by Callie Rose
He hesitates. My heart sinks as I watch the expression on his face crumple a little. “Fuck. You didn’t tell someone already, did you?”
“No,” he says quickly. “But I think that prince dude noticed me noticing you.”
“He did. I looked at you too, and I know I shouldn’t have. But if we course-correct from here on out and are never seen talking or fraternizing with each other, he’ll forget all about it. At most, he’s probably worried that we’re dating or something. They say that pregnant tributes are a pain in the ass to deal with.”
Nathan makes a face. “Gross.”
“Right?” My lips curl in a grimace. “But it’s better to let him believe that you’re a scorned lover than an idiot brother.”
He narrows his eyes at me, then laughs, his tired eyes warming. “I really did miss you, you know.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter, shoving at his shoulder affectionately. “I missed you too. Idiot.”
He hugs me again, and I let myself cling to him for a few long seconds. He is an idiot. And a fuckup. But he’s my brother, and I meant it when I said he doesn’t deserve this. There’s a lot of shit I’ve done wrong when it comes to Nathan, but I’m going to fix it all. Somehow.
After we break apart, I turn away quickly so he won’t see the tears glistening in my eyes. He’s enough of a mess already. I don’t need him worrying about my emotional state and getting himself even more stressed out than he is.
I head over to the door and press my ear against it, listening intently, but I can’t pick up any sounds in the hall.
Nathan shoves me aside gently and opens the door, sticks his head out in the hallway, and looks both ways. He mouths “clear” at me and gets out of the way so I can do my own check. He’s right, it is clear. I don’t look back to see if he’s doing the I-told-you-so face. I already know he is.
I’m on high alert as I pad silently down the corridor back toward the female tributes’ wing. As I creep past the closed doors, I realize that although Nathan and I were being quiet, we should’ve kept our voices even lower. I can hear the guy in the last room snoring, and I don’t even have vampire-sharp hearing. Hopefully the guard didn’t pass by on his rounds. But if he did and heard a woman’s voice, I’m pretty sure he would’ve busted into the room.
That thought eases the knot of worry in my chest. I’m being careful, and the vampire guards definitely don’t seem to be all that on-edge or alert. Probably because they know how tightly the whole palace is locked down.
Just as I turn down a hallway, leaving the men’s wing behind, the hair at the back of my neck prickles.
I freeze, sensing something.
But before I have a second to figure out what it is or even to react at all, strong arms grab my shoulders.
Chapter Eleven
Yanked off-course and pinned against a wall, my first instinct is to smash my head into the face of whoever’s holding me.
I barely restrain myself. All of my nerves are on fire, my muscles twisting with conflicting instincts, until I smell it. The coppery tang of blood, and something sweet and rich, like mulled wine.
Vampire.
My hunter’s focus rises above everything else, allowing me to calm my heart and my breath as I zero in on my prey. Prey that just happens to have me pinned up against a wall, but I’ve been in worse spots and still won the fight in the end.
I lift my head to meet my captor’s gaze and find myself staring at my own reflection in a pair of pale gray eyes. The same pale gray eyes that were watching me all freaking night.
Prince Bastian.
Fuck.
He’s got me pinned in with his body. He isn’t hurting me, but he’s damn sure not letting me get away. He pulls back and cocks his head, looking at me curiously. Hell, I’d be looking at me sideways too. I can’t remember the last time a vampire got the drop on me like this.
But this one is silent as the grave. I didn’t hear him coming, didn’t sense him coming. It’s like he materialized out of thin fucking air.
“Your heartbeat was faster in the great hall, when your safety was guaranteed,” he murmurs, his thick brows pulling together a little as he studies me. “Why aren’t you more frightened now?”
Fuck. I don’t know how to answer that. At least, not without explaining that I’m a vampire hunter in my other life and have trained my body to stay calm during a fight. Think, bitch, think.
