Rafe threw back his head and laughed before saying, "Curious, Skye? Somehow I don't think you'll ever see that show with your human mate. But maybe if you're lucky, Gian will take you to one of the clubs where vampires gather to feed and fuck their companions and slaves. Of course, to enjoy the entertainment, you've got to be part of the entertainment." Now it was his turn to smirk. "But maybe that won't be such a stretch for you." Rafael brushed his fingers across a scar on his neck. "The last time Brann was around when Gian was taking care of you, I paid the price."

Skye's eyes narrowed and opened, doubt warring with curiosity as she remembered Gian saying, You are my companion. Among our kind, the sharing of blood with a chosen one is often done in front of close friends, as she also remembered how he'd brought her to orgasm with his hands twice while in the company of other vampires. She turned to Syndelle. "Is he jerking me around?"

"He doesn't lie. I have heard of such places, though the Angelini do not frequent them."

Rafael snorted. "Only because they have their own places, and the Angelini who are bound to Weres like to attend the Howls with their wolfie mates." His grin widened. "Now those are supposed to be real fuck-fests. Not that I've ever been to one. Thank god. Running through the woods while a pack of wolves chase me for pre-coitus entertainment doesn't sound like fun to me."

Once again Skye's gaze sought Syndelle's. Syndelle nodded slightly. "Chasing a condemned human is not done often, though it is not against the laws we have all agreed upon-if the human's crime is grievous enough to warrant such a death."

Syndelle smiled teasingly at Rafael. "Though my human mate is delicious and would temp any Were, he would not be welcome at a Howl. Rarely are humans allowed at a pack's gathering. The Howls are held to encourage breeding and mating among the purebreds-so that more females will be born-though sometimes an Angelini female who has not yet found mates is sent in the hopes that she will bind two wolf packs together by mating with the alpha from each of them." A private, satisfied rush of heat warmed Syndelle. She'd thought perhaps she would find at least one mate among the Weres at the Howl she was supposed to attend in the company of Riesen's pack, and her parents had perhaps hoped she would find two, but both she and the wolf were well satisfied with Rafael and Brann.

"What about the other?" Skye asked. "Do the Angelini have fuck parties?"

Syndelle's cheeks warmed and she tried not to think of their parents involved in such activity, but she did not turn away from the truth. "Yes. Privately. Among Angelini who are close to one another. And there is rarely a sharing of one's mates."

Skye looked at Rafael. "Are there clubs in Vegas where vampires and their companions and slaves go to fuck and feed-as you so delicately put it?"

"Yeah. Why? Interested in going to one?" Rafe shifted his position and grasped Syndelle's hand, pulling her onto his lap, then wrapping his arms around her and hugging her tightly against him, his body vibrating with suppressed tension despite his external show of amusement.

"No, thanks," Skye said, moving to sit on the chair opposite them. "So are slaves willing or are they made against their will?"

"They are supposed to be willing," Syndelle said, shivering at the thought of being a vampire's slave. "But few understand the irrevocable contract they agree to when they take a vampire's blood, exchanging their souls and their will for whatever it is they hope to gain from their new master. Some call themselves servants rather than slaves, but in truth, they are chattel, to be used and discarded as a vampire sees fit."

"Discarded as in killed?"

"A vampire has the right, though it is frowned upon, and rarely is it necessary. Deprived of the blood of the master, a slave often commits suicide. But it is more common for a vampire to simply give the servant to another to use as he or she wills."

Skye frowned. "There are humans at Fangs who have a blood-tie to Gian, but he swears that they aren't servants, that he protects them by giving them his blood."

"Your mate speaks the truth," Syndelle said.

The doorbell sounded and Skye rose, opening the door for a whirlwind of a female whose first words were, "Oh god, I've made a complete ass of myself," before she noticed Syndelle and Rafe and added, "Again. Shit. Sorry. I didn't know you had company."

"My sister Syndelle and her boyfriend, Rafael." To them, Skye said, "This is Rico's cousin, Francesca."

Syndelle rose, smiling at the flustered girl, before saying to Skye, "We'll go home for a while and meet with you when it's time to go to The Hole."

Skye's smile was grateful. "Thanks. See you later. If we have time to try and track down Yvonne, I'll give you a call."

Rafael and Syndelle returned home, moving almost automatically to his bedroom, stripping without words being necessary, as the need for physical contact became as essential as the need to breathe.

They tumbled to the bed, but when Rafe would have covered Syndelle's body with his and fucked her, she resisted, pushing him to his back, playfully holding his wrists against the comforter while she leaned down to toy with the barbell piercing his nipple, sucking and biting and pulling it with her teeth.

