Chapter 6 Penelope
PENELOPE
The words had poured from her lips with a startling, almost sacrificial grace.
As though it were something she had truly yearned for.
Yet, no sooner than they had crossed into the air between them, Penelope felt the weight of them, heavy and irrevocable.
Her admission, her offering, seemed to exist apart from her—an utterance that, should her father ever find out, would send him into an early grave.
And what would her father think? His daughter—his only family, making a deal with what he would consider the devil. A demon. A bloody vampire!
And then, no—no. All of her doubt began to surface in a panic that chased her heart because what had she agreed to? She had not only allowed a man in her quarters, in her bed no less, but she had actually offered to give herself to him?
The thought made her stomach turn, yet her feet did not move. All reason, all self-preservation had fled, leaving her where she was—waiting for his answer like some pet. Like a lamb seeking comfort in the shadow of a fox, even as his jaws hovered open.
And Elias… Elias had sensed it too, perhaps. He stood motionless, a statue carved from doubt and longing, watching her as one might a wild, delicate thing—afraid that any movement might send her fleeing into the dark.
“You would agree to this?” he asked softly, his voice deceptively calm, though his gaze betrayed a flicker of disbelief.
Penelope drew a breath with difficulty, her chest straining against her stays, her ribs struggling as if her body resisted her own will.
She forced herself upright, every muscle taut with resolve she did not feel as though posture alone might keep her from unraveling. “If you agree to my terms, then I…”
Her voice cracked, the words dying on her tongue. Shame and uncertainty wrestled in her throat. Her eyes flicked to the piano behind him, lingering for a moment as she steadied her breath.
“I will help you,” she whispered, allowing her eyes to find his once more. “With your desire to learn… and your hunger.”
For a moment, the silence became unbearable.
Elias said nothing, his expression unreadable, his stillness suffocating.
He only looked at her—looked through her—until she wondered if she had misstepped or misunderstood.
The realization that she had just handed herself over to monster—a vampire—settling in her chest like lead.
Her breath came quicker. The longer he said nothing, the more her courage soured into dread.
She wrung her hands until her knuckles paled, every instinct whispering that she should rescind, should push him out the window, should confess everything and beg forgiveness from her father.
And yet, she stood there, waiting, praying he would speak.
“You will not run away from this?” Elias finally asked, taking a cautious step forward. Testing her.
“You have my answer. Yes, I agree. To all of it.”
“You agree,” he repeated softly. “And yet your heart thrashes as if in protest.” His lips curved into something not unlike a sneer.
Her breath stuttered. “I—I gave my word.”
“And I have lived long enough,” Elias murmured, leaning closer, his voice brushing her face, “to know a woman’s tongue does not always speak for her heart. No matter how deft that tongue may be.”
Her fingers clawed at her skirts, twisting fabric until the seams strained. She should deny him, shove him away, scream. Yet she remained rooted, trembling, trapped more by her own treacherous wanting than by his looming form.
“No matter,” he said at last, his tone solid again. “You have offered yourself. I will take you at your word.”
Relief—sharp and sickening—rushed through her chest, though it was short lived.
“How will you take my blood?”
Elias’ eyes narrowed as his smirk stretched wider still. His shoulders relaxed, only just, as he released a sharp and almost mocking breath.
Then, he moved. Not swift, but with that slow control he always seemed to possess. His hand wrapped around hers in what was becoming familiarity in the way his warmth would so naturally wrap around her.
“That,” he murmured, lowering his head until his lips hovered a breath from her wrist, “depends on you, Lamb.”
Her pulse rioted beneath her skin, betraying her, deafening her with its frantic rush.
She forced herself to lift her chin, though her voice came out thin and frayed.
Yet he stared at her with that damned smirk.
He knew. Of course, he knew what this was doing to her.
He could hear her heart from across her house.
He could hear the way her pulse raced every time he discarded the space between them as though it were offensive.
“And how do you prefer to… drink?”
He smiled, cunning and unbearably soft. “I prefer to be completely as my nature demands. I am not one to have practiced much… care, before.”
And before she could flinch or flee, he traced a single finger along the softness of her wrist, pausing just above the fragile blue vein that pulsed life. Not piercing, not yet—only reminding her of where this bargain would lead.
Elias’ smirk curved deeper as though he could taste her hesitation. Then, with maddening leisure, he guided her trembling hand upward, until her fingertips brushed the sharp, gleaming edge of his fang.
Penelope gasped at the unnatural smoothness of it, the razor tip that pricked without piercing. Her breath caught as he pressed her hand closer, letting her feel the full length of one fang, then the other, as if daring her to recoil.
“Do you see?” he rasped, his voice dark. “This is no metaphor, no symbolism, no game, Lamb. This is what waits for you when you give me leave.”
Heat and terror wrapped around her core, strangling all sense of reason. She should have pulled away, yet, she didn’t. Her hand remained against his mouth, her fingertips grazing the sharpness that could end her.
