Sunfall Read online

  I wanted nothing more than a few precious hours alone with Val, but I also knew my place. “You’re certain there’s nothing I can do?”

  Malcolm shook his head. “Go. I will have Karma bring me up to date.”

  When Val reached for my hand, I let her lead me toward the door. “I’m so thirsty for you,” she whispered softly enough that only I could hear. “Let’s not waste another second.”

  My hunger, my fatigue, my worry—they all melted away in the face of her need, and I followed her willingly.

  *

  An hour later I sat back in my chair, surveying the remains of my steak. Valentine had cooked it perfectly, and I was relieved to no longer be consumed by the gnawing hunger that had preoccupied me since my return to human form. Across the table, Val regarded me with an expression half-loving, half-hungry. Her own meal was similarly demolished, but I knew what she truly craved.

  She moved to lace her fingers behind her head but winced as the motion aggravated her injury. Her smile was rueful. “And how was your day, honey?”

  Laughing, I covered one of her hands with my own. “Probably the craziest on record.”

  “There may be crazier on the horizon.”

  Beneath her flippancy lurked a current of…not fear, exactly, but perhaps anxiety. Brenner’s theft implied that he was going to use the parasite for some nefarious purpose—a theory worrisome to all of us, but especially the vampires. Brenner’s agenda was very simple: genocide. He wanted to eliminate the presence of vampires on the planet. The last time he had gotten his hands on a biological agent, he had turned it into a powerful weapon that would have killed me had Val not discovered the means to create a cure. This time, it seemed far more likely that she was the target.

  Just as we had sat down to dinner, Val had received a text from Solana. Helen had regained consciousness, and while she was still very weak, she would be attending the meeting later tonight. Hopefully, she would have some answers that would set us on the right track.

  “We’ll find Brenner,” I said, knowing Val would hear the sentiment beneath the platitude. “We’ll stop him.”

  She flipped over her hand and slid her fingers against mine. The slow, brushing strokes of her skin set my own ablaze.

  “I don’t want to think about him right now,” she said. “I just want to focus on you.”

  The intensity behind her words spiked my pulse. “I love the way you make me feel. Like there’s no one else on the planet but us.”

  Val leaned forward, blue eyes blazing. “Tell me what you want, most of all in the world, right now. Anything. Whatever it is, it’s yours.”

  Her offer was sincere. I could have asked for the thousand-dollar ice cream sundae at Serendipity, and she would have called the restaurant without a second thought. Other women might have used a moment such as this to ask for jewelry or a new pair of shoes, but all I wanted was the sensation of Valentine above me, beneath me, inside me.

  First, though, I wanted to tease her. “Do you realize that I haven’t yet experienced the hot tub?”

  Val’s burst of laughter did nothing to dissolve the glorious tension flowing between us. “That’s easily fixed.”

  I stood and slowly removed my shirt. I wore nothing beneath it. “How about right now?”

  Her breathing hitched and her eyes darkened. When I peeled off my jeans, she bared her teeth.

  “Sure you don’t just want to go to bed?” Her voice was a solid octave lower than normal.

  “Not yet. I want to soak for a while.” But when she moved to join me right away, I held up one hand. “Stay exactly where you are.”

  After so much chaos and death, having the time to indulge in a sensual interlude felt like a luxury. Desire suffused my blood and I throbbed with the urgency of it, but I didn’t want to rush. Naked, I descended the half-flight of stairs to where the tub waited, already roiling merrily. My hips swayed as I walked, and above the churning of the water jets I heard Valentine sigh in appreciation.

  When I reached the edge, I turned to face her, then lowered myself to the tile and immersed my feet. The water was very hot and I eased myself into it by inches, watching Val’s hungry gaze roam across my misted skin.

  “You’re killing me.” The softly groaned words would have been inaudible to a human.

  “I’m not. I’m going to heal you.” With a slow exhale, I slid all the way into the tub until only my head remained above the water line. “Now, come here.”

