Revealed

by Zoe Allison

  “Okay,” she sighed. “You can have one with me. Then we’ll have something stronger.”

  He smiled as he poured them each a tumbler of blood plus a whiskey for him and a vodka for her. Despite his instincts, he sat next to her on the sofa rather than across from her in his armchair, quelling the internal voice that was attempting to dissuade him.

  “So did you check out your PC?” Vic asked. “Any sign of it being hacked?”

  “It appears you disturbed the mole just in time,” Vale said. “Good work.”

  She smiled. “Well, that’s one positive at least, even if we still don’t know who he is.”

  Vale frowned at her use of the word ‘he’.

  Vic took in his expression. “What is it?”

  He cleared his throat. “I was thinking earlier…”

  “Thinking what?” she asked.

  He was reluctant to give her any bad news after what she had been through but it was important to tell her. “We made an automatic assumption that it was a man. But was it?”

  She opened her mouth as if to protest, then paused, rubbing her forehead. “Shit, you’re right. They could have been male or female.” She looked at him. “Which means instead of narrowing the search any, we’ve effectively widened it.”

  The disappointment on her face upset him, especially when he was responsible for putting it there. “Listen,” he said. “Do not think about it for now. You need to rest up, then tomorrow we will come at it fresh.”

  Vic sighed. “There was something about them, you know? Their eyes were familiar. Dark.” She shook her head. Picking up her tumbler, she looked at it for a moment, then glanced up to meet his gaze. “I hope Gareth can come up with some information to help us.”

  Vale’s pulse spiked. He realized that he had yet to clear the air with her regarding Gareth but he still didn’t know what to say.

  Vic tucked her legs underneath her, sipping at her blood. “Well. Isn’t this refined?”

  He took a drink. “Why? How do you normally drink it?”

  She shrugged. “Sometimes a mug, sometimes from the bag.”

  “I prefer a tumbler—or a wineglass,” he said.

  “That doesn’t surprise me,” she told him.

  Vale laughed. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  Vic widened her eyes innocently. “Like what?”

  “Like I am a sweet little pet…or an old man.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “You are an old man.”

  He set his drink down. “Oh, really? I think that is the pot calling the kettle black.”

  She laughed. “Yeah, okay. That’s fair. I think I’m actually older than you are.”

  He smiled. Her laugh was infectious and she was gorgeous, but he shouldn’t be thinking that. He cleared his throat. “Anyway, why does my choice of drink receptacle not surprise you?”

  She took another, longer drink. “Okay, so don’t take this the wrong way, but you are kind of…formal.”

  He started laughing. “Formal?”

  “Yes!” she said, over the sound of his laughter. “You always follow the rules to the letter, you constantly think about how everything you do appears to others and you’re so bloody early for everything! Even your speech is formal.”

  He raised his eyebrow. “What is wrong with my speech?”

  “Nothing’s wrong with it,” she told him. “I love the way you speak.” She paused, her cheeks flushing. “I mean…the way you speak is lovely. It’s just that you don’t contract any of your words. Like saying ‘don’t’ rather than ‘do not’.”

  Vale thought about it. She had a point. “That is true,” he told her. “English was my second language and I always felt that the beauty of a language was in its being spoken fluidly and flawlessly.”

  Vic was watching at him with a strange look in her eye. She probably thought that he was being ridiculous.

  “You’ve got a point there,” she told him. “What was your first language?”

  “Italian,” he said.

  “Do you speak it much now?” she asked.

  “Not as much as English,” he said. “Only if I am working in an Italian-speaking area.”

  She was still studying him intently. “Italy is where you grew up?”

  “Up to a point, yes,” he said. “I was age eight when I left.”

  “Left for where?”

  “To join The Organization.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “That’s really young.”

  “I know,” Vale said. “Though it was the best thing that could have happened to me. I do not remember my parents much now, but I know that they were not benevolent.”

  Vic drew a sharp breath. “Your family was malevolent?”

  “As was the case for many of us,” Vale said.

