Demon of Mine (21 page)

He lay down on his back in the grass,
pulling her on top of him. He was unmistakably hard, his erection
unmissable, even through the layers of their clothing. She gasped
as he slipped a hand beneath her skirts and raised them, baring
everything below her waist to the stars overhead. Slipping a finger
into the slick heat between her legs, he smiled. “Another thing I
forgot to mention about being a vampire is that your sense of touch
is more acute.”

“
I’d already noticed,” she
gasped as her body tightened around him. He pushed another finger
against her damp folds until it disappeared into her inflamed
flesh, sending white-hot pleasure spiking up through her belly. She
moaned.

Smiling wickedly, he cupped one of her
breasts with his free hand, massaging a nipple. Even through the
layers of her dress and shift, it tingled and hardened immediately.
The neckline of the gown – another he’d borrowed from his sister’s
wardrobe – was blessedly low. When he pulled it down, freeing her
breasts with little effort, she trembled against him in
anticipation. As he plunged his fingers into her sex again, he
touched his tongue to each of her nipples, causing them to shrink
to rigid, aching points. He drew one into his mouth and teased it
with his teeth, biting lightly. She arched her back, forcing it
deeper into his mouth and burying his fingers to their knuckles
inside her. Her body responded by tightening impossibly around them
as wild contractions wracked her core, more intense even than when
he’d made love to her in bed that morning. She vaguely wondered
what it would feel like to come now with his cock inside her, if
just his fingers could bring this on. The thought was lost in a
haze of pleasure as she cried out, writhing against him.

Several breathless moments later, he
unbuttoned his pantaloons. “I intend to see that you enjoy this
night, for in the morning we must go to London.”

****

“
Do not take anything my
parents may offer you to drink, and try not to be caught alone with
either of them.” Damon repeated what had become a sort of mantra
for what seemed the twentieth time.

Elsie nodded as the carriage rumbled
over a bump in the road. They were scarcely a mile from the city
now, and Damon seemed desperate to reinforce the warnings he’d
given her several times already. Remembering his story about
drinking the stableman’s blood, she was determined not to take any
sustenance his parents might offer her. But did she really need to
worry if she happened to find herself alone with either of them?
Mr. Remington was intimidating, but just weeks ago she’d been a
candidate for becoming Mrs. Remington’s personal maid. “Your mother
was always kind to me. I shouldn’t think any harm would come to me
if I happened to find myself alone with her.”

Damon shot her a dark look. “My mother
is not the woman she pretends to be in front of her
servants.”

That seemed a rather incredible claim,
seeing as how the woman spent the majority of her time being waited
upon hand and foot. “If a lady’s maid doesn’t know her, then who
does?”

“
I do.” Seeing Elsie’s
skeptical expression, he continued. “All those years you worked in
her house, and you never would have dreamed she’d been throwing out
the food you brought her and feeding on innocent people instead.
Some of them were servants just like you. She drained their bodies
and dumped them in the Thames, and you never knew.”

Elsie lowered her eyes as her insides
squirmed at the thought. “I know you’re right, but it’s all so hard
for me to believe. To think she might have done the same to me that
first night I arrived at the house…”

“
I never would have let
them touch you,” Damon said, his voice suddenly sharp. “I patrolled
the hallway outside your quarters every night for two weeks, until
I was sure you’d been there long enough that your absence would be
noted if you went missing.”

A sudden warmth flared in Elsie’s
heart as she imagined sixteen year old Damon guarding her room as
she slept. She never would have imagined then that the handsome boy
had given her so much as a second thought after rescuing her from
the factory workers’ slum. How had she been so blind for seven
years? She reached out and took one of his hands in hers, smiling.
“What a romantic boy you were.”

“
Romantic
?” he asked, half choking on
the word. “Lurking in dark hallways to guard a twelve year old girl
from my murderous parents is not at all what I would call
romantic.”

“
Well I think so,” she
said, peering out the window at the looming city. “After my parents
died in the fire, I thought I was alone. I never imagined that
there was someone looking after me.”

“
Yes, and what a splendid
job I did,” he said bitterly, glaring out the window as if the city
itself were at fault.

Elsie’s stomach knotted as she
realized what he was referring to – her tryst with Lord Wilkes.
With each day she spent with Damon, what she’d done with that other
man seemed less and less significant to her. If only Damon felt the
same way. “I wish you wouldn’t bring that up.”

His expression softened as he looked
at her. “Forgive me. You know I hold it only against myself, not
you.”

“
I know. But I’d rather not
think about it, all the same.” In truth, there wasn’t much to think
about. Lord Wilkes had been a selfish lover – nothing at all like
Damon, who made her feel as if she were the luckiest and most
important woman in the world each time he touched her. Lord Wilkes
had possessed none of Damon’s skill and little of his concern for
her pleasure. What really bothered her was that Damon felt he’d
failed her, which couldn’t have been further from the
truth.

“
How is your headache?”
Damon asked, abruptly changing the subject.

“
It’s not as bad as it was
yesterday.” The throbbing ache was still distinctly unpleasant, but
her worries over how Damon’s parents would receive the news of
their marriage distracted her from the pain. “I’m almost too
nervous to notice that it hurts at all.”

“
There’s no need for you to
worry. I’ll handle my parents.”

“
Do you think they’ll be
angry?” Elsie asked, trying to imagine how they could possibly not
be when their former servant barged into their home, dressed in
borrowed finery and hanging on their only son’s arm.

“
They have no reason to
be.”

 
Elsie’s heart sank as
she recognized Damon’s comment as a rather delicate way of saying
that they
might
be.

He gave her hand a squeeze as the
horses clip-clopped down the city streets, their every step
bringing Elsie closer to the confrontation she was dreading more
and more. “What if they hate me for marrying you? There’s probably
some rich heiress they’d rather you married. I’m just a
housemaid.”

