Chapter 4 #2
My mind immediately takes a wrong turn and heads down Sex Addict Alley: All those years of experience.
At perfecting things. Learning how to drive people wild with desire, using those long fingers, those lips, his tongue …
He’ll be skilled at activities mere mortals don’t even know about.
Any orgasms I’ve had thus far in life will be like pleasant sneezes compared to the full-body explosions this guy could give me.
I blink at the image and try to ignore the rush of blood to the newly christened Triangle of Inappropriate Tingling.
Yikes. Get your filthy Seer mind out of the gutter—again—Rosa Capelli. My face heats, and he gives me that crooked smile. The one that says, yeah, I know you’re wet for me. I know you’re wishing the seam of your jeans was a little bit thicker …
He also has years of experience figuring out what people are thinking and feeling, I remind myself.
I drink down the rest of the brandy and lean back in my seat.
Try to play casual in a way I know won’t fool him.
How could I fool a creature who can hear my heartbeat, sense my lust, probably even smell the dampness between my legs?
The whole thing is fucking humiliating, apart from anything else.
“Firenze,” I repeat, nodding. “So, like, you’re a really old dude? Were you around for the Bargain?”
He grins, and it is a wicked thing. A wicked thing that sends a curl of need through my belly. “You already know that. You might be playing stupid, Rosa, but I know you’re not. You think you know what I am, and now you’re fishing for information.”
“Maybe I am. And maybe it would be a lot easier if you’d just tell me why you’re here and what you want with me!”
He stares at me, suddenly serious, his fingers tapping on the tabletop in a manner that suggests it may not be long for this world. His anger scares me a little. Not in a sexy way, just the average “oh shit, have I pushed the apex predator too far?” way.
“Do you know a vampire called Kurt?” he asks, ignoring my outburst.
“Like Kurt Cobain, Kurt? Ummm … No, I don’t think so. Should I?”
This conversation has taken an even stranger turn, and I’m starting to think I’ve made a huge mistake.
I need to leave, to get away from this creature and all the confusing shit he stirs up in me.
I need to sleep, maybe for a hundred years.
There isn’t enough of me to go round as it is, without all this crap.
“Did you know Anna Lombardi?” He grabs my wrist and holds it steady, being careful not to grind the bones this time, just making sure I don’t leave. What a gentleman.
“Not really. I was only four when she died. I don’t know much about it.”
“Your family didn’t tell you what happened to her?”
“My family,” I say, pulling my hand free, “probably didn’t want to scare the living daylights out of their kids by telling them horror stories.”
I’ve asked over the years but have been met with a wall of silence. My family is world-class when it comes to keeping secrets, but I figure they were kept for my protection.
There used to be three girls in my family—Angela, then me and Serena.
When Anna Lombardi was killed, Angela was twelve, and Serena and I were really little.
Vecchissime powers don’t start to manifest until we’re about ten, so at that stage we knew Angela was a Healer, but nobody knew about Serena and me—whether one or both of us would be a Seer.
Everyone must have been hoping for it because the last Capelli Seer was my long-gone grandmother.
None of that was in our orbit at the time. My parents made sure we were protected from it. We knew that Anna was dead, and that was sad for about a minute because we were kids and we didn’t really know her.
“What the hell has Anna Lombardi got to do with me? Or with you?” I ask, frowning. “And why are you stalking me, Luca da Firenze? I see that pretty tattoo on your chest. Is it a dragon?”
I’m trying to unsettle him, trying to regain some control of the conversation and how it’s making me feel. Thinking about the past, about Serena and my family, isn’t something I enjoy doing.
I’m also genuinely curious. Tattoos are associated with the Coscas, but I have no clue if the ink is a badge of honor, simply aesthetic, or some macho pain tolerance bravado bullshit. If I was hoping to throw him off-balance with the change in subject, though, one glance at him tells me I failed.
“You want to see, little malocchio? You want to look at the Firenze dragon?” Malocchio is the vamps’ allegedly offensive nickname for us.
It means the evil eye, which I actually think is kind of cool.
I’m hard to offend, so the name doesn’t bother me, but there’s a challenge in his words and in the look he gives me. Shit. So much for gaining control.
