Hunting Julian (The Gatherers) Page 2

  “Back off, Lurch,” she said dryly, pushing a finger into the center of his chest until her long fingernail dug deep into his flesh. “We both know I’m old enough to be here. I’m not giving some fluffy piece of candy an eyeball at my address. You’ll have to be satisfied with what you see.”

  She dropped her hand to indicate her stunning figure with a careless sweep of her fingers.

  “Julian,” Vincent warned in a sharp whisper, “let her in.”

  Julian frowned at the command and ignored the other bouncer so he could maybe provoke her into touching him again. The contact had been positively electric, charging up every nerve ending in his body and making him rather regretful that he hadn’t tucked in his shirt that night. He would have loved to see how she reacted to knowing he had a hell of an erection just from her approach. She probably wouldn’t appreciate it the way he did for its uniqueness, but it might have gotten a pause from her, or at least a fiery reaction of indignation he would have loved to feel and witness.

  “What will you do for me if I let you pass?” he asked archly, definitely risking his job and not caring any more than he had a few minutes earlier. This was what he was there for. She was what he was there for. Now that he had his target, there was no longer any reason to wait around for another.

  She placed a hand on a curved hip, the opposite one jutting out as she rested her weight back on her heel and slowly looked him over.

  “Look, I realize you are used to that smarmy charm working on the little girls who come in here, but I am neither a girl nor charmed, so back off before I call Vernon out here and get your ass fired.”

  “Go ahead. I would rather quit than pass up an opportunity to stand in your path.”

  She smiled at that, a slow curving of her lips that very obviously did not reach her beautifully cold blue eyes. “That sounded almost regal and sincere. You practice that one in the mirror?”

  “No, actually, it was sincere. Doesn’t majesty deserve regality?”

  She tilted her head and studied him, looking briefly perplexed, an expression that finally did make it to her eyes. He realized these American women were not used to men who spoke in such ways without coming off as insincere or obviously…what was the term she had used? Smarmy.

  Julian turned aside at last and offered his arm to her.

  “At least let me buy you your first drink before the undeserving throng tries to sweep you away?”

  “Thanks, but I don’t drink,” she said as she ignored his arm and breezed past him. “I’m just here to get laid.”

  The remark set up a cheer from those in the front of the line who had overheard her, and Vincent chuckled into his fist. Julian was barely paying attention to him as he kept his focus on the sway of her behind under that slinky silver fabric while she walked away in bold, sexy strides. “I believe,” he said softly aloud to no one, “I could consider that an invitation.”

  Julian dismissed the other bouncer and the line of people outside and instantly followed his target. The club had what Vernon liked to call a “comfortable” crowd. It was just enough to look popular and wildly fun, but not so much that it felt like an icebox jammed full of meat. Julian never took his eyes off her, and it wasn’t difficult at all to track her. The silver of her dress had much less to do with that than the fact that she was wickedly tall for a woman and that every inch of her became a magnet to everything in the room with a penis.

  “Shit,” he muttered when he saw the room shift to accommodate and then crowd her arrival. She blew off the first few predators with a cold warning look and a sharp, silent palm to ward them off, but Julian realized she had dressed to attract what she had claimed she wanted, and before long she would have her pick of the room.

  He frowned as he thought of all those other men moving aggressively into her sphere. Not that competition worried him, because he hardly considered them as such, but he realized he didn’t think he was going to like watching her play the game of social flirtation and invitation as she searched for someone to invite to her bed.

  Julian found himself suppressing a severe vocal reaction at the thought of her offering herself to anyone but him. Even muted, the possessive and feral sound startled a few nearby patrons, and he curled his fingers into fists in an attempt to get control of himself. It was to be expected, he told himself sternly. He had stayed longer than he should and his patience was wearing thin as his next target had eluded him.

  But now, he was certain, she was here; a vision in silver looking for a man to mate with. The odd thing was that despite her declaration of such a goal, he sensed no sexual readiness from her. He could smell not a hint of active pheromones spiking in search of a target of their own. Oh, he could scent the rush of her adrenaline well enough, and he heard the excited pounding of her heart, but there was something more akin to fear and anger in that mix than there was of sexual predation. But perhaps that was just a matter of allowing herself time to sit back, relax, and slowly open herself up to the possibilities.

  However, Julian was going to be her one and only possibility. He would see to that. He hadn’t come this far and waited this long for his prize only to be turned away by mere attitude or be pushed aside for a simple human male.

  Julian walked by her as soon as she sat down on the raised stool at a lone little round table. Surrounded by others, yet alone in the sea of humanity, for a moment she seemed ill-fitted to her surroundings. She was perfectly turned out and confident as hell, but he somehow got the impression she was just there to do what she had to do to get what she wanted, not because she enjoyed very much about it. It baffled him that someone so striking would have to resort to such raw tactics to find physical satisfaction. Men should be spilling out of every crevice to get close to her, just as they were doing now. Julian found it fascinating that she wasn’t already marked by another.

