Prince of Honor (House of Terriot Book 1) Read online

  Contrarily, she gripped him by the diamond-studded ears and jerked him to her, her mouth smashing over his, tongue thrusting to find and provoke more heated play. With a deep groan, Turow obliged her in a quick, hungry tussle that left them both breathing hard.

  Heat pounded off his body, burning against the backs of her fingers as they bunched the bottom of his tee shirt, shucking it off him with a violent pull. Her palms prowled chest and shoulders, then paused curiously for him to identify each unfamiliar scar.

  At his collarbone: “Cale’s lesson on how to use a blade.”

  At the glorious swell of a bicep: “Stephen. Bar fight he started and I had to finish.” Probably because Stephen was too drunk, though Turow would never say so.

  Across the hard ridge of his abdomen: “Sparring with Rico.”

  Tongue dampening her lips, eyes glowing, obviously turned on by the catalog of combat, Sylvia let her fingertip follow a thin line across his left pec as she purred, “And this one?”

  “You. Where you broke my heart.” When she blinked, her surprised reaction encouraged a wry smile. “It pushed me into something stupid, but I never regretted it.”

  “Defending my honor?” she chided in disbelief.

  “No. You never needed anyone’s help there. Especially not mine.”

  “Well,” she whispered, “I need it now.” She leaned forward, the scent of fresh washed hair overwhelming his senses as soft kisses traced that badge of honor. “To finish what you started.”

  Cupping her chin, he lifted her back to his lips, lingering over those sultry contours until the taste of her infused him with an unquenchable appetite for whatever time and circumstance would allow him. Knowing it would never be enough.

  Sylvia’s hands were busy at his belt and zipper, cuffed wrist making her movements awkward but not hindering her intention to free the one good thing—great thing!—Bram Terriot shared with all his sons. Rigid flesh pulsed within the curl of her palm, eager for a reunion with her own. She soothed that hot length with a teasing massage, using the drops of liquid coaxed from its tip. Feeling the hard beat of his power both in the way he jumped within her palm and groaned into their grinding kiss, she reluctantly released him to wrestle jeans down his hips so she could lift above him and slowly, slowly take him in.

  She arched, body shivering with remembered ecstasy, filled, fulfilled to her wildest anticipation and beyond.

  How had she forgotten how exquisitely they fit together?

  She never had. She’d had to push such memories away as threats to her intentions. But now, there was no reason to deny the perfect complement they were to one another as his hands scooped beneath the curve of her ass, moving her atop his lap with tantalizing little lifts until she couldn’t hold back any longer. She clenched about him in hard, uncontrolled spasms, head falling back so his mouth could scorch along the sleek bow of her throat, tasting her frantic breaths and jerky swallows. Then just holding her to him, continuing to move her gradually up and down on his unrelieved hardness as she melted into him in grateful relief.

  Her lips moved lazily over the cap of his shoulder, sampling passion-heated skin, nipping to test firm muscle.

  “That was wonderful,” she sighed, hips picking up his guiding rhythm.

  “That was just the beginning.”

  His quiet promise incited an expectant quiver. Smiling, she sat back, falling under the spell of his hot blue stare until drawn back to the slight curve of his smile. Feasting there for long moments, drawing on his lower lip, making him flinch at the startling cut of her teeth and sudden, rich flavor of blood. She rode his sharp inhale and let him tumble her over onto her back so he could begin to thrust in earnest. Forceful but not punishing plunges, quickening desire, waking her placid frame to actively seek out more pleasures, more pinnacles of delight. Just feeling him move above her, surrounding her with his heat and size and strength, inside and out, fired her needs, her wants, into an unfettered response, hands gripping hard flank and tense shoulder, mouth open wide to invite his plundering. Sharing his harsh breaths, excited by the bunch and tremble of his muscles, wild with the scent of him, the power of him, as they pushed together toward a mutual goal. Finding it explosive, shattering.

  Spectacular.

  For a long, leisurely while, Sylvia carried him along her damp form, lifting his slack weight with her shallow breaths, absorbing the comfort of his presence both over and inside her. Content. As happy as she could remember being for years and years.

