Trials (The Forever Series, Book 6) (13 page)

“Good. I’m glad,” I say and he looks at me in surprise.
“Your comments in Vegas about how you don’t feel anything for most of your
charges concerned me,” I add.

“Oh,” he pauses now, taking that in.

“I wish you had told me about him before he turned up in New
York. He is such a huge part of your life and I never even knew,” I say
cautiously.

He peers at me warily and I sigh. As much as he has changed,
he is still the same cagey tiger he has always been.

“He is hurting,” he says quietly.

“Why?”

“Because of his secret. He is hurting and I can’t do
anything to help him.”

“Oh.” I see now where this is going. I have a mild sense of
not
déjà vu,
but
something else. Like I was expecting it. Like somehow I knew it was coming.

I start to shake my head at him as he says, “But you can.”

“No, CK, no.”

“Liv, please.” I start at the use of Liv. “He needs you to
help him. I need you to help him.”

“No. I said that when we were in the past you should just
try and find someone you trust to help him.”

“Don’t you think we have tried that? Hundreds of times over
the last 2760 years, and it always ends the same. In betrayal and certain
death.”

“That’s a bit dramatic isn’t it?” I ask with a frown. “Just
throw some money at someone to keep their trap shut.”

“Aefre, I don’t think you really get the enormity of this.”
He sighs.

“I do. I get that his blood is the cure for our limitations.”

“Yes. For all of us,” he presses.

I nod, “Yes, I know.”

“
All
of us, Aefre. Not just the top four, but
everyone.”

“What? I thought anything below a Lesser Immortal couldn’t
withstand sunlight even with the Faerie Silver?”

“Not if they drink from Sebastian,” he snaps at me, getting
irritated with my apparent denseness. “And it isn’t a cure if they drink from
him, it’s temporary without the Silver and the spell. Do you get it now? If
they knew, he would be used as a Feeder for the weak. Imprisoned and used.”

I gulp. “Oh,” I say, realization dawning that it would be a
hideous fate to endure. “I see now.”

“Very well. So you see the problem we face? Even if we threw
money at someone as you so succinctly put it, what is to stop them from using
him to make even more money by charging for feeding?”

That is a massive reality check mixed in with a big old dose
of disgust.

“Fine. I get it. But what about Jess? They are married in
the future. Why not clue her in? I’m sure we could trust her, with her being so
close and all.”

“They are married in the future?” he asks incredulously.
“She drinks from him?”

“Well, no,” I admit. “He said he spelled her to not bite
him.” I am getting very confused here so I ask, “Why can’t he just spell
someone to forget after they’ve fed from him? And furthermore, if someone does
drink from him, how do they even know what he is? What his blood can do?”

He looks at me like I am thick and I wonder if perhaps I am,
as I just don’t get it.

“Don’t you feel it? When you drink from him, don’t you feel
it?” he asks.

“Feel what?” And err, present tense? As far as he knows I
only drank from him the one time. Oh crap, he does know. Sebastian must have
spilled the beans. He is so dead. But no, CK hasn’t come at me with accusations
about Xane so…ah, forget it. Freudian slip.

“The power rush,” he says and frowns at me.

“Oh that, well, yes, it
was
mildly boosting,” I say,
drawing out the word “was” for his benefit and he looks at me somewhere between
confused and amused.

“Mildly boosting? Is that all?”

“Well more so than the average Vampire,” I say now frowning
at him. “It is supposed to be more?”

“Aefre, the rush is incredible,” he says with a look of
wonder on his face. “The feeling of being invincible. And that is for me. For
Lesser Vampires it is so much more.”

“Oh, well I am clearly not a Lesser Vampire,” I say
haughtily. “What’s this got to do with anything?” I have lost the plot and I
want to fuck him now. Not talk about Sebastian.

“Hm, interesting. It must be your Queen status that makes it
so. Normally anyone who drinks from him knows there is something different
about him. All it would take is for someone to explore it further and…” he
holds his hands up.

“And what about spelling them to forget then?” I ask, more
than irked by now.

“He doesn’t have the power to make people forget, Aefre. It
is suggestion. You can’t suggest to someone they forget something.”

