Page 95 of Your Coffin or Mine
I finally get a good look at it and my jaw drops. “How the hell am I supposed to keep my boobs in that?!”
Chapter 29
VLAD
“You’re absolutelycertain I don’t look like an idiot?” I ask, standing before the oval mirror. I inhale deeply, sucking in the calming aroma of leather and books that fills the study.
“You look great, even better if you’d stop fidgeting like a boy in knee pants,” Doyle answers, his voice muffled with the number of pins in his mouth.
I glance around the room, noticing how little it has changed with time, unlike the rest of the castle. It’s clean, because Hilda would never allow it to be anything but, and the room is all dark wood. The walls are inlaid with intricate carvings of men hunting elk, made the same year Doyle attempted to talk me into hunting with him.
His head bows as he reaches the hem of the cape.
“What if she’s my mate?” I blurt out. I’ve been trying to figure out what pulls me to Aubrey so intensely, and Doyle has been my venting board since we started the alterations to my suit.
I haven’t told him yet that I bit Aubrey, and I won’t until I speak to her about it properly. Her blood still sings in my veins, and I have more energy than I can ever remember having. Like high-octane fuel, my engine is roaring with life.
“Your first piece of ass in a century, and she’s your mate? Really?” His large frame moves to stand after hemming my pants. “The odds are high that she isn’t. You cannot keep her—she’s a human, Vlad.” His tone is stern.
“Speak of her like that again, and I will rip your balls off and make you eat them.”I will never let her go.“Stop worrying. I know exactly what she is. Just help me make sure tonight goes as planned.”
“I like Aubrey, but it had to be said. And how can I do that when I don’t know what you are planning?” he asks, folding his arms over his chest.
“I need you to handle something for me.” I grin when he stutters, feeling more alive than I have in an age. “I know how much you love surprises.”
I snicker loudly when he does exactly as expected, and his eyes turn suspicious.
He raises a brow. “I enjoy surprises even less than you do. Speaking of, how in the hell did you get the damn goddess statue into the ballroom?”
My thoughts wander to the display downstairs I had wrapped in red silk only hours earlier. It really was one of Michelangelo’s bolder pieces.
“You mean the one from the Greek renaissance you’ve been keeping secret in the crypt?”
“Yes,” he says, obviously put out by me removing it from his treasure trove, but it reminds me of her, in the throes when she’s crying my name.
I am sure Aubrey will love it.
It is strange to feel a human emotion such as anxiety, when I have gone so long feeling nothing. My skin is tight, unease bristling below the surface of every cell with her absence, and the need to go to her is all but consuming. I hope Aubrey enjoys the show because I feel absolutely ridiculous.
Doyle frowns and blanches. “It was too much for you to renovate the floors and the plumbing, but dipping into my art collection is fine?” he grumbles. “If anyone notices it’s not a replica, it’s on your head.”
As if that even warrants a response—I hardly have time for such things.She mentioned in one of her posts that her favorite movie isTen Things I Hate About You, not to mention the majority of romantic movies I have now seen depict many men dancing to woo their fair lady.I’m here to woo.
“God, you’re a dick,” he murmurs, placing the thread and pins back in their box on the fireplace mantle. He points to a blood pack on the table filled with O negative. “Now, drink that.”
“Absolutely not.” I grimace. With Aubrey’s sweet taste flooding my veins, I don’t need it. Still, I say, “Surely they can do something about the plastic taste.”
“One, it’s not actually meant for consumption, and you know that. Two, you’re about to be in a room with a bunch of humans. You need it.”
“I had some earlier.” I meet his blue eyes with mine to hide my lie.
He gives me a suspicious look, but otherwise drops it. He knows I won’t do anything that can lead to reporters with a headline stating “Blood-sucking cannibal goes on rampage at hotel party.”
“The caterers have already arrived,” Doyle explains, before settling into a chair to sigh with exaggerated exhaustion. “So have the rest of the new staff, including our manager. The hotel is probably going to get busy after this.”
He’s complaining, but that’s what he wants. I don’t care, so long as I can chase my pretty woman through my castle. “All you do is bitch and moan,” I tease, and he lifts his head to shoot me a glare.
“Yeah, but while you were decorating and then getting your beauty sleep for an hour, I was organizing everyone. I haven’t had this much human interaction in decades becausesomeonedecided to become a decrepit old man for years. It’s tiring.”