“I—I was just so awed and overwhelmed before, with all the luxury and power and—” I’m not making any sense. That’s fine, I’m supposed to be a senseless groupie, right? “And, um, all the vampires.”
Bastian cocks an eyebrow and twists his mouth. “Awed and overwhelmed. Of course.”
Yeah, he’s not buying this for a second. He glances down the hallway, back the way I came from, then turns that icy stare back at me. “So awed and overwhelmed you had to take to the hallways, alone and unescorted, in the dead of night. What were you doing, tribute?”
He doesn’t say it like a slur, but it sure feels like one. Maybe I’m projecting, but I don’t care. Fuck this asshole.
“I was trying to find a bathroom.” I know it’s the wrong thing to say as soon as it’s out of my mouth. He must be aware that Anastasyia shows all of the tributes where their bathrooms are right away.
He actually laughs. It’s a surprisingly human sound, but that doesn’t make it any less creepy. He cuts his laugh off short, giving me a flat glare. “Do you prefer urinals, then, or just the men who use them?”
Crap on a fucking popsicle stick. Okay, so he knows where I was. Play dumb. I cock my head to one side, then think better of it as his eyes flash quickly to the exposed flesh at my throat.
I straighten my head again, clenching my jaw. “What do you mean?”
He chuckles, and the sound pours over me like rolling thunder.
“I see everything, you know,” he murmurs. “I watched as you fucked the male tributes with your eyes. You couldn’t stop staring.” He leans close to me, his breath brushing against my earlobe as he speaks in a low voice. “If that’s the kind of satisfaction you’re looking for, my bed is always open to you.”
My stomach dips and sways sideways, as if I’m on the deck of a ship in the middle of a storm.
“I wouldn’t be caught dead in your coffin,” I hiss out through my teeth, the words slipping out before I can stop them.
My heart thumps hard, and I bite my tongue. I know I’ve made a mistake. Again. I’ve always had grit, determination, and anger on my side, but I’m never been the best at disguising my feelings, and it’s been biting me in the ass all night. It’s only a matter of time before it gets me killed. Any willing blood tribute would be thrilled to have the prince himself make them an offer like that, and I just threw it back in his face.
Bastian draws back a little, but not enough to let me go. “You surprise me, tribute.”
“Stop calling me that. Please.”
Both eyebrows go up now, and he coughs out a surprised laugh. “I wondered why no one drank from you at the celebration. I’m beginning to understand it now. Have you not experienced that yet, my feral little—well, what would you have me call you?”
Mikka. Fuck. No. “D-Darcy.”
“Darcy, then. Have you never experienced a vampire’s kiss?”
My heart, the fucking traitor, speeds up. The prince grins, sensing it, and moves in closer.
“Ah, I see,” he murmurs, his breath caressing my neck like a physical touch. “Then you really don’t know.”
He’s testing me. I’m sure of it. And if I fail this test, I doubt he’ll even bother calling the guards in to deal with me. He’ll probably kill me himself, right here in this dark hallway.
I tell myself to relax, but my body isn’t listening. It’s going to happen, the one thing I’ve been dodging for most of my life, and there isn’t a damn thing I can do about it. My fingers curl against the wall behind me, my nails digging into the smooth stone to keep them from flying into his face. Ev
ery muscle is tense, waiting for that brutal moment.
Bastian leans closer to me, his large body and dominating presence overwhelming me. He seems to take up more space than his physical body could possibly encompass, like there’s an aura around him that pulses in the air, affecting all the atoms between us.
His fangs trace along my jugular, cold and hard and sharp, but they don’t penetrate my skin. Goosebumps rise up all over me, from my head to my toes, as my skin itself tries to defend against the attack—but still, he doesn’t bite down.
Tongue and teeth tease my tender flesh as his body presses close against me. His teeth scrape over my neck, sending a shiver of anticipation down my spine.
I don’t want it. I don’t want this.
