Mating Fever by Susan Hayes
Leta
“—are we going?” Leta finished her sentence as they rematerialized. The words weren’t even out of her mouth before she knew wherever he’d taken her, it wasn’t anywhere on Earth. The light was strange for one thing, dim and cast in dingy hues of yellow and orange. Her skin itched as unfamiliar magicks buzzed at the edges of her mind and a deep sense of wrongness overcame her. This wasn’t her home plane, and it wasn’t anywhere she wanted to be.
A quick glance around didn’t offer any clues as to her location. They were in a room with dark wood paneling on the walls and dark stone floors under foot. Everywhere she looked were antique furnishings and shelves full of books, some of them so old they looked like they were bound with leather or cloth. Instead of overhead lights, oil lamps and candles burned, adding their flickering light to the dim glow from the windows.
“Where are we? Some kind of museum?” she asked as she took in her surroundings.
“We’re not in a museum,” he answered, and she could swear there was a note of insult in his tone.
“Then where the hell are we?”
“You just answered your own question. Welcome to Hell, sweet cheeks. Well, Purgatory anyway.” He swung her around so she could see that they were standing in what looked like a study, with hallways and doors leading off in several different directions. “This is my home.”
I’m literally in Hell. Fan-fucking-tastic.
“Hang on, I thought demons…I mean the fallen, lived in Hell proper. Isn’t Purgatory the halfway house for human souls that weren’t evil enough to be sent to Hell, but had screwed up too much to get into Heaven?”
“It is. I’m not one of the fallen, I just work for them.” He shrugged his massive shoulders and started walking down a dimly lit hall, dragging her with him.
Leta tried to wrap her head around the fact that the most fearsome creatures in Hell’s infernal army weren’t fallen angels at all. “You’re human?”
“I was, once.”
“You were human, but you let Lucifer turn you into something else. Who does that? What exactly are you, Carnage?”
His lips curved up into a dark smile. “Horny.”
His answer should have pissed her off. If anyone else had uttered those words, they’d be spitting out the shattered remains of their dental work right now. For some reason, when he said it, her heart raced, her pussy got wet, and her clit started throbbing in time with her pulse. It was insane, but right now she was tempted to lean in and kiss him until neither of them could remember their names.
Instead of giving in, she bit the inside of her cheek to break the spell. Once she could think again, she poked a finger into the massive wall of his chest. “Whatever sexual whammy voodoo thing you’re trying here, it’s not going to work. I’m not interested.”
He laughed, turned, and pressed her up against the nearest wall until their mouths were only a fraction of an inch apart. “Little liar. You want me as bad as I want you. I can smell it. You’re already wet for me, and I can hear your heart pounding like a war drum right now. Whatever this is, we’ve both got it bad. I’m betting it would feel so damned good if we gave in and let this happen.”
“I’m an abomination,” she reminded him.
He raised a blond brow and gave her a panty-melting grin. “And I’m the Devil’s bounty hunter. What’s your point?”
She struggled to find one, but it was impossible to think past the urgent demands of her body. She wanted him like a junkie craved her next fix, and for the life of her, she couldn’t think of a reason to deny herself one last moment of pleasure. There had been so few of them in her life, and she wasn’t likely to get a chance to experience anymore. Not once he delivered her to Lucifer.
“This is an incredibly bad idea,” she murmured before closing the tiny space between their mouths and sealing his with a kiss. After a lifetime of running, Leta was tired of it all. Just this one time, she wanted to taste what it was like to have something she wanted, no matter how insane it was, or what the price would be.
She had never had a home, or friends, or anything resembling a normal childhood. All she ever had was her mother, and Atariel had died years ago, sacrificing herself to save her little girl. The vampires had only found them because her younger self had lacked the discipline to shield herself from detection. It was her fault, she had been weak, and her mother had paid the price. She carried the guilt of that knowledge around with her like iron chains she couldn’t break.
She had been the cause of so many deaths. So many lives snuffed out because they came in contact with her. That’s all it took. Death followed her like a shadow, threatening anyone she ever dared to get close to. This one time, she would let herself feel something. After all, Carnage was a fucking Hell Hound. If anyone could defy death, it had to be him.
