Bombshell (Monstrous Ink #2)

Chapter 16

“ E ffie,” I groaned as I felt her hot, wet mouth close over my cock. “What time is it?”

There was something about coming out of a dream about the green-haired minx and into a reality where she was doing her favorite morning pastime: torturing me, and quite literally, waking me up with a bang.

The mouth around my length lifted before a cheeky, still slightly groggy voice replied. “Early. I woke up to go to the bathroom and saw this and I couldn’t resist. Are you having naughty dreams, Dallan?”

“About you?” I muttered, scrubbing a hand down my face. “Always, Lass.”

Her chuckle was naughtier than anything I could have ever dreamed as she brushed her tongue along the ridged underside of my cock.

A full month had passed since the day the baby started shifting inside of Daphne, and dare I say it, everything was surprisingly normal. The shop opened and closed every day, Daphne went for her appointments, and Effie still went three times a week to the mansion to learn about her unique kind of magic .

Even Arsenio seemed to be leaving Effie alone at the mansion when she went for her lessons with Alexander. It was almost as if all of the revelations that were made that day hadn’t meant anything at all.

While things had been relatively peaceful, even I knew there wasn’t a chance in hell that Arsenio was going to give up on Effie being his Guardian. I could feel it deep in my bones, so much so that I’d put Art on discovering anything and everything he could about the Source.

Which… wasn’t yielding the results I’d have liked. Unfortunately he hadn’t been able to find much about it other than some old records of it causing havoc as soon as it left the Fae realm. Hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, wildfires, if you could think of a natural disaster, and the Source was linked to it.

“Are you really not paying attention to me right now, Dall?” Effie asked with a pout as she gave my cock a firm, almost painful squeeze, making me grunt.

“Sorry, Lass, my mind was getting the better of me for a moment,” I apologized and reached down to brush the bed head curls out of her face.

Effie harrumphed and gave my cock another rough pump. “I must not be doing a very good job then.”

She crawled up my body until the slit of her cunt wrapped around my shaft, and then for good measure, she lifted the skirt of the satin nightdress she was wearing so we could both watch as she rubbed herself onto me in slow, easy strokes, pressing my cock into my stomach as she took her pleasure and made herself wet enough to accept me.

Then Effie started to play her favorite game. “This might be a good time to talk about making Byrne a permanent employee.”

I groaned as she lifted her hips up and began to toy with me, notching the head of my length at her soaking entrance and shifting her hips before it could slide inside.

“Is this really the right time to talk about this?” I asked, wanting nothing more than to grab her hips and pull her onto my cock in one smooth motion, but I knew that would end our playful morning sex and there was almost nothing more that I liked more than morning sex.

“This is the perfect time,” Effie said with a grin as the vines on her back slipped out and snaked in between our bodies, one of them wrapping around my cock and giving it palpitating squeezes as she continued to tease me. “It’s been almost three months since he started working here and you’ve still got him in the shitty storage closet versus giving him his own room to work in.”

“He irritates me,” I muttered, reaching up to cup one of her breasts through the thin, slippery fabric of her dress.

Byrne had done little to win me over during his tenure as our resident body piercer. He was damned good at his job… and that was about it. He came to work every day, did his job, and then left as soon as the sign on the door was flipped to closed .

He didn’t want to talk to anyone but clients, he didn’t want to be friendly with anyone, and he sure as hell didn’t want to do any of the things that we at Monstrous Ink liked to do as a staff.

I’d come to think of everyone that worked at my shop as family, so it was getting on my nerves that Byrne wanted to work in it but didn’t want to have anything to do with us outside of it.

“Ambrose has been here for decades and he still irritates you,” Effie pointed out as she finally put me out of my misery and began to slowly slip down the length of my cock. Then she folded at the waist so that our faces were close together.

“Ambrose is different,” I said through clenched teeth as I felt the twist of her insides gripping me so tightly I nearly came just from the sensation alone.

“He’s not.” Effie pressed a few kisses along the line where my tentacles met my cheek. “But he likes you and Byrne doesn’t. You, Dallan Elder, can’t stand to not be liked by someone.”

My hands slid along her smooth thighs before I caught one of her vines before it could sneak in between our bodies to play with me and drive me even more insane. “Doesn’t everyone want to be liked?”

Effie huffed a laugh. “Not the way you want to be liked. If I wasn’t so sure of how you felt about me I’d be half-worried that you had a crush on the big kitty man.”

