Lucky in Love Read online

“It’s not an issue.” Though the hollowness I feel in this newly developed heart of mine makes me wonder if it is, deep down. “No worries about anything else either. I can’t contract or pass along human diseases.”

  “I’m clean too,” he tells me. “So, what are ye, if ye don’t mind me askin’?”

  I move off and help him to his feet, where he promptly discards the last of his clothing and follows me to bed. I try to think of something to tell him that won’t reveal much, but honestly, something about all of this feels too right to worry about what the outcome might be. Either that, or I’m being blinded by the love I’ve begun feeling in earnest. Not just the first twinges for this human, but the full-on devotion I’ve discovered for Dean and Damon these past few months too.

  “I was born in hell.” I tell him as we get into bed.

  “Ye don’t say! I was takin’ the piss about that devil woman ting before.”

  “I’m a demon with special abilities,” I tell him, as he pulls me into his arms.

  He’s so open and trusting, in spite of what I’ve just told him. This is the intoxicating side of humans I barely ever catch a glimpse of. I’ve gotten this close before, usually at the request of a Master. This feels different. More intimate.

  “A demon, eh? Well that’s interesting. Tell me more about yer special abilities then.”

  I smile against his warm chest. It’s so different to being held by a vampire. Their cool skin prevents the desire to sleep, which works out well usually considering I mostly use the bed for less boring reasons. Tonight, I could sleep. I even feel like I need it.

  “I deal in fortune,” I start, hearing him murmur in interest, though I can tell he’s getting more comfortable now and more likely to fall asleep. “Some would call me Lady Luck, but I’m one of several demons who have this ability.”

  “Ye don’t say.” His voice is low now, and the feeling of being in his arms is so comforting I’m starting to yawn.

  “We are Djinn,” I tell him, wondering if he’s starting to drift like I am. “My master commands good luck from me, at all times. I give that to him, but I also have to give out bad luck. There’s always a balance, a price to be paid for the good. He doesn’t care what I do with that side of things, as long as it doesn’t hit him.”

  “Ye have a Master?” He sounds confused.

  “I’m a slave, Finn. Whoever owns my charm, owns me.”

  “Yer charm?” He moves a little and turns my head to face him. “What’s this charm then an’ where can I find it?”

  I shouldn’t have told him. What was I thinking? I just smile. “The owner has to give the charm up willingly. It can’t be stolen.”

  “There must be some way...”

  “There isn’t,” I tell him. “I can’t be freed, but that doesn’t matter. I’m not treated badly. I have my own space. I have lovers. I don’t need to be rescued.”

  I don’t even realise tears have been filling my eyes until they start to drip onto my cheeks.

  He wipes them away, a solemn expression on his beaten face. “If there’s one ting I’ve learned in all me years, Maeve, it’s that there’s always a way. Don’t worry yer pretty head. I’ll find it for ye.”

  Finn wasn’t long in drifting into a deep slumber. I find myself running my fingers along his arm, beginning to wonder what brought him to the casino in the first place. He’s not well-dressed like the heavy rollers Bronson’s used to playing high stakes poker with. He insisted on joining the game last night, even though he barely had enough chips cashed in to make it through the first hand.

  I think back to the first moment I laid eyes on him.

  There was an air of desperation as he was manhandled into the room, one hand grasping his chips as his eager eyes drank in everything around him. The cocky swagger as he hauled his arm out of Dean’s grasp and scowled at my lover brought a smirk to my lips. This guy was going to be fun. I had no idea how much.

  “Git yer thieving hands off me,” Finn said indignantly, smiling and nodding at Bronson. “How do ye do, Mr. Parker? I’d like to join yer game here, if ye’d be so kind.”

  Bronson’s gaze was hard, and I expected him to throw this guy out of his casino immediately, quite possibly missing a limb or two. “Buy in is ten grand.”

  Finn nodded, placing the chips on the table. Twelve grand in total. His hand shook a little as he put it down. I knew straight away, this was everything he owned. He was taking a huge risk tonight and he knew it. I wondered what had brought him here, exactly.

