Chapter Five
New Year’s Resolution Number Five: Don’t wait for Prince Charming. The guy doesn’t exist. And even if he did exist, he’d be boring as hell.
The bed was too soft and comfortable. The covers felt like silk against her skin, and the pillow beneath her head was so plush that Lark figured she must be sleeping on a cloud.
Since she normally slept on one seriously lumpy pillow and a paper-thin mattress, alarm bells went off in her head even before Lark’s eyes opened.
When they did open, Lark spied the heavy, wooden furniture around her, the massive four poster bed that she currently occupied…
and the bedroom that was very much not her own.
She took in the scene with a frantic glance, and she kind of flipped out.
A quick scream broke from her as she jumped from the bed. And that was when the next shock of the day hit her.
She was wearing a soft, silken gown. Again, not hers.
“Easy…” His low, deep voice came from the corner. Her gaze immediately snapped to said corner. Sunlight trickled through the blinds, but didn’t reach him.
The vampire prince. The prince who’d just been—apparently—sitting there and waiting for her to wake up. On a scale of one to creepy, that was super creepy. Super, super freaking creepy.
Devereaux smiled at her. “You wake up with a lot of energy.”
“Where the hell are my clothes, you bastard?”
His smile dimmed. “And you wake up…grumpy?”
She growled.
He sighed. “Your dress was dirty and covered in blood. I sent it to be cleaned. You’d lost your shoes long before we met, remember? Anyway, when you passed out—”
“Because you bit me!” She bounded toward him. Glared down at him. “I probably passed out from blood loss because you bit me—twice!”
He stared up at her. And, damn him, he still looked sexy. Maybe even sexier than he’d looked the night before. “You asked for my bite. Both times.”
“I didn’t ask for you to be at the New Year’s party!”
“Technically, I wasn’t at the party. You were there with that dumbass Charles.” He sniffed. His eyes blazed. “Don’t worry. My men are hunting him. I’ll have him staked before nightfall.”
Staked before… “What is wrong with you?” The question just blurted from her.
He blinked.
“I mean, you’re a vamp prince. I’m the daughter of a monster hunter. You shouldn’t be here—giving me nightgowns, hunting down my blind date from hell. You should be staying in your own lane, a lane far away from me.”
“Staying in my own lane…” Devereaux repeated her words with a frown as he rose. His body brushed against hers, and a surge of heat swept through her. “I happen to think I am in my lane. You’re mine.”
“That is…wrong. I’m not your anything.”
He smiled. He had dimples. Shit. A cute vampire. He looked all…less menacing when his dimples winked and why hadn’t she noticed the dimples before?
Oh, right, because she’d been too busy trying to stay alive.
“Three times,” she whispered.
A furrow appeared between his brows.
“I was bitten three times yesterday.” Now she took a huge step away from him.
“I know what that means.” And it didn’t just mean that she’d had a really shitty New Year’s Eve.
Maybe the worst ever. “Two bites from you and one from Charles.” Her hand rose to press against her neck.
But the skin didn’t feel tender. And when her fingers fluttered over the area, she couldn’t find any trace of the bite marks.
Weird.
Her hand fell back to her side. “In order to become a vampire, a human has to be bitten three times. Three times, and then the human drinks the blood of a vampire. After that, presto, no more human.” Hello, worst nightmare.
Hadn’t her mother told her, time and time again, that there was nothing worse than a vampire? That they were the most evil beings on the planet? The most conniving?
And yet…there she was. In a vampire’s bedroom. Her mother had to be spinning in her grave.
“That is how it works…for humans,” he murmured. His gaze was on her neck.
When a vamp looked at a woman’s neck, it was never a good sign. “Give me clothes to wear, or I will walk out of here in this nightgown.”
Now his gaze fell to her body, and his stare heated even more. “You look beautiful in that gown. But then, I think you’d look beautiful in anything or in nothing at all. Actually, I think you’d be absolutely stunning naked.”
The vamp prince was seriously hitting on her. She pointed to herself. “Monster. Hunter’s. Daughter.” She pointed to him. “Vamp. This isn’t going to happen.”
“I think it’s very Romeo and Juliet.”
“Uh, yeah, you know how that story ended, right? They both died.”
He winked at her. “Then isn’t it a good thing that I’m undead?”