  She vaulted down the stairs and was at my side in the space of a blink. Her chest rose and fell rapidly as she disrobed, and when she finally stood nude before me my mouth went dry. Valentine often passed for a man, but her naked body was the paragon of feminine strength. Her long, runner’s legs gave way to a lightly rippled abdomen and full breasts, framed by chiseled arms strong enough to hold me tightly when I needed comfort and hold me down when I needed to be dominated. Right now, I wanted to bury my face in the flaxen hair between her thighs, and I gripped the edge of the tub to stop myself from moving. We were going to take this slowly, even if it killed us both.

  Her sigh of pleasure at the water’s heat became a hiss of pain when she submerged her injured arm. I pressed myself against her side and rubbed the back of her neck until she relaxed.

  “I love your hands on me,” she murmured.

  In response, I kissed first her shoulder, then her neck. When I trailed my lips along her jaw line to flick my tongue against her earlobe, her self-restraint finally shattered. In an instant, she was looming above me, my legs trapped between her knees, her fingers curled in my hair.

  “Enough!”

  Despite the heat of the water, my skin pebbled at her assertive tone. When I tried to speak and failed, triumph flared across the stark planes of her face. The tide had turned, and I waited with open arms for it to engulf me.

  “I need to be inside you,” Val rasped. Darkness eclipsed her brilliant blue irises as her thirst magnified her desire. “Every way, all the way. No more waiting.”

  Finally, I found my voice. “I’m yours. Take me.”

  I expected her to strike quickly, anticipating a swift surge of pain followed by the slow bloom of ecstasy. Instead, she covered my neck and collarbone with searing kisses until I was begging for her teeth. Only then did she claim me fully, sliding her canines into my jugular.

  She cradled my head as she drank, her gentle touch playing counterpoint to the necessary violence of our joining. I thrilled to the sensation of her lips hollowing around my skin; of my blood being drawn deeply into her body. My inner beast was alert and on-guard, but she recognized the touch of her mate. And when Valentine slowly began to ease her free hand along the taut muscles of my inner thigh, the panther’s contentment radiated from the depths of my brain, as though she was purring.

  “Yes,” I gasped as Val drew closer to the center of my need. “Please touch me.”

  Her mouth at my neck became less insistent as she slipped inside. When she filled me up, I cried out her name. When she twisted her fingers, I screamed. When she finally tore her lips from my skin, I cupped the nape of her neck with one hand and pulled her in for a long, passionate kiss.

  Her thumb moved over me, her fingers inside me, but I couldn’t let go until I knew that she too was on the edge. With my free hand, I found her wet and swollen. As she moved in me I moved in her, and when she broke the kiss to breathe I held her close, our foreheads pressed together, each reading the signs of the other’s approaching ecstasy.

  “Mine,” she gasped against my lips, her eyes losing their focus. She was very close, and I gloried in her lack of control.

  “Yours. Always. I love you, Valentine.”

  At my words, her body clenched around me. The sound of my name on her lips propelled me over the precipice with her, and in my last lucid moment, I knew only peace.

  Chapter Eight

  I woke to the sound of an angry wasp nest. Alarmed, I sat up quickly, only to discover Valentine beside me fumbling with somet
hing on the nightstand.

  Her buzzing phone, not stinging insects. Slowly, I reoriented to my surroundings. My feet were tangled in crimson sheets on a king-sized bed, and floor-to-ceiling windows revealed the glittering cityscape below. We were in our SoHo apartment, and it was almost ten o’clock in the evening. I’d been asleep for nearly three hours, but despite my body’s accelerated regeneration, I was still exhausted. I let myself sink back down onto the blankets and curled around Val, who had pushed herself up into a sitting position.

  I smoothed my palm down her thigh. “We can sleep for another hour, can’t we?”

  “I could sleep for another month.” Her voice sounded as gritty as my eyes felt, but she leaned over to kiss my forehead before slipping from the bed. “That was the bank, not my alarm. I need to call in. Stay and rest, baby.”

