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  SEDUCED BY MAGIC

  Stephanie Julian

  Stephanie Julian

  Published by Stephanie Julian

  Copyright 2014. Stephanie Julian.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to a legitimate bookseller to purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the text, please contact the author at [email protected].

  All characters in this book are fiction and figments of the author’s imagination.

  Author’s Note

  In the contemporary world, magic holds no sway.

  But looks can be deceiving.

  Old Gods remain. Old ways continue.

  Mythical creatures live among us…if you know where to look.

  Glossary

  Aitás – Etruscan Underworld

  Arus – magical power of the Etruscans

  Enu – humans of magical Etruscan descent, including lucani and strega

  Etera (pl. eteri) – Etruscan for foreigner, used to describe humans with no magic

  Fata – elemental beings of magical Etruscan descent, including linchetto, salbinelli, folletti

  Folletta (pl. folletti) – Etruscan fairies, only female

  Gianes – Etruscan water spirit

  Lauru – Etruscan sprites who love to clean

  Linchetti – Etruscan night elves

  Lucani – Etruscan werewolves

  Involuti – Etruscan founding gods, from whom all other Etruscan deities were descended

  Malandante – Etruscan dark magic users

  Querciola – Etruscan succubus, induces fierce sexual desire in men and feeds off that desire

  Salbinelli – Etruscan satyr

  Strega (pl. streghe) – Etruscan witch

  Versipellis (pl. versipelli) – shapeshifters; Etruscan lucani (wolves) and Norse berkserkir (bears)

  Chapter One

  Through the window, Scarlata watched him sleep.

  The warm summer air slipped around her bare skin, pebbling her nipples into tight nubs of pure sensation and making her pussy ache with anticipation.

  She’d come to kill him. Not fuck him. This man wanted to make her a pet. Or worse.

  Well, the tables were about to be turned.

  She fluttered her wings for a second before tucking them close to her back and merging them into her skin. Then she walked to the front door—the only door—and laid her hand on the warm brass knob. It turned, even though he’d locked it before stripping naked and falling into his unmade bed.

  Science didn’t allow for magic. That was his first failing. Only the first of many, she was sure.

  Walking through the door of the single-story cabin, she stopped to look around the room. To the right, a living area contained an upholstered chair, a table and a television on a stand, tucked neatly into the corner. She crooked a finger and the TV hummed to life. The snowy screen baffled her for a moment until the rectangular box next to it hummed and clicked. Then the TV screen blinked to life. Two men and one woman appeared on screen, involved in a threeway that would make a gymnast proud, and set to music that made her cringe in disgust.

  She had nothing against sex in all its forms but music that awful shouldn’t be allowed to exist.

  Obviously, he was horny. He hadn’t been with a woman since he’d arrived at this cabin in the eastern Pennsylvania forest five weeks ago. He’d parked his car by the side of the building and had moved it twice. Both times he’d returned with grocery store bags. No one had been to visit.

  A smile curved her lips. Obviously he was becoming frustrated.

  Turning, she took in the chaos that began on the far side of the room. Papers lay all over the floor like a pale carpet. He’d pushed them all off the dining room table earlier tonight with a growl before he shoved away from the table and stalked around the cabin for several minutes, muttering to himself.

  He’d become frustrated in the past week, having found nothing to prove his theories.

  Served him right.

  Bending, she picked up one of the paper. The words subject, test and resistance jumped out at her. The English language continued to sound harsh to her ears, even after more than two centuries.

  Still, when he spoke with a voice that reminded her of the growl of a lucani, something low in her body tightened.

  Leaving the dining area, she followed a paper trail down the hall to a small room on the left, where the chaos appeared to have a system. Books tottered in waist-high stacks, papers and magazines in unsteady piles. A slim notebook computer sat on a table under the window. Over the past five weeks, she’d watched—sometimes from a nearby tree branch or sometimes just outside the window—while he sat for hours on end, either typing or staring into the forest surrounding the house.

  He’d never seen her through her glamour. Not even when she walked only feet away from him while he hiked through the forest, watching the raptors that had given Hawk Mountain its name glide on the air currents.

  Fool human. Did he really think he could outwit her, trap her and keep her in a cage to study like an animal?

  She turned, anger heating her blood, and headed for the open doorway on the other side of the hall.

  She walked into his bedroom in silence, the cool wood flooring giving way to plush carpet, decadent against her soles. She stood for a brief second, eyes closed, as she dug all six toes into the luxurious wool rug. He’d brought this rug with him. She’d watched him unroll it beside the bed the first day he’d arrived.

  As she opened her eyes, she found him in the pale glimmer of moonlight filtering through the uncovered window.

  A stream of silver cut across his back, leaving his head and shoulders in darkness but revealing a sleek expanse of back and the hollowed curves of his gorgeous ass.

  Goddess, he was a beautiful specimen.

  She cocked her head to the side, watching the steady rise and fall of his back. His skin gleamed with a slight sheen of sweat due to the heat. Even here in the forest at night, the temperature hovered around eighty degrees.