Why not? I think to myself, but refrain from saying it out
loud at the risk of sounding even dumber.

“Fine,” I say. “I get that you obviously know what you are
talking about, having been dealing with it for thousands of years,” to which he
looks relieved, “but I can’t do anything about it,” to which he looks annoyed.

“You can. You can be with him in the way that he wants, that
he needs.”

I just stare at him so he tries a different tactic. “How
would you feel if you could have sex and feed, but not be fed from?”

“I do, all the time. With Lincoln,” I say and then really,
really wish that I hadn’t.

“With your VAMPIRES!” he roars at me and I jump to my feet,
hand over my racing heart.

“All right!” I snap. “Keep your pants on.” Although, I could
really do with him losing his pants right about now.

He visibly calms himself and tries again, “I know you love
it, Aefre. I know that you can’t live without it.”

Well, he has me there. He must see he is finally getting
through to me as he continues, “He doesn’t even risk being intimate with other
Vampires because of it. With the exception of Vivienne--who he spells--he
hasn’t been with another Vampire in centuries.”

Now he has my undivided attention. If I couldn’t be with
another Vampire I would probably lose my mind. Vamp and Human sex is fantastic,
Vamp and Shifter sex is incredible, but Vamp on Vamp action beats them off with
a very big stick. A tree even. Those big Redwoods you find on the slopes of the
Sierra Nevada.

“Finally,” he says, crossing over to me.

“No, but wait. Future him said he spells Jess not to bite
him. Why not just do that?”

He sighs, a long-suffering sigh, as clearly I still don’t
get it. “Because he
wants
to be bitten. Aren’t you listening to a word I
am saying? And it is a chore for him. It isn’t enjoyable. You know firsthand
that your mind gets lost to his suggestions and your body takes over. He
doesn’t want to be stuck with a mindless fuck – literally. He wants passion and
intimacy, to make love and to feed from his lover as she does to him. All of
the things that we want. That we all want.”

I gulp. “And you are asking me to do that with him?”

He closes his eyes in pain, “Yes.”

“Oh, Constantine, I can’t. You know that I can’t because of
Cole. He would be devastated and he wouldn’t understand. And you…” I grab his
hand.

“He doesn’t have to know.”

“I’m not lying to him.”

“Aefre, you already are lying to him.”

Gee, thanks for the reminder there. “And you want me to add
to it?”

“My only concern is for Sebastian,” he says shortly.

“Clearly, as you don’t seem to have a problem with pimping
me out to take care of him,” I sneer at him, now quite put out that he has
basically just tried to guilt me into complying with his request.

His pained expression returns, “I don’t mean it to come
across that way. I love you, Aefre, but you are the only one who can help him.
I have to put my own feelings aside about this.”

“What about my feelings? Have you not even bothered with
those?”

“Of course I have. I know you want him. I can see the way
you look at him.”

What? Is he seriously trying to turn this back around on me
now?

Of course he is. It’s his biggest talent. Well, that and
making me orgasm intensely without even having to try. Speaking of, I am
getting pissed off with this conversation now so I make a declaration that will
draw it to a close swiftly, so the fucking can commence.

“This is something so completely out there, I am struggling
to get my head around it. However, I have heard everything you have said to me.
I am in no position to comply with your request but when I am free to do so, we
will revisit. End of story. I want to hear no more about this.”

“Done,” he says straight away.

Err, that was easy. Too easy. Why go through all of this
drama for such an easy roll over?

“It will give him hope,” he says quietly.

Oh. Now I really feel like crap. “Can we fuck now?” I ask
him, desperate to change the subject.

He chuckles, humor restored, “Oh yes, my sweet. We can
definitely fuck now.” I throw myself at him before he has stopped speaking and
kiss him with exuberance forgetting all about whatever it was we were talking
about.

Chapter 7

Things got very naked and very sweaty soon after I launched
myself at my sire and after my third orgasm (see, he doesn’t have to try very
hard at all), I straddle him and pull him up, wrapping my legs around him. He
drops his fangs and feeds from me extra slowly, I think to make his point even
clearer about how much I love this and would die without it. He pulls on my
hips to get me to move over him again when we are rudely interrupted by an
unexpected and very unwelcomed visitor.

