Page 14 of By the Pint

I took one small step towards Casey, into his personal space. I tried not to suck in the scent of him. Or to notice the delectable lines of his throat tracking down into his open collar, the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed, the tiny hairs lifting on end as if to greet me.

“Fancy taking this somewhere quieter?” I asked him.

He picked up his whiskey sour and drained it in one.

5.

Casey

Dima led me out of the Grand Chamber, past the rutting crowds, and into the gardens of Dreadmourne Castle. The temperature dropped as we hit the night air, but either my jacket was doing a stellar job of keeping me insulated, or being this close to Dima Black was misfiring all my neurons and making me feel numb and tingly and slightly too warm all at once.

“Your first bloodbath?” he asked me. His cloak swished behind him like a certain disfigured musical genius haunting a theatre.

The music from the party, including the grunting and wailing faded more with each step from the orgy. It was replaced by gravel crunching underfoot, a handful of birds prematurely announcing the dawn, my unsteady human breaths, and my own thoughts churning about over one another. As I suspected, Dima’s mind was eerily silent. I made another attempt to breech it, failed, and sunk back into my miserable feelings.

Generally, I didn’t do feelings. Feelings were like rules, or junk food, or mortality. Great for other people. Not so much for me. I’d already experienced more feelings in this one night than I would have been comfortable with for an entire lifetime.

I was frustrated with Killian. He had abused my trust and not listened to me. Again. Like a fucking teenager, he’d trashed the house and invited that gods-damned centaur over after I explicitly told him not to. Part of me wondered if my six-hundred-and-twenty-year-old master had sent me on this wild goose chase simply to have the place to himself for the night.

I was annoyed with the valet for having the audacity to suggest parking my car in the open-air overflow lot.

I was anxious? … excited? … nervous? to be alone with Dima. I wasn’t sure I could pinpoint which emotion it was yet, and I wasn’t all that sure I wanted to.

And then there was this niggling sensation that something was … squiffy with me. With my abilities. I’d never failed this badly to get a read on someone, and frankly, I was starting to worry. Was my power wearing off? Fading? Had I used it all up somehow? Or was I not as good at everything as I assumed I was?

But the biggest mindfuck of all was Dima Black himself. Walking beside me under the glow from the gas lamps like he had zero worries. Of course he didn’t have any worries. He was immortal. He had all the time in the Eight and a Half Kingdoms. He was stinking rich, and disgustingly good looking. And even though I couldn’t get a proper read on him, I wanted him.

Or perhaps I wanted him because I couldn’t get a read on him.

Either way, I couldn’t stop thinking about pinning him against the nearest tree.

Beside me, Dima pinched his lips together with his fingers, almost as though he was trying to rein in his smirk.

I imagined fucking him would be a relatively peaceful experience. Silent and enjoyable. I bit down on my bottom lip. I’d never experienced that before.

Gods, how I wanted to test that theory.

“Yep, yes, I’m a bloodbath virgin. Is it obvious?” I said, in an attempt to rid myself of the images.

He removed his hand, his smile ever present. I was beginning to realise this man never stopped smiling. “It’s the suit, I guess. Seems naive to wear something so expensive to a place where they will literally tear it from your back.”

I wanted to impress you,I thought.

We came to a stop next to the lake, and Dima took a seat on an old splintering wooden bench. The moonlight, now the only source of illumination, bounced off the glassy waters, bleaching the tan from my skin, and, if possible, making Dima’s even whiter. Ghostly almost. Still beautiful, though.

“I didn’t really know what to expect,” I said, sitting next to him on the bench, but leaving a decent two-foot gap between us.

He assessed me for a moment, his eyes travelling over my face in a way that I was entirely used to. Everyone wanted to get a good look at the famous—infamous Casey ‘The Temper’ Freckleman. Even if the average vampire had no idea about my wingball history.

But with Dima, it was different. He was no average vampire.

It felt as though he could see through it all. Past this indomitable facade I’d erected. Straight to the heart of me.

It felt like he was stripping me bare. Like none of that mattered.

At once unnerving and thrilling.

“Tell me, how is it an unaccompanied human familiar finds himself at the Bloodsuckers in Business conference, and probably the deadliest orgy in all of Borderlands?”

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