“I’m fine,” I said. Or tried to say. My throat felt thick as the shock of the afternoon still buzzed through my body. My hands hadn’t stopped shaking, and my limbs were tingling. I looked down at the floor. My blue suede vans were scuffing Draven’s nice marble entryway. My legs felt unsteady and shaky, like I needed to sit down before I fell down.
Draven’s hands settled on my arms. He tilted my face up to his. “I’m sorry, Mia,” he said. There was so much regret in his voice that it made me wince. “You’ve just arrived and already someone has tried to hurt you.”
He stepped away and dropped his hands, making me feel abruptly colder. “I would understand if you want to go back to Manhattan.”
I peered up at him. His face was closed off, and I wasn’t sure what I’d seen in his expression.
Power was still rolling around me in what felt like waves. The waves crashed into me, still threatening to drop me to my knees, but I stiffened my legs and fought to stay upright. Before I could ask him if he could stop flooding the room with zinging power, the surrounding power stopped abruptly and dissipated. Maybe making the new assistant pee in the entryway like a puppy was a faux pas. Something polite vampires tried not to do.
I was extremely grateful.
I did a quick assessment of myself and, realistically, my situation. And the overwhelming consensus was that I wanted to stay. Not for Draven or my new position, but for myself. I’d never known any of this existed. Bomb not withstanding, I’d never felt so much peace before. Anywhere. As we’d cruised through the medium-sized town, I’d been so impressed that most people felt good to me. Some, like Draven, felt like what I imagined catnip felt like to a cat. Soooo relaxing. It was a new way of living for me, and one I didn’t want to give up. Not for any reason. I was so sick of living day-to-day feeling chaotic and anxious. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.
“I’ll stay,” I whispered, trying to smile. But I was certain it ended up more grimace than smile when Draven looked at my offering with a troubled look in his eyes. “I think I need a double chocolate chip muffin. If you’ll excuse me.”
I headed toward the kitchens, but Draven’s soft, velvety voice stopped me. “Thank you for staying, Mia. We’ll keep you protected.”
I made my way to the kitchen on weak legs without looking back at him and pushed through the door.
I needed a whole lot of carbs.
* * *
After grabbingmy muffin from the kitchens, and meeting the French chef Henri (Ahn-rEE), I tried to find my way back to my suite again. I was still trembling, but it was getting more manageable.
I’d learned on my whirlwind tour with the silent Mesmer that the villa was broken up into four different wings: the Garden Wing, the Ocean Wing, the Forest Wing, and the Galaxy Wing. Even though I’d stayed in another guest room last night as they finished up my bathroom, I knew that I’d been put in the Ocean Wing in the Sunset Suite, so I headed there with my muffin, humming under my breath as I ate my chocolatey Prozac. It was such an unhealthy thing, eating your feelings, but I’d just been almost blown up. If anything, I was rather proud of myself for only reaching for chocolate. Maybe a valium would have been a better choice.
They’d decorated each wing of the house according to its name. Somehow, someone had guessed that I loved the ocean, so I got to traverse these halls, gazing in awe at the murals on the walls that looked like I’d gotten transported to various beaches around the world. Some had underwater themes, and had tons of creatures and ocean plants, but most were just murals of beaches around the world. Theycoveredentire walls and weregorgeous!
As I finished the chocolaty goodness that is a double chocolate chip muffin, I licked my fingers and entered my suite. Murals of beaches from Borneo, Australia, and Fiji covered my walls. My chandelier was made of seashells, and my walls were painted a soft sand color. My bed was a canopy bed with cool blue sheets and a luxurious baby blue comforter. Thick, sandy colored carpet covered the floors, with a large seashell themed rug. An enormous fireplace took up part of the wall across from my bed, and a huge curved-in window with a thick, padded bench-seat took up the other wall.
I slipped off my shoes and looked around at the nicknacks that filled the floating shelves and the shelves above my dresser. I’d been told I could make this room my own, but I had brought little from home, and even though Draven had paid someone to ship the things in my storage unit back in Manhattan to me, nothing had arrived yet. When they did, I would put my personal stamp on my room. Coincidentally, most of my nicknacks were ocean themed. They would fit in perfectly here.
My hands were sticky from the muffin, so I tried to locate the door to the bathroom. The first was a smallish closet that looked like it was full of linens for my bed. The second was the newly re-done bathroom.
My eyes went wide as I looked around. It washuge!The bathtub looked to be some high tech, ridiculously comfortable tub with jets, but the shower seemed to be the focal point of the whole bathroom. It was the size of my kitchen back home. It was a round walk-in with glass enclosing everything from waist up, and tile from waist down. There was an entrance just in front, with a small step that led in. The tile had been done in swirls of differing shades of blue and silver. It had two shower heads, one on each side, three windows set at eye-level that were open to the breeze coming off the coast, and beneath the windows, a curved bench that sat against the wall. It was amazing! Breathtaking!
Also, there was a naked man in it.
I yelped, making some kind of embarrassing noise between indignation and mortification. I had a brief glimpse of paleish skin, short silver hair and tattoos of celestial bodies before I threw my hands over my eyes.
“What are you doing in my shower?” I demanded. Seriously, why was there someone in my shower? For a minute I worried that I’d gotten the wrong room, but nope, I remembered the hallway, and I remembered Mesmer showing me the door I’d just come in perfectly. Iwasin the right room.Hewasn’t!
The man laughed. “It’s the best shower in the villa!”
Well…yes, probably. From what little I’d seen of it, it had looked divine. “I don’t care if my shower is better than Buckingham Palace, it’s not your shower!” I growled. I was suddenly very territorial over my beautiful, perfect bathroom. I’d never seen anything so gorgeous in all of my life, and I didn’t want to share. I felt completely justified in this. “Out!”
I twitched one of my fingers a little to the side and looked to see if he was finishing up. Focusing only on his face, I watched as he pumped some conditioner into his hands and worked it through his hair. I growled at him. I wanted him gone, and he was not listening!
Trying to keep my eyes squeezed mostly shut, I stomped into the shower, and blindly felt for the nozzle to turn it off, getting myself soaked in the process. Once I turned it the last bit, my ears picked up the sound of the other shower head spurting out water. Growling, I stomped to that one, and turned it off too.
Then the first one came back on.
“We can do this all day, Starshine. I need to rinse.”
“You wouldn’t need to rinse the conditioner out if you’d left when I first asked!” The nerve of this guy.
I turned to him and folded my hands across my chest, staring him down. The man was handsome, I reluctantly admitted to myself. He wasn’t built like a linebacker, but he wasn’t without muscle either. He had more of a toned swimmer’s build. His hair was a beautiful silver, and his eyes were dark purple with specks of gold dust in them. He had tattoos on his pecs of stars and moons, and one sleeve tattoo that looked like a swirling galaxy.