But I have to keep telling myself I don’t want it, because his tongue and teeth and proximity are doing strange things to my body. My head feels too heavy, and it rolls away from him, lengthening my neck for his mouth. Shivers of dread change ever so subtly, morphing into something else entirely. That arousal I felt in the ballroom flares up again deep in my belly, making my clit throb as my neck warms under his attention.
He nips my ear, then trails his tongue back down to my shoulder, nipping me there too. His sharp teeth press against my skin hard enough for me to feel them, but they never penetrate it.
Dammit, get it over with! I scream at him inside my head. I can’t take the fucking anticipation.
But that isn’t what this feeling is, not really. It’s… it’s want. He’s putting me under a spell with his touch, that’s what this is. That has to be it. Because right now, for the first time in my life, I want him to bite me. I want him to taste me, want his fangs inside me.
Then the teasing stops abruptly.
My neck is still whole. There are no puncture wounds, not even closed ones. He never once bit down.
I open my eyes to find the prince stepping away from me, his expression unreadable. The long line of his nose and vicious cut of his cheekbones make him look like a statue of an angry deity. Even in the dimly lit hallway, his eyes are clearly visible, and I could almost swear I see lightning crackling in the storm gray of his irises. He fixes me with a hard look, any emotion he might be feeling hidden behind the stoic mask of his features.
“Get back to your room, Darcy.”
And just like that, he turns and walks away.
I have to press my back against the wall to stay upright. Adrenaline and something else I can’t quite name race through me, making me tremble and shake.
I know I’m lucky. I know he could’ve just as easily killed me as talked to me. He could’ve ripped my throat out and left me to bleed out in the corridor, gasping and choking until my last breath.
But instead, he did… nothing.
Why didn’t he bite me?
Chapter Twelve
A timid knock at my door wakes me after not nearly enough sleep. I throw on some clothes, if you can call them that, and answer it as fast as I can, not wanting to be caught half-dressed by Anastasyia or some other vampire.
But it’s not the matron of our ward. It’s Jessica, and she looks like hell.
“Hey.” She gives me a wan, hopeful smile. “Um, sorry if you were still asleep, but we’re all going to breakfast, and I was hoping you’d come too?”
She seems more resigned to all of this than she did yesterday, but somehow less sure of herself. I give her as reassuring a smile as I can manage.
“Sure,” I tell her. “Just need a minute.”
When I’m finished with enough morning functions to make me feel halfway human, I find her in the hallway with her back pressed against the wall and her arms tucked up to her chest, her fingers linked behind her head as if she’s shielding her breasts and her neck. She straightens up when she sees me, though, and smiles.
“Winona said she’d save seats for us,” she says. “She’s really pleased about last night, I think. She’s in a really good mood. Things must’ve gone well for her.”
I have no response to that, so I don’t try to come up with anything. Jessica and I walk to the dining hall in comfortable silence. I like that she doesn’t feel the need to fill moments of quiet with pointless words.
Honestly, she seems like the kind of person I would have liked to be friends with on the outside. Not that I ever let anybody get that close—friends are nothing more than liabilities in my line of work—but if I allowed myself to have friends, she would make a good one.
The undead must be late risers. The great hall is mostly empty of vampires at this hour, but there are quite a few tributes already sitting at the tables when we enter. The whole vibe is much different than it was last night, the atmosphere more relaxed.
Most of my fellow newbies seem to have adjusted to the flipped schedule pretty easily—I guess it’s not so hard to do when you never see the sun—and are already chattering on animatedly over their breakfasts. A cluster of giggles makes my head hurt. Of course it’s coming from the table Jessica is leading me toward. I slide into my seat and the dark-haired girl sits down beside me. She seems to scoot her chair closer to mine as she moves it in toward the table, but maybe that’s just in my head.
Does she think I can protect her somehow? Or is she especially scared of someone here? What’s going on with her?
