I leaned up and kissed him. “Who are you and what have you done with my Zane?”
He gave me a chagrined look and tossed his cigarette down on the Aubusson carpet, then ground it under his boot. “I’m the guy who just had to bite the oversexed waiter in the hallway who was looking for you.”
Aw, that was sweet. “You’re so sexy when you’re jealous.”
“I’m not jealous,” he said in a tone that indicated that he was, in fact, very jealous. “I just worry about you.”
“I’m a succubus,” I said, poking him in the chest. “We don’t have super strength, super speed, can’t fly, and can’t charm people or influence them like the fallen. So shoving our boobs under everyone’s noses to distract them? That’s what we do.” It wasn’t like this was a revelation to him—the first time we’d met, I’d been doing something very similar, and he hadn’t disapproved of my tactics then.
“I’m Ethan’s friend. You know if he could see Remy right now, he wouldn’t be pleased.”
Zane did have a point. It was odd to think that Zane and Ethan had been at each other’s throats a few months ago and somewhere along the line had turned into friends. Now they were buddies like Remy and I were BFF, and they looked out for each other. And apparently the friendship extended to watching out for the other guy’s girlfriend. This was the reason behind Zane’s grumpiness, then.
Ethan was normally the fourth member of our little troupe. As an Enforcer, his job was to handle tasks given to him by the Serim. No one seemed to think that an Enforcer could have—or possibly want—a life of his own, so Ethan’s superiors were mystified by his relationship with Remy. He was visiting his monastery at the moment, requesting permission to remain out in “the wild” a bit longer. I didn’t know what Remy would do if his permission was turned down.
But I knew what straight-laced Ethan would think of Remy’s flirty diversions. He would
not
be happy.
Good thing he wasn’t here.
I glanced at my watch, frowning. Much as I loved seeing Zane here, we only had a few minutes before the unveiling of the manuscript would draw the crowd into the formal antechamber that we currently occupied, and I needed to get to it before that happened. I grabbed Zane’s arm and turned him toward the door. “I’m going to steal the page. You go find Remy and pry her off her latest conquest.”
He gave me a mock salute. “Your wish is my command.”
“Tease,” I said to him, and turned away.
Zane grabbed my hand, spinning me around and pulling me back toward him again. My body pressed up against his, and I could feel the heat of him even through the layers of clothing. The Itch spiraled through my body, pulsing with need. “Kiss before you go?” he said, leaning in to me with a smile. “And then I promise I’ll behave.”
“Maybe just a small one.” I slid my hand to the back of his neck and twined my fingers in the short black hair at his nape. Who was I to resist a vampire? Especially such a delicious one.
His eyes flickered red down at my own, and his mouth slanted over mine. I felt his fangs brush against my lower lip before he slid his tongue against mine, giving my mouth a slow, tantalizing graze that made me weak in the knees. Over and over he licked into my mouth, each thrust a suggestion that I was more than receptive to. I clung to him as the kiss grew more intense, heat coursing through my body.
Even if we were together a thousand years, I’d never get used to the way Zane kissed me. It was as if he wanted to devour me whole, and every touch was barely leashed, every stroke of his tongue speaking of need and desire and lust.
Just as quickly as he’d begun to kiss me, Zane released me with a grin. His eyes had flared bright red, and he stared down at my dazed face with a hungry gaze. “Hurry up and get your page,” he said in a low growl. “Because you have exactly five minutes before I rip that dress from your body.”
Hot damn. I quivered at that and melted in his arms. “Five minutes,” I echoed dreamily. “Got it.”
Zane pressed a kiss to my forehead, made sure I could stand on my own two feet again, and then left the room, shutting the door behind him with a soft click.
In a haze, the Itch pounding through my body, I stared after him until he was out of sight. Then, my senses snapped back into place, and I straightened my dress. Right. The page. Get the page and then we could be done with this little adventure and go back to our hotel for a few hours of frisky bed-play. I was always game for that.
I touched my finger to the headset. “Remy, Zane’s coming to get you. I’m going to grab the page and then join you two out front. Understand?”