  Not that this would have stopped him. It hadn’t before and it wouldn’t now. Especially not now. He just found it curious. He had to assume it wasn’t for lack of trying by others, and taking into consideration her brusque, bold nature he could only conclude that this was the way she wanted it to be. Brief, easy, and detached.

  Intriguing.

  Such a complex ego and personality would certainly make for some interesting challenges, he made no mistake about that, but he was definitely spoiling for a challenge.

  From her. Not from a thousand other male idiots who wouldn’t know what to do with a woman like this if given a map, a guide, and a way to cheat. Besides, she smelled good enough to eat, and he was realizing just how damn hungry he really was.

  In all of this time…encountering so many women and experiencing them at their most primal and most vulnerable, and he had never reacted like this. Julian began to realize there was a significant reason for all of it—the possessive urges, the jealousy, and most of all the uncontrolled response of his entire psyche just to her distant presence. The way he had been so juiced up by the simplest touch of her fingertip should have tipped him off instantly, but he’d been caught between his needs for his second target of the month and the press of time. He hadn’t seen it at first. Now he began to understand what he was standing in the shadow of.

  If Kine could see him now, he’d make Julian suffer for every moment he had touted how he didn’t need a kindra. But at that time he hadn’t fully appreciated how powerful certain instinctual urges could really be, and he was quite sorry now for not showing them their due respect. He was becoming more regretful by the second as his skin literally began to tighten with the need to get closer to her. She called to him on a visceral level and he knew that although resistance was inconceivable for him at this point, the pull was completely one-sided until he did what he had to do. However, it would require gaining her trust in order to betray it.

  Not an easy task for many reasons, her obviously jaded and acerbic personality being the key sticking point.

  Julian moved over to the bar across from her and watched very carefully as she took pleasure in b
lowing off a few more men before deigning to be a little charming to one or two. She was holding a very select court within a half an hour and Julian studied each of her choices carefully. Each one was handsome, carried a fit build, and was obviously full of confidence. A lot like him, if he thought about it, but she had dismissed him for some reason. It occurred to him that her dismissal had been rather purposeful in its way. She had gone out of her way to cut him much more sharply than she did others.

  Yet her parting shot had been very leading.

  Julian pushed away from the bar and crossed to her. He stepped through her court and held out a hand in invitation although he had yet to see her dance. He didn’t verbalize his request and didn’t back away when she ignored him for a while to finish her current conversation. Then she turned her head and looked up at him. For a moment there was something very hostile flashing in the cold depths of her ice blue eyes, and then she cocked a brow in question.

  “Back again?” she asked almost wearily. She leaned back in her chair, liquid silver fabric drawing tight over her fine breasts. He felt every man in range zero in on the detail and it grated harshly on his senses as they reacted with sexual arousal in varying degrees. Each and every one of them was determined to be the one she took home with her. Half of them were already hard in anticipation of it.

  He needed to withdraw her from this throng before his temper began to chafe. As well trained as he was in controlling his more volatile emotions, he was in deep and alien waters now. He’d never experienced the brutality of impulsive feelings that he was currently being thrashed with.

  “Again?” he echoed softly, meeting the chill beauty of her gaze. “I never left. However, it is time I asked you to dance.”

  “Time?” she asked archly.

  “Well, yes. You challenged me earlier. I took up the gauntlet. The next step would be to convince you that I am the one you want to take to your bed tonight. I imagine dancing with you, and therefore obtaining time for private discussion, is one of the best ways to secure that in this environment.”

  “Hey!” someone protested his forthright supposition.

  She held up a hand to stay the protester’s chivalrous intent.

  “Dancing will convince me to fuck you?” she queried just as bluntly. “You must be a hell of a dancer.”

  “Only one way to find out,” he said.

  She contemplated the proposal with amusement on her lips, then got up and walked past him, once again refusing to let him touch her even to guide her to the dance floor. That was okay, though. He would be touching her soon enough.

  They reached the floor and he took the choice away from her abruptly, grasping her wrist and tugging her in close and tight along his body. She was tall and incredibly fit beneath her curves, her strength showing itself in a flare of resistance for a moment before she seemed to make herself relax against him. He understood instantly that it wasn’t a real relaxation, the low tension in her spine and legs radiating clearly into his psyche. He had expected her to be uptight, so he didn’t understand why she would try to affect otherwise. Why, he wondered, did she make herself curl against his body when she wasn’t yet ready to do so?

  He tested her, dropping a hand into the low, sweeping curve of her spine as it spread out over her sweetly turned bottom. He moved her in tight to the tempo of the music, swaying her sharply and deeply into the bend of his hard body. His very hard body. He made the state of his arousal known, letting her feel the thickness and weight of it through both their clothing, figuring she should share in the state since she’d caused it a good forty minutes ago and it hadn’t eased since. But that was okay, too. He was enjoying the sensation. The deprivation. He wasn’t looking for easy relief; he wanted to drag it to him kicking and screaming, and he knew she would be the perfect resource for the battle he craved.

