Sundown, International 4: Maneater Page 2

  And if my brain had been functioning properly, I might have read something into that.

  But my brain wasn’t functioning properly. It could only think about the golden perfection of the man now sliding his body over mine, divesting me of the rest of my clothes. His hands skimmed my waist, my hips, caressed my thighs. He kissed my breasts, sucking the nipples into his mouth and making me moan.

  When his hand slid between my legs and explored my pussy, my hips came up six inches from the bed. I was so hot, so ready, on fire for him that when I pulled him over me and wrapped my legs around his waist, he didn’t hesitate to slide inside.

  And, oh. Oh. Yes, indeed, he fit inside me, and he did so very very well. Dear gods in heaven. I wanted to weep at the perfection of it. Totally mindless now, I could do little more than writhe against him as he stroked into me, thick and hard. While my hands clutched at his back, his shoulders, his exquisite buttocks, his were busy touching me, caressing my body, keeping the fire licking over my skin. His hot lips skimmed butterfly kisses over my face and throat.

  When the tension built inside me so high I couldn’t stand it any more, he was there with me when I broke. Gasping for breath, I dug my fingers into those glorious muscles of his and held on as he surged into me, over and over, and was finally still.

  Chapter Two

  We lay there for what felt like a long time. My heart was pounding faster and louder than any of Aunt Leucosia’s rap albums. This… this glorious man lay there with me, his body solid between my thighs, his skin smooth and damp with sweat. When he lifted his head and kissed my mouth, his eyes were the deep, fathomless blue of the Mediterranean.

  “Hi,” he said softly, and I grinned like a fool.

  “Hi.”

  His fingers brushed a few strands of damp hair from my face. “Alexius,” he said.

  “What?” My brain felt like mist. Happy pink mist.

  He grinned. “My name. It’s Alexius.”

  “Oh.” Alexius. Alex. Lexius. Alexiuuuuus.

  You know, I finally understand that Maria song on Raidne’s West Side Story CD.

  He was still grinning, and I realized I hadn’t given him my name. He was still inside me, and I hadn’t told him my name.

  My face burning, I managed, “Chloe.”

  “Hi, Chloe.”

  “Hi, Alexius.”

  He kissed me again, and I sighed and wrapped my arms around him and just sank into his kiss. His body felt so wonderful against mine, every inch of him pressed against me, so hard and hot. His cock twitched inside me. Was he getting hard again?

  Yes. Oh. Mmm. Yes.

  His hands stroking me, he rolled onto his back, taking me with him and giving me a prime view of his golden chest as I sat up. Yes, he was definitely getting harder now, more so every second as he looked up at me.

  “Hi, Alexius,” I said again, surveying the perfection of his naked torso.

  “Hi, Chloe,” he said, his cobalt eyes dancing. He ran his hands up my sides, from my hips to my breasts, making me shiver, then stroked his thumbs over my nipples, which made me gasp. When he pulled me down toward him, arching my back so he could lick my breasts, I moaned. My breath came fast. I shifted my hips, felt him move inside me.

  Damn, he felt good. He felt insanely good. His hands, his mouth, his cock. The perfect ridges of his hipbones against the insides of my thighs. The ripple of his abs against my stomach. He was perfection, and I wanted more, more, wanted to buck and grind and writhe, take him over and over again.

  Dizzy, I kissed him, rubbing my damp nipples against his chest, moaning into his mouth, lightheaded with desire. How was he doing this to me? I’ve seen some very pretty men in my time, but no one like him. I couldn’t get enough. I never ever wanted to let his body out of contact with mine.

  Distantly, I wondered if this was what it was like for a man when he met a siren. This mad, desperate lust, this mindless wanting. Had someone cast a spell on us? Was Eros up to his tricks again? Or were all women like this when confronted with a man so beautiful, so perfect, that even his voice --

  His --

  Oh no.

  I ripped away from him so fast my head spun. Sitting up, still riding that huge pole of his, I stared down in horror.

  “Alexius!” I cried.

  “Chloe?” He looked mildly alarmed. His cock throbbed inside me.

