His unique scent, fresh and warm, tinged with cedar and wool, had already seemed to overtake all of the other smells of memories—dark, awful ones—in this chamber, and now sat fully in her consciousness, reminding her of how he tasted and felt.
“But then….”No.She shook her head.
Temptation thrilled her…and eased into despair. But no. How long would his resolve last, if indeed he truly had resolve and it wasn’t merely a trick?
As if he read her mind, Cale said, “I won’t touch you. Even if you bid me.” He glanced at the manacles on the wall, then back at her. His eyes challenged her, dark and intense.
Narcise was aware of a light fluttering in her center, broadening and spreading like the delicious heat of a fire on a cold Romanian night. Those compelling eyes still fastened on her, he walked over to the smooth white wall, marred only by the chains that hung there.
“I understand why you hesitate to trust,” he said, slipping one of the cuffs over his wrist and locking it into place, where it held his wrist just away from his head. “Perhaps this will help.” Then, unable to close the other manacle with his chained hand, he stilled and met her gaze. A sharp twinge pierced her inside.
“Narcise. Believe me when I say: nothing you could do would be more difficult than standing here, keeping my word not to touch you.”
Trust me, he’d said before. He seemed to be saying it again, wordlessly this time.
She looked at the band encircling his wrist, wide and, she knew, cold. He would give her that control?
Wholly? Willingly?
In a place where she’d fought for so long to keep her own?
The irony touched her deeply.
And then all mundane thoughts of irony and the like fled as she realized what she had. Here. Giordan Cale: handsome, strong, and virile. Offering whatever she wanted, great or small, as she wished.
Narcise’s mouth dried and she found it hard to swallow as she walked toward him, her bare feet padding from cool stone floor to lush rug back to stone again. Her middle was filled with fluttering moths, her gums swelling as they pushed out her fangs.
All the while, their eyes met and held, and it seemed as if she could feel his heart, thudding inside her own chest. Their heartbeats pounded together, their breaths seemed to work in tandem, and for the first time, in this room, she felt…womanly.
Womanly, and powerful, in a way she hadn’t felt since she’d loved Rivrik. More than a century ago.
Standing there in front of Cale, Narcise lifted his free arm, and felt the little ripple of a shudder beneath his skin. Her upper fangs brushed her lower lip, and without thought, she took him and brought his wrist toward her mouth.
Cale went still. Even his breath ceased as she watched the blue veins seem to surge and pulse amid the tendons in his golden skin. Instead of plunging in her fangs, Narcise flicked her tongue over the delicate ridges there, tasting the salt on his warm flesh, sensing the flavor of his scent and the essence of lifeblood pounding beneath its thin covering.
When she lifted her face, she heard the soft hiss of his breath and saw the faint smile lifting his lips. There was heat in his eyes, but no tension, no conflict in his face. Merely pleasure.
For some reason that comforted her, and she allowed her eyes to narrow and crinkle at the corners. Allowing almost a smile. And then she clicked the second manacle around his wrist, and stood back to survey her captive.
As the thought flitted into her mind, at first her reaction was one of horror that she should even have thought the word. She knew what it was like to be a captive, held immobile and helpless and at the mercy of the whims of others.
But this was different, she told herself. He gave up control willingly. He offered. Hewantedto be here, hewantedher to touch him…and whatever else she chose to do.
And, she found, there was no doubt that she wanted to do…many things.
That alone was a welcome revelation, a relief, to a woman who hadn’t willingly responded to the touch of a man for decades. For once the fangs protruded and the bloodscent filled the air, and the penetration began, even Narcise couldn’t control her own body’s instinctive reaction. But those occasions hadn’t been real pleasure, or true satiation. They’d been wrung from her like some unwanted and terrible purging.
But now, tonight, this was for her.Allfor her. And Cale seemed to have understood that.
“Are you going to stand there all night while the blood flows from my arms,” he said in that mellow voice, “and make me only imagine what you might do? Or are you going to kiss me and make the discomfort worth my while?”
“I never kiss,” she told him, nevertheless moving closer. Her fingers itched to tear that shirt away and see what was underneath. She had a sudden fantasy of muscles shifting and bulging from the effort of pulling on the chains, in his biceps and rippling over his chest, and she wanted to see if it could be real.
His shirt was made of the finest linen, warm and damp from his skin. She tugged it loose from his tight breeches, noticing the very healthy bulge rising behind them. The sight and accompanying thought sent another spear of lust into her belly, and she boldly smoothed her hand down over that tempting ridge.
Cale gave a soft sigh and when she looked up, his smile had grown that much hotter and his eyes darker. “Is it becoming warmer in here, or am I imagining it?” he managed to say.
“I’m perfectly comfortable,” she replied and smoothed her hands beneath his loose shirt. His firm belly, warm and textured with a light dusting of hair that she imagined would be the same rich brown as that on his head, skittered and trembled beneath her fingers. And as she slid her hands further up beneath the shirt, she covered hard slabs of pectorals and then her fingers curled up over smooth shoulders. The tips of her fingers brushed over what must be the ridges of his Mark from Lucifer: slender, raised, vein-like markings spreading from beneath his hairline down over the back of his shoulder. As she slid over that unholy branding, her own Mark twinged and she brought her hands to rest flat on the front of his chest, pressing into the wiry hair growing there.
