Page 74 of The Royal Street Witch
I do it. Cassius won’t hurt me, but he could. He could break my neck right now before I would have time to react if he wanted to.
“Behave,” he snarls and slides off me.
I lie still, breathing heavily on the floor, turning my gaze to his.
He pulls his hand through his hair with a sneer, tongue sliding over his fang.
“Don’t psychoanalyze me and don’t you dare talk to me about threatening people.”
“I’m just making an unfortunate observation, darling.”
“Your kind has benefitted from my power for a long time,” I say, but Cassius is wise and I hate it. He sees too much of me. The parts I keep hidden from most. The parts I usually only show once I’ve chosen to, and now my lip is quivering and the energy builds in my fingers once again. My defense mechanism, my lifeline.
“What can I do? He has a taste for beautiful women. Believe me, I brought her for me. But he had to have her and there was no stopping him. That’s our life, that’s how we live. That’s what you better get used to if you continue to risk everything you have to be with him.”
The room spins, because perfect strangers can give Bastian what he yearns for. Something I can never let him have. Not ever. And it’s as if Cassius reads my mind. His expression goes slack, his chin dips as his eyes try to meet mine. I sit up, resting my elbows on my knees.
“So what if he craves the blood of beautiful women? He withstands it most of the time.” He wags a finger at me. “For you. Look at me, I have an affinity for young blood, and I fight it every day. We can’t help our tastes, but we can control them.”
“That’s control?” I say, pointing to the closed door where Bastian feeds.
“He’s insatiable now. He can’t control himself. He must feed and feed often. I brought the boy for him, I did. But he was taking the woman before I could do anything. We must take what we can get. Luring people to the Garden District is trickier than in the Quarter.”
Everything he’s saying makes sense, and if Cassius yearns for youthful blood and doesn’t act on it, maybe there is some good inside of him. Yet I can’t get the grin on his face when I walked in the room out of my mind.
“You delighted in my pain.”
“I’m vampire. What brings us more joy than great pain?”
My fingers crackle and his eyes travel to my hand. And he widens his arms at his sides, palms flat out as if taunting me, as if saying, ‘Hurt me, I dare you.’ So instead of electrifying him to death like I long to do, I rise, walking straight past him, and throw open the door.
Bastian has had his fill and is sitting on the floor, eyes closed, his head resting on the woman’s leg. She lies on the couch still, her mouth turned with a satisfied smirk, lost in a pleasure filled dream, and I look at the two small circles on her thigh, the blood caking around them.
My cream sits on the table next to her, and through the burning, I dab some on my finger and rub it over the bites, watching as the holes rejuvenate with skin. And it’s confusing to be amazed yet plagued by what I can do at the same time.
Grabbing a towel, I wipe up the blood that made its way down her thigh onto the couch. An overwhelming flood of guilt hits me. This is not consent, and most days I can ignore it because I bare no witness to it. But today, I can’t ignore it, much like I couldn’t that boy on the couch that evening at Nightwalkers.
Bastian looks up at me with red rimmed eyes and he’s still so weak. A torture takes over his face, a deep sense of remorse as he looks at the woman on the couch and back to me.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” His head drops in his hand, seeming too heavy for his neck to hold up.
So many emotions pummel me—guilt and rage and pain and it’s too much. I feel myself vibrating, my power begging to be released. But I look at Bastian on the ground, his mouth whispering too many “I’m sorry’s” to count, and I remember who the fuck I am.
I kneel before him. “Let’s go, love. There’s nothing to be sorry for.” And I pull him up, wrapping his long arm across my shoulder so that I’m his crutch. We stumble past Cassius, his face blank, his arms crossed.
“You’ll take care of this?” I nod toward the people in the room behind us. With a heart as heavy as iron, I know there are changes to be made, but the only thing I will focus on right now is getting Bastian to his room.
“Heyyyy,” Bastian coos to Mercury, fingers outstretched once he sees my little black cat, that sweet tone that only Mercury is granted.
“Easy,” I say, trying to hold Bastian up, and I need to call upon my powers for the strength. He plunks into the closest chair, and Mercury jumps right on his lap, purring like I’ve never heard him purr before.
A soft smile reaches Bastian’s lips as he pets Mercury, and his hands have blood on them and he’s shaking. Beads of sweat form along his brow, his white shirt stuck to his skin.
I strip his jacket off and run my fingers through his wet hair. “How about a cool bath?”
He swallows, his hollow cheeks shimmering under the lights, his head nodding.
Once the bath is full, I lead him to its edge, falling to my knees to unbutton his shirt, sliding off his shoes and socks.