“Oops, so sorry to interrupt,” her stupid tinkly voice says
as she pops in from nowhere.

I glare at her from the middle of the very rumpled bed where
I am still fucking my sire. “What the fuck do you want? And hello? Heard of
knocking or texting even?”

She bats her eyelashes at me, well, no, probably not at me,
probably at CK. His head is that close to mine, it’s hard to tell who she is
looking at. “Can I have a word?” she asks.

“What do you want, Vivienne? We are kind of busy here in
case you hadn’t noticed,” he snaps at her but with an undertone of caution.

“I lost something,” she says and holds up her right arm. “I
desperately need it back.”

He sighs that world-weary sigh I often get and looks at me
apologetically. “Fine, I will help you look.” He loosens his grip on me.

Uh-uh. Does he really think I am going to let him swan off
naked with this woman to look for missing objects, that she obviously misplaced
while they were going at it? Oh! He brought her here? I glare at him with
something close to loathing. Well, the “I still love you” kind of loathing, and
he has the grace to look ashamed as he realizes I know.

“I will take you,” I say to her, climbing off my sire and
making a big show of throwing the covers over his naked self. I magick myself a
robe and add, “This is, after all,
my
home as well.” I quickly look back
at CK and he is pleased, but not that I have taken ownership under these
circumstances.

“Wait here,” I snap at him and he has the good sense to obey
me. Obey me? Christ, that’s a first.

I grab Vivienne by the arm and lead her out into the
hallway. She is staring at me in awe and something else.

“What?” I ask her.

“You…he…you get away with talking to him like that?” she
asks, amazed.

Oh, when will people learn?

I ignore her and ask, “What did you lose and where do you
expect to find it?”

“He has asked you to share his castle?” she presses, not
moving forward.

“Yes,” I say shortly, “not that it is anything to do with
you. Now if you please? I would like to get back to what you interrupted.”

“I’m sure you do,” she mumbles and steps forward, leading me
to a room not far from my own. “Erm,” she hesitates.

“I know you were together here with Sebastian,” I tell her,
although I was not informed it was actually here, which is a very bad move on
CK’s part. A very, very bad move. “Please go and see if you can find what you
lost,” I say, opening the door and she steps in hesitantly.

“You know?” she asks.

I sense her fear, as I was quite explicit the last time I
saw her about keeping her hands to herself. “Yes. He tells me everything,” I
say haughtily. And yes, I am a big fat liar but I am not giving this woman the
satisfaction of catching me on the back foot.

“Oh. You are not angry?” she asks, wary of another
Queen-like smack down.

“I wouldn’t say that, but I know he did what he did only
because of Sebastian.” I make this point to her so she knows it was nothing to
do with her.

She searches furtively for a few minutes and I decide to
help to speed this along. “What did you lose?” I ask.

“My Faerie Silver,” she says to my amazement. “I have lost
that damn cuff more times than I care to think about. I have looked everywhere
else. It has to be here.”

“Cuff?” I ask her with a frown.

She nods absently and gets on her knees to look under the
bed. Okay, this is weird, but I help and go to the other side of the bed to
look. I find it straight away. “Here.” I stand and hold it out to her.

“Thanks,” she says gratefully and takes it from me and puts
it on.

I am burning with curiosity and, well, screw the damn cat.
“Eloise gave you a bracelet?” I ask her.

Her eyes meet mine and she debates whether to talk to me.
“Yes.” She slips it off her wrist again with ease. “Easier to punish me,” she
says and shrugs. “I sometimes don’t even notice it is gone I am that used to
having it off. One of the reasons I am not sorry you ended her,” she adds
quietly.

Her own sister not only turned her but also punished her?
Extensively, by the sounds of it as well. What a bitch.

“You don’t have to look so horrified on my behalf. You know
what a cruel bitch she was.”

“Erm, yes. I am surprised she would do that to her own
sister though,” I say.

“We stopped being sisters the minute she became my sire.”
She sits heavily on the bed and I actually feel sorry for her. “He is so in
love with you,” she says out of the blue. “I envy that.”