The Bleeding Dusk (19 page)

“I hope you shall put me out of my misery and tell me the skinny stick of a woman wasn't your mother,” Sebastian said, his fingers sliding beyond the crease where her left leg joined her hip.

“Skinny woman? What are you talking about?” Her voice was a bit breathy, but maybe he wouldn't notice. He certainly seemed to be concentrating on what he was doing, if his own steady breathing was any indication.

“There were three of them together—the dry, brittle one, the loud, large, pillowy one, and the bossy, elegant one. I was rather hoping,” he said, his fingers at last beginning to tug at the bottom edge of her corset, searching by feel for the blade, “that none of them was your mother…but since they were talking about you as if they knew you well, I realized I was bound to be disappointed.”

“You saw them? If you caused them to be captured too, Sebastian, I shall never forgive you!” She focused on irritation rather than on the movements of his fingers as they felt around her stays. “It should be there somewhere. You'll feel the short handle protruding from the bottom of the corset…just…yes, there! I do wish you would hurry.”

“Oh, faithless woman,” he replied. “It was I, in fact, who saved the dry stick of a woman from being some undead's evening feed. And it was I who directed the man who was supposed to be protecting them—Zavier, was that his name?—to their location so he could whisk them to safety.”

“So they are safe?” Victoria breathed a long sigh of relief that had nothing to do with the gentle tickling of his knuckles as he worked on pulling the knife from its special slot in the corset. “Oh, how silly of me to forget, Sebastian, there is a little frog enclosure that keeps the blade from sliding out and wreaking its havoc on my gown. You must loosen it and the braid holding it in place will fall away and you will be able to—
oh.
Sebastian, stop that!”

He chuckled in his Sebastian way, low and laced with warmth. “But you liked it before,
ma chère
.”

“That was when I trusted you,” she replied smartly, feeling him pulling on the corset again instead of letting his fingers stray where they should not have gone. “Actually, I don't believe I've ever trusted you, but that was before you drugged and kidnapped me. And why did you say you hoped Lady Petronilla—the slender one—was not my mother?”

Sebastian gave a groan of triumph as the stiletto at last came free of its place in her stays, and he pulled it away.

“Take care you don't cut me with it,” Victoria ordered, glad the moment was over as she rustled her skirts back into place by shifting her legs. “I'll move so you can slice my ropes—no, no, on second thought, I think it would be best if I did the cutting. If you would put the blade down, I'll move so I can pick it up and saw your ropes.”

“What a splendid idea. At least the blood you'll draw will mingle with what's already there. And, to answer your question,” he said as she maneuvered herself slowly around so they were back-to-back again, she sitting on her haunches so her hands were that much higher, “I was particularly hoping the dried-up stick wasn't your flesh and blood because it is a well-known adage—at least to the male population—that a woman, when aging, takes after the looks of her mother.”

Victoria had levered up the knife and was sawing delicately, and awkwardly, against the ropes. “And whatever is wrong with the way Lady Petronilla looks?” She couldn't keep the little grunt from her voice as she felt soreness and pain radiating up her wrists from the tense, awkward motions. Her injured left leg screamed under the weight of her body as she knelt there, working as fast yet as carefully as she could.

“She is as flat as a board. Ratter, even.”

“Flat as a—oh.” Victoria bit her lip and rolled her eyes in the dark.

“Ah, at last! I can feel my fingers again,” Sebastian said, and he wiggled said fingers against hers.

“Take care,” she warned, “else you'll get them cut and then you won't feel them at all. This blade is wickedly sharp.”

“It is indeed, for I'm free already.”

She felt a jolt as he pulled his wrists apart, brushing against her as the ropes fell away. He gave a relieved exhale as he took the blade from her aching fingers. Victoria heard the unmistakable sound of friction, as if he were rubbing his wrists and arms to get the blood flowing again. Which was something she longed to do herself, as soon as she was untied.

“Now what are you doing?” she asked, impatient to be free.

