King of Spades (2 page)

All the better. He tired of how easily wenches crawled into his bed. He craved a challenge, and he would have the redheaded woman begging for his cock even without his
tigri
pheromones.

With his magic he sent the card to his library for safekeeping, and then summoned his leather strap. The sorceress’s eyes widened as the strap appeared, and the scent of her juices strengthened.

“Raise your dress above your ass,” he commanded as he trailed the strap over her bare back and arms.

The sorceress continued to suck his cock as she reached down and pulled her clothing up to her waist so that her ass was bared to him.

Darronn smiled. “This is for disobedience,” he said as he swatted her backside with the black leather.

Kalina moaned around his cock, and he knew she reveled in both the sting and the thrill of his lash.

Darronn continued to lightly strap the sorceress while she pleasured him, leaving faint pink marks upon her pale flesh. His vision blurred as he imagined it was his future queen who sucked his cock, and his thrusts grew stronger. He would relish fucking the wench’s mouth and her sweet quim. He would enjoy turning her skin rosy with his strap, making it sting and tingle so much that she would beg him to drive into her harder and harder yet.

With a shout Darronn climaxed, followed by a roar, as he imagined his seed spilling into his future queen’s womb.

Chapter One

With a scowl fierce enough to send any guy in the bar diving for cover, Alexi O’Brien grabbed her bottled beer and chugged the contents. The icy, bitter fluid rolled down her throat, settling in a cold burn in her empty stomach. Hell, she ought to get a good buzz, and fast. She’d never been one for drinking, but today she needed something to dull the pain and anger she knew would never go away. Not unless—
until
—she found Alice.

Annie, their conservative cousin, frowned as Alexi slammed the bottle onto the rich mahogany bar and signaled the bartender for another round. Alexi cocked her head and studied her favorite cousin and best friend, Annie. Alexi knew that her cousin only needed her half-glasses for reading or painting. But, like Annie’s plain-Jane clothing and her ever-present severe hairdo, the reading glasses were a way of hiding her true self from the world. If she’d just ditch the glasses, get a sexy wardrobe and let her hair down, Annie would be absolutely stunning.

“Getting plastered isn’t going to bring her back,” Annie said in the soft southern accent she still had despite the fact she’d been living in San Francisco for over ten years. Although if she was pissed, that southern accent got hard in a hurry. She pushed her pewter-framed glasses up to the bridge of her nose then toyed with the straw in her sweet iced-tea. “Alice wouldn’t want you to be miserable, sugar. You know that.”

Alexi raked her fingers through her wild auburn locks as the bartender placed another bottle in front of her. His appreciative gaze lingered on her slim form, trailing from her generous cleavage to the gold tiger charm dangling from the piercing at her belly button, and down to her tiny skirt.

“Don’t drink those too fast,” he said in a deep voice that made her nipples tighten against the flimsy material of her blouse. “You might do something you’ll regret later, sweetheart.”

“Oh, really?” Alexi studied him in a blatant perusal from his blue eyes on down. The guy was dark-haired, muscular, and hot, as she usually liked her men, and she could almost imagine letting him tie her up while he slid into her pussy. Would he be man enough? Damn, she hadn’t thought about her bondage fantasy in a long while.

Her gaze slid over the bartender’s snug black t-shirt to the hard-on pressing against his jeans, and her pussy grew wet at the thought of wild and wicked sex with him. Yeah, no doubt he’d give her a good ride. She bet he’d even enjoy participating in one of her favorite fantasies, the one where she was a French maid being erotically punished by her employer.

Alexi used to fuck ‘em and leave ‘em all the time because she didn’t believe in long term relationships or happily-ever-afters. But since Alice’s disappearance, Alexi just didn’t have it in her to flirt or fuck. The only reason she’d dressed this way tonight was because Annie had practically dared her, and Alexi never backed down from a challenge.

“If I get drunk enough, I might even find you attractive,” she said to him with a sugar-sweet smile, and the bartender gave a good-natured grin. Alexi dismissed him with a little flick of her fingers and then crossed one leg over the other. Her skirt slid up, exposing a good inch of flesh above her thigh-high stockings.

Annie rolled her brown-sugar colored eyes. “I can’t believe you let that one go.”

But this past year, Alexi always let them go. She couldn’t enjoy herself without knowing that Alice was okay.

