His mind raced with the possibilities, both feasible and not so feasible, and his lips moved, but no words came out.
Paris was right. He had found something.
It was time.
It was happening.
And the piece of paper in his hand might be the only link to finding their friend alive.
AS SOON AS he was alone, Leo pressed his hands to the wall surrounding him, frantically running his palms over the supple leather surface. Maybe I missed something, he thought as he searched for a lever or some kind of hidden panel. He needed to get out of there. Now.
Before Alasdair came back to “dispose” of him.
Why the hell is this happening to me? He still didn’t have that answer. One minute, he’d been at work, getting ready to launch the biggest project of his career, and now, there he was, trapped in a warped kind of nightmare, staring at all of his most sinful desires—
Oh no. No, no. He couldn’t, and wouldn’t, fantasize about someone who wanted him dead. No matter how sexy he was.
I need to get out of here. He’s messing with my head.
As he moved his fingers over the curved wall, he shoved the image of the two males aside and instead started to think about his friends. What would they be thinking right now? Elias and Paris?
God only knows.
They’d known him his entire adult life, and he’d never just…disappeared.
If I were in their position, what would I be thinking?
He had no idea. It wouldn’t be anything good though. That was for damn sure.
Resting his forehead against the surface, he cupped the back of his neck, frustrated at his hopeless situation.
It was all so strange. Surreal, even. And none of it made any sense. Then again, his world now involved vampires, so sense seemed to be a pretty big fucking leap of sanity in an otherwise insane reality.
And why is Alasdair hell-bent on thinking I’m hiding things from him?
There wasn’t anything exceptional about him, unless it was his expertise in his chosen occupation they were after.
That has to be it, right?
Both men had spoken Greek, a language he was fluent in due to his upbringing and his studies. And the coins on the wall… Leo assessed the one right in front of him again and ran his finger over it.
Yes, they are definitely from the Archaic period.
For the last two years, he, Elias, and Paris had been working around the clock on their exhibit. What would they want with him in correlation to that? It still didn’t make any sense.
When he came up with nothing, he let out an annoyed sigh. He wasn’t hiding shit, and no matter what he told Alasdair, he wouldn’t believe him.
Hell, at this point, he wished he could think of something convincing to get this over with. But then he’d be dead, and he wasn’t quite ready for that yet.
“See? I knew you’d be a fighter.”
Leo’s spine stiffened at Alasdair’s voice.
“Turn around.”
“Fuck off,” Leo retorted, sick and tired of being toyed with. Having expected harsh retaliation, he was dumbfounded when a deep laugh filled the room.
“Turn around, Leonidas,” Alasdair instructed again, and then, inside his mind, he added, Or would you like me to make you?
Clenching his fists by his sides, Leo reluctantly did as he was told. Alasdair stood before him, his hands behind his back. He was sexy as sin, and the smug expression on his face told Leo that he knew it.
“Have you come to get rid of me?” Leo asked, unable to stop himself. What did he think he was doing, provoking the guy? But there was an anger radiating inside him that hadn’t been there before. It was making him brave.
Stupid, but brave.
Alasdair brought his hands out from behind his back, and Leo immediately stepped away, unsure of his intentions.
“No need to run. I already told you I am not going to kill you…”
As his voice trailed off, Leo could practically hear the word yet begging to be tacked onto the end of that statement.
“Give me your left wrist.”
Leo dropped his gaze to the object Alasdair was holding and shook his head. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Do I strike you as the jovial sort?” he asked, taking another step forward. “Now, let’s try this again. Give me your left wrist.”
“Why?”
Instead of answering, Alasdair snatched Leo’s wrist up between cool fingers and shackled it with the iron manacle. As the unyielding metal locked into place, Leo reached for it with his free hand, trying to pry it loose.
“Don’t bother,” Alasdair said and then tugged on the chain attached to the cuff. “There’s no way to break free until I release you.”
“And when will that be?” Leo asked, raising his eyes.
Alasdair shrugged, and the move was so…human that he almost seemed normal. That was until his lip curled up at the side and the razor point of one of his canines became visible, which sent a shudder through Leo’s confused body.
“Whenever I decide.”
“I don’t get it,” Leo muttered, still running his fingers over the metal in a futile attempt to extricate himself. “What do you even want from me?”
Alasdair wound the chain around his hand, and Leo was forced to move with it or stumble. When he was only inches from the vampire, Alasdair whispered, “I’m not quite sure yet. However, as soon as I decide, I will either tell you or you will be dead. For now, you’re coming with me.”
ALASDAIR STRODE ACROSS the room towards the pulley on the opposite wall, dragging Leo behind him. “Pick up the pace, Leonidas. Trust me when I say you won’t like the alternative to walking on your own.”
He glanced over his shoulder in time to see Leo straighten up and start to walk at a normal speed.
“Very good,” he said when they both came to a stop. “You and I are going to go on a little field trip.”
“What?”
“We’re going back to your apartment. I want to know what it is you’re not telling me.”
“I’m not hiding anything. I don’t know how many times I have to say it.”
“You can say it a million times and I still won’t believe you. Stay here,” he instructed, looping one of the chain links over a hook attached to the wall.
