TAYLOR’S SILENCE AND STILLNESS gave her away. Brody swiveled to look at her and he instantly put down the wine and the handful of bread he held and turned back to her. “Don’t look like that,” he said softly.
She removed her hand from her mouth. “Your back!”
He gave a tiny shake of his head. “I don’t even feel it right now. It’s days old.”
She moaned. “They did beat you for escaping the cavern, then. I’ll kill him, Brody. I’ll fucking kill him.”
He frowned, puzzled. Then his frown cleared. “Who did you put the squeeze on to get me here?”
“Oresme…who paid off Basilides.”
Something flickered in his eyes and Taylor nodded. “Basilides, then. That’s who gets to answer for this.”
Brody curled his hand around her neck and his fingers were warm against her flesh. She shuddered at the contact, because it was familiar and dear, yet strange to her because of the heat.
“Don’t do anything. Those two schemers spent years arranging affairs to suit themselves. You’ll just make yourself their target if you push things more than you have. They let you have this night because it’s a feminine whim. They think it’s harmless. If you were to threaten them in anyway.…” He shook his head.
“I’m not going to sit around and let someone get away with doing that to you,” she said flatly. “No one gets to do that to anyone, anymore.”
Brody shook his head again, his gaze boring into hers. “Here in Constantinople at this time, they do.”
“How can they do that to another human being?” she asked helplessly.
“I’m a slave,” Brody said flatly. “I’m not human to them.”
“You’re not a slave. Not anymore,” she said as firmly as she could.
Brody tilted his head to look at her. Silently, he held up a hand and turned it so she could see the metal cuff properly.
“This is temporary,” she replied flatly. “You know it comes to an end and soon, if I have anything to do with it.”
Brody shifted on the divan so he was facing her properly instead of twisting to look at her. It brought his knee up to lie bent across the cushion. “I had forgotten that, somewhere in the last few days. We do get to jump out of this, don’t we?” And he smiled.
Taylor drew in a shaky breath. That smile meant he had returned to the Brody she knew.
She rested her hand on his shoulder. “Back to Marit and your music.”
“Smog and clean sheets, traffic jams…Críost and showers…” He sighed, rolling his head and stretching his shoulders.
“Spain kicking Ireland’s ass in the World Cup Finals,” Taylor added, hiding her grin, for Ireland’s national soccer team was one of Brody’s guy things. He followed international soccer with keen interest. But Ireland was not the strongest team in the league and he was constantly disappointed.
Now his mouth and eyes opened in mild surprise. “Spain?” he replied with disdain. “That’ll be the day.” He lifted the damp ends of his hair from his shoulders, pulling it away with a twist of his wrist, winding it into a thick strand, then tossed it back over his shoulder and out of the way.
The mannerism was so familiar, so Brody, that its appearance now made her eyes sting with weak tears of relief and happiness. She hid them, blinking furiously, and threw the challenge back at him. “Ha! The day Ireland wins against Spain, I’ll buy you that Tessler you were drooling over.” Sports cars were another of his passions. He had been thinking about trading in the Maserati for a while now and the Tessler had caught his eye.
Brody grabbed a handful of the hem of the cloth tied around her and tugged. “Deal, mo bhean álainn.” His voice was abruptly deeper and thicker.
The cloth unraveled and crumpled around her hips. Brody made a growling sound in his throat. “Most beautiful,” he repeated in English and pulled her toward him, his hands on her hips.
Taylor’s heart skittered as he tossed the white cloth aside and pulled her so she was lying on the divan and half tucked under his body. He kicked his own sheet aside and leaned over her. In the low lamp light his eyes were very black. “You’re good for my soul, Maggie Taylor Yates.”
“Tá tú go maith do mianach, freisin.” It was the Celtic version of ‘me, too.’ Taylor lifted her head and kissed him.
The lingering traces of wine in his mouth and on his breath were almost shocking, but it was a minor thing. Brody passively accepted the kiss for a mere heartbeat, then he took control by pulling her up hard against him and driving his tongue into her mouth.
It was an explosive kiss. A ground-breaking one. All the tightly held emotions Taylor had been storing inside her for the last four days, for lack of someone to share them with, all of them drove the kiss, making it one of the most intense moments in her life.
Brody almost tore his mouth from hers. His chest was heaving. “My god!” he breathed. “Veris was right! Kissing you while I’m human is poetry and gourmet food all rolled into a single symphony.”
Trust Brody to find an apt and unusual analogy for what he was feeling. Veris, the trained academic, had used statistics for comparison.
Taylor stroked her forefinger along the line of Brody’s cheek. “Wait until you come. It’s even better.”
He blinked, then chuckled. “Ye’re a wanton, Maggie,” he told her, letting himself revert back to his natural Irish accent.
“And you just hate it, don’t you?”
He smiled as he bent to kiss her again. “Uh-huh. Especially while I’m without the canines, my sweet one. I can kiss you as hard and as deep and as long as I want, and not have to worry about ripping your flesh apart as I do it.”
“I noticed their absence,” she murmured against his lips. “Kiss me again.”
