Chapter 7
Seven
Nero
I will give you anything you want, but in return I want my freedom.
Mina’s husky voice filled my head, her words from two nights ago, and it wasn’t the first time.
She’d demanded her freedom, but I couldn’t give her that. She was asking too much.
If she refused me entry to her room, if being confined angered her enough to reject my touch, tonight I’d have to try something different.
Her refusal to let me close, to even speak to me, wasn’t something I could tolerate. Truthfully, the more she denied me, the longer it went on, the closer I felt myself slipping to the edge of my sanity. Her pussy got wet when I was near, yet she would rather suffer than let me ease her need just to punish me. Her behavior was illogical. My bride confounded me, and infuriated me.
If I wanted to bend her to my will, I needed to be more strategic in my approach. I needed to throw Mina off-balance and regain control in a way that made her believe she still had some.
I never used the dining room in my apartment. I could eat human food; I just didn’t need to. It had lost all appeal a long time ago, like all pleasures had. Maybe with Mina that might have changed as well? Tonight, I’d had Pretender go out and acquire a meal for Mina and me to share. Apparently, that’s what females liked—to dine with their mates—and afterward, my hope was that her guard would lower enough that she would let me touch her.
I heard footsteps along the hall, and I turned to the door. From the article I’d read, surprises were enjoyed and welcomed as well.
The door opened and Pretender led Mina inside. She stopped sharply when she saw the table of food, then her gaze sliced to me.
“What is this?”
I gripped the back of the chair I stood behind. “I realized you’d not seen the rest of the apartment. I thought we could dine together, then I could give you a tour.”
“Well, no, I haven’t seen the apartment because I’ve been locked up like a prisoner since I got here,” she said, but her voice was shaky.
I slid out the chair, choosing to ignore what she said. My newly awakening emotions were volatile, and anger that she wouldn’t give me what I wanted was already rising inside me, and that wouldn’t help at all. I was at least capable of seeing that. “I thought we could dine here this evening.”
“No, thank you,” she said. “I’d rather eat in my room alone.”
A snarl tried to crawl up my throat, and I choked it down. I didn’t like this feeling, not at all. How did she do this to me so easily? “Tonight you will eat in here, with me.” I glanced at Pretender. “You can leave.”
He gave me a nod and walked out, closing the door behind him.
“Come here, Mina.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Now,” I said, locking eyes with her.
Hers widened slightly, then she lifted her chin, showing me she wasn’t happy, but finally made her way over to the seat I held for her. She sat and I took the chair closest at the head of the table.
“These dishes, they’re your favorites, yes?”
She looked at the food laid out before her, and shrugged a delicate shoulder, making no move to reach for any of it.
“Pretender spoke to your mother’s cook. She confirmed these were your favorite dishes.”
“Well, she was wrong.”
My lips peeled back and I sucked in a breath. “You won’t eat it?”
She did the shoulder shrug again. “Beggars can’t be choosers, I suppose,” she said.
“No one has made you beg for food.” I was barely resisting picking her up, setting her on the table in front of me, shoving up her dress, and feasting on her for my dinner instead.
“Prisoners don’t get to choose, Nero. We don’t get to choose anything.”
“Tell me what your favorite meal is.”
“Why do you care?”
I didn’t know why, but for some reason, I did. Knowing what her favorite meal was had suddenly become incredibly important. “Tell me.” She kept her lips pressed tight. “You said you don’t get to choose; I’m letting you choose, Lalka.”
She was silent several more seconds, then finally glanced my way. “I like pasta dishes and fresh baked bread and, for sweets, I like cake and anything with lemon in it.”
I nodded. “I’ll make sure you have some of your favorites from now on. If there’s anything else you want to add to that list, just say so and I’ll make sure you get it.”
She made a little huffing sound and nodded, then she finally reached for the food in front of her, placing some roast meat and vegetables on her plate.
I did the same, hoping to make her feel at ease. I couldn’t take another night like the last, banished from her room, desperate for her scent, her closeness.
We ate in silence, and though, yes, the food tasted good, was enjoyable even for the first time in centuries, I found her silence began to irritate me. I wanted to hear her speak. I wanted her eyes on me while she talked. I searched my mind for something to say to engage her in conversation. I was out of practice—I didn’t know how to converse anymore—so coming up with a topic was difficult.
I searched the room for ideas, my gaze ultimately landing on a painting, a scenery.
“Do you enjoy art?”
She stilled. “Art? Like paintings?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know. I suppose so. I’ve only ever looked at the ones in my parents’ house and in books…you know, since I was kept at home after you went to the vampire court and announced your intention to claim me, to mate me, when I came of age. Which it turns out was a big fat lie. You don’t actually want a mate though, do you? You just want a little doll?”