“
You are
not
a housemaid anymore,”
he said firmly. “You are my wife, and nothing they say can change
that. Besides, I think that in time, they will be glad to have
another vampire in the family. Keeping the secret from nearly
everyone is tiring.” He frowned. “Of course, it would be much
easier if they didn’t throw themselves into the middle of London’s
social circles and burgeoning industries, but they insist upon
amassing an empire.”

“
Aren’t you proud of your
family’s accomplishments? They own half the factories in the city,
and you are heir to them, after all.”

“
Proud?” Damon turned over
Elsie’s hand and uncurled her fingers, holding her palm open to the
light that streamed in through the window. Delicately, he traced
the callouses that roughened her skin at her fingertips and below
her knuckles. She’d had them as long as she could remember. “Proud
of an industry that makes its profit off the backs of children?
No.”

The carriage slowed as it approached
the Remington house, smoothly rolling through the gates. “Here we
are,” Damon murmured.

Chapter 12

Before Elsie knew it she was climbing
out of the carriage, wincing only slightly at the sunlight. Then
she and Damon were entering the house, standing on the foyer floor
she’d swept a thousand times. She felt ridiculous in the airy, pale
blue gown she’d borrowed from Lucinda, who’d gladly handed over the
dress in exchange for a meticulous account of every last detail of
Elsie and Damon’s marriage. They’d left her at the Hertfordshire
estate, smirking as her eyes glittered with apparent amusement.
She’d claimed to have plans for the day, but Elsie suspected that
she simply hadn’t wanted to be caught in the middle of whatever
argument might unfold between Damon and their parents.

The servant that met Damon and Elsie
at the door wore his usual blandly polite expression at first, but
shock flashed in his eyes as he took a second look at Elsie. She
forced herself to keep a straight face as the man gave her a third
look, and then a fourth before his gaze finally settled on her
wedding ring. His name was Jonathan Carver and he’d been working in
the house for three years – knowing those things only made Elsie
feel even more out of place in Lucinda’s luxurious gown. She didn’t
need his incredulous stare to remind her that last time she’d seen
the man, she’d been a halfway convalescent housemaid. At last he
regained his dignity, wiping all traces of surprise from his face.
“Shall I inform your mother that you’ve arrived, sir?”

“
Is my father
here?”

“
No, I’m afraid he’s gone
out on business.”

“
We’ll see my mother
immediately, then.”

Jonathan silently led them upstairs.
In the corridor on the second floor, they passed a maid dusting an
expensive vase that sat on a pedestal in an alcove. She was not but
fifteen, one of the lower housemaids who Elsie herself had
instructed many a time. Rebecca, she was called. Stifling the urge
to nod at the girl or offer a greeting, Elsie forced herself to
glide quietly past as the girl shot furtive, wide-eyed glances over
her shoulder. The awkwardness was almost as bad as the anger that
filled Elsie when she wondered whether she might encounter another
housemaid – Jenny.

She’d done her best lately not to
think about her friend – or at least, her former friend. How could
she count Jenny as a companion after what she’d done? Disapproving
of Elsie’s feelings for Damon was one thing, but lying to her?
Elsie never would have imagined that Jenny would have had the gall
– or the necessary cruelness of spirit – to invent a nonexistent
‘fiancé’ for Damon in order to keep Elsie away from him. But
looking back on it, that was exactly what she’d done.

Elsie should have realized then that
it had been a lie. After all, Jenny had conveniently said that
Damon’s supposed fiancé was to arrive at the London house ‘sometime
within the next few days’, knowing that Elsie would likely depart
for Hertfordshire again within the same time frame. No doubt she’d
wanted Elsie to return to the country thinking that Damon was a
claimed man. Well, she’d underestimated them both. Jenny’s lie had
failed to do anything but destroy the trust Elsie had invested in
her.

But perhaps that was for
the best. She was having a difficult enough time convincing
herself
that she was Mrs.
Damon Remington, and all that the title entailed. Maybe it would be
easier for everyone else to see her as more than just a housemaid
if she disassociated herself from the servants. There was a time
when the notion would have broken her heart, but that was before
Jenny had deceived her. Now it prompted a rush of emotions, not the
least of which were sadness, confusion and a burning sense of
betrayal.

Damon touched the small of Elsie’s
back in an intimate gesture that reminded her of the news they were
about to break to his mother. The footman knocked on the doors to
Mrs. Remington’s chambers and opened them when instructed. Taking a
deep breath, Elsie let Damon guide her into the
antechamber.

Mrs. Remington was perched on the edge
of the damask sofa in the center of the room, just as Elsie had
found her so many times when she’d served her tea. Were it not for
Damon’s gentle touch and the nervousness boiling in the pit of her
stomach, she would have felt like a maid entering the room on some
bland errand.

“
Damon.” Mrs. Remington’s
voice held only the faintest note of surprise. No doubt it was due
less to the sudden arrival of her son than to the sight of Elsie at
his side. “You’ve brought Elsie back. Has the country air improved
her health so quickly?” Her hazel eyes widened as they swept over
Elsie’s fashionable gown.

Damon’s voice was steady. “She is
well, but that is not why I’ve brought her here. She comes with me.
We have married.”

The silence that followed his
statement might have lasted for millennia, or perhaps only a
second. Elsie held her breath, not sure whether to expect a dose of
the iciness Mrs. Remington was known for or an angry
outburst.

“
Married?” Mrs. Remington
said the word slowly, exploring it with her musical voice as if it
were some foreign expression she was trying to grasp the meaning
of.

“
Yes, just recently. It was
a small ceremony, but a legal one in a small chapel in
Hertfordshire. She is one of us now.”