Chapter 2
1115 Words
Chapter Two
“Need some water, Prince? A lozenge?” The witch frowned, shiny black fingernails fluttering over her collarbone like beetles. “Cherry’s my favorite, but they say honey-lemon’s better for a scratchy throat.”
Gabriel coughed. The tightness in his chest progressed to a burn that quickly stole his breath.
He panted like a dog, hands trembling as he reached for her. “If you’ve… poisoned… I’ll kill—”
“No. You won’t.” She lowered her hand and flashed a saccharine-sweet smile.
At once, his throat relaxed. Breath rushed back into his lungs, clear and crisp. The tremor vanished, hands steady once again.
Gabriel blinked away the blur in his eyes. Couldn’t be certain it’d even happened—already, his memory of the last few seconds was fading. He took another breath. Pressed a hand to his chest, testing his heart.
Still beating, for f**k’s sake.
“Feeling better?” she cooed.
Bloody hell. He stalked toward her again, done with the games. Done with the niceties. Done with all of it. The sooner he could set her straight, the sooner he could escape her intense presence. “I need three things from you, witch.”
She glanced at her fingernails, calm and collected. “You and every other bloodsucker in this city. Take a number, Prince.”
“One, you’ll reveal the location of your former vampire master. If you don’t know his location, you’ll help me discern it by any means necessary. Two—”
“I already told you, I have no idea—”
“Two, you’ll break a blood curse—dark magic, demon-bought, definitely in your wheelhouse.”
“Excuse me? Curses aren’t—”
“Three, you’ll confess your crimes and accept your punishment.”
“Ah, and there it is, folks.” Jacinda rolled her eyes. “The final threat of a desperate vampire. Also, a boring one. Confess your crimes and accept your punishment? Really? Did you practice that line in front of the mirror last night? I bet you did. That and the sexy eyebrow thing.”
“Sexy eyebrow thing?”
“Straight out of a vampire soap opera.”
Amusement stirred inside him, but he kept it in check—along with his sexy eyebrow—and swallowed another mouthful of bourbon. “I’m not prone to threats, witch. Or soap operas. Only promises.”
“Why don’t we just skip to the good part, then?” She made a slicing motion across her throat, then held out her glass for a refill, defeat finally settling on her shoulders. “What a f*****g day this turned out to be. TGIF, motherfuckers!”
Gabriel smiled. A real one, utterly unintentional.
Fuck.
He was starting to like this witch. The fire. The fight.
He poured them each another round.
“Tell you what.” He downed his drink and refilled his glass again, emptying the bottle. “I’ll let you pick two out of three. Player’s choice.”
“Is this a joke?”
“It’s a kindness.”
She shrugged and ran a black-tipped finger around the rim of her glass. “I thought you wanted me to work behind the bar. Isn’t that what you told your brother?”
“That was a joke. Putting a poisons expert in charge of serving drinks to New York’s supernatural elite? Not exactly good business sense.”
“That’s too bad, because I’ve got zero experience with curses and no clue about Duchanes.”
“That is too bad. Choosing death, are we?”
She folded her arms across her chest, assessing. “Death by what, exactly?”
“Exsanguination.” Devil’s balls, how he loved the way that word rolled off the tongue.
“I see. And who’s doing the drinking?” Her smile was lighter now. Teasing. Bordering on flirtatious. “You, I presume?”
He grinned and spread his arms. Welcome to the party, witch.
She stood from the chair and set down her glass, the tatters of her blouse lifting to reveal the expanse of skin across her lower abdomen, smooth and unmarred. Kissable.
Gabriel’s c**k stirred.
Then, squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin, his bold little witch huffed out a breath and said, “Fine. Do it. Make it quick, though—I hate melodramatic endings.”
She was still smiling. Still teasing.
The woman had no idea who she was playing with.
And that’s all it was. Games and spells, smoke and mirrors. Gabriel and his c**k would do well to remember it.
He set down the empty bottle. The glass.
Gave her one last look, dark and deadly.
He was on her in a flash, one hand gripping her hip, the other fisting her hair and yanking it to the side, exposing her neck.
She gasped at the roughness of his handling but didn’t draw back. Didn’t flinch. Not even when he pressed his mouth to her soft flesh, that tantalizing spot just below the jaw.
Jacinda trembled in his arms.
Fear? Lust? Shock? Gabriel didn’t give a f**k.
A steady pulse throbbed beneath his lips. His tongue darted out to taste.
Everything about her drove him mad.
The salt of her sweat. Soft wisps of hair tickling his nose. That forbidden, dark-earth scent. The heat of her, warm and throbbing and full of life, like the very heartbeat of existence.
Blood rushed beneath her skin, darkening her neck. Singing to him once again. Begging.
His fangs barely broke through, sharp points grazing her tender flesh, and—
“Wait!” she gasped, adrenaline spiking once again. “Please… please stop.”
It was nothing more than a whisper, but a concession nevertheless.
“Fear makes honest fools of us all,” Gabriel said.
The words rang hollow. He should’ve been thrilled at his victory, but this one left a bitter taste, the reasons for which he had no interest in exploring.
Grudgingly, he released her and backed off.
Jacinda swept her hair back in front of her shoulders, hiding that delectable neck from view. Her smile was gone, eyes no longer glittering. “How long?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“If I agree to help you, how much longer will you let me live? A week? A month?”
At his obvious confusion, she continued, “Everyone was terrified of Augustus, Prince, and with good reason. But that old bloodsucker? He had nothing on you.”
Gabriel bristled at the mention of his dead father. At the comparison. The witch was utterly clueless, and her presumptions put his lingering desire on ice.
“I know your game,” she pressed. “Everyone in this city talks, and believe me, I’ve heard all the stories about the ruthless Redthorne prince.”
“Have you, now? And what do the stories say?”
“People are nothing but transactions to you—even your own family members. Once they’re no longer useful, they… they disappear. Usually after you torture them to death.”
She lifted her eyebrows as if she were daring him to deny it.
Those blue eyes blazed right through him.
He blurred into her space once more, hand curling possessively around that delicate neck, thumb brushing the pulse point.
Jacinda sucked in a startled breath, and he thought again of her kneeling in the dirt at Ravenswood, face turned up, a pale flower blooming in the darkness.
His fangs descended in earnest. It took everything in him not to sink them into her flesh and f*****g break her.
“Then I suggest, little moonflower,” he whispered, “you find a way to remain useful.”
- Writer