I jerked like she’d smacked me and shot her a half-hearted glare. “Do not even joke about that. ”

For good measure, I lifted a hand and gave her ass a smack, making the both of us moan when Effie’s insides clenched tightly around me.

“Then stop being so stubborn and give him his own suite before he quits and we’re back to having no one to do piercings.”

Effie kissed me before I could argue any further, her hips starting to roll as she rode me with abandon, taking her pleasure and giving me mine until we both exploded.

She collapsed into my chest, her single heart beating a chorus right alongside mine as we tried to catch our breaths.

“Fine,” I managed when the lights finally cleared from my vision. “I’ll give him the room at the end of the hall but you have to tell Heath he’s going to have to share with Fiero a little longer.”

Effie just grinned. “I’m sure he won’t mind.”

I shot her a quelling look. “You need to stop trying to set those two up. It’s been six years, if something was going to happen it would have by now.”

“You don’t see what I see,” Effie said with a smile as she pushed herself up and gave me one last peck on the mouth before getting up to get ready for the day. “Besides, it took you and me fifty years to happen. I don’t think it will take even half as long for those two.”

I snorted at that. One thing about us supernatural creatures was that we did things slowly. Like three to five business centuries slowly .

Even though I wasn’t sure how old Fiero was, the man had refused to be interested in any kind of partner for as long as I’d known him.

He’d taken Heath under his wing when he’d found him on the side of the road six years ago with a mangled-but-healing bite wound on his neck and no place to go.

And while Effie was right that there was something going on between them, I was pretty sure it would take divine intervention in order for them to ever take the next step and even then I wasn’t sure if it would work.

“You’re heading to the mayor’s mansion today, right?” I asked, watching as Effie stepped into the walk-in closet we now shared to get dressed.

It wasn’t one of her lesson days, but she’d gotten a text from Odette late last night before we fell asleep that had her concerned.

“Yep, I’m going to check on Odette and should be back by lunchtime for our staff meeting. Don’t forget that you’ve got a vamp coming in this morning so you need to make sure Daphne turns on all of the black out spells I’ve enchanted on the windows.”

It was rare to get a vampire client during the day, but Henri almost preferred it. He claimed that a little bit of sunlight helped to burn the ink into his skin and make it last longer. I, however, was pretty sure that the French vampire was just batshit crazy.

But he paid top dollar for me to tattoo him, so we humored his little eccentricities .

Effie emerged from the closet in a flowy white sundress that was speckled with green flowers and a row of pearl buttons up the back.

“Button me up?” she asked, turning and holding up her hair so that I could start to fasten the dress.

Everything about living with Effie was so damned domestic that it made me choke up every time I did little things like this. From the skincare products in our bathroom to the constantly bubbling potions bench in the living room, this was what I’d been longing for for years and now it was here.

Sometimes I worried it was all one big dream or hallucination and that one day I would wake up alone in my bed without her.

“Dallan, are you listening to me?” Effie asked as I made it to the top of the dress.

I grinned dopily up at her. “No, I was too preoccupied with staring at my gorgeous mate.”

Effie rolled her eyes, but a pretty pink flush still filled her cheeks as she repeated herself. “I asked if anything strange has been happening out in the water. I know you’ve got your monthly meeting with your people tonight.”

I shook my head. Everything had been disturbingly normal on that front too. The weather had evened out to where it was supposed to be now that it was June.

Not only that, but the currents had shifted back to normal and the tourists had stopped drowning .

It was almost as if Arsenio had found a different Guardian for the Source and that had made everything go back to the way it was around Port Haven.

I hoped we were that lucky, but I also wasn’t much of a betting man. “I haven’t noticed anything, but I’m sure they’ll tell me if they have. In great, never-ending detail.”

“They only do it because they trust you and respect your leadership,” Effie said and she put a hand on my shoulder and leaned down to give me a kiss.

“I wish they’d respect me just a little less.” I huffed a laugh before deepening the kiss, our tongues sliding together as I felt my cock stir again. “Any chance I can interest you in a second round?”

“I wish,” Effie said before straightening up. “But I promised Odette I’d come by today. She sounded so strange in her text and I’ve barely seen her since that afternoon with Cash, so I’m a bit worried.”

Effie had told me all about the sketches that her friend had drawn and we’d both come to the conclusion that the faerie woman probably had some sort of prophetic ability which was exceedingly rare for her kind.