  Since the last time they’d lain similarly hip to hip, heart to heart.

  She turned her face to meet the back of his head where it rested on her shoulder, cheek rubbing short, damp hair, lips caressing his neck at its nape.

  Turow Terriot. Who would have thought?

  For now, she happily held that secret close. For the moment, he was hers to hold and enjoy like there was no tomorrow. Because for her there probably wouldn’t be.

  She’d let him rest and recover, but not for long, too aware of the clock ever ticking. She’d cushion his heavy form for now, then demand as much as she could from it throughout the hours of the night. She’d let him fill body and mind with delirious pleasures, selfishly taking everything he could give, because his strength and confidence fueled hers, and she’d need every ounce of it to get through what was to come. Leaving him behind, again, as her restless life’s ambitions drove her to greet her fate without a whimper.

  She felt him stir and grow inside her, gradually, inexorably, forcing her from grim thoughts to heady anticipations. She accepted and returned his kiss, his touch, his hurried demands, becoming aggressive challenger and responsive lover beneath his increasingly urgent claim. Lost to what once could have been, but would never be. Except for this night.

  It was early. Faint daylight crept in through cracks in the curtains, but the room was still quite dark.

  Turow couldn’t move. Couldn’t manage more than a quiet moan. His body wouldn’t respond, his mind refusing to engage. A huge weight of sated bliss layered over him, making simple actions impossible. Every breath he took reminded him why.

  The covers tossed over his naked body held her unique smell. His tongue tasted her on slightly swollen lips. But it was what he didn’t feel that finally goaded him into awareness.

  Her heat didn’t rest beside him. In fact, the sheet was cold.

  Empty.

  He tried to sit up but something jerked him down. That something a metal bracelet about his wrist, shackling him to the bed frame. His hazy mind recoiled in surprise. How could she have gotten to the key where it lay a room away in the pocket of his coat?

  Alert and now wary, Turow let his senses sharpen before opening his eyes to a sight that scarred him, heart and soul.

  Sylvia stood on the other side of their shabby room, dressed in her castoff clothes, her lovely, kiss-bruised lips narrowed, her expression carefully masked.

  She met his gaze directly, hers betraying nothing.

  Because they were not alone.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Turow didn’t know who they were, but he knew who’d sent them. Three professionals care of his brother, James.

  There was no reason to react to Sylvia’s treachery. He wouldn’t give her or the others the satisfaction. He sat up, throwing off the covers, heedless of his nudity, to reach for his pants. The cuff pulled him up short. He gave the chain a quick jerk.

  “Do you mind?”

  While the others stood ready, one of the stoic males approached to release him so he could tug on his clothes and boots. Pulled to his feet, his wrists were bound behind his back before he was dragged toward the door. He didn’t resist. What would be the point?

  Escorted amidst the trio with a very quiet Sylvia bringing up the rear, they stepped out into the crisp morning where the grim-faced manager waited. She spat at his feet.

  “Pervert,” she growled. “Here I took you for a decent fella.” To Sylvia, she cooed, “I shouldn’t have been so trusting. Glad these
here gentlemen showed up when they did ′fore he had a chance to—” She let that sentiment dangle unfinished as Sylvia stepped past her without a glance.

  Turow shared the old woman’s chagrin. He shouldn’t have been so easily duped, either. His sin was worse. He’d known better. And now Jamie would have him to use as a pawn against their king.

  A huge black SUV sat behind his rusty truck, blocking its exit should he have escaped them inside. A fourth black-garbed male sat behind the wheel. Turow’s curiosity over the seating arrangements was answered when the front passenger door was opened for Sylvia and the rear tailgate lifted to stow him. Then he had no further thoughts at all as a blow to the back of the head dropped him without a sound.

  Sylvia had no questions for her rescuers. In fact, she hadn’t been expecting them. The farthest thing from her mind as she’d lain blissfully in Turow’s arms, was the door opening gratis the motel owner. She’d acted quickly. Once she’d whispered the location of the key, she’d quickly released her own wrist, cuffing Turow as he slumbered like the dead, though now that seemed a bit too horribly prophetic. She'd done so fearing for him, not the intruding strangers, should he suddenly awaken.