  Julian turned her quickly around in his arms, giving himself the cushion of her rear for his hips as he curved an arm around her ribs under her breasts. He moved them both to the low, pulsing throb of the music almost as reflex. His full attention was elsewhere. His nose drifted down the line of her neck as he drew in that delicious verbena cleanliness. Feminine musk rose from her skin beneath her dress, the heat of the press of so many bodies making her warm considerably and creating the rich aroma in abundance. It was agonizing and gorgeous all at once. He longed to draw her away somewhere alone so he could indulge without all the harsh outside influences of smoke, alcohol, and overused synthetic perfumes worn by others.

  “This is quite an argument,” she said with a flirtatious rubbing of her backside against his zipper. Julian’s hands swept down to her hips, holding her there against him as he let her warmth burn into him until he ached. She did not argue in the least, instead taunting him in seductive slides and wriggles.

  Julian grabbed her around her slender throat, tipping her head back against his shoulder and engaging her ear with a rough-voiced warning. “Don’t think you will play me like this and then just walk away with a toss of these sweet shoulders and that tart attitude of yours.”

  “I can do whatever I want. It’s a free country and I owe you nothing.” She turned in his hold, reaching down to flick a saucy finger up the length of his erection. “I think I’ve given you enough already.”

  Then she tossed her shoulders and whirled out of his hold, making as if to walk away. Julian didn’t let her get that far before returning her with an almost elegant catch and spin back against him. He settled her firmly in place, his hand back over her bottom although quite a bit more blatantly this time.

  “Tease,” he said gruffly against her ear. “Why are you being so purposely cruel to me? What have I done that so offends you?”

  “Why would you think I am offended? Can’t stand some simple hard-to-get? Grow a thicker skin,” she advised. “Toughen up.”

  “I am plenty tough enough. Hard as steel, in fact,” he hissed against her cheek. “More so than I have been for a very long time.”

  “Mmm. Sure,” she scoffed. “Guy like you? You probably take home some airheaded tart every single night. Maybe I’m just not interested in being one of the crowd. Ever consider that?”

  “You wouldn’t be. I can promise you that. You would be the very last woman I would ever bring to my home. There would be you and no other after you.”

  Asia couldn’t decide if that was a threat or a deadly promise. Still, she had to force herself past her knowledge of the game he was playing with her. She was pushing him too hard. She needed to be his choice, just as he was promising. She needed him to take her with him, and she prayed he would try to do to her what he had done to Kenya. She didn’t have an exact plan per se because she didn’t know exactly what it was he had done, but she was not going to leave him until he told her where her sister was. He would pay, one way or another, but above all else she had to know what had happened to Kenya.

  Large hands slid over her hips and waist, and she shuddered at the sensation. It was horrifying, how a caress could be so logically repulsive and yet physically compelling all at once. In truth, she felt the crawling of her skin because she knew what he had done, but it was almost as if…as if the rest of her body was disavowing that knowledge just so it could respond on a purely molecular level. Without her permission, she felt the draw of him that so many other women must have felt. But that was okay, she told herself. She wanted to feel everything exactly as they had. She wanted to do everything exactly as his other victims had.

  She had already made mistakes, like avoidance and cringing when his touch had so sharply reviled her. When he had reached in offer to get her to dance, she had been flooded with the irrepressible rage of wanting to hurt him in an act of vengeance. Asia needed to control that fury. She wouldn’t allow herself to destroy her opportunity with wild emotion.

  So now she took slow, even breaths and let him press his prodding erection against her pubic mound as they swayed in a rhythm contrary to the music around them. He seemed oddly out of control, like his patience
was worn very thin. Was it because he was off schedule and he was eager for his latest kill? His words promised her he wasn’t just looking to get laid. He wanted to get it all off. Whatever it was, he wanted to use her completely to satisfy his needs—both carnal and homicidal, if that was his goal. She could feel it in the desperation of his touch and the way he wouldn’t let her move away from him again.

  “That’s quite an unbelievable promise,” she whispered with a sly grin as she snaked two fingertips down the back of his neck in a meandering path of stimulation. “I could be the worst lay in town.”

  His laugh of disbelief was flattering and resounding. He was convinced otherwise and he made no bones about it.

  “If this was only about sex, I might be worried,” he conceded, “but it isn’t.”

  A stupider girl would have taken that charmingly accented phrase as a promise of depth and romance. Many of them probably had. Thirteen of them at the very least. It disturbed her to think her sister had fallen so foolishly into such candied promises. Kenya was not so naïve to be swept away in such ways.

  “Then what is it about?” she dared to ask.

  “Oh, much more than the physical. Even beyond the spiritual. Once you learn the truth of that, perhaps you will not be as harsh and jaded as you are.”

  “You call it jaded; I call it having my eyes wide open.”

  “I call it a shame. The pain you American women suffer at the hands of your foolish men only proves to me how lacking they are as a sex and species.”

  “You are of their sex and species,” she reminded him with a laugh.

  “I am something very different than you have ever known before. This is another promise I can make. In my culture, you would be quite treasured. I would treasure you.”

  Yes, of course you would. You would kill me, stuff me, and mount me, getting off on the memory of my screams and death throes again and again as you treasured some trophy from my body.