I thought that was an excellent idea. Then I remembered why it might not be an excellent idea.
“Lucien said he’s feeding again tonight.”
She stood and pulled me up with her. “Good. It’ll serve him right to get some secondhand alcohol in his system,” she commented with feeling and leaned into me while she walked me from the room. “Feeding from someone inebriated,” she gave a mock shudder, “tastes crap.”
At learning that knowledge, I liked her plan all the better.
Stephanie and I were hanging off the stools that sat around the huge island bar that separated the enormous kitchen from the breakfast nook and comfy-kitchen-living-area. Yes, I had a comfy-kitchen-living-area with a big, fluffy couch, an attractive, low coffee table and a gigantic, round bean bag that two small adults could pile themselves into. Who needs all that? I already had a living room and family room for goodness sakes!
Both Stephanie and I had consumed more than our fair share of vodka martinis under the watchful and reproachful (I might add) eyes of Edwina when the next thing happened.
More boxes arrived.
These weren’t cardboard boxes filled with Lucien’s clothes. These were glossy black boxes of all shapes and sizes, each of them tied with a blood-red satin bow.
The minute Stephanie eyed the delivery man carrying a tower of boxes, she cried, “Yippee! Lucien’s been shopping.”
This news did not make me happy.
“Oh, my dear. You may be moody but you must have pleased him somehow,” Edwina pronounced having lost her stern glare and donning a gleaming smile. She was following delivery man number two.
I ignored Edwina and watched Stephanie who was already digging into the stash with an abandon that was slightly scary.
He’d said a package would arrive. A package.
Did he expect me to wear all this stuff at once?
Stephanie pulled out a flash of material, swinging it around and then smoothing it against her front.
“This is stunning. Come here, Leah, try this on,” she demanded.
I looked at what she held.
She was right. It was stunning. It was the most exquisite thing I’d ever seen.
An evening dress, black matte silk, flowy skirt with a slit up the front lined in aubergine satin, halter-topped and backless.
Both delivery men came in again, each bearing another tower of boxes.
“More?” I whispered.
Stephanie didn’t hear me or ignored me, likely the second, she was on a mission.
“Come here, Leah. This first,” she was shaking the black gown at me, “then this.” She picked up what looked like a cream-colored skirt lined in pale blue and it had a kick pleat.
I slid off my stool and drunkenly wobbled into the comfy-kitchen-living area.
I touched the fabric of the black gown. It was glorious.
Stephanie let it go to turn her attention to another box and I caught it before it fell to the ground.
I held the dress up in front of me.
I really wanted to enjoy this. I really, really did. But instead it made me feel more trapped, more suffocated, more owned.
Lucien was dressing up his pet. And I was his pet.
It made me feel somehow dirty.
“Why on earth would he buy me this stuff? I’ll never wear it,” I mumbled or, I should say, slurred. We’d had a lot of martinis.
Stephanie paused in her gleeful activity and looked at me. “What do you mean, you’ll never wear it?”
“I live in a house in the middle of nowhere. My job is to hang around until a vampire wants to feed from me.”
Stephanie straightened and caught my eyes. “Yes, that’s part of your job. Another part of your job is to play escort should he want to show you off. At the opera. Or a dinner party. Or A Feast.”
God, I hoped Lucien didn’t like opera. That would suck because I loathed it.
I decided to latch onto something else she said, something Lucien had mentioned before. “A feast?”
She nodded. “A Feast. Some vamps take their concubines to Feasts. I don’t but I know on occasion that Lucien does.”
“What’s a feast?” I asked and Edwina made a little pip noise and both Stephanie and I swung our eyes to her.
“You don’t approve?” Stephanie asked, not dangerously, curiously.
“Not to his taking the girls there, no,” Edwina answered softly then started to gather up discarded tissue, ribbons and boxes. “They can get dangerous.”
“What’s a feast?” I asked again but Stephanie was still studying Edwina.
“Lucien would never let anything happen to one of his concubines.”
“I know,” Edwina said and straightened. “It’s just…” she hesitated, looked between us and finished, proclaiming, “my girls are good girls.”
This made me even more intrigued so I asked, louder this time, “What’s a feast?”
“She may need another martini for this,” Edwina mumbled, dropped the detritus and headed to the martini shaker.
I was no longer intrigued, I was now concerned. So much so I plonked down on the fluffy couch amidst a mountain of tissue paper as the two delivery men added two more towers of boxes to the plethora.
Stephanie plonked down beside me and Edwina fetched us fresh martinis.
Then Stephanie explained. “Vamps can feed from two places, their concubines and any mortal who attends A Feast. That’s it. That’s the law.”
“So why are they dangerous? Do they round up the victims…?” I stopped speaking when Stephanie’s face grew scary hard.
“They aren’t victims, Leah. They choose to be there.” Her voice was as hard as her face.
I ignored her voice mainly because I couldn’t imagine what she said was true.
She studied my expression and her face softened.
“It’s not like it was with you and Lucien,” she said under her breath so Edwina, who was tidying my new, extravagant wardrobe, couldn’t hear. “Most mortals love it. Some even become addicted to it. There are even ex-concubines there.”
I felt my eyes grow round and she nodded and continued, “It’s frowned upon, of course. A concubine will lose her or his reputation by attending Feasts after they’ve been released. Their families are normally shunned. Their line will henceforth go unchosen at Selections. They usually don’t attend once a concubine falls mostly because they aren’t invited.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Feasts are where common mortals go.” She put her hand on mine. “You, honey, are anything but common.”
This sounded sickeningly superior.
She must have read my face because she went on, “They love it, the mortals who attend. They don’t care. They build their whole lives around it, traveling from Feast to Feast. They’re like groupies.”
And this sounded simply sickening.
“I still don’t get why it’s dangerous,” I pressed and Stephanie leaned back.
“Because anything goes,” she replied. “Lots of liquor, loud music, dancing and bodies. Any mortal is fair game. Some have two, three, even more vampires feeding on them at once. There are some Feasts, not the ones Lucien attends, mind, where there are drugs. Sex. Orgies.”
“Wow,” I whispered and she smiled.
“The good ones are fun. You can take your fill of as many mortals as you want. It’s great.”
It didn’t sound great but that was just me.
“Why would you take a concubine there?” I asked.
She shrugged. “To share another part of your life with her. If you’ve got a good one, to show her off to other vampires.”
Something struck me. “If anything goes, and a concubine is mortal, is she fair game?”