Amazingly, Antoine’s movements began to calm, growing weaker with each second that Snow stroked his forehead. There was love in that touch, deep affection that showed on Snow’s handsome face and shone in his icy eyes.
Snow’s pale gaze shifted down to the scars on his brother’s body and Sera caught the flicker of guilt that crossed his expression. There was pain in it too. Antoine had said that Snow didn’t remember much about the night he had attacked him and killed the rest of their family, but he knew what he had done. Antoine struggled to cope with the things that had happened, the scars a constant reminder that he couldn’t escape. Those scars were not only a terrible reminder for Antoine but for Snow too. How did he feel whenever he saw them, knowing that he had created them and had tried to kill his brother?
The pain crossing his expression as his gaze flickered over them was deep, fathomless, and he radiated clashing emotions of hatred and hurt. Sera felt sorry for him as she watched him struggling against his feelings. She couldn’t imagine how terrible he felt, how responsible and guilty.
“He told me what happened.” Although she whispered it, it came out sounding loud. Snow didn’t look at her. His mouth quirked into a grim smile and his eyes roamed back to Antoine’s face.
“Telling her our dark bedtime stories now are we? That isn’t like you. She must be getting under your skin.” Snow hunkered down close to Antoine and continued to caress his forehead. Antoine’s movements halted and his breathing turned heavy. Snow carefully lifted his left eyelid.
Pale beautiful blue irises.
Antoine had said she had some magic in her but Snow was the real fae here. He could soothe his brother even when he was sleeping, something she had failed to do.
“It would explain the nightmare.” Snow frowned at Antoine and shifted his hand to his cheek, softly stroking it. It was strange to see such a lethal, dangerous man being so tender. It soothed her fear and left her feeling that she was seeing the other side of Snow, the man he was when the bloodlust wasn’t riding him. She could understand the depth of Antoine’s love for Snow now and why he desperately wanted to save him, because she could see the endless depth of Snow’s love for him. “He hasn’t told anyone before.”
“I know.” She still felt awed and honoured by that.
“He must like you.” Snow smiled again but there was sorrow in it now and she recalled what Antoine had told her about him. He had asked Antoine to kill him. It wasn’t sorrow for his brother. It was sorrow for himself and the things he had done, and it was laced with an edge of finality and a sense of relief.
Snow still sought his death.
A permanent release from his suffering.
On top of that, he was watching his brother feel again, for a woman, and everyone in the room knew how well that had ended last time.
“He won’t leave you,” Sera said, afraid she was intruding and it would anger Snow, but unwilling to stand by and watch the man that Antoine loved so much believe that he was about to find himself alone again. “I swear to you, Snow. Your brother loves you and he feels guilty about his part in what happened to you and your family. He won’t make the same mistake again. He would sooner leave me than leave you. He loves you.”
“I know.” Snow stood and towered over Antoine, immense and dark, lethal.
He seemed calm but he still radiated power, his formidable build only adding to the sense of danger he wore. She couldn’t imagine how Antoine must have felt when he had battled his own brother and had almost lost. She was surprised he had lasted in a fight at all. Snow had killed their parents and others who were likely far older than he had been at the time. He had overpowered and murdered them all, but he had failed to kill his brother. Even in the darkest grip of his bloodlust, his love for his brother was stronger than his hunger for death and violence.
Snow huffed. “You do not have to fear me, female. Or for Antoine. I will not harm my brother.”
“I have a name.” Sera knelt on the bed, clutched the crimson sheets around her with one hand and shakily held the other out to him. He raised a pale eyebrow at it, as though the gesture was unfamiliar to him, or perhaps he just hadn’t expected her to risk touching him and placing herself at his mercy. “Sera.”
“Snow.” He grasped her hand, his huge one engulfing hers, and the strength of his grip surprised her. She had expected hard and tight, bone-crushing. He was gentle and warm.
Antoine growled.
She looked down at him at the same time as Snow did.
“Hands off my female,” Antoine snarled and launched his foot upwards. It collided hard with their joined ones, knocking them apart and sending Sera crashing backwards. She managed to stop herself from falling off the bed completely and stepped down off the mattress. Her wrist throbbed, deep pulses spiked with sharp stabs, and she clutched it to her chest.
Antoine flipped onto his feet on the bed. Nude. Every muscle coiled in preparation.
“Antoine,” she said and he turned towards her, red-ringed eyes losing their sharp edge as they met hers. She held her hand out to him. Just as Snow had turned docile in the presence of the newly-turned female vampire, Antoine’s rage drained away and he blinked slowly. “I was just introducing myself.”
“What were you doing in here in the first place?” Antoine turned back to Snow and casually stepped down off the bed, as though he hadn’t just come close to unleashing a terrible violence on his brother.
He was an inch or two shorter than Snow, and of lighter build, but Sera knew without a doubt that he would fight his brother if he didn’t like his answer.
