Elizabeth opened the door a hesitant crack, peeking out at her mother, but unable to see who the audience was behind her other than some dark servant clothing.
Air and her mother’s will got the door opened. Air closed the door again before the waiting servants behind her got a better look inside of Jill’s room.
“Jill, I heard you had an accident,” their mother said, walking past Elizabeth and the corpse of Jill’s crumpled gown on the floor. “I was so surprised to hear about your clumsiness from the king’s Consort,” she added. “Everyone is so worried about you. I had to come right away.”
Mom was obviously putting on a show for the audience on the other side of the door. What they heard was all that mattered.
Elizabeth connected all the minds of her family like a three-way call.
“Why didn’t you send for me?” their mother asked.
“We had it handled,” Elizabeth insisted.
She imagined the scene for their mother.
Jill’s brave destruction of the tiny, red, bottled doom.
“Okay. There’s no taking back what happened, but thankfully, only Jill’s strength was exposed,” their mother said with a resigned sigh.
She kicked off her heels and sat on the floor in front of Jill’s legs.
Jill wisely stayed silent. The baby was still the baby, no matter how old she got. Mom was going to fuss.
“Block it, Elizabeth,” her mother ordered before she started the healing.
“Already done.”
The pain Jill felt was like a sunburn compared to the actual second and third-degree burns on her legs.
For healing like this, it would be expected that their mother would have to dose Jill with a heavy sedative first. None was needed if Elizabeth had hold of her sister’s mind.
The healing was over in moments.
“Tell the Consort that Jill should be okay for supper tonight. This is superficial, and I won’t be needing her offer of healers. I can manage this much on my own,” their mother said, loudly, for their audience outside the door.
“Go to the exercise class you agreed to for Prince Daemon, Elizabeth,” her mother said, not even giving her a look. She was still focused on Jill.
In all the commotion, Elizabeth had completely forgotten about her new class. It was a good thing their mother was here.
“I’ll be back after I go stab something,” Elizabeth said to both her mother and Jill.
“Decorum, Elizabeth,” her mother reminded her.
Jill snorted.
She imagined Elizabeth stabbing a demon with an ornate, silver dagger while dressed in Victorian style, complete with corset and a lacy fan.
Elizabeth responded by sticking out her tongue at Jill and cutting off the three-way connection of their minds, so she got in the last comeback again, slamming the door behind her on the way out.
If You Give Him a Taste
The demon liked to make her sweat.
He hadn't lied about the running part of the class, but he had failed to mention the distance and the intensity from this little workout.
It wasn't a fitness class for nobility, but military-level training for demon handlers.
The other girls in the class were from working clans. They had hard, lean muscles from physical work that made Elizabeth feel like a slob.
Running wild in the hills around their cottage wasn't the same as running really far, really fast, and with no end in sight.
She had been quickly left behind by the rest.
None of the other young witches had figured out that she was a noble. It had made for a warmer reception than she and Jill had experienced earlier.
A couple of the witches had seemed liked they might want to be friends, running the first couple minutes with her before promising to talk more at the finish.
Elizabeth couldn't really speak anyway, just heave air in and out between punishing steps, so she had nodded them on.
Her world narrowed from one breath to the next, her burning muscles threatening to seize if she stopped even for a moment. It was exhilarating even if tiring, pushing her body like she did her magic.
Daemon slammed into her like a freight train halfway through the trail.
One moment she was running and then her feet were off the ground. He picked up her smaller body, turning so he could absorb the impact from a thick oak tree against his back that stopped their momentum.
Leaves floated down around them as she smashed against his chest, cradled for a moment, and then he switched their positions to put her back against the trunk.
They were both panting from the run.
He yelled at her between breaths.
“What are you wearing?”
The question was as unexpected as his sudden arrival.
“Uh, running pants, uh, breeches,” she muttered at him, irritable as his grip didn’t give an inch to her questing wiggles to free herself.
He had her pinned to the tree, dangling a foot off the ground, and still, he towered over her.
She glanced up.
He wasn’t looking at her clothes.
His dark stare penetrated her startled gaze.
Fuck. No demon had ever gotten the better of her like this. She was pinned like weak prey, subject to his every whim.
Why did that make her hot?
She shivered as the adrenaline kicked her abused muscles. Running was no longer an option.
His pupils had dilated fully, making his eyes demon black, except for the thinnest rims of green irises. It was intimidating.
The only time she usually got this close to an angry demon was when she was slipping a stake between his ribs.
“I can feel my magic inside you,” he told her, the fingers of his free hand trailing over her racing carotid pulse.
Whoa, they’d gone from what she was wearing to what was underneath her clothes really fast.
His body was all pressed up against her front, but that tiny touch by her newly reinforced tattoo was what really drove her crazy.
She felt like the ink would burn through her shirt and sear his thumb.
He continued to brush over her right shoulder, sticking the fine cotton of her shirt to her sweaty skin as he traced the pattern of the tattoo from memory.
