A Most Peculiar Season Series Boxed Set: Five Full-length Connected Novels by Award-winning and Bestselling Authors

by Michelle Willingham

  A sweet sensual shudder ran through her frame. Her heart beat quickened. The scent of her shy arousal filled the air. “You should not be here.” She lifted her face, her light eyes holding his. “But I’m glad.”

  The loneliness in her voice was a blow to his gut. “Sybil,” he whispered. “This is madness.”

  “I know.” A small breathy laugh cut through the cold and scored a direct hit on his heart. The pain almost sent him to the floor. Then she rose on her toes and kissed his lips.

  He froze.

  The brush of her velvety lips stroked him all the way to his cock. His fangs lengthened and only by the strength of will did he stop them from extending. No blood. A taste of her skin with his tongue. That was all he wanted. One and no more, he swore on his honour, but he had to have one before.... No he would not think of his ultimate design. Yet, she deserved something more, better, before...

  Tentatively, he flicked his tongue across her lips. They parted instantly and he delved deeper. Her sweet curves pressed up against his length. The sensations of taste and touch jolted through him at the speed of lightning, as sweet as honey, as tart as lemon and gods help him, as heady as champagne. And so full of light, the darkness inside him shrank away.

  He raised his head and took a slow step back. If he wasn’t careful he, cold unfeeling Anton, would become enslaved by such intoxication.

  The sound their hard breathing filled the room.

  She touched a finger to her lips. A lady’s hand, small like the rest of her and so white he could see the tracery of veins. They matched the delicately formed body he still felt as an echo against his own.

  “Oh,” she breathed, a look of wonder on her face.

  He had the idiotic urge to preen. To tell her it was only the beginning.

  It could not be. This was the end.

  “I always wondered,” she said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “How it would feel to be kissed by....”

  He stared at her, unable to speak for a moment, his fangs retracting, hard. “By?” he rasped.

  She closed her eyes briefly. “By a man as handsome as you.” She shivered.

  It was not what she intended to say, he was sure. She gave a small shrug of delicately sloped shoulders and he couldn’t stop himself from gazing at her slender throat, at the pulse beating so fast in the hollow, the fragrant scent of innocent arousal perfuming his every breath. His cock hardened to granite. He wanted. Needed.

  “I am sure you must have had other suitors.” he said trying to break free of the yearning that had him in an iron-fisted grip.

  “No.” She touched her neck. “Were you licking that girl in the park?”

  He didn’t want to lick her. He wanted to bite. His fangs triggered. He barely stopped them from emerging. “No.”

  Her body trembled so hard her nightgown shimmered around her. “Why did you come here tonight?”

  She wanted him as much as he wanted her.

  Mine.

  Animal that he was, he wanted to possess her, but she couldn’t be his. It wasn’t possible. He was bound to his King. One taste, though, wouldn’t hurt anyone. Gripped by the balls by his lust, the consequences no longer mattered.

  He pulled her close and covered her delicious mouth with his.

  CHAPTER THREE

  GENTLE AT FIRST, his kiss ravaged her mouth, teasing and tormenting, until Sybil couldn’t breathe, or think. The taste of his velvet stroking tongue sent shivers through her body. Tentative, yet bold for her, she touched her tongue to his and his answering groan of pleasure was a delicious spear of sensation all the way to her core. Emboldened, she grasped his shoulders for balance and tangle her tongue with his.

  Slick silky heat.

  Sharp points scrape the edge of her tongue. She explored the dagger-like obstructions.

  He shuddered.

  Her insides turned to hot liquid. Her core fluttered unbearably. She slid her hands around his neck while his tongue playfully flicked at her lips. With nothing but instinct to serve as her guide, she licked at his lower lip. He opened his mouth and she plunged her tongue into hot silken depths. He tasted of darkness and heat and exotic spice.

  His hands stroked down her back, caressed the dip of her waist and cupped her bottom, gently squeezing. Her back arched. She pressed her hips into him. He held her close and through the thin linen of her nightgown she felt a hard ridge against her belly. His male part, she thought vaguely. Not something she was supposed to think about. Or know about. Danger.

