He swept a hand around her and pushed the grimoire across the table, clearing a spot and then lifting and turning her to sit before him. She stared up at him, a man who could command her with but his breath. Mouth open and eyes arrowed on hers, he asked her for something, daring her to relent.
Vika grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him in for a kiss. A hard, bruising connection that opened his darkness into her and spilled down her throat in a lush sigh. He tickled up her skirt, taking his time, inching it slowly, his fingers tapping and sliding at her thighs, and all the while, feeding her hungry kisses with his.
CJs kisses poisoned her need for control, to make order. She wanted him to mess her up, to ravage her clean spirit. She nibbled his lower lip, tugging not too gently. He groaned and shoved her skirt high to her thighs, where the ruffles collected with a shush in her lap. Exploring fingers lightly traced the inside of her thigh, as if the ghost from the chandelier had managed to substantiate touch.
A sensual alchemy of her sighs blended with CJs groan as he opened her mouth with his tongue and bit the inside of her lip. It hurt sweetly. She clasped her thighs about his hips and clung with her fingers to his shirt, pulling, clutching, needing so desperately to fall.
Falling, falling, deep into his mystery. She spread her arms wide in her mind and let the moment sweep her to oblivion. He gripped her chin and held her head so she could not look away from him. His lips were reddened from their kiss. She imagined her hair must be mussed and her cheeks and lips as stained with passion as his. Oh, but her skin needed him to deepen its color all over, stain her with his magic.
I cant stop touching you, he said. Youre the one magic I havent yet explored, and I need to learn it now.
He lunged for her neck, roughly kissing at her vein and moving up along her jaw. And he slid a hand between her thighs. Her panties were tiny, sheer and black, and he snagged the thin elastic waist and tugged. The airy fabric slid over her aching mons, and she shifted her hips expectantly.
Im going to touch you everywhere, Vika. There are no demons in this world who can hold me back.
Just as long as you can hold them back.
Were in the light. Trust me?
Yes.
He lifted one of her legs, gliding his hand along her sinuous length, and propped her ankle against his shoulder, kissing the inside of her calf and drawing his tongue to her anklebone. Ultrasensitive there, Vika wriggled. Her bare skin soaked up his heat with every kiss, every lick.
He gripped the hard black leather shoe, and when she thought he would pull it off, he slipped his tongue between the space under her arch and the leather. The electric touch scurried through her system, and she tilted her shoulders against the stacked grimoires. She lifted her breasts, and her head landed on a thick book as pillow. Slowly, lazily, he stroked her arch, playing her arousal to a glowing, pulsating peak.
Gliding a hand down her bare legthe tattooed hand shimmered across her skin with magic untoldhe followed with kisses to mark her flesh, as if a witch hunter searching for the telling sign. None would find it, for Certainlys kisses were indelible; only she could read and interpret them with her sighs.
His fingers played over the sheer panties, each stroke slow and sweeping. He held her gaze and she his beneath the dazzle of crystals constellating above them. Hot breath seeped through her skin and skittered delicious tingles through her groin and up and down the insides of her thighs. His jade eyes, bold and sure, asked permission.
Biting down on her lip, Vika closed her eyes, waiting, anticipating...
A hot kiss pressed against the black panty. Breaths hushed over her folds. He kissed her there, through the sheer slip of fabric, tonguing along the delicate, elasticized edges and finding her skin hot and moist.
Vika clutched the tumble of her skirts at her hips. Soft breaths were punctuated by teasing lashes of tongue traveling the length of her entrance. His hands clung to her ankles, each one propped at his shoulder. His hair tickled her stomach. Spiced tea perfumed the dusty air, and above, the crystals tinkled as if a cavalcade processional to a faery march.
He tugged her panties with his teeth, slid them down her legs and quickly over her heels, and then knelt before her, positioning the spike heels of her shoes at his shoulders.
She thought she heard him whisper, Fuck, yes when she dug in her heels, but her mind reeled with the clatter of crystal, the perceived whispers of the ghost and the shift of papers as her movements unsettled the books stacked around her.
She clutched a book and dragged it to her chest because it was all she had to hold, an anchor, a means to keep from floating off on a blissful wave. As CJs tongue mastered her trembling loins, her fingernails dug into the leather cover, surely carving divots in the ancient tome. Her core jittered, as did her entire being. So close she soared to the edge, to crying out at the command of her lover. Her legs quivered, her heels digging into his shoulders. Muscles in her belly tightened, anticipating the storm.
