The roof of the building Damian finally chose was higher than the gallery building by two floors, which gave them an elevated viewpoint. The building had a supermarket and gym on the first floor, a dance studio on the second and apartments on the remainder. The apartments made it easy to gain access to the roof. Damian showed Riley how simple it was to dazzle one’s way into gaining access into buildings and public areas of almost any building in New York with a bit of charm and a lot of very sincere lying.
Once they were on the roof, Damian selected the best vantage point, then called Nicholas on his cell phone. “And bring food,” he said curtly, before dropping the phone back inside his jacket. He glanced at Riley. “By the time he gets here, it will have been four hours since you last ate. You’ve worked your body hard today. I won’t have you pass out on me from low blood sugar.” He turned back to watching the roof of the gallery below.
Riley was sitting on an air-conditioning vent. Now she pulled her knees to her chest, and wrapped her arms around her legs. “You’re pissed at me.”
“No.” He spoke with his back to her.
“You’re angry about something.”
“You’re trying to give me human emotions. My reactions to day-to-day petty concerns are not the same as yours any more. Do not make the mistake of trying to think of me as a man. I’m not.” His face was in profile to her and he looked for all the world like he was disinterested.
“Bullshit, Damian. You think I don’t know how fragile the male ego is? This happens to be something I do know about.” She put her feet down and stood up, wanting the authority the height would give her. “It bothered the crap out of you I wouldn’t let go back there, and now you’re pouting.”
Damian turned to face her, a startled expression on his face.
But Riley wasn’t finished yet. “I don’t give a shit how old you are, and you can shove that ‘being above petty concerns’ lie over the ledge you’re leaning against because I don’t believe it for a second—not for this instance, anyway. You’re hiding behind it because you just don’t want to talk about it. Again.”
“Jesus,” he breathed. “You and Tally. Straight for the gut. No quarter given.”
She flinched at the mention of her mother’s name. “Did you ever fuck her?” she demanded.
He drew in a breath, a sharp one. “No,” he said quickly. “I was with Nicholas then. Once she met Carson, there was room for no one else. She saw no one else. They were obsessed about each other.” He dropped his head, staring at his hands where they lay palm up on the concrete edging of the balcony. “They were only together for six years before Carson was killed by Lirgon, but those six years were lived so intensely…” He shook his head. “It was almost as if they knew they would not have long together and they squeezed as much as they could into the time they had. There was no room for anyone else, really. Just the small handful of friends they trusted with their lives and that was all.”
“The opposite of what you do, in fact,” Riley said dryly.
Damian grimaced. “I suppose…yes. Our race does become complacent about emotions. Time gives you that luxury.”
“That’s what you’re doing now,” Riley told him. “You’re avoiding me.”
He turned to face her, leaning back against the edge, spreading his arms along either side. He smiled. “Relentless, aren’t you?”
“When it’s important,” she agreed.
“Is it important, Riley?” His tone was cool.
Her heart jumped. “Don’t try to get around me that way.” She stood up. “If this was simply just sex, just passing time, then you wouldn’t be so put out about what happened back there.” She came toward him. “I’m not centuries old like you, Damian. But I’m not an idiot, either. Don’t treat me like one.”
His gaze never wavered. “I apologize,” he said evenly. “Such a simple tactic would work with a great many others. I’ve grown used to manipulating humans in such ways.”
“And you still haven’t answered my original question.” She stopped barely a foot away from him and looked him directly in the eye.
“Do you know,” he said softly, his gaze directly locked with hers, “that staring a vampire directly in the eye is the equivalent of challenging them? Most vampires find their feeding impulses kick in and have to subvert those impulses to other drives, if they wish to avoid killing the human who foolishly locks gazes with the vampire.”
“Other drives?” Riley echoed, keeping her eyes square upon Damian’s black pupils. His lashes were black, as were the thick brows.