On his way to the en suite to change his shirt, Alasdair paused when Leo muttered something under his breath. He then pivoted back around and faded out—only to fade back in directly opposite his human companion.
“What did you just say?” he asked as Leo’s mouth fell open and he backed up to hit the wall.
“N-nothing.”
Alasdair stroked his thumb over Leo’s jugular. “That’s twice now. Let’s not make it three times.”
He thought Leo would cower, but as he looked into his eyes, he saw the pupils…dilate. Vasilios had been right. Although he didn’t want to be, Leo was very much attracted to him. The flushed cheeks, the rush of blood he could hear traveling south, and those heavy, lust-laden eyes. They all gave the human away—and made Alasdair want to fuck him until he could no longer stand.
Yes. He could use this to his advantage
“What’s twice?”
Alasdair flicked his gaze down to the lips asking the question, and when the vein under his thumb throbbed in response, so did Alasdair’s cock.
“That’s twice you have lied to me. Don’t do it a third time. Now. What. Did. You. Say?”
“I-I said,” Leo said, slightly breathless.
Alasdair stroked him again. “You said what?”
“You’re having…I don’t know…some issues when it comes to me. So I said why don’t you ask the suit guy, the one you called Vasilios, to read my mind?”
Disgusted that Leo was right and he was having issues with him, Alasdair abruptly spun away. He’d never come across someone who could best him, and he was more than a little irritated that Leo seemed to have worked that out.
“I am not having
issues trusting you. I am having issues with believing for one second you are who you say you are. And do not speak his name. Not ever.”
“You asked—”
“Stop talking,” he thundered and turned back to see that Leo had indeed stopped talking. “You are very brave all of a sudden.”
Leo raised his arm, the chain rattling. “What have I got to lose? That hook up there isn’t for fun and games, I assume.”
Despite himself, Alasdair wanted to smile for the first time in a long while. “Certainly not fun for you, no. Perhaps, for me.” He pointed to the chain and stated, “That is going to attach to me. Not the hook on the ceiling.”
“To you?”
“Yes. As in, I will be holding it.”
“Like…like a leash?”
Alasdair thought about that for a second and then inclined his head in a slight nod. “Yes, if you want to think of it that way.”
He studied the disgust that twisted Leo’s mouth, but that didn’t stop him from talking again.
“You lead people…us…I mean, humans, around on a leash? Like what? A pet? A slave? Some kinky fetish deal where you suck our blood dry and then kill us?”
Alasdair stalked forward until Leo’s ass hit the wall. Then he brushed his lips over the neatly cut hair around the man’s ear.
“I assure you, Leonidas. If I get kinky with anyone, they are more than happy to be chained up, hooked up, or fucked up by me. And if I decide to kill them afterwards, they are so high that they beg me for that release.”
Alasdair flicked his tongue over Leo’s cheek, and when he felt him shiver, he didn’t have to be inside his head to know that it hadn’t been from fear.
“Your kind,” Leo asked, and Alasdair heard his pulse skip. “You kill during sex?”
The question was pitched low, Leo’s voice raspy, and when he replied, “Sometimes…” Leo shifted his head so they were practically nose to nose.
This human was curious in the most unusual ways. Asking questions Alasdair would think would horrify him. But the telltale signs of arousal told him otherwise and had Alasdair fighting every instinct he had to keep his teeth off of him.
He’d always been a master at controlling his inner savage, until now. Of course, when it was of the utmost importance, he was finding the challenge difficult. He needed to move.
Now.
“But—” Leo said, stopping when Alasdair shifted away so fast that the breeze from his departure ruffled his blond hair.
“But?” he prodded when he was several feet away.
Leo blinked and then started again. “But the chain. It can attach to the hook on the roof if you want it to. Can’t it?”
Alasdair backed away from the brave and ever-inquisitive human. “Oh yes, file mou. It most certainly can. And that would be a fun game indeed.”
THAT DOESN’T TELL me much, Leo thought as Alasdair disappeared into the en suite, which left him to stare at the ceiling.
He yanked at the cuff on his wrist again and cursed. His heart was working double time as it tried to pump his blood frenetically through his veins while also racing it down to the rock-solid erection straining against his thin pants.
When Alasdair’s breath had swept over him and he’d started talking about death and sex, God help him, his cock had gotten harder with every fucked-up scenario he’d imagined. Then add in the tongue along his cheek and Leo was left contemplating his own sanity if he thought that sex with this guy, thing—vampire—was worth his life.
He was not going to get out of there alive, and as images of what that hook might be used for crashed into his head, he berated his lust-hazed mind. This is where I’m going to die, he thought, and any desire he’d been feeling disappeared as a fresh wave of nausea tightened his gut.
What if Alasdair decided on a whim to hang him up and feed on him until he was drained? Or what if he hung him up and cut him open chest to sternum like they used to back in England…
“Hung, drawn, and quartered?” that silky voice asked as it sliced through the air.
Leo looked over and saw that Alasdair had come out of the en suite in a black, buttoned shirt.
“That’s so messy. Especially the drawn-and-quartering part.”