And when she came, her body arched upward and her hips bucked. Her cry was soft and kittenish, a top note to the satisfied moan roiling from CJs throat.
Yes, so perfect, he muttered, biting her thigh gently. My perfect little witch has been undone.
Vika felt the heat redden her cheeks, and her sigh exhaled delicious exhaustion. That was what she had wantedfor him to redden her. To undo her.
Chapter 9
Certainly leaned back against the counter, the tea service behind him. He turned and poured a measure into a clear glass cup. Turning, he watched Vika sit up on the table, tug down her skirt and fuss with her hair.
No, dont do that, he said. I want to look at you just as you are. Mussed.
She put down her hands and gave him a little smile before self-consciously looking aside. Her garnet hair was tugged from the updo, and one sleeve shrugged off her narrow shoulder. Her skirt was bunched above her knees, revealing long, pale, gorgeous legs that ended in those sexy shoes that had dug into his shoulders. He would find marks there later. He hoped.
Her mouth was red, and she sucked in a corner of her lower lip and looked up at him from under a swath of bright hair. It was a kittenish look, like a sexy come-on from one of those Playboy models to which no man could deny an attraction.
Certainly swallowed a sip of teahard. Great Hecate, where have you been all my life?
She twirled a strand of bright hair about her forefinger. Living in my little round house. Studying magic. Casting spells. Cleaning up piles of werewolf and other assorted creatures.
Ive never met anyone quite like you. Conflicting in so many ways, yet each bit of you complements all the other bits. I like you undone, Vika. But I like you all tidied up and perfect, as well.
Ive never met anyone quite like you. Conflicting in so many ways, yet each bit of you complements all the other bits. I like you undone, Vika. But I like you all tidied up and perfect, as well.
If were going to analyze what we like about the other, I have to say youre not the kind of man who has ever attracted me.
Another sip of tea went down the wrong way, and Certainly managed to croak out, Thanks a lot.
Its true. But I cant seem to stay away from you. She took his left hand and stroked a fingertip over the tattoos on the back of it. Youre everything I never thought Id want. When you look at me like that over the rim of your teacup, I want to tear away my clothes and let you stare as long as you like. Im normally pretty controlled around men. You bring out the vixen in me.
Tear away. Ill look as long as you want me to.
She fingered the neckline of her dress, her long black lashes dusting the air as she apparently considered doing some clothing removal. He wasnt even close to coming down from the incredible sexual high theyd shared, and if she wanted to go round two, he was right there, hard and ready for action.
But she shook her head and stood up from the table, her skirt shrugging down to hide her sexy gams. Is there a bathroom down here?
He gestured to the left, and she walked out. That was either the quickest fall from arousal, or she needed a few minutes alone. Some kind of woman thing. He hoped.
He was dreadfully out of practice with women, but she had seemed to enjoy his fumblings.
Tilting down the remainder of the tea, he eased the front of his jeans down to make room for the hard-on that would not soften, he felt sure, until long after hed parted from Vikas company. Might have to rush home for a long shower.
He gathered the grimoires theyd shoved aside during their heated coupling. A page had been torn, and he cursed his carelessness. These texts were ancient. Great care must be taken with them.
The title of the spell on the page read Seducing Demons from the Body.
If the universe wasnt knocking him over the noggin, hed guess he and Vika had an innate magic when together and had conjured this spell to the surface. Either way... I can dig it.
He read through the ingredients, of which there were only two: a man and a woman (one must be possessed by a demon), as well as the usual accoutrements: candles, athame, herbs, blood. If he understood the gist of the Latin spell, it seemed to work in reverse of a demon summoning normally performed by a familiar and his or her assistant. Having sex would open the one possessed by a demon and allow his partner to conjure that demon forth and cast it to the demonic realmbut only after having sex with said demon.
So simple as that?
Yet it involved sex. Only then could the body release the incorporeal demon from within. And then to have sex with that demon to lure it toward final release?
Trickiest means to an exorcism Ive ever heard of. He wasnt so sure about allowing one of his demons the rein to have sex with Vika.
Would Vika approve? Hed had almost sex with her. She had been willing, unflinching and receptive. But they hadnt gone all the way, and he suspected if he suggested sex as a demon-exorcising skill it would spoil the mood and make the experience suck.