“Sexual, often,” Damian murmured, his voice thickening perceptively. “But if the need to feed can’t be slaked via sex, then physical expenditure. Running. Fighting. Dismantling buildings.” His hands were gripping the edges of the concrete, and the knuckles were white.
Her heart squeezed in her chest and she was mortally aware of the blood pumping through it.
Damian’s eyes were unblinking. “Look away, Riley, if you do not want me to force you to yield to me right now.”
“Answer my question first,” she breathed, fighting to hide just how badly she was trembling.
He hissed out his breath. “Ask your question!”
“I hurt you by not fully trusting you enough to give up control and let go, didn’t I?”
Damian’s lips parted as his fangs partially lowered. His eyes closed. The sight terrified Riley but she remained totally silent, repressing every impulse to show any sign of fear, including the almost overwhelming need to reach for the knife hanging heavy and reassuring in her inside jacket pocket. She knew it would trigger Damian into action she couldn’t defend herself against. She didn’t have the skill yet and perhaps never would. He was too old, too experienced and far too strong—and she had pushed him, perhaps too far.
“That is it,” he whispered. His chest lifted as he drew a very deep breath and let it out, like a man smelling the air. Then, astonishingly, he smiled. “Yes,” he said firmly. “You wounded me when you would not give up control.” His smile grew wider. “My…what did you call it? My fragile male ego? It appears that even after all this time it is still remarkably delicate.” And he laughed.
Riley found her mouth lifting in a smile, even though she was puzzled. Damian’s laugh was infectious and his transformation from scary vampire to happy man was stunning and breath-robbing.
He curled his hand around the back of her neck. “I laugh, Riley, because it’s so ironic to find this vestige of humanity still lingers in me, and it’s such a pathetic one. Vanity, indeed. Pride. Ego. They’re not admirable qualities. Why, if human qualities were to linger, could they not be the better ones like courage, loyalty and…and…”
“Love?” Riley suggested softly.
Damian’s face shadowed. “I never lost that,” he said softly. “Love never goes away. It changes. It can become perverted, if you let it and some do. Some allow it to become the vilest emotion imaginable, as it twists between the creatures they become and the partners they associate with. But love never goes away completely.” His thumb stroked her jaw. “Is that one of your questions, Riley? What lies between us? Where this all leads?”
She jumped. She couldn’t help it. The question lay in her heart and mind, but she never would have asked it. “How can you possibly answer such a question now? It would be unfair to demand an answer.”
Damian’s mouth lifted at the corners. “To you, it may seem that way.” His hand at the back of her neck drew her closer as his other arm wrapped around her back. “I can see farther than you.” He pressed her against his chest, where she had once slept. “Relax,” he told her. “Nicholas will be here soon with food. Meantime, it’s nearly sunset. We must watch the skylights.”
Her face turned inward and she found her lips were a mere inch from his neck. This time, she gave into the same impulse she’d had when travelling to New York just that morning, she kissed his neck and slid her tongue over the flesh, tasting it.
Damian sighed. “Sweet.”
“You have no idea how badly I wanted to do that this morning, in the car.”
“I knew.”
She thumped his shoulder with the heel of her hand. “It’s just not fair, you being able to smell everything about me. It’s like being able to read my mind. You get advanced information about me and I get left behind about what’s going on with you two.”
His long finger lifted her chin so she was forced to look him in the eyes. “You do very well with just your own senses, Riley Carson Connors. You just skewered me very neatly. I’m still bleeding, thank you very much.” His lips touched hers in a soft kiss meant only to reassure. The kiss lingered, lengthened, but still didn’t do more than share warmth and empathy. She knew Damian was carefully not arousing her—the gargoyles were about to rise. They could not afford to be distracted, even though she sensed that he longed to have her to submit to him, to make her let go completely and fully in the most comprehensive way possible, as soon as possible.
Very soon the confrontation between her control and his ego would come. But for now, he was content to let her keep control. His tongue brushed her upper lip and lifted away. “Don’t feel inadequate with us two,” he told her.
