by Lana Sky
Enough to realize when another subject change was in order.
“How could this happen?” I directed the question his way, expecting a clear, succinct answer.
It’s a tumor, Eleanor, honestly.
Anything but, “I don’t know.”
“Sorry?” I blinked, convinced I’d heard him wrong. I even patted my ears in case they’d become clogged.
“You heard me.” His gaze shot to mine and nothing had ever terrified me more than his expression. Not the nightmares. Not the hunger. The hue of his irises flickered a burnished silver and in them I saw the truth before he uttered it out loud. “I don’t know.”
A sound trickled out of me that might have been another laugh. It definitely wasn’t a sob. I hadn’t fallen that far. Not yet. More tears weren’t what spilled out of my eyes to paint my cheeks. Just sweat.
“What do you mean, you don’t know—”
“Eat.” He nudged the side table, jarring it closer to me. The bowl of soup wobbled, precariously close to the edge. “I can hear your stomach growling from here.”
“No.” I shoved the bowl away. “I don’t want the damn soup. I want answers—”
“I don’t know!” Thunderous, his rich baritone rang out, stinging my ears in its wake. He had shouted. Was shouting. “You want answers? Well, so do I. Do you think this is a common occurrence? Well it isn’t. Neither is a woman who willingly sells her soul and can’t seem to stay out of danger no matter the risk—”
“Sir?” Footsteps raced down the hallway and a woman in a white uniform peeked out from behind the door. A nurse. “Is everything okay?”
I almost envied her. She felt something. Fear, most likely. My physical senses might have returned, but my emotional nerves lacked reception. I still felt…hollow, even as a vampire raged a few paces away.
“It’s getting late,” I began while lurching to my feet. The nurse rushed forward to assist, but Dublin beat her to it.
His hand caught my arm reflexively, but I wrenched out of his reach, forced to grip the bed frame to steady myself.
“I’m fine,” I insisted. “In fact, I should be leaving.” I staggered for the door, pushing past him.
“Where are you going?”
“What does it matter?” I tossed back, limping over the threshold. “You can leave without a word, but I can’t?”
It had to be late. The main lights were dimmed in the hall, leaving just a faint glow to see by. Up ahead, I spied an adjacent corridor that must have led to the central ward. Rather than head for it, I turned and advanced farther down the hallway. I needed silence. Darkness. Escape.
“I asked: Where are you going?”
Damn. A shiver racked my spine, instilled by the grit in the voice haunting me.
But I didn’t give in. Left. Right. My feet moved dutifully, driving me forward even as my newfound strength began to wane again. Pride warred with basic human instinct. I needed to sit down. I needed—
“Stop.” A pale hand slammed against the wall inches from my face and I had no choice but to stop. “I’m begging you. Begging that, for once in your life, you exercise caution.” Though his tone was level, anger bubbled up beneath the surface of his polished persona. Like heat, I felt it sear my skin.
“So, now you care? Funny, considering that you left. Without a word. Without so much as a calling card. After you told me that the only reason you even bothered to tolerate me was to, and I quote, ‘Get to the only Gray who mattered.’”
“Should I tell you where I was?” He shifted to face me, and I took an involuntary step back. He towered above, his features in shadow. “I was trying to save your life, yet again. A task it appears that I take far more seriously than you do.”
I swallowed. Ah. “What a convincing lie.”
“A lie…” His eyes widened and then narrowed into slits. Against the wall, his fingers flexed, and a hairline crack appeared in the plaster. “You think you have the right to pout like a petulant child? When it was your sister who—”
“My sister who what?”
He seemed to hesitate before confessing, “Your sister who signed a contract of her own.”
“Oh?” My heart throbbed, suddenly heavy, and I turned away. “Don’t tell me you’ve been with her all this time? How lucky for you. You managed to score not just one Gray sister, but both—”
“No.”
I cringed. His tone was far too soft.
“I didn’t force her into a contract, Eleanor.”
He let the silence linger, almost daring me to ask him to continue.
I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
So, his upper lip curled back from his teeth as he said, “She refused to let me near you—as you lay dying, I might add—unless I agreed to her terms.”
Heat prickled up and down my spine as a burning sting stabbed at my eyes. “What terms?”
“I agreed to leave the city immediately,” he said. “Cease all contact with you. If I refused, she would stand by and let us both watch you die.”
“No.” I blinked more rapidly, shaking my head. “You’re lying.”
He wasn’t. We both knew it. Still, it helped somewhat to say as much. I could give Georgiana the benefit of the doubt she never extended toward me. I could pretend she actually loved me.
As long as I ignored the truth.
“Do you think I wanted to tell you like this?” he countered. “Trust me when I say this, but I don’t enjoy playing the role of your monster.”
“So, why come back at all?” I bit back. My heart raced as rage overrode logic. He wasn’t the only one with secrets to tell. “No, don’t tell me. We both know the answer—for your contract. Is that it? You want it back?”
Of course. His face would reveal as much. I smirked, ready to witness the truth in full view—his gaze widened, horrified. His jaw clenched, made of stone.
He wasn’t gloating.
