Even with the mink, the shock of cold air was a little stunning after the cozy warmth of the limo. But we weren’t out in it for long. My toes barely had time to register the frozen sidewalk before Mircea swung me up and ran with me up the stairs of a beautiful old row house.
A plain red door, like a dozen others on the street, gave way to a narrow little hallway boasting a priceless chandelier, a mahogany welcome desk and what looked suspiciously like a Cézanne, its bright colors glowing against the dark wood paneling.
A rotund little vampire bustled around the side of the desk and then disappeared. It took me a second to realize that he’d bowed, so low that even peering over the edge of the mink, all I could see were the lights gleaming off his shiny bald head. He bobbed back up after a minute, and then he did it again, like one of those drinking bird toys that just can’t stay upright.
But eventually he did, leading the way up the stairs. And I guessed he must have been a lot older than the driver, because not a word was said until his slightly shaking hands had opened the door to a magnificent suite. It was saffron and coral and deep chocolate brown, with a fireplace in caramel-colored marble and a huge window overlooking the city lights.
“I—I hope it is to your liking, my lord,” he murmured, and turned pink-cheeked with delight when Mircea casually nodded.
“Yes, it’s fine. We’ll eat up here.”
“Of course, of course. Right away.” The little vamp bowed himself out—literally—bobbing three times as he withdrew backward into the hall. And then Mircea finally let me down, only to get his hands inside the coat and push me against the wall.
“I’m dirty,” I protested.
He waggled his eyebrows. “Promise?”
“Mircea!” I laughed in spite of myself. “I want a bath before we eat!”
His eyes, glinting in the discreet light of the suite, met mine. “If you’ll indulge me.”
“I’m not bathing with you,” I told him firmly. I’d never get any dinner that way.
“Of course not,” he said, in pretend shock.
“Then what?”
He let a single finger trace down my cheek to my jaw, to my neck, to my . . . necklace? “Is your ghost in residence?”
“No.” I hadn’t felt the need for a chaperone. “Why?”
“Because I have a recurring fantasy of you dining with me wearing this.” That warm finger slowly traced the outline of the baroque monstrosity. “And only this.”
I made a small sound and closed my eyes.
Goddamnit.
Despite appearances, I was trying, I was really, really trying, to have a relationship with Mircea, not just to jump his bones every time we had five minutes alone together. And I’d been doing pretty well lately, mainly because he’d been in New York and I’d been in Vegas and my plans always sounded a lot more doable when he wasn’t pressed up against me and—
“Stop that,” I told him, as he rotated his hips sinuously, because the damn man had no shame at all.
“Then give me an answer,” he said, laughter in his voice.
I looked up, intending to say no, but those dark eyes had an unmistakable glint of challenge sparkling in their depths. As if he thought I wouldn’t do it. As if he was sure I wouldn’t do it. Because I wasn’t a vampire, wasn’t adventurous like . . . certain other people. Who probably didn’t have a problem sashaying around covered in nothing but that long, silky black hair, those almond-shaped, dark eyes peeking coyly back over her dainty shoulder as she—
Goddamnit!
But it wasn’t that easy for me. Not because I had a problem indulging him, although nudity wasn’t my favorite thing. But because I was human. And Mircea, like a lot of vampires, had the bad habit of assuming that whatever he wanted from a human, he would get.
It didn’t help that he was usually right.
And centuries of that sort of thing had messed with his head, to the point that he rarely saw the need for debate with said human, or compromise or negotiation or any of the sort of things he would do with one of his own kind. He’d claimed me; therefore I was his. End of discussion, had there been a discussion, which there hadn’t been because I was human and some days, most days, that attitude just really made me want to tear my hair out.
So here I was, trying to see if a relationship would maybe, possibly, in some sort of way work despite the fact that the mages were absolutely going to hate it and the Weres weren’t going to love it and I was also going to take flak from the vampires after they realized that “relationship” didn’t mean “ownership” in my vocabulary, and what was Mircea doing?
Acting like there was nothing to discuss, of course.
Only there was. There so very definitely was, like five hundred years of history I knew next to nothing about. Like the fact that almost all I did know was that he was fiercely loyal to his family, had a horrible sense of humor, and when he walked into a room, he made my breath catch.
And, yeah, that was definitely something, but was it enough to base a lifetime on? I didn’t know yet. All I did know was that if I kept giving in, kept doing what he wanted, kept acting like we were already together and the decision had been made . . . then pretty soon, it would be.
And I didn’t know yet if it was one I could live with.
“Cassie?”
I looked up to find him regarding me with exasperated eyes. “Do you really have to think so hard about this?”
“It’s . . . complicated,” I said fretfully.
“No, it really isn’t.”
“Yes, it is! It really, really is, and you know it is and—”
He stopped me with a hand on either side of my face. “When are we?”
“What?”
“The year.”
I frowned. And my power sluggishly called up the date: “Nineteen sixty-nine.”
“And that means you haven’t been born yet, doesn’t it?”
I nodded.
“We haven’t met yet—am I right?”
“Well, not unless you count that time in—”
“Cassie.”
“No. Not . . . technically. But I don’t get what you’re—”
“I’m saying that nothing that happens, or doesn’t happen, tonight will have any bearing on our relationship once we return. No implications. No consequences. Think of this as . . . a night out of time.”
“A night out of time?” I repeated doubtfully, because I didn’t get those. Time caused me problems; it didn’t solve them. Not even for one night.
His forehead came to rest against mine. “A night out of time.”
I licked my lips and thought it over. “The servers will see.”
“And if I arrange it so they won’t?”
I looked up at him, and it was a mistake, because he was grinning that little-boy grin, the one he never showed in public because it would completely trash his image as big, bad Vampire Senate member. But I got to see it every once in a while. And it never failed to be devastating.
“Just dinner,” I heard myself say, before I could bite my tongue.
“Just dinner,” he agreed softly, stroking the lines of my cheekbones with his thumbs.
And then he let me go.
Chapter Thirteen
The bathroom of the suite turned out to be as impressive as the rest. Golden marble with thin veins of burnt umber running through it covered everything from the floors to the ceiling to the double sinks to the spa-like tub, all polished to a high gloss. There was a plush dark orange rug, matching towels, and a basket of expensive toiletries all done up in cellophane like the Easter bunny had just delivered it.
And there were mirrors, lots and lots of mirrors.
Almost every surface that wasn’t covered in marble had one, and all of them informed me that I looked like hell. My makeup was long gone, my hair was a freaking disaster, and my body was smeared with mud and various other substances I didn’t want to think too hard about. I sighed and peeled the laddered foot of what had been an expensive pair of stockings off my filthy feet. My polish was chipped and my toes . . . well, they looked like you’d expect after being dragged across cobblestones.