She smiled up at him. “I won’t.”
Damian jerked his head up, like he’d heard a loud noise, or been alerted by something. “Nicholas,” he said, his hand falling away from Riley’s face.
Riley turned in Damian’s arm.
Nicholas was three or four paces beyond the roof entrance door, a grocery bag in one hand that glowed ghostly white in the gloaming. He was standing very still, where he had come to a halt on the rooftop. He had moved almost silently, so that only Damian had heard him.
Nicholas’ face was painted with shock, the blue eyes wide. As soon as Riley turned and saw him, though, Nicholas shook himself and strode forward, swinging the grocery bag in her direction. “Food for the weak one,” he said, dropping it at her feet.
Riley pulled away from Damian, even though his arm stayed around her. He was not hiding from Nicholas in any way. She stepped away from Damian, letting his arm drop.
“You two reek of sex,” Nicholas said sharply. “Couldn’t you have at least showered instead of assaulting me with the stench all night?”
Riley sucked in her breath, shocked.
Damian shook his head. “That’s a cheap shot, Nick, and you know it. Feel better now you’ve hurt Riley and no one else?”
Nicholas shrugged. “I couldn’t give a tinker’s damn if the truth hurts,” he told Damian, heading for the edge of the rooftop. He was completely indifferent. “Riley isn’t here to be coddled. She can deal with it.” He leaned over the edge to peer down at the top of the gallery and the skylights below, where the lights from the gallery were radiating pure light in three big square white panels up into the night. “That’s it?”
Riley, leaning over the wide concrete lip on Damian’s other side, and saw Nick glance at her. He was not as indifferent as he wanted her to think. Was it her he was aiming his barbs at? Or Damian?
She pushed back from the edge and straightened up, her heart thundering. Games within games. Was she going to get hurt here because she wasn’t playing her own game? Because she didn’t have an agenda? She was the only short-lived creature on the playing field, caught between two centuries-old vampires who’d learned the art of strategy from fighting actual war campaigns that she’d only read about in books. Damian had already confessed he could see farther ahead than her. What if she was the pawn in this? The piece that could be easily sacrificed in order to promote another, stronger player?
She had to be smarter than this, didn’t she? Or should she just trust that love would win out?
No, don’t be stupid, Riley. Love is what romance heroines rely on. This is the real world.
In the real world, life wasn’t fair, the underdog didn’t always win, you got kicked when you were down, justice didn’t always rule and in no way, shape or form was it impartial. Above all, if she didn’t watch out for herself, no one else was going to.
Riley leaned over the ledge once more, copying the two vampires, to make it look like she was relaxed and hadn’t just had her teeth mentally kicked in for her.
She had to figure out what she wanted from these two, then plan how to go and get it. Damian was going to have to learn to live with disappointment, because she wasn’t going to give up control for him in the near future. No way. Not if this was the way they were going to play the game with her.
“There,” Damian murmured. “And there.”
“I see it,” Nicholas replied.
Both of them leaned motionless, watching the skylights.
Riley swallowed her fury and watched. Shadows were fluttering around the rim of the skylights. Large ones. Her heart began to pump hard.
Then large shadows stepped into the light below the panes, blocking it. She couldn’t see detail, because the light pouring from the skylight was the only illumination source nearby and night had fallen suddenly as they had waited on the roof.
The skylights lifted back on hinges almost soundlessly and six large shapes eased out. From having studied him so long that afternoon, Riley was able to pick out Lirgon from the shape of his wings and head. Seeing him move was fascinating, but she recalled Damian’s warning. These creatures had been the most deadly foe her parents had faced. Lirgon had killed both her parents in the end. She could not underestimate the creature no matter what he looked like, or how he moved.
The six hunched shapes paused around the edges of the skylights and closed them again. The wings—ugly, hooked, leathery things—unfurled and stretched out to dozens of feet across and flapped experimentally. Hisses and snarls floated up in the air. The whisper of language, but not words that Riley understood. Then the wings began to beat in earnest.
