Gaslight (Crossbreed #4)(112)

“Why would they go through all the trouble of paying for someone only to kill them?”

He shrugged. “Sometimes a youngling is unable to control their bloodlust. That’s why the buyers are very particular about where they get the merchandise from. Houdini chose willing women from those ads. Did they know what they were truly getting into? No. But the ones who glamorize and fantasize about Vampires are easier to control and more likely to respect and fear their elders than someone made against their will. No one wants to pay millions of dollars for an ungovernable slave.”

“What happened to the girl?”

Christian ran his fingers through the brown fur beneath him. “I charmed her to get as much information as I could about her kidnapping, but most of it had already been scrubbed. Worry not, Raven. I left her with happy memories. The officials can’t send her back to her family since she’s been turned. They’re too politically prominent, so the scandal will keep them quiet.”

“What scandal?”

“’Tis a shame when a young lass runs off with a dashing young man who wants nothing more than to make love to her while under the influence of LSD. She’ll write them a letter every few years from a new location, living her bohemian life. Where she’ll actually be is another story, but closing that case as a murder wouldn’t have given a family like that peace. They would have opened an investigation and suffered needlessly. Children go off into the world all the time to live their dreams.”

I smiled at the thought.

Christian suddenly reached out and touched my face. “Seems like forever since I’ve seen that look.” He scooted closer. “There’s something I can’t get off my mind.”

“What’s that?”

“Fletcher.”

I slanted my eyes away.

“Are you planning to hunt him down?”

“No,” I quickly said, shifting my position.

“You don’t want to see him dead?”

I braved a look. “We’re immortal. I’ll run into him again… eventually. And when that day comes, I’ll be ready. But right now, Keystone is my priority. I’m not letting him ruin the life I’ve built. Not again. He won’t take that from me.”

Christian leaned in so close that his lips brushed against mine. The nearness of him gave me comfort for reasons I couldn’t explain, and a fire smoldered in his black eyes.

I wanted him.

He claimed my lips with a hunger that belied his outward calm.

The absence of touch was cruel, so I scooted closer until he wrapped his arm around me. Christian’s lips were firm and sensual, his tongue stroking against mine with restrained passion.

It shocked me how easy it was with him—how familiar.

His hand swept down my back to my thigh, fingers slipping beneath the string of my bikini bottoms. One snap, and he could tear apart the fabric, but instead he tortured me with his inviting touch. Christian slowly broke the kiss, his whiskers coarse against my skin. I liked the way they felt against my lips—it made me want to scratch my teeth against his jaw. He dragged his mouth to my neck, and when he stroked my artery with his tongue, I desperately clutched him.

Suddenly, a dark memory slithered in my thoughts, and I drew back.

“Did I hurt you?” he asked, confusion swimming in his eyes.

I wanted to turn around and face the fire so he couldn’t see my anguish, but instead I wiped a spot of blood that had dried on my wrist. “I’ll never be clean.”

“I can fix that with another pail of water.”

“No, that’s not what I mean.” My lip quivered, and I silently cursed myself for letting my emotions take over. “How can you be with me after knowing what he did?”

Fletcher had pleasured himself on more than one occasion, and the few times he climaxed, he’d done it right on me. Christian had to have known, but if not, I didn’t want to verbalize that fact out loud.

With the crook of his finger, he tilted my chin up to look at him. “Your Creator took pleasure in degrading you. But if you allow yourself to feel ashamed about something you had no control over, then he wins. You’re strong. You have the gifts and potential to be a powerful immortal, and Fletcher knows that. I’ve heard a Mage can tell a lot of things from stealing another’s light. He wants you for himself, and that means never showing you what you’re capable of becoming.”

“And what’s that?”

He cupped my face with his hands and stripped me bare with his eyes. “Everything.”

I leaned forward to taste his lips again. So soft and pliant—a contrast from the hard, cruel man I knew him to be.

Christian drew back. “Are you just doing this to remember?”

I softly kissed the corner of his mouth and crawled onto his lap. “No. I’m doing this to forget.”

He sucked in a sharp breath when I licked his earlobe and then nipped it. Christian wasn’t touching me, and my constant craving for his physical affection became unbearable. I needed to feel something besides hate, besides pain.

He gripped my shoulders and held me back. “Don’t do something you’ll regret later. It’s too soon.”

“Stop saying that!” I struck his chest with my fists, my voice broken. “I can’t wait five years to get my life together again. I can’t go on feeling this emptiness that’s growing inside me like a black hole. If I don’t feel something now—something good—I’m going to shatter into a million pieces.”