on her heels so her back was completely to him. He was not her father. No man could replace the great man who had raised her...
She sniffed back a tear. She wanted to go home to her family. If only she could make this nightmare stop, erase it from memory.
Lifting her head, she asked, “I’m allowed to do as I please, am I not?”
“You may drink from whomever you wish, my dark one. But I am no fool. Johnny Santiago is more to you than a mere sip.”
A fist pounded the table, upsetting the goblet near Kam’s feet. Blood spilled over her shoe and foot. Normally she would have dragged a finger through the rich treat and suck it away. Now, she stood and marched down the empty table, away from him, arms crossed high on her chest. She left a trail of blood in her wake.
“Do not walk away from me!”
Her body was tugged backward. Kam clawed at the air, landing on her palms as she was forcibly dragged through the blood. As she neared the end of the table her body flipped over and she landed, crouched, on his legs, her palms catching against his iron-hard black-muscled chest.
But a breath away from his face, she stared into his hard red eyes, summoning as much defiance as she could—stage persona to the rescue. And when she thought she could spit in his eyes and march away her body softened against her will and she settled into a ball in his arms. A sigh sifted from her being.
She didn’t want this surrender!
He controlled her with a persuasion far stronger than any vampire could wield.
“Johnny!” she screamed, but her voice was halted.
A blade cut across her neck, searing red pain as it separated skin, muscle and sliced bone. Kam clutched for the gaping wound—and felt only smooth skin.
* * *
“Hell of a rival,” Johnny muttered as he walked along the Seine toward the barge one of his tribe mates had lived in for years.
Did he want to compete against the dark prince?
For as right as Kam felt to him, she would always be wrong, tainted by the darkest, most menacing evil in existence.
Johnny shoved his hands in his pockets. The early morning walk was quiet, unhampered by tourists, because rain misted the cobblestones. Sunrise in an hour or two, he guessed.
The connection he had with Kam was undeniable. And if she did dump Himself for him, then he should be pleased. Yes?
And why should he give a care for what or who she had slept with before she’d met him? Everyone had a past, baggage.
That chick had a hell of a cartload of baggage.
But fact remained, he’d told her he wanted to win her heart, and he’d meant that. So that entailed a fight for her. How did a guy fight the devil himself?
“Johnny!”
He hadn’t noticed the man leaning against the stone river wall across from the moored barge. Dante tended to meld with the shadows due to his long black hair and a love for black velvet clothing. Add a frill of lace at the wrists and neck? Dante d’Arcangelo had been transformed to vampire during the bohemian phase at the end of the nineteenth century and had never shed the romantic image that had accompanied that fortuitous time in his life.
The romantic artist look certainly attracted the women. Dante was the lover in the Incroyables, and he took the title seriously. Usually he juggled two or three women, and that didn’t imply one at a time, either. The man’s bed was a revolving showcase of flesh and scintillatingly wicked indulgences.
“What’s up?” Dante gestured Johnny join him at the wall. “You look troubled.”
Dante was always willing to listen. Another attribute, for who didn’t like to talk about himself?
Johnny squatted, pressing his back against the wall, and picked up a smooth stone from the cobbled walk. Turning it over and over, he then tossed it high and over the barge, waiting to hear the splash. “You know that chick I’ve been seeing?”
“Christian mentioned you’d hooked up with
She sniffed back a tear. She wanted to go home to her family. If only she could make this nightmare stop, erase it from memory.
Lifting her head, she asked, “I’m allowed to do as I please, am I not?”
“You may drink from whomever you wish, my dark one. But I am no fool. Johnny Santiago is more to you than a mere sip.”
A fist pounded the table, upsetting the goblet near Kam’s feet. Blood spilled over her shoe and foot. Normally she would have dragged a finger through the rich treat and suck it away. Now, she stood and marched down the empty table, away from him, arms crossed high on her chest. She left a trail of blood in her wake.
“Do not walk away from me!”
Her body was tugged backward. Kam clawed at the air, landing on her palms as she was forcibly dragged through the blood. As she neared the end of the table her body flipped over and she landed, crouched, on his legs, her palms catching against his iron-hard black-muscled chest.
But a breath away from his face, she stared into his hard red eyes, summoning as much defiance as she could—stage persona to the rescue. And when she thought she could spit in his eyes and march away her body softened against her will and she settled into a ball in his arms. A sigh sifted from her being.
She didn’t want this surrender!
He controlled her with a persuasion far stronger than any vampire could wield.
“Johnny!” she screamed, but her voice was halted.
A blade cut across her neck, searing red pain as it separated skin, muscle and sliced bone. Kam clutched for the gaping wound—and felt only smooth skin.
* * *
“Hell of a rival,” Johnny muttered as he walked along the Seine toward the barge one of his tribe mates had lived in for years.
Did he want to compete against the dark prince?
For as right as Kam felt to him, she would always be wrong, tainted by the darkest, most menacing evil in existence.
Johnny shoved his hands in his pockets. The early morning walk was quiet, unhampered by tourists, because rain misted the cobblestones. Sunrise in an hour or two, he guessed.
The connection he had with Kam was undeniable. And if she did dump Himself for him, then he should be pleased. Yes?
And why should he give a care for what or who she had slept with before she’d met him? Everyone had a past, baggage.
That chick had a hell of a cartload of baggage.
But fact remained, he’d told her he wanted to win her heart, and he’d meant that. So that entailed a fight for her. How did a guy fight the devil himself?
“Johnny!”
He hadn’t noticed the man leaning against the stone river wall across from the moored barge. Dante tended to meld with the shadows due to his long black hair and a love for black velvet clothing. Add a frill of lace at the wrists and neck? Dante d’Arcangelo had been transformed to vampire during the bohemian phase at the end of the nineteenth century and had never shed the romantic image that had accompanied that fortuitous time in his life.
The romantic artist look certainly attracted the women. Dante was the lover in the Incroyables, and he took the title seriously. Usually he juggled two or three women, and that didn’t imply one at a time, either. The man’s bed was a revolving showcase of flesh and scintillatingly wicked indulgences.
“What’s up?” Dante gestured Johnny join him at the wall. “You look troubled.”
Dante was always willing to listen. Another attribute, for who didn’t like to talk about himself?
Johnny squatted, pressing his back against the wall, and picked up a smooth stone from the cobbled walk. Turning it over and over, he then tossed it high and over the barge, waiting to hear the splash. “You know that chick I’ve been seeing?”
“Christian mentioned you’d hooked up with
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