He was suddenly at the bedside again. “Lie down.” Nopleaseorthank you, and her body moved woodenly even as she fought every inch. He settled her carefully on a comforter of white eyelet lace, and the air grew still. The funny sense of the air turning dead under an invisible force-field was hatefully familiar; almost before she realized what was happening, he had vanished.
CHAPTER 32
There was much to do.Daylight hours found him arranging mortal identities for cover, carefully draining no few of Antinous’s resources to provide for a leman’s comfort, moving steadily through one task after another to build crucial ramparts for defending them both from notice either mortal or sanguinant. He even found a few hours to test his tolerance for the sun’s blazing gaze, and found it much greater—though more uncomfortable—than he had imagined.
He could still barely believe she was safe, whole, alive; shock could kill a fledgling and his leman had suffered too much. The collar kept her quiescent enough to heal and possibly ease into a new rhythm of existence. He fed her twice nightly, keeping an iron grip on the steadily mounting thrall.
If restraint was torture, it was also richly deserved. The beast snarled and snapped within his bones, at the floor of whatever soul he possessed; his skin was increasingly, terribly sensitive, an iron bar sunk agonizing roots into depths of his belly, and rinsing her pliant, unresisting limbs nearly drove him to madness.
He wanted nothing more than to take her repeatedly, feel her shudder with pleasure under and around him, fuse himself to her softness. Every time her fangs pierced his pulse, every slow thorough draw against his veins as she fed, made his own true teeth fight for release and the beast struggle for primacy.
She was even more helpless now. Yet her huge, pale eyes were full of pleading. Or did he imagine that? Was the look hatred instead, or the uncomprehending stare of a collared fledgling? He did not dare take a single mouthful of her, though the collar provided more than enough room.
Finally, upon the fourth night since inferno and escape, he could wait no longer.
He rolled his sweater-sleeves up and bathed her as usual, dried her, wrapped her in a soft yellow gown which suited her a great deal, set the seals with care. Settled her on the bed, her pretty hands in her lap, her hair combed—and oh, he would like to spend hours upon that small chore, imagining she was willing, that she enjoyed his touch.
Or at least, tolerated it.
Finally he knelt at the bedside, gazing up at her. Took her hands—warm, almost limp, much softer than the battle-hardened hide of her sanguinant. “Leila.”
Those wonderful wintry eyes with lavender threads patterning the iris, a puzzle he could study endlessly as the whorls and ridges on her fingertips. Her mouth, relaxed, lips slightly parted.
“Can you hear me? Nod if you understand.”
Her chin dipped, drifted back to level. Her gaze sharpened. Was it fury or grief, begging or disgust? Deceptively fragile-looking gold threads gleaming against pale, lucent skin, a beautiful contrast. He could tell himself it was necessary, required to keep her safe.
“We will leave this place next dusk,” he said, past the dry stone lodged in his throat. “Before that, though…”
Under the correct orders, she could even provide a simulacrum of willingness. The temptation was exquisite, especially with the mating-thrall approaching near insanity.
She will hate you. A constant, grinning, grinding reminder.
Each time the answer was the same.Let her. It is better than this.
For her dreamy movements, her lack of resistance, her vacant stare reminded him of ossification. He laid her hands back in her lap, took her shoulders, applied gentle pressure.
“Bend down,” he ordered, softly. “Just a little… yes, there.”
He traced one of the metal knots with a hesitant fingertip, then reached for her nape. The catch was easy, though the collar would dissuade its wearer from attempting to loosen the simple hook, the curved eye. Stretching the warm, near-liquid threads, loosening the restriction, he drew the collar away. It did not wish to leave her—he understood the feeling, down to his very bones—but necessity demanded.
Eventually the threadlike tangles, skin-warm, dripped between his palms. The effect would linger briefly; she sat stock-still, staring not at him but at glimmering metal. Temptation rose again, and he nearly foundered.
No.I cannot do that to her.
Maximus closed his hands. A simple wringing, muscle flickering in his forearms, and an expensive, very rare item of the demimonde gave a thin awful squeal as he tore it to shreds. Again and again he twisted, folded, and crushed, until a fine glittering dust descended to pale carpet.
He did not dare look at her. Brushed his hands together, ridding them of detritus as the fragments split finer and finer, just as sanguinant dust in the final throes of dissolution.
Her pulse, slow and steady while controlled by the collar, now quickened. So did her breathing. Her fingers trembled, the long glossy sheaf of blue-black hair falling to shield her face. Maximus longed to touch her; his hands were fists, denying the urge for as long as possible.
Leila crumpled, sliding from the bed’s edge, and screamed.
CHAPTER 33
She couldn’t stop.
The cries poured out of her, razorfeather birds; when she toppled Max caught her and Layla struck out, wildly, her fist glancing off his stone-hard cheek. Her body jerked, twisted, starfished and kicked as if throwing a toddler-tantrum in Meemaw’s trailer. Maybe every motion she hadn’t been able to make stored itself up and now broke free, or she’d forgotten how to control her own limbs.
