Eternal Captive: Mark of the Vampire (25 page)

“I’ll be fine,” she argued, returning to the stove and the final pot of heated water. “I have a very good sense of direction.”

Leaning against the wall, his arms folded across his chest, he grumbled, “I don’t like it.”

“What is it you don’t like exactly?”

Oh fuck, did he tell her? Lucian thought, grinding his molars. Did he tell her about the warning or that he hated the idea of her leaving at all, walking out the door, taking her scent and her smile with her, leaving him alone with his thoughts and the possibility that while she was gone he could change back into the monster?

Shit, no. He wasn’t saying any of that. Not yet.

“You will be meeting
credenti
members,” he said instead, “speaking with them.”

She laughed, her back to him at the stove. “I hope
so. It’s the only way I’m going to get some information on our guards.”

“Screw the guards! I don’t need them anymore. I just need you.”

She brought the last of the hot water toward him, toward the tub. “Well, that’s very sweet, in a volcanic eruption sort of way, but I’m worried about them.” She smiled at him, her green eyes flashing like emeralds. “You? Not so much.”

He pushed away from the wall and headed straight for her, only stopping when the chain wouldn’t allow him farther. Even then, he yanked on the thing, seeing if he in truth could rip the fucker off the wall. Damn the Order! Damn his father. Damn his head for all the thoughts of her, his tongue for wanting to taste her again and again…

She poured the last of the hot water in the bath and was about to remove her nightgown when she suddenly realized he was in the room and unable to leave it. She glanced up at him, her brow lifted.

Lucian rolled his eyes. “I’ve seen you naked, remember?”

“I don’t care,” she said with too much calm, too much embarrassment. “This is…different.”

“What? Standing before me in the light of the fire as opposed to lying beneath me in the light of the fire?”

“Shut up.” Her eyes narrowed and a blush crept up her neck. “And yes.”

He grinned and his cock knocked at the door of his zipper again. Poor fucker needed some attention…“Since I can’t get this leash off and take myself for a walk, what would you suggest, baby?”

She lifted her chin. “That’s Princess to you.”

He snorted. “Maybe stab my eyes out with the fire poker?”

“Hmmm,” she said, her eyes roaming over him, his chest, his zipper, “not a bad idea.”

God, he’d love to take her right now—rip that white scrap of nothing off of her once and for all. Let her walk around naked all the time. “Or perhaps I can turn around and face the wall like a good dog?”

Her lips twitched. “Even better.”

Wicked thing, he mused, backing up until his back hit stone. Forget tasting her. What she needed was a good slap in the ass. And he was just the ass
hole
to do it. “Or perhaps I could watch you bathe and comment as crudely as possible about everything I see and wish to touch?”

She swallowed, her neck turning a pretty pink as blood rushed toward her face. “That would be true to your nature.”

He looked at her through his lashes, his voice going savage. “You know, with your blood inside me, I would be calm and gentle—fit to assist you.”

“What are you suggesting?” she asked, her eyebrow lifted. “Touch, but don’t look? Is such a thing possible for you, Lucian Roman?”

His cock pulsed. It wanted her, wanted between her legs, wanted up and inside her cunt. “It would be a supreme effort, Princess, but I believe I am up to the task.”

“Perhaps I could blindfold you,” she joked, holding up the dish towel she’d used to wipe the stray droplets of water that littered the side of the tub.

The seductive humor dropped away from Lucian’s mood and countenance and was replaced with a tight jaw and eyes narrowed into two slits of predatory lust. “I would like that.”

She tilted her head. “Stop it.”

His brow arched in challenge. “Blindfold me, baby.”

Her cheeks colored prettily. “No look. No touch.”

“Well, what the hell else is there?” he growled with annoyance.

She walked toward him, waving the piece of fabric, her grin widening with each step.

“You will make me a
credenti veana
with that wrap,” he uttered, but beneath his grouch, his body was aflame and pulsing, thinking about her containing him.

“Fine,” he said as she placed the towel over his eyes. Anything to keep her here, keep her close. “Have it your way, but I will be listening.”