  “Deal the man in,” Bronson said, after a long pause.

  Dean got an extra chair and I admired his visible muscles as he brought it to the table. He always wore tight fitting black T-shirts to work. The vampire was stunningly attractive, with caramel hair in a cut that framed his chiseled features, and hazel-brown eyes with flecks of gold that just mesmerized me to look at. Even if compulsion worked on me, he would never need to use it to get what he wanted. His gaze drifted to mine momentarily and his lips made the faintest of twitches. He doesn’t smile often, but when he does it’s devastating. I would find a way to coax one out of him later. He left after being dismissed; back out to keep watch over the main casino for the rest of the night.

  The game began, and I watched the new player with increasing interest. He seemed tightly wound, his jaw clenched while he kept his expression as relaxed as possible. He didn’t want it to seem like he knew what he was doing, but by the third hand I knew that he did. Seemed to be a combination of reading people well and counting the cards. He was practiced at this, smooth even if he seemed a little nervous.

  It was only a matter of time before Bronson worked out what he was doing. He didn’t have the funds to risk losing a single hand in an effort to hustle the regulars properly. That made my Master instantly suspicious. I knew when Bronson threw his hand down and looked my way with narrowed eyes that he’d had enough.

  “Think you can come to my casino and hustle me?” Bronson asked, cracking his knuckles.

  I winced, already certain of the gambler’s fate.

  “It’s beginner’s luck, is all,” Finn murmured, trying to keep his tone jovial as he scooped the chips toward him. He’d just won over a hundred thousand dollars, but surely he could see now that Bronson wasn’t about to just let him walk away with those winnings. “I’m sure ye’ll win it back in a heartbeat.”

  One nod was all it took to send three vampires Finn’s way. They dragged him kicking and cursing from the table. He didn’t go willingly. I learned some new curse-words as they hauled him outside. Bronson hadn’t given the signal to kill. I knew that didn’t mean much, but it sparked hope within me as the game picked back up, with the chips being rounded up and taken away before a new deal started. My Master glanced my way with a scowl, as if he couldn’t believe that had happened when I was supposed to be around to stop that kind of ill fortune.

  Some people are just born lucky, I’d tell him when he got me alone and demanded an explanation, though it would fall on deaf ears. True or not, I doubted Finn was feeling very fortunate right now. I excused myself once the games were over, as I always did. It was only done when my Master had won more than his fair share of chips, and at least one of his opponents was looking sickly pale and just a little petrified to go home without the money they’d brought out tonight.

  The guy wasn’t dumb enough to say a word. I knew he wouldn’t be back. This was what Bronson did. He bled people dry. It was never enough, but that just meant he never needed to stop doing it.

  When the game night was over, and Bronson retired to his penthouse suite on the top floor of the hotel, I went out back to check on the hustler. It was such a relief to find him alive, my eyes filled with water and my heart swelled in gratitude. I really needed to get these damned emotions under control. I didn’t know where the hell they were coming from.

  Some people talk in their sleep. Finn seems to mutter almost ceaselessly while he’s in REM state. I listen in, trying to make out his words. Most
of them are jibberish, or his accent too thickly leaned on while he’s murmuring them. One single word sticks out and that’s all it takes to tune me in. Daughter.

  More of his words become clear once that one is out there. I quickly realize the rest of the sentence that linked back to it. I’ve gotta do what’s best fer me daughter.

  His reasons for risking his neck in the poker room are beginning to come into the light. People will move the earth for their children. They’ll do anything to protect their families.

  I wish I’d asked while he was awake. Not that knowing would help anything. There wouldn’t be anything I could do to aid him in this hour of need. He’d lost all the money he had trying to fleece my Master last night. I couldn’t give him that money back. It belonged to Bronson now, and he had tighter fists than anyone I’d ever known. Must be why it chokes so hard to see my charm wedged onto one of his big fingers, out in plain sight for the world to see, yet there was nothing I could do to take it from him.

