Page 25 of The Shadow Bride

Without warning, my arms snake around his waist, and I draw him closer, holding him flush against my body.

Tha-thump tha-thump tha-thump.

Transfixed, I drag my tongue along the rapid beat of his pulse. He tastes like salt, slightly bitter from his soap, but beneath it all, something richer lingers. Something darker. My entire body shudders in time with his. With a groan, he tries to pull away, his breathing ragged and his eyes unfocused. “Célie, what are you—?”

The Tower door bursts open, and Brigitte snarls, “Get away from him!”

Too late.

My fangs have already lengthened, and—though weak, though faint—I am still a vampire, and perhaps all the more dangerous for it; neither can move fast enough to stop me. Brigitte’s shout still hangs in the air as I sink my teeth into Jean Luc’s throat.

Chapter Nine

Petite Menteuse

His blood surges into my mouth, thicker and faster than expected. Hotter. It streams down his throat and shoulder, across my chest, until it paints both of us scarlet. I don’t stop, however. I can’t stop. Though tears pour down my cheeks, though he thrashes against me in shock and horror, spluttering incoherently, I merely thread my arms beneath his shoulders and drag him lower, closer. Easing my access. “C-Célie—” He seizes my waist and attempts to pry me away. “Célie,stop—”

I hardly feel his efforts. His hands could be a gentle caress. Indeed, as his blood fills my body, it becomes startling easy to hold him. To keep him with me forever.Mine.The thought rises like a snarl—and perhaps Idosnarl, my teeth sinking deeper—because Jean Luc scrabbles at my nape now, my hair and nightgown, desperate to find purchase. And hisfear—I can sense it, scent it, sharper than blood magic and just as potent, even inebriating. It floods the entire alley until I might drown in it, and my jaw clamps instinctively in response. My tongue works frantically.Wasting it.I amwastinghis lifeblood, but I cannot control the flow, cannot do anything except bear him to the street and trap him between my knees, pinning his useless hands to the cobblestones. Because I need more of it.

I needmore.

Before I can properly adjust my bite, however, my ribs erupt in agony.

“Let himgo!” Brigitte’s calloused hands replace Jean Luc’s, and she screams, tearing at my arms before sliding his silver Balisarda through my ribs once more. Twice. Three brutal strokes. Though I choke, snarling and twisting away from her—delirious with pain,burning—my hands refuse to relinquish him. My teeth remain in his throat, even as his movements grow slower. Weaker. Brigitte lifts his Balisarda to strike again, her eyes crazed with fear. The scent only goads me further. “Get away from him! I saidget”—she grits her teeth with effort, still swinging wildly—“away!” She hacks at my arms now, merciless in her assault. “Help!Help!”

In a sickening circle of life, however, Jean Luc’s blood heals my wounds as soon as they open, and Brigitte’s sobs soon join my own. “Help!” Her shrieks split the dawn like an axe. “Someone please help us!Please!” In one last, desperate bid to free him, she swings the Balisarda high, higher, before embedding it in my neck.

Pain unlike anything I’ve ever felt rends my body in two.

Because this time, she leaves the blade half-buried in my flesh, and I feel every inch of it as I turn, slowly, to face her.

Lethal purpose pounds through my chest as I wrench the Balisarda away, as I toss it to the ground and rise to my feet. Though the wound doesn’t heal instantly, vanishing like the others, the skin still knits itself back together. It leaves an angry puckered line.

Too late, she realizes her mistake. Her eyes widen when my lip curls. Her breath catches when my vision sharpens, bleeding red, and—after a split-second deliberation—she darts up the alley in an obvious attempt to lure me away from Jean Luc. And I willoblige her.Oh yes.I will give herexactlywhat she wants, and I will relish watching that bright, cold light leave her eyes as she dies to protect him. Blood roars in my ears. Though her gaze darts frantically for a means of escape, there is none.

If she runs, I will catch her, and already my knees bend in anticipation, my entire body trembling, tightening, because I hope she does—I hope she runs.

As if in slow motion, she turns to do just that.

And I attack.

It takes less than a second for arms of iron to wrap around my chest, pinning my own to my sides. His scent engulfs me next—rich, decadent—and heat coils tight within my belly in response.Michal.And nowIam the one thrashing in vain, seething and snarling against him, helpless to move until he frees me. I should’ve known he wouldn’t leave. I should’veknownhe’d interfere—

“Hello again, pet.” His voice drips with apathy, and he shakes his head, heedless of my efforts to snap his shin with my heels. “We really must stop meeting like this.”

“Let me go,” I snarl.

“As much as I’d enjoy watching you eat your fiancé, I don’t care much for the mess it’ll leave behind.”

“Ihateyou—”

“I know you do, Célie.”

I shudder convulsively at my name on his lips. And I hate my reaction—I do. I hatehim. With a vicious curse, I writhe and twist, driving my elbows into his ribs. Attempting to create space, to loosen his grip. My skin tingles intolerably where he touches me, and—and he cannotbehere. I told him toleave. Though Jean Luc presses a hand to his throat to stanch the bleeding, the scent of hisblood still entwines with the delicious scent of the vampire behind me, the scent of fear. My head spins with it all—each scent more potent than the last—until I am mindless in his arms, delirious. Until all I can hear is the sluggish beat of Jean Luc’s heart and the rapid beat of Brigitte’s.

Until all I canseeis scarlet upon the cobblestones, down my front. It coats Michal’s leather sleeves now too.

It makes them slick.

---