The hot, rhythmic penetration was all she could take. The moment Julian reached around her to rub her clitoris, she shivered as sweet release flowed through her in a heated rush, breaking down all her defenses, launching her into a mad spiral of pleasure.
Goosebumps peppered her flesh as she came, her body convulsing in rapture.
“That’s it. Come for me,” he murmured against her shoulder, kissing her there, scraping her with his teeth as his stabbing thrusts grew harder, more frantic.
Ripe fear curled through her. Her whole body tensed in anticipation of his bite. Julian uttered what sounded like an erotic obscenity then sank his fangs into her shoulder.
Never before had it felt as heady or potent as this. His fangs lit her up like liquid fire. Pure lust blazed through her veins. Her nerves sang with minute vibrations, and colored light pulsed behind her closed eyelids. Her lips formed an O as she fought for breath. In an instant, her entire body tensed and released, a second, blinding orgasm flared through her, growing brighter and more intense until her thoughts scattered into shivering, pulsating oblivion.
They collapsed together on the bed, their panting breaths mingling together. Julian released her, his tongue swiping over the tingling bite wounds before planting a quick kiss on the back of her neck. He rolled off of her, and stretched out alongside her on the mattress.
After a moment, Julian eased up on his elbow and released the binding around her wrists. Having her arms free again was blessed relief. Eleni’s muscles burned from being in one position for so long, something she hadn’t noticed until now.
She turned over onto her back and rubbed her wrists, grateful for the cool air that brushed against her overheated skin. Beside her, Julian rested with his arm flung over his eyes. The skin from just above his elbow was a weathered brown, the color of distressed leather. The sight of it startled her. Not because the scars were gruesome, or that she hadn’t known he’d been burned a long time ago, but because the wounds weren’t imagined. They were real, and somehow that seemed impossible. Julian had such a dominant personality, it seemed as though he should be immune to physical harm.
The burn scars chased up his arm, and along his left side. She couldn’t see much more than that, but she guessed the withered discolorations must cover most, if not all, of his back. It made sense now why he hadn’t wanted to remove his clothes for her—the scars bothered him. He obviously hadn’t wanted her to see them on their first night together.
Eleni gave herself a mental shake. The last thing she wanted was to seem disrespectful, or to upset him by staring. Worst of all, he could come to the conclusions that the burns could in some way affect her ability to bond with him.
Julian’s breathing had grown deep and regular. Perhaps it was for the best that he slept. Feeling awkward, she sat up on the edge of the bed and looked around for something to wear. If she remembered right, her room was straight down the hallway, past the balcony overlooking the front foyer, and at the end of the opposing corridor. Surely, she could find her way there on her own.
There was nothing nearby save for Julian’s black robe still draped across the end of the bed. She grabbed it, eased off the mattress, then flipped the robe around her shoulders. It was far too large. The hem touched the top of her feet.
She’d folded the front together, and was searching the floor for the belt Julian had discarded when she looked across the bed and saw him sitting up on his elbow, watching her. “Where are you going?” he asked.
“I…I was going to return to my room.”
“No.” Julian threw back the sheets, and was out of bed in an instant.
Her heart leapt when he prowled toward her. He grabbed the front of the robe by the lapels and stripped it back over her shoulders so that it slid easily from her body onto the floor. Julian snatched it up and balled it into a wad of fabric before tossing it into the corner of the room.
Eleni opened her mouth to explain, but Julian cut her short when he swept her off her feet and carried her back to bed. “If it were my wish to dismiss you to your room, I would do so,” he said as he returned her to the mattress. “But this is our first daylight together. You will sleep here with me.”
Chapter Six
Eleni woke feeling sluggish and hazy brained. Disoriented, she stared at the gentleman’s chair along the shadowy wall by the bed, and when she noticed the black sash tossed across the bentwood arm, she remembered Julian’s touch, his heated kisses. She propped herself up on her elbow and looked around, noting that a fire still burned in the gas fireplace. She shoved her hair back from her face, wondering what time it was.
Julian slept beside her, pale and silent, the black satin sheets pooled around his waist. At the sight of his muscular chest, her heart did a somersault. One night with him, and already he had given her so much pleasure.