  Apparently I’d only needed an hour of sleep myself, but those minutes spent resting in this hopeless soul’s embrace were the best I’d spent in a long time.

  The sudden knock at the door almost has me jumping out of my skin. Right, I remember, Dean.

  My second lover doesn’t like to be kept waiting, and I’m sure Damon was right that he’d break the door down if I didn’t open it within the next few seconds. He was already on his second knock.

  I throw on my silky robe before I unlock it and take off the chain.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” I ask, my voice just above a whisper and irritable enough to make his eyes narrow briefly. I let the door fall open and cross my arms, daring him to make a move with my indignant expression.

  He peers past me. Can’t see the bed from there, but I know Finn is still murmuring quietly in his sleep and I know Dean’s supernaturally-enhanced senses come with the kind of range that can hear people talking two blocks away, word for word.

  He shakes his head at me, disappointment in his golden eyes. “I can’t believe you’d defy him like this. What’s going on with you right now?”

  His words cut straight to the point. Truth is I don’t know the answer to his question.

  “Did you ever want a family, Dean?”

  His gaze softens. “Is that what this is about?”

  “I think it might be.” At least in part.

  He steps into the room and plants his lips on mine. His kiss is hard and unrelenting. I feel him tugging at the belt of my silk robe before growling against my lips and tearing the fabric to make it melt away from my body. He closes the door behind us only after I’m naked in his arms, save for an emerald ribbon of silk around my waist.

  He uses the belt to pull me toward the bathroom with him. He hits the lights and I close the door, leaning against it, as his gaze darkens. He’s vamping out so I know what’s going to happen next and it makes everything inside of me tremble.

  Being bitten is the biggest thrill I’ve ever experienced in my lifetime. The first time it happened, I didn’t know what to expect, and it blew me away.

  He looks so darkly seductive when his eyes go black. His fair skin makes this look extra potent.

  He smiles and my heart bangs harder in my chest. His fangs are so viciously sharp. They don’t look capable of doing anything other than causing fatal damage, but he wields them with such precision I go weak at the knees just catching a glimpse of them. He stalks toward me, and pins me against the door. I feel the hard throb of his erection against my belly as he dips his head to my neck.

  I shiver as he scrapes those sharp teeth along my collarbone, making me tingle all over with anticipation. I wait for his fangs to reach the vein in my throat and sink in, but he moves lower and scrapes those sharp points carefully over my breasts. I gasp in a breath as he rakes them over the tips of my nipples.

  His tongue slicks out next and I’m in heaven as he alternates slow licks and gentle chewing before making the choice to sink his fangs into my breast. Adrenaline rushes through me as the affect of his bite flows slowly over every inch of my body. The high that comes once my blood is flowing from the wound is second to none. I’m practically flying by the time he seals the bite with his saliva and retreats back into his human form. His smile this time is a little smug but that’s okay. He can have it.

  “Oh, Dean,” I gasp out.

  He’s quick to release his cock from his jeans and I part my legs for him, that slick valley between my thighs already well lubricated from the endorphin rush of his bite and the anticipation of our joining.

  “I can smell him on you,” he leans in to tell me, a hint of possessiveness in his tone.

  “Get used to it,” I tell him, as he pushes the tip of his cock into position. It dawns on me what I just said as Dean gazes me over curiously with those mesmerizing golden eyes. I know what he’s thinking before the words come out of his full, perfectly formed lips.

  “He’s human.”

  How do I explain that’s part of the appeal? I shrug, tilting my hips to remind him this isn’t the time for a heavy conversation. “We can’t all be perfect.”

  There’s fire in his eyes as he thrusts inside me, burying his cock deep. I gasp as he fills me and begins to move, his hands clasping my thighs and pulling my legs up until I take the hint and encircle them around his back.

  “I want you every way I can have you tonight, Maeve.”

  “Then I hope you brought lube,” I tease him as he thrusts a little harder.

  “Your cum is all the lubricant we need,” he teases back with a smug smile.

