‘Eleanor, please, please don’t do this, not if Jill doesn’t want it,’ Finn said, nuzzling against her throat, speaking in harsh, breathy rasps. ‘Please set her free.’
Jill could no longer distinguish where she left off and Eleanor began. The lust she felt was white-hot, but there was more, there was so much more. She could feel the demon down under her breastbone, up along her spine, underneath her skin and coursing through her veins. Eleanor was everywhere, Eleanor was everything. Eleanor was raw, aching power wrapped in a need that was unlike any need Jill had ever experienced. She stood only on the edge of the ocean of Eleanor, the ocean that was somehow, incredibly, impossibly, contained by her.
Orgasm came from a long way off, like a wave growing on itself. Jill wasn’t sure where she was in that ocean of lust, but on it was a life raft, and that life raft was Finn. And if it were possible, he was filling her even fuller than Eleanor was. She held on tight, thrusting hard. Meinrad grunted his orgasm onto the floor next to the altar. Chelsea keened out her release against the press of her palm.
And then the world exploded outwards. Finn came. Jill came, and Eleanor curled around her in an embrace that was ecstatic and primordial and completely and totally new. And just at the instant before it all slipped away, Jill held on tight.
Chapter 7
When Jill came to, she was lying on Finn’s sofa. He sat on the coffee table next to her, bathing her forehead with a cool cloth. The relief on his face expanded to a cautious smile. ‘Welcome back. You all right?’
Was she? She wasn’t sure. Nothing seemed broken or damaged. Her head didn’t hurt, and it was still on the right way. There was no urge to vomit pea soup. Her stomach felt just fine, though she realised she was ravenous. And damned if she still didn’t feel like she could open her legs and pull Finn right down on top of her. He was certainly well equipped for it, with a hefty hard-on snugged up tight against the front of his jeans.
It was when she rested her hand upon it, when he moaned and bit his lip, that she noticed Meinrad glaring at her from across the room, arms folded over his deep chest as though he were standing guard. Chelsea sat on the arm of the sofa at her feet, leaning anxiously forward. Then it all came rushing back to her, the altar table, the bad-arse dagger, the chanting, the sex. Eleanor.
She felt warm breath against the fine hair at the base of her neck, then it moved over the tips of her nipples and, like the brush of a feather, it flicked down her sternum and ended with a tiny puff against the node of her clit. As the pleasure of it rushed up her spine and straight to her brain, she knew.
‘It didn’t work,’ she said.
Meinrad growled. ‘You fucking have to want it to work first. She can tell that, you know?’
‘Don’t tell me what I want.’ She forced herself into a sitting position, thought better of it as the world spun around her, and Finn eased her back down. ‘You don’t know what the hell I want. And don’t go acting like it’s all my fault you screwed up.’
‘Ease off, Meinrad. Now.’ Finn came to his feet so quickly that Jill had to do a double take. Almost before she could blink he stood nose to nose with the big man. ‘Eleanor was in your care. You were her host.’ He shot Chelsea a sharp look. ‘Both of you.’ The room practically vibrated with Finn’s anger, and Jill felt something as visceral as it was sexual, laced with fear and the effervescent tingle of magic she’d felt on the altar.
‘The two of you knew I was working in Kinky Boots, and you knew what night it was. What the fuck happened?’
It was almost as though Meinrad visibly deflated. ‘I have no idea.’ He plopped down in a partner to the Queen Anne chair that was in Kinky Boots, dwarfing it beneath his heavy haunches. ‘Chelsea and I were shagging. We thought Eleanor was fully engaged. She was in me at the time. You know how she likes my cock.’
Jesus, too much information, Jill thought, but she was the only one who seemed to notice.
Chelsea nodded sagely. ‘Usually Meinrad’s size can keep her occupied for hours.’
Even Finn nodded his agreement.
‘Like I said, Chel and I were shagging. She had just had a nice big come, and I was getting close.’ The big man ran a hand through his wild hair. ‘Well, you know, at that point a person’s a bit distracted, a bit vulnerable. Anyway, I came, and before we caught our breath, we realised Eleanor was gone.’
Jill eased herself into a sitting position, and just when Finn was sure she was comfortable, the pizza arrived. ‘Pizza after a botched exorcism?’ She said. ‘Who knew?’
‘Food after magic,’ Finn corrected, offering her a hefty piece of quattro stagioni on a plate Chelsea had scrounged from the kitchen.