The Killing Dance - Laurell K. Hamilton [168]
He ran his hands under my arms, not trying to pin them, but forcing them up away from the knife in his stomach. He pinned me to the floor with his body. I expected him to draw out the blade, but he didn’t. He pressed the hilt against my body and pushed. He shoved the blade into him up to the hilt and kept pressing. The hilt bruised against my stomach and he ground it into both of us.
He shuddered over me. He raised his upper body off me, pinning me with his lower body, snuggling it between my legs so I could feel him, hard and firm. He pulled the blade out in a burst of crimson and plunged it downward so fast my arms were only halfway up to protect my face when the blade bit into the carpet. He drove the blade hilt deep into the plywood floor, so close to my head that it pinned my hair on one side.
He undid the button on my jeans. He wasn’t even trying to control my hands, but I only had one knife left. If I lost it, I couldn’t kill him. We were about to find out just how good my nerves were.
Richard’s power flowed over me again, but it wasn’t the same. It was less frantic, more as if he was trying to whisper something to me, offer me something. Then I realized what it was. The first mark. Jean-Claude and Richard, for it was they, couldn’t do it now without my permission. I was too powerful to be forced, at least Psychically.
Gabriel kept my legs pinned with his hips and grabbed the front of my jeans, fingers pointing outward, away from my body. His claws sprang out through the cloth, and he ripped upward, slicing the cloth nearly to my pubic bone.
I screamed and let Richard do me. Better the monster you know than the monster about to go down your pants. A line of warmth ran through my body. It had been even simpler when Jean-Claude did it on his own, once upon a time. Even knowing what it was, it didn’t feel like much.
But I felt better instantly; clearer-headed, more . . . something. Gabriel hesitated on top of me. “What the hell was that?” The skin of his bare arms was prickled with gooseflesh. He’d gotten a taste of the power.
“Didn’t feel a thing,” I said. I tugged on the knife in the floor, pulling at it. Gabriel ripped my jeans in both hands, and they split down the middle, leaving nothing between him and me but my panties and his leather pants. I was at a bad angle for the knife and it was only halfway out when he slid his hand down my panties.
I screamed. I screamed, “Richard!”
The power flowed over me. With Jean-Claude, I had watched his burning blue eyes enter me. With Richard as focus, there was nothing to see, but smells, the forest, his skin, Jean-Claude’s perfume. I could taste them both in my mouth like drinking two strong wines one mouthful after another.
Gabriel’s hand froze down the front of my body. He was staring down at me. “What did you just do?” His voice was a whisper.
“Did you think raping me would be easy?” I laughed, and it unnerved him. I saw something close to fear in his storm grey eyes. He’d moved his hand. Not having him down my underwear was too big an improvement for words. I never wanted him to touch me like that again. Never.
I had two choices. I could bluff and hope I could run, or I could reinitiate sex and kill him. The second mark didn’t give me that much more power. In fact, it gave the boys more pull on my power than the other way around. So, sex it was.
“What’s wrong?” Raina asked out of camera range.
“Gabriel’s getting cold feet,” I said. I raised up on my elbows. The knife he’d shoved in the floor held my hair pinned, and I kept raising up, tearing a hunk of my hair out. It was a small pain, but I knew it would appeal to Gabriel. It did.
I was sitting up with my legs on either side of his thighs. He picked me up, hands sliding over my undies, cupping my buttocks. He leaned back on his knees, supporting my weight. He watched me, and I saw something slide through his eyes, felt it tremble through his hands.