  “That’s a Greek name!”

  His perfect brow creased. “I suppose it --”

  “Alexius,” I said, gripping his shoulders -- his broad, strong, wonderful shoulders. “Who was your mother? What was her name?”

  One golden brow arched. “My mother?”

  “Yes!” Frantic now, I gabbled, “Was she human?” No, he wouldn’t necessarily know. “Was she Greek?”

  “No, actually she was English. And her name was Mary.”

  English. Mary.

  “And she was quite definitely human.”

  Human.

  I slumped, breathless. Human. Oh gods, what a fool I’d just made of myself! But what would you think? This glorious, perfect specimen, who made me go gooey with lust -- if there was such a thing as a male siren, wouldn’t he look like Alexius? What if one of my aunts had strayed? What if there was someone else out there like me?

  And I’d just had sex with him?

  Well, it’s all right for the Pantheon, but I’m half human, and that half is plenty enough to freak right out at the idea of getting jiggy with my close relatives.

  Suddenly, I wasn’t feeling so sexy any more.

  He’s not related to me, I told myself. He can’t be. It doesn’t matter. His mother was human. Most probably his father was too, and he can’t be related to my father with any degree of intimacy, since the poor man was eaten about four hundred years ago.

  Everything’s fine.

  “Chloe?” he asked, stroking my arms gently. “What’s all this about? Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” I said, and tried to find a smile. Had I asked him if his mother was human? Oh gods. “I just… I thought… you reminded me of someone, and I thought… but you’re not.”

  “Not what?”

  “Not… related to someone I know.” Like me. Ugh.

  “Who?” he asked.

  “I…” I tried a measure of honesty. “Okay. You looked… you reminded me of one of my aunts, and I thought… well, it just freaked me out.”

  He looked amused. “Well, my mother was an only child. My father has a sister, but she has no children.”

  “And my aunts are… well, I just thought… it doesn’t matter. I’m sorry.”

  He smiled, a lovely, gentle smile. “It’s all right.” His thumb made circles on my shoulder. He shifted his hips, reminding me he was still very much inside me.

  Then someone knocked on the door, and he swore.

  “Who is it?” I called.

  The reply was muffled, coming as it did from the other site of the suite’s sitting room.

  I exchanged a look with Alexius.

  “Did you order room service?” he said.

  “I just checked in.”

  “We didn’t order any room service,” he called, but the door to the suite was already clicking open.

  “Your luggage, sir, ma’am,” called a male voice.

  “It’s the honeymoon suite,” Alexius said through gritted teeth, as I slid off him and searched for something to wear while I told the damn bellboy to bugger off. “You’d think they’d figure out we don’t want to be disturbed.”

  I had to smile at that. “We’re not really on honeymoon.”

  “Yeah, but they don’t know that.”

  My shirt was still out in the main room, and all I had was a skirt. Maybe there was a robe in the bathroom, I thought, but unfortunately getting there involved crossing in front of the door to the suite’s sitting room, where the bellboy was. And the door was open. And he saw me. Naked.

  His eyes went shiny. His jaw dropped. His pants tented.

  I swear, someti
mes being a damn siren is really annoying.

  “Excuse me,” I said, but he clearly wasn’t listening.

  He dropped my suitcase. It landed on his foot, but he didn’t seem to notice. His hands were busy fumbling his fly open, getting out his swollen, red, shiny cock. He rushed toward me, falling to his knees and burying his head in my crotch.

  “I think he’s angling for a tip,” Alexius said from behind me.

  Shoving at the bellboy’s greasy head, I glanced back desperately. Alexius was lounging on the bed, watching with what looked like amusement. He was still wonderfully, rampantly naked.

  “Get off,” I said firmly to the young man burrowing his head between my thighs. I could have used The Voice, but I didn’t want to scare Alexius. “Get out. Go away!”

  He mumbled something but it was, understandably, muffled. His tongue flicked my labia.

  And I got angry.

  “Get your head out of my crotch and get out of this room and don’t come back,” I snarled, and when you have a mouth full of teeth in rows like a shark you can really snarl.