  On a gasp she pulled back, panting, and gazed up into his taut expression. “We must not,” she said thickly, stabbed by disappointment when he nodded tersely and stepped back, his broad chest rising and falling as if he was barely holding himself from ravaging her where she stood.

  Her knees weakened at the thought. Longing filled her. She fought it, but unable to stand, sank onto the nearest chair. She touched a shaking hand to her temple. What on earth had come over her. She felt wanton, unbridled. “I’m not like this. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  He made a sound like a growl and paced a step further away. “Attraction cannot always be controlled.”

  So coolly logical. The male of the species would take whatever was offered. He must have sensed her desire, her longings, at the ball. She gazed at her hands in her lap, suddenly aware of how little she was wearing, while he was dressed for riding in coat and boots and beautiful snowy linen. “You must think me dreadful.”

  “I think you delicious,” he said, the hunger in his eyes giving his words the ring of truth.

  The deep voice in a room lit only by firelight sent chills down her spine. Weakness. Foolishness. The way to destruction.

  “You didn’t answer my question. How did you get in here?” She hesitated, but forced the word past her lips. “Why?”

  He drew in a deep breath through his aquiline nose and let it go in a long sigh. No sign of the long canines she’d glimpsed earlier. Had they been a figment of her imagination? She wished they were. He was one of them, an Other, but he hadn’t wanted to lick her throat as she’d seen them do with other women. Perhaps he did not find her attractive in that way. Yet that kiss.... She touched a finger to her lips and found them full and slightly tender. Well-kissed. She’d heard the matrons nodding among themselves over a debutante who had disappeared from a ballroom, returning flushed and rosy-lipped. Oh, she could not let kissing happen again. She would lose her position.

  “Why, Count Grazki?”

  “Anton.”

  Such a beautiful name. Her mouth wanted to taste it. “Anton,” she said softly, knowing she would never speak it again, except in the privacy of her room and her dreams.

  “You call to me,” he said, his voice deep and gravelly, his eyes dark and puzzled. “It has not happened for a very long time.”

  She swallowed. She wanted to tell him about the things she saw. Wanted to ask him if he was one of them. She didn’t dare. “I’m sorry if I did anything to make you think—” she turned her face away, “to make you think I was encouraging you to....”

  He made a sound of impatience. “You are not at fault.”

  He was staring at her his eyes full of regret as if he was about to do something she might not like. Suddenly fearful when she hadn’t been at all afraid of him before, she tensed. “What is it?”

  He reached out a hand and let it fall, then spun away, walking toward the window. He turned to look back at her. “I beg your pardon. I should not have come here tonight.” His gaze held her, his full mouth flattened in a thin straight line. Something pressed at her mind, and pain shot through her temple. And then...

  And then....

  Sybil stared at the carpet near the window, patterned with reds and blues and greens, a place where something.... Something.... Another sharp pain stabbed at her temple. A dreadful throb started low at her nape and she closed her eyes.

  Freezing. Cold to the bone.

  She opened her eyes. Sat up str
aight. Why on earth was she sleeping in a chair. Slowly she turned her aching head and looked at the barely glowing fire and then at the window where the first light of dawn made itself known. Sparrows cheeped hopefully amid the roofs outside.

  Nothing like the dawn chorus of the country.

  She was in London. Right. She had come to London. And there had been shopping. And....Carlton House. And... Vauxhall. And tonight she had danced with Count Grazki. After that she’d come home and undressed and gone to bed. So why was she sitting in the chair? The pain in her head intensified. There was something she needed to remember. She touched her fingers to her lips.

  Pain sharp as a blade made her gasp.

  Oh God! Had she been wrong about what she saw being real and was in fact losing her mind? No. Her mother hadn’t lost her mind until they had locked her behind bars. Before that she’d been a normal woman who saw people no one else did. If she had not spoken of it, they would not have locked her up. It wasn’t until after she was locked up inside that she had changed.