Damian’s hand caught her jacket and pulled her down into a crouch on the tarmac coating the rooftop, hugging the wall, just as he and Nicholas were doing.
The gargoyles rose in lazy flight into the air, wings lifting them in heavy, silent sweeps into the night air, almost vertically up over the rooftops as they searched the terrain with their excellent vision and even better sense of smell and hearing. Then, with a small circle in the air, they glided off toward mid-town Manhattan and Central Park. Where the hunting would be more congenial, Riley presumed.
Nicholas spread his long legs out on the tarmac. “Saint Peter on a fucking pony,” he said, resting his head back against the wall. “All six of them.”
Damian sighed. “This really is starting to get a little old.”
“If this is the same as last time. We’ll confirm it, then deal with it. Once and for all.”
“It’s unlikely to be anything else, Nick, you know that.” Damian sat up. “Why court a disaster just to be sure?”
Riley stood up and faced them both. “What the hell are you talking about? Either of you?”
Nicholas answered without hesitation. “The six gargoyles that just rose are the original six from the Stonebrood clan. The last six, which I and twelve demon hunters spent two weeks hunting and exterminating in 1873. In the end it cost us eight lives, but we did it because we knew if we did not, the rogue clan would continue to go on slaughtering humans for the joy of it for decades to come, for gargoyles are virtually immortal if their stone-sleep is secure enough. We accounted for every last gargoyle in the clan. That was the last clan, we thought. Gargoyles were wiped from existence and taken from the hunters’ lists.”
“Until 1977. Until my mother met my father,” Riley prompted.
“The only reason they returned to life was through supernatural means,” Damian told her. He lifted his arms to his knees and let his hands hang between them. “The demon Azazel that Nick had been hunting brought rock likenesses of the gargoyles to life—he channeled their life-force into the carvings using summoning charms. Azazel had more powers than Nick was aware of and we’ve always wondered if he really disintegrated the day Tally dealt with him, or merely departed and bided his time. Your mother hedged her bets. She made us swear to protect you if Azazel ever raised the clan again. She knew he would come after her offspring if he knew of you, for she was the one who transfigured him, the last time. He’ll be looking for vengeance, this time.”
Riley crossed her arms. “So despite seeing the six rise again, you still feel it is necessary to confirm that Azazel is behind this? Or is this some fancy form of procrastination?”
Nicholas’ eyes widened slightly.
Damian just laughed. “She’s Tally all over again, and then her father for good measure.” He laughed again, silently this time.
“Glad you find it amusing,” Riley told him.
“I’m not sure I could stand it, having Carson in the mix. I always found him irritating at the best of times,” Nicholas said, looking up at her.
“Only because he was fucking Tally and you wanted her yourself,” Damian said, his tone casual, as if he were discussing the latest football scores.
Riley jumped a little. Nicholas grew still, his gaze still on Riley.
Damian picked up the small plastic bag of food and held it up to Riley. “You should eat.”
Riley took it. She realized that she was starving to the point of nausea and suddenly didn’t care what was in the bag at all. She was going to eat every last morsel. She backed up to one of the air conditioning hubs, sat on the lid and tore into the deli sandwich with huge bites.
“We should still visit the sculptor, anyway,” Damian said, getting to his feet. “Riley isn’t ready to face Lirgon yet. How long until she will be, Nick?”
Nicholas shook himself, clearly trying to dismiss Damian’s shocking statement. He pushed himself to his feet. She felt his gaze on her, assessing. “Three days. Maybe two, but only if you were there, too.” He seemed to be struggling with inner thoughts. It made his words come slowly. “It would be risky, even then. Tally had years of training and Lirgon still…” He stopped and pressed his fingertips to his temples. “I can’t do this, Damian. I can’t.”
Riley put the sandwich down, shocked.
Damian, standing a little behind Nick, didn’t look surprised at this sudden confession. “You have to,” he said simply.