“Why did she vanish the way she did?” Alexi rubbed one of her gold bracelets, a habit she’d taken up when her twin disappeared—Alice used to rub her own bracelet all the time. “One year ago today. A
year
, Annie. I just can’t believe it.”

“You’ve got to get on with your life.” With her index finger, Annie pushed her glasses back up her nose. “You’ve done everything from mounting a well-publicized missing persons campaign to hiring every private investigator in the city. You’ve almost exhausted your resources, your law practice is suffering…pretty soon you won’t be able to afford to eat, much less search for Alice.”

With a slow shake of her head, Alexi fixed her gaze on the beer bottle and picked at the label as that familiar sadness settled all around her like piles of legal briefs. “No real clues. Alice’s purse and jacket scattered on the park bench…even her shoes left in the grass.”

Alexi’s brows narrowed as she remembered that day so clearly. While driving to the park on her Harley, moments after talking to Alice on her cell phone, Alexi had just
known
something had gone wrong. The link she’d had with her twin since birth had been severed as cleanly as if it had never existed. It was like a hole was now where her sister should be…like a paper doll that had been cut out of a book and lost.

Alexi had arrived at the park, frantic, only to find no signs of Alice other than the items she’d left behind.

Sighing, Alexi tore a piece of label off her beer bottle, her twin gold bracelets glittering from her wrists with every movement she made. Moisture beaded on the bottle’s brown surface, wetting her fingertips as she worked to strip the bottle bare.

A fresh wave of anger flushed over her at the memory of why Alice had gone to the park anyway. She’d walked in on her cheating bastard ex-fiancé and caught him screwing their landlady while being fucked in the ass by a guy in leather and chains. Alexi had maced the hell out of the three of them, but Alice had fled.

After Alexi had kicked the trio out of the apartment, she’d called Alice on her cell phone several times, but her twin had refused to come home, insisting that she needed to get away. Alice had mentioned the reason she’d been home early to begin with—her boss had fired her for refusing to suck his cock as part of her secretarial duties.

In the weeks following Alice’s disappearance, Alexi had taken her fury out on the bastard and made him pay. She’d done her homework, and the accountant had gone down in a hurry for tax evasion.

Alexi took a couple more swallows of her beer before she thunked the bottle back onto the bar. “I’m going to find her, Annie. I know that she’s out there somewhere. She’s
not dead,
she’s just missing.”

Annie sipped her iced-tea through the straw and carefully set it back on the drink coaster so that it was perfectly in the center. “You and the police have done everything you can.”

But Alexi’s mind slipped back in time, to the moment she’d parked the Hog, thrown her helmet aside and ran for the park bench. “Why did Alice stuff her bra and panties into her purse?” she mused aloud for the thousandth time. “If she’d been kidnapped and raped, it’s not likely the person would take the time to leave Alice’s underwear behind, so neatly tucked away.”

Frowning at her beer bottle, Alexi’s head began to spin—from both the beer she’d chugged and the memories of Alice’s disappearance. “Her bare footprints led around a tree…and then nothing.
Nothing.
It was like she’d been swallowed up whole.
”

Alexi turned her gaze to Annie who looked totally miserable now. “This was supposed to be a night to get your mind off everything for a little while,” Annie said quietly. “Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.”

“I’m sorry, honey.” Alexi leaned over and hugged her cousin. Annie was soft and warm, and smelled of brown sugar and vanilla. When Alexi pulled away, she gave Annie the start of a smile. “You’re right. I need to enjoy our time together and that’s that.”

The alcoholic buzz hit Alexi hard. One minute she was feeling a little loose and the next she was good and tipsy. She was such a freaking lightweight, and a giggly drunk the rare times she reached that point. Alcohol made her real horny, too, but she wasn’t likely to do anything about that, other than using one of her assorted vibrators when she got home.

She braced one elbow on the bar and trailed the fingers of her other hand over her sexy midriff top with the beaded fringe, down to the black mini skirt, and then pointed to the lipstick red heels she’d put on at Annie’s suggestion for their night out. “Maybe I ought to see if I can find a man and put this outfit and these “fuck-me” shoes to good use. It’s been over a year since I’ve had a good lay. I don’t do celibacy well.”