  The bellboy froze for an instant. Then he scrambled to his feet and was gone so quickly you could almost see his outline quivering in the air.

  I stayed where I was, breathing hard, willing my teeth and my eyes and my hands to go back to normal. It’s only a partial change, and it happens when I feed in human form. In my true form, the teeth and the eyes change, but the hands turn into wings. My whole body below the neck turns into something like a large eagle.

  You probably didn’t need to know that.

  “Chloe?” Alexius said.

  “C’n gerra c’ff guz g’ys,” I said, but since I was speaking through three layers of serrated teeth it came out a bit garbled.

  “What?”

  His voice came from right behind me. His hand touched my shoulder. Any second now he’d see --

  “I c’d --” I jammed my jaw shut and swallowed hard, balled up my fists and dared my body not to return to normal.

  I turned.

  “I said, you can’t get good staff these days.”

  Alexius scanned my face, and smiled. “Can’t blame him for being knocked out.” His knuckles traced my jaw.

  “He very nearly was.” I grimaced. “Ugh, I feel all… greasy.” Wow, how sexy was that?

  But Alexius just took my hand and led me toward the bathroom. “Then let’s investigate the shower.”

  I couldn’t believe he wasn’t at least a little disturbed by my behavior. I mean, first of all I ask if his mother is human (what was I thinking?), then I’m digging a besotted bellboy out of my crotch and snarling in a voice that has commanded men to their deaths. It’s not what might be called normal.

  The shower was huge, big enough for two, and some friends. Jets of water came from half a dozen angles to spray us, warm and soft, and under the carefully angled spotlights Alexius soaped me all over with something divinely scented.

  He took extra time soaping between my legs, which was very kind of him. Although somehow I don’t think his intentions were that selfless. It wasn’t long before washing became caressing, and I was clinging to him as he slid two fingers up inside me and circled his thumb around my clit. Writhing, gasping, I let the water tease my skin as he stroked me with expert fingers. His cock pulsed against my thigh, and I reached down to stroke it.

  “Mmm,” he said into my neck. “No.”

  “No?”

  He lifted his head and gave me a wicked grin, before dropping to his knees and pushing me back against the wall. “No.”

  And you know, this time I didn’t feel remotely compelled to use The Voice. Hell, no. If anything, I might have used it to command him not to stop, but even after he’d licked me to one delicious orgasm, he kept on going, his tongue performing miracles on my most sensitive flesh. He nibbled and licked, sucked my labia into his mouth, swirled his tongue around my clit, thrust his fingers in and out of me. My hands clutched blindly at his head, tangling in his wet hair as I thrust my pussy closer, deeper into his mouth. I had one leg draped over his shoulder and I swear the other was being held up by him. By the time he raised his head I was shaking all over.

  “I could do that all day,” he said, which nearly made me come again. He kissed my stomach, his lips tracing soft patterns across to my hip. “But…”

  He pulled me down to the floor with him. Actually, all he really did was let go and catch me as I slithered bonelessly down to sprawl in his lap. I felt his cock throbbing under me and squirmed against it. For all my mad orgasming earlier, I was ready to be filled again with that thick, long cock.

  My mouth dry at the thought, I reached down to stroke it. Alexius held me between his legs, his cock rising between us. I could barely wrap my fingers around it. I wondered if it would fit in my mouth.

  Alexius groaned. “Don’t,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Look at it like that.”

  “Like what?” I fondled his balls.

  “Like you’re wondering what it tastes like.”

  I licked my lips. I was wondering that. But for once, not in the siren sense.

  “Oh, hell,” he said, and lifted me up, closer to him, sliding his hot length against my wet pussy. I caught my breath, sliding against him, wet all over but especially where his cock was pushing, throbbing, stroking.

  His mouth found mine, his tongue thrusting inside, and I couldn’t take any more. I wanted some thrusting down below, too. I grasped his cock in one hand and slid down onto it, the pleasure so intense it had me clinging to him, moaning. Wrapping my legs around his waist, I pulled myself tighter, pushed him deeper inside me, and looked down to see the pink, wet lips of my pussy spread around the thick base of his cock.

