Page 38 of V for Vengeance

I’d promised to let go for tonight.

Maybe it was arrogance, but I didn’t think Cash would be shameless enough to do anything to me. Not now. He might be a cowardly asshole, but I didn’t think he was out to hurt me. Or maybe I was too trusting. Maybe I’d regret it later.

But what would Kate do?

Discarding my instincts, I took the drink and downed the contents before I could talk myself out of it.

It was instantaneous; a wave of dizzying sensation washed over me like the one I’d experienced with Phillip the first time I drank alcohol. It was the same feeling of being tipsy, but I had better control over my limbs. I wasn’t falling all over myself this time. My inhibitions seemed to be turned off by how quicklyI fell in rhythm with Cash’s movements, but my head still processed things the same way it would if I were sober. There wasn’t a delay in my thoughts.

Not yet, at least.

“It won’t inhibit the necessary faculties, V. Just make everything feel better. A bit more…sensitive, perhaps.” I glared at him. “In a good way, I assure you. You’ll enjoy the atmosphere more, love. You have my word as a gentleman.”

Ha! Gentleman. Where?

I’d meant to say it out loud, but the words got caught in my throat. My mouth didn’t move to say them, either. Rude. But he wasn’t wrong. The way his body felt against mine as we pressed closer, pushed together by the swarming crowd, reminded me of that one time when Phillip and I danced together at the Hocus Pocus club.

Now that I thought about it, that was the first time I met Cash. Wow. Weird. Never thought I’d be reprising my role as a sensual dance partner to the Dark Fae, but I guess crazier things had happened.

My skin was hypersensitive to his caress. I quivered every time his fingers brushed across my skin. Even made a few sounds I wasn’t proud of. And soon, Cash took it a step further. He rubbed his hands all the way down my arms, his beautiful purple gaze staying with mine. He laced our fingers together and guided them around his shoulders. Then his hands were on my waist, bringing me closer to his heat. To his luscious scent.

Fuck, he smells so good.

Wait, how long had we been dancing?

My head lolled to the right and left, but time was a construct in this tipsy world the drink brought on.

“You should still be able to think on your feet and fight like a demon. Think of it like muscle memory. Your reflexes will kick in.”

I wasn’t sure who this gorgeous bastard was talking to because my smile had gotten lazy and I wasn’t fighting him. I was moving with him. I’d fallen under the drink’s spell.

But Cash went on as if he was worried I’d accuse him of something, “I’m not a madman. I’d never put you in a vulnerable position, dove. You have to trust that much,” he whispered, his beautiful face shimmering in the strobe light. His breath hit my face faster, andgoddammit,it felt amazing.

My head tilted to one side before I slid my hands down his smooth chest then returned them to loop around his naked shoulders. I dragged his head down, bringing our mouths close enough to kiss. His glowing cat eyes dropped before he licked his lips and wrapped one arm tightly around my waist so our hips locked together. His other hand sunk into my hair.

The way he stared at me was different. Charged. Maybe even feral. He wanted something. He was desperate for it. It made all the purple in his eyes turn to liquid and his cat-eye slits blow out wide enough to overtake most of the color.

Dragging his fingers through my loose curls, I watched Cash’s heated gaze dance around my face until it reached my lips. His mouth opened, but he didn’t say anything. Or maybe I hadn’t heard him because I was lost to how good it all felt. He didn’t do anything else, just twisted my hair through his fingers and swung us side to side in time with the beat.

For a second, I really considered kissing him.

I could blame the alcohol and use it as an excuse to taste those ridiculously soft lips again—to live in the moment. It was a stupid urge to have, but something about the way he touched me and tugged his fingers through my hair, the way he rolled his hips against mine but kept us locked together, put heat into my stomach. Twisted the damn thing into knots. Through the lens of my tipsy haze, it was like seeing the Dark Fae in a whole new light, and he was so goddamn beautiful.

“You know what’s crazy? I do trust you. It doesn’t make sense, but it’s like…it’s like I know you’ll never hurt me,” I whispered as if I couldn’t help myself.

Is this drink a truth serum of some kind?

Cash’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth, struggling to say something. Visibly swallowing, he bent his head down, and his hold on me tightened. “V—”

But I’d looked away already. I was distracted by something that moved out of the corner of my eye. The familiar glow of amber. I almost didn’t believe it at first. I thought my inebriated brain was playing tricks on me. Because it didn’t make sense that a shadow in the crowd would suddenly shift and solidify into a person. Or that that shadow would then become someone I’d spent weeks being confused about—and still honestly was.

Nothing in Sloan’s book of supernatural oddities was capable of becoming a shadow. I mean, at least I didn’t think so. I really needed to read all the tomes he lent me. It was on my to-do list.

So, what was she? Was this magic or something else?

“This was quite clever of you, I’ll admit, to accost V without her keeper’s permission. But whatever thing you’re planning here, it’s over. One of Lux’s henchmen is here. Knowing what she can do, I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s one of the Seven. And she didn’t come to play. She brought an army of Fae with her, and they’re about to storm this place with their bag of tricks. If we don’t leave now, they’ll trap us, and then we’ll be forced to fight.”

My eyes took a lazy path down Jo’s body, a little slower on the uptake. “But there’s like a hundred people in here…” I slurred. “We can’t…I won’t leave them to die.”

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