Page 21 of Blood Bonds

“Well technically, I think you can say the mugger survived you,” I teased back, making him smirk fully this time. It was the closest thing to a smile so far and Jesus Christ, it was breathtaking! In fact, if this guy ever smiled fully then I think that would have been criminal… forget the gunman.

“Then you can thank me over dinner,” he stated as if he wasn’t about to take no for an answer.

“I think I already thanked you,” I pointed out, and he argued playfully,

“Not over dinner, you didn’t.”

I laughed at that before pointing my finger at him, telling him, “Oh now you’re smooth.”

He shrugged his shoulders and said, “I do try.”

I couldn’t help but look him up and down and be bold enough to say, “Looking like that, I suspect you don’t have to try too hard at all.”

His eyes widened at this because I had clearly shocked him with my brave response and well, he wasn’t the only one… I could feel myself start to blush.

“Is that a compliment, Vanessa?” he asked seductively, stepping closer and, again, the way my name just rolled off his tongue, my God I thought I would soon start panting. But to try and not let on to how much he was affecting me, I told him,

“You look like a smart guy…one who owns a mirror.”I added the last part behind my hand like it was a secret, and this time the grin he awarded me was nearly fucking blinding!

I swear this man couldn’t be real! There was no way anyone was that beautifully raw.

“I am smart enough to ask a beautiful woman to dinner before she can disappear on me,” he replied confidently, making me suck back a quick breath at having this living God in front of me calling me beautiful. It didn’t feel real, more like a dream I found myself mentally pleading with God to let me never wake from.

Because there was no way this man could find me beautiful.

“So, what is it to be, Vanessa?” he asked, his deep voice becoming smoother and more seductive.

Jesus… every time he said my name, I nearly closed my eyes, just so I could complete the fantasy and picture us in a bedroom. In fact, it felt dangerous. As if all he ever needed to do was say my name that way and I would do anything he asked of me.

Knowing that I needed to find my backbone and take back some control, I told him, “Coffee.”

“Coffee?” he repeated, as if surprised.

“Yeah, we can go for coffee but on one condition,” I said, making him raise a single dark brow as if this was all it ever took for him to get people to speak.

Naturally, it worked, because I told him my one simple condition…

“I pay.”

Chapter 9

Oh Brother

As soon as I said I would pay for the coffee, he looked like he wanted to argue but something in my face must have held him back. Because, in the end, he simply nodded and held his arm out as if to prompt me to start walking.

“Erm… do you know a place?” I asked, feeling a bit foolish saying we should go for coffee and not knowing anywhere. I mean, right now I didn’t even know where ‘here’ was, other than somewhere to the north in the huge sprawling 843 acres of Central Park.

At this question, I received another devastating smirk before he offered me his hand, something I looked at like it was going to bite me.

“Give me your hand, Vanessa,” he ordered in a sterner voice because, clearly, he was a man used to getting his own way and, well, I seemed powerless to stop myself. So, I placed my hand in his and let him lead me along the path. Those strong fingers once more enveloped my own and made me feel tiny compared to him.

But I also needed to question the timing of this. How was it possible that in the span of twenty-four hours I had come into contact with two devastatingly handsome men who seemed to take an interest in me? Was it really a coincidence? Okay, so there was a bit of a difference, seeing as one of them I had witnessed murdering a man, turning into a Vampire, biting me, then kidnapping me. Oh, and not to mention, a man I was still psychotically obsessing over.

Maybe I had hit the jackpot this time, because instead of just running from one scary motherfucker, this time I had run straight into the arms of another who had then saved me. Although what he had been doing in the park, I didn’t know, making me ask,

“What were you doing here in the park this time of night?”

He looked down at me as we passed by the fountain, headed back the way I had first come.

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