  The NASCAR lover from the gas station. It had to be. She hadn’t given him a second thought. He’d seen her impulsive cry for help and responded. Saving her from Cale’s wrath at the cost of Turow’s trust. And perhaps, his life, depending on James’s mood. She didn’t let that possibility settle too deeply. She couldn’t afford to. Just like she didn’t dare think of her lover from hours ago trussed and unconscious in the back now that their positions were reversed, she victor, he victim.

  Always have an exit strategy for when those you depend upon fail you and leave you all alone. Her mother’s words. A truth Sylvia carried within a broken heart. First her father, and now Turow, through no faults of their own.

  She’d survive. Wasn’t that the important thing? She’d never had the luxury of worrying over the moral implications that tormented Turow. So why was she now?

  Her lover. Her friend. Her only one. Who’d now have every right to wish he’d let Cale murder her back in New Orleans. He’d stepped between her and her fate then, calling on his king to show restraint, to let their family have the honor of deciding her end. She took no pride in outsmarting him. Shame came closer to what knotted uncomfortably in her belly as miles and hours whipped by in the luxurious vehicle. Carrying her to another sharp U-turn of consequences.

  Six hours, and not a rustle of movement from the back of the SUV.

  Had the blow killed him? Sylvia didn’t know if she should hope for that. It depended on what James had in mind for his younger half-brother. James, for all his suave intelligence had, like his father before him, a quixotic streak of cruelty winding through his questionable soul. With a charming smile, he’d lean in for an embrace only to sink fangs into the throat of the unsuspecting, ripping it out before a cry of surprise could escape. She’d seen him do it. In a way, that made him more dangerous than their clan’s new king.

  With Cale, who was not one for subtlety, you knew where you stood. As companion, as ally, as bed partner. She’d wanted to be all those things to him, but politics and ambition, hers and her mother’s, had gotten in the way. Though he’d played an admirable game of subterfuge and intrigue as a fighter in the New Orleans Shifter underground under the moniker Mick Terry, and managed almost singlehandedly to collapse James's growing empire, Cale had left no doubts at all how he felt about her. She was only alive because Turow had interceded.

  Could she do the same for Turow now? Maybe. Maybe not. Her influence with James had been steadily declining even before her mother’s death. She’d fallen from the role of one-time possible queen at his side to becoming second string to Martine’s brilliance. She didn’t kid herself. Martine had always been the attraction for James. Any interest he had in her was as a bright moon within her mother’s tremendous gravitational pull. He’d been in Martine’s orbit, fed by her schemes, pushed by her need for power and control. They’d both been helplessly circling Bram Terriot’s manipulator and guide. Without her, Sylvia feared there’d be nothing left to bind her and James as partners with benefits in plots or in bed.

  But the clever Terriot prince had expended the time, trouble and obvious expense to retrieve her. To what end? She guessed she’d soon find out as Las Vegas appeared on the desert horizon like a gaudy snow-globe city.

  Instead of heading for one of the glitzy Terriot hotels, their destination was a small, edge of the Strip gambling club without the class or clout to be considered a casino. At the mid-day hour the lot was nearly empty, but their driver bypassed it to circle around to the rear service entrance. Before she could get a glimpse of Turow, she was hurried inside, through a large storeroom of supplies and liquor to a surprisingly posh office where James Terriot waited.

  Tired, anxious and ill-dressed, Sylvia tore into him like a juicy steak.

  “It’s about damned time! Is this what you call protection? Those buffoons you assigned us let Cale breach our home and kill my mother! I’ve spent the past few days a dirty, abused prisoner on my way to face execution without as much as a decent pair of shoes.”

  “You’re welcome,” James drawled, not the least impressed by her tirade.

  He sat at ease behind a large industrial desk looking like a fashion-shoot model in his Terriot finery. Harshly handsome, like the rest of his brothers, James's dark auburn hair was impeccably styled, his features square-jawed perfection, his smile relaxed. But there was a chill to his gaze warning her not to carry her irritation beyond his tolerance.