  She appeared to be processing that information, a look of surprise on her face. “I hadn’t realized. I assumed they must have been benevolent, like you. I thought that I was probably the only one who had such an evil family.” She paused, looking at the ceiling, then she cleared her throat. “You were so small…when you joined, I mean. How did The Organization find you?”

  “By then they had started actively searching for the abandoned children of known malevolents.” He watched her carefully, trying to fathom what was going on in her head. “They knew that nobody was born bad, and if they rescued such people, they could bring them up in the right way and create good citizens at the end of it.”

  Vic nodded slowly. “And they all end up joining as agents?”

  He shook his head. “Not necessarily. Some do and some find another path, but all are guided, stay in touch and aid The Organization if needed.”

  “I had been an adult for a very long time at the point I joined,” Vic said, studying the contents of her glass. She hesitated. “I wish I’d applied sooner.”

  “It sounds as if your family was perhaps similar to mine?” he said.

  She blinked. “Maybe.”

  Vale touched her hand. He wanted her to confide in him. He had a craving to know everything about her. “Do you want to talk about them?”

  She smiled. “Not really. They were bad and now they’re gone. It’s all in the past and best forgotten. My way of handling it is to move on and never look back.”

  “Yes,” Vale said. He of all people could understand the need for some secrets to be kept as such, even though he wanted to be close to her. “I am probably the opposite. I go over things a lot in my mind and try to study them from different angles. To be honest, I feel that I overthink the past at times.”

  She laughed. “If I did that, I think I’d go mad.”

  He smiled. “You are the nearly the opposite of me in many ways. You always arrive at the last minute and you are more relaxed than I am. But I would say that you have the same integrity and moral standards that I do. We are very similar in that sense.”

  Vic glanced away. “I don’t know about that. I don’t think I can measure up to you.”

  Vale frowned. Why would she say that? She was of the highest integrity. It was something that he admired about her and he trusted her implicitly. He reached out and took her hand. “I would disagree,” he told her. “I think you are one of the most reliable and honest people I know.”

  She smiled weakly and squeezed his hand. “Thank you.”

  He smiled back. “I must annoy you at times. My ways no doubt appear uptight to you, and to be fair, I probably am.”

  Vic shook her head. “Not at all. Nothing you do annoys me.” She seemed slightly embarrassed. “You’re a good friend,” she told him.

  “You are too,” he said. She was fast becoming one of his closest. “Perhaps that is why we complement each other, our differences. We are black and white, you and I—like our surnames.”

  Vic smiled. She placed a finger on her breastbone. “Black.” Then she moved her finger over to his chest. “And Bianco.”

  Vale covered her hand with his and she shifted closer toward him. He was starting to feel
that way again, like he had in his office when he’d ended up kissing her. And he hadn’t even finished his whiskey yet.

  “The only thing is,” she said, “I don’t think we’re black and white at all. We aren’t opposites. I feel we’re in harmony in a lot of ways. We’re blended into shades of gray.”

  The gap between them was closing by the moment—and it wasn’t just physically. “Can I tell you something?” he asked.

  “Of course you can,” she said, studying his face intently.

  He felt the emotional connection to her, and the need for her to understand him better. “I am more relaxed in your company. I think you are right about me being formal. I have always played everything straight down the line and it suits me. But perhaps as time has gone on, it has become somewhat of a burden.”

  “A burden?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he said, meeting her eye. “I feel like the world is on my shoulders sometimes.”

  She searched his eyes. Then she slipped her hand out from under his and eased it around the back of his neck. “That’s why you get all that tension,” she said, massaging the area that troubled him.

  Immediately the discomfort that had been building started to flow away. It was replaced by an electric sensation that flowed from her contact throughout his entire body, reaching his heart and causing it to accelerate. He inched a little closer to her. Their legs were touching now, their torsos turned toward each other.

  She was still gazing into his eyes, unraveling him further. “Why do you feel the responsibility for everything?” she asked him.

