Hunger (17 page)

She looked back at him but he refused to meet her gaze, his blue eyes fixed on a point off to his right. He hadn’t sensed something in that direction. He was avoiding her. Why?

She went to turn back to him but the women swept forwards, taking hold of her and ushering her inside, fussing over her in a way that made her want to snap at them and break free.

Eve kept looking back as they escorted her into the house and more vampires surrounded her, speaking all at once, their excited chatter falling on deaf ears. She stared at Tor, willing him to look at her, to tell her why he had suddenly distanced himself and turned guarded again.

She didn’t understand.

She needed him now more than ever, felt she would drown without him and couldn’t handle this attention from a horde of vampires. Every instinct she possessed said to remove her knives from her backpack and fend them off.

The answer became clear when a man at the fringes of the group muttered, “Did you see what just walked in?”

Another responded, “To think they would let such a ruthless, vile creature protect our Chosen Daughter.”

A third, this one female, scoffed. “To think we have to have that in our house while our Chosen Daughter is here.”

The bastards were talking about Tor.

And they were talking about her as if they bloody well owned her.

She was no one’s possession, and Tor was no vile creature.

More voices whispered around her, clearer now she was listening for comments about Tor, easy to detect amongst the din of chatter and formal greetings.

Each word against him, each voice that mocked his manners and breeding, his roughness, speaking of him as if he were stupid and an animal, not a person, cranked her anger higher, bringing her close to turning on them.

She didn’t much like her new family. She didn’t like how they treated Tor as if he was a second-class citizen because he wasn’t refined as they were and didn’t move in their circles.

The three who had greeted her first and brought her into the building ushered her on, leading her into a large green reception room directly across the foyer from the entrance.

Her throat tightened as one of the women broke away and approached the doors, intending to close them, shutting her alone in the room with them. She turned sharply, about to shout not to, and her eyes fell on Tor.

He leaned against the earthy green wall, his legs crossed at the ankles and his hands jammed into the pockets of his black jeans.

Relief swept through her and she sagged with it, her tension fading fast. He met her gaze and then looked away again, settling his focus on the tall French doors lining the wall behind her, opposite him.

The blonde woman settled in a green velvet armchair near the elegant marble fireplace off to Eve’s right and the redhead followed her, choosing the seat opposite her. The brunet man took the couch, leaving the only space available to her as the seat next to him. She shifted foot to foot, fighting the panic that threatened to rise again.

She didn’t want to sit next to him.

A servant dressed in dull grey entered and shuffled towards a polished wooden side table. She set her tray down and poured four glasses of blood. Eve covered her mouth, swallowing the bile that rose into it, scalding her throat.

Tor pushed away from the wall but didn’t come to her. He stared at her and she looked at him, catching the concern in his striking blue eyes. He flexed his fingers, cast a glance at the three vampires seated near her, and then folded his arms across his chest and leaned back against the wall.

Eve frowned, looked down at the three vampires, and caught the scowls they had directed at Tor. When the servant approached them with the tray of crystal goblets, they smiled at her and exchanged pleasantries before taking their glass.

The evil bloodsuckers treated their serving vampires better than they treated Tor.

Eve hated them for it.

She hated how they all stood again and fawned over her, their voices a clamour in her aching head, while they shunned Tor and treated him like dirt. He fought for his bloodline, took dangerous missions to protect them, risking his life while they lived in comfort and safety, leading a pampered life.

The servant approached her and offered the final goblet. “No, thank you. I don’t want it… and you’re missing a glass. There should be
five
.”

The woman threw a nervous look at her and then at Tor, and then back at the two women and the man. The blonde woman waved her away, as if telling her not to concern herself with Tor or providing him with blood. Eve had half a mind to pick up the goblet and throw it at the bitch.

She really hoped they didn’t have to spend long in this hellhole. If this was an indication of things to come when she reached the Oslo mansion, the stronghold of the Vehemens bloodline, then she never wanted to set foot in that place.

