A Tale of Two Vampires (18 page)

Engagement.
He frowned as that word echoed in his head. Was that the reason Io was so hesitant to engage in lovemaking? Was she saving herself for marriage?

“How about that woods where we found that stag a few winters back?” Arnulf suggested. “The one halfway between the town and here.”

No, that couldn’t be. She admitted she had lovers in the past—he spent another few seconds mentally grinding his teeth over that irksome fact—which meant her innocence was long gone.

“Aye, that would be a good spot,” Rolf agreed. “Excellent suggestion, Arnulf. Do you know the place, brother?”

Perhaps, though, she was seeking a husband. Women did that. Would she expect him to make her an offer of marriage? Personally, he had been in Io’s company enough to know that he wouldn’t mind spending the next fifty or so years with her at his side, but he had buried one wife, and didn’t know if he could go through the pain of watching another woman he cared for die.

“You know the spot we’re talking about, don’t you, Nikola? There’s a clearing in the center of it, from what I can remember. We could meet there and tell you the truth about those closest to you. What’s the name of the woods? Sauber? Sauston?”

“Zauberwald,” Nikola said without thinking, his mind busy on the conundrum that was Io. The second the word was spoken, however, his attention shifted. He ought to know the spot—it was where thirty or so years ago he had run into a demon lord, and been cursed into his present state.

“Yes, that’s the spot, Zauberwald. The so-called enchanted forest.” Arnulf smiled before adding, “Although I’ve never seen what was supposed to be so enchanting about it.”

Nikola frowned as he eyed the two men before him. “What about it?”

“It is the ideal place for us to have a meeting, dear brother. One that will, I’m afraid, open your eyes to the true nature of those who are around you.”

“What the devil are you talking about now?” he demanded.

Rolf laid a finger on his lips, glancing over Nikola’s shoulder to where the footman had just entered the hall. “Tonight. Shall we say midnight? In the Zauberwald, at the center. All then will be made clear.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to refuse, since he had hopes that at that time of the evening Io would be in the middle of seducing him, but there was a slight chance that she might not yet understand that he was no longer pursuing her.

“As you like,” he said, turning on his heel and heading toward his study. “I have business to attend to. You will no doubt entertain yourselves.”

“Of that, you can have no fear,” Arnulf called after him as he left the hall. There was a slight tone to his youngest brother’s voice that rubbed him the wrong way, but now, he told himself as his boot steps echoed in the side hallway that led to his study, was not the time to worry about such mundane irritations. Now was the time to focus on alerting Io to the fact that she was free to seduce him at her convenience.

How very hungry I am,
he projected to Io an hour or so later, as he worked on his automaton. He allowed the red, biting sensation of the hunger to claim him for a few seconds, knowing that she would feel that, as well.
I shall need to find sustenance soon.

I said I would feed you later. I’m busy with Imogen right now.

Busy with what, may I inquire?

None of your beeswax,
she said curtly, and closed her mind to his before he could attempt to broach it and see just what it was she was doing in such secrecy.

His steward brought work that demanded his attention then, with concerns of the estate, following which he was obliged to visit the stables and attend to Old Ted regarding one of the mares due to foal at any moment.

Have I mentioned that I dislike intensely women who adopt an air of mystery in order to captivate a man?

Have I mentioned that I dislike intensely men who barge into women’s heads without at least knocking first?

Knock, knock.

Oh, very funny.
There was a slight pause.
I’m not trying to captivate you, Nikola. I just want to…
Her voice trailed off in his head.

What?
he inquired, curious.

The echo of her thoughts came to him so faintly, he wasn’t absolutely certain he heard it.
Save you.

Save me?

What?
The word was spoken with a sense of Io being startled.

You said you wanted to save me.

I did not!

I heard you. “Save you,” you said, and since you can speak only to me in this manner, you must have meant that it was me you wished to save.

You’re imagining things,
she said somewhat desperately, followed immediately by another echoed thought, this time of an oath.