Nicholas dropped his hands and pointed at Riley. “Look at her! She had no idea who she is, her heritage, the traditions, any of it. We have to give it all to her and she’ll never absorb enough to appreciate even a fraction of it. Tally at least grew up in our world.”
Damian didn’t move. “You’re going to hate Riley because she isn’t in awe of you? That’s bigoted of you.”
Nick whirled to face him. “She has no idea what she’s dealing with!” he railed.
“I’m right here,” Riley reminded him. The food she had eaten was sitting at the bottom of her stomach now, like a cold rock. She felt sick.
He strode over to her. He was angry. Lines were drawn beside his mouth and his eyes were very blue. “You fucked him,” he said, pointing to Damian, “but you have no idea who he really is.”
“And you do, of course,” she said softly, suddenly grasping the shape of his anger.
“No, of course not! Damian is nearly three thousand years old. Even I have trouble trying to hold the concept of that amount of time in my mind, and I’ve lived for nine hundred years longer than you.” He gripped his hands together, like he was trying to hold his temper in. “You literally fell into our world last night, Riley. How can you possibly appreciate…?” He hesitated.
“You want to make sure I appreciate the right things and hate the things that should be hated,” she finished. “You want me to soak up a lifetime of prejudices and learning in a day, so that I will genuflect at the right moment, will be scared when I should be, and will laugh at the same things as you two.”
Nicholas straightened up. His anger faded.
Riley shrugged. “I’m sorry, Nick. That can’t happen. Not in the real world. If you wanted me to be another Tally, then you shouldn’t have abandoned me as a baby and left me for the foster system to take care of.”
He sucked in a sharp breath.
“That’s not how it happened, Riley,” Damian added.
“No?” She brushed her clean hands of invisible crumbs to hide their trembling. “I wasn’t exactly in a position to argue at the time.”
“You were born in 1983, on the same day your father was killed. By 1983 record-keeping and social services were much more effective and regimented than they were when Nicholas and I helped raise your mother. Even so, we helped your mother for the next year or so hunt down Lirgon and look after you. But when Lirgon and your mother died, it was bloody, brutal and close to public. The authorities got involved. Your mother’s body was found and when they realized who she was, they put you into the foster system.” Damian shrugged. “We were not next of kin, Riley. In 1984 we could barely produce identity papers saying we were alive.” He grimaced. “We’ve not been so unprepared since.”
“You left me in the system. Alone. You didn’t try to find me.” Riley wished the plaintive note wasn’t there in her voice, but there it was.
“We couldn’t find you,” Nicholas said simply. “We tried.”
Damian lifted a hand. “He’s lying just a bit. Once you emerged from the foster system, he had your St. Louis location within twelve months.”
She looked at Nick. His gaze cut away from her.
“But you still didn’t contact me. Why?” she demanded.
Damian answered again. “We could see you were building your own life. We didn’t want to dismantle it just because we selfishly wanted to bring you back into ours.”
Her eyes pricked with hot, hard tears. “It didn’t occur to you I might like to have the choice?”
Nicholas’ blue-eyed gaze speared her. “There’s no choice when we’re in your life. The underworld is destructive and seductive, and it takes over your life until there’s nothing left but this—the hunt, the chase, the constant thrill of your next target and the bizarre bohemian shadow world that normal humans have no idea exists right under their elbows and behind their ears.”
She shuddered. His eyes seemed to grow larger, until all she could see was the summer blue of his gaze. Staring directly at a vampire is a challenge. Damian’s words echoed in her mind.
“Let me go,” she whispered.
Nick blinked and turned away.
Riley drew in a breath. Then another. Her heart was thundering and her clitoris was swollen and pulsing. Her breasts were aching and heavy, the tips pushing at the soft material of the singlet. She licked her lips. She was powerfully aroused—Nicholas had been forcing her to it with his stare. She wiped her sweaty palm on her jeans, trying hard not to look at Damian, for she knew he would be able to sense her aroused state. At least here on the rooftop the open air would sweep some of her telling pheromones away.
