Chapter 24 #3
"I hate that I'm right, too." I let out a breath that's more frustration than anything else. "Do you have any idea how much I want you right now? How hard it is to stop?"
"I can feel how hard it is." She shifts her hips against me, and the friction makes me groan. "Literally."
"That's not helping."
"It's not meant to." But her expression has softened. The defensiveness is fading, replaced by something warmer. "You're really not pushing me away."
"No."
"You're not saying this is a mistake."
"It's the furthest thing from a mistake." I rest my forehead against hers. We're both breathing hard. "I'm saying I want it to matter. I'm saying I want you to be certain. Completely certain. Not because of Vivienne, not despite Vivienne, but because you chose this. Chose me."
"I have chosen you."
"Then choose me again. Tomorrow. When the poison has had time to fade.
When you've had time to think, really think, about what she said and what it means and what it doesn't mean.
" I pull back enough to look at her properly.
"I've waited centuries to feel this way again.
I can wait another night to be sure you feel the same. "
She stares at me for a long moment. I watch her process, that sharp mind working through the implications of what I've said and what I'm offering.
"That might be the most romantic thing anyone's ever said to me," she says finally.
"I'm over six hundred years old. I've had time to learn."
She laughs, a real laugh, surprised and warm. The sound loosens something in my chest.
"You're also infuriating," she says.
"I've been told."
"And arrogant."
"So I've heard."
"And you're going to leave me aching all night because you want to be noble."
"I'm going to be aching too, if that helps."
"It doesn't." But she's smiling now. Something real, something that reaches her eyes. "It really doesn't."
She pulls me down for another kiss, softer this time. Tender rather than demanding. A promise rather than a plea.
When she pulls back, her expression has changed. The uncertainty is still there, but it's tempered now by something warmer. Something that looks like trust.
"Later," she says.
"Later."
"And you'd better make good on those promises."
"Every single one." I press a kiss to her forehead.
Her cheek. The corner of her mouth. "I told you in the car that I remembered every word.
Every sound you made. Every way you felt around my fingers.
I've been thinking about nothing else for days.
When I finally have you, it won't be quick.
It won't be desperate. It will be everything I've been imagining since the war room. "
Her breath catches. "You're not making the waiting easier."
"Neither are you."
Footsteps in the hallway. We both freeze.
They pass by without stopping, someone on patrol, probably, or staff heading to their quarters. But the moment breaks the spell.
Celeste slides off the desk. Smooths her dress. Touches her hair and grimaces at the damage we've done to Elena's careful work.
I retrieve my jacket from the floor, shake out the wrinkles, don't put it back on. My shirt is still hanging open, and I catch her looking at the exposed skin with an expression that makes me want to forget everything I just said about waiting.
"I should go," she says. "Rest. Process. All the things you're supposed to do after a night like this."
"Celeste."
She pauses, one hand on the door.
"When you think about what Vivienne said," I tell her, "remember this too: whatever you were meant to be, whatever Valentina intended, it doesn't change what you've become. What you are to me."
"And what's that?"
I tell her the truth.
"Essential."
She's still for a moment. Then she crosses back to me, rises on her toes, and presses a kiss to the corner of my mouth. Soft. Brief. A promise.
"Goodnight, Maximus."
"Goodnight, Celeste."
She leaves. The door closes behind her with a soft click.
I stand alone in my study, surrounded by scattered papers and the lingering scent of her, and I try to remember the last time I felt this frustrated.
I move to the window, pushing aside the heavy curtain to look out at the grounds. The moon has shifted position, casting different shadows across the gardens. Somewhere out there, Konstantin is planning his next move. The other lords are weighing their options.
And none of it matters as much as it should.
My lips still feel the pressure of her kiss. My skin still remembers the path of her fingers. I haven't been this aroused and this frustrated in centuries.
But I meant what I said. When I finally have her, I want it to be clear. Uncomplicated by doubts and poison and the machinations of vampires who've been playing games since before she was born.
I want her to choose me. Really choose me. Not because she was designed to, not because she's running from fear, but because she wants to. Because she sees what I am and wants me anyway.
The ring box on my desk catches my eye. I pick it up, turn it over in my hands.
A small leather box that held a ring for centuries.
My father's ring. His father's before him.
Generations of Marchetti men who lived and died and never imagined their legacy would end up around the neck of a vampire in twenty-first-century Atlanta.
Empty now because I gave it to a woman I've known for approximately two weeks.
A woman I'm falling in love with anyway.
I set the box back on the desk. Pour myself another whiskey, though I don't drink it. Just hold the glass, feel the weight of it, the coolness against my palm.
I don't know what Valentina intended. But I know this: whatever Celeste was meant to be, she's chosen to be something else. She's chosen to stand beside me. To fight with me. To trust me with her fear and her uncertainty and her hope.
I can do no less.
I set down the glass, untouched, and move toward the door. Dawn is still hours away. There's work to be done. Security reports to review, strategies to refine, a war to plan. And a cold shower to take, because there's no way I'm going to be able to concentrate on any of it in this state.
But as I walk through the quiet corridors of my compound, I find myself pausing outside her door. Listening. I can hear her moving inside, the soft pad of footsteps, the rustle of fabric. She's not sleeping either.
I raise my hand to knock. Hesitate. Lower it again.
Later. I promised her later.
I intend to keep that promise.
I walk away, heading for my quarters. Part of me is already counting the hours until I can stop waiting and start living.