He wore black slacks, a white shirt and a gray jacket, and his dark hair was pulled neatly away from his quiet, reflective face. His shirt was open at the neck and he wore no tie. She was beginning to recognize that this was his casual attire, yet he achieved a certain elegance, due to his erect carriage and natural poise more than anything he chose to wear. She suspected he would embody that same kind of elegance even if he wore jeans and a T-shirt.
As she paused on the doorstep, he turned to walk toward her, fixing his intelligent, keen gaze on her face. She felt her damn heart rate speed up again, and what little poise she had fell apart completely.
She bolted into the room. “Hi, I hope I’m not late. Beautiful evening outside, huh? Not that you’re able to go out to enjoy any of it, at least until the sun disappears—but maybe I’m not supposed to mention something like that. You know, it does seem a little like pointing out someone’s pimples. . . .”
He seemed to move at a casual, unhurried pace, yet somehow he appeared directly in front of her, which brought her to an abrupt halt. Amusement tilted the corners of his eyes. “Trust me when I say this—that is not at all how you should enter a room. Ever.”
“I just thought I might be late,” she said stupidly, looking up into his smiling gaze. His presence was so large and intense, she was surprised to discover that he was only a few inches taller than she.
He put one slim, strong hand on her arm and gently turned her around. “Enter the room once again, and this time, do so slowly, if you please.”
Ah, that phrase again. It would be her nemesis yet.
Intensely conscious of his touch, she walked back to the door. To her own frustration, she noticed her all too human reactions were out of control again. Her breathing accelerated, along with her heartbeat, and a fine tremor shivered through her hands.
Still, it wasn’t quite from panic. Not quite from terror. She knew he wouldn’t hurt her. She had no idea why she was reacting so strongly to him, and she had no words to describe it. He simply approached, and all her systems went haywire.
Baffled at herself, she plunged into talk again. “You should know, I’m beginning to develop a conditioned reaction to the phrase ‘if you please.’”
“Are you?” The Vampyre quirked an eyebrow as he kept a smooth pace beside her. “And why is that?”
“Raoul says it all the time, usually just before he slams me to the ground or throws me into a wall.” Reaching the doorway, she used it as an excuse to pull away from his hand as she turned to face him again.
He frowned, his lips drew tight and the small scar at the side of his mouth whitened. Her gaze lingered on it. She had seen that scar whiten once before. It was a tiny tell, and she wasn’t sure what it meant, except that it revealed some kind of deeper emotion.
He said, “I noticed you were moving rather stiffly yesterday evening.”
She knew where his thoughts went, and she met his gray-green gaze. “It’s all right. I’m handling it.”
He shook his head. “You should not have to deal with pain, or handle any discomfort.”
The way he said it made her pause as her perception underwent another small but irrevocable shift. If Xavier refused to take advantage of his human attendants during a blood offering, then the act of the blood offering itself was all for their benefit, not for his. Theoretically, Raoul could draw blood from everyone, and Xavier could get his needs met quite well from a distance.
So he didn’t say what he had because he needed or wanted the blood offering. He said it out of concern for her well-being.
Oh hell, he was going to make her give up the whole concept of “monster” entirely, wasn’t he?
“I understand,” she said softly. “And I’m on my journey toward making that choice. But for now, do you know what I did this morning?”
He studied her. “Raoul told me what happened in the gym. You surprised him.”
“Yes.” She pointed to her own chest. “I did that. Nobody enhanced me, or gave me special powers. I thought the plan up, and I executed it. And because I’ve worked my ass off these last six weeks, I was fast enough to pull it off. Barely, but I did, and that feels nice. I know I’m not where I need to be yet, but for now I feel pretty good about where I’m at.”
His lean jaw angled out slightly, but he refrained from saying anything further. Instead, he stood back. “Fair enough. Now, please go down the hall and come back in. Show me that you know how to walk, not bolt like a runaway horse.”
She sighed but complied. As she walked into the room again, she found that he had moved some distance away. When she paused, he walked toward her, moving with his characteristic seamless, balletic grace. She watched warily as he gave her a slight bow, inclined his head and offered his arm.
“Good evening. May I escort you into dinner?”
She squinted one eye at him. “I’m supposed to be your attendant, not a guest. Attendants are supposed to be invisible and anticipate your every need, not be escorted in to dinner.”
He sighed. “Well, I do not see any evidence of you anticipating my every need at the moment.”
“Didn’t you ask me to walk out and come back in?” she said. “And didn’t I do it?”
He looked at her in exasperation. “For the love of God, querida, do not argue over every little thing. Just go along with this.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, stung. Gingerly she put her hand into the crook of his elbow, feeling the bulk of hard muscle move underneath the cloth of his jacket like a panther’s muscles shifting underneath its fur.
He led her around the table, smoothly matching his longer stride to hers. “If you were attending me at a function, what would you do?”
“How many attendants do you have with you?”
They reached where one of two formal dinner settings had been laid, and she waited while he pulled out the chair for her, then sat.