“Cutting apart my ankles. You do realize,” he said with a sudden, low chuckle, “that I am free and you are still bound, my lovely Venator. And that I have the rare advantage over you?”

A little squirm started in her middle, making her feel ill. Or…perhaps it was something altogether different from nausea. “Sebastian,” she said in warning, then remembered. “I have to ask you something about my aunt.”

“…and that you are at my mercy?” His voice had taken on a low purr, and suddenly he was next to her, moving with such freedom that she knew his legs were also unbound.

“Sebastian, when you took her
vis bulla
—”

His hands found her face easily—how, in the dark, she didn't know—but when his elegant yet sticky fingers curled under her chin and around the back of her neck, the only thing she could do was try to pull back as she lost her train of thought.

She had no leverage, nothing but her aching wrists and chilled fingers to hold her steady, propped behind her. When Sebastian moved closer, bringing that familiar scent of clove that always clung to him and setting her heart to pounding, Victoria had nowhere to go except down to the floor…and that was one place she didn't want to go.

He missed her mouth that first time, his lips brushing just above his fingers, in the middle of her cheek. But he soon rectified the error and drew her forward, up on her knees and toward him, chest to bosom, as he covered her mouth with his.

+ Eleven +

In Which Michalas's Wish is Granted

As so often occurred when
kissing Sebastian, Victoria found herself more helpless than not, with her hands still tied and her balance precarious. Yet she closed her eyes there in the dark and opened her mouth when he opened his, accepting his slick tongue and offering her own. The aches in her hand and leg eased, fading away in the wake of the deep kiss that reminded her how much she had missed this—intimate touching, passionate kissing, Sebastian himself.

She couldn't see him, just barely the dark shape of a shadow close to her, blocking her vision. But she pictured his handsome face and the sensual curling of his tawny, lion's-mane hair, surely tousled from battle with the vampires. His eyes were a darker shade of the same hue, a chestnut, and his skin—so unlike his grandfather's pale visage—was golden. He looked like a bronze angel, she'd often thought. An ironic description.

His lips were soft and smooth, fitting to hers and then drawing closed to lick and then nibble at the corner of her mouth, his teeth gnawing gently at her bottom lip, right where his grandfather had bitten her the night before. Victoria started when she realized this, when she felt his teeth on the tender part of her lip, and tried to turn away. But he was cradling her face in his hands and only kissed her more deeply than ever.

“I thought…you preferred…carriages,” came a raspy, annoyed voice from across the room, “Vioget.”

Victoria started and twisted her face violently from Sebastian, who seemed to have no inclination to release her. “Max? Oh, thank God, you're alive!”

“Your…concern…overwhelms me.” There was a soft shuffling sound, a sharp intake of breath. “Perhaps…you would be…so kind as to…bring that knife…here. When” —his voice trailed off, then picked up more strongly— “you've finished…of course. I cannot…imagine…it should take…very long…at all.”

“Carriages, parlors, dungeons,” Sebastian said carelessly, “wherever the opportunity presents itself. Which it does rather more often than I would expect you'd imagine—or be familiar with.”

But as he spoke Sebastian had released her, mainly, Victoria thought, because she'd mutinously kept her face away from his seeking fingers and mouth, twisting back when he tried to renew the kiss. Now he moved behind her, his hands on her hips as he found his position.

Too late, she realized she was at an even greater disadvantage with him kneeling behind her, knife in hands. “Don't move now, Victoria,” he said, his voice curling in her ear like soft smoke, his breath warm on her skin. “This knife is very sharp, and I cannot see what I'm doing. I'd hate to slice into your beautiful flesh…the fresh blood would draw the hungry vampires here in a moment.”

One of his hands moved aside the great mass of hair that had fallen from her coiffure, when her stake had been removed, and now his lips pressed gently to the sensitive skin there on the top of her shoulder, at the juncture of her neck. Featherlight at first, then heavier, then with a sleek brush of tongue, he kissed her flesh while he sawed away, one-handed, at her ropes.