She was trying to get under my skin, to bait me, obviously, and she’d succeeded. I didn’t like the way that made me feel either. “What about music?” I asked, attempting to change the subject.
“The music I listened to was restricted since my future mate would want his female innocent and untainted by the outside world,” she said, not sparing me so much as a glance this time, then she slid a slice of tomato between her perfect rosebud lips.
I gripped the edge of the table. “I never asked for that.”
She huffed a humorless laugh. “You had to know that’s the way it would be, Nero. Did you think about what would happen to me at all when you stated your intention to claim me? Did you even spare me a thought? Did you wonder about my life and how it would change?”
No, I hadn’t, not beyond her safety. “I wanted you safe.”
“No, you wanted to make sure your possession was sparkly and new when you finally got to take it home. You turned me into a prisoner in my own home.” She placed her knife and fork on the table. “And you’ve kept me that way…a prisoner.”
The more we spoke, the more tumultuous my burgeoning emotions became and the farther away from my goal we got. “Would you like a tour of the apartment?” I needed to stop this line of conversation now, for both our sakes.
“Sure,” she said, standing immediately and tossing her napkin on the table eagerly, too eagerly.
Placing my hand on the small of her back, I led her to the living room, pointing out the antiques and other items of value and possible interest to her, then directed her down the hall toward my bedroom.
Mina seemed to be searching for something as we walked, then after a few minutes, she visibly deflated. I realized what she was doing—she was looking for a way out, an escape.
I will find a way out of here. I will leave you, and I’ll never come back.
As her vow filtered through my mind, a feeling like a storm swelled inside me. Didn’t she know I would never let her leave? The knowledge that she was unhappy enough to want to run from me, that I was spectacularly failing at this, unable to make my young bride happy, had darkness, gnarled and ugly, spreading through me like poison.
I didn’t know what the fuck to do. My reanimating emotions were growing inside me, but they were all jumbled and made me feel insane. I’d even reverted to asking August for assistance. He’d said his female didn’t want to mate with him yet but liked to sleep in his arms. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d allowed someone to sleep in my bed with me, but if that made Mina happy, I’d do it.
Would she even want to? Would I be able to hold her without touching her like I truly wanted to? Without this dark, twisted thing inside me taking hold and doing a lot more than wrap my arms around her?
All I knew was I wanted her to be happy here, happy with me.
I opened the door at the end of the hall and motioned her inside. She walked through, then stopped suddenly.
“Why am I in your bedroom?” She scanned the room, taking in everything, but her gaze kept darting back to the bed.
“Because this is where you will be sleeping tonight.”
“No.”
I bit back another snarl. “You wanted out of your bedroom, so this is where you will sleep instead.”
“I told you that as long as you treat me like your prisoner, you don’t get to be close to me in that way.”
“I allowed you to leave your room. We dined together—”
“You think that’s enough for me to let you…touch me? To do whatever it is you want to do to me?”
My control slipped. I hooked her around the side of the throat and pulled her to me and pressed my forehead to her temple, breathing her in. “Even now, I can smell how wet your cunt is, Lalka. All this denial, refusing me this way, is a waste of time. I know what you want, and you will give it to me.”
She shoved at me, taking me off guard, and I stumbled back a step.
“Letting me leave my prison for a few hours, having a meal with me, that isn’t freedom, Nero. This is just you trying to get your way without giving me anything at all. You know what I want, and this isn’t it.” She took a step back. “Take me back to my room. I’d rather be there alone than in here with you.”
The roar erupted from me before I knew it was coming. “You will not deny me. Not anymore.” I was having trouble naming the emotion battering me. My bones were molten beneath my flesh, burning under my skin. I wanted to tear at it, flay it from my body. I wanted to keep on roaring to release this jagged bolder in my chest as I dropped to the floor at her feet, curl my fingers around her legs and demand… beg her to let me have her. I told her I didn’t want anything more from her, and I’d meant it, because I would break her if I took more, but right then, logic had left me.
I’d never wanted anyone the way I wanted Mina. No one denied me. Everyone I’d ever wanted, wanted me even more. That’s what power got you. But this….this little female refused me over and over again. I’d been the one to decide not to mate her, and now it was all I could think about.
Mina had fucking broken me . She’d stripped me bare.
I felt like a fucking fool, something only my bride had ever accomplished, and that sent my rage higher. I stalked forward, and she backed up, hitting the wall. Curling my fingers around her slender throat, I leaned in. “You want me. Give in.”
“Never,” she bit out.
Her pulse fluttered wildly under my fingers, and the scent of her pussy intensified. “Give in to the hunger you’re feeling. Are your juices coating your thighs, Lalka? I bet they are.”
