“Come be with us, Gideon,” she said.

9

IT was a large Jacuzzi tub, but he and Daegan were large men. However, as if anticipating a need to make some room, Daegan had his knees bent, also forming a convenient cradle for Anwyn to lean against. Gideon lowered himself into the water, sucking in a breath. As the hot water closed over his balls, he sent an apology to the sperm being in cinerated.

Well, it wasn't as though he was expecting to produce heirs. Last thing he'd ever do was bring a child into this kind of world.

“I can help with the washing,” he said gruffly. “If you want me to.”

“You know what soap is? I'm stunned.”

Gideon's eyes narrowed, but Daegan's remark brought a cautious flicker of amusement to Anwyn's gaze that made the barb worth it. She gave him a slight nod of permission.

Daegan angled his chin toward a bottle of creamy soap in the corner. When Gideon picked it up, along with a clean washcloth, he found it had a fresh scent to it that matched the smell he'd experienced on Anwyn's skin earlier. For all that they'd done in the Queen's Chamber bathing area, somehow doing this was far more intimate and personal, something that worked its way below the physical and made him feel a little more exposed. But nothing could feel more exposed than she was, with her wounded throat and chest, the recollection of the bruises and blood. He was about to kick his own ass if he didn't get past his own hang-ups.

It's because she matters to you, you prick. Pretend like she's any other victim you've pulled away from a vamp, and you'll be fine. There hadn't been many of those. Only four scant times in his bloody career had he arrived in time to save a vampire's victim. He'd soothed them, cleaned them up if they needed it, gotten them to hospitals, and it hadn't rattled him like this.

He worked the soap in the cloth as Anwyn curled up on her side against Daegan, her arms folded over her breasts. Her head rested on the firm curve of his biceps as he rinsed her hair with the cup again, fingers stroking through the strands. When he was done, she watched Gideon approach with those intent mermaid eyes, enhanced by the silken trail of wet hair outlining her temple, cheek and throat. Even so, he touched her knee, warning her before he began to smooth the soap down her back.

He wasn't sure what she would be comfortable with him doing, but guidance came from an unexpected source. “Wash it all off, Gideon,” Daegan said quietly. “Don't leave any part of them on her soft skin.” He nodded to a basket. “If you put some of those soap petals in, then the water will have soap in it and you can take the washcloth below the waterline and rub her with it.”

“Sounds like you've done this before.”

“No. Not this.”

A particularly harsh sob caught her then. Daegan tightened his arm around her, his hand pressing against the side of her head. He propped his arm on his knee, shielding her face from them both.

Gideon understood that this was best, to let her cry herself out without their interference, as often as she needed to do it. She didn't need their words right now. But he couldn't help moving in closer, even if it meant he had to slide his feet over Daegan's shins, though he took pains to clear them without touching.

Those silent sobs were wrenching his heart out of his chest. Daegan put his head down on hers.

This was just Part One of the evening's agenda. Somebody was going to live to regret Part Two, big-time. If Daegan thought he was leaving Gideon behind for that, he'd better think again.

For now, though, Gideon began to rub the washcloth over her skin in slow circles. A plaintive sound escaped her lips. He could tell she welcomed the cleaning, but perhaps the touch reminded her of other hands that had been on her tonight. He knew it reminded him. Even if they got the sire's blood and all these wounds disappeared, she'd still have to deal with them on the inside. The worst scars never showed on the outside. Moving beneath the waterline after depositing the petals as Daegan suggested, he ran the cloth slowly down her side, across her stomach. Though the vampire had said to wash it all off, he avoided her breasts, or too high on her thighs, anything that might cause her to flinch.

Even so, she turned in Daegan's arms. Putting her hand over Gideon's wrist, she held his movement, her fingers trembling.

“I'm sorry, sweetheart. I'm trying not—”

She shook her head. Despite the fact her eyes were still glistening, dangerous fire bloomed behind them.

“I want you both inside me. Please. Get rid of it. I can't . . . The bathing is . . . It's good, but what I want is for them to be gone.”

Her hands had clenched, and though savagery was heavy in her tone, this wasn't the burgeoning vampire. It was the woman, though her lips had curled back from those new fangs. Female fangs were so much smaller than the males', even elongated in bloodlust. Almost dainty in their deadliness.

“I don't want to hurt you.” Though her legs were folded together now, Gideon remembered the raw, torn skin between them. The wounds on her chest and abdomen were fused now, and he assumed that something similar had happened down below, but still . . . Daegan was silent behind her, his gaze lowered to the crown of her head so Gideon couldn't tell his reaction.

