Page 4 of Claimed

A rush of liquid comes from somewhere – from me?!

Lucien grins and whispers, “Oh Luna, what a good girl.” Then he buries his face in the wetness, lapping it up, smearing it all over my pussy.

His fingers return to my clit, wetter now, moving faster and harder.

And this time, when I come, my whole body shakes.

I am barely able to speak but somehow, as Lucien crawls up my body and rests his head on my chest, I manage to mutter, “What the fuck just happened?”

2

Luna

“Stop distracting me with orgasms.” I wrap the sheet around my body and sit up against the headboard. Lucien’s hand is between my legs. I clamp my thighs shut and he grins but doesn’t push them open again, just kisses my stomach on top of the sheet and sits up.

After he explained that I’d essentially experienced the female version of ejaculation, and then helped me experience it a second time, all over his gorgeous rug, we moved to the bed and I sat back, watching him as he made himself come for me.

Telling him what to do, how fast, how hard, making him stop.

Playing with the power I have over him. Over him!

But now it’s time for answers. “You promised to tell me everything.”

Lucien stands up and moves to the sideboard. He is tapping his foot, and for a moment I wonder whether he’s going to turn around or talk to me like this – with his back to me.

“Why am I really here, Lucien?”

After a long pause, he turns and meets my eyes. His jaw twitches. He’s naked, and it is very distracting. As if he knows what I’m thinking, he fetches some underwear, pulls it on, then sits down on the edge of the bed.

He takes my hands in his, then releases them, then inhales deeply. When he speaks, it’s as if he’s putting on his ‘professor’ voice. “Have you ever heard of The Covenant of Shadows?”

I shake my head. “No. Should I have?”

“Few humans have. It’s an ancient supernatural text – like a combination of a prophecy and a power source. It dates back to the earliest days of vampires and other supernaturals. Thousands of years.”

I am trying not to think about how hot he sounds or let my mind drift to an imaginary scenario where he’s teaching me in a big Cambridge lecture hall and I’m sitting in the front row, not wearing any underwear, opening my legs for him.

“Okay,” I try to remember how to focus. I wasn’t always a bookshop assistant. I was a student once. “How does that relate to me?”

Lucien runs his tongue over his fangs. He studies me as if he’s still unsure whether he can trust me with this kind of information. “The Covenant speaks of a human woman with the ability to control shadows. The Queen of Shadows.” His eyes fix on mine. “A woman who can manipulate darkness itself.”

Before he even spoke the word shadows, my neck had begun to tingle. My throat is suddenly dry. “Like what happened at the gates? When the shadows moved around me.” I am murmuring, almost speaking to myself, but my brain feels like it’s resisting putting the pieces together.

“Exactly like that.” Lucien nods. “The Covenant describes this woman as a bridge between worlds.” He stands up and starts pacing. “Supernatural and human. Someone with enough power to either unite those worlds or destroy them both.”

He stops talking and waits the way my college maths tutor used to when he knew I was on the edge of solving a problem and was letting me get there myself instead of providing the answer.

“You think I’m this ‘Queen’?” I let out a nervous laugh. Half expecting him to laugh too and tell me, Of course not, I’m asking you to help me find her.

He doesn’t laugh.

“That’s ridiculous.” I bury my head in my hands. “I really do need to see a shrink.”

“Luna.” Lucien’s tone is firmer now. He leans forward and tweaks his finger beneath my chin. “The shadows respond to you, and you have no magickal training. For a human to have innate powers like that; you know that’s not ridiculous. You know it’s real. When I was first assigned to watch you⁠—”

I’m staring at him, feeling soothed by his voice, but then my brain snags and I pull back. “Wait,” I interrupt, “you were assigned to watch me? By who?”

Lucien flinches a little. Clearly, he hadn’t intended to tell me that part of the story.