Page 50 of Her Vampire, His Ruin

“I’m so sorry about this, erm… Viktor,” she says, grasping Elizabeth’s wrists and gently removing the knife. “Elizabeth is very protective.”

“I can see that.” He grins, dropping his gaze, his cool grey eyes tracking over her face. “Nice to finally meet you, Edie.”

“Vik, give Elizabeth some space,” I command, my voice cooling at the appreciative look he gives Edie.

He nods, stepping back. “You’ve got it, boss.”

Elizabeth exhales sharply, eyes never leaving Viktor as he circles the table and drops into a chair. He tosses her a wink, taming a rebellious strand of blonde hair as he does so. She bares her teeth in response. Pussy cat? Hardly. She’s a tigress.

“Elizabeth, what the hell are you doing?” Edie asks, exasperated.

She bristles under Edie’s disapproval, her long hair swaying with the movement. “He wouldn’t let me pass. What was I supposed to do?”

“Well, don't threaten him with a butter knife, that’s for sure.” She lowers her voice. “We are guests in Dorian’s home. Have you lost your mind?”

Viktor waves away her concern. “No harm done.”

Elizabeth narrows her eyes at him. “There’s still time.”

Unbelievably, this raises a smirk from Logan, which promptly falls from his face when Henrietta twines her arm through his and says, “It really is so nice to see you again.”

“Nice?” he bites out.

“The testosterone in here is suffocating,” Elizabeth snaps, skewering each of us with a glare. “I half expect each of you to whip out a club and drag us off to your man-caves.”

“I’m not averse to a little domination,” Henrietta says, winking at Logan, who practically hisses at her.

Viktor chokes on his glass of water.

“Okay, that’s enough,” Edie says, gripping her sister’s hand and dragging her to the opposite end of the table as far away from Viktor as possible. Elizabeth mutters something inaudible, but finally drops into a chair.

“Well, now we’ve got that introduction out of the way, should we eat? This food looks utterly delicious, doesn’t it, Angel?” Henrietta says, looking longingly at the pan-seared scallops as Logan rounds the table and pulls out the seat opposite her.

Viktor snorts, eying Logan. “I like the nickname Angel. It suits you.”

“I thought so too,” Henrietta agrees.

I bite back a laugh as Logan scowls. Viktor shakes his head, shooting me a look of amused disbelief.

To my right, I can sense Elizabeth teetering on the edge of another outburst without even glancing her way. What really seems to grate on her nerves is Viktor’s unshakable calm, but she’ll need more than sarcasm and threats of violence to get under his skin. Compared to Logan and me, Viktor is practically unflappable. So much so that he keeps his cravings under the same tight control and, unlike us, he never drinks blood straight from the source. Instead, he relies on the chilled reserves stored in the cellar of Avant Garde, and before that, he only drank blood from animals.

“Dorian, I am so sorry about this,” Edie mutters under her breath.

“Don’t be. It’s been a long time since I’ve been this entertained.”

By the time we’ve finished the main course, emotions have settled to a somewhat manageable level. Elizabeth is still as tense as she was when she entered my home, but at least she’s satiated her hunger and has refrained from attacking Viktor. Still, if Viktor winks at her again, I wouldn’t be surprised if she tries to scoop out his eyes with her spoon.

Logan hasn’t taken his eyes off Henrietta all night. His clipped responses to her questions do absolutely nothing to put her off from flirting with him. She’s committed, I’ll give her that.

Relaxing back into my seat, I drape my arm around the back of Edie’s chair, my fingers trailing over the bare skin of her shoulder. Tonight I have my urges on a tight leash, it took me consuming two litres of blood from our stores before their arrival, but at least Edie isn’t in any immediate danger, though I admit the steady throb of her heartbeat, and gentle thrum of her pulse is testing my control.

“Well, I suppose I’m going to have to be the one to point out the elephant in the room,” Elizabeth suddenly says as all eyes snap to her.

“If that’s supposed to be another insult, then it’s fallen flat. I happen to like elephants,” Viktor says with a shrug. “In fact, did you know they have incredible memories? They can recognise other elephants after years of being apart. Not to mention they can remember locations of water sources, migration routes and threats to their herd, behaving differently to avoid them.”

Elizabeth narrows her eyes at him. “That’s all very interesting, but that wasn’t what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?” he asks her as the four of us ping-pong our attention between them.