And now you just swore at me. I heard that, too.

Argh!
she yelled in his head.
Stop talking to me!

Why?

Because I’m busy!

Doing what?

Argh,
she yelled again.

I dislike this sense of mystery you insist on having around me,
he pointed out.

I know you don’t like it, and I don’t really care, so just mind your own business and leave me alone.

You should care. You’ll never seduce me if you don’t pay attention to the little hints I have been giving you about how best to tantalize and entice me.

Seduce you? Are you insane? I just got through telling you, numerous times as a matter of fact, that I don’t want to have sex with you. Why on earth would I want to seduce you?

From what do you wish to save me?
he asked, congratulating himself on neatly turning the conversation back to that subject.
My own lust? If so, I must tell you that the only way to save me from that is to apply your nubile, smooth body to mine.

That’s it, it’s official, you’re completely bonkers. Now stop talking to me so I can figure out how to keep the future from being destroyed.

That seems an odd pastime, but since you are determined to seduce me at your own pace, I will allow you to get on with it. But you should be aware that I will be busy for the next few hours, and thus will be unavailable to perform those sexual acts about which you are even now thinking.

Silence followed that statement for the count of twenty. She hadn’t been thinking of anything erotic, at least not that he was aware, but the second he mentioned it, she did.

He smiled to himself.

I’m not thinking of any sex acts!
she protested, but it was a feeble protest, and they both knew it.
Dammit, all right, I am, but only because you’re putting them in my head. Stop putting your smutty fantasies in my head, Nikola!

I have done nothing of the kind. You are thinking about how you wish to touch and lick me, and to sit astride me and take me into yourself. Although I’m quite willing to allow you to do those things to me, they are not
my
fantasies.
These
are my fantasies.
He let her see some of the things he wanted to do to her.

You bastard,
she swore, and immediately pushed him out of her mind.

He laughed, delighted and charmed by her personality as much as the way her mind worked, and, of course, by that luscious body that by now he was convinced was created just for his enjoyment.

By the time he had attended to some overdue correspondence, taken a stroll out with the gamekeeper to discuss the current stock of wildlife on his lands, and avoided his brothers’ company, dinner was upon them.

“Why, Robbie,” he asked as he stood in his bedchamber, clad in only a dressing gown, “is the water not hot?”

“Is it not?” The footman pursed his lips and looked thoughtful as he stood at the end of the squat metal bathing tub.

“I’m sure it is not sufficiently hot. You know I desire my bathwater to be very hot. I have told you that every week for the last four months, since you insisted on taking up the duty of bringing my bathwater. I have told you that I wish for it to be boiling before it leaves the kitchen, so that it will be a suitable temperature for bathing by the time the tub has been filled.”

Robert shrugged. “It was hot when I checked last. Perhaps you should check again. Perhaps it is hotter than you think.”

Nikola, about to remove his dressing gown and bend over the tub to do just that, paused and slid a glance over to where the footman was watching him with a hopeful expression. He sighed. He didn’t mind being the subject of unrequited lust, but he preferred that the luster be of the female gender. It just made things easier that way. “Leave that can of water, and you may go.”

“But, monseigneur—the water, she is not the way you desire.”

“Robert—”

“I will fetch you more water, very hot water, steaming water that will make little beads of moisture appear on your chest.”

Robert—”

“No, monseigneur!” Robert held up a hand to stop his protest. “It is no trouble. You must have the water most hot so that it slides across your belly just like the, how you say it, slithering of a tongue.”

Nikola took a deep breath, picked up the tall metal can of by-now-lukewarm water, and emptied it into the tub. “This is fine. You may leave.”

“But—”

“You may leave!”

Robert, pouting a little at the stern command, minced on his exceptionally high heels around the screen that protected the tub from drafts, and on to the door. He sniffed, but exited the room without further incident.

Nikola divested himself of his velvet dressing gown—the castle was always chilly, especially in the evening—and got into the tub, busily washing himself while he thought of Io, and how he was going to get her to seduce him again.