Eve bit her tongue to stop herself from pointing out that she was apparently their Chosen Daughter and their behaviour disgusted her. Tor wouldn’t want her fighting his battles. Just as she didn’t want him to fight hers. She wouldn’t say anything until he asked her.

Or until her tentative and fragile grip on her temper broke and she couldn’t stop herself from giving these vampires hell and a lesson in manners.

She forced herself to sit beside the man and swore Tor growled under his breath. Eve shuffled left, placing herself as far from the man as she could without making it obvious that she was avoiding him.

“We cannot say what an honour it is to have you visit us,” the blonde said, her accent thick and definitely Dutch.

“It is indeed an honour.” The man leaned back in the corner of the green velvet couch and raked a gaze over her.

Tor growled low again, sending a shiver down Eve’s spine. The man flicked a disinterested glance at him.

“We were so very excited when we received word you were coming.” The redhead leaned towards her and reached out to touch her hand.

Eve pulled it back out of her reach and frowned at her. The redhead looked unsure what to do in reaction to her withdrawal and then sat back again, taking her hand with her. She toyed with her goblet.

Eve stared at the crimson liquid and her focus shot to Tor.

She swung her gaze to where he had been.

He was gone.

Her throat tightened again and she pulled her bag onto her lap, clutching it and keeping it close. Her knives were in it. She could reach them if she needed them. Her gaze darted over the vampires, her senses locking on each one in an attempt to calculate their strength as she automatically devised a plan to protect herself.

“Will you be staying long?” the man said and stretched his arm along the back of the couch, placing his hand close to her shoulder.

She turned on him. “No.”

His eyes widened as if she had struck him with the force of that word.

“I mean,” she said, softening her voice and smiling to cover her nerves. “I don’t think so. It’s down to Tor.”

Whom she would be having words with about leaving her alone with these vile people. Shortly afterwards, she planned to give up her pride and beg him to let them leave and find somewhere else to stay.

“You seem unsettled,” the redhead said, her French accent sending a cold shiver through her. Most of the weaklings who had killed and tortured her had been French.

She needed to see Tor.

Her senses reached for him and the riot of dark emotions quietened a little when she found him. She latched onto him, refusing to let him go even though she knew he could probably sense her and would be aware that she was clinging to him like some pathetic weak little girl, using him to combat her fears.

Her nightmares.

She tried to make pleasant conversation with the three vampires. “Amsterdam is lovely.”

If lovely was debauched and dangerous, and riddled with vampires.

“I never go there myself. I prefer to hunt in the vicinity.” The man moved his hand and it brushed her shoulder.

Eve turned on him again, holding her bag closer, fighting the temptation to unzip it and arm herself.

“You must have been through much in the company of that man. I cannot imagine he was of any use for conversation or that he ensured your lodgings were at the level they should have been,” the blonde said with a pretty painted smile.

Eve still wanted to hit her.

“I think you would be surprised by the level of conversation Tor is capable of if you took a moment to actually engage in one with him. He is rather intelligent and insightful, and has been good company.” Eve tried to keep the bite from her tone but wasn’t sure she had succeeded when the man raised an eyebrow at her, his hazel eyes shimmering with curiosity.

“He is easy on the eyes,” the redhead said and backtracked when the man and woman turned glares on her, “or he would be if it weren’t for his position.”

Eve squashed the desire to bare her fangs at the bitch in warning.

She stood, slung her bag over her shoulder and smiled pleasantly to cover her anger. She was probably broadcasting it to every single one of them, but she felt better pretending she wasn’t and that they weren’t aware that she was cutting them into tiny pieces in her head.

Before any of them could speak and shatter her fragile control, she quickly said, “If you’ll excuse me. I’m tired from the journey and want to retire.”

The man stood and smoothed down his black suit jacket. “You may wait here while we call a servant to show you to your room.”