Her gaze lingered on his ripped abs, and the dark trail of hair that disappeared beneath the covers. Reaching back, she laid a hand on his muscular chest. His skin felt cool, and his breathing was so shallow one might think he was not breathing at all. Not wanting to wake him, she withdrew her hand, and contented herself with staring at him.
All her life she’d been around handsome men, but Julian’s dark good looks made her weak inside. In awe of him, she trailed her gaze along his chiseled jaw, dark with a day’s growth of beard stubble. His shiny black hair fanned out across the pillow, beckoning her touch.
He slept with his hand behind his head and tucked beneath the pillows, the unguarded pose exposing the burn scars along his left side. Even if she hadn’t known about his scars before her arrival, it wouldn’t have mattered to her that they were there. They didn’t seem to pain him, and they didn’t detract at all from his raw male beauty.
Of course, a vampire’s ideal beauty differed from a human’s perspective. Eleni had been taught that vampires prized perfection from the time she was old enough to understand what her role in life would be. For vampires, their bodies had to last them through hundreds, and in rare cases, thousands, of years. Preservation of their looks was important to them, and they prized in themselves the same kind of flawless beauty they looked for in a blood mate.
To Julian, his scars must seem like unforgivable flaws. A needless shame, in her opinion, but at least now she could begin to understand why he sent away his entire harem.
She was grateful he had made an exception for her, even if he had only accepted her because she was a blood gift from Dominic. However, that didn’t mean she was foolish enough to surrender her heart to Julian. There were two sides to people. She had learned that lesson the hard way. Eleni stared at her new Biter a moment longer, then pulled back the sheets and climbed out of bed.
She wrapped herself in a satin sheet that had fallen off the bed during the day, and padded quietly across the room to the door.
Out in the hallway, she walked toward the open balcony overlooking the grand entrance. A faint glow clung to the stained glass window of St. Vincent, the gemstone colors radiant in the dying light of day. She passed in front of it, looking down over the silent entryway as she crossed into the west wing of the house. Walking past the empty silence of so many uninhabited rooms disturbed her. A house of this size was not meant to be empty. The lack of laughter and idle chatter made the chateau seem less like a place for the living, and more like a mausoleum.
A chill passed over her when at last she turned the corner. Trying to ignore the empty row of adjoined rooms, Eleni fixed her eyes on the double doors to the suite Julian had set aside for her. Even then, she couldn’t quell the sense of oppressive loneliness and an almost queasy sense of fear. The silence and stillness made the hall seem almost haunted—with what, she couldn’t guess. Not ghosts, she was certain of that, but perhaps centuries of bad memories had left an impression.
Eleni reached the double doors, and grabbed for the handle. She entered the room without a second thought, and yelped in surprise at the sight of a woman standing in front of her closet door in a bright blue dress.
It seemed as though the world stopped for an instant. Her attention settled on the open-mouthed expression of shock on Gisele’s face. The servant stood amid a mess of strewn clothes.
Eleni could barely believe what she was seeing. The maid had dressed herself in the sleek blue evening dress she’d brought with her from San Francisco. It was ill-fitting on Gisele’s body shape. It fit her trim waist perfectly, but fit too tight across her large bust and curvy hips.
A sharp pain lanced Eleni’s heart. Anya had given her the dress as a sobriety gift before she’d left for France. But Gisele hadn’t stopped with just the dress. She wore a slash of red lipstick that Eleni suspected came from her makeup drawer in the bathroom. But what infuriated her most, was that the servant had secured her lush, honey blonde hair into a loose knot at the nape of her neck with her great grandmother’s floral hairpins.
Gisele’s face blazed scarlet. “I came in to prepare the room for you, and the dress—”
“—was on the bed,” Eleni cut her off in a flat voice. “Yes, I know where I left it.”
“Is it truly a reason to be angry?” Gisele asked in stiff defense. Shaken, she looked remarkably like a little girl discovered playing in her mother’s wardrobe.
