts. He began to stroke and explore, and my breathing quickened. I wanted him to explore me, to bring me, but not onstage, and in that moment where things make sense that later might not I asked for what I wanted him to do. “Put them inside me.”

He did what I asked, sliding two fingers inside me so that I writhed for him, eyes closing, because it was almost too much. He crooked his fingers inside me and found that spot that is harder to find than the one most men search for; it made me open my eyes and look up at him to find Jean-Claude’s face next to his so they were both staring down at me, and I knew who was giving Graham tips and hints for how my body worked. Jean-Claude smiled down at me, and I smiled back.

“That’s cheating,” I said, but my voice was breathy, and my eyes were having trouble focusing.

“Non, ma petite, this is cheating.” And he started playing over that sweet spot that was outside my body while Graham continued to flick his fingers over the deeper one. It wasn’t just that their fingers seemed to know exactly what to do but them looking down at me together, the delighted heat in Jean-Claude’s face and the amazement in Graham’s that he was getting to touch me. We all have our kinks and one of mine was two men at once. Jean-Claude’s fingers knew exactly how to touch me, and through him Graham knew exactly what to do, too. I kept thinking I’d protest but then the sensations distracted me and they brought me together, one larger orgasm chasing the deeper one so that I screamed my pleasure for them, my upper body coming up off the ground like I was reaching for something to hold on to in the air above the stage. When I lay quiet and twitching on the stage Jean-Claude’s voice filled the world. “Two men giving you pleasure but taking none of their own, because this night is all for you.”

Graham stayed kneeling between my legs, but Jean-Claude stood to talk to the audience, to send them home with lust and happiness and then the power, our power, contracted like it had been slapped away from them, out of them. He dropped to his knees to grab my hand and touch Graham’s arm; the moment he touched us both his power, our power, flowed out and filled the audience again.

The other vampire had laid a compulsion inside the audience; that meant that if we didn’t free them of it come tomorrow night the vampire would be able to call them out of their houses, out of their lives, and take them one by one.

I stared up at Jean-Claude and thought, How do we free them?

“You have pushed propriety as far as you are comfortable onstage, I would not ask more but I must have at least wolf to touch, but I need enough energy of the ardeur to chase out the evil that has been laid inside them.”

A voice came out of the darkness offstage: “You have more wolves to touch.” Jake was still in his workout clothes. He was ex-Harlequin and looked like James Bond should have looked: medium skin tone, brown hair, brown eyes, medium height. He was so medium that you would never pick him out of a crowd in most of the world, he would just blend. Other figures moved in the dark, it was every wolf we had on security. Not the regular pack like Graham, but the ones who had been SEALs and had fought to the last man against a group of shapeshifters and lived to tell the tale; they’d also failed their blood tests for lycanthropy, so now they worked for us. Jean-Claude had promised not to call the werewolves without talking to Richard first, but any wolves who worked for us, that was different.

“I did not call you, so how did you know of my need?” Jean-Claude asked.

“Nathaniel called us,” Jake said.

Nathaniel moved up beside the stage where I could see him. I was suddenly embarrassed and a little chilly with my dress around my waist. He opened the link between us to let me know how much

he’d enjoyed the show. He was a serious voyeur and his eagerness traveled through me so that I wasn’t embarrassed or cold. Graham did help me to scoot down my dress and sit up, but holding on to Jean-Claude and Graham with Nathaniel in my head was like new foreplay. It chased away any discomfort.

“Take my hand and see if it is enough,” Jean-Claude said. Jake got up onstage and touched the vampire’s bare shoulder, and Jean-Claude’s power flexed. “Try more wolves,” I said. They came to him onstage, most of them in exercise gear because they’d been helping to test Edward and Peter. I had a moment of panic that they might have come to try and help. Bad enough Edward, but I did not want Peter in the audience tonight.

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