She reached up, fitting the white fabric to his eyes. “Consider me warned,” she said, as she moved behind him, her breath on the back of his neck. Then slipped away, cool air filling the space.

He stood there, his chain and shackle hard against his wrist, digging into his flesh. But he didn’t give a shit. His ears strained for any sound it could manage to pick up on. Hands rising, the hiss of fabric as it fell down the body.

This was fucking torture! “What are you doing?” he demanded.

“I have just removed my nightgown,” she said.

He ground his molars, his hands clenched into fists. “I knew it.”

“You peek, you die, Roman.”

“I’m already dead, remember?” he growled. His cock jerked, his balls tightened. “You said so yourself, lass.”

“No, you’re the undead. Remember?”

He never got a chance to answer because he heard the sounds of water moving, rushing, greeting beautiful, white skin.
Fuck
. His nostrils flared. This was completely unfair. He wanted to see—using his imagination was complete and total horseshit!

He heard her hiss and started.

“What?” he said, his hand reaching for makeshift blindfold. “What it is?”

“Hot,” she said with a sexy little growl.

He about lost his mind. “This is bullshit!”

“Wait, Lucian!” He could almost hear her covering up all the good parts with her hands, her thigh crossing over to meet and protect the other in a continuation of splashes. “We agreed—”

“I agreed to nothing,” he uttered tersely, his body on fire. “I don’t follow rules. No matter who makes them.” He ripped the fabric from his eyes and threw it into the fire, then let the sunlight assault his vision. “No one will ever keep me from looking at you, Princess. Understand? Not even you.”

She stared up at him from the center of the white claw-foot tub, her green eyes emerald bright. Her dark hair was loose and falling over the back edge like a waterfall of chocolate. He was no artist, but she was sure as hell a painting.

His eyes roamed over her in the water, and as they did, she let her hands fall away from the places and treasures they were hiding.

“That’s right, lass,” he said, his tone as fierce as his intent. “What you have, what you are, belongs to me now. No more pretending, remember?”

Her eyes closed and she inhaled. “I don’t know how this happened…It wasn’t supposed to happen.”

His hand went to the waistband of his jeans, flipped off one button, then another. “Does it matter? Does anything matter anymore? We are both doomed to our own particular brand of hell.”

Her eyes opened and she turned her head toward him. “I wish you could come in here with me. Water’s warm. I’m warm.”

His lip curled. “Too far, but how ’bout I come right here.”

She bit her lip and her gaze dropped to the waistband of his jeans.

His hand was almost to his cock when a loud rap on the front door halted him. In under a second, he had his head down, his eyes up, and his fangs bared.

B
ronwyn stood up so quickly water splashed like a tidal wave over the sides of the tub. She looked around for her nightgown, spotted it on the floor in a discarded puddle of white cotton.

“No,” Lucian uttered, the word exiting his lips with a grave snarl.

Naked and dripping wet, Bronwyn’s gaze shot to the
paven
, who one moment ago had had his eyes on her skin and his hands hovering near his cock. Now his gaze was pinned on the door, his growl for the one behind it.

“It has to be the guards,” she said, stepping out of the tub, grabbing a towel. “The magical barriers the Order put into place wouldn’t allow anyone else to pass.”

“The scent of Impure is weak,” he said, suspicion lacing his tone. “I don’t like it. Don’t want you anywhere near that door.”

“You’ll like when we have the key.” As she quickly dried her limbs, there was another knock on the door, harder this time, more insistent.

“Get lost or get bitten!” Lucian shouted at the wood.

“Stop that now,” Bronwyn scolded as she grabbed her nightgown and pulled it over her head. She wasn’t altogether dry and the thin cotton fabric clung to every hill and valley she possessed. That would not do, she mused, grabbing a blanket off the chair near the fire and wrapping it around her shoulders.

“Stay where you are, Bron,” Lucian said darkly, straining at his chain, his eyes still locked on the door, “Cruen is trying to get to us, to you.”

Bronwyn laughed, wrapped the blanket tighter around herself, and headed for the door. “Do you really think Cruen or any of his recruits would come knocking on our door to capture us?”

She had a point. “Not unless they were incredibly stupid,” he said with deep irritation and heat.

