“Using him to set an example?”
“It’s like you know me,” Ryder drawled.
“Some days,” Damien said, glancing at me. “Is she coming to Silvano City with us?”
Ryder looked at me, his dark eyes flaring with black flames. My skin heated as he caressed me with that searing gaze.
I felt owned under that stare. Possessed. His.
My thighs clenched at the thought, my stomach flickering with a forbidden fire. Logically, I knew craving him was a death sentence. But my body refused to adhere to reasonable thought. I reacted to him because I was trained to react to him. It suited the supernatural chain of life.
Ryder was the hunter.
And I was his prey.
“Yes,” he murmured after a long, hot beat. “Watch the living room footage from a little over six hours ago, and you’ll understand why. She’s quite gifted with knives.” His eyes left me for his friend. “Everyone will expect her to be weak as a human. I can use that.”
“She’ll be even more underestimated if she’s perceived as a member of your harem,” Damien said, sending a chill down my spine. He spoke about me as if I were an object to be reassigned and used where needed—a startlingly accurate summary of my life.
“My harem?” Amusement flirted with Ryder’s features. “Ah, right. I suppose I’ve inherited Silvano’s toys.”
“You have.”
“And who’s protecting them at the moment?”
“Garland,” Damien replied.
Ryder grunted. “So you mean he’s fucking them.”
“Likely.”
“Great.” Ryder returned his attention to me, his pupils dilating as his gaze dropped to my chest, then gradually rose to my face. “Hmm, Willow would make a delectable addition to my harem.”
“She would. But she’s going to need a wardrobe to match.”
Ryder nodded slowly. “Yes. Arrange it.” The dark flames in his eyes glowed brighter, revealing a hungry vampire behind his handsome mask.
I swallowed.
Joining a vampire’s harem had been near the bottom of my desire list, just a few steps above the breeding camp.
Yet the idea of being in Ryder’s bed didn’t turn me off. Which was exactly why I needed to fight it. His interest in me would be temporary, and when he finished, I’d be handed off to another.
And then to another.
Living out the rest of my days in sexual servitude, just waiting for one of the vampires to accidentally—or purposely—kill me.
His touch ventured up my side to my face, where his knuckles kissed my cheek in a tender caress. “Don’t look so frightened, pet,” he whispered. “I’ll make sure you enjoy it.”
Damien grunted. “Don’t say that in front of the others. She’s a toy, Ryder. Remember that.”
He was right. Vampires didn’t see humans as equals. They didn’t care if we were hurt or frightened or dying. We were food. Fuck toys. Beings they enslaved to meet their needs.
Yet Ryder hadn’t treated me that way, and even now, he continued to glide his fingers across my skin to my throat. “You probably want to take a shower. Then you need to eat.”
Damien sighed loudly. “Fine, do it your way. I’ll be with Number Twelve in the basement.”
Ryder continued to ignore him, his eyes holding mine. “Tomorrow, I’m teaching you how to shoot a gun.”
“That’ll go over well,” I heard Damien mutter from farther away.
“Then we’ll work on improving some of your sparring techniques,” Ryder continued, disregarding Damien’s side commentary. “You fought well, but all of your instruction has been in regard to taking down humans. As I showed you earlier, my kind is different. We’re stronger and faster. But all vampires have weaknesses. I’ll teach you how to exploit those.”
“Wh-why?” I asked, my throat dry. None of this made any sense. He wanted me to teach him about my courses—something he should already have had access to—and now he planned to add me to his harem and teach me defensive strategies reserved for Vigils.
“Because you’re going to be my little secret warrior,” he replied, his eyes twinkling. “You’ll be the ally no one will anticipate.”
“Ally?”
“My ascension won’t be easy.” He drew his fingers through my hair, his eyes following the movement. “There are those who want to kill me, as you’ve just experienced. And you, my sweet pet, are going to help me slay them all.”
The prey becomes the hunter, I thought, mulling over the concept.
How had this become my life? My fate? How long would he keep me? Would I die at his side? Die because of him?
Would I die even faster without him?
My stomach twisted at the notion. He wanted to train me how to kill others. Perhaps I could use the knowledge to defend myself instead. To escape. To finally be free.
And go where? I wondered.
I couldn’t answer that.
Ryder stood and held out his hand. “Now come, it’s time for you to shower. I’ll make you some plain chicken to eat afterward since I know my other food has been hard on you. We’ll work up to it.”
This vampire baffled my mind, yet I found my palm rising to meet his. Warmth spread up my arm at the touch, the fire reigniting inside me. He tugged me up to my feet, his opposite hand finding my hip to steady me.
“You took sexual arts classes, yes?” he asked, his palm leaving my hip to press into my lower back. My chest met his bare torso, his heat a welcome blanket to my senses.
“Yes,” I whispered, my throat suddenly tight.
“Good,” he replied, releasing my hand to cup my cheek. “You’re going to need that training in Silvano City. Because I intend to take full advantage of it.” He pressed his lips to the edge of my mouth before gliding along my skin to my ear. “Try to use this week to prepare yourself properly, Willow. I’m not an easy lover, and I will be grading you on your technique.”
My stomach flipped, his words showering me in a sea of warmth and fury.
I wanted to argue and fall to my knees at the same time.
It was a perplexing reaction that rendered me speechless, something he translated as acquiescence.
He led me upstairs without another word, his palm a fiery reminder against my lower back.
I had a week to figure this out.
A week before he expected me to perform.
And if he was like all the other royals, he didn’t just mean with him, but with others. They notoriously shared their harems with higher-ranking officials of society.
Could I handle that?
Was I prepared?
Would my training kick in properly?
My knees shook as we entered my room. One glance at the bed had my thighs clenching, and not from fear but from the prospect of what Ryder intended to do to me.
This isn’t what I want, I told myself. Yet that voice sounded weak. Unprepared. Terrified.
Because some part of me deep down did want this, and that was the part that scared me the most.
“Strip,” Ryder said as he escorted me into the bathroom. Rather than watch me comply, he focused on the shower.
It gave me a moment to catch my breath.
Then I remembered his demand, and heat suffused my skin once more.