Silently, without breaking eye contact, he unbuttons his shirt.
Slowly, the fabric parts, each flick of his fingers revealing another delicious slice of rich burnished-gold skin.
I want to look away. I tell myself to look away.
But I can’t. I’m paralyzed, my eyes fixated on his torturously languid progress.
He tugs the edges of his black shirt apart, and I gulp audibly as I am confronted with a perfect slab of muscle.
The tattoo must start on his back, and the huge wings of the black-and-silver dragon swoop over his broad shoulders and upper arms, flowing with breathtaking artistry all the way around and underneath his pecs.
I can’t stop myself. I reach out to touch the intricate lines with my fingertips and trace the design over his chest. The sculpted planes of his body are cloaked in silky-soft skin; he is iron wrapped in velvet. I have never seen anything so magnificent in my long life.
His eyes meet mine, and the silver rings around his irises seem to flare and flame. For a moment, we are both silent, and I wonder if he is as confused by this as I am.
“What is happening here?” I murmur as his hand covers mine, pressing my fingers hard against his flesh.
He sighs and shakes his head, and there’s a flicker of confusion as he replies, “I don’t. Fucking. Know. All I do know is that I need to protect you.”
My heart sings at the thought of letting him. Of giving up the fight, even for a little while. Sleeping in his arms, safe from the dreams, safe from the visions. Safe from everything—except him, I remind myself. This man is dangerous, no matter what mystical juju is sparking between us.
“I don’t need protecting,” I snap back, pulling my hand away and shoving it into my pocket so it can’t misbehave again. “Especially by an Old World Cosca vamp who’s probably killed more humans than I’ve had hot dinners. I don’t know you, and I don’t want to know you.”
There is a second—less than that—where he looks hurt. Then the shutters come down, and he sneers at me and refastens his buttons. “Think you’ve got me all figured out, gattina mia?”
“I’m not your kitten, and yeah, pretty much.
Enough to know that I don’t trust you, that I’ll never trust you, and I’ll certainly never need you.
” The quiet fury in my voice is directed as much at myself as it is him, but it still feels good.
It clears the lust from my mind, and I feel almost like Rosa Capelli again.
“Never is a big word.” He leans across the table so his face is only inches from mine.
“And as for not needing me … Maybe you don’t.
But you need something. Tonight, I took that stake from you like it was a child’s toy, and we both know you were mine to do with as I pleased.
If I wanted to drink you dry, you wouldn’t have been able to do a thing about it. ”
My amulet flares hot on my skin, telling me I am in danger, and I’m not sure if it’s from him or from me.
He’s right—he could have drunk me dry. Even now, with this budding anger rising inside me, I find myself imagining what it would feel like to have his mouth on my neck, his teeth on that soft, sensitive skin. Licking, probing, biting …
Lethal. It would have been lethal.
I refuse to back down and keep my eyes locked on his. I can’t let him see my weakness.
“You’re right,” I answer, clearly surprising him.
“You could have. But that’s not a point in your favor, big guy.
It just means I should never be around you again.
Most of the vamps I encounter aren’t playing in the big leagues.
The majority are fucking idiots. I probably need to train harder, stay more alert, but we’re both aware there are more Rogans in the universe than Old World vampires with your …
skills.” I was doing so well until that last word, and I hate that I falter over it.
That my stupid sex-crazed mind immediately went to those kinds of skills.
He leans back and grins. For the first time, I see the white gleam of the tips of his fangs, and it’s clear I’m only seeing them because he wants me to. Because he knows exactly what I’m thinking about.
“Yeah,” he says, raising one eyebrow. “I am exceptionally … skilled. And by all means, train harder. Stay more alert. But know this—you have enemies, Rosa Capelli. Enemies you might not see coming, like this Kurt and the allies he has drawn to his cause. At the moment, I’m not one of those enemies, and you would do well to remember that. ”
“Enemies schnenemies! There’s always some jerk with a hard-on to kill a Seer. This Kurt guy has probably got delusions of grandeur. They all do. I blame the internet.”
“This is not a damn joke! Do you know who sent me here?”
“No idea. Ronald McDonald?”
