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I nod, and then sigh loudly. “Well, I’m sure I’ll be down there soon.” Even though the idea of feeding off a stranger, a human no less, gives me the creeps.
There’s a knock at the door and Amethyst answers it, smiling at her mom as she takes a tray of tea.
The door closes and she brings the tray over to me, putting it on the coffee table. It smells heavenly, in a porcelain pot, with shortbread cookies beside it. I didn’t think I’d ever be hungry for food again, but my stomach growls. It also reminds me of drinking tea and eating cookies in my parent’s kitchen, and my heart pangs for the innocence of the years past, innocence I’ll never get back.
Amethyst pulls up a velvet ottoman and sits across from me. “My mom made the cookies herself. You better eat them since the vampires don’t eat as much food as they should, and I eat too many sweets as it is.”
I reach for a cookie and nibble on the end of it, unsure how my stomach will react after all that blood. Like I’ve discovered with all the food I’ve had lately, I can pick up on every single ingredient, down to the specific type. It’s pretty amazing, though it can make food overwhelming. Thankfully, these cookies are simple and delicious.
“I’m sure with you being half witch, you won’t have to drink blood that often anyway,” Amethyst says. “And that’s what Solon’s there for. You won’t be in the Dark Room.”
“I don’t think so,” I say, trying to catch the crumbs from my mouth. “We had a fight.”
She raises a perfectly groomed brow. “A fight? With Solon?”
I frown. “That doesn’t happen?”
Her lips curl with amusement. “No. I mean, it happens. But everyone basically does what he tells them to do.”
“Alpha of the house, huh.”
“Yeah. And they’re all alphas, so it’s a handful. But he rules the roost. He rules most of the city, to be honest.”
“I got that impression earlier,” I say, thinking of the waiter at the restaurant.
“So why do you think you’re fighting with him?”
I look down at the tea, avoiding her eyes. “Oh. Uh. I got…carried away.”
“With feeding?”
“Yeah…”
“That’s what he wants from you. He’s fine.”
“Well, that, and uh…he was naked and I was naked and…”
She stares at me, waiting for me to spell it out.
I exhale. “This has never happened to me before, but I guess I was a little handsy and out-of-control and he told me to stop and when I didn’t…”
I close my eyes, feeling gross and ashamed and I probably shouldn’t be telling Amethyst, a girl I don’t even know, the intimate, personal details of what happened.
“He got mad,” she fills in.
“Yeah,” I say, looking at her. “I’ve never seen him mad before. It scared the shit out of me. But at least I stopped.”
She nods, rubbing her pink lipstick together. “Hmmm. It is rare that Solon gets mad. I’ve seen it, and you’re right, it’s, uh, intense. Especially when he’s always keeping his emotions so perfectly in-check. But he won’t stay mad. He understands more than anyone else what it’s like to lose control…”
The way she trails off there sounds like she just said something she shouldn’t have.
“What is it?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “Nothing. I think your tea is ready.” She leans over and pours my tea for me, the fragrance of the lemon balm filling the room. Not the best smell, but right now I find it comforting.
She gives me another quick smile. “Solon has a complicated past and I don’t know the half of it,” she explains. “All I got from him are the things he sometimes tells me when he’s drunk.”
“He gets drunk?” I ask, eager to see him lose his decorum.
“Rarely. It takes a lot for a vampire to get super drunk, but I have seen it. The perks of running a bar for them.”
“So, what did he tell you?”
I half expect her to tell me what Wolf told me, that his past is his to share or some bro-code excuse like that.
“I just know he has issues with getting close to women,” she says carefully.
“Surely a man like that has every woman in the city throwing themselves at him,” I say.
“Oh, he does. He attracts them like crazy. It’s not just him compelling them either, it’s just the way he is. Normal humans, they know something is amiss with him, something beautiful and dark and dangerous. They want to be a part of it. Equally scared and fascinated. That’s what compels them.”
“So, he doesn’t bring any of them home?”
“No,” she says. “I mean, he sleeps with them, but usually at a hotel or their place.”
And at that, I’m suddenly hit with a wave of nausea, feeling physically ill, my heart seeming to collapse on itself.