“You had a nightmare,” Sera said before Snow could utter a word, bringing Antoine’s focus back to her. It was probably safer that he hear things from her rather than his brother. If she could soothe his dormant darker side, then she had to be the one to explain. That way, Antoine wouldn’t lose the cool that he seemed to have such a tentative grasp on. She could see it in his eyes. The red was gone but she had a feeling it still lingered, hidden behind those calm impassive irises that fixed on her, waiting to make itself known again. She didn’t want it to seize control of him. She wouldn’t let him suffer as his brother did. “I didn’t know what to do. You were fighting me. Snow came in and calmed you for me. That’s all.”
Antoine looked over his shoulder at Snow, and his brother nodded.
“Now, if you do not mind, I have seen enough of your bare arse for one night.” Snow grinned and escorted himself to the door. He paused there and looked back at her. “Be gentle with him, Sera.”
She rolled her eyes. She wasn’t sure which Snow she preferred. The mindless demon or the sharp-tongued man intent on embarrassing both her and Antoine.
He closed the door behind him and her gaze crept back to Antoine. Damn, did he look good stood there all naked and sleep ruffled, pale blue eyes possessively locked on her. She shivered from the feel of them, awareness of him prickling across her skin and heating it, filling her with an intense need to cross the room to him, slide her hand around the nape of his neck, and kiss him. She wanted him again, couldn’t get enough of him.
Would never get enough of him.
“I should go to work.” He didn’t move to hit the shower or get dressed. He continued to stare at her, as though waiting for her to convince him to forget work, just as she had done each night since their first crazy one together.
He had taken a lot of convincing the second night and had put her powers of persuasion to the test. The third night he had taken less convincing. Right now, he looked as though he might be convincing himself.
“Do you often have nightmares?” Sera wanted to know what she was getting herself into so she could be prepared to deal with them. Would running her fingers through his rich brown hair and speaking calmly to him, reassuring him, like Snow had work for her? She hoped it would.
Antoine shrugged, the action causing his muscles to shift beautifully, luring her green gaze back down to his bare body. Her blood heated, desire scorching her veins un
til she was licking her lips and thinking about running her tongue over every delicious inch of him.
“More often than I probably remember. Sometimes I don’t wake with Snow here, so I have no idea if I slept peacefully or not. Have I slept peacefully with you up until now?”
Sera nodded and a curl of her blonde hair fell down over her chest. Antoine’s blue eyes followed it and burned into her, cranking her temperature up another notch. She silently willed him to come to her and strip the red sheets away from her bare body, to run his hands over her and forget work and everything else and just spend another night lost in ecstasy with her.
“You’ve snored like a pig, but you’ve been relatively behaved before tonight.”
He smiled and it was beautiful and full of warmth. She had somehow cracked his armour and made it through to the other side to find herself face-to-face with a man more beautiful than she could have imagined. She didn’t care about the darkness he held within him, because she would help him conquer it, just as he helped his brother, sacrificing everything for him and never blaming him for the terrible things he had done. How could she have ever thought that he was cold and unfeeling? The things he had to deal with were enough to make anyone distant.
Antoine crossed the room to her, muscles moving in a breathtaking vision of masculine beauty, and raised his right hand to cup her cheek. He held it, his gaze locked on hers, so icy and cool, but full of heat.
“I did not hurt you?” he whispered and she shook her head. Her wrist had stopped throbbing now, her pain forgotten as she lost herself in watching him. He looked her over, frowned at the silk sheets wrapped around her like a toga, and removed them just as she had desired. He dropped them on the bed and she closed her eyes as he inspected her, hands lingering in all the good places. His thumbs flicked over her nipples, teasing them into hard straining peaks, and then his hands skimmed over the curve of her waist and settled on her hips. He moved around her and she bit her lip as he peppered her lower back with soft kisses, working his way upwards. His hands skated over her stomach, pressing in and giving her a hint of his strength, and folded over her breasts, supporting them as he kissed her shoulders. “I do not want to hurt you.”
“You won’t.”
He pressed his lips to her shoulder and sighed. “You do not know that.”
“I do.” Sera turned in his embrace, pressing the full length of her bare body against his solid muscled one. Delicious. “I trust you, Antoine. I trust that you won’t hurt me, and I can prove it to you.”
“How?”
“Wait here.” She went to pass him but he grabbed her waist, curling his arm around and dragging her back against his front. She smiled over her shoulder at him and removed his hand from her. “I will be a whole two seconds. Trust me.”
She grabbed one of his shirts off a pile near the door, slipped it on and did up a few of the buttons. It reached halfway down her thighs and smelt like Antoine, warm and spicy. He started to speak when she opened the door of his apartment but she didn’t stop. She crossed the black and gold hallway to his brother’s door and knocked. While Snow had a habit of just walking in unannounced, she would rather not. Antoine had been angry enough when he had found her touching her brother in a gesture as innocent as a handshake. She didn’t want to think about the scale of the fight that would erupt should she walk in on Snow when he was nude.
The door opened.
Snow raised an eyebrow at her.
She mirrored him.
It was a good thing she had knocked. The darkly beautiful man was wearing nothing more than the world’s smallest towel around his hips and was dripping water all over his apartment floor.
“Can I borrow something?” Her heart flipped in her chest.
“Depends on what it is.” He went to take a step back and then stopped. “I do not think it wise that you enter my room. My brother has claimed you as his female. I do not enjoy Javier’s dark moods whenever Lilah enters my room without his consent. I have no desire to inflict such pain upon my brother. State what you desire and I will consider it.”