“You’re just in time.” Another one of the tributes whose name I’m pretty sure is Gretchen grins at us. Then she leans forward, keeping her voice low. “We were just rating some of the vampires, picking the ones we’re most interested in. Status is easy, because it’s already built in to the system. I mean, obviously Bastian is the top dog around here, but anybody at the high table would be a good match. So now we’re moving on to pure looks. Who do you think is the best looking of the bunch?”
“Connor,” Chelsea murmurs dreamily, then licks yogurt off her spoon. “He’s so cute and so fit, and he’s got that whole funny guy thing going on.”
“Nah. He’s too much of a pretty boy for my tastes,” Elise puts in, surprising me. I didn’t think she’d have an opinion about any of this, or admit to one anyway. She points with her spoon across the hall. “Rome.”
I follow where she’s pointing, and my heart leaps up into my throat. The broad-shouldered punk bouncer looking vamp is standing against the wall, sweeping a brutal glare across everyone in attendance for breakfast this “morning.”
“Oh, he is a hottie.” Winona purses her lips, glancing around the table with a smug look. “But I heard he was in trouble with the Elders. You know, the vampire court that sits up at the high table with the prince.”
Gretchen nods. “Yup. Just got back from banishment. Supposedly his punishment is over, but you know how it goes. Ex-cons always gonna be ex-cons to some people.”
“What did he do to the Elders?” Another girl—Demi, I think—asks.
Gretchen shrugs, stealing another glance at Rome. “Who knows? Nobody’ll talk about it, at least not to tributes. All I know is, the Elders still hold a grudge against him, and he’s always got that scowl on his face—unless he’s feeding.” She waggles her eyebrows smugly.
Demi gasps. “Oh my god, did he feed on you last night?” she asks in a whisper.
Gretchen grins. “A lady never kisses and tells.” She waits a beat, just long enough for Demi’s face to fall in disappointment, then adds, “But I’m not a lady. Hell yeah, he fed on me. It was hot as hell too. God, I love the way he does it. Trust me, girls, you’ll find your favorites.”
Jessica is pushing her food around her plate, not eating any of it. That worries me, but the direction this conversation is going worries me more.
“Sure, he’s good looking enough,” Winona says dismissively. “But honestly, the bad boy type never gets anywhere in life. Neither do goody-two-shoes like Connor. He’s sweet and all, but the other vampires will walk all over him for all eternity. Now, Bastian—”
“We know, we know, he has all the power,” Chelsea says, rolling her eyes.
Winona purses her lips. “What
I was going to say is that if you’re looking for the hottest man in the room whose attractiveness isn’t dampened by a personality handicap, Bastian wins, hands down.”
“Guess that depends on what you mean by a personality handicap,” a girl I haven’t met yet says. “I think refusing to bond is a pretty big handicap. Why fantasize about someone you can never have?”
“That’s your problem, Ji-yoo,” Winona shoots back. “You see ‘impossible’ as a fact. I, however, see it as a challenge. You can bet your ass that when the bonding ceremony rolls around, I’ll be the one lying across Bastian’s lap. You’ll be lucky if a vampire busboy chooses to bond with you.”
Ji-yoo pretends to cuss her out in Korean. I’ve picked up just enough of the language to recognize a grocery list when I hear it, and I hide my grin behind my hand. Winona obviously doesn’t have a clue what Ji-yoo is saying, and she flushes bright red, her eyes flashing murderously. I’m waiting for her to launch herself across the table at the dark-haired woman—and honestly, I kind of want to see Ji-yoo take her—but she just sniffs instead.
“You could at least pretend to have some manners,” she says. “Unless you really want to lower your standards that much.”
Ji-yoo rolls her eyes. I shoot an amused glance at Jessica, but she’s still shoving things around on her plate. I don’t think she even heard the exchange.
“So, Winona, who fed on you?” Elise asks with a wicked grin. She doesn’t talk a lot, but this girl’s got an edge to her. I like it. She’s just my kind of bitch.
“Oh.” Winona shrugs, turning her nose up. “Nobody important. But the important ones will come.”
“Guess so. You can’t go anywhere but up.” Elise smirks.
