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“Is Absolon here?” I turn to face her.
“He’s coming,” a raspy voice says from behind me.
I look to see Ezra on the staircase, though he wasn’t there a second ago.
I haven’t seen Ezra since he abducted me, and there’s something about him that still makes me stand up straighter, the calm dissipating. In the daytime, in this house, he seems taller than I remembered, wiry and lean, but full of power. His style is much more relaxed than Solons, a black denim jacket, a navy graphic t-shirt, grey jeans. His dark fair falls softly across his forehead, his skin tone tanned, not pale like Wolf or Solon. He has the look of Italian nobility in a casual, yet deadly, package.
“Hi,” I say in a meek voice. “I came to get my bag.”
Ezra purses his lips in disbelief, his brown eyes raking over me. I’m wearing jeans, and a thin, off-the-shoulder sweater, and the bare skin it exposes is where his gaze finally rests.
Ice burns my shoulder as his eyes slowly roam up to my neck, making me feel unsteady and unsettled.
Yvonne clears her throat loudly, snapping Ezra out of it. I don’t have to turn around to know she just gave him a cutting look, because even he looks mildly afraid.
“Solon will be with you in a moment dear,” Yvonne says to me, briefly touching my elbow. “Would you like me to stay with you?”
I blink at her. How brave this woman is, standing with two vampires, one of whom desperately needs to feed. “That won’t be necessary.”
She nods, a wash of relief coming across her, and then she disappears down the hall.
Ezra watches me for a moment, then slowly walks down the stairs, his gaze unnerving.
I look away, finding my focus drawn to the staircase bannister. There are numerous deep gauges in the wood, like something had clawed at it. Someone has tried to cover it up with a few coats of shiny paint, but they still remain.
I had done some more reading about the Westerfeld house the last few days, trying to meld together what was fiction and what was reality. Apparently, Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan, used to frequent here, and prior to his conversion into Satanism, he was a lion tamer and kept a cub inside the house. He also used to hold satanic rituals in the ballroom, which I’m guessing was Dark Eyes.
The whole thing makes me shiver, even more than the fact that this is a full-blown vampire’s lair.
“Is that from the lion?” I ask him, gesturing to the bottom of the bannister.
Ezra eyes me in surprise. “Lion? No. That was Solon.”
My mouth opens. How the hell did Solon do that? He’s got sharp fingernails, but they aren’t claws.
“Do you want something to drink?” Ezra asks me, gesturing to a large set of doors.
Yes. Blood.
But I don’t feel comfortable telling him that. I don’t want to mention blood around other vampires, and the last thing I want is for him to offer himself, despite how hungry am.
“I’m good,” I tell him, walking toward the room, Ezra right at my back. I can feel his frozen stare on my shoulder, practically smell the lust and desire rolling off him in waves.
We enter the large library, a gorgeous place filled with books from floor-to-ceiling, all teak wood shelving, old chandeliers hanging from a gilded ceiling, but it’s hard to focus on that when all I can feel is Ezra’s hunger.
He places a hand on my shoulder, and I gasp at the contact, freezing in place. Fear floods all my senses, setting off panic, while the ruby in my necklace starts to burn on my chest.
“Please remove your hand,” Absolon’s quiet but deadly voice comes from behind us.
Ezra hesitates, then takes it away. I breathe a sigh of relief, turning around to see Solon leaning against the doorway, black pants, a burgundy dress shirt, sleeves rolled up to the elbows.
But despite the casual pose, his eyes possess the lethal self-assurance of a cold-blooded killer.
Ezra raises his palms as he saunters past him. “Don’t worry, I wouldn’t dream of hurting your beloved protégé.”
I know Ezra was being sarcastic, but the word beloved hits me deep. For a moment, I wonder what it would be like to have this man’s love, if he’s even capable of it. Surely vampires fall in love, don’t they?
Not for you to find out, I scold myself, willing the butterflies inside my stomach to settle.