His kiss was longer this time, and heady. Taylor blinked as he released her mouth and trailed his lips over her chin and down the length of her neck. She was breathing hard and aroused as hell. It had been four days without a single caress or kiss from either of them, and Taylor was used to multiple erotic encounters each day. One or both of them would find a way to raise her pulse, leave her trembling, or have her squirm and scream in ecstasy. They took pleasure in leaving her in a limp state at least once per day.
Brody closed his mouth around her nipple and Taylor gasped and clutched at his head, her fingers sliding through his damp hair. Her clit and pussy were throbbing with urgent need. It had been far too long. She twisted on the divan, trying futilely to relieve the ache.
Brody pinned her thigh down, his body heavy and hard on top of her. Even human, he was strong, directing her body where he wanted it so he could deliver the most devastating stimulation. The thigh he was not holding down he scooped up with one arm under her knee, spreading her open for him to toy with as he wanted.
He nibbled his way down her belly, making her abs quiver. Taylor’s grip in his hair tightened convulsively as he neared her mound. “Brody…” she whispered desperately. “Don’t wait.”
He gave a low growl. “You taste ambrosial,” he told her, his lips moving against her flesh, very low down on her abdomen. “Better than you’ve ever tasted before. One doesn’t hurry luxury.” He slid his tongue into the top of her crease, probing and finding the swollen nub of her clit.
Taylor’s hips lifted in reaction and she closed her eyes, letting herself drop into the power of the climax building in her, instead of denying it or trying to hold it back. Her breathing hastened and hitched in her chest as Brody’s tongue stroked and his lips caressed her clit. He slid his hand under her ass and lifted her pelvis up higher. It also kept her mound steady, defeating any thrust or rise of her hips.
She gripped the divan, a moan escaping her.
Brody thrust his fingers deep into her pussy, spreading them so the knuckles would rub against the sensitive walls.
Her climax hit her with an impact that stole her breath and made her sight fade for one shining moment. Taylor arched off the cushions, her fingers digging into the fabric, gritting her teeth together to stop the scream that was pushing from inside her. She couldn’t alert the household to her midnight visitor by screaming aloud.
She dropped back onto the cushions, panting, and Brody surged over the top of her. He planted his hand next to her head and impaled her with his cock in a heavy single thrust that stilled all Taylor’s movements as she accepted him into her. She sucked in a breath, her body trembling around him. It had only been a few days, but it seemed much longer since they had shared this primary intimacy.
“I love having you inside me,” she whispered, looking up at him.
Brody paused, his cock lodged as deeply inside her as he could drive it, looking down at her with his dark eyes. “No man could ever tire of this, not with you. I’m glad I screwed with history just enough to bring you into our lives.” It wasn’t the first time Brody had made this confession to her—well out of the range of Veris’ hearing, for Veris would have an embolism if he heard that Brody considered the near-disaster he had created when they had first met one of his finest achievements.
Brody eased from her body and thrust once more, slowly and deeply. Then again. He growled, the tendons in his neck and shoulders straining. “Íosa Críost. I can feel...everything.” His thrusts hastened and the little furrow appeared between his brows once more. “Too much...” he muttered.
Taylor wrapped her leg over his hips. She could feel the orgasm take his control, making him quiver and thrust in shallow, quick movements. His eyes closed. “Aaaggh!” he growled, the sound pulling from deep inside his chest. His hot seed spilled in her and this time Taylor could feel it...the heat of his essence.
Brody froze, staring down at her, his muscles straining. He swallowed.
Taylor smiled at him. “That came from your toes,” she observed.
He gripped her hip, shifting her on the cushions a few inches. “That was just the opening aria,” he assured her. “Then there’s the rest of the opera.”
His cock was still a rigid shaft inside her.
Taylor caught her breath as he began to thrust again, for the music analogy confirmed what his earlier gesture had told her.
Brody was back. Now, she just had to keep him here.
* * * * *
Brody made love with a fierce relentlessness, taking her again and again. His need might have lingered for hours except for the fact that he was human in this here and now. Once his human body had been fed, watered and the first hot driving edge of his need had been satiated, the next most critical biological priority asserted itself: Sleep tried to claim him.
Brody fought it off with a shake of his head and by grinding the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. “It’s barely past two a.m. I just got here. I won’t waste this night by sleeping it away,” he growled, reaching for her.
“Your body will shut down on you whether you want it or not,” Taylor warned him as his lips trailed between her breasts. “You’re sleep deprived and your biorhythms are naturally low right now.”
“Shut up and kiss me,” he demanded.
But exhaustion was a force Brody could not ignore, bargain with or work around. Barely fifteen minutes later, he yawned mightily, his lips brushing over her hip bone, then lifted his head and swore softly.
Taylor drew him up to lie alongside her on the divan. “Just rest for a few minutes,” she suggested. “Even a catnap of five minutes might refresh you enough to keep going for a few more hours.”
Brody rolled onto his side and tucked her up against him. “This feels…” he murmured, his voice thick with sleep.
“Strange,” she finished, agreeing with him. “It’s usually me who gets to fall asleep in your arms.”