Was Snow saying that he thought his brother was attached to her? She had figured Antoine’s outburst was just a momentary glitch brought about by his sleepy state.
She didn’t dare hope that he was right. She had tried to keep her relationship with Antoine as physical as possible and not emotional, but the more time she spent with him, both intimately and afterwards when they would talk about his life and hers, the more she fell for him.
Her desire to make him see that they could be together was the reason she was here now, about to ask Snow for something that would likely embarrass him and Antoine as much as it did her.
“Those.” She pointed, already blushing deeply and unable to say the words aloud.
Snow followed her finger, looking over his wide bare wet shoulders. His head snapped back around, white hair whipping with the force of the action, spraying droplets over her.
“The restraints?”
She cringed at the volume of those two words. Here she was trying to keep things subtle and he was shouting it at the top of his lungs.
“You want to tie my brother up?” He chuckled. “You are a dark little thing.”
Her blush deepened. It wasn’t what he thought it was but she didn’t correct him. He lumbered across his room, leaving another trail of wet footprints on the wooden floor. He had the same taste in decor as Antoine. Black, black and more black with the odd red accent. His bed was something straight out of a torture chamber though. The mattress looked comfortable enough, covered in black silk sheets and fluffed up pillows. The bed itself though. She had never seen anything like it.
Metal posts as thick as Snow’s arms supported the four corners. The top and bottom of each post ended in wide square steel plates bolted to the ceiling and floor. On each bedpost, there was a length of inch-thick steel chain with an equally as thick cuff attached to the end. The leather lining the inside of the cuffs was cracked and stained dark with blood. The bed looked as though it should have been strong enough to contain the most feral of creatures, but the posts were bent in places, dented and showing signs of wear.
“Seen enough?” Snow said and she jumped.
“I didn’t mean to stare.”
He shrugged casually but there was shame in his pale blue eyes. “I have my good nights and my bad nights.”
So she had heard. She glanced at the bed again, feeling sorry for him. He had to chain himself to a bed, cage himself, whenever he had a bad night. Something told her that he used the restraints more often than that. Did he sleep in them? Chained and defenceless, open to attack? One of the first things she had learned on becoming a vampire was how to protect herself by finding a secure place to sleep. While the general human population didn’t know about vampires and the other creatures that shared their world with them, there were hunters out there who were constantly on the lookout for her kind.
“Snow,” she said and he handed the restraints to her.
“Do not pity me,” he snarled and closed the door in her face.
“He is right, Sera. It is his choice. I have always maintained that. Do not make him feel wretched for the choices he makes. He desires to protect others, those he cares about, and that is a noble thing.”
Sera nodded and turned away from Snow’s door, coming to face Antoine where he leaned against his doorframe a short distance along the corridor, wearing only his black boxer shorts.
He raised a dark eyebrow at the four sets of restraints in her hands. They were heavy, weighted with more than just steel and leather. What she was going to propose was dangerous, but she needed to show Antoine that she trusted him.
“Are those for me?” He nodded towards the cuffs.
Sera shook her head.
“They’re for me.”
His eyes widened.
She walked over and held the restraints out to him.
“I want you to use them on me. I will prove that I trust you and that you
won’t hurt me.”
CHAPTER 10
“Sera.” Antoine pushed away from the doorframe and Sera shook her head to silence him.
She knew what he would say. “I trust you, Antoine. You won’t hurt me. I want to do this.”
His pupils dilated, darkening his eyes with the heat of passion that said he wanted to do this too, but not because he wanted proof that she trusted him or that he wouldn’t flip and hurt her. It was the thought of chaining her up that had him reaching out for the restraints, taking them from her, and leading her into his room.
He closed the door behind them and Sera exhaled slowly, trying to expel her rising nerves. She had never allowed anyone to restrain her before, not in her human life and certainly not in her vampire one. Just the thought of being chained, especially by industrial-strength restraints like the ones in Antoine’s hands, handcuffs made for an ancient vampire, had her heart pounding and instincts kicking in. They told her to flee, to end this before it began. It was too dangerous.
She didn’t care.
She had to make herself as vulnerable as she could be in order for Antoine to accept that she trusted him and that they could be together. He needed to know that even when she was defenceless, open to attack and at his mercy, he could keep control and not let things go too far. If she could show him that, he might believe that the bloodlust that silently lay in wait in his genes was something he could master and he didn’t need to fear it.
Sera stripped off the borrowed shirt and set it down on the pile. Her gaze fell on the bundle of silk ties beside them and she lifted a black one, the material soft and sensuous against her fingers. Her heart flipped in her throat and her blood heated. She bit her lip. Mercy, she couldn’t deny the fluttering desire in her belly that said she was already asking Antoine to cuff her, she might as well go all the way and ask him to blindfold her too.
When she turned to face him, the black silk tie dangling over her hand in front of her breasts, Antoine raised a dark eyebrow. He looked as though he was going to refuse the whole affair. Had she pushed too far?
Dark and Dangerous: Six-in-One Hot Paranormal Romances Page 98