Part 2 (2/2)
As she'd heard, he did absolutely nothing to hide his vampirism anymore. Some vamps could pa.s.s naturally. Others made adjustments in order to pa.s.s. For instance, she wore contacts and sungla.s.ses when she went out, and she did her best to move slowly, like a human. If you knew what to look for, it was easy to spot a vampire in any crowd, but no one would ever mistake Mikhail for human.
The power he held as his family's leader s.h.i.+mmered around him like a second skin. He made a beautiful prince. Once upon a time she could not resist the draw of that power, but she wouldn't pay the price for it anymore. Princes demanded absolute submission from those around them, especially their lovers. Now that she was a prince herself, she submitted to no one-not on the street, not in the council chamber and never, ever in the bedroom. She'd done her time on her knees. She had no intention of kneeling ever again.
Tapping Mikhail's image on the screen with her fingernail, she murmured, ”Very pretty. Too bad I'm going to have to kill you.”
He chose that moment to look up, directly into the camera. Straight into her eyes. Alya s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand from the screen.
Her a.s.sistant buzzed. ”Ms. Adad? Mr. Faustin and Mr. Silver are here.”
Mikhail continued to stare into the camera lens. She could not shake the feeling that he was tracking her with his uncanny eyes. Alya turned off the monitor, annoyed that he could rattle her with a trick like that. She checked her knives and leaned back in her chair. ”Send them in.”
When Mikhail walked through the door the curtains stirred and the air temperature dropped. In a glance he took in every detail of the room, just as she would, memorizing the layout, cataloging the feeders, Dominick, and hanging Frank, and tucking that information away for future use.
Alya stood to greet him. She sampled his power, letting it brush over her skin before shaking it off with a s.h.i.+ver, like a cat that's been stroked backward.
Their eyes locked and held without the camera as intermediary. She'd not been challenged so directly for a long time.
For the briefest moment, she glimpsed him as the angelic boy he'd been, kissing her with a smile. Was that really him? Had that girl been her? Some version of them, maybe. An incarnation on another plane. b.u.t.terflies filled her stomach, a visceral memory of how he'd once thrilled her. She hardened herself against the unsettling feeling. Sentimentality was a dangerous luxury.
”Knyaz,” she said, inclining her head without lowering her eyes. She used the t.i.tle he'd be known by among his own people.
”Knyaginya,” he said, his gaze level, his hands folded in front of him, his expression that of a church saint. His use of the feminine honorific made her smile. It was quite an ugly mouthful. And properly, she should be knyaz too. She was no one's princess.
”To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?”
Mikhail gestured to his lawyer. Alya had forgotten the man even existed, but he'd been standing there at Mikhail's left shoulder all along, grey and un.o.btrusive. He stepped forward with a letter sealed with black wax and dropped it on the table.
”Ms. Adad, I've come to testify that this sworn affidavit from Natalia Faustin is certified as genuine prophecy by the Council of Mothers.”
What in the h.e.l.l did that mean? Now she'd have to call in her lawyers to find out. She didn't touch the letter.
Mikhail pulled back his coat sleeve, revealing a strange bracelet-no, rather a slender black rope coiling up his arm. She hissed as she recognized the magic crawling over it. How had security let that by?
s.h.i.+t. Hoping against hope, she pushed her panic b.u.t.ton with her toe. Dominick raised a brow at her. She made a subtle ”wait” signal with one finger.
”Alya Adad, I declare you mine by right of dream, bound to me by fate and blood-”
And then she understood. He hadn't come to kill her, he'd come to marry her.
”You are f.u.c.king kidding me.”
Mikhail didn't falter. He continued reciting the proposal. There was probably some rule that he had to say the whole thing, and Mikhail was never one to break a rule. And it wasn't a proposal, she realized, it was a declaration of intent.
”This rope, woven of both craft and magic, symbolizes the unbreakable bonds of marriage.”
The rope came alive, uncoiling itself from his arm, slithering into a loop between his outstretched hands. From the corner of her eye, she saw Dominick tense, ready to leap at her slightest gesture. She also knew that Mikhail could kill him with a single blow. And security was not coming.
She had to get out of there. Lead Mikhail away from her people, and get some distance between herself and that rope. Then she could take him on.
”It will ensure your submission to me as a bride-”
Saying this, he stepped into range. She kicked the desk, sending it hurtling against his legs, knocking him backward. Seizing the second she had before he recovered, she sprinted out of her office, down the corridor to the central staircase, praying Dominick wouldn't engage him.