His hand shoots toward me and grabs my chin.
He holds my face steady despite my struggles, and I consider slamming a stake down through his other hand, pinning it to the table.
But I’m aware, even if he isn’t, that we are attracting attention.
The bartender is looking over with a frown, obviously trying to weigh up whether he needs to intervene and just as obviously hoping he doesn’t have to.
Luca’s grip doesn’t waver, and neither does his glare. I’m going to have finger-shaped bruises on my face tomorrow, and that is not a good look.
“Listen to me, Rosa Allegra Capelli. This is not a game. Kurt is dangerous. He’s powerful. And he has allies, possibly within the Vecchissime themselves. I was sent here by my boss to kill you or kidnap you. He wasn’t bothered which. He is not a vampire you want to mess with. He’s … He’s bad.”
It’s barely there, that hesitation, but it is there.
He’s conflicted about what he’s saying. Maybe he thinks he shouldn’t be saying it.
Maybe he’s regretting not having killed me already.
If his boss is the Don of the Firenze Cosca, then he’s a hundred percent right to be worried.
Disloyalty is a big deal in a world where allegiances run for centuries.
I once heard a story about how the Milano Don kept a vamp who’d betrayed him tied to a post in a dungeon for ten years and disemboweled him with a scimitar every single day.
Anything other than pure obedience could get Luca into serious trouble, yet he’s risking it.
He didn’t kill me when he could, and he seems to be warning me in his own angry way.
That and the fact that he abruptly lets go of my face earns him a few points for good behavior. But it doesn’t mean I trust him.
We are both quiet for a moment, our mutual fury dissipating.
Someone puts a song on the juke box—one-half of the goth couple, and the two of them are now dancing to that old Doors track about people being strange—and I ponder how bad this Don must be for a vamp like Luca to describe him as such.
Handling the Rogans of the world is one thing.
Taking on the head of a Cosca is a whole new level of risk.
Especially when I have no fucking clue how or why I caught his attention.
The Vecchissime and the Coscas have lived in uneasy peace for longer than I’ve been around, so I haven’t had cause to mix with them.
From what I’ve been taught, their rules are strict and the consequences for breaking them brutal.
The result is that they keep their vamps under control, and their criminal empires are vast but disciplined.
Never once have I been Called to deal with a Cosca vamp.
Presumably because whatever depraved shit they get up to, they get up to it in a way that has been deemed acceptable by the Vecchissime.
Or they’re really freaking awesome at hiding it.
Regardless, the news that I’m now one of their targets is not great. I am already exhausted, and this ratchets it all up a level.
I school my face into something perfectly neutral and concentrate on keeping my breathing steady so he doesn’t spot my fear. Because I am scared now. I’d be stupid not to be.
“Come with me,” he commands. “Let me help you figure this out. Let me keep you safe.”
“Why?” I ask, genuinely confused. “Why would you want to do that? Because you feel sorry for me? Because you want to fuck me? Because we had such a sweet little meet cute over the body of a dead vampire? Nah, I don’t think so, Luca da Firenze.
My mama taught me not to talk to strangers, and like Jim is singing right now, people sure are strange. ”
He slams his fists on the tabletop so hard our drinks bounce a couple inches into the air. I grab my beer as it flies upward, and his rolls to the ground, shooting fizzy amber liquid across the floor.
“That’s your final answer?” he asks, oblivious to the stares from around the room. Jeez, how has this guy lasted so long? One of the number one skills of the Old World vamps is blending, but he has “I am not quite human” stamped all over him.
“That is my final answer, Regis.” I lean back and touch the lip of the beer bottle to my mouth. Tipping it backward to take a long drink, I show him my throat. Show him that I am not afraid of him. I am, of course, faking it. But damn, the beer sure tastes good.
He gets to his feet, gives me one last extra-pissed glare, and snaps, “Good luck to you, Rosa. Maybe I’ll come to your fucking funeral.
” He storms from the room, sending the goths scurrying for cover as he stalks past. They recognize him as a threat, no matter how nice the packaging.
He slams open the door and disappears into the darkness without so much as a backward glance.
Well, I think as I finish my beer, that went well.