“I'm commanding you. Please.” Her eyes filled with those tears again. Her face held a rictus of controlled determination, a combination he couldn't refuse. Her psyche was as stretched as a rubber band but fragile as a thread. One more refusal from him might snap it.

“Hurry,” she said thickly. She shifted her grip to his forearms, clawing, trying to pull him to her. “Now. I can't bear the feel of them anymore. Please. Don't take any time. Just come into me.” Jesus, his cock was ready for it, wanting it, too. And he admitted it wasn't entirely mindless.He wanted to sear those cock-sucking assholes away from her flesh, and God help him, he wanted to do it in the most primal way a male could do it, removing their touch from the flesh of the woman he considered his .

. . or rather, under his protection. Maybe both. The feeling was shocking, made all the more so because when Daegan's gaze lifted, locking with Gideon's, he saw the same thing there, only Daegan's sense of possession of this woman was far more clearly stamped, no matter her feelings on the matter.No vampire has a claim on me , she'd declared, only hours before.

I'd think twice about that one, Mistress, Gideon thought, seeing the vampire's eyes flicker with fire. He should have felt out in the cold again, but she was calling on them both. Her urgency wove around them, drawing the three of them irrevocably together.

“I will take her from this side, vampire hunter,” Daegan said. “You take her from there.” Lifting himself up to prop on the edge of the tub, Daegan reached for a bottle of cobalt blue glass, nestled in the same basket that held the soap petals. As he poured some of the lubricant in his hand, preparing to work it over his cock, it was already high and hard, reacting with the same primitive eagerness as Gideon's.

Gideon wasn't into staring at guys on even his horniest days, but for some reason his heartbeat increased, watching Daegan take himself in hand to make his thick organ slick for Anwyn's rear entry, minimizing her discomfort.

However, before he could get started on that, she'd turned toward the vampire with a slippery sound of skin squeaking over the bottom of the tub, like a vehicle spinning its wheels when the gas pedal was slammed down. She closed her mouth over Daegan, took him deep.

Gideon knew he'd have to be dead not to be stirred and admiring of the way she went down on the vampire to the hilt. He was a substantial guy, so she had to take part of him down her throat. She didn't gag a bit. When her hands pressed into Daegan's thighs, the vamp closed his eyes, a muscle flexing in his jaw as he gripped her hair, holding her as she sucked hard on him. She scored him a couple times with her newborn fangs, if his stoic flinch meant anything.

Then her mouth slid back up, the soft lips pausing over the head, coaxing viscous fluid from the tip and swiping it away with her tongue. She would have gone down again, but Daegan caught her hair, held her off of him, gave her a warning look. With a defiant expression, she turned in the water, creating a rolling current that lapped across Gideon's belly as she left Daegan to prepare himself. Her gaze fell on Gideon's cock now, just as turgid. She leaned forward, braced on her knees as she slid her hands down his chest, her nails digging in to his flesh, drawing red lines. He drew in a breath as she snagged a nipple painfully, but then she bent forward and her mouth closed over him as well.

Gideon surged up into her mouth, an involuntary reaction that summoned a clear growl of approval from her throat. He held himself above the waterline for her, but she didn't look up at him, sliding down his length as expertly as she had for Daegan, tasting and sucking, drawing his flavor into her mouth fully to get rid of the one she didn't want. Her tongue had the flexibility of a snake, coiling and teasing, stroking and lashing so that his cock pulsed in crazed, confused need, warring with the horror and guilt still boiling in his mind.

As if that wasn't enough stimulation, Daegan generously lubricating his cock, growing even harder and thicker, made Gideon imagine in detail how it would bury into that other tight entry point.

“Just this moment.” She came up for enough air to mutter the ambiguous comment, but then she was down on him again. Her knees adjusted, spreading, her heart-shaped buttocks positioned in the air, her need clear. He'd never seen a woman go into a subservient position and yet be so clearly in control.

Daegan set aside the lubricant, his hand still working himself. That glistening tumescent organ slid through his clenched long fingers like a living beast. Gideon's cock pulsed, making Anwyn growl again. When she swallowed, he knew he'd leaked pre-come into her mouth.

Then Daegan slid back into the tub. Meeting Gideon's gaze again, he maneuvered one foot under Gideon's splayed knee, so that as he went down to a sitting position, he was threading one long leg beneath Gideon's, then the other, so the two of them were forming a diamond eye, with her in the center.