Aching harmonies of danger, heartache, and sin.
Lifting a hand, Reginald arrested Layla’s jaw with spread fingers. Running his thumb over her lower lip, he pulled it down. Opening her mouth, he glanced to her lips. As if his power went where his gaze commanded, Layla suddenly tasted the ocean sliding over her tongue; salt-spray and brine, and the creamy texture of the oyster. The sensation made her writhe against him as it licked to the back of her throat; thick and meaty. She had no choice but to swallow it, her entire body spasming with all that delicious heaviness sliding down her throat.
Deep inside her, its thick heat lingered. Layla shuddered against Reginald, undone. It was the most impossibly erotic thing she had ever felt, even more than her rumbling sexual encounters with Dusk and her heated passion with Adrian. She gasped, hoping he would do something about her wretched need.
Praying that he wouldn’t.
“Feel me, Layla Price.” Reginald breathed by her ear. “Defy my command again and I will assault you with my storms until you beg me to drown you. Tonight, you will showcomposure. You hold power as a Courtesan that you never could have achieved as a Concierge. Even though you are still in training, you will honor your new position as you follow my lead tonight. Am I clear?”
“Yes.” Layla could hardly breathe. Cradled against Reginald’s chest, his power made everything she’d felt inside the atrium feel insubstantial. His body was hot, so hot; even as waves of chill pleasure rolled through her, playing with her the way an orca plays with a seal. His lips smiled as she shuddered against him. Reginald had rolled her with his Siren’s power.
And she loved it, dammit all to hell.
Looking up, she found Reginald watching her. Stroking his thumb over her lower lip, he pressed her with the softest kiss. Shivering with ecstasy, Layla melted into his mouth as he licked his pleasure into her, dark and exquisite. She felt him smile as he pulled away, leaving her gripping the stone railing of the veranda as if it was the only thing that could keep her afloat in his storm.
Their gazes connected.
Reginald’s smile vanished as he stepped back.
“People have killed for my pleasure, Layla Price. People have died for it. People have taken their own lives because they could not have another night in my bed. Consider this: what might someone do to have my embrace? What might they risk; who might they betray to have my kiss again – or yours? What might any of these Hotel Owners do to support Adrian if you charm them tonight? This is the power of a true Courtier or Courtesan of the Hotel. Learn it. Come.”
Head Courtier Reginald Durant made a sweeping gesture toward the glass atrium, as he watched Layla with his pale blue eyes. He didn’t take up his wig, only extended his arm in an escorting position, waiting. Still flushing with the heat of his lesson, Layla took his arm. Trapping her hand lightly on his sleeve, Reginald twined his long fingers into hers, binding their hands together gently. It was an intimate gesture, kind, and for the first time Layla questioned her fury with him – wondering if maybe he wasn’t as much of a bastard as she’d made him out to be.
Perhaps Reginald Durant really was trying to help her succeed with her magic.
And the danger they faced tonight.
CHAPTER 2 – OWNERS
Leading her back across the evening veranda, Reginald escorted Layla into the Hotel Owner’s party. The fête was in the Blue Pavilion tonight, a massive domed atrium of cobalt crystal lattice with diamonds set into the ceiling to mimic a starry night sky. It was like an observatory, though the space was open with waterfalls and niches of greenery to meander through. The Pavilion was home to thousands of night-active moths, and as Layla and Reginald were admitted through the veranda doors by six Guards in crimson uniforms with pikes, they stepped through a shimmering netting and into a night-scape alive with life.
Luminous moths swirled lazily through the enormous blue dome. The twilight was waning outside, but underneath the dome it was always night. Around the space, veins in the greenery brightened as the twilight died, every tree and flowering vine vivid with phosphorescence. A string quartet played music and elegant people mingled with drinks or lounged in rattan chaises upon sprawling rugs. A moth as large as Layla’s hand with fuzzy wings and long feather-feelers landed on her shoulder, glowing silver-white like her gown. Its feet tickled her as it walked around, trying to decide if she was a mate.
