Kristen Painter - Forbidden Blood

He let it spill through him, willingly giving himself over to her forbidden blood. Catarina had never tasted like this.

Then, afraid he would take too much, he released her. Her eyes were wide, her chest heaving. The tiny wounds at her neck began to close almost immediately. She blinked a few times.

“You are a very powerful vampire. Already I feel renewed.”

A sharp pain racked his body as the strength of her blood became his. He grabbed on to the workbench and let it run its course. His muscles tensed as hot and cold warred within him, and as the pain subsided, his heart began to beat. He inhaled, filing his lungs with her perfume. “So much…different than Catarina. That’s twice the reaction I get from her.” He blew out Catarina. That’s twice the reaction I get from her.” He blew out a breath and the storm of sensation inside him leveled out. “Are you all right, cara mia? You look shocked. I was too rough.”

He took her hand and led her to the stool. She sat, looking a little dazed. “No, you weren’t too rough. You were fine. I just…

Arnaud always takes my wrist. Or maybe it was”—her chest rose and fell with a deep breath—“the kiss.”

Her skin was flushed and the rhythm of her pulse matched the beat of his own. Perhaps he was falling in love with her. Either way, the thought of her returning to Arnaud made him want to run a sword through Arnaud’s heart. “That was too forward of me. But I am not sorry.”

She smiled a little. “I’m not either. I just never knew a kiss could make you dizzy.”

“Then you’ve never really been kissed before.”

She laughed. “Of course I’ve never been kissed before. I’m comarré.”

“So I am the first to kiss you? And the only one to have pierced your throat?”

She nodded, her cheeks faintly pink. “Yes. You have ruined me,” she teased. “How will I go back to Arnaud now?”

Possessiveness griped Dominic’s spine like steel claws. “You will not go back to him at all”

“What?”

He glanced over at the sunlight serum still awaiting testing on his workbench. “Arnaud is too dangerous. He doesn’t need the ability to walk in the sun any more than he deserves to have your ability to walk in the sun any more than he deserves to have you as his comarré. You will not return to him. I have enough wealth.

We’ll leave, start over somewhere new. Then neither of us will ever have to face him again.”

The color bled from her face. “I can’t do that,” she whispered. “I cannot spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder.” She grabbed his hands. “You know Arnaud. You know he won’t let either of us leave like that. I cost him money.

He would consider you a thief. He will have you made anathema.”

The word cooled Dominic’s ardor, but not by much. He wanted this woman, but if protecting her meant losing his status, could he do it? Could he give up everything for…love? For companionship? The physical contact alone nearly swayed him.

He’d lived this solitary life for centuries, long ago accepting that the bulk of his years would be spent alone. With Marissa’s arrival, that acceptance had begun to erode. The ground beneath his feet grew dangerously thin. “There must be a way for you to leave him.”

She went paler still “There is, but…it’s not something I’ve ever known another comarré to do.”

“Tel me.”

She hesitated, staring deeply into his eyes as if hoping to find her courage there. “I could claim libertas. But then I must fight Arnaud and if I lose, I die.”

Libertas. The word erased the last whorls of pleasure from Dominic’s kiss and left fear in their wake. Marissa had thought about it, but thoughts and going forward were two very different things.

“What do you mean, die?” he asked.

“I don’t know how to make it any clearer. Either I kill Arnaud or he kills me. It’s a death match. The winner gets their freedom.

Or a new comarré.” She shuddered. “There’s no way Arnaud would turn me down, either. He’d relish getting a new comarré and the chance he’d lose would never enter his mind.”

“You cannot fight him. I will not allow you to do that.”

She straightened. “You will not allow me? You don’t have that kind of say in my life.”

He held up a hand. “You’re right; I do not. I spoke out of turn, but it is insanity to think you could fight Arnaud and win.”

“Hah.” She glared at him. As much as she wanted to tell Dominic about her years of training in many different types of combat and her skills with daggers and swords, she didn’t.

Those were comarré secrets. Revealing them could get her into deeper trouble. If only she could just run away with Dominic, but that would simply give her a life of fear. She needed a life of freedom.

“Why do you laugh? You think you have a chance against him?”

“I don’t think it. I know it. I just don’t know how much of a chance.”

Dominic leaned against the workbench and studied her. “You could beat him?”

“I could.” Maybe. “Or at least come close.”

“Close still means you would be dead.” He shook his head.

“No, I do not want to be a part of this. Perhaps it is my own foolishness, but I find myself having…feelings for you. I am a passionate man, and I tend to give those passions free rein. What they want most is you. So you can understand why I do not wish you to go through this. Or anything that might harm you.”

Despite his declaration, her frustration built. “There is no other way for me to get free. No other way for us to be together.”

“We will find a place safe from Arnaud.”

“That place does not exist.” She got to her feet and paced toward the other end of the room, thinking. Books, bottles, and papers crammed every available space, making it hard to believe Dominic couldn’t find an answer among them somewhere. She Dominic couldn’t find an answer among them somewhere. She shook her head. “I will have to go back to him. And you will have to find a way to change my blood.”

He was quiet for a while, letting her pace. At last he spoke. “I have another idea.”

She turned and looked at him. “I’m listening.”

“You say libertas is the only way you’ll feel safe leaving him?”

“Yes.”

“Do you think you could ever care for me? Not as a patron but as a man?”

Tiny sparks went off in her belly, the kind she’d never felt before. The kind that promised both pleasure and trouble. The kind that said her plan to use Dominic for her own end was quickly turning into something very different. “I have very little experience with this kind of thing, but I believe I have already begun to care for you.” There was no point in lying to him. They could both be dead in less than a month, depending on what Arnaud decided.

His eyes glimmered silver and his face relaxed with confidence. “Then what if I give you an advantage?”

“What kind of advantage?”

“What kind do you want? Strength? Speed? Agility?”

For the first time since they’d begun the discussion, her footing felt firm and even, not like she was struggling to climb an insurmountable cliff. “Al of the above.”

Two nights later, she and Dominic were in his recreation hall, a space big enough to hold a variety of sports events normally reserved for outdoor arenas. He lounged in a chair at the edge of the floor while she faced off with a fringe vampire she assumed was one of his staff. Nero was a half meter taller and outweighed her by probably thirty kilos. Essentially, Nero was a beast.

Dominic probably employed him as security.

“Ready, Nero?” Dominic’s voice echoed through the cavernous space. “Don’t hurt her.”