“Go and feed, Alasdair. Find a warm body to fuck. Forget about that human you’ve been obsessing over, and forget Stratos. Let it go.”
But he couldn’t. Something felt…off. Stratos hadn’t been the type to do what he had done, and that was still bothering him. So was the fact that the one person he wanted to fuck was also harboring a most dangerous weapon.
“So you can walk outside when it’s daylight?”
The question from Leo was so unexpected Alasdair lost his train of thought and dropped his hands, crossing them over his chest. He eyed the human and wondered when this man had decided he was no longer a threat.
Maybe it’s time to remedy that. “That’s the first question you ask when trapped in an elevator with a hungry carnivore?”
“Hey, look,” Leo said, trying to appear casual. “I’m hungry too and could do with some eggs and bacon. But you don’t have to worry about me attacking you. I expect the same courtesy.”
Alasdair resumed his previous position with his hands by either side of Leo’s head, pleased when the man clamped his mouth shut. “And why would you expect that?”
Leo’s throat contracted as he swallowed, and Alasdair lowered his eyes to his pulse.
“Because you want something from me.”
The words could’ve been taken several ways. Alasdair knew Leo was referring to information, yet he couldn’t seem to help himself from lowering his lips to the corner of Leo’s mouth.
“And what is that? The pleasure I denied myself last night? Is that what you think I want, Leonidas?”
Leo’s breath brushed over his lips as he dared to ask, “Why did you deny yourself?”
He was surprised to discover how much he liked this bolder side of Leo, and he nipped his lower lip then said, “I like how it feels to hunt you down. To toy with you. To tease you until you’re begging for it. It’s in my nature.”
Several seconds passed, and the air became thick with the same sexual tension from the previous night. The desire that had been ignited was still hovering between them, unfulfilled and most definitely unsatisfied.
“So you want me to be scared of you. And I was, am, terrified. You’re really fucking scary. But I can’t help but wonder why something as destructive as you is so…”
“So?” Alasdair pressed.
Leo’s breath faltered when Alasdair moved his mouth down to his neck and licked a path along the vein pulsating there. “So…so attractive.”
Alasdair chuckled at the reluctant compliment. “While it’s incredibly flattering that you think my looks were designed this way due to what I am, it’s just not so.” He then grazed his teeth along the line of Leo’s jaw and told him, “We appear as we were when turned. Minus, of course, anything cosmetic, such as a haircut. The vampire gene merely adds an eternal…shine of sorts. An immortality elixir, some might say.”
When Leo arched his head away without even realizing, exposing the column of his throat to him like a final meal to a dying man, Alasdair’s stomach knotted.
I must be fucking insane to torment myself this way. I know what his blood can do to me. And yet…I still want it.
“So you’ve always been this…this…” Leo trailed off on a sigh, not finishing his thought.
Alasdair raised his head, not quite certain his control could be counted on.
“Come on. You must know how hot you are,” Leo said, straightening back up and shaking his head as if to clear it.
“Hot?” he asked, the word breaking through his thought as one he wasn’t familiar with.
The elevator came to a halt, and when the doors opened, Leo slid past, keeping a wary eye on him, and walked out into the corridor.
Alasdair followed down the dimly lit hall. “This place reminds me of home.”
Leo glanced over his shoulder and rolled his eyes at him. “Of course it does. We’re in a basement.”
“Your boss makes you work in a basement? Hardly seems like a job worth getting upset over losing.”
When Leo stopped and spun to face him, Alasdair slid his hands into the pockets of his pants.
“I’m lucky I still have a job, no thanks to you. And I wouldn’t be so judgmental. Like you said, you live in the equivalent of this basement.”
He gave a slight nod. “You could look at it that way, I suppose. Or that you’re lucky to be alive and able to come back to said job because of me.”
Leo scoffed. “Why? Because when you tried to kill me you got paralyzed? That’s not luck because of your goodwill. That’s luck due to my own body’s kickass defense system.”
Alasdair faded in and out so quickly he had their bodies pressed intimately together before Leo could react. “A defense you claim to know nothing about.”
“Ye…yeah. That’s right,” Leo stuttered.
Alasdair stared him down as he reached for the piece of paper. But Leo’s fist tightened stubbornly, refusing to let it go.
“Give it to me, Leo.”
“No. It’s none of your business.”
“I don’t care. I want to know what’s on it.”
“There’s nothing on it.”
“Why do you insist on lying to me when you know I can find out the truth?”
Leo locked his jaw, refusing to say any more, and glared at him.
“Fine. Let’s do this the hard way.”
As what was about to happen seemed to dawn on Leo, he shook his head, but it was too late. He was already inside his mind.
GIVE ME THE paper, Leonidas.
Yeah, he hated when Alasdair delved inside his head. It felt so intimate and invasive. But when he did that weird body-and-mind-control thing, Leo wanted to scream at him to fuck off and leave him alone. Being at someone’s mercy was not pleasant. At least, when it was physical, he had some recourse. This was so…one sided.
His arm rose, and he handed Alasdair the journal entry. Then he watched in a daze as he unfolded and read what was on it. When Alasdair was done, he looked at him with a fierce scowl. Alasdair had gone from sexy to scary as fucking hell.
Who told you about this?
“Told me about what?”
About the Assembly Hall? How do you know of it?
Leo’s mind scrambled through his memories and thoughts for something about an Assembly Hall but came up with nothing. “I don’t know what the Assembly Hall is.”
Alasdair grabbed him by the wrist and yanked him forward, thrusting the paper in his face. You wrote about it here, several times. It’s dated before we met. If you don’t know what it is, how did you know to write it?
Compelled to answer with only the truth, Leo opened his mouth and replied, “I don’t know.”
I don’t believe you. At each turn there’s more tricks, more deception. You can even fight this somehow.
Leo couldn’t fight the mind game Alasdair was playing. Every word shoved into his head was heavy and authoritative, and he couldn’t do anything other than stand there. So, when Alasdair faded them out of the hall, he expected to find himself back in the strange room with the leather walls and metal hooks. Once he’d come to, though, he was stunned to be on the worn couch against the brick wall of his office.
ALASDAIR PACED THE length of Leo’s office, staring at the chaotic mess of photographs, posters, and timelines pinned all over the wall. He’d dumped Leo on the couch when he’d faded them inside—and that’s when he’d spotted it. An entire wall filled with hundreds of images from days long past.