I double-checked my knot and pulled on the trap, making sure it was secure. Not so much because I was scared of falling, obviously, but more because I didn’t want to make a big, embarrassing noise and get in trouble. I kicked my legs over the bar and hung upside down for a brief moment before shimmying upright to sit. Checking my form in the mirror, I pointed my toes and smiled at myself. As a little kid, I’d threatened again and again that if I didn’t get my way, I would run away and join the circus. And now I had, twice.
A shadow filled the doorway, and I almost fell over backward.
“Bonsoir, songbird.”
Vale leaned against the doorway, all too pleased with himself.
“You really like scaring the shit out of me, don’t you?”
His grin widened. “Very much, bébé.”
“And why are you skulking around Paradis late at night?”
“One might ask you the same question.”
He walked to me slowly, his boots somehow silent on the boards. He wore the tight, striped trousers and paisley waistcoat that all the dandies under a certain age wore, but the addition of his gypsy shirt and brigand’s honed physique only served to highlight his wildness rather than indicate the usual cultured aloofness. The Parisian gents also favored wild, long, foppish hair and purposefully messy ponytails, as if every one of them was trying out for the part of the Rosetti that hadn’t yet been discovered in Sang. But Vale’s shorn head and rough beard only made his golden-green eyes shine brighter. My fingers tightened on the ropes of the trapeze as he wrapped his hands around the bar on either side of my hips, just beyond the black ruffles of my skirt.
“Can’t blame a girl for being curious.”
“Oh, I never would blame anyone for that.”
“The door was open.”
“Of course it was.”
With every volley, his hands drifted closer to my body, and my breathing sped up in response. With the height of the trapeze, his eyes were level with my cleavage. He took one step closer, and my knees pressed against his chest. I couldn’t even think of where my feet pressed, farther down.
He looked up at me, humor in his eyes. “But really, bébé. Why are you here?”
I swung my hips back and forth, taking the trap with me. “Maybe I felt the need to explore a little.”
His hand found my ankle and traced up the back of my leg, running one finger seductively up and down my stockinged calf.
“Exploration, eh? That’s an excellent preoccupation.” His eyes met mine, and even though they were as light as a summer meadow, they held all the promise of a shadowy bedroom draped in velvet. “I like exploring. I could help you with that, you know.”
His hand settled on my thigh, and I squeezed my legs tightly together at the rush of warmth he caused.
“But you’re going to have to loosen up first, oui?”
18
I smirked and perked up in mock indignation. “I may work in a cabaret, but I’m not a loose woman, monsieur.”
“But in your profession, surely you must remain limber. Lithe. Flexible.”
“Flexibility is just one of my many talents.”
“I’d like to see more of your talents, bébé. Maybe I could teach you a few things myself.”
“You’re so very altruistic.”
“I don’t know that word, but I’m guessing it’s similar to sexy.”
He reached for my face, and I leaned down to meet him, his lips pressing gently to mine, almost nibbling. Heat shot through my body, and it took effort to stay on the trapeze. But something was off. I pulled away and licked my lips.
“Wine. You taste of wine.”
“I must test the vintage before I can sell the wine properly, bébé. Part of the job, being a brigand.”
I looked closer. His eyes were slightly red, which was making them glow an otherworldly green.
“Are you drunk, Vale?”
He grinned, hands back on the trapeze on either side of my hips.
“Peut-être.”
With a whoop, he pulled the trapeze back and ran, pushing me high into the air and swinging with me, dangling from the bar. He couldn’t go far, as the wall was near and I’d adjusted the ropes to keep it close to the ground, but I still felt the sensation of flying. I took advantage of the mirror to watch the fine lines of his back and the way the trousers hugged his butt. A red-striped handkerchief fluttered from his back pocket. When he hit the wall, he kicked off it and swung back, tucking up his knees so the trapeze could swing in the other direction.
I tried to hide my childlike glee at flying through the air on a trapeze with a seriously hot guy dangling just underneath me, his buzzed hair tickling my ankles through the stockings.
“Yep, you’re drunk.”
“Just a little. Just enough.”
“Just enough for what? Wailing and waking up the entire cabaret?”
He let his feet down, dragging his boots to bring the trap to a stop. I held on tightly and recomposed my legs, crossing them demurely at the ankles. With more agility than a drunk man had any right to possess, he swung up and turned in the air, landing on his feet, facing me again.
“Just enough to come to you when I don’t have any information, any tips, any trinkets, any advice. To come to you with nothing but myself.”
“Vale, you don’t have to—”
I tried to slide off the trapeze, but he pinned me there and stepped close, spreading my knees to stand pressed against me. His arms wrapped around my waist as he ran his nose up the buttons of my jacket and planted a kiss in the V of my cleavage. I couldn’t breathe and suddenly felt as if I was upside down, as if everything had gone topsy-turvy.
“No, I don’t have to. I want to. And if it took half a cask of the best wine in Paris, so be it. Bébé, I’m not just your errand boy. I want more.”
Maybe it was the absinthe still bubbling in my blood, or maybe I was just sick of being an object of lust who never gave in to her own passions. Hell, maybe I felt the same way, not that I was about to admit it. But I bent my head and pressed my lips against the gold rings set in the curve of his ear.
“More what?” I let my breath play over his scalp. “Eh, bébé?”
He drew a deep breath and buried his face between my breasts. I gasped, caught entirely by surprise. The hot, wet touch of his tongue would have sent me flipping over backward had his strong arms not held me firmly down.
It was insane, the way he devoured me with lips and teeth, and all I could do was hold on for dear life, feeling as if I was floating a million miles over the ground.
“Ouch!”
His teeth had nipped too hard, and I drew back with a hiss.
“What the hell?”
Vale’s lips didn’t budge, and I realized exactly what he was doing. Bludmen tended to smell and taste of hot pennies and old meat to humans and, I suppose, half-human, half-Abyssinian brigands. But once someone had ingested a certain Bludman’s blud, even one drop, that changed completely for them both. If what I knew of Crim and Tish applied, I would now smell delicious to him, and were he human, I wouldn’t be rabid for his blood. He had always smelled strange to me before, but I suspected the hunger I felt for his body, mouth, and mind wouldn’t lessen a bit.
He sighed and pulled me closer. “Oh, dieu. Now you’re like butterscotch. Mignon, I could eat you alive.”