  This region of the United States was in the thrall of a heat wave. Temperatures reached nearly one hundred degrees during the day, while barely dropping into the low eighties overnight. He’d abandoned most of his clothes the last few days, wearing only a pair of shorts that brushed his knees and hung low on his hips. He didn’t bother with underwear anymore.

  She drew in a breath, surprised at how hard she had to work for it.

  She wanted to touch him. Needed to touch him so badly her fingers ached and curled into fists at her hips.

  What could it hurt? Just a few touches before she… What?

  She hadn’t really decided yet.

  An ancient spell to ensure his continued slumber whispered from her lips and she watched it sink into his skin with a pale shimmer.

  Spreading her fingers, she reached out to touch the warm flesh of his back. The smooth texture reminded her of new leaves and his scent… Oh, his scent was sweat and heat, musk and male. Her lungs tightened even further.

  It’d be a shame not to have him before she disposed of him. It’d been ages since she’d enjoyed sex with an etera, a human with no magical abilities. Eteri had learned to be inventive in ways forgotten by her people, the folletti. A race of the mythic Etruscan Fata, folletti had long ago lost the ability to enjoy themselves.

  Unlike the Enu, the humans of magical Etruscan descent such as the streghe an
d the shape-changing versipelli, the Fata, such as the folletti, the linchetti and the salbinelli, had non-human attributes—wings, pointed ears or furred legs.

  Some Fata who could blend did so. Like the linchetti. But those like her, with hooves or wings, lived in hiding, in fear of being discovered.

  Reduced to seeking refuge in the ever-shrinking parts of the world humans had forgotten, couldn’t penetrate or simply didn’t want, those Fata cared more about survival.

  This man threatened her existence and those under her care.

  Sprawled in the center of the bed, he murmured something in his sleep and rolled onto his back. Her breath caught in her throat at his masculine beauty.

  Her fingers landed on his broad shoulders and slid to his firmly muscled chest then dipped to caress his nipples. The little nubs hardened under her touch and she tweaked them before continuing a downward path to his flat stomach. By the time she reached the line of fine, dark blond hair that arrowed straight to his large cock, he’d already thickened in arousal.

  She curled her fingers around his hard length, smiling as his shaft pulsed in her hand, more blood rushing to the organ. The flesh became hot to the touch and her fingers tightened in response. When he moaned in his sleep, her sex clenched and the ache low in her gut became all-consuming.

  She needed to ease that ache. It’d been so long—

  Releasing him, she slid onto the bed and straddled his thighs, bracing her hands on the hard muscles of his chest. Such strength under velvet skin. She could stroke him all night.

  Barely able to see his features in the dark, she blew a stream of power at the bedside lamp. When it flickered to life, her breath actually caught in her chest.

  Asleep, his face looked almost boyish. Another smile curved her lips as her gaze shot back to his groin. Maybe not that boyish.

  But, oh, his face. So classically handsome. Strong, square jaw. Straight, aquiline nose. His eyes were closed but she knew they were lightly colored, green or blue. His hair was blond but not one simple shade. It was caramel and wheat and gold. Colors created by his work outdoors.

  Chasing her.

  Her smile fled as her gaze dropped to his lips, firm and curved and slightly parted, as if he was having trouble breathing.

  Good. She wanted him to suffer. Wanted to make him pay for the worry that ate at her. She would take her pleasure tonight. But he would find none. And he would remember this only as an unfulfilled dream in the morning.

  Of course, if she killed him tonight, he would remember nothing.

  To take her mind off that suddenly dreary thought, she again wrapped her fingers around his thick cock, so engorged it lay flat against his stomach. She pulled it toward her, holding it firmly until it pointed straight into the air. She shifted forward until the tip brushed her vaginal lips, teasing her clit. Shivers of sensation danced from that small bundle of nerves to her womb and straight into her spinal cord.

  Pleasure sizzled like magic along her nerve endings. But where magic could drain her, sex energized her. Sex shot pure adrenaline into her bloodstream.

  She drew in a deep breath—filled with his scent. It teased a moan from her that echoed throughout the room. And elicited an answering groan from him.

  Her sleeping spell would keep him out while she took her pleasure. And if he did please her, she’d make sure he suffered no pain when she took his life.

  Still, she didn’t want this to end too quickly. A slow, steady climax was always more desirable than quick gratification. She’d been alone for so many years now and human males never could last more than thirty minutes, at least in her experience. What was thirty minutes in the span of a six-hundred-year life?

  With her hands braced on his chest, she slid her wet flesh against his cock until it was soaked with the moisture seeping from her body. For several long minutes, she rubbed her flesh against his, coming close but not letting herself achieve orgasm.

  She never allowed the tip of his cock to slip further than an inch inside her body. Instead, she used the swollen head to rub against her throbbing clitoris then slid forward to allow it to tease the plump, hot lips.

  Eyes closed, she concentrated on sensation, ignoring the man, pleasuring herself with his body.