  He was so close to telling her. He really wanted to, but he shouldn’t. It was in her best interests not to know. “I-I have just always been that way,” he said. It wasn’t a lie. “I think you are right that even my speech reflects my true nature.”

  Vic smiled, the blue-green of her eyes iridescent in the evening’s shadow. “Your true nature is wonderful, Vale.”

  His heart skipped a beat and he glanced down. “I owe you an apology.”

  She frowned. “What for?”

  He couldn’t bring himself to look at her. “For my behavior before…regarding Gareth.”

  She was still for a second. Then she lifted her hand to brush his hair off his forehead and his heart went into overdrive.

  He met her eyes again. “I am sorry for acting in such an irritable manner.”

  “That’s okay,” Vic said. She paused, studying his face. “What was it that bothered you about him?”

  His mouth was so dry that he wasn’t sure that he could get any words out. “To be honest, I did not know why—at least not at first.”

  “And now?” she asked softly.

  He glanced down at her mouth briefly. The curve of her lips was drawing him in. “I think I was jealous.”

  Something flashed in her eyes. “In what way?”

  “Of him. Because of how close he was to you.” He paused. “And it got worse when I thought you had slept together.” He felt guilty even saying it.

  She appeared to hold her breath for a second. “We didn’t, though.”

  “I know,” he said. “But that does not matter. It was not any of my business in the first place.”

  “Then why did it upset you?”

  He hesitated, examining her expression. He knew he should hold back, but he’d come too far to stop now. “Because of my own feelings for you.”

  Her eyes widened. “What are your feelings?”

  His breath caught in his throat. Her face was so close—another couple of inches and they’d be kissing…again. His pulse whooshed in his ears as his internal struggle raged. He was desperate to do it—however, his innate ‘uptight’ nature told him it wasn’t a good idea. But then again, hadn’t he just been about to make a breakthrough? One that perhaps indicated that being rigid all the time was doing him some harm?

  Just as the balance of his inner turmoil started to tip, Vic stroked his cheek gently. She hesitated for a second. “Do you want to kiss me again?”

  Vale was drawn back to her mouth. The scales had counterbalanced. “Yes.”

  She lifted her face and brushed her lips against his. A burst of pure fire erupted inside him, burning in his chest and down into his abdomen. It was even more intense than earlier and the force of it shocked him. Pushing aside his uptight inner voice, he circled her waist, hauling her into his lap because he couldn’t get her close enough. The kiss intensified and Vale realized that, uncharacteristically, he was losing control. Why did she affect him in that way? She let out a little moan and it was like accelerant being thrown onto his fire. He slid his tongue against hers, reveling in the sound of her breathing becoming labored. He needed her closer still. He pulled her against in so that she was straddling him, then broke contact for a second. “Is this okay?”

  “More than okay,” she said, and immediately covered his mouth with hers again.

  She moved her lips across his cheek and onto his neck, causing a wave of goosebumps to flow along his skin and shivers to run into his core. Then she gently nipped at his neck with her teeth and his self-control slipped further away. Vic lifted her hands to the front of his shirt to unbutton it. It was a matter of seconds before her hands were on his skin, but it seemed like an eternity, such was his desperation for her to touch him. She continued to trail her mouth along and onto his chest, displacing her hands down his abdomen. The sensations she was creating swirled into an ever-more-powerful maelstrom until she reached her hands even lower and started to unbutton his jeans.

  “Wait,” he breathed.

  She paused, her breathing ragged. “Why? Don’t you want to?”

  “Yes,” he said, “but not here.”

  He stood with her still straddling him, and she wrapped her legs around his waist. “Is your shoulder okay?” he asked, suddenly remembering her injury with a flash of guilt.

  “It’s fine,” she said, holding his gaze.

  He walked toward his bedroom, unable to take his eyes from hers.

  Vic leaned down to brush her lips against his as he took them over the threshold and toward his bed. “Is this you being formal again?” she murmured against his mouth.

  He smiled. “Yes. Do you not like it?” He laid her on the bed, brushing her hair from her face.