When she thought it was safe, she let her gaze lift up from her lap. Right into Damian’s eyes. He clearly had been waiting for her to look up. He had returned to his deceptively indolent lean against the edge of the roof, both arms spread against the ledge. Now that she was looking at him, he spoke. “Riley has a psychological need to stay in control, no matter what. She probably acquired it from her turn in the foster system.”
Riley bit back the moan of betrayal. How dare he speak of it aloud? And to Nicholas?
Nicholas turned to look at Damian, then her, quickly. Her expression must have given him all the confirmation he needed. He glanced at Damian again. Something passed between them, a silent communication.
Riley wrapped her arms around her middle and squeezed. “Shouldn’t we go and see the sculptor or something?”
Nicholas considered her again. “It’s the dinner hour. It would be uncivilized to interrupt a human during their mealtime.” He spoke absently, his gaze on her face. “The foster system did more damage than I thought.”
“Just shut the fuck up,” she snapped.
Damian straightened up from his lean and strolled toward her. “She has such a need to control, in fact, that she will not let go, not even in my arms.”
Riley jumped to her feet, her face burning hot. “God, you had to tell him even that?”
Damian lifted his shoulders. A shrug. “You’re a liability. He has to know.”
Her breath deserted her, just as it had earlier that evening. The impact seemed somehow worse this time. Damian stopped barely a foot away from her, his eyes drilling into her with chilled mercilessness.
She found her voice. It was nearly bodiless. “All that talk this afternoon. The things we did. And the whole time you were just…assessing me for Nick. Sizing me up. Seeing if I were fit for duty.” The words tasted like ashes in her mouth.
“It’s a tough world out there. We have no use for a gentle maiden and a delicate sensibility that would get slaughtered in the first pass.”
“A test? This was a test?”
“You can call it that if you want.” Again, the disinterested shrug.
Fury ripped through her. She had been moved around the chessboard like the pawn she had been determined not to become. She had been utterly blind to the fact that she was being manipulated all along. How stupid was she? She had been completely unaware of when an agenda was being worked around her.
“Go back to your training room, little girl,” Damian added, jerking his head toward Nick, who stood just to one side, watching this all go down with perfect stillness.
Afterward, she was never able to reconstruct the reasoning that made her act. There was none. There was simply hurt and fury and the need to strike back—and a subconscious knowledge that nothing she did could possibly hurt Damian, who was so much faster and stronger than she was. He would stop her long before she could do anything to him and probably damage her in retribution…and she would deserve it.
She whipped out the carbon knife from inside her coat and gripped it hard in her hand. An ugly cry burst from her lips as she grabbed the front of Damian’s coat for purchase, took a perfect lunge forward with her lead foot and thrust with the knife, straight into his stomach.
The knife buried deep—it was incredibly sharp and she had thrust hard. She felt something give, deep inside him. There was a soft sighing sound and blood gushed over her hand as she stared down at it.
She pulled out the knife. “Oh god, oh god! No, no, Damian!” She looked up at him as he staggered sideways, his eyes closing. His hand came to his stomach. The sideways stagger ripped the knife from her grip and it dropped to the rooftop.
Nicholas was suddenly there behind Damian, holding him, lowering him to the ground.
Damian coughed and blood trickled from the corners of his mouth.
Blood was everywhere, all over his coat, all over his hands as he pressed them against his stomach.
Riley dropped to her knees next to him, Nicholas beside her. “Damian, why didn’t you stop me? Dammit to hell, why did you do this? What do I do now?”
He coughed again. “Too late, I think,” he said weakly.
Fright tore at her with cold, icy fingers. “What?” she breathed.
His eyes closed and his head rolled limply to one side. His hands slipped down to the tarmac.
Riley wasn’t aware that she was shaking him, or that she was crying his name, until Nicholas uncurled her fists from Damian’s coat one finger at a time, picked her up, sat her in his lap and turned her face into his chest. His arms shut out the ambient light.
