He scampered to the door, eased it open, and snuck out like a ghost.
As soon as he disappeared into Upper Brook Street, I turned to Istabelle with my brows furrowed. “What was that about?”
“I was in treatment room number two during your last session. He’s not interested in sound baths, is he?”
“How did you—”
“Who on earth would disrupt the healing vibrations with constant chatter?” She shook her head and chuckled. “A word of advice, my dear. Unwanted suitors can block the heart chakra just as much as devastating heartbreaks. If you want to attract new love in your life, throw away the old.”
I sucked in a deep breath through my teeth. It was as though Istabelle had read my intentions for the morning and was parroting them back at me. Perhaps she could sense my resolve to do better in my energy.
“You’re right,” I said. “Would it be okay to refuse to perform sessions with him?”
Istabelle smiled, her gray eyes shining with pride. “I’ve been waiting for you to ask. One of these days, you’ll learn—”
Her face froze as though she’d seen something startling through the window.
That was about when I felt the curl of smoky magic around my senses. Unlike last week, when that magic had felt like a noose around my neck, this smoke was nearly four times as powerful and felt more sensual than a caress.
As I turned, I caught sight of the two girls standing by the quartz crystals. The one facing the window also froze and grabbed her friend’s arm. Curiosity stirred through my insides, and I spun toward the window.
Standing outside was a man about six-foot-two, with a strong build and broad shoulders. He wore a blue suit so dark that it appeared nearly black, with a navy shirt that curled around his prominent pectoral muscles.
The man seemed preoccupied with a tall amethyst geode that obscured his face and the top half of his athletic body, but the gaps in the display gave me a tantalizing glimpse of a corded neck, thick biceps, and muscled legs beneath slim-fitting pants.
The long-dead butterflies in my stomach fluttered back to life. I couldn’t see his face, but even after three years, nobody could mistake that exact shade of bronze skin. A reddish-brown that looked like it had been warmed in the fires of sin.
I shook my head from side to side. It couldn’t be him. It could be any one of his four brothers—Constantine, Sylvester, Ferdinand, or Lazarus, or any of the vampire nobles he was related to by blood.
After what he said to me that evening on the palace steps, he would never track me down to an obscure crystal shop in London.
He stepped away from behind the geode, and his violet eyes looked into mine with an intensity that hit me harder than a slap.
Valentine Bloody Sargon was about to walk into my life.
The Vampire King who had broken my heart.
Chapter Four
I leaned back on the counter, trying to catch my breath as Valentine opened the door and sauntered inside. Those wretched eyes of his glinted like he was looking at his next meal.
My insides trembled. Neutrals like me were supposed to have the most delicious blood.
It was like being caught in the gaze of a panther or some other apex predator with the gait and grace of a dangerous feline.
My heart pounded hard enough to burst, making my ribs reverberate with every frantic beat. Valentine didn’t walk—he stalked. Right now, I was his prey.
Tall, dark, muscular, and sleek—he looked the same as he did in my dreams. Dreams that I would try to suppress with amethyst geodes and Native American snares. Dreams that would make me awaken with a quickening heart. Dreams that would haunt me through the days and half the night.
I’d resigned myself to Valentine Sargon being a ghost of loves past, a specter that I could escape if only I strengthened my mind and rebuilt my shattered heart.
Yet when he walked into the store, seeming to fill the air with his intoxicating, masculine scent, he was as real as the worst waking nightmare.
Istabelle swooped past in a puff of lavender perfume. “Welcome to my crystal shop. How may I be of service?”
“Good morning, Mrs. Bonham-Sackville,” Valentine said in a deep voice that resonated with every nerve, including the sensitive bundle between my legs that had awoken the moment he walked into the store.
Heat surged through my veins, coalescing in a traitorous part of me that pounded in time with my fluttering heart. I breathed hard, trying to force the sensations somewhere else, but it was impossible to concentrate with him taking up all the space.
His dark gaze lingered on mine, and the corners of his lips curved upward. “May I speak with your assistant?”
I sucked in a breath through my teeth, and the pounding of my heart quickened to the beat of a battle drum. How did he know Istabelle’s name? Had he known all this time where I’d gone or just recently tracked me down to the Crystal Shop?
“Mrs. Bonham-Sackville’s assistant is busy,” I snapped, making the girls in the corner clap their hands to their chests and gasp.
Valentine turned to them and grinned, revealing perfect white teeth. I knew exactly how those girls were feeling—awed at the sight of such a breathtaking male. He was the reason why I found even the most attractive human men so unexciting.
Vampires weren’t just physically perfect, they exuded a raw sensuality that bewitched all reason and ensnared a person’s heart. But they were vain, loathsome creatures who basked in the power they held over others and had no qualms about toying with people’s emotion the way a cat would toy with a floundering bird.
The girls huddled together and giggled, not seeming aware of how dangerous the beautiful predator was in their midst.
I pressed my lips into a tight line. Valentine was probably soaking up their adoration the way he had basked in mine when I was too young and inexperienced to know better.
“Go home,” he said in a hypnotic voice that sent a palpitation of desire through my heart.
I clenched my teeth, holding back a torrent of rage. Rage at myself for reacting to Valentine and rage at him for using his infernal wiles.
As though in a trance, the pair put the rose quartz crystals back in the baskets and drifted to the exit. A large man wearing black opened the shop’s door, letting them out, and blocked the shop like a sentinel.
“Mesmerism on humans?” I snarled. “Disturbing a place of business with your guards? Whatever will the Supernatural Council say?”
Valentine turned his violet gaze back to mine. “Morata.”
I flinched. “You have no right to call me that.”
Morata was short for Inamorata—what he called me during what I thought was our courtship. It meant lover in Italian and was the title of a Dean Martin song he loved to play whenever we danced.
My heart raced like a feral beast caged within my ribs. I tore my gaze away from the monster’s eyes and focused on the beauty spot on his left cheekbone. He had a bloody nerve to even stand within ten miles of me after what he did, let alone dredge up that term of endearment.
“Your Majesty.” Istabelle dipped into a deep curtsey. “Allow me to give you a tour of my humble establishment.”
Valentine’s gaze left mine, and he offered Istabelle a gracious smile. With those violet eyes no longer attempting to hold me captive, I could finally exhale. Istabelle knew how much heartbreak I’d suffered in the first year of my apprenticeship—she’d helped me through the worst of it with healing sessions.