As the seconds ticked by, she wondered if it was less dangerous to interrupt him than it was to remain under his study.
“It itches,” she complained, trying to shrug his touch off.
“It feels different,” he said, tugging the neck of her shirt down to look at the tattoo.
Surprise, he was undressing her again.
The old-fashioned cotton fibres of her shirt didn’t really have stretch. She’d worn it unbuttoned, more than her mother would have allowed, in mercy of the heat and run.
Why did everyone here have to dress in such ridiculous clothing?
At least, they allowed females to dress in pants for riding and physical work. Shorts would have been more reasonable, but there was no way this society would allow a woman to parade around in her underthings, as her mother had put it.
Daemon didn’t seem that deterred by the extra layers as he quickly unbuttoned another two inches of her shirt to bare her shoulders.
He frowned at the tattoo.
There was no way he missed how it had faded.
“It’s different because I tasted your blood,” she confessed, skipping over what had happened in the library with the twins.
She tried to shrug her shirt back up. She didn’t want Daemon looking too closely at it.
Would he suspect there was something wrong with her if he saw how her magic ate at the tattoo so quickly?
Had Phillip said something to him?
He looked back up at her eyes. “The fan?” he queried, quickly guessing where she got the blood. “I’ll be coming to get that tonight.”
He dismissed the fact that she fed on him, in a manner, like it was a harmless cheat on a strict diet.
She focused on the last part of his
comment. “Tonight?” she squeaked out in horror.
How was she going to investigate if he invaded her room again?
He probably would track her down if she didn't show up.
“Tonight, tomorrow night, and every night. You will leave your door unlocked,” he commanded with a royal attitude.
She stayed sullenly quiet.
This was worse and worse. How was she going to explain Daemon’s nightly visits to her mother when she hadn't even admitted to the claim yet?
“You need to feed on me. Bottled blood loses its potency in days. It’s only meant for matching.” He explained it like he was teaching a kid.
If that was weakened potency, she wasn’t sure if it would be safe to drink it straight from the tap. It would be liquid lightning in her veins.
Besides, what was he talking about? He couldn’t be serious about her feeding on him.
Witches never did that. He must mean he wanted her to take a taste to reinforce the claim bond between them.
“My mother is probably going to throw the rest of the blood from the fan away, thanks to your interference this morning. I told you she doesn’t want me claimed,” Elizabeth threatened, hoping she could still put pressure on him to stay away.
He had broken their bargain almost immediately, practically ratting her out to her mother at breakfast.
“I never mentioned my taste, sweetheart,” he rebutted, looking at her mouth.
She licked her dry lips. “Why else would you tell her I belong to you?” she asked. “I told you no feeding,” she reminded him.
“You refused a lot of things, but the claim was agreed upon,” he said. “I didn’t even insist on you telling your mother that you accepted my claim, this morning when you denied it,” he added as if this was a big concession.
It was a big deal, considering claims were supposed to be worn displayed on the shoulder to keep other vampires away. It wasn’t exactly an engagement, but more at the level of a promise ring.
In vampire terms: a promise to exclusively feed one vampire in exchange for his protection.
“I don’t need to announce the claim when I’m not going to be feeding other vampires,” she said.
He was the one to agree to the claim under those terms.
The tiny nick on her lip from Phillip felt like a stinging lie now.
Daemon still hadn’t let her go. The conversation only put on hold whatever had provoked him into such a dangerous mood.
She wriggled, and he tightened his hold.
“You are mine,” he said. It sounded every bit as possessive as the first few times he had said it.
“A claim is not ownership,” she protested.
She still was not sure what claim protocol she had broken to offend him. He knew she was keeping her tattoo under wraps.
How could he complain about what she wore?
However, it was the only thing that made sense. He was mad she wore clothes with shoulders, instead of the more traditional, claim revealing clothes that bared the shoulder and the tattoo to view.
“I’ll wear what I want. The claim isn’t for show. I’m not letting you pick out matching lingerie for me to Barbie for you, Prince.” She said his title with as much disregard as possible.
“Are you always so disagreeable?” he asked, arching a lazy brow at her.
She nodded.
“Disobedient?” he asked with a dark tendril of threat.
It was like he was asking her to tattle on herself, taunting her to be bad, just so he could punish her.
“Should have asked before you claimed me,” she boldly taunted him back.
He was much too close, that deep voice doing delicious things to her. She wanted to push him more, so he could lecture in that sexy voice and she could listen.
It was a dangerous impulse.
Her rebellious sass should have made him angrier, but Daemon’s eyes hooded with unmistakable lust as he slowly looked over her trapped body, once more.
“Naughty?” he whispered, bending closer to her ear.
There was no mistaking his meaning this time.
“Wicked,” she promised.
He dragged her up against his muscled thigh, riding between her own.
The repeat performance was as stimulating as the first.
“You have no idea what you've done wrong, do you?” he asked.