“You knew,” I deduced, closing my eyes in defiance of everything his shocked expression conveyed. Yes, he had to know. “You want it that badly? Fine. Just admit it now. I’ll shove the damn thing down your throat if you do.”
But he said nothing. No quip. No insult.
“I-If we are done here, I’ll just be leaving,” I stammered weakly. One step was as far as I made it before I found myself shoved against the wall.
Gently. Cool fingers gripped my shoulders, trembling with the restraint needed to keep from bruising—his expression contained no such care, however. Even the suit couldn’t save him—man became monster.
Rather than berate me, he reached into his jacket pocket. I hadn’t noticed the bulge against his side before, which concealed something thin, made of silver. Two circular bits of metal capped off each end of it, and recognition hit me like a slap. Manacles.
“Are…are you insane?” I exhaled the question.
“I’m exasperated.” He caught my wrists in his fist and casually tugged. Two involuntary steps brought me closer to him. In a low voice, he warned, “We can walk back to your room together. Or”—he hefted one end of the handcuff so that the metal caught the light—“I can drag you there.”
I fought to keep my head held high, my chin jutting defiantly into the air. “You can’t do this—”
In a blur of motion, he lunged. One sweep of his hand robbed me of balance, but before I could sway, I was in his arms. He surged forward, carrying me down the hall.
Heedless of any poor soul who might have been sleeping, I screamed. I kicked. I flailed.
“You can’t do this!” I attempted to grab at the doorway as he turned into my room.
With little effort, he broke my grip and headed toward the bed. One shrug of his shoulders and I landed in an unceremonious heap over the crumpled blankets.
He snapped one of the cuffs onto my wrist while I was still stunned and secured it to the frame of the bed. I didn’t even have a chance to resist. To fight. So I settled for lashing out like a child and kicked him.
If he felt
the pain in his right knee, his face revealed nothing.
“You don’t want to eat?” he echoed. “Fine.” One swipe of his hand sent the tray of food crashing into the wall. Yellow broth slashed the white backdrop like paint and the cake went flying into a far corner. “You don’t want to talk about this with some damn rationality, have it your way. Scream, Eleanor. Fight. You’ll just give me a reason to gag you.”
Shock deflated me. I cringed against the headboard as he stormed toward the doorway. A nurse was already there, gaping in shock.
“Get Ms. Gray something to calm her down,” Dublin ordered as he pushed past her. He spared one last searing glance in my direction and snarled, “She’s a danger to herself.”
With what seemed to be an apologetic frown, the woman nodded and rushed off. Oddly enough, when she returned sporting a syringe, I didn’t resist, allowing her to pierce my vein with little fanfare.
Like a good captive, I lay there, one hand chained to the bed, the other resting somewhere over my heart. It was racing. Pounding. Surging.
From unease or rage?
Who the hell knew?
Eventually, the wave of medication kicked in. My pulse slowed and my eyelids became heavy. When sleep came for me, I surrendered to it.
He might have won this round, but he’d already lost another.
When one was locked within a game of wits against a vampire, I’d learned that there was only one way to break a stalemate.
Someone had to bleed.
And I was already wounded.
The drug wore off in slow, ebbing waves. When my thoughts finally seemed coherent again, I peeled my eyes open, expecting to find myself strapped to the bed. Instead, both hands moved freely.
That wasn’t all. The beside tray had been righted, the mess cleared from the floor. Fresh food had replaced my ruined meal—another nondescript cup and a plate of bacon, eggs, and sausage. Draped over the foot of my bed was the black dress Yulia had brought along with a pair of my sensible flats and a black coat, also mine.
Unease goaded my heart into racing, but I choked the fear back.
Instead, I ignored the food in favor of getting dressed. My body felt stiff, each movement awkward and slow. By the time I fastened the last button on my coat, someone had entered the room to join me.
He was wearing black, I saw when I finally gathered up the nerve to look. A black suit. A blacker tie. His eyes glowed in harsh contrast, taking me in with one callous sweep. But he wasn’t angry.
Even worse, he was unreadable.
“I suggest we change tack.” He sat on a nearby chair and gestured toward the bed. “I’ll open with a threat, since you seem inclined to play the role of prisoner. How much do you value your cat?”
“T-Tinkles?” Panic clenched my lungs, making each breath a struggle. “Where is he?”
“Safe,” Dublin replied before I could assume the worst. “I will return him to you, of course. After we finish our discussion.”
“Or?” Despite my feelings toward him, there were some lines even I had never envisioned him crossing. Then again, I’d never owned a piece of his soul before.
“Or I’ll keep him,” he warned. “We both know he won’t mourn your company.”
I bit my lip in anguish. In some ways, it was a far worse bluff than threatening his life. I would be the only one disenfranchised in this equation.
“What do you want?”
“I suggest we revert to our usual method of communication.” He placed something onto the bedside table, beside the food: a rectangular, leather-bound book flipped open to a blank page. When my gaze returned to Dublin, he crossed his arms, transforming into his businessman persona. “We negotiate.”
“Via a contract?” I backed away near the wall, keeping him in full view.
“Yes. I will apologize for last night if that’s what you want.”
“And what do you want?” I whispered.
