Cora said nothing as he counted down a line of oak wine casks, handing her the penlight as he gripped a cask with both hands, throwing all his weight against it, willing it to move. It shuddered and groaned for a few seconds before giving way, sliding to the side, revealing a cobwebbed entrance cut low into the stone wall.
“In,” he said, kicking the remains of a wooden crate out to cover the marks on the ground where the cask had moved.
“Are there mice? I have a thing about mice,” Cora said, her fear palpable.
“If there are, I won’t let them near you,” he promised.
She gave him a long look. “Do I have to go in there with you? Would the Julian guy know who I am? With regards to you, that is?”
Pain laced him at her words, although he understood her reticence. If it weren’t for her, he’d say to hell with the council and face down the messenger. But he no longer had only his own future to consider. “No, he wouldn’t. You don’t have to go with me if you don’t want to. Pia will claim you as a visiting friend, I’m sure.”
She looked at him for the count of five before she nodded and ducked down to enter the room.
He smiled at her ass. He couldn’t help himself—she was just so contrary at times, it was all he could do to keep from pouncing on her and claiming her right then and there.
The hidden room was more a hole scraped out of the side of the mountain than anything else, the smell in it particularly earthy when he pulled the door closed behind them. Cora scooted to his side, clutching the back of his shirt and peering around suspiciously as he shone the narrow light around the tiny room. There was no sign of rodent life, but his nose told him otherwise.
“Do you see anything?” Cora asked, pressing herself into him.
No. Surely you cannot be scared of a tiny little animal.
“You’re kidding, right? Because if there is anything more frightening than little mousy feet and tails and those twitching noses, I don’t know what it is. Well, OK, rats are icky, too, but I count them in the mouse category.”
“I see nothing,” he lied, meeting the beady-eyed, but mildly curious, gaze of a large brown rat that scampered onto a broken chair across the small room.
“OK, but if you do, I’m out of here. It’s no reflection on HOLY JESUS!”
Cora screamed and pointed in a direction forty-five degrees from the rat, and proceeded to climb him like he was a ladder.
“You know,” he said conversationally, her heaving breasts pressed against his face as she struggled to climb even higher up his body, her heels digging into his hips, “that mouse is probably far more terrified of great big you than you are of it, mousy feet and twitching nose aside.”
“Don’t let it get near me!” she shrieked.
If you keep doing that, love, Julian will hear you.
Sorry. MOUSE! Can we leave yet? Please?
I don’t know, he said, rubbing his cheeks against the thin linen shirt, the scent of her and the feel of her breasts waking his appetite . . . both appetites. I’m rather enjoying this. Except the way your heels are poking into my flesh. Could you . . . thank you.
Sorry. It’s just that I really do not like mice.
I’ve ascertained that fact for myself. Much as I appreciate having my face buried in your breasts, at some point, I’m going to need oxygen.
She pulled back slightly, just enough for him to get some air into his lungs. “Sorry,” she repeated softly. “Can you see the mouse?”
He glanced over to the rat. It was cleaning its face, one eye on them. “No, I don’t see a mouse. It probably ran when you screamed, and went back into its home.”
“You think so? ” She shifted, obviously trying to peer into the darkness. “Maybe. Why are you hiding something from me? I’ve admitted I’m your Beloved—aren’t you supposed to let me have a lifetime membership pass into your brain?”
He leaned back against the wall, his hands on her wonderful ass as she tightened her legs around his hips. “Are you giving me complete access to your thoughts and feelings, as well?”
That stopped her. He could feel how disgruntled she was over the thought that he could keep things from her, but knew she couldn’t demand he allow her into his mind willy-nilly unless she honored those same terms.
He frowned at that thought. Just what, exactly, did she have to hide from him? “A Beloved should never keep things from her Dark One,” he said primly.
“I’ll be sure to pass that along to the next Beloved I see. Is your back getting tired?”
“No, although if you slid down a bit, I could at least kiss you. Unless you wish to take off your shirt so I can kiss your bare breasts?”
He felt her thinking that over, but she sighed, instead and cautiously unlocked her legs from their death grip on his hips, slowly lowering herself to the ground.
“Do you mind?” she asked, squeezing between him and the door.
“Not at all. The rat doesn’t live who will make it past me to you,” he said.
She froze. “RAT? You think there are rats in here?”
Cielito, you’re going to pass out if you hyperventilate, and then I’ll have to stop guarding you to resuscitate you, and that will leave the path open to the mouse to touch you with its feet.
She screamed into his mind at that thought, but made an effort to breathe. He couldn’t help but smile into the darkness at the fact that she thought nothing about facing down one of Bael’s wrath demons, but was almost prostrate with terror at the thought of a few rodents.
“Distract me,” she ordered his back.
He started to turn, intending on taking her into his arms.
“No, not that way! You have to stand guard. Distract me while you watch for attacking beasts. I suppose we should talk about Eleanor.”
“I’d prefer not to.”
“I hate to say it, but I’d rather not, as well. What a chicken I am. Tell me . . . tell me about your past. Jas told me that vampires are either born that way or made. Which were you?”
“My father was an unredeemed Dark One; thus I was born that way, as well. What do you want to know about my past?”
“Well . . . how old are you? You look like you’re my age, but I have a feeling you’re older than you look.”
“I was born in 1336 in what is now Dachau, Germany.”
“The place where the concentration camp was?”
“Yes. It is a lovely area, despite that blot on its history. I have a summer home there that I think you’ll like.”
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”
“None left living. My mother had several children before my father seduced her.”
“Sounds like Daddy had some issues.”
“Several, not the least of which was an inability to remain with any woman longer than a few weeks. He died in a fire in the eighteenth century.”
“Really? I didn’t think you guys could die.”
“We can be killed, yes. We don’t die of natural causes, however, and it’s not easy to end our lives, but in my father’s case, the building he was in collapsed on him, trapping him in the fire. Even a Dark One cannot stand up to that sort of thing.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, and he knew she honestly was sorry about the loss of his father.
“Thank you. I was not close to him, but he was my only living family member. I felt his loss.” He didn’t say more, but she read it in his mind nonetheless.