  Weary to the bone, aching in her head, she stumbled to her bed and lay down. A bad dream. She must have had a bad dream. When she next awoke all would be well.

  As long as she told no one what she saw. As long as she remained free.

  Anton strode through the underground passages of Vlad’s royal residence. They sprawled beneath Mayfair. He could only imagine the faces of the humans who lived above if they ever discovered the truth of what lay beneath their homes and businesses. Vampires were forced to keep a close eye on any signs of new buildings in England’s capitol. More than once they’d been forced to buy up a plot of land to keep their secrets. Once, they’d been forced to close up a section of their Citadel and move its occupants elsewhere.

  The King’s quarters were safe below the three houses he owned in Bedford Square, and the Hall of Justice lay beneath the garden, as did the Council Chamber, but peripheral offices and dwellings were always at risk.

  Like the healer’s suite of rooms where he was headed. They lay below her shop, which faced onto a courtyard at ground level.

  A youth walking in the other direction lost his cocky walk and avoided Anton’s eyes. Anton ran through his memories, the bloodline and what he knew of the young male. He lived in this quarter of the underground city. He had the right to be here. They passed each other without a word.

  Anton stopped outside the healer’s door. Hesitated.

  Anton? Her voice was a clear bell in his head. Their complex relationship had faded over the years, but she still recognized his scent without effort.

  “Healer,” he said, refusing to let her read his thoughts. “May I enter?”

  “Of course.” She spoke aloud this time and he entered her sitting room lined with shelves full of bottles and jars of varying hues. Her private sleeping room was closed off by a door. She sat at her eating table before an enormous and ancient tome. Her face was calm. Her dark eyes without emotion. “Are you injured?”

  A practical question. A reasonable reason for his presence. In his line of work things did not always go right. “No. I need information.”

  Surprise filled her face. She closed the book’s cover with a thump. Dust flew into the air. “What kind of information?”

  There weren’t many people he trusted as he did Ester, Vlad’s sister. Once they had been close friends, though they had avoided each other since he became the King’s Blade. The past between them was too painful for reminders. He could imagine that his presence in her vicinity must be like sandpaper against her skin. “This is confidential.”

  “Naturally.”

  “Have you ever heard of humans who can see through our shadows?’

  Her jaw dropped. “Never.” Her eyes widened. “Are you saying—”

  He put up a hand. “A question, no more.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Anton.”

  “All right. There is a woman who I believe sees through my cloaking. I want to know if there is a precedence. Anything to give me an idea about how or why or...” he shrugged. “Is it an anomaly? Are there others? I need to know if it is something I should be worrying about.”

  “You mind-cleansed her I assume?”

  “Of course.” The brutal force required to break through bright shield around her mind to accomplish the cleansing of the few minutes he had spent in her room, their kiss, had shocked him. There had to be an explanation. A way of dealing with her memories. Or— The alternative made him feel ill. To kill an innocent when he’d only ever eliminated the guilty.... There had to be another way.

  “I have never heard of a human who saw us when we did not wish it,” she said musing. “Are you sure your shadows were properly formed?”

  He didn’t bother to answer.

  “The Librarian would be better placed to answer your question.”

  The Librarian would go to Vlad. He wasn’t yet ready to expose Sybil Lofstrom.

  She pressed her lips together in a thin straight line when again he said nothing. “All right. I’ll dig into the histories.” She gave him a look filled with guilt. “I owe you a great deal.”

  That look pierced him to the bone. He did not want her to feel guilty. What he had done he had done for his own reasons. “Thank you.”

  She nodded and opened her book.

  He walked out. The history between them was too raw, too bloody for real friendship any more, but he sensed an acceptance.

  It was midnight, the sun long since set when he left the den and took to the streets, his shadow drawn close about him. He travelled swiftly along Bond Street. Other vampires saw him and watched him pass, making sure to give him a wide birth. Humans saw him not. No matter how close he came. No, there was nothing wrong with his shadowing.