He let his thigh hold her up, while his hands slid over her body and shoulders to finally trace along her jaw.
She couldn’t say a word.
He cupped her face, so she had to meet his gaze. His thumb swept stray hair from her braid off her left cheek.
His touch was so gentle.
“Your innocence is half of the problem. You are unaware of the risks you take,” he softly said.
What risks? Tempting a demon, like him?
What had they been talking about . . . ?
Clothes. Her shoulders being covered up.
“In retrospect,” she started. Her explanations to her mother usually began this way, sounding like she had reflected on her actions without doing it. “I should have realized my dress could be interpreted as . . . ?”
She hesitated, not sure what to make up.
He merely flicked a glance down at her mostly modest shirt and pants.
“I don't care what you wear. You’re a grown witch. You could dance naked around my bed for all I care—”
“In your dreams.”
“—but you should expect any vampire to respond appropriately if you—”
“Mauling me is appropriate for a caveman, not a prince.”
“—persist on fucking smelling like—”
“Smelling?” She ignored the profanity.
“It’s not your clothes.”
He shifted a hairsbreadth from her lips, demonstrating that merely pinning her to a tree was barely an invasion of her personal space.
He was now practically inside her own breaths.
“It’s you,” he accused against her lips.
His deep voice vibrated down the angle of her jaw and bypassed all higher levels of communication. Her ears were fine, but her brain had shut off.
Instinct drove her to tilt her head back, despite the dangerous fangs so close to her carotid.
Better her neck than her lips. She remembered how well he kissed.
His cold nose on her neck startled her for a moment, her heated flesh warming it as he sniffed deeply.
His hands shifted back down her body to more comfortably fit her against him.
“You wicked tease,” he whispered, not quite panting but still taking deep breaths. He kept his fangs hidden.
He was gentle at her neck, but there wasn’t an ounce of give elsewhere, as he kept her positioned.
She tried to shift against that muscled resistance, a hard throb against her core that she could feel all too well in her thin pants.
No, nope. She was more than her primitive instincts.
“In retrospect,” she began, again.
“This scent,” he said before she could say more. He brushed his nose against her pulse point and sniffed in confirmation. “Did you let anyone else near?”
Oh, he said that with such dark possessiveness.
She clenched her thighs against the building ache from his unintended nuzzling.
She should be terrified of a demon so close to her neck, but instead, her body was thrumming with anticipation, like the moment before the kiss goodnight on a first date.
He was priming her, she realized, although she wasn’t sure if it was intentional.
“This is an invitation,” he informed before she could confess or lie about Phillip. She felt the scrape of a fang, his bloodlust aroused, swelling his canines for feeding. “A witch wears scent-enhancer to drive a male crazy for her blood.”
Okay, so he was saying she started it. Didn’t matter now, this runaway train had no brakes.
Phillip had kissed her before the protocols class, where she had been sprayed, so her g
uilt and worry over confessing that accidental tasting got shoved down the priorities.
Right now, all that mattered was relieving the fire Daemon was lighting.
She reached up and ran her hands through his hair, the silky strands doing nothing to cool her lust. She was torn between pulling him away or grasping him even closer.
“No biting,” she quickly ordered before she lost her head.
He growled in frustration but obeyed. A little nip over her pulse, with no real bite, ratcheted up her tension.
He worked his way along her neck, stopping when she tightened her grip on his hair. Then he would lick and softly suck at her skin until she relaxed.
When he finally reached her ear, she was no longer able to hide what he was doing to her body.
Her pelvis rocked mindlessly against his thigh, her hands hopelessly tangled in his hair, and she twisted her neck closer to his mouth, unable to hold still.
His hot breath in her ear sent shivers down her overheated body.
“I won’t bite you, sweetheart,” he told her. He rolled his hips, letting her feel every inch he wanted to sink into her. “I won’t take you until you beg for it,” he whispered, letting a sharp fang trace the shell of her ear.
He had come so close, but the arrogance in his voice made her refuse him the words he wanted.
“When pigs fly, Prince,” she said, squirming to get loose.
His rich chuckle against her ear was the last straw. She yanked his hair, purposefully rough.
He held his head still long enough that she knew he only moved away because he chose to move.
Her angry gaze refused to be cowed as he stared into it.
“Did you really tell me that all I have to do to get you to bare your neck, willingly, is make a couple of pigs fly?” he asked, hotly amused.
His fangs were protruding, still aroused and making him lisp some of the words.
“It’s just a saying when something is impossible,” she explained.
Of course, he wouldn’t be familiar with human sayings. She must have sounded like an idiot to him.
“I have air, sweetheart,” he reminded her. “I can make an elephant fly if that’s what you want.”
Like Dumbo?
She giggled inappropriately. How silly.
Being with humans so long had her thinking like them and forgetting about magical abilities. Thinking like that could get her in trouble.
Every Witch Demon but Mine (Maeren Series Book 1) Page 22
