“Okay. I will but please, don’t freak out. I’m not going to hurt you,” I repeated.
Romeo nodded slowly.
I took a deep breath and dropped my fangs again, feeling the tingle of desire to taste him the moment I did it.
“Fuck!” he said, staring at my mouth for a full minute before I retracted them. He lifted his gaze to my face. “So how does this work?”
I frowned. “Sorry? How does what work?”
He rolled his eyes. “Are you going to eat me now… suck all my blood and then glamor me or something?”
“Glamor you?” I asked.
“Whatever you call it when your kind wipe our memories or make us kill someone or whatever,” he said.
“Seriously? You’ve been watching too much HBO… reading too much Sookie Stackhouse.” I smiled to try to make him relax a bit. I finally gave up when he just looked at me like I was a dick. “Fine. It’s called compelling and no, I don’t do that.”
“Why?”
So many questions.
I chuckled, slowly shaking my head. “As desperately as I want to taste you, I would never do that without your permission.”
“Tell me what the hell just went on here then. Your strategy was take me to bed and then what? You were planning on just letting me drive away without killing me?”
I sighed. “Yes. I told you I wasn’t going to feed on you. In fact, I was headed into town to sate my hunger when I saw you. It’s kind of your fault this even happened, you know.” I smiled at him but that just made him frown deeper. I sobered immediately. “I’m sorry. Don’t be so sensitive. I was always shit at poking fun.”
“Oh, you think?” he asked.
I stifled a smile because as much as I really liked this man, the last thing I was going to do was anything to scare him or drive him away. I had no friends and hadn’t in the years since being made a vampire. Sir Robert had mocked me for wanting more of others. He had been as cold a man as I had ever met. He’d always been disappointed that I refused to turn off my humanity after I’d been turned. After he’d led me away to feed upon me the first time, then deciding he liked me enough to make me a vampire, life had been a horror for me… one blood bath after another. After I’d seen ample proof of Robert’s inhumanity, I’d begged him to just kill me. It would have made Romeo sick to witness the things I’d seen my maker do… forced me to participate in.
I shook myself out of the past as he posed another question. “So, what was your plan for the night? You were going to town to drain some unsuspecting human and then after seeing me, you decided to get your chimney swept first?”
I couldn’t stop my chuckle. He was very funny. “No. Vampires don’t always kill their prey. I never do.” Not the whole truth.
“Got it. Just a snack, then?”
I smiled. “Some vampires—very old vampires—have no heart or soul left beating within their chests. Instead, they become just like the supernatural animals everyone fears… vicious, predatory, creatures who live to inflict sadistic pain on their victims. I’m not one of those vampires. I take only what I need and then leave them alive and well.”
“So, you don’t kill humans? Never?”
“I have… but not on purpose. I only take what I need for sustenance and because I’m so old, I don’t need much,” I admitted.
Romeo cocked his head as he seemed to study me. A shiver ran over him, and I once again noted the chill in the room. “How old are you?”
I held out my hand and gestured to him to come and sit on the bed. “It’s freezing in here. Please come up here and we’ll talk. I hope you now believe that I’m not planning on hurting you.”
He frowned. “I don’t know anything of the sort.”
“Romeo, if I wanted to hurt you, I would have drained you already. As it is, I’m only sorry we got off to a bad start.” I gestured to him again. “Please, come up here and let me wrap you up in these blankets. Your whole body is shivering.”
He stared at me for a long minute and then finally got off the floor and walked over to the bed, sitting down on it. I smiled and reached for a fuzzy throw blanket, reaching out slowly to wrap his shoulders with it. He took it and snuggled in.
“Come on. Lie down with me. I won’t touch you unless you want me to, Romeo.” I deliberately moved away from him, crawling over to the other side of the bed, and getting under the covers. I glanced over to him and patted the bed beside me. “I won’t bite.”
A trace of a smile played across his lips as he finally moved closer, sliding his long, muscular legs under the covers and turning on his side. I slowly reached for the comforter and drew it up over the throw blanket he still wore and tucked him in before turning to face him with my head propped in one hand.
“Now what? We just look at each other?”
I smiled salaciously. “We could do more but I don’t think you trust me,” I said with deep regret.
“I’m trying to trust you,” he said, honestly. “This is all a lot to accept. It’s like five minutes old and just the thought that I’ve been walking around in a world filled with supernatural creatures is kind of a lot to take. If I hadn’t seen your fangs, I would have thought everything you were telling me were lies.”
“I understand that. I handled things wrong. It was my fault. I should have never brought you home when I