Unfortunately with prophetic abilities also came things like paranoia, anxiety, and sometimes even death as that kind of magic tended to leech at one’s lifespan. It wasn’t something I would wish on my worst enemy let alone the sheltered woman that Effie cared so much about.

“Okay, well call me before you’re about to head back,” I told her, tugging her down for one last kiss. “And please be careful.”

“I’m always careful, Dallan, careful is practically my middle name.”

I frowned. “You don’t have a middle name.”

Effie just grinned and shot me a cheeky wave before heading for the door, leaving me still naked in bed with nothing but a half-hard erection and the need for a very cold shower to make it go away.

“This is quite nice, Dallan,” Henri said as he examined his bicep where I’d just finished an all black and white stained glass window piece. It was based off of some chapel in the French countryside, so I’d had to do what I could with the grainy polaroid he’d brought it.

“Thank you, I tried my best to get it as close to what you brought in as possible,” I told the vampire as he began digging in his pockets for the gold coins he usually paid with. Effie would throw a fit as she was really trying to get our clientele to pay with modern currency like the American dollar. But I wasn’t even sure if Henri had a bank account or even knew what a dollar bill was.

He rarely came down from his home deep in the mountains surrounding Port Haven and the usual crazed look in his eyes told me that he wasn’t sure what year it was let alone what country he was in. It was a wonder he managed to make these tattoo appointments at all.

“Your best is more than enough. Now, come here for a moment,” he said, his accent growing thick as he spoke and I had to lean in a bit to understand him. “The waves are going to swallow us all up today, did you know that?”

The vampire giggled, flashing a pair of yellowed, chipped fangs at me.

A chill skittered down my spine. “What does that mean?”

“The Guardian wasn’t dead yet, no, no, no , he held on longer than anyone thought possible for her. But the king was starting to grow weary of him and so he said ‘off with his head!’ She’s very angry now and will swallow us all whole.”

How had a vampire who rarely spoke with anyone come to know about the Guardian? And who was the woman he was speaking about?

But Henri just gave another crazed snicker before folding my fingers around the gold in my hand. Then he got up and started to leave, forgetting the magical cloak that he wore to protect his skin still hanging on the hook on the wall.

“Wait! Don’t forget your—” I called but he ignored me.

Cursing under my breath I snatched the cloak off of the hook and hurried after him before we had a barbecued bloodsucker on the Wharf.

I made it into the lobby where Daphne was frowning at the door .

“Where did Henri go? He left his cloak…” I trailed off as Daphne pointed.

Henri was standing outside, his face tilted to the sky. He should have been boiling, his skin shredding away from his body in the full, early summer sunlight. But he looked totally fine.

Opening the shop door I stepped out to look at him. His skin was still slightly pink, like he was getting a sunburn, but the man didn’t seem to notice as he continued to stare upward.

“The Sun goes black and the waves rise, today the Source grieves as her soulmate dies.”

He said it like it was some kind of riddle, but upon glancing up I gasped when I saw the dark circle covering the Sun. There had been no mention of a total solar eclipse anywhere and there were other people stepping outside to look up at it. When I turned to ask him what the fuck he was talking about, the vampire was completely gone as if he’d vanished into thin air.

“Dallan!” a familiar voice called my name and I turned to find Odette Sidhe limping in my direction. She was barefoot and battered, her golden hair full of leaves and twigs, and as she came closer, I could see the scratches on her arms and legs from what looked like tree branches.

I had never seen Odette by herself ever in her life. Arsenio kept his daughter on a tight leash, so seeing her standing in front of me with a panicked expression on her face made every instinct I possessed scream that something was very, very wrong .

“They took her. Daddy tricked her into coming to the house and they took her,” Odette sobbed, reaching out to grab onto me before her legs gave out.

I opened my mouth to ask her where they took her, but I was cut off by the sound of a siren blaring overhead, making me jump.

“This is the Port Haven Coast Guard,” a voice came through the loudspeakers that were attached to most parts of the town in case of an emergency. “There is an immediate threat of a tsunami. I repeat, an immediate threat of a tsunami. We urge everyone to get to higher ground immediately before impact. I repeat a tsunami is imminent, get to higher ground.”

The sound of people’s screams filled my ears as they started to run for the parking lot, falling over each other as they went.

“Dallan!” Cash came hurtling out of the shop, everyone else on his heels as he swept his mate off of her feet. “What do we do?”

“Take everyone and get them out of here,” I ordered, my eyes catching on Santi as he ran for the end of the dock. “I’ll call you once things are safe.”

