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My feet struggled to move forward on the plush red carpet that led to the bigger drawing-room. I stopped at the door, my hands clutching the Anastasia book in a sweaty mess. I reached out for the door handle. My hand shook every second until it landed on the cold metal. I gripped it tightly and stood there, hoping the door would open by itself so I wouldn’t have to do it.
“He bit you,” Arthur stated. He knew. He’d known this entire time, even when I mentioned James liked doing that to other vampires, and he never said anything.
“You questioned him when you were hunting me?”
“Yes and no. Yes, I questioned him. No, he didn’t tell me about it. I figured it out. Your behavior, certain things you’ve said, and as if I didn’t need confirmation, you’re scared to death to open that door because he’s behind it.” I dropped my hand and felt my cheeks redden. Arthur had seen me weak many times, but this was different. I still felt shame over being bitten, as if I felt somehow that it happened because I didn’t stop him, or didn’t try. Like it was my fault. “You’re safe.” I looked up at him, his gaze steadfast as always. “I won’t let him bite you.”
I nodded to him and pushed the doors open.
My gaze immediately found James amongst the three people that stood in the middle of the hunter green room. With his back turned, he was admiring one of the large paintings on the wall and pointing at it while saying something to the woman next to him. The woman was Sara, with her pink-tipped hair that was longer now and in stylish waves. She was wearing a golden dress that looked like it belonged to an Egyptian goddess, and it emphasized her generous curves. The third person was James’s son Drake, whom I was not expecting to see. His presence still confused me with his human not-human smell. He saw me first and patted James on the arm to get his attention.
James turned to me with a weak smile. His pallor was diminished, and his eyes had sunken in so badly he looked like a drug addict. More importantly than that, that implacable air of superiority I had come to know was no longer in his eyes. This was not the James that had bitten me. This was the James that had written the book in my hands. The one before his binge madness, before his insanity, and before his cruelty.
“Hello, Lisbeth,” he said gently.
The sound of his voice sparked fear inside me again, though it was lessened by the fact that his voice was thin and broken. I couldn’t find any words to say back to him because I hardly knew where to begin. Sara still had her back turned, and my guilty conscience wondered if she hated me now, after how I’d treated her. I hadn’t even bothered to feel bad about it at the time because I hadn’t realized what I’d done until much later.
I tried to call her name, but my voice faltered so I ended up squeaking in her direction.
“What’d you use the 2-dollar bill on?” she asked finally.
I laughed and sobbed all at once. “Pencils.”
She turned and raised an eyebrow at me. “Seriously? Pencils? They’d better be nice pencils.” I tried to convey my despair over what I’d done to her with just the look on my face, because if I started apologizing, James might try apologizing too, and I didn’t know what I’d do if he did. Yell? Probably.
It went quiet again and I stole a glance at James’s pale face. I couldn’t stop my stomach from twisting into a knot when he met my gaze.
“I assume we’re here because of that.” He gestured to the book I had in my hands.
“I need information on Anastasia.”
“That information is forbidden,” he said, sliding his eyes to Arthur in a challenge. “How do I know you won’t have him arrest me if I even speak one word about her?”
“If this was a trick, you wouldn’t have come. Sara would’ve told you.”
“Maybe,” she said with a grin. “Or maybe I’d get him locked up so he’d behave himself.” James grinned back at her and took her hand in his.
Oh.
I froze in shock at the sight of their intertwined hands. A human and a vampire. I mean, Olivier and Renard had been in love for thirty years prior to his being turned, but they kept it strictly platonic. I had a feeling these two had no such qualms. Me loving a werewolf was high on the ick factor. Human plus vampire was not on the ick factor. It was on the ‘you have disgraced your family and your cow’ factor.
“I’ll tell you everything I know, on one condition,” James said. He kissed Sara’s hand and let it go to step forward. “If you forgive me for what I did to you.”
No. That was too much, far too much.
“No. There will be no forgiveness,” I said firmly. A cold terror was forming inside me, and I felt a slight pain in my belly.
“Please, Lisbeth. I’ve treated many people badly in my lifetime, but I’ve never treated anyone as horribly as I did you.” I couldn’t breathe. The more he spoke, the more he sounded like the old James, and the more he spoke about what he’d done, the more my mind conjured up the memories. The agony, the torture, and all the enjoyment he’d gotten from it.
I ground my teeth together. “I said no, James. Respect when someone says no, for once in your life.”
“Lisbeth,” James pleaded, just before he reached out and put his hand on my arm.
I screamed in white-hot agony. With his hand on my arm, I could feel remnants of the connection his bite had made, even though it had long been destroyed. I felt sick and frightened all at once. I recoiled and felt something splash against my legs. Arthur caught me from falling and picked me up in his arms. He rushed me out of the room.
“No, I need...” I felt pain in my stomach. “I need to ask him about Anastasia.”
“Your water broke. You’ve gone in labor.”