Leo studied the cocksure walk of the male coming his way and heard himself saying, “You get a perverse kind of pleasure out of this, don’t you?”
“Out of?”
“My confusion. My fear. It turns you on, right? What kind of sick fuck are you?”
“Is that a trick question?” Alasdair asked, unhooking the chain. “I’m not a person, Leonidas. I’m vampire. That’s the kind of sick fuck I am.”
Leo struggled to pull away. “I don’t want to be led from here like a dog. Or beamed up out of here,” he rushed out, thinking they were about to do the vanishing act.
“Unfortunately for you, the last option is the only way out of this room. You’re in luck, though, because that’s not how you’ll be leaving the lair itself.” A grimace cross Alasdair’s features. “We’re leaving via the Walk.”
“The Walk?”
“Yes. And you’re going to shut your mouth and do as I say.”
Leo’s eyes narrowed as he asked, “Or you’ll kill me?” He didn’t dare look away from Alasdair.
He grinned manically. “Now you’re starting to get it.” Then he clamped a hand around his wrist, and before Leo could pull it free, they faded out of his prison cell.
IN LESS THAN a second, Alasdair and Leo appeared outside the room they’d just been in. The corridor was empty, as Alasdair had known it would be, and when Leo slumped forward into his arms, he moved them to the sidewall, propping him against the jagged bricks.
It was the night of the Walk, and everyone would be in the designated wing, lining the sides of the passageway, awaiting the showing. This was the one night of the month where they publicly presented their latest yielding, or piece of property, for the rest of the brood to see. It was a place to show off—to one-up each other.
Alasdair inspected Leo, who was still out cold, and realized he didn’t loathe the thought of making an appearance. Usually, he avoided it like the plague, never caring to participate or see what others were indulging in. He much preferred keeping his property to himself. But Leo had to be presented tonight, especially after Isadora had brought him to Vasilios’s attention. No human was to be kept a secret from the brood, and if he didn’t show his hand, many would question why.
He ran his eyes over the light hair covering Leo’s chest, down his toned arm, and to the cuff surrounding his wrist. Fierce hunger growled to life inside him like an animal. He needed to feed, but ever since Leo had appeared, he hadn’t had a taste for anything other than him.
Wanting a better look at the man who’d captured his attention, Alasdair moved in closer. His hair was the same color as Thanos’s. But where Thanos wore his longer, Leo’s was short, and right now, even though it was a mess, the top of his hair sat off to the right of a determined side part.
Alasdair licked his lips as his inspection continued down a slightly crooked nose that led to a thin top lip and fuller bottom. Though he’d once viewed Leo as nothing more than a meal, he was now entertaining all the sinful possibilities of the flesh—ones that would alarm the human but also appeal to his more carnal side.
He wanted answers about this man.
He needed to know about the secrets that coursed through his veins—the ones that could incapacitate him with one taste.
Force, however, was not getting him anywhere. He didn’t think that would be necessary much longer though. He remembered the way Leo had watched him with Vasilios. And now, when he’d had him against the wall.
No…force most certainly won’t be necessary in convincing this man. Not when I can use other means of coercion.
Having decided on his new course of action, Alasdair placed his lips by Leo’s ear and softly instructed, “Open your eyes.” When Leo’s eyelids flickered and opened, he added, “We have someplace to
be.”
LEO’S HEAD WAS pounding as his eyes opened and adjusted to the shadows. When Alasdair’s face came into sharp focus, he grimaced. The vampire had done exactly what he’d asked him not to—the vanishing act.
“Does your kind not believe in doors?”
Alasdair looked away from him, studying the empty hallway. “Not in a room where the object is to keep the detainee from escaping.”
“Detainee?” Leo asked, straightening his posture against the wall. “Don’t you mean prisoner?”
When Alasdair returned his attention to him, his lips tipped up at the corners, and Leo could’ve sworn he was smiling at him. Not a sneer or a smug smirk, but a genuine smile.
“It’s the same thing. Isn’t it?”
Somewhat put off by the underlying humor and the curve of his lips, Leo averted his gaze to also glance down the hall. “Where are we?”
“Why, we’re standing in a corridor, Leonidas.”
Leo turned his face back to Alasdair’s, and before he could ask that he be more specific, he said instead, “Why are you being so nice all of a sudden?”
“Nice,” Alasdair said as if the word was completely foreign to him. Then he took a step towards him, and Leo had to suck in a breath to keep their bodies from touching. “I haven’t even begun to be nice to you.”
Leo refused to drop his eyes when Alasdair traced the pad of his index finger along the line of his jaw.
“But you’ll know when I do.”
Leo didn’t trust or understand the sudden change in Alasdair’s demeanor for a second. He’s likely getting ready to snap my neck.
I promise you I am not. However, the idea of biting it is very appealing for several reasons.
The breath Leo had been holding rushed out at the thought of Alasdair putting his mouth on him that way. Then he admonished himself. He should be angry. Enraged, even. Not fucking turned on.
“Get out of my head,” he snapped.
One of Alasdair’s black eyebrows rose, and he lowered his hand. “Consider me gone. Though it should be noted, I know you enjoyed having me in you.”