Her face flushed bright red. “You disgust me.”
What was happening? Where was my control? My hands clenched and my vision blurred as everything inside me twisted into rage. I spun to the wall beside her and put my fist through it with another roar. When I turned back to Mina, her eyes were wide, her chest heaving.
I fucking hated that look in her eyes as well. Turning, I quickly stormed out of the room, locking her in, before I tore it down around us.
Somehow, I had to find a way to tame all the volatile emotions clashing inside me before I lost control completely.
Mina
I woke when the bedroom door opened and closed.
Somehow, I’d fallen asleep lying on his bed.
I’d fought it, but as the hours passed, exhaustion had won out.
Nero had returned.
My heart immediately sped up, and the blood in my veins and the flesh between my thighs heated, tingling in a way that was pleasurable. My body betrayed me every single time. But I would fight it for as long as I had to.
Gods, I felt his eyes burning into me from across the room. I wanted to tell him to leave, but this was his room not mine. Not that he would care how his presence made me feel. I hated that being this close to him made me feel almost as feral as he’d behaved before he’d walked out of this room several hours ago.
No, my bonded wouldn’t care about my emotions, because he was utterly devoid of empathy.
A rustling sound came next. Was that the clink of his belt buckle?
I tried to keep my breathing even. Was he undressing?
The bed dipped, then Nero slid up behind me, his arm slipping around my waist.
“What are you doing?” I choked out, even as I ached for him to touch me. “I told you, I didn’t want you to…” He nuzzled the back of my neck, breathing in my scent, and tingles danced across my skin. “Nero, I said n-no.”
“I’m just going to hold you, Lalka. Nothing more,” he said roughly.
I didn’t know what to do, what to say. I didn’t understand this game he was playing. I wanted to stick to my convictions, but it felt nice to be held. Too nice. “If you try to do anything else, I’ll fight you,” I said, even though I wasn’t sure I meant it. I couldn’t let him think he could control me. I had to make him understand how much I hated the way he was treating me.
I wanted to be his mate, not his prisoner.
At least I thought I wanted to be his mate. My feelings about this male were complicated and constantly changed.
“Okay, little doll,” he said as he shuffled closer, so his entire body cradled mine. “You can have it your way…for tonight.”
He lay motionless at my back, and the way he held me felt maybe even a little awkward, as if this was unnatural for him. I supposed it was, but then what would I know?
Suddenly, I needed to know something, anything, that proved there was more to this cold, confusing male than what he’d shown me, or at the very least, that there once had been. Because I couldn’t keep doing this, fighting for more, if there wasn’t—if there never had been more. “Tell me something about before you were a member of The Five, before you lost your emotions.”
He stilled even more, which seemed impossible, but somehow he had. “What do you want to know?”
“Do you remember your parents?”
“Only fractured moments of distant memories.”
I couldn’t imagine being so old, or so broken that I forgot my own parents. My stomach churned. “Did you have any brothers or sisters?”
There was a beat of deafening silence. “A sister. Dorotha.”
“Do you remember much about her?”
“Yes.”
“Is she still alive?”
“She was murdered by fae soldiers long ago.”
The sudden need to comfort him surprised me. Still, I went with it and slid my hand over his that rested on my stomach. “I’m sorry, Nero.” His voice hadn’t changed, but he was affected, I could feel it. Anger literally radiated through his body to mine.
“It was a long time ago.”
“But you loved her, didn’t you?”
There was another pause, then his arm tightened around my waist slightly. “I suppose I did. It was her death that drove me to fight in the war, to become a member of The Five, so yes, I believe I loved her.”
A kernel of hope ignited inside me. “When was the last time you held someone like this?” I asked, wanting to know more.
“I can’t remember ever holding another like this.”
“What about your sister? Did you ever hug her?”
“I’m…not sure. Possibly, when she was small. But I lost my emotions a very long time ago, Lalka. After that happened, I didn’t require affection. I honestly can’t remember ever feeling the need to hold anyone like this.”
That sounded lonely to me. “But you do now? Feel the need, I mean?”
His fingers flexed against my belly. “I guess so.”
“And do you….like it?”
Another beat of silence. “Yes,” he said, finally smoothing my hair away from my throat and dragging his nose along my skin. “I think I do.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, and the silence stretched out.
“Good night, Mina,” he said.
“Good night.”
I was positive I’d never be able to fall asleep beside him, not after the way he’d lost control earlier, but I did. Somehow I drifted off almost immediately.
When I woke the next morning, Nero was gone, and Pretender was waiting to take me back to my room.
As soon as the other vampire shut me in my pink prison again, it was as if the madness of the night before had never happened, as if those quiet moments in the darkness in Nero’s arms were all a dream.