How he’d hurt with it, ruining marriages and reputations. Pitting man against man. Friend against friend. Making money.
And that was even before he’d turned Dracule.
If there was a strong person in the room, it was not he.
Was that why Luce had chosen him?
“Strong?” She laughed bitterly and surprised him. “No one thinks of me as strong. Maia is strong. She’s smart and beautiful and she knows just what she wants, and she has managed to get all of it. And soon, a handsome husband who loves her. And she’s still a lady. Everyone likes her even though she’s bossy. And me…Well, I’m the silly one, the one who cannot be serious. The one who must be told everything to do for I cannot determine it myself. Sonia is sweet and kind and pretty. She’s the youngest. But I…I’m nothing but a jest.”
“I suspect,” Voss said, groping for words, “if Maia had lived through what you’ve seen and done in the last day, she would not have fared nearly as well. Did you think I hadn’t noticed thewooden stick in your hand earlier today? You meant to defend yourself instead of crying and hiding in the corner.”
Angelica smiled, swaying a little, and her lashes swept down over her eyes. For a moment he thought she was going to slump into unconsciousness, but she straightened and gave him such a heavy look that heat exploded in his chest.
“Thank you,” she said, and rose to her feet. Her movements were slow and deliberate, heavy with whisky. His blood surged. His mouth dried.
Now.
She looked at Voss suddenly, directly, and drew in her breath. Then she spoke in a rush. “It’s odd, being here with you. Alone.”
With those innocent, emotional words, full awareness burst over him. Searing pain blasted anew from the Mark: inside his shoulder, radiating down his back and leg, and along his arm in stunning agony.
Do it.
He must have gasped, for she moved toward him. “What is it?”
“No.” He reacted without thought, turning away to hide the flame in his eyes and the swelling in his mouth. His cock shifted, filling. He imagined her naked, filling his hands with her. Tasting her.
Need, wrapped in pain, blazed on him, taking his breath and his voice. Pounded. Squeezed.
He could stop it by taking her.
“Vo—my lord.” Her voice was panicked. “What is it?”
“It’snothing,”he said, forcing the lie from between clenched teeth with lungs that wouldn’t move.
He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. There was nothing but white-hot, searing agony blazing through his body, seizing his mind.
Take, take, take.
It wasn’t the need to feed, to drink. It was her. All of her.
He felt her hand on his back, through the two layers of clothing against his Mark. Spinning away, stunned by white-hot agony, he stumbled into the chair and table. He heard it fall and the clink of glasses and bottle. The smell of whisky and wine, of Angelica and the layers of men before them in this room filled his nose, suffocating him.
Now, now, now.
She had her hands on him, she was half sobbing and shaking him, trying to get him to look at her and he knew, somehow, if she saw his face, his eyes…
Her image filled his mind as his hands grasped the wooden planks of the floor. The pain. The pain was…impossible. Nothing like it.
Have to stop it.
His fangs thrust long and sharp. His cock hard and throbbing. His eyes hot and burning.
He knew. How to stop it.
He knew how to turn the agony into red pleasure.
His lungs worked again, deep and harsh. The floor was there beneath his knees, so close he could see the mouse dung, the dirt filling the cracks, a button, a thread caught on the splinter beneath his palm.
