“A strange place for a girl to be wandering at night in this city,” I told her calmly. “Perhaps you’re lost.”
The vulnerable openness of her expression instantly closed up. She seemed to age a few years as her soft mouth tightened into a straight, emotionless line and her luminous eyes hardened into stones. “I’m exactly where I planned to be.” Much like she had at our first meeting, she lifted her delicate chin.
What was this pretty creature hoping to prove by pretending not to be afraid? She was no match for even quiet, brooding Logan. Had I wanted to, I could have torn the thin white skin of her throat before she had the chance to say a single word. Didn’t she know she was living purely on the strength of my mercy?
Her stubborn foolhardiness elicited a grudging but genuine admiration. Seldom did I get the chance to meet mortals whose hearts and minds were able to withstand the knowledge of my nature. This human girl, on the contrary, had sought me out, followed me to my home. And now she was caught, and she still refused to back down.
“I suppose you expect me to spare you?” I spoke somewhat sternly, so that she wouldn’t know I was in any way pleased to see her again.
“And I assume you’ll have a price,” she shot back. “How about you tell me what you three are doing out here?” Her wits were as sharp as her tongue, even under these trying circumstances. She brushed an unruly lock of wild hair from her eyes, which burned into me. Were I any weaker, that gaze might have turned my bones to ash.
“Well.” I smirked. “It’s very doubtful you’d have anything material that would interest me. But I think we could work something out. A payment plan, if you will.” Stepping forward, I reached out to touch her face with the backs of my fingers, running my knuckles from cheekbone to jaw. She was a beautiful little thing.
A tiny shudder cracked her wall as she took a deep breath.
“I don’t want to know,” she said, eyeing the three of us, and the brave little thing never recoiled, “but I have a sickening feeling you’re going to tell me anyway.”
I laughed, unable to help it. She found a way to deepen my burgeoning fascination at every turn. Reckless, ignorant, self-endangering, and funny! How had it taken so long for this rare sort of woman to fall—almost literally—into my hands? She could not be permitted to stray too far from watchful eyes unless I wanted to risk losing her. But at the same time, I suspected she’d come back on her own even if I set her free.
After all, she had been unable to stay away once already.
The girl glanced to the side as I appraised her. When she had spoken, there were no fangs of any kind I could see, just the smooth, ineffectual even pearls of her teeth all humans carried. Yet the longer I stood so close to her, the greater I sensed something unusual, a characteristic I didn’t recognize in her. Not to mention, no humans would stand before me without trembling with fear.
“Who are you, gorgeous?” For now, I kept my tone gentle and safe. Those great, jeweled eyes shifted back to mine. Her brows knit.
“Save the compliments, Romeo. My name is Veronica.” She paused, holding my gaze. How fascinating seeing I haven’t even tried to charm her yet. “By the way, I’m not giving you anything. Especially not what it looks like you’re thinking. And you didn’t answer my earlier question about what you’re doing here.” Veronica’s whole body was tense with frigid anticipation. One hand had curled into a tight fist. On the surface, she might have seemed calm, but underneath was a cornered animal, ready to fight her way out, tooth and nail.
"We’re out for a stroll.” I grinned. Not discouraged, I slid my gaze over the side of her neck and over her throat. The blood pulsed through her carotid artery. I could hear it, smell it at being only a couple of feet apart. A shadow of the rich, metallic taste hovered on the surface of my tongue. My mouth began to water. But beneath that lay something new, something dangerous, something tempting. I narrowed my gaze on her. Veronica was so much more than a human. I didn’t quite understand it, but a shadow lingered beneath the surface. Who exactly was she?
“Is there nothing I can do to change your mind to come home with me?”
“You have nothing I want.” She held her chin high, her hands stiff by her side, and I didn’t miss her gaze sweeping over the three of us constantly. She was watching our every move.
Her words had told me one thing very clearly, but the signals from her body, the heightened heartbeat, the faintest hint of red shaded her cheeks said something else entirely. “It would be a damn shame to waste a body with so much potential.”
“I’m not here for your entertainment.” Veronica’s face reflected disgust and disdain at the same time her pulse sped up.
I knew that I had her in the palm of my hand, no matter how hard a fight she thought she was putting up. Not to mention that all together, we had her outnumbered and outclassed.
“Then what do you want? To spy on us?”
She gave no response, but the truth showed itself at the corner of her mouth, curling upward ever so slightly. The fire was back in her eyes as she stared daggers, first at me, Seth, then at Logan. Ever dispassionate, they gazed back at her.
“I could have you killed,” I replied.
“For crossing paths with you out here?” She pursed her lips in a mocking expression looking like she might break out laughing.
“You should just do it.” Seth spoke up at last, pushing his way into our sphere. He stood at my shoulder and glowered down at the captive. Smoke rose from his nostrils, wreathing around his face. “What a waste of time. Bring her home, or let’s chuck her in there too.” On the last word, he jerked his thumb over his shoulder toward the icy river thundering along at his back. I glanced at the surface of the water just in time to see the last of a pale, slightly mottled hand disappear below the current.
“Enough,” I warned.
The demon grunted and fell silent, but I noticed that he, too, was transfixed by her sensuous beauty. His expression betrayed the naked lust I felt stirring within me. To see him want her so openly enraged me.
That was the moment I decided that I wanted to make her mine—in body and in spirit. Turning new vampires was a practice I had abandoned for decades, that I had, in fact, sworn never to repeat. Mistakes had been made in my careless youth, and they had cost me dearly. On the rare occasions I allowed my mind to venture back to those days, I remembered little more than brokenness and shadow, a constant crisis of faith.
One look at Veronica and those long-held convictions flew out the window. All I could think about was how she’d taste and the feeling of her death and rebirth in my arms. So many times it had been orgasmic in its own way. Pleasure mingling with pain. The thought of experiencing that moment with her filled me with a fiery passion I hadn’t felt in years.
Her hand fell to her waist, which I assumed was where she kept a weapon. No one would come alone after us without a plan for when things turned bad. She took several steps backward, aware this wasn’t a fight she’d win if she started one. But it occurred to me that her intention hadn’t been about battling us but to gain intelligence.
The urge to sweep her up and spirit her away to the house threatened to blind me to everything else in the world. It was tempting just to say that nothing else was of consequence until I’d gotten my fill of her. But not even her potent allure erased the gravity of other, more pressing issues. My body longed to have its mounting hunger sated by her flesh, and yet I understood that she was no more than a distraction. To acquire her would be to acquire a weak point for my enemies to exploit.