  He found himself in Grosvenor Square looking up at her window. He cursed and turned away. He had more important quarry to find. Killers of his people. It would take his mind off the next victim of the king’s justice.

  Sybil.

  “A moonlight picnic?” Lord Orrick glared at Mrs Davenport seated on the chair opposite him in the drawing room. Sybil tried to focus on the conversation and not the terrible pounding behind her eyes from her constant headache.

  Orrick’s gaze flicked to his daughter and scowled. “Don’t you think it a little risky, ma’am?”

  Mrs Davenport cast a fond eye on the two girls who were following the conversation with eager expressions. “I assure you, Lord Orrick, it is the best of good ton. We attended King Vlad’s party at Greenwich two weeks ago. They are the fashion.”

  “King Vlad.” Orrick made a sound of disgust. “A landless king putting on airs. Not one of his men have joined ours on the battlefield that I know of. Not the sort of man in whose footsteps I want to follow.”

  The man Count Grazki reported to. Sibyl felt her headache pound harder. As if thinking of the Count made it grow worse. How could that be? He’d been nothing but charming, even if he was— The pain made her wince.

  Mrs Davenport gave her a concerned glance. “Are you all right, Miss Lofstrom?”

  Trying not to gasp, Sybil forced a smile. “I awoke with a headache.”

  “Before I leave I will give you the receipt for a tisane that has been in my family for generations,” the woman said kindly.

  “Oh Papa, dearest, please say I may go,” Caroline begged clasping her friend’s hand to her bosom. “If you don’t, it will be the shabbiest thing ever. Imagine it. Dancing beneath the stars.”

  Poor Lord Orrick was no match for his daughter’s pleading as the little minx well knew. His eyes softened. “What if it rains?” he asked, fighting a gallant rear guard action. “I won’t have you getting a chill, my dear.” He turned his gaze on Sybil. “What do you think, dear Miss Lofstrom?”

  “Please, Sybby,” Caroline said. “Please say you think it is perfectly acceptable.”

  “If you are worried about your daughter’s chaperonage,” Mrs Davenport added. “I can assure you there will be no misbehaviour under my roof or withi
n my gardens. I guard my daughter’s reputation well.”

  “I can see no harm in it, provided the garden is well lit,” Sybil said.

  Lord Orrick visibly caved in. “I will be relying on you, Miss Lofstrom.”

  “Naturally, my lord.”

  Her smile broad, Mrs Davenport rose to her feet, followed by Lord Orrick and Sybil.

  “Then it is settled,” the matron said. “The ball is on Saturday.” Her eyes twinkled. “I invited Count Grazki, too.”

  The pain behind Sybil’s eyes tightened like a vice as the image of the handsome foreigner swam before her eyes. “Count Grazki,” she gasped. “Not on my account, I hope?”

  Orrick looked at her from beneath lowered brows. “What is this?”

  The other woman chuckled. “Count Grazki is one of King Vlad’s young men. He is to attend in the King’s place, since his majesty is otherwise engaged. He accepted the invitation weeks ago. Before you arrived in Town.” She cast Sybil a knowing look. “I believe he might have a tendre for your Miss Lofstrom. He seemed quite enchanted with her last night.”

  “Nothing of the sort,” Sybil said weakly. “He was merely polite.”

  “He danced with no one else.” Caroline said

  Orrick’s expression darkened.

  “You are mistaken, Caroline,” Sybil rushed to say. Miserably aware of the glances of the others in the room, Sybil shrank into herself. “I can assure... no thought of... I would never presume...”

  “Well and good,” Orrick said, his expression easing from its severe lines. “I would not like to think you were neglecting your duties.”

  “Never, my lord,” Sybil said. She hadn’t. Only why did she feel so guilty?

  Caroline caught her father’s hand between her own, pressing it to her cheek. “Thank you, dearest Papa. You are the best of fathers.”

  “All right, child. Be a little more circumspect, if you please.” But he was clearly pleased to have made his daughter happy.

  Mrs Davenport and her daughter took their leave to many avowals of the fabulous time they would all have at the promised house party.