nose in her bleached hair. She yanked at his shirt while Luke fumbled with his belt buckle, and when she put her hands on his cheeks to kiss him, the sensation of pleasure was so unfamiliar that it made him shudder because the skin of his new body had never felt anything but pain.
He hoisted the girl up onto the counter, setting her just off balance so that her knees splayed open. A fire was building in him, warmth in his groin, but this time the heat would be all sexual pleasure.
So, he’d let the fury watch. Maybe he could twist it into some kind of kinky fantasy. Didn’t every guy think about having two women at the same time? Not that he wanted to have the fury…but when his eyes slid away from the girl in his arms to his tormentor, he caught the slightly aroused parting of the fury’s lips.
It surprised Luke to think that a creature like her could be titillated, but his ability to ponder such things was decidedly limited as all the blood rushed from his brain to his cock.
Phaedra knew that her mistress—the chaste maiden goddess of battle—would have viewed this scene of carnal lust with complete contempt. What’s more, Athena would have expected Phaedra to feel equally disgusted by the lieutenant’s panting need for the Slavic seductress.
But Phaedra was no cruel war goddess. She’d been set upon Luke Lazaros to torment him until he earned forgiveness or until his sanity shattered. But he wasn’t the worst criminal she’d ever encountered. He could be surprisingly courteous, consumed with some personal sense of honor, and because of this, in all the months she’d been stalking him, she’d become aware of a strange and unbidden emotion that tightened painfully in her chest. One that she could only identify as compassion.
Maybe that’s why she wanted to allow Luke this small comfort, this moment of intimacy—even if it was lewd fornication upon a countertop next to a cash register and dusty bits of junk. Or maybe it was just that she liked the view.
Luke was a spare-built man with lean muscles, taut, every extra inch of flesh having been burned away in the fire. Stripped to the waist, he was surprisingly beautiful to watch, even as his strong arms encircled a half-naked girl of easy virtue. The sight of unbridled lust between her prey and the shopgirl shouldn’t have mesmerized her this way; Phaedra was an avenger, born only to mete out justice. Punishment and redemption should have been her only concerns. But watching Luke about to claim this woman, about to sate his needs without inhibition, aroused her.
Squeezing her thighs, she became aware of the warmth there. As Athena’s creature she’d learned to ignore such feelings. She’d learned to bite down on her lip until the iron tang of blood in her mouth drove these animal sensations away. But for some reason, here and now, Phaedra didn’t want to banish the swell of her breasts or the insistent throbbing between her legs.
She was a fury, a relic of a forgotten age. An age of heroes and justice. Those days were gone now, and most of the old gods were gone too. But Phaedra remained, not as powerful as she once was, and increasingly numb. Maybe she just didn’t want to be numb anymore.
Watching this man and woman, muscles straining, hands feverishly stroking each other, was a vicarious thrill. Luke yanked down the lace of the girl’s bra so that engorged pink nipples strained to meet his hands. The shopgirl’s glossy fingers skimmed into her already wet panties as if she couldn’t wait for Luke to touch her there, and then she moaned with pleasure.
The urgency of Phaedra’s heartbeat as it pounded at her wrists and throat and cunt nearly forced her to moan too. Forbidden questions crowded Phaedra’s mind. What would it feel like to kiss someone? Wet and suffocating? Soft and alluring? Would a kiss cause her to gasp for air or pant or push her hand inside her panties to stroke the wetness there?
Phaedra had never touched anyone—not even herself—except to inflict pain. She’d never used her hands to elicit a whimper of pleasure the way Luke did now when he squeezed the girl’s pendulous breasts. In only a few moments, she’d be watching the clench of his ass as he rammed the girl into the countertop. And at the thought of it, Phaedra’s mouth went dry, entranced by the carnal intimacy, half-imagining herself in the girl’s place.
It was too much. She’d let it go too far. Long pent-up desires breached all the dams she’d built inside herself to hold them back. And her hand dropped to her sex, squeezing there as if to hold back the flood.
Chapter Two
He saw her do it.
He never knew what made him turn his head and open his eyes, but he looked at the fury the exact moment that she clutched at herself, thighs clamped around her fingers as if she were a naughty girl he’d caught rubbing herself to orgasm. It was powerfully erotic. Her eyes locked with his as if she couldn’t look away. He wanted her to do it…to pull those tight pants down and finger herself. He imagined she’d look wicked and wanton.
Instead, she quickly faded from view.
Still, the sight had kicked his already roaring sex drive into a higher gear. The shopgirl was stroking him, thumb smearing the tip of his cock with the sticky evidence of his arousal. And from his oversexed haze, Luke became dimly aware that the fury was right behind him. He should have braced himself for whatever mayhem she was about to cause, but he was in such a state that the warmth of her lips near the back of his ear made his already swollen shaft jump with pleasure. The idea of being tangled up with these two women seared through his brain, burning away any trace of good sense.
Of course, the fury wasn’t a woman—not exactly—and she was dangerous as hell. Ignore her, Luke thought.
The shopgirl mistook his hesitation and pouted. “Don’t tease me.”
No, there would be no teasing. At least not the first time, when it would be all he could do not to embarrass himself. It was going to feel so good to lose himself inside her. All Luke had to do was guide himself into those pink glistening folds, but just as he made ready, the fury whispered, “Do you think she knows that you’re a virgin? At least in this body…”
Shut up! It wasn’t until the shopgirl shrank back that Luke realized he’d said it out loud. Cursing himself, he hastened to explain. “No, no, I didn’t mean you—I just mean, less talking, more making out.”
He captured the girl’s lips and kissed her hard.
The fury’s voice behind him was a throaty purr. “I guess whatever STD you catch from her will burn up the next time you’re reborn from the flames so you don’t have to worry about venereal disease.”
Ignore her. Ignore her. Ignore her, damn it!
The fury was relentless. “Do you think you’ll have enough cash to pay her afterward? She doesn’t look like the kind of girl who takes a credit card for services rendered—“
“Hey!” Luke said, twisting his head around to glare at the fury for insulting his would-be lover. Unfortunately, the girl didn’t appreciate Luke’s sense of chivalry. Her eyes flew wide as if she were in the clutches of a maniac and both her hands went up to cover her breasts. She pulled away as if she thought he were some schizophrenic rapist who might take her to bed and then cook her up in a stew.
“Wait,” he said, quaking with sexual frustration. He needed this!
“You should go,” the girl said, grabbing her clothes with a look of terror.
Luke was having trouble adapting to rapidly changing conditions on the ground. He tried for flattery. “Listen, beautiful, I’m just a little tense. Just let me—“
“Go away now or I call police!”
Okay, so, quite the impression he’d made here. “I’m going,” Luke said, holding up one hand in surrender, fastening his pants with the other. “At least let me pay for the book.”
“Just take it,” the shopgirl cried. “Take book and get out!”
With chalk in one hand and a crystal in the other, Luke slammed open the book of arcana and began copying the symbols on the wooden floor.
“It’s