She wouldn’t laugh. But…There was something about him. “Why? Why are you doing this? Why help me last night? Why give me a place to sleep? Why—”
His hand rose and cupped her cheek. Again, a surge of heat swept through her body. Her heart raced. Her breath panted out. And her nipples became tight as desire beat in her blood.
Okay, hello, plot twist.
“In the vampire world, I cannot become king until I have a worthy queen to rule at my side. I have been waiting centuries for my queen. I don’t have to wait any longer. I’ve found her.”
She looked over her shoulder, just in case. Because, obviously, there had to be someone else there. He couldn’t mean her.
A rumble of laughter came from him. “Absolutely, it’s you. You are the only one who will do for me. You were born to rule. Born to be at my side, forever.”
No way. “I was always told that I was born to kill vampires. All monsters.” Her mother had drilled that particular lesson into her head.
His fingers slid down her cheek. Fell away from her, and dammit, why did she miss his touch? Why was she leaning toward him like he was the sun and she was a freaking flower?
“How did all of that work out for you?” Devereaux asked her. “The monster killing routine? Out of curiosity, just how many monsters have you killed in your life?”
Damn him. “None.” She was the biggest failure in her family’s history.
“Turned out, I didn’t have the killer instinct.
” If she couldn’t take down one single bad guy, how in the hell did he think she was going to be queen of the whole undead world?
Not happening. “You’ve got the wrong woman.
Sorry. But thanks for the help last night.
” She turned on her heel. Looked like she’d be leaving in the nightgown. Whatever.
Before she could reach the bedroom door, Devereaux was in her path. Stupid vamp speed.
But, wait, she’d used vamp speed the night before. How the hell had she done that?
“I bet you have all kinds of…instincts…inside of you,” Devereaux rasped. He looked fierce and dangerous. A bit delectable. If you went for that type. “Maybe you just needed the right person to wake them.”
She wet her lips.
“I have the right woman. The only woman I want. I just have to convince you, Lark, that you want me, too.” His head lowered toward hers.
She should back away.
Push him.
Get a stake or something.
She didn’t move. Because she liked having him close. That weird heat was pounding through her blood again, and all she wanted was his mouth. On hers.
“I have to wake you up.”
She was awake. Crazy vampire.
“You’ve been sleeping a very long time. Living in a world that wasn’t meant to be yours. So much more waits for you. I can show you things…impossible, wonderful things. I can put a kingdom at your feet, if you’ll just let me.”
He was going to kiss her.
Back. Away.
Instead, she stepped forward. She didn’t wait for him to kiss her.
Instead, the girl who’d been raised to fear vampires, the woman who knew she should run—she put her mouth on his because a hot, dangerous desire was blooming within her.
A dark lust that pushed her to touch him.
To taste him. Even though she knew it was wrong, even though Lark knew it was a mistake, she put her hands around his broad shoulders.
She rose onto her toes. And her open mouth met his.
Need. Hunger. Longing. The surge hit her so hard that her knees trembled.
She didn’t have to worry about falling, though, because his arms locked around her, and Devereaux pulled her tightly against him.
The kiss was consuming. His tongue thrust into her mouth.
She tasted him. He devoured her. Desire exploded.
A wild craving that shook her entire body.
All she wanted was more. So much more. She grabbed for his shirt. Yanked—and the buttons went flying.
He gave a low, rough growl and picked her up. Her legs wrapped around his waist. She’d never, ever felt this way before. Part of her was absolutely horrified. She couldn’t be reacting this way. Not to a vampire!
But…
Another part of her…another part just thought…finally, I found him.
That was insane and wrong, but…
At the moment, she didn’t care.
He spun her around, caging her between the closed door and his body.
Her mouth pulled from his, and she began to kiss her way down his neck.
Her sex was against him. The gown and her panties covered her, but the material was so thin.
The hard, heavy length of his arousal shoved through the pants that he wore.
Pants that were in her way. Down, down her mouth went, and Lark could feel the race of his pulse beneath her lips.
She licked his skin. She sucked. She scraped her teeth over his neck, and then she opened her mouth to—
Bite?
Whoa. Whoa. She jerked her mouth back. Gaped up at him as ice water seemed to fall over her.
She’d been about to bite the vamp prince. And if she’d taken his blood into her mouth—if she’d bitten him hard enough to break the skin—
Lark would have become a vampire.