“Or wanted to borrow a cup of sugar.” She glanced over her shoulder and smiled at him. Him with his sculpted chest, piercing eyes, and hard, beautiful features.

He softened a fraction and whispered, “Don’t open it.”

“You’re acting as though I’m taking away your freedom instead of trying to give it back to you,” she said, her brows lifted. “The key to your release awaits, Vampire.”

“You are the only key to my release,” she heard him whisper as she opened the door.

Her body felt heavy and inflamed by his words, but the sight that greeted her outside the wooden door cast
those feelings away like a stiff breeze. No guards waited expectantly, but a
veana
. She was a striking
veana
of about Bronwyn’s height and her mother’s age, and she stood there with her hands in the pockets of her blue dress, her dark green eyes cast in the shadow of her mood, curious and concerned. She was long and willowy and had the most beautiful hair Bron had ever beheld. Hundreds of perfectly shaped ringlets fell around her face and kissed her shoulders in a color that could not be forced; it was as if the afternoon had found its most perfect shade of dappled sunlight.

“I apologize if I’m disturbing ye, lass,” she said, her voice as soft and pretty as her hundred ringlets. “Would ye be Bronwyn Kettler, then?”

Before Bron could answer, before she could even ask if the
veana
had come with news of the Impure guards, Lucian growled behind her and called out, “Fucking hell.”

The
veana
blushed, the color soaring up her high cheekbones, making her green eyes glow with fire and with fear.

“Do not step foot in this house, madam,” Lucian shouted, his tone so vicious Bronwyn wondered what in the world this
veana
had done to make him act so.

Tears sprang to the
veana
’s eyes, and she said to Bronwyn in a soft voice, “It’s good to hear his voice even if he doesna want to hear mine.”

A slow roll of understanding moved through Bron and yet she still asked, “Who are you?”

She smiled gently. “His ma.”

The opposing emotions inside of Bronwyn in that moment nearly tore her apart. She stood in the doorway, gripping the wood for support, knowing this
veana
was telling the truth, as only Lucian’s blood could find its way here, through the Order’s barriers and charms. She cared for Lucian more than she wanted to admit, even to herself, and the impulse to protect him against a
veana
whom he’d told her was unloving, uncaring, and had tossed him into a torturous school situation for her own convenience was strong. And yet this
veana
with her blond curls and anxious expression appeared anything but callous.

“Tell her to go,” Lucian snarled behind her. “Tell her never to come back here if she values her life.”

Bronwyn hesitated. She wasn’t sure what to do. She wanted to honor Lucian’s wishes, but she also wanted to find out the truth. Clearly Lucian’s account of the past wasn’t the complete one. This was no monster standing before her. Of course looks could be deceiving—she knew that all too well.

“Perhaps another time,” Bronwyn said to the
veana
. “When he’s more—”

“Perhaps never!” Lucian shouted.

The
veana
glanced past Bron and called out, “I only wish to see ye for a moment,
Balas
.”

“Balas,”
he spit out.

“See if ye are well,” she continued quickly, almost desperately.

“You want to see if I am well, Mama?” he roared, the chains that held him rattling in the background as he surged forward. “Fine! Open the door, Bron. Let my
mother
come inside and inspect me.”

Bronwyn eyed the
veana
seriously, knowing that this was a volatile situation and would no doubt turn uglier if she took another step farther. “I think another time would be better, don’t you—,” she began.

But Lucian cut her off. “Let her inside, goddamn it!” he snarled. “Let her see the monster she created!”

The chains of his birth held him captive in both body and blood, and as the
veana
walked through the door and entered the cottage his world went from warm and pleasant and safe to all darkness, all brutal despair. Her eyes were heavy with sadness and guilt and, God help him, love, as she closed the distance between them, but all Lucian could feel was the weight of the
credenti
on her, of the community that had both seen his entrance into the world and had found a way to make him unwelcome and abhorrent in it every day afterward.

Shit. He wanted to look away, look down as she stopped in front of him, her gaze roaming over him, her hands twitching at her sides. It was the
balas
inside him that felt the shame, the wee one who had learned very early on who he was, who he had come from and who had knowingly brought him into the world.