Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 99700 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 499(@200wpm)___ 399(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99700 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 499(@200wpm)___ 399(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
As he was one of the younger vampires, she also figured he was the least likely to mess up and say something about the Spanish Flu or claim to have been close family friends with one of King Henry’s many wives.
“I wish,” Pandora said. “It has to be Bellatrix.”
“Why would she be following us?”
That was the question, wasn’t it?
But since Bellatrix and Pandora barely tolerated each other, she could only come to one conclusion.
“I’m worried she might think there’s something … up with us.” Pandora kept her voice low, knowing that vampires have acute hearing.
“Up?” Victor looked down at her with those gorgeous green eyes, his dark brows scrunched.
“Yeah, like, I don’t know … maybe we weren’t convincing enough?”
“It was a family gathering,” he said. “What were we supposed to do, have our hands all over each other?”
Pandora’s skin tingled at the very idea of Victor’s hands all over it, especially in that thin, barely-there dress from the party. She could have felt his warm skin through the material, shivered at the way the fabric would have slid across her overly sensitive skin.
“Pandora?” Victor snatched her out of a lovely little fantasy that left her feeling heated and achy.
“I don’t know. Some of my family members can be really … perceptive. She could have just picked up on there not being, you know …” She trailed off, not sure what to say. Heat? Because she sure as hell felt a lot of that toward him, if not the other way around. “I guess just … physical contact,” she said, shrugging it off.
To that, Victor nodded, looking off in the distance as they started walking again.
“Do you still see her?” he asked, voice low.
“Yeah,” Pandora said, but she tried not to be obvious about it. She didn’t want Bellatrix knowing she’d seen her. At least not until she knew how to handle the whole situation.
“Good,” he said.
Then he was turning toward her, the umbrella tipping to the side, the fine mist of rain cool on her cheeks, contrasting the warmth suddenly crackling in the air between them.
His free hand slid to the small of her back, steadying her as he leaned down. “Just go with it, OK?” he asked, voice low enough for only her to hear, his breath warm on her skin.
“OK,” she agreed, happy to have more of … whatever this was.
Then his head ducked and his lips claimed hers.
It was firm at first. Deliberate. Part of an act he wanted to sell to an audience.
But the moment their lips met, everyone and everything else fell away.
Suddenly his touch wasn’t calculated, but electric – a surge that melted her immediately.
Her hand instinctively slid up to rest on his chest, feeling the steady thrum of his heartbeat beneath the damp fabric of his coat. And suddenly, for her, there was nothing about that moment that was for show.
His grip on her tightened, pulling her closer instead of steadying her, like he couldn’t let her move away. Not just yet.
Her own response betrayed her, lips parting under his.
If it was fake, it wasn’t supposed to feel like this. Her chest felt tight, her knees weak, as his lips slanted over hers again and again, dragging a soft sigh out of her.
Her hand moved around to the back of his neck as she leaned in, their bodies pressing close so she could feel the beat of his heart reverberate into her own chest.
Victor’s teeth nipped her lower lip, making her head fall back, inviting more. Needing more.
Desire was burning through her veins, a wildfire whose flames threatened to consume her completely.
Another whimper escaped her then and the sound seemed to sober Victor.
He pulled back, his hand falling away. She felt embarrassingly unstable without his touch, even as she forced her own hand to fall.
When her lashes finally fluttered open, he was already gazing down at her. His expression was unreadable but changed.
“There,” he said, a faint rasp in his voice. “That ought to do it.”
As they walked on, they both refused to look at each other.
Pandora couldn’t help but wonder what was going through his mind. If that kiss had been as real for him as it had felt for her. If he was feeling as conflicted as she was.
She was so distracted by her own response to the kiss, and her desire for more, that she was only half paying attention to Victor as he started to talk about different printing places in London where they could get their invitations drawn up and made for them.
Sensing her lack of response, he let the conversation fall away before they even made it back to Luna Bean.
“Where’d he go?” Pandora asked when they walked into an empty café. Save for Lucy behind the counter, looking rather pleased with herself.
“Off to torture someone else with his awful personality, no doubt,” Lucy said, shrugging.