  Naked, she padded toward the door. I watched her go, then pulled the covers up to my chin and allowed the distant cadence of her voice to lull me into a doze. As I hovered between sleep and waking, daydreams—both feline and human—flickered before my mind’s eye. After so much chaos, the images were gloriously mundane: lounging in the shade of a lone tree on the savannah, sharing a meal with Val at an outdoor café, holding her hand as we walked along the Hudson in full daylight. I clung to the mental pictures, sifting through their layers, craving a time when we could bring them all to pass.

  At the sounds of Val’s return, I knew our momentary respite had come to an end. Her footsteps were quick and purposeful, and I opened my eyes in time to see her fling wide the doors of the walk-in closet.

  “What happened?”

  She turned just enough for me to observe her clenched jaw. “Christopher Blaine.”

  Fatigue forgotten, I slid to the edge of the bed. Presidential candidate Christopher Blaine had some kind of strong connection to Brenner, though no one in my circle knew the precise nature of their relationship. “What did he do?”

  Wooden hangers clacked together loudly as she searched for something to wear. “He’s coming after vampire assets, and my bank is directly in his crosshairs.”

  I stepped inside and began to dress. “At Brenner’s orders, do you think?”

  “Don’t you?” When she noticed what I was doing, she stopped buttoning her shirt. “Baby. You should stay. Get a little more sleep, and I can meet you at Headquarters.”

  I took a step closer to her, running my palm across her taut abdominal muscles before doing up her remaining buttons. “No. I don’t want to be parted from you.”

  That made her smile, and she lightly caressed my cheek before leaning in for a gentle kiss. “All right.”

  During the elevator ride, I toyed with her French cuffs, spinning the bull-shaped links back and forth. As the sign of both the Order of Mithras and a burgeoning economy, the bull was an especially appropriate symbol for her to wear. Dressed in a dark charcoal suit over a red-and-white striped shirt, Valentine cut an imposing figure. She exuded a blend of confidence and ambition as heady as an expensive cologne. As the daughter of the Secretary of the Treasury, Val had grown up surrounded by the world of high finance, and it showed. Banking might not have been her calling, but she was adept at playing the game.

  “You know,” I said, “I almost feel sorry for Blaine.”

  “Oh?”

  “I know that you and your father don’t exactly see eye to eye, but you’ve managed to combine his best qualities without expressing his worst ones.”

  “That’s a relief.” She linked one arm through mine as we emerged into the crisp night. “I don’t want to do this forever, though. I still think about going back to medicine.”

  I half-turned toward the nearest subway station before remembering that our driver was waiting at the curb. It was going to take some time for me to become accustomed to the perks of our new existence.

  “Don’t forget,” I said as she settled into the backseat next to me. “Forever is exactly what we have. Plenty of time to try all kinds of careers.”

  She walked her fingers along the seam of my slacks in a caress at once reassuring and arousing. “Once we’ve dealt with Brenner, let’s take a century off to do nothing but sleep and make love.”

  “Oh, that sounds so good.”

  For the remainder of the ride, I leaned my head against her shoulder and emptied my mind of everything but the sensation of being close to her. Only when Val directed the driver to drop us off at the front entrance did I pull away to smooth out the minor wrinkles in my blouse and run a hand through my hair. Oddly, I felt self-conscious—perhaps because I held no official role at the bank and would be there only as Valentine’s lover.

  “You look fantastic,” Val murmured as we entered the lobby.

  She hadn’t read my mind, but she had probably picked up on my body language. I squared my shoulders and reached down to lace our fingers together. Whatever my minor insecurities, I had to project an air of confidence. This was vampire territory, and the widespread renewal of hostility between our species meant that I had to tread carefully.

  Val kept my hand firmly clasped in hers as we made our way across the crowded atrium. Heads turned and whispers followed in our wake. I wondered how much of the attention was due to the events that had just transpired at Headquarters, and how much simply had to do with Valentine’s emergence as a major player in the vampire world at this particularly chaotic time. While we could have arrived via her private entrance, she needed to be visible right now. Her presence would improve chances for stability—not only for the Bank of Mithras, but also for the Consortium.