Annie rolled her eyes and Alexi had to grin. Her cousin lived alone with her cat, Abracadabra, and was an artist as well as a brilliant English Lit professor. Annie looked the part, too, with her butt-length nut brown hair pinned into a knot at her nape, and her ever-present loose skirts and blouses. Tonight Annie’s version of going-out-on-the-town dress was a simple black blouse and skirt that complimented her generous figure, but couldn’t be called sexy in the slightest. And for all Alexi knew, Annie was still a virgin, ‘cause she always got embarrassed when the subject of sex was brought up.

So Alexi almost fell off her barstool when Annie said, “I think you should. That is, er, get laid.”

“Excuse me.” Alexi held up one finger as she grabbed her beer with her free hand and chugged the rest of the bottle’s contents. She banged the empty on the bar then turned back to her cousin. “Did you actually say the term, ‘get laid,’ as in ‘get fucked?’”

A deep rose flush stole over Annie’s face. “Just because I’m not getting any, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.”

“Hmmmm.” Alexi placed her finger on the tip of her nose and swayed as she eyed her cousin from head to toe. “I think this calls for a plan of action. A plan to get Annie laid.”

“Um, no.” The room’s soft lighting reflected off of Annie’s glasses as she retrieved her wallet from a pocket of her skirt. She pulled out a twenty and tossed it on the bar, enough to cover the tab for two beers, iced-tea, and a tip. “I don’t do casual sex.”

This time Alexi snorted. “You don’t do sex at all.”

The color in Annie’s cheeks flashed stoplight red and her voice raised an octave. “Ready for dinner? I made reservations at the seafood place next door.”

Alexi’s head spun from all the beer as she grabbed her jacket and purse, and slid the long skinny strap of her purse onto her shoulder. “So that was your plan.” She giggled and slid off the barstool, her tiny skirt sliding up to her hips and flashing her bare ass cheeks and the strip of thong beneath. She didn’t give a damn if anyone saw her butt—right now she was feeling fiiiiine. “You know I can’t hold my alcohol. Figured you’d get me drunk and relaxed before dinner, did ya?”

Annie gripped Alexi’s upper arm to steady her. “Worked, didn’t it?” Annie glanced over Alexi’s shoulder and muttered, “But I’d better get you out of here quick, before the big guy in all that black leather makes it over here.”

“But I like men in black.” Alexi tottered as Annie dragged her toward the bar’s swinging doors. “I really like to get down and dirty with ‘em. The tall, dark, and dangerous type. Maybe I’d even let him tie me up—if he’s man enough to take me.”

“Trust me, sweetheart.” Annie gripped Alexi’s arm tighter. “You don’t want to mess with
that
one. Big. Hairy. And butt-ugly.”

“Oh, Annie.” Alexi giggled again and slipped her arm around her cousin’s waist. “It’s nice to have someone looking after
me
for a change.”

It was midnight by the time the taxi pulled up to Alexi’s pastel pink townhouse. She and Annie had enjoyed a relaxing evening of several courses, from shrimp cocktail to clam chowder, to Caesar salad, then grilled salmon, cheesecake for dessert, and coffee with Bailey’s afterwards. Alexi had enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine during dinner, and had managed to keep up her good buzz, but she’d had to have her coffee afterwards. If she didn’t get her daily dose of caffeine, things could get ugly.

For a fraction of a second when she looked up at the dark townhouse, a sense of loneliness bled through Alexi and she wished she wouldn’t be alone for at least one night. But she shoved the loneliness away, gave Annie a quick hug goodbye, and climbed out of the cab.

“Get some rest, y’hear?” Annie said as Alexi stood outside the car’s door. “Need me to walk you to the door?”

“Okay and nope, I’m fine.” Alexi gave her cousin a smile and tried not to wobble on her heels so Annie wouldn’t realize just how tipsy she still was. “You made this night
so
much easier to get through.”

Annie pushed her glasses up her nose and returned Alexi’s smile. “For both of us.”

After she shut the car’s door, Alexi watched the taxi pull away until its red taillights disappeared over the hill.

With a sigh she turned, her purse slapping against her hip beneath her jacket. She tottered up the steps to the townhouse she’d been renting since Alice disappeared. It was supposed to have been a surprise for Alice—one of the partners at the firm Alexi worked at took a position in New York City. He’d agreed to rent the two-story townhouse to them at a rock-bottom rate. The day that Alice vanished, Alexi had finalized the deal.