Maybe I dozed a little, because when the sound of a plate landing on the table in front of me jerked me upright, there was drool on my left forearm. A large glass of water and a couple of little white aspirin joined the plate, which appeared to have a sandwich on it. My mouth watered. I grabbed for the food and took a big bite without even thinking, my eyes slipping closed in ecstasy at the taste. An almost sexual groan slipped past my lips.
“You’re welcome,” Rans said in a wry tone, seating himself in the other chair. “I do so appreciate a woman with a healthy appetite.”
Something important occurred to me at the same instant I swallowed, almost making me choke. Coughing a bit, I reached for the water glass.
“Shit,” I managed when my throat was clear. “Wait. Sorry. I can’t eat this. I’m gluten-intolerant.”
Rans raised a glamoured blonde eyebrow at me. “You’re not gluten-intolerant. You’re a succubus-human hybrid who was starved of sex for... how long? I’m impressed that you were able to manage your malnutrition with lifestyle alterations for as long as you did, but trust me when I say—on the list of things that are likely to kill you right now, sandwich bread is quite near the bottom.”
I stared at him, and then I stared at the sandwich in my hands.
“Do vampires have really good hearing?” I asked.
“Yes,” Rans replied slowly, obviously unsure where I was going with that.
I nodded. “Good. In that case, your punishment if you’re lying to me will be to stand outside the bathroom door during my hour-long bout of explosive diarrhea.”
He sighed. “I’m not lying to you.”
I shrugged and devoured the sandwich.
At his prompting, I also drank the water and swallowed the aspirin. Then I let him lead me to what I gathered was the guest bathroom, where he rummaged around until he found an unopened toothbrush in a cabinet drawer. I brushed my teeth, eyed the shower stall warily, and decided in a shining moment of self-preservation that I was quite likely to fall down and split my head open in my current state. Maybe that was what Rans had meant about gluten being low on the list of things that would kill me?
I stumbled out of the bathroom and into the bedroom across from it, to find that Rans was waiting there, standing near the bed. He’d shed his glamour. That was good. I was one seriously shallow bitch when I was drunk, apparently, and Mr. Blonde and Forgettable just wasn’t on the same shag-ability scale as his real appearance.
“Hi,” I said, a bit breathlessly. Without really intending it, I’d plastered myself against his body. I breathed in deeply, taking in his scent.
I felt his small huff of amusement more than I heard it. He let me pull him down to press our mouths together for only a moment before he pulled back, capturing my wrists in a gentle grip and easing me away.
I frowned. “What’s wrong?”
He kissed the furrow in my brow. “You’re the one who keeps saying you’ve been roofied, luv. You need sleep right now more than you need a top-up. Get all that Fae shite out of your system first, and hit on me again later if your hangover isn’t too atrocious.”
A sinking sensation pulled at my stomach. For the first time since drinking the mead, all of the circling thoughts and fears surrounding the past few days threatened to descend and crush me beneath their weight once more. I caught at Rans’ arm, distantly aware of how pathetic I was about to look.
“Stay anyway,” I breathed.
He stilled, and I realized that it was the first time I’d asked him for something bigger and more important than sex. Damn it, damn it, damn it. Being drunk was the absolute worst. Mentally berating myself, I drew breath to backtrack before he could point out how ridiculous I was being.
I was too slow.
“You should be careful, Zorah,” he said. “I’m not a good person to trust in that way.”
I held his gaze for a long moment. “Then stop rescuing me, goddamn it,” I shot back, anger swelling to join my humiliation.
And that was reasonable, wasn’t it? If you didn’t want a girl to start trusting you, then you shouldn’t save her from monsters. You shouldn’t protect her and watch over her and say nice things to her, if you were just going to pull away and pretend later on that you were no good for her.
Huh. Apparently I’d stymied him, at least temporarily. Twice, he started to speak before stopping himself. Finally, he settled on, “Lie down on the bed, Zorah. I’ll stay with you until you fall asleep.”
My stomach unknotted itself, and I nodded. Crap, it was pretty clear I’d slid past the fun part of being drunk and into the depressed, weepy part. That was bad. I needed to keep my damned mouth shut before I started sounding like even more of a pathetic, whiny bitch than I already was.
I could do that. Sure I could. I mean, how hard could it be?
I sat on the bed and kicked off my boots. Deciding that the rest of my clothing wasn’t worth the effort of dealing with, I rolled onto my side, turning my back to the room. After a moment’s hesitation, the mattress dipped and a cool body slotted in behind me. Another pregnant pause, and an arm wrapped around my waist.
An ache built in my throat. I’d had so little of this in my life. Could I trust it, when I’d practically had to beg for it before he agreed to give it to me?
Eventually, Rans broke the pensive silence. “You’re terrible at guarding your heart, aren’t you,” he said, not really phrasing it as a question. “You told me your father was a passive-aggressive arsehole, and yet you were ready to charge in and save him without a