  Three people were waiting in the anteroom of her office: Kyle Jordan, and a man and woman I didn’t know. Kyle, whose puppyish enthusiasm had persisted even after Val had turned him into a vampire, looked excited to see me. The other man put me immediately on edge despite his wiry build and average height. He was dangerous. I knew it instinctively.

  Like him, the woman betrayed no emotion as she stood to greet us. About my height, she had eyes and hair of the same rich chocolate shade. A surge of possessiveness made me dig my nails into Valentine’s hand before I even knew what I was doing. Val stroked her thumb once over my knuckles in silent reassurance.

  “Bridget and Caleb, this is my partner, Alexa Newland. Alexa, Bridget manages the new brokerage services wing of the company and Caleb is my head of security.”

  “Pleasure.” My handshake was firmer than Bridget’s, and she quickly disengaged. Caleb only offered a shallow nod.

  As the door closed behind us, Val shrugged off her jacket. With it went the air of formality she had cultivated while we were under public scrutiny in the lobby. She gestured toward the conference table. “Let’s sit. Caleb, I haven’t yet checked in with Headquarters. Any news on Brenner’s whereabouts?”

  “A few leads, but nothing solid yet.” He waved away the glass of scotch she tried to hand him. “I haven’t put many of our people on the chase. Do you want that to change?”

  “No. If Blaine is after us, we’re going to need them here.” Val sat in the chair at the head of the table. “Speaking of which: all I know is what Bridget told me on the phone—that Blaine is using his pull with the SEC to launch an investigation.”

  Bridget withdrew a pair of glasses from her small purse and opened the file folder she had carried in with her. “Not only the SEC. He’s also reached out to the rating agencies, and to a few watchdog groups.”

  Val leaned back in her chair. “What’s the motive, here? Is he just trying to drum up negative publicity to make our investors lose confidence? Or is there more to it? Do we have any sense of his long-term goals?”

  “I’m of the opinion that whatever Blaine is up to, it somehow fits into Brenner’s plan,” said Caleb. “On the one hand, he might simply be trying to create a panic. On the other hand, he may be after something bigger. I’ve put both our physical and cyber security teams on full alert.”

  Val drummed her fingertips on the tabletop. “I want to know his motives. Until we do, we’ll only b
e able to react, and I don’t like getting caught flat-footed.”

  “What about the legality of all this?” I asked, trying to remember back to the courses I’d taken that had included a corporate law component. “Does he have any kind of just cause for sending these agencies after us?”

  “The Consortium’s legal counsel has been informed,” said Bridget, “but right now, as you can imagine, they’re focused on other matters.”

  The possibility of putting some of my education to use while also protecting Val was highly attractive to me. Despite having taken a leave of absence from NYU Law, I still had plenty of contacts there whom I could call on.

  “If I can help, I will.”

  “I know this cover-your-ass stuff is important,” said Val, “but I’d rather kick his ass instead. Give him a taste of what he’s dishing out. Can we brainstorm some ways to distract him and hit him where it hurts at the same time?”

  As the others began to toss out suggestions, I surreptitiously ran my heel along Valentine’s calf muscle. Going on offense against Blaine was a smart idea, and right then I decided I wouldn’t wait for Bridget, or the beleaguered Consortium, to ask for my help. At the earliest possible moment, I would take matters into my own hands. It would take a lot of cramming on my part, but I would find a way to bring a suit against Blaine while Val’s people worked to destabilize him in other ways.

  After a few more minutes of discussion, she pushed her chair back from the table. “We need to get to Headquarters. Caleb, will you do some digging to see which of these angles seem most fruitful?”

  “Of course.”

  “We’ll reconvene soon. In the meantime, let’s play stall ball every step of the way.”

  Val answered a few additional questions as she walked them out. After she closed the door behind them and turned around, she discovered that I’d taken the liberty of testing out the high-backed leather chair behind her desk.