“And if I asked for care?” she whispered, barely audible.
Elias pulled her hand back, kissing the tips of her fingers where his fangs had grazed.
He closed his eyes, still pressing the pads of her fingers against his lips as though considering the idea in truth.
“Then I would take less,” he finally said, lowering her hand but never releasing it.
“Slower. It will never be my intention to harm you thus. Or to ruin you. But make no mistake, Lamb—it is still hunger. Still need. Care cannot sweeten the bite.”
Her skin prickled and a dangerous excitement worked its way lower and lower. Her body betrayed her with a tightening in her core. “And if I do not ask for care?”
The smile that fully unfurled on his lips was as sharp as his fangs. “Then I would take you as you are. No pretenses. You would feel exactly what I am, and what you are to me. And, I will tell you something else.”
Her chest tightened. Every instinct told her to retreat, to bolt for the safety of distance. But her body betrayed her, holding still, eyes locked on him. A tremor shivered through her, yet her voice emerged before she could stop it. “What?”
“You will enjoy it.”
Her heart leapt even as her stomach dropped what felt like miles deep within her.
“You know nothing of what I will enjoy,” she whispered, her voice thinner than she wished. “We are strangers. Practically.”
“Perhaps for you that is true. But I have been watching you for many nights now. Your innocence may be able to trick that fool of a Mayor, but your body cannot hide these things from me.”
Her throat worked soundlessly, but he pressed on.
“I hear the way your heart races for me, Lamb. There is no hiding that.”
His hands slid, deliberate, to the small of her waist, and with cruel ease he guided her back until she was pressed flush against the door. The wood bit cold through her gown. Heat bloomed low in her belly as a wetness began to form between her legs.
Then Elias lowered himself, slow, deliberate, like a man lost in prayer—though there was no piety in it. Only hunger. Only desire.
His hands dragged down her sides with such measured pressure her breath stuttered, her chest straining against her stays. He stopped only when he had claimed the tops of her thighs in his grasp, his fingers curling, reminding her that he could hold her captive should he wish.
“Perhaps,” he murmured, lifting his face but not rising, his mouth perilously close to the hem of her skirts, “I should show you. Then you would believe me.” His smile cut deeper. “Believe me when you are crying from my touch.”
Penelope’s breath hitched as his lips pressed against the top of her thigh, a breath away from where her skirt covered her sex. He held her gaze as his lips pressed against her, never wavering as if daring her to look away.
Her hands shot to the door at her back, gripping for anchor, as though the wood might save her from his bite.
“Elias—” Her voice cracked on his name. She should have shouted, should have struck him—but the words slipped out soft, tremulous. A plea that even she could not deny.
“Shh,” he whispered, pressing the shape of a kiss against the fabric.
“I hear what you do not speak, Lamb. I know when you are scorned”—another kiss on the apex of her inner thigh—“When you are scared.” This time his fangs pierced her skirt, grazing her skin, causing her to gasp. “And when you are yearning.”
Before she could push him away, before she could summon sense or fury, his teeth caressed her harder—high, at the curve of her thigh. A searing jolt of terror lanced through her, chased instantly by something far more treacherous.
Need.
She gasped, her knees threatening to give way, as his fangs pierced her thigh through the dress. Not deep, not yet. Just enough. Just enough for fire to course through her veins, for her body to betray her in the most wretched fashion. Just enough for him to play with her.
Penelope’s hands found his shoulders, a whimper falling from her lips as his teeth pushed deeper.
It was as though the entirety of her nerves were lit on fire—as though she had truly felt what it meant to submit for the first time.
The sound he made—half growl, half moan—vibrated against her skin as he finally closed his eyes.
His grip tightened, possessive, pulling her closer devouring her whole.
She felt the pull, the terrible rhythm of it, and the world narrowed to that singular point of violation—of intimacy.
Elias moaned as he pulled her closer, taking more from her as she bit her lip, fighting to not give him the satisfaction of her pleasure.
As his teeth pushed deeper, something pulsed from his fangs. And with each pulse, her body fought to turn against her. Paralyzing her in her own fraught pleasure.
It was too much.
It scared her, how willing her body was to play the part of prey, caught in the teeth of a monster yearning for nothing more than complete surrender.
“Elias, wait—” she cried, a desperation building in her sex as she felt something wet running down her legs and—no. No. It was all too much.
Her hand shot to his hair, not to caress but to shove him away. Yet her palm faltered, fingers tangling in the ghostly white strands as though her body were at war with itself. She hated herself for it.
She wanted him to ignore her pleads. To keep taking from her.
“Stop,” she whispered, but the word came out weak, quivering. Her chest rose and fell with frantic strain as if her very breath fought to escape.
He opened his eyes to look at her as she came undone.
With another growl, Elias pulled back.
The feeling of his fangs being removed from her thigh made her stomach tighten.
“Do you feel it?” His voice was muffled against her dress as he kissed where he had bitten her, lips wet with her blood. “How your sweetness calls for me?”