Shadow Kiss (Vampire Academy #3)(73)

"Because half the fun of you is that you're so difficult."

A new idea occurred to me. "Do it."

"Do what?"

"Use compulsion on me."

"What?" It was another of those rare shocked Adrian moments.

"Use compulsion to make me want to kiss you - except you have to promise not to actually kiss me."

"That's pretty weird - and when I say something's weird, you know it's serious."

"Please."

He sighed and then focused his eyes right on me. It was like drowning, drowning in seas of green. There was nothing in the world except for those eyes.

"I want to kiss you, Rose," he said softly. "And I want you to want me too."

Every aspect of his body - his lips, his hands, his scent -  suddenly overpowered me. I felt warm all over. I wanted him to kiss me with every ounce of my being. There was nothing in life I wanted more than that kiss. I tilted my face up toward his, and he leaned down. I could practically taste his lips.

"Do you want to?" he asked, voice still like velvet. "Do you want to kiss me?"

Did I ever. Everything around me had blurred. Only his lips were in focus.

"Yes," I said. His face moved closer, his mouth only a breath away from mine. We were so, so close, and then -

He stopped. "We're done," he said, stepping back.

I snapped out of it instantly. The dreamy haze was gone, as was the yearning in my body. But I'd discovered something. Under compulsion, I had definitely wanted him to kiss me. Yet even under compulsion, it hadn't been the electric, all-encompassing feeling I had when I was with Dimitri, that feeling that we were practically the same person and were bound by forces bigger than both of us. With Adrian, it had simply been mechanical.

Deirdre had been wrong. If my attraction to Dimitri was just some subconscious reaction, then it should have been as superficial as that forced attraction to Adrian. Yet they were completely different. With Dimitri, it was love - not just some trick my mind was playing on me.

"Hmm," I said.

"Hmm?" asked Adrian, eyeing me with amusement.

"Hmm."

The third "hmm" hadn't come from either of us. I looked across the hall and saw Christian watching us. I separated from Adrian, just as the bell rang. The sounds of students pouring out of classrooms rumbled through the hallway.

"Now I can see Lissa," said Adrian happily.

"Rose, will you come with me to the feeders?" asked Christian. He spoke in a flat tone, and his expression was unreadable.

"I'm not guarding you today."

"Yeah, well, I miss your charming company."

I told Adrian goodbye and cut through the cafeteria with Christian. "What's up?" I asked.

"You tell me," he said. "You were the one about ready to start making out with Adrian."

"It was an experiment," I said. "It was part of my therapy."

"What the hell kind of therapy are you in?"

We reached the feeders' room. Somehow, despite him getting out of class early, there were still a few people ahead of us in line.

"Why do you care?" I asked him. "You should be happy. It means he isn't moving in on Lissa."

"He could be moving in on both of you."

"What are you, my big brother now?"

"Annoyed," he said. "That's what I am."

I looked beyond him and saw Jesse and Ralf enter. "Well, keep it to yourself, or our good friends will overhear."

Jesse, however, was too busy to hear, because he was arguing with the feeding coordinator. "I don't have time to wait," he told her. "I've got to be somewhere."

She pointed to us and the others in line. "These people are ahead of you."

Jesse met her eyes and smiled. "You can make an exception this time."

"Yeah, he's in a hurry," added Ralf in a voice I'd never heard him use before. It was smooth and less grating than usual. "Just write his name down at the top of the list."

The coordinator looked like she was going to tell them off, but then a funny, distracted look came over her face. She glanced at her clipboard and wrote something. A few seconds after she looked away, her head jerked up again, eyes sharp once more. She frowned.

"What was I doing?"

"You were signing me up," said Jesse. He pointed at the board. "See?"

She looked down, startled. "Why is your name first? Didn't you just get here?"

"We were here earlier and checked in. You told us it was okay."

She looked down again, clearly puzzled. She didn't remember them coming earlier - because they hadn't - but she apparently couldn't figure out why Jesse's name was at the top now. A moment later, she shrugged and must have decided it wasn't worth overthinking. "Stand with the others, and I'll call you next."

As soon as Jesse and Ralf came near us, I turned on them. "You just used compulsion on her," I hissed.

Jesse looked panicked for a fraction of a second; then his normal swagger took over. "Whatever. I just convinced her, that's all. What, are you going to try to tell on me or something?"

"Nothing to tell," scoffed Christian. "That was the worst compulsion I've ever seen."