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Hopefully takings had been steady.
I wavered as I stood behind the closed door, still in the opulent bedroom, somehow unwilling to take the next step to leave. Despite everything, I felt safe here.
I felt fucking wanted.
I had an undeniable pull to Nicolas. I’d let him touch me, and his fingers had been magic, his kisses like a drug created just for me. I wanted him to do more to me. In this bed.
In his.
A shudder ran through me, chasing a spike of desire at the idea of being surrounded by his scent, wrapped in his sheets, filled by his body.
A hunger like I’d never known threatened to claim me, and I took a deep breath then swallowed, forcing the hunger away.
Something about this man made me weak, and I couldn’t afford to be weak. Steeling myself against the ridiculous, clearly self-destructive instinct to stay, I wrenched the bedroom door open and stepped out into the hallway.
Like the first night I’d arrived, Nicolas detached himself from the shadows, straightening from where he’d been leaning against the wall.
“Leia.” His voice was hoarse.
“I have to go.” I’d meant to sound firm and businesslike, but my words were desperate and sorrowful instead.
“Don’t go.” His eyes beseeched me, and when he walked toward me, I was powerless to escape.
My back hit the wall, and his arms braced either side me, pinning me there. Trapping me in another gilded cage, but I melted against him as he stared at me, one of his hands tangled loosely in my hair.
“Don’t go,” he said again. “Stay here—be mine.”
“Nic.” I stared at his mouth as he spoke, watching his lips form the words until I couldn’t stand it anymore, and my body betrayed all of my logical decisions.
I rose on my tiptoes and my mouth brushed his. For a moment, his gray eyes darkened, clouds of confusion swirling in their depths. Then his gaze cleared, and he crushed me to him, aligning me to his body so I could feel every muscle and the evidence of his arousal laying heavy against my hip as he claimed my mouth, the force of his lips almost bruising as desperation flared between us.
His tongue slid against mine, probing forward before his movements became gentle and exploratory, almost languid in the most intimate of caresses.
My breathing spiraled out of control until I had to draw away to inhale. Nicolas’s forehead rested against mine, his eyes closed so I couldn’t see what he was thinking, didn’t know how he felt.
“I have to go,” I whispered, and his eyes sprang open, pain flaring dark red in the midst of all the gray.
“Stay.” His word was nothing more than a breath. “I can give you anything you want.”
But as he spoke those words, the certainty that he was wrong settled in my gut. I wanted to be loved, not just be required as the battery to supercharge whatever vampiric powers Nicolas thought he had.
“I don’t just exist to secure your ascension to your father’s throne.” I tried to erase all regret from the words, but I wasn’t sure I managed. “I won’t.”
He stepped back, his face paler than I’d seen it, and I took the opportunity to walk away from him, my steps silent as I moved down the hallway to the stairs.
For once, Mr. Baldwin was nowhere to be seen, but the taxi I’d requested idled outside the front door. I slid into the backseat and closed my eyes against the pain that streaked through my chest.
A sob lodged there, and before it grew and I couldn’t speak around it, I forced out the address of The Pour House, my throat already thick, my eyes gritty. The driver met my gaze briefly in the mirror, his pale blue eyes kind as he nodded.
As he pulled away, I glanced out the back window, and that was a huge mistake. Nicolas stood in front of his house, watching me depart, his face twisted in something that looked far too much like anguish.
I curled my fists, pressing my nails into my palms to try to reawaken my resolve, thankful for the fact I still couldn’t speak and tell the driver to turn around. I closed my eyes as I turned away so I didn’t have to see Nicolas anymore, and a tear slid silently down the side of my nose as the car turned onto the road and we picked up speed as I left the impossible casino owner behind.
After we drew up at the bar, I dragged my small bag with me as I slid from the seat, and when I turned to tell the driver to wait while I found some money, he waved me away and drove off, leaving me standing outside my bar with nowhere to go but in.
I turned around and looked at it for a moment. Then I blinked and looked again. What the…? Tired, cracked paint had been replaced, and I had a brand new, updated sign. Tables and chairs sat outside on a refurbished covered deck, and they were full. Customers talked and laughed as low-volume Zydeco music filtered through state-of-the-art speakers.
I dropped my bag, and a puff of dry dust blew up from the ground. Surely this wasn’t my place. My bar had never hopped or popped, or whatever shit bars were supposed to do. I’d limped from open to close, till count to till count, day after day, never sure if I’d be able to keep the lights on and the beer flowing, and now look at it.