  “I could do this all day,” I said, and he smiled, and moved inside me, and do you know what? We did do it all day.

  Chapter Three

  We ordered room service, and I specified a female staff member to deliver it. No one complained. I guess hotels are used to that sort of thing. We ate strawberries and drank champagne off each others’ bodies and looked out over the Vegas skyline as the sun went down, then Alexius ran a bath in the huge double tub and we frolicked in there.

  I kept expecting there to be something wrong with him. But he was perfect. Having examined every inch of him quite closely, I can say with absolute truth that he had no physical flaws whatsoever. There was a small birthmark on his upper thigh, shaped like a flaming sun, but that couldn’t be considered an imperfection. In fact, it was so adorable I spent some time kissing it.

  His skills as a lover were unparalleled. I’ve been alive four hundred or so years (no one’s exactly sure, calendars not being important to my mother and her sisters back then) and in that time I’ve had plenty of men between my thighs. And none of them could match the skill, the tenderness, the ferocity, the inventiveness of Alexius’s lovemaking. Certainly none of them could match him for stamina.

  He had a melting golden voice, deep and smooth and wonderful. His smile was like a sunrise. He was smart. He was funny. He was…

  Uncannily perfect.

  But when I woke the next morning he was gone.

  Well, that figures, I thought, rolling over in the somewhat rumpled bed and inhaling his scent like the besotted fool I am. I knew he couldn’t be perfect. Human men aren’t perfect. Even the gods aren’t that hot. Bossy little sods that they are.

  Paper crumpled under my cheek. He’d left me a note.

  Chloe, I didn’t want to wake you. Have work to do this morning but should be finished by lunch. Pick somewhere and I’ll meet you there. Love, Alexius.

  Love. Oh dear, I’m in deep. He writes those four letters and I’m delirious.

  Delirious enough to take ten minutes to realize he hadn’t left me a number or any way of contacting him.

  Yeah, like I said. I knew he wasn’t really perfect.

  Showering, savoring the sensitivity of my skin, the soreness of my muscles, I dressed modestly -- I al
ways dress modestly, it reduces the number of men who turn into slavering fools at the sight of me -- and made my way down to the concierge desk.

  “What can I do until lunchtime?” I asked the lady there.

  She looked me over. “Alone?”

  “My --” er, were we still pretending we were married? Don’t dwell on that, Chloe, it’ll drive you mad. “I’m meeting someone for lunch.” Possibly. Probably not.

  She glanced at her watch and said, “Well, we aren’t short of things to look at here, ma’am. You could go shopping…”

  I considered it, but there were only a few hours left until lunch, and when I get started shopping, I can be there for days. So shoot me, I only get to see a mall once every five or ten years.

  “Or how about the Shark Reef at Mandalay Bay?”

  I quickly shook my head. Fish hate me. All animals hate me. They know a predator when they sense one. Even predators are frightened of sirens. You don’t get many sharks around our island.

  You don’t get many anythings around our island. Just bones. Lots and lots of bones.

  Seeing my face, the concierge smiled. “Not fond of sharks? They have other tropical fish --”

  “No -- I’m just not big on fish generally.”

  “Even dolphins? They have dolphins at the Mirage.”

  Dolphins aren’t fish. They still aren’t fond of me though. But even as I thought that, I remembered something from the research I’d been doing before I came. “Don’t they have tigers there? From the conjurers show?”

  “Yes ma’am, they do. The white tigers. You like cats?” I nodded. Cats aren’t scared of me. “Well, then, you could go to the Secret Garden. They have white tigers and white lions. You ever see a white lion? They’re beautiful, ma’am.”

  I smiled. “Yes. I’d like that.”

  She gave me directions, which I ignored and hailed a cab instead. The Secret Garden wasn’t really all that secret -- there were massive signs everywhere pointing to it. The man at the ticket kiosk refused to take payment and offered me a personal tour, which I accepted.