  “Besides,” he added rather drily, “from what I hear, you were hardly being abused when my men found you lying with my brother.”

  She arched a brow. “One does what one must to survive. We both are experts in that area.” She took a seat in one of the steel chairs angled across from him, perching as regally as a queen in her sloppy hoodie and gel shoes. Her gaze swept the room. “Is this your retirement plan? I’d expect something a bit grander.”

  “It’s a front for things I don’t want attention drawn to. Things like rescuing tiresome females who show very little gratitude.” After her obliging nod of thanks, his smile grew colder. “And for torturing information out of a fellow Terriot prince.”

  Sylvia waved her hand in annoyance. “You won’t learn anything of Cale’s plans from him. He’s been out of contact with the family since your rather rash attempt at a coup.”

  The reference failed to amuse him. “Well then there’s no reason to keep him alive, is there?”

  Aware of those shrouded blue eyes watching her, Sylvia shrugged. “Do what you like. I wasn’t exactly treated like a princess in his care.” She plucked distasteful at the sleeve of her soiled garment. “I don’t owe him anything. But,” she posed with a sly slant of a smile, “Cale is fond of him. That might be worth something to us.”

  “Perhaps.” Turow’s fate was dismissed with a flick of James’s hand. “We’ve more pressing business. Our supply is almost gone. Our benefactors in the North won’t be patient for long. We’ll need to prove to them that we still have worth.”

  Not a word of condolence regarding her mother. Bitterness gripped Sylvia’s aching heart. She carefully presented a bored front. “They’ll have to wait until after I’ve showered and shopped. I lost everything in the fire.” A truth curling like harsh smoke about her words. “I won’t be in much of a mood to save our schemes looking like this.”

  James laughed, used to her vanity and willing to indulge it. “I’ve got rooms. You’ll have to be discreet. It wouldn’t do for us to be discovered here so close to home. I’ve taken the liberty of filling a closet for you. If none of my choices suit you, you can always replace them.”

  She stood and stretched across the desk top to touch a light kiss on his mocking lips. “You have superb taste, James. Thank you.”

  That tiny bit of humbling satisfied him. “I’ll have one of the men take you to the hotel.
I’ll join you for dinner. First, I need to have a heart-to-heart with Turow.”

  As tempted as she was by the thought of a stocked closet, the darkness in his tone made Sylvia hesitate then play her cards with care. “He’s a valuable resource, James. Don’t waste him.” Figuratively or literally.

  “You know how I hate waste.”

  She’d have to accept that bland assurance for the moment.

  James called to Bart, the large, silent driver who’d ferried them from Gallup. “Take Ms. Terriot to the hotel and stay with her in case she needs anything.”

  “I’m sure I’ll be fine,” she began to protest, but James waved it off.

  “I’ll feel better if he’s there.”

  Sylvia froze inside. Had she been mistaken about James’s interest in her? Was she a prisoner, too, only kept in a higher-class cell? Perhaps Turow wasn’t the only bartering tool James planned to use.

  She followed the behemoth without reaction, winding back through the stockroom where her lover from the previous night sat bound to a chair in the shadows. She glanced his way, unable to help herself. Their gazes met briefly, hers carefully veiled, his a flat reflection of her own. How he must hate her.

  Head held high, Sylvia forced herself to keep walking. Turow Terriot’s fate was out of her hands.

  Now, if she could only keep it out of her mind.

  The sight of her knocked the fuzziness from Turow’s aching head. He’d been swimming through a fog of pain and disorientation since he’d broken the surface of consciousness in the back of the SUV. Sylvia’s scent had calmed any rash ideas from forming. With her near, his mission wasn’t a failure. He wasn’t a failure to his king or his own code of honor. No situation was so dire it couldn’t be recovered from. So he’d always told himself. That certainty faded in and out during that endless trip to Vegas.

  She’d lain with him only to keep them in one place long enough for rescue to catch up to her.