Page 93 of Collared by the Vampire Prince

“Or what?” he asks mildly.

“Or I’ll tear your fingers off.”

Never mind that I can’t shift into my true form. It still feels good to say.

Felix’s eyes narrow, the last trace of his smile disappearing. “How dare you threaten me?”

I nearly laugh.

“Who did you say you belong to?” Victoria asks, as though we have been making pleasant conversation all this time.

She’s staring at my collar, no doubt wondering what my Master might do if they harmed me. I don’t tell them I don’t have one.

I give them a wolfish grin. “Why don’t you provoke me and find out?”

Victoria snorts. “Feisty.” She turns to Felix. “Probably not worth finding out.”

Felix scowls but drops his hand from Jane’s neck.

Victoria’s eyes gleam. “How does it feel to be bested by a wolf?”

Felix flips open his textbook with unnecessary force and refuses to answer.

I take Jane’s hand and give it a small squeeze. She does not look at me. She only shakes her head before withdrawing her hand and folding it tightly in her lap again.

I frown, confused. Before I say something, Zott claps his hands, the sound cracking through the classroom.

“Attention, please, class. Attention!”

Silence falls as everyone turns to face the front. Professor Zott picks up a piece of chalk and writes a single word that spans half the blackboard.

MISSIONARY.

My throat goes dry. What the actual…?

“Missionary,” Zott announces, dusting chalk from his fingers. “One of many positions with which you will become intimately familiar over the coming months. I refer in particular, of course, to our lovely wolf shifters.”

Several vampires laugh.

“Some call it vanilla, but it remains popular for good reason. It is essentially the default—though the vampires you serve may have their own preferences. Each to their own, of course.” He chuckles before addressing those kneeling. “Many of you will spend a considerable amount of time upon your backs, so it is best to become comfortable there.”

Heat crawls up my throat. It is not quite embarrassment, but very close to it.

I assumed from the name that this class would involve obedience training of some kind. I assumed kneeling, and collars, and possibly even leashes. I had not let myself imagine we’d be discussing sex—

Zott pulls a cord beside the blackboard, and a chart unrolls from the ceiling like a window blind. It is filled with diagrams. Men. Women. Vampires and shifters. Naked bodies rendered in painstaking detail and arranged in numbered positions. Legs open. Hips raised. Hands restrained or placed obediently at their sides.

My face burns hotter. For one humiliating instant, I remember Nathaniel beneath me in the carriage. His hands gripping my hips. The hard length of him pressing against my thigh as he rocked slowly beneath me.

His voice echoes through my mind, There are other ways to show your submission. I wait for disgust to overwhelm me. It comes—but not quickly enough. Not strongly enough to smother the treacherous warmth stirring beneath it.

I must be in shock. Shock, or slowly losing my mind.

“Now,” Zott continues, tapping the first diagram with a long wooden pointer so sharply I flinch, “the receiving partner must learn not to impede access. Knees wide. Back relaxed. Throat available where desired.”

His pointer slides upwards along the drawn body.

“There is a difference between lying down and presenting oneself. A properly trained pet does not make a Master doubt his or her eagerness.”