“No thanks.” Because she would probably kill them in the space it took for that to happen. “I need to find Tor and discuss some things with him. Send a servant to us when the room is ready. Please, go about your business as if I’m not even here. I don’t want to be a bother. I’d rather just a servant come and help us. Thank you.”

With that, she hurried from the room, hoping they would get the message and she hadn’t offended them too much. She didn’t want to see them again. She would rather spend the rest of her enforced stay in this hellhole being tended to by the serving vampires. At least they didn’t treat Tor with contempt.

Eve followed her senses, her awareness of him increasing as she drew closer to his location. Another servant approached her, this one a man dressed in a grey shirt and black slacks. He carried blood on a tray too, a large decanter of it. She stared at it as he passed, her fangs itching, but not for the blood he carried.

She wanted Tor’s blood on her tongue again, couldn’t get the taste of him out of her mouth or the memory of biting him out of her mind. Her fangs ached with a need to press into his flesh.

Not anyone’s flesh.

Just his.

He had awakened a hunger in her that she couldn’t deny and one that demanded he sate it.

She increased her pace, hurrying along the corridor, her focus locked with intent on Tor. His signal grew stronger and the smell of his scent surrounded her, beckoning her to him. She stopped outside a wooden panelled door, drew in a breath to steady herself, and then pushed it open.

Tor sat at a long wooden table in a library whose walls were all made of shelves crammed with books. He had one in his lap, balanced on his thighs, his booted feet resting on the table in front of him.

“You should be with your hosts,” he said without taking his eyes off the worn pages of the book. He flipped to the next one, ran a hand through his ice-blond hair, and settled it back in his lap, drumming his fingers against his leg.

“If I go back, will you come too?”

He shook his head. “I don’t belong there.”

She dropped her bag from her shoulder. “Then neither do I.”

He lifted his head, his blue eyes meeting hers, incredulous. She had never seen him look so shocked or feel it too. Why? Why did it surprise him that she would rather be with him?

Something surfaced in his eyes, clouding their clear pale depths, something dark and almost needy.

His eyes searched hers, darting between them, and she sighed, realising that he needed to hear her say the reason she was in this room with him now and not with the others.

Eve closed the door behind her and ventured a step towards him. “I would rather be with you than with those pompous idiots. If they shun you because you’re a hunter, then they should shun me too.”

Tor closed his book and leaned further back in his seat, his icy gaze studying her intently. “You’re our family’s Chosen Daughter.”

Eve took another step towards him. “I don’t care for titles or for people who treat someone well purely because they have one. I’m a hunter. You’re a hunter. I would rather be with my own kind… with someone like me… with someone I like.”

The ice in his eyes melted, softening the glacial blue to something more akin to tropical waters. She edged another step forwards.

His lips curved into a smile, a rare one filled with feeling and meaning.

Eve took a final step, closing the distance down to bare millimetres. She cupped his cheeks in her palms, settling her little fingers along the straight line of his jaw, and tilted his head up.

“You’re beautiful,” she whispered.

He tried to look away but she held him fast, not letting him escape her, needing him to see that she meant it and they weren’t just empty words designed to placate him. He was beautiful, a strong and wonderful man, and if these people couldn’t see it, then they were blinded by their vanity.

“I’m really not, Eve,” he said and shook his head, shifting her hands with the action. “The things I’ve done—if you knew about them. I’m far from beautiful.”

She could see in his crystal blue eyes that he believed that, and he thought it was an obstacle between them. He couldn’t have been more wrong. If anything, it made her feel closer to him. It made her feel that out of all the people in this world, he was the only one who could truly understand her and her him.

Eve shook her head now. “I don’t care. I’ve done things too. We’ve both done what we’ve needed to in order to survive, Tor. We’re hunters. We’re given missions and we carry them out. We see them through and do all in our power to live to fight another day. So when I say you’re beautiful, I mean it. I know the darkness in you because it’s in me too, and it doesn’t frighten me. It makes us who we are.”