“I don’t know what to think,” Eleni said truthfully. She pulled Julian’s bed sheet tighter around her, clinging to it like a shield. “We both know you shouldn’t be in here going through my things.”
Before her date with Julian, she’d tried on the dress, but decided it was too long, too glamorous for the evening. She’d left it lying across the foot of the bed with the intention of hanging it up later. She didn’t know how to take it situation—as an insult, or an awful gesture of flattery? Gisele was a veritable stranger. One she would have to live with, but a stranger all the same. It felt like a violation of more than simply trust.
“Take it off.” Even to her own ears, her voice sounded angry and resolute. She had lived in Rubio’s house with eighteen other women, and while it had ended poorly, no one had ever trespassed on her privacy in this way. No one had ever worn her clothes or jewelry without asking her for permission first.
Gisele began to shimmy out of the too-tight dress. “You plan to tell Julian.” It sounded like an accusation.
The thought hadn’t crossed her mind until now. It didn’t surprise her that Gisele would be worried, but Eleni didn’t need to involve him in a small squabble she could handle by herself. If she presented Julian with a problem so soon after moving in, he might believe her to be a troublemaker.
She turned her back while Gisele changed, but now that Eleni knew she could not trust the woman, it was hard not to watch her in the dresser mirror. Eleni glimpsed Gisele’s white bra straps as the servant turned to toss the dress onto the end of the bed. She spoke to her reflection.
“I will clean my own room from this day forward, is that understood?”
“Perfectly,” Gisele responded stiffly. Once she had pulled on her jeans, she slipped her feet into a pair of gray flats and grabbed for her yellow patchwork cardigan off the floor. She whipped the sweater around her shoulders like a cape, and had only pulled one arm through before she started toward the bedroom door.
“My grandmother’s hairpins, too,” Eleni called after her.
Gisele froze, backtracked. Making no move to look Eleni in the eye, she stepped over to the dresser and fumbled to remove the delicate, enameled flowers. Her hands were shaking as she pulled the pins free and scattered them on top of the dresser. At once, she turned on her heel and hurried from the room.
Eleni didn’t realize she was trembling until Gisele was gone. Immediately, she walked over to the bedroom door and locked it. She wasn’t sure how much good locking the door was going to do since Gisele probably had a key, but it made her feel better—slightly more secure. Still, she couldn’t stop herself from going through her jewelry box to see if anything had been taken.
To her relief, everything appeared to be in order. Nevertheless, she didn’t intend to leave her jewelry box lying around anymore. She replaced the hairpins and shut the blue velvet box, securing the gold latch. Glancing around, she noticed the bedside table had a drawer. Of course, a drawer didn’t compare with a safe, but it was better than nothing—especially now she knew she couldn’t leave things lying around for the staff to find.
She tucked away her jewelry box then closed the drawer and glanced out the window. Night had fallen. The sky was an inky, purple black with a crimson rim along the far horizon—still early. If Julian wasn’t already up and about, he would be soon.
She cursed under her breath. She still needed to shower and get dressed before she went downstairs. The incident with Gisele had put her completely on guard, but it didn’t change the fact that if she was going to catch Julian at breakfast, she’d have to hurry.
* * * * *
Julian stirred from a dream and stretched. With his eyes still closed, he rolled over and reached for Eleni, but his hand found only cool, satin sheets. His eyes popped open and dark brows pulled into a frown. He sat up on his elbow and raked his hand through his hair. The door was closed, and the room silent. When had she left his bed?
Their shared night of pleasure was seared on his memory. The scent of her blood beating with lust had nearly driven him mad with desire. He had not felt so alive in centuries before claiming her.
A twinge of disappointment plucked at him that she hadn’t stayed until the lure of nightfall woke him. Exhaling deeply, he rolled onto his back and folded his arms behind his head. It had been a very long time since a woman had shared a bed with him. Sometimes, he called on Marguerite to sample a woman from her harem, but it was not the same as having an Acolyte of his own to share his bed. The women were faceless, nameless. Gone the next morning as their vampire mistress demanded of them, which suited him fine. Eleni was different, special in some way he couldn’t put his finger on. And it wasn’t simply because she answered to no one but him.