As they entered the pavilion, the cacophony of magic from the Hotel Owners suddenly closed around Layla again. Inundated with the combined power of over fifty people in the atrium not restricting their magics, it was like the Samhain Masquerade but worse, as seeking tendrils and thundering flows were suddenly wrapping around Layla, tasting and testing. Stiffening on Reginald’s arm, she tried to breathe through it, navigating those flows like a river by floating among them as Reginald was teaching her.
But they were awful. The Samhain Masquerade had been a night of passion, and Layla’s inner Dragon had roared with delight to surrender to the eros she’d felt then. But this party was about power, and as Layla entered the fête, she felt the Owners baiting her, trying to manipulate her with their magic. It was casual for them, all par for the course; but Layla’s breath was suddenly high, her heart racing to be inundated in that vicious energy again. A scalding sensation built on her skin as her Dragon snarled inside her, coiling up into a pre-strike knot with fangs bared.
Reginald’s fingers smoothed over hers upon his sleeve, and Layla felt an invisible wall of water surround her, much like Dusk did with his crystal shields. It was Reginald’s version of a shield, flowing but strong, and Layla inhaled a grateful breath as she felt the drives of power sluiced away from her.
“Thanks.” She spoke, relieved.
“Of course.” He returned quietly, with a small smile.
They began to navigate the party, as they had been doing for a scant ten minutes prior, before Layla had panicked and stepped out to the veranda. Reginald was gloriously effete as he led her around, his haughty poise and piercing blue eyes instantly making even the Owners with the wretchedest magics attend him like he was royalty.
And in a way, he was. Reginald Durant was considered one of the top five Courtiers in the world, and commanded a price for his Assignations that reflected it. He was a celebrity, even among the Hotel Owners. As Reginald introduced Layla to a number of people she’d never met, all of them ancient and dripping with Twilight Realm money, not to mention ridiculous amounts of magic, Layla watched how the Owners treated him. They gave him bows and deferential nods, using his proper title as they watched him with avarice. Though Reginald looked human, albeit ridiculously handsome for one, everyone here knew exactly what he was, and treated him accordingly.
A Royal Siren, and an expert in the arts of passion.
Layla used her Concierge skills as they went around, memorizing names of Owners as she was introduced, their Lineage, and anything else notable about them. Though many looked human, they weren’t; humans were not allowed to own a share of the Red Letter Hotel. Maneuvering around the hall, Reginald didn’t linger – the Head Courtier was eye candy for the night, his date in the same category.
After twenty minutes of banal conversation, Layla was relieved to see her bound Royal Crystal Dragon lover and Head Concierge Dusk Arlohaim enter the pavilion with the Hotel’s Madame, Etienne Voulouer. Dressed in a classic white tuxedo jacket, surprise took Dusk’s handsome face as he saw Layla, as if he hadn’t known she’d be in attendance. His smooth lips fell open, a wave of iridescence passing through the serrated ridges of midnight-blue scales at his temples and outer cheekbones, as well as his artfully-styled dark hair.
Dusk’s vivid summer-blue eyes pierced her, sliding down her clinging silk gown with a pleased smile. Exceedingly sexy with his strong soccer-player’s body, he turned, making a bow to the Madame. Leaving her, he maneuvered to where Reginald and Layla were speaking to a lizard-woman with iridescent green scales that matched her slinky green gown.
“Layla Price! You are a vision.”
Dusk’s hand flashed out before Reginald could pull her away – catching Layla’s fingers and raising them to his lips. Pressing them with a soft kiss, he pressed a low tremor of his sexual magic into Layla with it, his sky-blue eyes simmering with all the pleasures they’d been denied these past weeks.She was instantly on fire. Layla felt the full force of his vibrations hammer her – making her own magic roar. Passion seethed through Layla from her fingertips to the depths of her groin. But before her enormous energy could surge out to any Owners, Reginald thickened his shield around her in a furious wave.