His cock jumped in response, a pant escaping as his back arched, pressing the nipple deeper into her mouth. She shifted position so that she could admire the defined muscles of his chest, the washboard abdomen and his engorged penis as she lowered her upper body and offered him her own nipple. Her cunt lips swelling, her clit standing at rigid attention, waiting for its turn to feel Rafe's lips and tongue.

Rafe groaned, latching onto Syndelle's offering like a starving man, laving and biting roughly, grasping her nipple with his teeth and pulling on it like a greedy puppy at its mother's teat. Fire streaked through Syndelle's belly and she reveled in her mate, wanting to wallow in his scent, his desire, in the sounds of pleasure he was making.

He shifted to her other breast, and she kissed her way over to his other nipple, playing with it, sucking it until his pleas and his hands urged her lower.

She went willingly, dragging her stomach over his mouth, mimicking the dart of his tongue into her belly button with a lick and twirl into his navel, before traveling the last short distance to heaven and pressing her swollen clit into his mouth as she licked over the head of his penis.

Lust roared through Rafael, as hot and demanding as the female flesh above him. He wrapped his arms around Syndelle's hips, hugging her wet cunt to his face and burying himself in it. He was starving for her, desperate for her, completely addicted to her. He wanted to spend all day licking and sucking, making her cry and beg and shiver and writhe, but already his balls were tight, his cock tortured as her mouth and hands worked him, bringing him to the edge of release again and again, only to deny him.

They were both shaking, panting, almost to the point of no return when he rolled, ripping himself away from her so that he could watch her face as he took her, as his cock shoved into her cunt, as she cried out, wrapping her legs around him, welcoming and holding him tight in honest passion and blossoming love.

His lips sought hers, his tongue mimicking what his cock was doing. He pumped in and out of her, the pressure and anticipation building with each hard, deep stroke, until finally he was locked in the heaven of her body, his semen rushing through his penis in wave after wave of sweet agony.

Afterward they lay cuddled together, his cock still deep in her channel as they absorbed each other's heat and essence. Idly Syndelle traced his spine, smiling into his shoulder at the way his buttocks tensed when her fingers drew near them.

"How did you end up with Brann?" she asked, bracing herself against his withdrawal, letting him know with the touch of her mind to his that she would accept his refusal if he chose not to answer.

He stilled and she could feel his internal struggle, until finally Rafe exhaled, a heavy sigh that seemed to deflate him. He pulled his head back so that he could meet her eyes, giving her a smile so fragile she feared that any movement on her part would chase it away.

I'll show you if you want to see it, he said, the offering touching her so intimately that her heart felt like it was going to burst.

She nodded and Rafael lowered his head, brushing his lips softly against hers. I've never had anyone like you in my life. It scares the shit out of me. If you care about someone, it only makes it worse when they discard you like you're trash.

"Are you really afraid of that happening, Rafael?" she whispered. "You're no slave, you're a companion and a mate." Do you really think that anything you could show me would make me turn from you?

I don't know.

Then show me the worst and find out.

The very worst was locked away in his childhood. A guilt that even he couldn't face most days. What he could show her made him laugh and shake his head. "The worst is sexual and you don't seem to shock easily."

"Sex is hardly a new discovery-for humans or supernatural beings. There is little that doesn't get talked about among so many brothers, and my parents have not shied away from explaining things." Her face grew somber as she added, Everything in my life has been centered around protecting me and teaching me to guard myself in the hopes that once I found my mates and claimed them, I would be safe.

Rafael could sense there were deeper meanings and fears behind her words, just as there was overlaying sadness and uncertainty about whether or not she would be loved for herself and not just because the Angelini magic made it impossible for her mates to refuse her. He couldn't stop himself from reacting, from giving a tender, self-conscious laugh. "We're a couple of fucked-up vampire companions, aren't we? Brann probably wonders what he did to deserve us."

His small joke brought tears to Syndelle's eyes and warmth to her heart. "Speak for yourself, I'm a mate, not a companion."

"Yet," Rafe whispered, covering her mouth with his, teasing her lips apart and stroking inside, conveying with the gentle brush of his tongue against hers that he wasn't driven only by the animal instinct to mate, that her love and acceptance were becoming essential to him.

For a long while they lingered, exploring each other, enjoying each other, their bodies moving in unhurried rhythm as they swallowed each other's soft cries of pleasure. When they were finally sated, it was Rafael who said, "Do you still want to know how I became his companion?"

"Yes."

"Watch then," he said, pulling up the memory for her to see.