Page 60
“I’m remembering the way you kissed me.”
Colour warmed her throat. She ate another piece of cheese and let me enjoy the result.
“We sleep,” I continued. “A bed works. So does this floor. Hunger makes rest shallow, and the court wakes me whenever someone crosses the lower boundary.”
“Does a bite turn someone?”
“No. Feeding takes blood from a human. Turning requires a deliberate exchange. The vampire drains the human close to death and gives blood back while the heart is still beating. It can’t happen by accident during sex or feeding.”
She absorbed that in silence. Her thumb passed over the two marks on her wrist, and some of the tension left her shoulders.
She looked up. “Would your blood heal me?”
“Yes, but it would also make you sensitive to me for several days. You’d feel where I was and whether I was injured. Too much could let me influence your body more easily. I won’t give it to you unless an injury makes the risk necessary or you choose it knowing what follows.”
“Good. I’m already sharing enough.”
I rubbed my thumb over her knuckles until the tension left them.
Her foot touched my thigh. “Did becoming king make you want people to obey you?”
“No. It gave me the power to demand obedience inside this court. Power doesn’t create the desire to use it. Adrian wanted control long before he stole access to the wards.”
“What did you want?”
The complete answer included the plan I’d made before I met her. I didn’t give her that part.
I answered with what was true now. “I wanted the court safe and its human families free to live outside it. I wanted a queen who could tell me when I was wrong without fearing the result. Right now, I want Adrian away from you and every chain off my body.”
My gaze moved over her mouth and lower. “I also want you back between my knees.”
Bryony’s pulse quickened. “That part sounded less royal.”
“It’s the most honest part of the job.”
She smiled, but her eyes stayed on me. “I want you too. I’m still deciding what I trust.”
“Take the time you need.”
The answer hurt. I’d promised direct answers, and the truth I still held could break the alliance we’d made in the garden.
Her hand remained in mine while the fire burnt lower. I kept my grip loose and stayed beside her.
Bryony yawned and tried to hide it behind her hand.
“You need sleep.”
“You don’t need vampire hearing to reach that conclusion.”
“No. I needed the yawn.”
She finished her water and stood. The old key, her phone and Edith’s case were locked in the bedroom, and her knife waited beside the bed. We’d done everything we could to make the room safe without pretending a locked door could stop Harrowmere.
Bryony paused beside me. Her fingers brushed the red mark at my throat, then travelled into my hair.
I tilted my head back. She kissed me once, slow and warm, and stepped away before I could pull her closer.
“Goodnight, Stellan.”