He said, “For this hypothetical scenario, I have just you in attendance.”
“Then I would keep pace a few steps behind you until we reached the room.” She watched him walk to the place setting on the opposite side of the table and sit. “After you sat down, I would take the position just behind your chair, so I could serve you wine or whatever else you might need. If this was a function without a banquet table, where people stood to mingle, I would find a place against a wall to stand and watch until I’m needed.”
“Very good.” With a flick of his long fingers, he indicated the place setting in front of her. “Now, can you explain this to me?”
She barely refrained from rolling her eyes, because she knew he would not appreciate it. Reaching for patience, she told him, “Of course I can. This is what Raoul has been teaching me for the last month and a half.”
“Then you should have no trouble demonstrating that knowledge to me, should you?” He sounded as if he might be reaching for patience too, although for the life of her she couldn’t understand why.
A sigh escaped her before she could stop it. “Raoul and I have gone through table manners, a history of Vampyre customs, and what an attendant should and should not do for a wide variety of events. I just don’t understand why you want to focus on this now, when I know all of it already.”
“Do you, indeed?” he said. His diction seemed to become even more perfect. She wondered if that might be some kind of warning sign, as he cocked his head, his mouth held at a slant. “Then perhaps you can kindly explain how this place setting would differ should an Elf be present.”
Her gaze fell to the place setting. The outside spoon was very slightly out of alignment, and she took her time adjusting it. Finally she had to make the grudging admission. “We haven’t talked about Elven dining yet.”
“I see.” His gray-green gaze glittered as he looked at her. “What about Dark Fae formal dining customs?”
She rubbed her chin, her lips pursed. Then she
shook her head.
“The Light Fae?”
“No,” she muttered.
“What about the Demonkind? I do not refer to the Djinn, who naturally do not need to eat and will adapt to the predominant social custom of the occasion, but to the other Demonkind who may be at table.”
Oh, for crying out loud. This was like some kind of modern version of My Fair Lady.
Only with Vampyres.
She made herself breathe evenly for a few moments. “You’ve made your point.”
“Have I? How fortuitous.” As he lounged back in his chair, all the subtle signs of aggravation disappeared. “Then perhaps we should get back to the task at hand, so that I can determine what you have learned before going on to teach you what you haven’t.”
Okay, that went too far. One small part of her mind—the wary part, the sensible part—started to whisper, Don’t say it, don’t say it. . . .
But the rest of her was too exasperated to listen. She flung out her hands and opened her eyes wide. “Who says ‘fortuitous’ these days?”
He just looked at her. The slanted angle of his mouth had returned, as well as the slight snap to his diction. “Apparently, I do. Now, if you are quite through, it might behoove you to remember that a successful attendant is nowhere near this argumentative with her patron.”
The devil took hold of her tongue. There was no other explanation for it.
“Behoove,” she said.
The angle of his mouth leveled out, and his voice turned exceedingly, dangerously soft. “Yes. Behoove.”
She opened her mouth. Shut it. Opened it again. Don’t say it. . . .
Gray-green eyes narrowed, daring her to cross the line.
Then the rest of what he had said sank in.
A successful attendant. Meaning, of course, that she wasn’t a successful one. She wasn’t anywhere near it. She wouldn’t let him bite her, and she couldn’t keep her mouth shut.
Was this what he had meant when he had said that some people couldn’t settle into the lifestyle of attendant, even when they wanted to?
Discouragement sagged her shoulders. With a groan, she bent her head and put her face in her hands. “I’m sorry. I’m failing completely at this, aren’t I?”
TEN
Xavier covered his mouth with one hand as he regarded Tess’s dejected figure. “I don’t know that I would quite say you’re failing completely.”
“Thanks,” she said, her voice muffled. “I find those words so encouraging.”
Some undefined impulse brought him out of his chair. He walked around to her and when he reached her side, he leaned back against the table, crossed his arms and looked down at an angle at her bent head. “Perhaps we should take a moment to recall a frightened young woman I met at the Vampyre’s Ball. Do you remember her?”
Her head lifted, and she looked up at him.
Those large, lovely dark eyes of hers were surrounded by shadows. She looked tired and worried. He smiled. “That young woman could not run for an hour, nor could she hit nine marks out of ten when shooting a gun. And she certainly could not have surprised Raoul so thoroughly, could she?”
Her gaze fell, and she pretended to straighten the spoon again. “Probably not.”
Nor would that young woman have tested his patience so thoroughly or endured having him in such close proximity, but he decided not to push his luck by mentioning that.
Instead, he held out one hand to her, palm up. “I think we are through with etiquette for the evening. Now we will begin with the dancing lessons.”
Her gaze focused on his outstretched hand. She hesitated, and for a moment he thought she would not take it. Then she put her hand in his, her gesture uncertain.
He didn’t give her time to reconsider. Instead, he curled his fingers strongly around hers and tugged. Following his prompt, she rose to her feet. He tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and firmly led her away, toward the ballroom.
