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Narcise stared up at the painting and tried to concentrate
He was standing too close to her, this lanced her way all evening as he played hostbut hen he did, made a rush of heat flood her body
She had lied, of course By i that she hadn&039;t noticed hiht when she&039;d killed athat she didn&039;t remember him
But she did remember him Very well In fact, she&039;d ht, in the privacy she&039;d won by sending her opponent to hell Despite the fact that he was a friend of her brother&039;s, Cale had provided an interesting subject for her creativehair that capped his skull with glossy brown texture, shadowed in the square chin and fine lips in a strong, handsoht, she realized she hadn&039;t quite got the shape of his eyes, nor the correct angle of his jaw and the proper shading of his cheekbones in that first sketch-but she&039;d been working froiven her the details, either: the blue flecks in his brown eyes, the sht eye, the ele beneath his easy sh that his particular scent rose above that thick, hazy sled lifeblood and arousal The hair on the back of her neck prickled, as if he were so close that his breath brushed over the sensitive skin there
She prayed that he was right, that Cezar was too occupied to notice
Cale hadn&039;t yet responded to her gentle taunt asking how he&039;d known of her skills, and at last she could no longer keep fro at him But when she turned, she had to resist the desire to step back Instead she drew in a shallow breath and steadied herself
Too close Much too close
Not because he threatened her-at least, not in the way otherfaces and hot eyes and deter, deep inside
His appealing face was right there, a breath away, and he was looking down at her She was tall for a woman, and her chin was almost level with his The corners of his brown eyes crinkled a bit, and she saw not the lust she expected, that she was accustoe laced with levity
As if to say, Oh, this shall be the game, no?
"Your skill with the sword," he said at last, neither acceding to nor challenging her lie, "is legendary At least a the Dracule"
An unexpected bitterness swept her Unexpected because she was adept at keeping that emotion well in check Her swordplay and her beauty, known throughout the Draculean underworld, contributed not only to Cezar&039;s power and fame, but also to her captivity If she had neither, would her brother even care?
Of course, if she had no beauty, she would never have become part of this world He would have let her die-perhaps even helped her-just as he had their brother and father, and even his wife Instead Cezar had found a way to preserve her, along with himself
Uncertain how to respond to Cale&039;s statement "My brother has employed a variety of excellent trainers to tutor me" The chamber had becoed at her Her guer in her belly
"He must take care of his investht, but she saw a flash of anger in his eyes and tightness at the corner of his one dry and she found it difficult to s Was it possible he understood? "My brother certainly doesn&039;t wish any serious injury onher voice steady It was a true stateh barely so
Cale hadn&039;t released her gaze, and she found herself trapped in it, looking at the blue and black flecks in his rich brown eyes "I was prepared to intervene that night," he said, his voice a low rumble
Narcise felt the bottom of her belly drop She couldn&039;t speak, couldn&039;t think at first; her lips had formed a silent O She clamped them closed as she tore her eyes froed to say, even as her heart pounded and an odd fluttering rushed through her "That would have been foolish"
All pretense that she hadn&039;t reratitude He would have intervened? He would have helped her?
What would Cezar have done?
Suddenly she felt warht-headedness was sudden and unexpected The air had turned so thick, lush with the sweet-peppery ss were trying to thrust free, her hands tre, she felt his fingers close around her wrist, and another strong ar around her waist
"So her away "It has become too close in here And you have not fed"
"No," she protested, deter the haze Cezar wouldn&039;t per her heels in, despite the pressure on her arers of this place
"When is the last time you fed?" Cale deh her; his scent enveloped her along with the heat of his body
The world swirled a bit, glazed with red heat, then as she blinked and steadied herself, she focused "I will feed in the ," she told him "When we return" If Cezar perood behavior on social events such as this He didn&039;t starve her; that would be foolish But he withheld just enough, just long enough, that she was in need And pliable And she knew better than to partake without his permission
The air had cleared a bit and Narcise realized that, despite her efforts to the contrary, Cale had uide her out of the close, warrip "Please," she said, forcing her voice to be sharp and strong instead of desperate "Ifor ly, his eyes still too close, his h that if she turned her head, the pouf of her hair would brush against it He&039;d caught up her hand in his, drawing her toward him "Very well," he replied "But you must feed I can see the need in your eyes"
Somehow, the rumble of his voice, the low dip of the syllables, was so inti twisted inside her There was coer
He rip, noticing for the first time that they were in a dim corridor A door behind her was ajar, and beyond she could see into the chamber they&039;d just vacated
Heart in her throat, she peered into the hazy, golden rooh the filtering smoke, she could see the chair in which Cezar sat, its back facing her, his head barely rising above it He couldn&039;t see her from that position, thank Fates, and Narcise noticed the other two figures settled in front of him
He did indeed see heart slowed a bit, but before she stepped back into the cha around her wrist
"Do you see?" Cale said, drawing her back toward him, away from the door "He has no notice of you"
"But-" she began, and then she stopped, her breath catching
He&039;dhis arm, and all at once the scent of fresh blood permeated the air "Merde," he muttered "What have I done?"