  But as the minutes passed, she found herself staring down at him.

  His face didn’t contain the perfection of the folletti but it had a rugged beauty all of its own. Her hand rose to cup his jaw. Her skin, dark olive against his golden tones, caught on the stubble of the beard he hadn’t bothered to shave in several days. She wondered what his jaw would feel like rubbing against her skin. Between her legs.

  She moaned and finally let herself slide onto his cock, seating herself to the hilt.

  Goddess, his cock was thick and hot and stretched her so wide, she wanted to moan.

  The wiry hair at the base of his erection meshed with the fine silk of her mound and she reached down to spread her lips so the hair could tickle her clitoris.

  She took a few seconds just to absorb the feel of him lodged inside her, her pussy clenching around him.

  And then his eyes opened.

  Chapter Two

  Justin Johannson was having the best damn dream ever.

  A beautiful woman had crawled into his bed and was rubbing her body against his, slow and steady.

  It’d been more than three months since he’d had actual, real live sex and sometimes his hand wasn’t good enough. He’d resorted to porn flicks to jack off to in the last couple of days but he’d take a wet dream over video any day.

  Especially this one.

  He didn’t recognize the woman. As a matter of fact, he couldn’t see her. Her face was in shadow. All he could see… Actually, he couldn’t see anything. He could only feel.

  He tried to open his eyes but they were so heavy it didn’t seem worth the effort. Besides, if he opened them, the dream would end. He knew he had to be asleep because his entire body felt weighted. Even his dick felt heavier, thicker.

  So he let the dream take its course, knowing he’d wake up in sticky sheets. But it’d be so damn worth it.

  Hell, he hadn’t even penetrated her yet and it was the best damn sex he’d had in years.

  Then she slid onto his cock, her internal muscles clamping onto his shaft, sucking him into her body, and he never wanted to wake up.

  He moaned then drew in a deep breath laced with her scent—flowers and rain and something earthier. Jesus, she smelled fucking amazing.

  He had to see her, had to know what she looked like.

  With an effort, he blinked and lifted his lids just wide enough to stare into the purest green eyes he’d ever seen.

  Spring grass, new leaves, clear-cut emeralds. They were almost too beautiful to be real. He definitely had to be dreaming.

  Except, those eyes widened and he heard her gasp. His gaze transferred to her mouth, her full pink lips parted in disbelief.

  He blinked a few more times and her features started to coalesce. She looked a little like that Italian actress from the 1960s. What the hell was her name?

  High, sculpted cheekbones. Pointed chin. Dark auburn hair that curled and fell over her shoulders.

  Sophia Loren. That’s it. Now why the hell would he dream about Sophia Loren?

  And who the hell cared?

  He lifted his hands to brush her hair over her shoulders so he could see her breasts. Not large but high and firm. He covered them with his hands and squeezed, plucking at the firm nipples and eliciting another gasp.

  Damn, she felt more real than any dream he’d ever had. Not that he was complaining. Hell, no. He didn’t care if he never woke up, as long as she stayed with him.

  Releasing her breasts, he swept his hands to her silky soft shoulders then down firmly muscled arms. From there, his hands shifted to her slim hips. Her skin felt cool beneath his touch as he lifted her by the hips, contrasting with the heat of her pussy as she slid back down his cock.

  She was wet and sleek and… God,
let him never wake up.

  Dear Goddess, what would she do now?

  The man was awake. But how? How had he broken through her sleeping spell?

  More importantly, did she really care at the moment?

  No, not really.

  She only wanted him to continue to slide her up and down his shaft. The drag from his flesh on her internal walls provided an exquisite friction she didn’t want to relinquish.

  And he seemed in no hurry to finish. He took his time, eyes slitted, his mouth a straight line as he watched her. The motion of his hips as he thrust into her rubbed her clit against the root of his cock. Each movement brought her closer to an orgasm that threatened to make her heart stop.

  She couldn’t allow that to happen. She had to be in control here. She had to be.

  But her body decided otherwise.

  She rode him faster, her clit throbbing as she raced toward climax. Hands planted on firm abs, she rocked on that hard shaft, took him as deep as she could before pulling up only to slam back down again.

  She tried not to lose herself in the rhythm but she got lost in those blue eyes. They mesmerized her, made her want—

  Her orgasm broke, sending a wave of ecstasy through her body. Crying out, she grabbed onto his wrists to steady herself, feeling her moisture spill onto his cock and drip between them.

  “That’s right, baby,” she heard him croon. “Come for me.”

  His voice, husky and tinged with a slight accent of the American South, wrung more spasms from her body and still he continued to move.

  Finally her orgasm abated and, needing more than a little willpower, she forced herself to focus again on his face.

  He was smiling, his eyes half-closed. “Damn, that was good. This is the best fucking dream I’ve ever had. And I ain’t ready to wake up yet.”

  She didn’t anticipate his next move.

  In one smooth motion, he rolled and she found herself on her back, legs spread as he pumped into her.