While they had talked—and argued—the sunlight had faded enough so that he could enter the ballroom. He turned on the lights then led her into the room, pausing only to look at her curiously as her hand tightened and she dragged at his arm.
Her sharp gaze darted from the windows to the gleaming expanse of the floor, and he realized what she was doing. She was making sure it was safe enough for him to enter.
Something startled inside him warmed. Not only did she pay attention to the details in her immediate environment, also she had good protective instincts.
“It’s safe,” he said. “But thank you.”
The glance she gave him was as uncertain as everything else she had done that evening, but her grip on his arm relaxed, and they walked forward together until they stood in the middle of the empty, polished floor.
Earlier, he had set a portable stereo on the piano, already loaded with a CD filled with waltz music. He turned to face her, and while he was not quite able to ignore how her heart sped up when they came face-to-face, at least her scent didn’t fill with such overwhelming fear.
“The waltz is a simple and elegant dance,” he said. “And the music is beautiful. It’s in triple meter.”
“I’m not musical,” she told him, looking down at their feet. “I don’t know what that means.”
“Don’t look at your feet. Nobody looks at their feet when they dance. Look at me.” He paused until her head lifted, and her wary gaze met his. “Triple meter simply means three beats to a measure. One-two-three, one-two-three. That’s the rhythm of the dance. Spatially, visualize a box. We will be stepping around the corners of the box together. You move backward, while I move forward.”
The angle of her head acquired a skeptical slant. “Why can’t you move backward, and I move forward?”
Trust Tess to ask that question. He bit back another smile. “Convention. I’m the male, and you’re the female. That means I lead and you follow, which is good for you, since I already know the dance.”
“Well, you know how that old saying goes,” she said.
“What saying is that?”
A spark of humor entered her gaze. “Ginger Rogers did the same thing Fred Astaire did, only backward and in high heels.”
He had met Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers once in 1934, when they had come to Evenfall to dance for the Masque at winter solstice. He chuckled. “Very true. I’ll keep the pace and guide you around the corners of the box, like thus.”
As she watched, he stepped back and positioned his arms as if he held a woman, one hand curved around his invisible partner’s back and the other pretending to clasp her hand. Then he glided through the steps as he watched Tess.
Her eyes widened, and he stopped. “What is it?”
Color tinged her skin, along the proud curves of her high cheekbones. “You have this way of moving.”
“What way is that?” He walked back toward her with a frown, disquieted again.
When he had invited her, he truly had not anticipated how much she might change. The strong angles of her face highlighted the shape of her eyes and the sensual curve of her lips.
She had become too striking. That meant more eyes would fall upon her and linger, more people would remember her, and that meant, in some situations, she might be in more danger.
He would have to consider the possible ramifications of that, another time. For now, he set the issue aside and concentrated on her.
She lifted her shoulders in an awkward shrug, and her gaze fell away. “You move with such grace and self-assurance all of the time. I’ll never be able to match that.”
“Nonsense,” he said. “Not only have I been dancing for a very long time, but I was also engaged in fencing lessons and swordplay from the time I was a young child. I have a lot of experience, and you haven’t. You will learn soon enough.”
She shook her head and gave him a wry look. “Beli
eve me, the way you move takes a lot more than just experience, no matter how many decades—or centuries—you have under your belt. Just now you looked as if you were floating.”
If that had come from anyone but Tess, he would have been sure that was a compliment. As it was, he had no idea how to respond.
Instead of speaking, he dug in his pocket to pull out the remote for the portable stereo and keyed on the music, and the lovely, timeless strains of Chopin’s Grande Valse Brillante swelled to fill the room.
A sense of peace and contentment filled him. He loved music, and he loved to dance. Teaching Tess to waltz was going to be a pleasure.
A half an hour later, he had revised his opinion drastically, as she stepped on his foot again. Instantly, they both stopped moving and glared at each other.
“Young lady, you are not an elephant,” he told her. “Kindly refrain from imitating one.”
“I’m sorry!” she said for the fifth time.
Or perhaps it was the sixth. He wasn’t sure; he had lost count. It was certainly often enough that she had begun to say it through gritted teeth.
He forced himself to take a breath. While he might not need to breathe anymore, the action seemed to help him reach for patience. “Not to worry. We’ll keep doing it until we get it right.”
Rubbing the back of her head, she muttered something about dancing with the stars and Vampyres.
He cocked his head. “What was that? I didn’t quite understand you.”
“I—never mind.” She squared her shoulders. “Are we going again?”
“Of course.” He opened up his arms, and she stepped into them.
While teaching her to dance had turned into much more of a chore than he had anticipated, this one thing was purest pleasure: she came readily to him, and she no longer remembered to flinch from his touch.
Of course, he did not clasp her too tightly, but instead held her precisely at the correct distance. And her heart rate still sped up every time he looked at her, or reached out to touch her slender, muscular body. But mostly, he thought, her fear seemed to have subsided, and even though she seemed to have the dancing ability of a koala bear, for that reason alone, he counted the waltzing lessons a success.
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