Page 68 of Till Death Do Us Part

My heart surged, a soaring feeling that made me feel like I could cry with relief.

Vera.

Protecting me again. The instant she was here, I’d never felt so safe in my life, like nothing could possibly happen to me. Even with Peter still clutching my hand, I wanted to throw myself on Vera and kiss her already.

“Oh, yeah? Or what?” Peter chuckled, and the others laughed with him. Vera gave them their second of laughter before she spoke in a deadly low voice.

“The human hand has eight carpal bones, five metacarpal bones, two phalanges in the thumb, and three in each other finger, for a total of twenty-seven bones. Breaking the carpals will disable your wrist altogether. Your hand will be completely useless, which will give me the opportunity to break each of the metacarpal bones and bend your hand backwards over itself, and then to break each phalange before you can do anything other than scream. They make a sound like stepping on gravel. Your hand will never fully heal, and you’ll keep hearing that sound for the rest of your life. One more time. Take your hand off of my wife.”

The room was deathly quiet now, and Peter’s hand felt limp and clammy on mine. He let go, and I tugged my hand away. Vera gave him one more squeeze around the wrist, and I heard him make a quivering sound of panic before she let go.

“That’s better,” she said. “I understand the mistake. It’s easy to mix people up in a masked ball. But just so you know, this woman belongs to me and me alone.”

“I… Constance,” I whispered, voice shaky. She smirked at me, and Peter scoffed, turning away.

“All right,” he said, puffing his chest and putting on the bravado, “someone doesn’t know how to act at a party. Come on, guys, let’s get out of here.”

Vera watched him go before, quietly, she said, “He’s lucky I’m in a good mood.”

“That was your good mood?”

She turned to me, eyes gleaming behind the mask. “Follow me,” she said, and she slipped her hand into mine, leading me through the crowds until we got into one of the quiet rooms, up on the mezzanine floor, with a heavy red velvet curtain drawn most of the way covering the view of the ballroom below. She pointed me towards an electrical outlet on the wall. “I broke some of the internal casing to create a ventilation channel into the next room’s circuitry. You’ll be able to hear clearly, but just to make sure, I’ve set up a listening bug inside as well. Between the two of you, you should be able to make out everything about the conversation.”

“All right…” My heart was still pounding from the interaction with Peter, my hands shaking. Vera smiled at me, licking her lips.

“Now that that’s settled,” she said, her voice low and murky, and she backed me up against the wall. Something surged in my chest, the soaring feeling from when she’d stepped in to rescue me flaring up into heat instead, and I murmured softly as she buried her fingers in my hair. “I just watched somebody else try to make a pass at my wife, and I need to stake my claim on her.”

“Vera…”

“Shh. I’m Constance now.”

“I’m glad you showed up…”

She pressed her lips against mine, gripping me tighter as she kissed me hungrily, our masks clicking together. “Mine,” she whispered hungrily against my lips, and I nodded eagerly, my knees buckling.

“Yours. Only yours.”

She nipped on my bottom lip, sucking lightly, and I moaned in surprise when she pushed her hand down my front.

“Oh, V—Constance—I—is this the moment for…?”

“Just enough to prove that you’re mine.”

Oh, God. It wasn’t the moment at all, but my body didn’t get that message. I moaned quietly as my back arched into her touch, quivering. The adrenaline heightened the situation… the panic of a strange man dragging me away, and then Vera appearing to save me, like she always did.

I wanted her so badly. I wanted to do whatever she asked.

She hiked my dress up, raking her fingers up my thigh, and I moaned into her mouth. Her strong fingers teasing higher before they dragged up the front of my underwear…

“Oh, God,” I whispered.

“Do you want it?” It was a rhetorical question. Yes was the only answer I knew. And yes was the answer.

“Please, yes.”

“Then let’s make sure we’re properly making a point of it,” she said, and I gasped as she took me by the hips and repositioned me, pushing me through the curtains to see the ballroom below, and I went with a gasp, leaning against the railing as Vera’s hand continued to reach up my dress, obscured by the draperies on the railing. She pressed herself up behind me—a tender embrace to anyone looking, anyone who wouldn’t know better.

“Make sure to keep a straight face,” she whispered in my ear. “Don’t let any of them know I’m up here claiming my fuck toy’s needy little pussy.”