A brief flurry of cold air alerted him to the fact that someone had come into the room. He sighed to himself, about to tell Robert that he had no need of any further services, especially those of an intimate nature, when a hesitant voice spoke. “Nikola?”

“Iolanthe?”

“Listen, I wanted to talk to you really quickly—” She came around the end of the screen and stopped, her eyes huge. “Oh! You’re having a bath! I had one a little bit ago. You have really weird tubs, but at least the water was nice and hot. Um. Nikola, you’re naked.”

“Yes. I am also wet.”

Her eyes widened even more as her gaze flickered between his face and his chest, and knees. “So you are. You don’t fit in your tub. Your legs are all scrunched up. Why don’t you get a bigger tub, one you can sit in properly?”

“That would take an inordinate amount of time and water to fill. Did you desire something in particular, or did you just wish to see me at my bath? Is this an attempt at seduction? Because if it is, you must first allow me to get out of the tub, since there isn’t room in it for both of us.”

“No, no, I don’t want to seduce you—” She stammered a little before swallowing. “I…er… I wanted to talk.”

“About what?” Casually, he rose from the tub. Nikola was not an overly modest man, but he was very aware of her gaze as it crawled across his naked flesh when he reached for the bath linen to dry himself.

She just stared at him for a few seconds, her eyes now moving from his groin to his chest and back to his face. “Um…what?”

He took in her flustered expression, and decided to make things easier for her. “Is it my penis?”

“Huh?” She looked at the object in question.

He gestured toward it. “You seem to be looking at it quite a bit. And yet, you’ve seen it before. Does it, for some reason I am unable to fathom, now startle you?”

“No!” She stared at his groin in fascination as his arousal at her inspection of his body quickly became apparent.

“Ah. Then I must assume you wish to caress it, and perhaps take it in your hands as you did earlier this morning. Dare I hope that you might wish to indulge in that most wicked of all practices, and use your mouth instead?”

“No! I don’t want to touch you or give you a hand or blow job. I don’t give a hoot about your penis.”

“Then why are you still staring at it?”

“I’m not,” she said mendaciously, her gaze locked on his nether parts. Her fingers twitched.

“Io.”

“Hmm?”

“I wish to make love to you, and feed from you, and then possibly make love to you again, because the way you are staring at me makes me think I would be able to achieve a second bout of lovemaking immediately following the first, not that I’ve successfully done so in the past, but if there was a woman who could ensure such a thing is possible, you are that woman.”

“Too many words,” she said, and as he was half expecting, she lunged at him, flinging herself with wild abandon that he wholeheartedly appreciated.

He was ready for her, though, and backed up with her in his arms until he bumped into the bed. He allowed her to push him down onto his back, his hands busily divesting her of one of Imogen’s gowns that had obviously been lent to her.

“I have never, ever felt this way about a man,” she murmured as she swept her hands up his chest, her fingers tracing out all the muscles in his arms and upper torso. “My god, you’re really ripped. Like, work-out-at-the-gym sort of ripped. I didn’t think people in the past could have a six-pack, but you actually do have one. You must do a lot of physical stuff.”

“I ride,” he answered, pulling off the gown and her chemise, leaving her in the odd matching short stays and undergarment that hid all her warm, delectable secrets from him. “I hunt when needed. Imogen likes to go for walks, and many times, I accompany her. I taught my son swordplay, and he and I spent many months working on his technique. How do you remove the stays?”

“The what, now?” She bent down to swirl her tongue around his nipple. He saw stars for a few seconds.

“Your stays. The ones confining your breasts.”

“It’s called a bra, and it unhooks in the back. Nikola, this is wrong.”

“No, you’re right, it does unhook in the back.” He pulled the stays off her, his hands immediately filled with her sublime little breasts. Just enough to fill each palm, he thought with satisfaction as he rubbed his thumbs gently over the little brown nipples.