Chapter 3
Three
“She’s waking up.”
Were they talking about me? There were three people now. The two men—holy hell, I couldn’t tell if these guys were hotter than this bed was comfortable—and a woman. A really pretty woman.
I sat up. Two lamps flanked an expansive bedroom, Victorian with modern royalty.
So, was I dreaming?
I didn't feel like it. Everything was so … real. I was in the back room after the lights went out, reading that book? I must have fallen asleep. Odd since I don’t even remember being tired.
They were all talking at once.
“Maybe someone should get her some water?”
That, from the original hottie. The other two gave him looks I couldn’t decipher, the woman arguing that she should be the one to stay with me, but if I really was dreaming …
“Can you stay?” I asked him.
Because when one is presented with a dream wherein a Damon Salvatore-like man appears, there’s really only one course of action.
“Behave, Riven,” the other guy said before they left.
I must have given him a look that told him to ignore his well-meaning advice as it all came together.
I’d been reading a paranormal romance when lightning struck.
And apparently had been more tired than I thought, falling asleep imagining I could read old English as if it were modern English.
How my chilly back room floor wasn’t waking me was a tomorrow problem.
“So,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. “How does a beautiful woman like you end up in the back of The Book Loft? You gave the owner quite a scare.”
“Let me guess,” I said, warming up to the whole dream-aesthetic. “The Book Loft is a bookstore in Stone Haven?”
I’d considered that name, or something similar, when Nolan and I were brainstorming shop names for Between the Pages. No wonder I’d pulled it into the dream.
He smelled real, like a cross between cedar and sin. The fluttering in my stomach at his raised brows and amused expression also felt so damn real.
“Good guess.”
Yep. I was dreaming about my book. Wouldn’t be the first time.
“What were you doing back there?”
His question sounded like the teacher in Charlie Brown. I’m sure actual words came out of his mouth, but who could concentrate with eyes like that gazing at you.
“They’re so blue,” I blurted. “Unnaturally blue.”
“My eyes?” He was even more amused now. “Unlike yours, brown and wide like a doe just before. . .”
He stopped. Which is when I remembered the story.
“Please tell me you don’t feed on poor little doe.”
He seemed surprised. “So you know?”
“That you’re a vampire? Yeah,” I nearly laughed. This was so cliche and ridiculous but, as dreams went, probably my new favorite. “I know.”
“I’m pleased you aren’t scared.”
Scared of a dream? Not remotely. And since it wasn’t real-life where I’d rather die than flirt first without knowing if it would be reciprocated, I gave a very non-Lena response.
“Not scared. More like, curious.”
His eyes dipped to my lips. “First time?”
Now this is what I’m talking about. Go Lena!
“Uh huh,” I murmured, leaning into the innocent doe-eyed persona.
“That still doesn’t explain what you were doing in the back of the bookstore,” he said, getting up from the bed. My heart thudded as he locked the door and returned to me. “And my cousin will probably kill me but …”
But? I wanted to ask, but when he sat back down and ran a finger down my cheek to the crook of my neck, words escaped me.
“Here?” he asked, our eyes linking just before his hand wandered downward. His finger traced the outline of my breast as it meandered lower. And lower, gently meandering out to my hip, tracing the hem of my jeans before inching toward my inner thigh. “Or here?”
Please don’t wake up. Please don’t wake up.
“Will it hurt?” I asked.
Even in my dream, apparently, I wasn’t a fan of pain.
“Au contraire, chérie. Ce sera comme si ton monde explosait.”
I swallowed, already sad about the fact that he’d pulled back his hand.
“So you’re French? Riven?” I repeated, somehow remembering what the other guy had called him.
His eyes narrowed. “Back in my time, educated Englishmen spoke French. You know my name, but I don’t have the privilege of that same knowledge.”
“Lena,” I said. “What is, was, your time?”
“Lena,” he repeated in a tone only written about by my favorite romance authors. “The year of our Lord twelve hundred and eighty-four, when the curse was cast.”
Curse. Like the book. But that wasn’t real because I’d fallen asleep before I could read it. What was the healer’s name? “When Isobel cursed the two families?”
It was the first time since waking up I had enough sense to be scared. Thankfully, his expression changed back, almost instantly. “Apologies.,” he sighed. “Lady Isobel cursed my family, aye. But that’s not what we’re here to talk about.”
“No?” I asked, still a little scared, and still a little turned on, all at once. “What are we here to talk about?”
He moved closer, so effortlessly I almost missed the movement. Reaching for my hair, he slid it away from my face, exposing my neck. Leaning down, I prepared for Riven’s touch, imagining his lips against my skin. Was his bite going to hurt? Would it bring pleasure/pain, like in the books?
“I’m here to talk about your deepest, darkest desires,” he whispered into my ear. “What do you want, Lena?”
His hand suddenly splayed across my chest. Moving upward, his forefinger and thumb brushing against my collarbone, it was only as his breath tickled my ear and his hand climbed upward that I realized he was about to put it around my neck.
Power, dominance, exuded from him. Riven could choke the life from me without blinking. But he wouldn’t. Oddly, I trusted him. Implicitly.
Such was the strangeness of dreams.
“Should I toss you, face down, and pleasure you from behind, Lena? Or tie your hands,” he whispered, his lips dangerously close to my skin. His breath was cool, not warm, and it moved the few loose strands of hair near my ear, raising goosebumps on my neck. “And feet to this bed? Perhaps both?”
Part of me wanted to reach behind his head, with the one free arm not pinned beneath us, and press him to me.
Do it, already.
But another part of me, the one that won out, wanted to hear what he had to say next.
“Did you know I touch myself, stroking slowly at first, thinking of you? I can hear your breath, imagining your screams of pleasure, as I get off. It feels so … fucking … good.”
I was about to get off too. But I didn't want to. Not before he kissed me. Or showed me what the bite of a vampire actually felt like.
Except.
How could he touch himself thinking of me when we’d just met? That made no sense.
“Brace yourself, chérie.”
With that, and no other preamble, I could feel the sharpness of his teeth against my skin. I closed my eyes. He was about to bite me and it felt … it felt … cold. Smelled musty.
He was, gone.
My eyes whipped open, and I wasn’t in a bed in Stone Haven any longer. The light of my phone still illuminated the book on my lap.
I jumped up.
What in the ever-living hell?
Had I fallen asleep sitting up?
That was without a doubt the most realistic-feeling dream I’d ever had in my life. Except … my hands flew to my neck. Nothing there, that I could feel. Until I looked down at my fingertip at a tiny drop of blood.