She wept in great wracking sobs that hurt her chest and her head and Nicholas did not say a word. It wasn’t until she rested silently against him that he wiped her cheeks with his hand and then licked his fingers of her tears. “Control is an illusion, Riley. No one ever has total control, however much they like to think they do.”
She watched the way he relished the taste of her tears. “Do you know what I’ve just done?” Her voice was hoarse and ragged.
“You just lost what you thought was control,” Nicholas said calmly. “We forced you to it deliberately.” He pushed her bangs out of her eyes and tucked them behind her ear.
She might have felt a cold chill in the region of her heart except that her capacity for surprise and hurt and shock had maxed out. She stared at him.
A hand curled around her neck and she caught her breath. She knew instantly it was Damian’s, even without looking around. Nicholas was beginning to smile.
“You tricked me,” she told him.
“We…suggested. The power of suggestion was enough.”
Finally, she had the courage to turn and look at Damian. He sat right behind her, and although his coat was still stained in blood and ripped where her knife had sliced clear through it, his stomach was healed. He’d wiped his mouth of blood already.
“You son of a bitch,” she breathed.
“Guilty,” he agreed.
“Do you know what you put me through just then?”
“No. I really was…well, I guess unconscious is as good a term as any. I plan on asking Nick for details later though.” He didn’t even have the grace to look uncomfortable about such an intimate discussion. His expression sobered. “But it needed to be done, Riley. You cannot go on believing you can operate alone and in control like you were.”
“But if there is no such thing as control, then what is there? Something must exist if there is no such thing as control, or the world would be in chaos.”
Damian nodded. “Trust.”
She stared at him. “Trust.” She half laughed. “You’re kidding me.”
He shook his head.
“Three thousand years, we’ve split the atom, gone to Mars, there’s no such thing as control and what’s really running the world is trust?”
He smiled. “Yes.”
Nick’s arms tightened around her. “He really is not fooling around,” he murmured.
Damian got to his feet. “Trust is something you give. Control is something you take. They’re two sides of the same coin. It starts very simply by giving your trust to a few. Perhaps one, if that is all you can bring yourself to give up control to. You lay your life, your love, your trust in the hands of another and expect that they will not let you down. Ever.”
“That’s it?”
“It’s no simple matter, Riley. You’ve already had a small taste of how complex handing over trust can be. There’s sorts of trust you can give. From all consuming, complete-life trust,” and he glanced at Nicholas, “to just trusting that someone will come through with tonight’s meal for you. People give their trust all the time, from their dentist to their coffee clerk, without realizing the implied contract between them. They think the world runs on control, but it’s running on trust. Control isn’t going to do you any good if the trust isn’t there. You can’t force people to behave. In three thousand years, we have learned that much.”
He held out his hand to her. “I need a shower,” he said simply, “and you need better food and sleep. The sculptor will have to wait for tomorrow, Nick.”
Riley stifled the need to protest.
“Of course,” Nicholas said, instantly letting her go. He picked up her hand and kissed the back of it. It was an old-fashioned move, but it didn’t feel silly or quaint. His lips touched her skin and she shivered. He was staring into her eyes again—or at least, it felt like he was. Riley try to draw a breath, but breathing abruptly became almost impossible. She became aware in an instant of her ass and thighs resting against his legs, pressing against his hips, creating heat. Her shoulder was pushed against his chest, her hip against his abs. Although vampires seemed to run cooler than humans, where she touched Nick there was heat and pulsing. She could feel his cock next to her hip.
As he turned to look at her properly, she could feel the muscles in his torso flex against her.
She finally was able to draw a breath into her lungs and sucked it in sharply. It shuddered down.
Nicholas’ eyes narrowed thoughtfully as he watched her over the back of her hand. Then he lifted her hand up to Damian.
“We’ve all made choices, it seems,” he said softly.
I didn’t! she wanted to cry.
Damian lifted her to her feet.