No answer. Well, it might have been difficult to reply if her tongue was stuck down someone else’s throat like Zane had said. I clicked the headset off, fluffed my hair to hide it again, and set off on my mission.
I’d first heard about the Melledin Manuscript in a magazine. I’d been reading in bed while waiting for Zane to awaken from his daily hibernation. For months, I’d been studying haloes, looking for clues in historical data, searching for mentions of miracles and unexplained phenomena that might lead me to one of the missing archangels. I followed up on every single name that Zane could give me, looking for immortals who had affected the course of history in oblique fashion.
And when that failed, I just buried myself in research. I loved research, after all. I’d been reading an article that compared a newly-found mysterious manuscript to the Voynich Manuscript. They thought the author of it was John Dee—a famous Elizabethan mystic—except for the fact that it seemed to be hundreds of years older than anyone had thought. Scientists viewed the manuscript as a mystery.
Then, Zane had woken up and distracted me, and I’d forgotten all about the manuscript…
Until I found him reading the same magazine a few days later, a funny expression on his face. It turned out that not only could he read the ancient angelic script that the Melledin Manuscript was lettered in, but it provided the first real clues we’d had toward finding the two missing haloes. The Melledin Manuscript had recently been on a tour in the US, visiting several prominent museums along the way. Now it was back home in Switzerland, and that was why we suddenly found ourselves in Europe.
One page of the manuscript in particular held the key to the information we sought. Unfortunately, the picture in the magazine spread had been an extreme close-up and Zane needed to see the entire thing. Thus we were resorting to… less ethical methods of getting our hands on the page.
And now here I was, crashing a charity function so I could get inside and rip apart a thousand-year-old manuscript that was lauded as one of the most fascinating finds of the last century.
Sure, we could just take a picture of the page instead of ripping it out of the book… but that also meant that the information would be out there for other immortals to discover. I needed that halo to win a boon from the Archangel Gabriel. Something told me that he’d be just as happy giving that boon to someone else. And given that the Serim and vampires did not play well together…
Well, it was just best if I confiscated the information, even if it hurt my soul to deface a priceless book.
The book wasn’t in the room, though. There was another set of double doors at the far end of the room, and I headed toward those. I tested the brass handle of the door—not locked, and no alarm. Well, that made things easier. I entered the room and shut the door behind me.
“This room is off-limits.” A man in a security guard uniform stood by the lit case where the massive book rested.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” I gave him a bright smile and closed the door behind me.
He frowned in my direction, gesturing that I should leave the room. And when I didn’t move, he continued to approach me. “I said, you need to leave—”
I reached out and brushed his cheek with my hand, shutting down his mind and sending him to sleep. Okay, so succubi weren’t completely helpless, as I’d intimated to Zane. But the powers we had weren’t exactly subtle ones, either. With my fingers pressed against the guard’s forehead, I rummaged through the dream I’d forced on him, looking for pass-codes or security keys. Nothing, luckily for me. With a pat to his cheek, I stood and approached the dais.
The book lay spread before me on a pedestal, a lit glass case protecting the valuable object inside from onlookers. It was beautiful, I thought as I stared down through the glass. The pages were thick and yellowed with age, the ink crisp and vivid with color. Scrollwork decorated the edges of the paper with a story that archaeologists hadn’t been able to figure out, but Zane had told me involved the fall of the angels. Not just any angels, but specific ones.
The ones I was looking for.
Biting my lip, I grasped the glass case and pulled it off the book. My entire body was tense, ready for an alarm to go off, but nothing happened. With relief, I placed the case on the ground at my feet and leaned over the book. I’d normally wear latex gloves to handle a book like this, since the oils on my fingertips were sure to destroy it… but I was just about to rip out a page and stuff it into my bra. Did it even matter if I left fingerprints on the damn thing?
We’d discussed taking the entire book with us. After all, if one page had the info we needed, the others might have useful information as well. But our plan meant slipping in and out unnoticed, since the place was crawling with security. And my dress was tight enough that only one page was fitting down the front.
