Page 61 (1/2)

Janvier’s hand curved over her nape “I could hold you for eternity”

Closing her eyes on that bittersweet vow, Ashwini just lay wrapped in him, and when sleep came, she went into it warmer and safer than she’d ever been Yet the darkness lapped at the edges of her s she didn’t want to know, didn’t want to see A vampire with skin a shade darker than her own and vivid black eyes, his razored black goatee paired with hair braided tight to his skull, used a whip on the white, white skin of a wo over her breasts and her stomach

Two strokes broke the skin, drew fat droplets of blood

Yet when the vampire used the handle of the whip to violate her, the woased for hiave her what she wantedand she crawled to abase herself at his feet, begging to pleasure hiain, he put his booted foot on her shoulder and pushed her to the floor, where he shifted his foot to her throat and held her dohile he kissed a golden-skinned girl with ripe young breasts and innocence in her eyes She couldn’t have been old chain around her hips Closing his hand around her throat, the black-eyed irl’s face went pink, then red, her eyes bloodshot When she scrabbled at his arm in a final panic, he smiled and kissed her and continued to squeeze Too soon, she was lirip on her throat to throw her onto the black-sheeted bed in the center of the roo his foot off the woman on the floor, he made her unzip him, then used herher in the ribs

She curled up into a ball, her eyes wet and worshipful, but he ignored her in favor of the li her with his body, he began to feed, his throat , deep draftsand his hips in a way that said he wasn’t only feeding

“No!” Corabbed Janvier’s phone where he’d left it on the bedside table “Call Trace,” she said to Janvier, who’d woken when she did “Find out what Khalil’s done to the girl”

Janvier didn’t question her, just made the call “Adele had already entered the room after security alerted her,” he said once the conversation ended, his features griirl is alive Barely Trace says she’s twenty and a regular at Masque, extre even younger”

Heart thudding and skin damp, Ashwini nonetheless didn’t break away from Janvier’s side, his arm around her and her own around him “Did she know she was about to be choked almost to death then sexually used when she went into that room with Khalil?”

“He has used her similarly before” Janvier put his phone back, his ues of sexuality, but in tieted the true innocents”

Ashwini caught a grinding anger she rarely heard in Janvier’s tone “You knew soirl from the bayou, maybe fourteen and awestruck by the wealthy vampire who showed an interest in her Six months after she ran away from home to be with him, the piece of shit returned her, hollow eyed, addicted to opium, and broken on the inside” His voice shook “A year after she drowned herself, her father told me that Khalil had said she was trash, worth a little a, she focused on what Janvier had remembered “He used the word ‘trash’ specifically?”

“Or so very siain “But I wouldn’t put all my faith in that, cher There are too many old vampires who see humans as disposableBut Khalil has the cruelty to do as done to Felicity, and the wealth and experience to hide his deadly perversions I will ht not even need spies,” Ashwini muttered “I seem to have a direct surveillance feed to his life, thanks to a siainst his breastbone “I don’t mind sex dreams—but why can’t I have sex dreaun?”

Kneading the back of her neck, Janvier shifted slightly until he was on top of her His kiss et, his body weight delicious, and his skin so hot her own blood ignited “I’m not a sex dream, but perhaps this poor Cajun will do as a substitute?”