“I don’t even know if I snore,” he whispered.
Taylor muffled her laughter because the heavy exhale that he gave told her he had fallen asleep already. He had been fighting it off too long and as soon as he relaxed it took him.
She turned under his heavy arm so she could see his face. His eyes were closed, the thick black lashes resting against the pale flesh of his high cheekbones. He was a beautiful man, and when he was completely relaxed like this, it showed far more easily than when his wariness and guard was raised as it was so frequently when strangers were around.
Taylor only realized she had drifted into sleep herself when soft sounds and movement on the other side of the room alerted her to intruders. She jerked awake as Kale hurried across the room, carrying a lamp. Kale’s face was impassive as always, but barely three paces behind her were Brody’s caped and hooded guards.
Taylor shook Brody awake, cold fear washing through her. She had only just drifted off herself, so Brody had been asleep a few minutes only. It could barely be three in the morning.
The guards had returned too early.
Taylor shook Brody harder. “Braenden. Wake up now,” she called in the ancient Greek they used in this time. She shook him a third time, then slid out from under his heavy arm and grabbed the white cloth she had used as a sarong earlier in the evening, and wrapped it around her, hiding her nakedness.
Brody stirred groggily.
“Mistress—“ Kale began, speaking softly.
“Up! Get up, you lazy bastard,” one of the guards demanded. He lifted his foot and kicked at Brody.
His foot didn’t make contact.
Brody seemed to roll out of the way and rise to his feet in a move that Taylor would have sworn was only possible for a vampire to make, with their enhanced strength and responses. But in a cat-quick reaction, Brody barreled his way between the front pair of guards, sending them staggering.
The guards reacted almost as fast. They circled Brody in a defensive pincer, enclosing him in a tight circle of bodies. He slammed up against the other side of the circle and instantly, they closed in on him, raining fists and the pommel of theirs swords on his back, arms and shoulders, forcing him down to his knees.
Taylor realized she was trying to go to his aid when Kale gripped her arm, holding her back. Horror washed through her, along with despair, but Veris was not here this time for her to hide her face against and pretend this was not happening. Taylor grit her teeth, remembering that she was truly alone now and the only one who could help Brody.
She made herself watch each blow and punch. The tears she shed as she watched scalded her cheeks like hot acid, but she didn’t wipe them away.
When Brody was beaten into submission and docile once more, they attached the chains to his cuffs and slid the collar about his neck and fastened it. A long disguising cape was thrown about his shoulders. No one bothered with a tunic for him. He was left naked and barefoot beneath the rough material of the cape.
Taylor picked out the head guard by his blind eye. She wiped her face and stepped in front of him. “It isn’t sunrise,” she told him. “You are not abiding by the terms of the agreement I arranged with Oresme.”
“Terms?” He laughed at her. “What, exactly, did you think you were arranging? You get what you get, lady whore. Consider yourself lucky.”
Taylor glanced at Brody, at his face which was barely visible under the pulled-over hood. He had warned her this would happen and she fully expected him to send her an I-told-you-so look, or to lift his brow at her. But his head was down, his gaze on the floor. Even his shoulders were slumped, making him look smaller. Shorter.
Brody had gone. Braenden the slave had returned.
Anger stirred in Taylor’s chest and belly for what they had done to him and to his spirit. She looked at the guard as he tugged on the chains, preparing to move Brody out.
“What is your name?” she demanded.
“What business is that of yours?”
“The next time I arrange a night like this, I’ll make sure to include your name in the list of people who share the purse I give Oresme,” she told him.
He laughed. “What makes you think there’s ever going to be a next time?” He pushed past her, making her stagger. Kale was instantly at her side, holding her up, helping her find her feet again.
Taylor looked up, just as the huddled group of caped men disappeared around the corner of the suite entrance.
Brody was gone.
* * * * *
As they got closer to the main cavern, the stench got stronger, and that was what finally overcame Brody’s lethargy. The throbbing in his back and shoulders from the punches and blows from the sword hilts was nothing…but the idea of being forced back into that filth and wretchedness after even a few short hours of touching and tasting Taylor’s delicate sweetness was too much to bear.
The guards led him directly toward one of the cages, and Brody reared back, blank wordless refusal building in his mind and muscles. It was like a madness swelling inside him, rising to engulf his sanity and shake him apart with despair and fury.
“Whoa, boy!” he heard Basilides say.
That was the last coherent thought he had for a while. He hit out at anything and everything around him, fighting with every fiber of his body and soul. He would not let himself be put in the cage. He couldn’t.
He knew it was a battle he could not win. There were too many guards and he was chained and naked.
But to give in just because he couldn’t win would strip him of more than just clothes. So he fought until one of them—probably Zeno, who had spent the journey from Matthew’s house bellyaching about his assignment—took his consciousness with a decent blow to the head.
His vision faded as he sank to the ground and his last coherent sight was of Evaristus, crouched in the dark shadows near the last cage, watching his downfall with a quizzical expression.
Brody thought there was surprise in Evaristus’ eyes.
That he might have surprised Evaristus, who seemed to know everything and see everything, was a satisfying idea.