Her building had a central staircase made up of wide oak steps and curving banisters which wound three stories down to the marble clad lobby. She bypa.s.sed the stairs entirely, vaulted the railing and plunged down the well. Landing on the ground floor in a deep crouch, she sprang toward the exit. No one was down there. Security was gone, the lobby still and silent as a tomb.
Just as she hit the doors, Mikhail landed exactly where she had. He'd come slower than she expected, and that meant he'd spent a second or two on Dominick. G.o.d d.a.m.n him.
As he sprang up from his landing crouch, she drew two knives from her waist and sent them spinning at his face. He blocked the first with his forearm and got nicked at the hairline by the second.
She sprinted out into the sparkling lights of Sunset Boulevard. Barefoot and fleet in her jeans, she ran straight into the crawl of Sat.u.r.day night traffic and bounded onto the hood of the first car that got in her way. He jumped on another. Hopscotching cars, they crossed the boulevard, shouts, honks and camera flashes in their wake.
She hit the opposite sidewalk, leapt for the low roofline and swung her body over the top, legs extended, toes pointed like a gymnast. He was right behind her, his hands gaining hold of the roof just as she rolled to her feet, so close that his fingers grazed her back through her thin silk blouse, raising goose b.u.mps.
But by the time he swung over the side, she was two rooftops away, waiting for him, exactly where she wanted to be.
Mikhail jumped the last gap between them, and paused, letting the vibrations fade under his feet. Alya waited for him, straight-backed and tall, her long black hair s.h.i.+fting and stirring in the breeze.
Long ago he'd known her well, and he'd heard what she'd become since. But nothing could have prepared him for seeing her in person. Or for wanting her so much.
In the office he'd used every ounce of restraint in him to hide this desire from her, but from the moment he'd scented her from the outer office he'd been possessed by a stupefying, blinding l.u.s.t. If he couldn't figure out how control it, it would get him killed. Soon.
Still, he wanted to see her move, because her every gesture flowed like water, so he began to stalk her in a slow circle. She matched him step for step, her amber eyes watchful but fearless.
The air on the rooftop was fresh and cool and the city spread out around them, white, gold and red lights blurring and flas.h.i.+ng. The only sound was the rumble of engines beneath them. Their feet made no noise at all. She was evaluating him, waiting for him to speak, but he didn't plan to say much.
”So, you want a bonded wife. Tell me, are you keeping serfs too? Doing that whole feudal thing?”
Silence did bother her, it seemed. They continued their slow dance.
”If you killed my people-”
That he had to answer. ”No one is dead.”
Her voice was deeper, and her accent had changed. As a girl, she'd arrived in New York speaking English with an Arabic-inflected French accent. The first time she spoke to him, that accent struck him dumb. It made her sound sophisticated and exotic. It made him want to kiss her every time she moved her lips. In the intervening years, her accent had faded, and she'd picked up plenty of Americanisms, but intriguing traces of it still survived in the sensual vowels and throaty consonants.
She stopped circling, widened her stance and snapped her elbows straight. A gleaming knife dropped into each of her hands. ”I a.s.sume you came here to die?”
Death would be a relief. As would murder. Or rape. As far as he was concerned, any release would be welcome after thirty years in purgatory. She wouldn't remember that he'd tasted her, or know what it meant if she did. That was to his advantage. She thought he could walk away, like she could. She thought he'd act sensibly. The idea almost made him laugh aloud.
He threw aside his coat and unfurled his rope. It slithered into a loop between his hands. Alya's full lips. .h.i.tched into a snarl. She raised her knives, daring him to approach. He played the rope out into a wide loop. Casually, almost carelessly, he tossed the loop in her direction, trusting the magic to guide it over her head. It opened wide. She sidestepped it, but it followed her, centering over her head again. Angry, she lashed out with her knives, her movements a blur even to his eyes. Any other rope would have fallen to the ground in confetti. Not this one.
With a sharp tug he pulled the loop tight, pinning her upper arms to her sides. Another tug and she was against his chest. He spun behind her, pressing his forearm tight against her larynx.
”Drop the knives.” Mikhail whispered the command because he could not draw a full breath. Not with her hair against his lips, not with her body against his. He ran his free hand along her left arm, closing his hand over hers. When she didn't release the knife, he increased the pressure on her throat.
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