  “Then you’d better start fucking me harder... Oh!” I climax suddenly as he vamps out and sinks his fangs into my throat. He’s so evil. I feel his laughter against my neck before he licks the wound and backs up. I slap him and he grins at me.

  “Don’t even try to tell me you didn’t like that.”

  “Fine, I loved it. No more cheating, Dean. I don’t have fangs so it’s not fair.”

  He keeps pounding into me, his grin slowly dying away to a light smirk. Then he pulls out and I slide down onto unsteady feet. He turns and knocks a bunch of towels to the ground.

  Then he gets out of his clothes in a supernaturally fast flurry of motion and I sink to my knees in front of him. His cock is long and hard and slick with cum. I take it into my mouth slowly, capturing each rigid inch of flesh as I work my way down. He groans as I lick and suck and taste him. Working his dick in and out of my warm, wet mouth.

  He won’t let me do this for long, so I enjoy every second. When he’s had enough, the fire is back in his eyes and he commands me to turn around and let him get my ass ready for his cock. Desire burns through me as he gets the lube from its hiding place under the sink.

  We don’t do this very often, but every now and then when he hasn’t had enough time alone with me he demands to possess my body completely. I have to admit, it took me a few centuries to get to a point where I actually started to enjoy anal, but it took the right men and a lot of practice to get it right. Dean and Damon are naturals. They know lube is essential.

  Dean’s fingers start to spread the cool liquid around my anus, before the first couple delve inside, causing me to moan. “Relax,” he tells me, taking his time sliding those fingers in and out to loosen me up a little. “I’m not going to fuck your ass until it’s ready to be fucked.”

  “No cheating,” I remind him, my voice breathy with anticipation now.

  “I promise I won’t bite,” he leans in and whispers before slipping a third finger into my ass.

  He moves his other hand around my waist and slips it between my legs. His cool, lubricated fingers stroke my clit as he gets my ass ready to take his cock.

  “Oh fuck,” I whisper as the first flush of an orgasm rocks through my body. I come on his hand and he removes the other, replacing it with the tip of his lubed-up cock. He pushes inside just as I hit the peak of my climax and my whole body tenses under him. He pulls me up so I’m fl
ush against him as he slowly begins to fuck my ass.

  His hands stroke my breasts and my pussy while he thrusts gently. He kisses my neck and whispers, “You sure you don’t want bitten right now?”

  I swallow as I try to ignore the temptation to scream out yes. As much as I love the rush from being bitten, I don’t need it to come for him. “Why?” I ask. “Don’t think you can make me come again without it?”

  I feel his lips twitch against my skin. “You know I can make you come either way.”

  He officially accepts my challenge, his fingers stroking back over my swollen clit. I moan as he pushes them further forward and wets them inside my pussy before bringing them back up to stroke that sensitive mound of flesh in exactly the way he knows I like it.

  “Come for me, Maeve,” he whispers as my body flushes under his touch.

  “Fuck me harder, Dean,” I beg as he pushes me closer and closer to the edge.

  I come, his name on my lips as he fucks me so hard I can barely stand it. He loses himself in me, one feral grunt signaling his climax as he pumps into me one last time before pulling out. He hugs me to him as I sink to the towel carpet we’ve made on the floor.

  His cool embrace feels incredible while I’m burning up right now. “See?” I tell him. “No biting required.”

  He just smiles, and it’s one of those devastating smiles. I knew I’d win one from him tonight.

  “I know someone who can get us potions,” Dean tells me once I’ve stopped breathing so heavily on the bathroom floor, and he’s holding me tight against him on top of the pile of towels we knocked to the ground earlier.

  “Potions?” I’m too spaced out from the incredible sex to figure out his meaning on my own.

  His hand circles my breasts, fingers trailing over my still swollen nipples. “So you can get pregnant.”

  He kisses my shoulder and pulls me in close while I try to digest what he just told me. Elation swells in my chest and then pops like an overinflated balloon.

  “I can’t.”