Face burning, he tried to control his body’s response, but it didn’t help. He didn’t feel any power being exerted on him the way that Martina had. But then, there was no need. The large space with him at the center, the ring of watching women and a few men, the fact that he was the only one nude in the room—it made him feel as awkward as a boy.
And like when he was a boy, concentrating on the problem only made it grow worse.
He finally accepted the truth, jerked the last of the delicate things off his feet, and stood up, stomach clenching.
To see his client reading a letter a servant had brought her.
It threw him. To the point that he didn’t know what to do except stand there, feet planted, hands at his sides. And try to act as if nothing unusual was happening despite the problem jutting proudly out in front of him.
It didn’t work. He didn’t know how Paulo would have handled this. Perhaps he would have enjoyed the attention. Showing off his well-maintained body to an appreciative audience, like a living version of the priceless statues that lined the stairs coming up. Maybe he would have posed and preened. Maybe he would have flirted.
Mircea was wishing the floor would open up and swallow him whole.
It didn’t help that the breeze off a balcony ensured that he felt every inch of his nudity. Cool tendrils slid across his skin, ruffling his hair, furling his nipples, and causing his wayward member to bob excitedly. And a couple of servant girls by the door to giggle and begin whispering things to each other behind their hands that they thought he couldn’t hear.
Or maybe they didn’t care. Their mistress certainly didn’t seem to. After what felt like an age but was probably only a few long moments, she looked up. And appeared faintly surprised to see him there.
Her eyes moved over his body, but if there was so much as a spark of interest, Mircea couldn’t see it. But after giving the letter to a servant, she finally turned her attention to him. “Very well.”
Again, Mircea waited. Again, she did not get up. And slowly, incredulously, he realized that she wasn’t going to.
He felt his hands curl into fists at his sides.
Was she trying to humiliate him?
He thought about walking out and damn the consequences. Martina would make him pay, and pay dearly, for insulting one of the godlike senators, he had no doubt of that. But it might be worth it to wipe that look of faint amusement off the woman’s face.
Of course, there were other ways to do that, he thought fiercely, and started toward her.
Only to have her hold up a hand. “No. From there.”
Mircea stopped abruptly. “From . . . here?” He was at least ten feet away. His eyes moved automatically downward, and then back up. Making the point that, well-endowed or not, “from here” was not a viable option.
One of her ladies laughed.
His client did not. “Pleasure yourself,” she instructed, and lay lazily back against the chaise, preparing to watch.
Mircea just stood there, thrown off balance again. Badly. And it didn’t help when someone closed the doors to the balcony, apparently deciding that the night breeze was making the room uncomfortable.
And inadvertently made it more so for Mircea.
Glass, so dear at home that it was reserved for religious icons or church windows, was manufactured here. And was so affordable that it was everywhere, swinging from ladies’ waists in the form of small mirrors, hanging from the ceiling in cesendelli, the delicate lamps copied from the Byzantines, or even taking the place of wood panels in the balcony doors. Which afterward offered a view despite being closed.
But at night, it wasn’t of the dark canal and street outside, but of the comparatively brightly lit interior.
And the naked vampire standing in a puddle of lamplight.
Mircea stared blankly at the image reflected back at him, and didn’t recognize himself. Gone were the heavy robes of court, the armor of the battlefield, even the fripperies of Venice. Gone were all the outward trappings of the man he’d known, the person he’d been. And in his place . . .
Was a decadent member of Venice’s oldest profession, naked expect for the black half-mask he wore.
He hadn’t taken it off, because he’d forgotten he had it on. Masks were common when going out in Venice, especially on formal occasions. And this one was just a scrap of stiffened linen, covered with a little paint.
But the effect on his appearance was astonishing.
He wasn’t a person anymore, with a name, an identity. He was a body, polished to a high sheen and bought at a heavy price. And expected to give a good show for the money.
It should have made him furious. It should have made him violent. Instead, it just left him bewildered.
Who was he, anymore?
Who was he without the power? Who was he without the name? He didn’t know; wasn’t sure he’d ever known.
From the time he was born, he’d been trained to be one thing: his father’s heir. To put the needs of family before his own, to endure hardship uncomplaining, to set an example before the people of the strength and stoicism of their leaders. Everything in his life had been designed to mold him to think a certain way, to be a credit to his house, to act as expected. And he’d done that.
He’d done that right up until his treacherous nobles shoved hot pokers in his eyes and buried him alive.
That man had died. This one lived. But, he realized, he didn’t know this one.
He’d spent almost two years as a vampire, one on the run, one here in the supposed sanctuary of Venice, trying to scrape up a living. But he’d never really faced the fact that anything had changed. He’d been acting like a prince in exile, someone temporarily down on his luck, who would be back to claim his throne any day now.
But he wouldn’t be back. Couldn’t go back. This was who he was now.
And he didn’t know this person.
He had never really even looked at this person, turning his face away in disgust, hearing the words of the old stories echoing in his ears: cursed, damned, evil, monster. But he looked now. For the first time, he looked.
Not at the man, but at the vampire.
And saw gleaming dark hair falling onto hard shoulders. Eyes that glittered dangerously behind the mask’s almond-shaped openings. Skin that glowed golden bright, highlighted by sweat and darkened by shadow where flesh became muscle: the curve of his chest, the ladder of his ribs, the indentation of his naval.
The proud jut of his manhood as his fist curled around it.
He stood there for a moment, head swimming. Completely unable to connect the polished, nude courtesan holding his throbbing member with the man he knew. But this time, he didn’t turn away.
Instead, he watched the muscles in his arm bunch and release. Watched his hand glide down the length of his thickness, from the creamy flesh to the rosy head, pausing to caress it softly before sliding back up. Watched as he completed a simple movement that nonetheless broke the laws of his church, of his homeland, even of the dissolute city in which he now lived, which equated self-pleasure with the crime of sodomy.
Watched what he had never actually seen, because such things were considered shameful and hidden away.
But it didn’t look shameful. It looked strangely beautiful. And even more so when he made the first, tentative thrust.
He’d never before noticed the way his whole body joined in the motion. How it started with tension in his calves and thighs, moved up to tighten his buttocks and back, and then rippled outward as he completed the movement. How each isolated action blended with the one before as he fell into a rhythm, melding into a sinuous wave, an erotic dance—