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I tried to sleep too, but I couldn’t stop thinking. I laid on my mattress and stared up at the ceiling. I threw my window open, listened—for what, I had no idea. Then I checked all fifty-nine of my potted plants and found thirteen that were in danger of becoming root bound. I brought the baker’s dozen needing new homes to the kitchen counter where I proceeded to make the entire kitchen a muddy disaster while I repotted my babies.
I was knee-deep in plant number nine at seven-thirty in the morning when the knock came. It’d taken the vampire a few hours longer than I’d thought to hunt me down, considering vampires didn’t need much in the way of sleep. I figured he’d probably been up since the potion had been activated, which meant he’d lasted three and a half hours in his newly enchanted apartment.
I took a deep breath, brushed hair back from my face, clapped off the worst of the dirt and headed to open the door. I was prepared for a battle. I wasn’t prepared for coffee.
“Thought you might have trouble sleeping,” Dominic said by way of greeting.
Then Dom shoved a hot coffee into my hands as he wandered aimlessly into my apartment. He was wearing black jeans, a black V-neck shirt that showed off a hint of his impressive chest, and a black leather jacket. His hair was standing on end, as if he’d just driven through a wind tunnel to get here, even though I was only a short elevator ride away.
And holy guacamole, he looked hot.
I knew the stubborn, staunch feminist in me should be all up in arms at the fact that he was marching into my apartment without a real invitation, but to be honest, I was tingling in sorts of ways that had me thinking I wasn’t all that mad to start with. My hands were getting sweaty with how close he was standing.
“Good morning,” I managed, taking a swig of the coffee. “Are you trying to get my blood boiling with this venti latte so I’m tastier to munch on when you eventually decide to kill me?”
“Kill you?” Dom murmured. “Funny, and I thought that you were trying to kill me this morning.”
I brushed a wisp of hair out of my face. “What would make you think that?”
“Could be the boiling hot water that poured out of my shower this morning.” Dominic stepped closer to me. “Came down like pellets of lava.”
I had no doubt he could hear my heart pounding. I was certain he was trying to make me uncomfortable, and it was working. Not because I felt unsafe but because I couldn’t keep my mind focused on the conversation at hand.
I could only focus on the way his chest felt against my cheek when we’d been dancing, or the way those big arms could scoop me up like a bouquet of flowers, like I weighed nothing.
“Then when I turned the knob to cold, nothing but black sludge came out of the shower head.” Another step closer. “Then I went to grab a bottle of water from the fridge and...” Dom paused for a smirk. “Low and behold, all of the bottled water in my fridge had been turned into holy water.”
My potion had been more creative than I’d expected. I didn’t say anything, because technically, there was no way for Dominic to know for sure it had been me turning his perfect apartment into a war zone.
“I opened the freezer to see the damage there. Every food item had been turned into garlic ice cream.”
I cleared my throat, thinking Emmy deserved some extra credit for that one. I hadn’t specified all the details of the spell down to the nitty gritty specifics. We’d allowed some room for the spell to morph and change and adapt, and I was impressed at the magic’s innate creativity.
“I wasn’t going to mention the fact that my thermostat was set to a temperature that only a polar bear would appreciate,” Dominic said.
“You mean it was set as cold as your coffin?” I shot back, finally finding a rebuttal.
It’d taken a while for my voice to kick in due to the sheer proximity of the vampire close to me.
Dom extended his arms, caging me against the kitchen island. “Was I supposed to find the steel bullets hilarious when they came shooting at me from the closet?”
“Steel bullets shot at you?” I gasped. “No! I didn’t program the spell to actually hurt anyone. Emmy said—”
“Aha.” Dom’s voice was a whisper against my ear that sent trembles down my spine to the tips of my toes. “So you admit that you were behind the potion. You’re the reason my formerly pristine penthouse is falling apart at the seams.”
“I’d hardly call a few hiccups in your morning falling apart,” I said. “I’m just trying to give you a taste of what it’ll be like for me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“When you kick me out of my place in two months.” I threw my hands up, having to wiggle them through the small space between me and Dom to get them there. It made the movement lose some of its effect. “I’m not going to be able to afford to stay in The Hollow, let alone in a nice penthouse. I’m going to have to move out of the city, drive an hour just to work here, and even then, I won’t exactly be able to afford much in the way of luxuries.”
Dom was perfectly still. No breathing. I doubted there was a heartbeat. He was a gargoyle of stone formed perfectly around me, and I was confident I couldn’t budge him an inch even if I threw my whole weight at him.
“You don’t get what it’s like,” I whispered. “You live in your castle in the sky, having been around for hundreds of years, and you don’t know what it’s like for us regular people.”
“Darling—”
“Don’t darling me,” I said. “I hate what you’re doing to me. You can’t go through with these actions and then pretend we’re friends. You’re taking away one of the things I care most about in this world.”