  “I love it,” she replied, pulling off his open shirt and kissing him in a way that left no room for doubt.

  He started peeling away her clothing, his reservations so far from his mind that he couldn’t even remember what they were. Spurred on by the way that she was running her hands over his now-bare torso and digging her fingers into his back, he stripped the last of the lacy material that hid her nakedness from him. He paused for a second, his heart pounding in his ears. She was truly beautiful.

  She was fumbling with the button on his jeans. Vale trailed his lips over her body, moving his mouth lower and lower, losing himself in the gasps of pleasure she was emitting. He reached between her thighs and started to kiss and tease her most intimate places, reveling in her moans and taking note of exactly what to do with his mouth and tongue in order to intensify those sounds. Vic pushed her hands through his hair, urging him on. Just as he sensed that she was at the brink, she tugged at his shoulders, bringing him back up her body to meet her lips with his.

  He hadn’t even noticed that he was devoid of clothing until he became aware that the full length of his body was against hers. They had now moved together so intimately that their coupling was almost inevitable.

  He paused in that position and gazed into the blue-green of her eyes. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” she breathed, the urgency in her voice driving his desire off the scale.

  Vale held her face gently as he entered her, watching every nuance of emotion in her expression and the color streaking her cheeks. He started to thrust, and their actions synced into one, neither in control but both in a subconscious, instinctive tandem. His every fiber was alive and sparking, and it was like some sort of awakening. His senses we
re heightened, and they were all filled with Victoria—her taste, her scent and the touch of her skin against his. The sensations created a crescendo of pleasure so intense that it was like nothing he had ever experienced. His breathing became more and more labored until his emotions threatened to overwhelm him.

  She was saying his name against his lips and telling him not to stop. He could tell that she was right at the edge, and the thought of that sent him impossibly further into overdrive. He interlaced his fingers with hers, lifting her arms above her head as he tasted her lips and drove more urgently. Her body started to shudder against his and it was all he could do to hold back for a few more seconds before he was taken along with her.

  He buried his face in her hair as their bodies were both racked with their climax. Inhaling her sweet scent, he listened to her sighs of pleasure. Her heart was beating against his chest in time with his own.

  Vic wrapped her arms around his shoulders tightly and he let his weight sink onto her. They had become one, physically and emotionally—black and white mixing to become not a shade of gray, but a vibrant rainbow of sensation and passion.

  Vale closed his eyes. He couldn’t remember ever feeling such a profound relaxation. He was at peace, without a care in the world or a painful knot anywhere in his body.

  Chapter Twelve

  Victoria opened her eyes and gazed around the room. For a moment she was disorientated and thought that she was still in the hospital. She rolled her shoulder and was pleased to find that there was no pain. Then she realized she was naked, whereas she normally would wear her pajamas to bed. That was when she remembered. Valentino. She was in his apartment, in his bed, and they had slept together the night before.

  She turned over to check across the king-sized bed, but he wasn’t there. Tuning in to her surroundings, she could hear him in the kitchen. The noises indicated that he was fixing them something to eat. Vampires didn’t need to take much food for sustenance if they were well sated with blood, but they tended to eat the odd meal, especially after physical exertion.

  Vic decided to grab a quick shower so that she could look her best once she emerged from the bedroom. After she made her way into the en suite, she gargled with some mouthwash then jumped into the shower cubicle. She washed herself in a hurry, her desperation to see Vale spurring her to move quickly. After that, she toweled off and threw on her clothes. Her hair remained wet, but that was okay. Maybe it would make her appear more seductive. She had no idea where his passion for her had come from, and she was more than keen to perpetuate it. Fair enough, he had kissed her earlier in the day, but afterward, he had seemed indifferent about it and she’d gotten the impression that it had been meaningless and spur of the moment for him, when it had been anything but for her. In her eyes, the events since they had arrived back at his place were out of the blue. She had been craving for him to look at her the way he had the previous night, and now that he had, she was terrified that he would change his mind and go back to just wanting to be friends.