“Wait! Where are you going?” Daphne asked with a frown, her eyes wide as the sirens continued to blare.

“I need to get Effie,” I said before turning and snagging Odette’s hand. “You, come with me.”

“I tried to get him to stop,” Odette said to my back as we hurried in the direction Santi had disappeared in. “But he kept going on and on about the safety of the town and how sacrifices need to be made.”

“Where was Alexander in all of this?” I threw the question over my shoulder at her. Alexander, as shitty of a father as he was, still cared about Effie in his own fucked up kind of way. If he didn’t want her to become the Guardian, then it was for a good reason.

I finally caught sight of the Santi standing on the end of the dock, staring at the dark shadow in the distance. All of the water from the bay had been sucked out, leaving the sandy ocean floor in its wake. That definitely did not bode well.

“I don’t know,” Odette murmured just barely loud enough for me to hear. “He hasn’t been home for a few days which I thought was odd and then my dreams started getting worse…”

That stopped me in my tracks and Odette ran into my back, her nose smashing into it as she yelped. “What was in your dreams, Odette?”

“A lot of things,” Odette said, looking a bit haunted.

“Anything about Effie?”

Big blue eyes fixed on my face before she spoke in a monotone voice. “They’re all about Effie, Dallan. She’s going to become the Guardian, but Daddy didn’t tell anyone that the Guardian of the Source can’t leave it behind. They are trapped together in that awful cave forever so Daddy can keep control over it.”

Her voice was hollow and far away as she spoke and it almost reminded me of Henri and his crazed ramblings .

With a frustrated growl I hurried to the edge of the dock where Santi was still standing.

“Santi!” I barked, making the Del Mar whirl around to face me. “I need your help to get Effie.”

“I can’t,” he said, his eyes wide with panic. “Kit was out on a beginner’s diving trip with a bunch of children and the boat never returned. I’ve got to go out to get her.”

I cursed under my breath, realizing that I was probably going to have to do this alone.“Go to her then and please be careful,” I told the man before turning back to Odette again once the sound of his retreating footsteps had faded. “Where is the Source located?”

Odette looked confused. “I don’t know about that…”

Frustrated, I grabbed her shoulders and gave her a rough shake. “ Think , Odette, or else your friend and my mate is going to be trapped in a fucking cave forever.”

Odette’s eyes filled with tears before shifting back and forth like she was flipping through her dreams to try and figure it out. “The Cave is only accessible by water but with the tsunami you can probably just walk in like Daddy did with Effie in my dream… it’s got a funny rock formation that looks like the prongs of a fork…”

I knew exactly where that was. To think that the magical source of the barrier had been just underneath one of my favorite spots to run for centuries.

“Thank you, Odette, you should get to higher ground.”

The faerie frowned. “No, I’m coming with you. ”

I started to protest but she cut me off. “In case you haven’t noticed Mr. Tentacle-Man, the ocean is not ocean-ing right now. How are you going to get to Effie before she gets attached to the Source, huh? With your feet? I can get you there much faster.”

“How?” I asked, watching as Odette’s silvery wings flipped open and fluttered behind her.

“With these,” Odette said proudly.

There was absolutely no way she was going to be able to fly and carry me at the same time with those flimsy things. I always thought that faerie wings were like the tiny vestigial ones on my own back—mostly for looks—but judging by her expression that didn’t seem to be the case. “Uh, no offense, but I’m a lot heavier than I look.”

“And I,” Odette said, holding out her hands to me, “am a lot stronger than I look.”

I put my hands in hers and yelped as my feet left the wooden planks of the Wharf and we were airborne.

“See!” Odette shouted down to me as we wobbled precariously in the air because she banked left in the direction of the ocean cliffs in the distance. “I told you I was stronger than I looked!”

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to think about anything but about how high up we were. It was the same as last time when we rode the stone dragon to chase Daphne when she’d been kidnapped, but at least there had been a saddle on that guy .

Now, all I had keeping me from plummeting down to the sandy ocean floor was a pair of tiny, manicured hands.

“Whatever you do,” I shouted up at her. “Please don’t drop me!”

“Oh come on, ye of little faith. I won’t drop you—I also saw that in my dreams.”

That wasn’t much of a comfort to me as we rode the current of air down to the forked cliffs where my mate was and I swore that, if anything happened to her, I was going to tear Arsenio Sidhe limb from limb.