What have you done indeed Narcise felt almost dizzy fro into her consciousness "Monsieur," shesharp and hard as her veins pulsed with the rush of need She was under no illusion that his sudden wound had been an accident
"You would doher steadily "If you would attend to this" He lifted his arm
He&039;d hardly needed to move, for despite her resistance, Narcise&039;s attention had already slipped down to his bare wrist His cutaway coat was gone, his shirtsleeve pulled away to expose a golden forearm, muscular and smooth but for the ooze of dark red blood
"Please,the full bustle at the back of her gown "You need to feed, and here I am in need of assistance"
Narcise should have been angry at hith of mind at the moment The bloodhis blood, his scentthat of the man whose presence had set her off-kilter, who hadn&039;therwho&039;d been willing to intervene in a sword fight his blood tempted her, and in her weakened state, she had no real chance to deny it
As if knowing she were light of head and uneasy, Cale slid an ar it between the hollow of her back and the wall behind She had the sensations of heat and solidness enveloping her, the alluring scent of his presence, the warm cotton of his shirt
She licked firstjust a delicate slide of her tongue over the pool of blood collecting in the hollows of his wrist He gave a little start, the tiniest of jolts, and she felt his arm tense beneath her ue and lips and a great surge of desire rushed through her
But soue over and around the s his life Pure, hot, lushstrong He was powerful She could no longer wait, and sunk her fangs into the surging veins on the inside of his wrist
Now he flowed into her mouth with the delicate rhythainst her ged against the wall and into his arms Lust and need swelled her body, in her veins and beneath her skin, pulsing and da
The as solid behind her, and Cale to the side, his arm still curved around her waist She was faintly aware of his body treh move his hand back to open palether She are of the heavy ring on his finger, biting into her shtly
Narcise drank, sucking gently, her ss quiet and rhythh her body She found herself caressing his wars, using tongue and lips to sip up every bit
There was a lanced up to see Cale&039;s eyes fastened on her Blazing red, they glowed like a banked fire beneath heavy lids His lips had parted, his fangs thrust long and te into her belly, and down Hard and strong, exploding into heat and dampness
Narcise looked back doay fro herself for his into her throat But instead of revulsion, she felt another rush of desire at the thought Her belly treainst their silk ches free, reality and fear sweeping into her glazedthe last bit of his essence, and felt hiainst the wall, suddenly standing on her own balance, and looked up at hi around the hazel iris, his lips still parted, showing the tips of fangs Cale&039;s chest , and for a ht reach for her and crush her against the wall rose to clog her thoughts
But he didn&039;t "Merci," he said in that delicious, low voice that said ht finish?" He&039;d slipped back into French again
Narcise knehat hehiain But at the very least, it was courtesy And at the most, it was one more moment of pleasure before she must return to a world of fear and desperation
With delicate fingers this tilance, she kissed the wound She used her tongue to slip away the last vestiges of blood, knowing that her saliva would cause the blood to stop flowing and the wound to heal quickly And then Narcise released hie at her And wondered how soon it would be before Cezar came out to find them
"Perhaps," Cale said, still in French, still in that low voice, "if David had been witness to such a display, his painting ht have had more authenticity A bitbut nod dumbly Her head was clearer than it had been for a while, but her body still hummed with desire
And when Cale turned to pull on the coat he&039;d slung over a nearby table, she ed to say, "Cezar will know" A knot formed quickly in her belly as the reality set in He would know and he would exact a punishment froer burning, but now inscrutable "But of course he will know In fact, perhaps he likely even planned this But I will ensure you&039;ll have no repercussions, mademoiselle You may trust me"
Trust me
The last time she&039;d believed those words from a o, on the night she was visited by Lucifer Narcise choked back a bitter laugh And look what trusting a iven her: an infinite life of captivity
Cale offered her his unwounded arh, she allowed him to return her to the chamber, ready to face ould coh Cezar&039;s anger, as she had so many times beforeor he would kill her in his fury And that, she thought, could very well be the lesser of the two evils
Cezar Moldavi was fully aware of his sister&039;s disappearance, and hom
Certainly he was, for he rarely allowed anything out of his control to happen Those days of being pu behind hi he did was carefully planned, every possible outco since destroyed anyone who could re, snot-nosed coward he&039;d once been