He cocked his head and shrugged, smoothing his hands along the front of his suit. “I think it’s best if you stay with me.”
I didn’t miss the marked shift in his tone. Cautious. As though I were a simpleton best communicated with via slow, careful wording.
“For your protection,” he said. “You need proper medical care. I will make all the arrangements—”
“Don’t pretend like you care,” I warned. His words still hurt, smarting on my psyche like invisible scratches. “Just cut to the chase and tell me what you really want.”
His eyes narrowed. “Should I come out and say it, then? I want my contract, of course.”
Ah. It was a game of hide-and-seek I’d planned over two months ago. Back when bitterness had driven me to hide the leather book where no one would ever find it, or so the childish part of me had claimed.
Knowing Dublin, everything I had was probably in the gloved hands of one of his agents, being ruthlessly inspected as we spoke. Or he’d searched for it himself. Hell, maybe that was the reason his hair was slicked, damp in a way that eerily coincided with the rain lashing at the window beyond him.
But one obvious fact diminished my glee at the prospect.
“You didn’t know I had it. Did you?” Suddenly drained, I crept forward and sat on the edge of the mattress, as far from him as possible.
“No.” He glared through the window. “Raphael doesn’t part with his trophies easily.”
“So, what happens if I tell you? I wind up shackled to another bed? Or is this the part where you threaten me for real?” I squared my chin, fighting to sound brave. Even before I saw his jaw clench, I knew I’d failed.
“To kill you? How about we bargain instead, like I suggested? You want to stay at Gray Manor? Fine. You want to live in denial? Fine. As long as you remain under my protection, you can set whatever terms you wish.”
“And as long as I return your contract,” I added.
He nodded after a second’s pause. “That as well.”
I bit my lip. To relinquish the one morsel of power I held over him or not? Knowledge is king, my father used to say, during one of the rare moments when he wasn’t heralding the importance of money. Never surrender it willingly.
“I’d like to know it’s secure,” Dublin insisted. “However, telling me its location won’t invalidate your ownership.”
I noted how reluctantly he added that last tidbit of information.
“Even if I tell you, it will change nothing,” I felt compelled to say. “I still don’t forgive you for insulting me—”
“And I don’t expect you to. As for our agreement, shall we put it in writing?” he asked. “You agree to stay with me as well as reveal the location of my contract. In return, you set your own terms.”
I attempted to meet his gaze and found no hostility in it. No real emotion, either. Just endless burnished silver. “Fine. I want… François gets to remain as my driver.”
He raised an eyebrow as he reached for the pen. “François?”
“I hired him a few weeks ago. He’s very…r-reliable,” I stammered. Honestly, it was the principle of the matter.
François, though slightly hated, was still someone I’d hired on my own. Dublin could lock me away in a tower if he wanted, just as long as he let me keep what little of my life I’d managed to rebuild.
“Fine.” He jotted down a line on a fresh page in the contract book. “What else?”
“And…” I swallowed hard, flexing my fingers against the mattress. “You apologize for what you said about me.”
He raised an eyebrow. “If that is what you wish…”
“And,” I added. “I want you to be honest with me. If I ask you something, anything, you tell me the truth. No secrets. No games. No lies.”
“Agreed.” With a stroke of his pen, he added another line. As he finished, his eyes cut to mine. “But I would like to second that request. You keep nothing from me. Nothing.”
He held the pen out and shoved the book across the table.
I sighed, biting any more questions ba
ck. We were on a dangerous precipice, mere inches from falling off. Only God knew what waited down below, and I wasn’t that inclined to find out for myself.
With a single stroke, I signed my name and watched him do the same.
And the sight alone shouldn’t have imparted the most stability I’d felt since…
Well, since he’d left.
“So, what now?”
“Now?” He tucked the contract book into his pocket and stood. “You uphold your end—you come with me, no dramatics.”
“And,” I added with a sigh, “I show you where your contract is?”
He nodded. “Where is it?”
“Where else?” I countered. It was obvious in a sense—what imposing shelter would make for the perfect hiding place for a vampire’s soul? “Home.”
On the Brink
Gray Manor rose upon the hill like the disapproving relative most people complained about. The one bastion of my life that I could never seem to escape.
My only comfort was that Dublin didn’t seem particularly fond of it, either. Stone-faced, he guided his car onto the property, following what little commands I gave. Follow the main path. Then go beyond the house, beyond the gardens, farther…
“Here,” I croaked once we’d reached the very end of the property.
Looming before us stood what my mother had lovingly referred to as the Crowning Jewel of both heritage and home. Our family crypt. Even now, the structure held the same morbid fascination for me that it had during my childhood.
Made entirely of stone and almost simple in appearance, the structure contained Gray bodies spanning at least three centuries, back from the time of my great-grandfather many times over, James. Given what a diverse and interesting bunch we were, I almost pitied it.
“You hid it here?” Dublin wondered. He had leaned toward my side without me realizing and I flinched as his chill raised goosebumps over the back of my neck. A part of me wanted to hate him still—hate the fact that he could sit so close to me as though nothing had changed.
I snuck a glance at his face, alarmed by how neutral his expression seemed.