She couldn't help the smallest of gasps when he mauled and sucked at the tendon there, where he knew she was most sensitive. And surely Max couldn't help but hear her reaction, the faint sound of breaking suction, the quiet lapping of Sebastian's mouth.

He did it purposely—whether it was to titillate and arouse her or to irritate Max, she wasn't certain, but the only thing she could try to do was ignore the swipe of his lips, the warm slide over the top of her shoulder, up along her neck. But when one of his hands—the one not holding the knife, fortunately, slid around to cover one of her breasts, Victoria couldn't hold back a sudden intake of breath.

Sebastian laughed softly against her skin, leaving a hot, moist puff there at the side of her throat, and Victoria pulled so hard to the side that she lost her balance and tumbled to the floor. But as she fell, her hands moved automatically to catch herself, pulling at the ropes. She was strong enough—and they were already frayed enough from the knife—that they tore free, and even though she landed half on her cheek on the cold, gritty floor, her hands were loose.

She rolled away from Sebastian before he could grab her again, though she felt his swipe through the air. “Your games are at an end, Sebastian. May I have the knife back?”

Half expecting him to taunt her with it, to demand a kiss or some other payment, Victoria was surprised when she heard it drop to the floor in front of her.

“If we only had something for illumination,” she said, feeling on the floor until her fingers brushed the stiletto. Gingerly she followed the blade until she found the handle and picked up the knife. It was no longer than the length of her longest finger to the end of her palm, and about the same width as her little finger. The entire dagger was nearly as flat as the piece of boning it had replaced, but was deathly sharp.

Miro had made the weapon specially for her, casting it to certain specifications. The silver handle was very short, extending only one knuckle's length from the small, flat hand guard. This was so that the blade could slide into the slit in her corset, and the handle would protrude just a small distance past the bottom end of her stays, keeping the metal from poking into her leg when she walked or bent. The other unique thing about the knife was that for perhaps another inch past the hand guard, the blade itself was covered with the same silver as the handle, so that Victoria could wrap her fingers around the hand guard and allow the blade to protrude between them without cutting herself. Since the handle was so short, it was the only way she could comfortably hold the dagger.

It certainly had worked, cutting easily through the ropes.

“I have something for light,” Max's voice rumbled, a bit stronger now. “But I'll need…some help.”

Victoria felt Sebastian moving, but he seemed to be farther away. “Sebastian? What are you doing?”

“I'm examining the door to determine whether there might be a way to open it, of course.”

Victoria wanted to protest that she would need his help with Max, but she did not. Instead, she felt around on the floor and finally brushed against something solid and warm. And very, very wet. Stickily wet.

“My God, Max…” She started in shock, moving her hands frantically around, trying to determine what part of him had been injured, and accidentally poked him in the face.

“Christ, Victoria…are you trying to blind me?”

She slowed her jerky movements, brushing over his warm, moist cheek and down along his neck, staying far away from his sharp mouth. “You needn't be so profane. I cannot see a thing!”

“Obviously,” he grumbled on a long breath. “I have a light. After you…cut these blasted ropes.” His breathing was heavy, and she could feel it now, feel the exertion in his body as he struggled to keep it steady.

She quickly sliced through the ropes that held his wrists behind him, and heard the soft moan of relief when his arms fell back into place. With trepidation she asked, “Where's the light?” The last thing she wanted was to be groping around Max's long, powerful body. Especially when he was injured.

“My left boot.”

Relieved, Victoria gingerly skimmed her hands lightly along the side of him, taking care not to investigate anything mortifying, and noting with increasing anxiety that there were several places that were soaking wet. The stench of blood was strong, and she could nearly taste the iron in her mouth. “Are you bitten?” she asked, reaching the bottom of his calf and finding the smooth, supple leather of his boot. “Again?” she added, remembering Sara tearing away Max's collar.

“No, I'm shot,” he replied, as if she should somehow have known. “And it hurts like the damned blazes, so if you could please…hurry.”

Like a valet, she knelt at his feet and tugged at the boot.

“No,” he snapped. “Under. In the heel.”