I laid tentative fingers on the thick vellum of the manuscript. It felt sacrilegious and amazing all at once. I was touching something a thousand years old. With gentle fingers, I turned the page, wincing. The lambskin sheets of parchment felt thin and weak under my fingertips. After a few cautious flips, I found the page I was looking for—seven rings of different colors seemed to be interconnected by golden chains on the page and surrounded by small, cribbed text in strange, looping handwriting. This was the page I needed. This one, Zane insisted, would lead us toward a missing halo, maybe both if we were lucky.
Flinching to myself, I gave the page a firm tug and yanked it free.
A priceless, fragile work of art, one of a kind and of holy origin… a book that had lasted a thousand years, and here I was defacing it like some teenager tearing out pages in the library. It felt dirty and wrong, and I couldn’t help but frown to myself as I rolled up the page and then slid the tube of paper down the front of my tight dress until it nestled deep between my breasts and out of sight.
I felt rather than heard the step of soft feet behind me and tensed.
“Don’t worry, honey. We’ve got you now,” an unfamiliar, breathy female voice whispered in my ear. A hand touched my bare arm. Before I could turn, a disconcerting, vague feeling washed over me. My mind fuzzed, then went black, and the last thing I thought before falling into unconsciousness was that I’d been found.
By another succubus.
“A lot of people are afraid to tell you the truth in this business. Yes, you’re going to have to suck a lot of dick. Yes, double penetration makes your ass look fat. Yes, that
does
look diseased. But I’ve always tried to be a straight shooter.”—
The Absolutely True Memoir of Remy Summore,
by Remy Summore
~*~
Succubi don’t dream. The few times I’d been locked in my own mind since I turned succubus, I’d basically existed in a conscious state while my body slept, my mind forming a “room” for me to inhabit to pass the time. Today’s room was my favorite pub closest to Remy’s place in New City. I drummed my fingernails on the bar as I sat on one of the tall stools, waiting to wake up. It had to be Remy or Dee who had knocked me out. Those were the only succubi I knew.
Don’t worry, honey. We’ve got you now.
I replayed the voice in my head over and over, but didn’t recognize it. They had me, all right. Whoever it was, this was
not
funny. We needed to get that page before some other immortal happened upon it and decided that they were going halo-hunting themselves. The Melledin Manuscript had gotten so much publicity in the last year that it was only a matter of time.
By the time I felt the shifting rubber band snap that told me I was zinging back toward consciousness, I was a nervous wreck, more anxious than furious. Oh, I was plenty mad, but I wanted to get the book taken care of first. I’d be angry later, when I had the page in my hand.
My eyes flicked open. I stared at the ceiling. Not cherubs. Okay, I’d been moved. I mentally assessed all my parts. No wounds. Still wearing the black dress and heels. On something soft. Couch? Bed?
I looked over.
A beautiful woman stood nearby, her tall, willowy height equal to mine. She had smooth black hair, lovely almond eyes, and wore a slim-fitting cheongsam.
“Awake?” she asked in a bright, cheerful voice.
I sat up and swung my legs down to the floor. I was definitely in a bed. I stood and eyed the woman. Her smile was friendly, but I didn’t trust this. Unease grated on my nerves, and my internal tuning fork gave an anxious wobble.
“Where am I?”
For some odd reason, she looked hurt at my suspicious question. Then she smiled brightly. “Phryne told me you’d probably be suspicious when you awoke. I bet you have no idea what’s going on.” Her look became sympathetic.
It was true. I did have no idea what was going on. Of course, I wasn’t going to tell her that. So I just stared at her.
She came to my side and linked her arm through mine. “Come on. Let’s go wake up Remy. The others are dying to see her again.”
Others? I let the woman lead me by the arm, staring at my surroundings. The room was lushly decorated, draperies and pale marble statues lining the walls. It looked rich, and the carpet under my shoes was thick and plush.
“Zane?” I asked.
“Phryne will explain everything, my love,” she said sweetly.
Uh, okay. The woman clutching my arm led me down a hall. As we walked, I began to piece things together. Someone had knocked me out. That was clearly this chick. She was a succubus, then, and older than me. But what the heck was she doing, kidnapping us from a party? And who was Phryne? I eyed her, but she didn’t look dangerous or unhappy or even angry. She looked sweet and lovely, and oddly thrilled to be at my side.