Page 22 of The Vampire's Hunter

Dani made a hasty exit then, escaping the pressing heat of the ballroom and quickly locating a passing waiter. She plucked a bubbling champagne glass from his tray, before immediately downing the contents. She felt Corbin’s presence behind her a moment later.

“I think you’re supposed to savor it,” he whispered into her ear.

Dani passed the champagne flute back to the waiter, before snatching another. “I’m sorry I insulted him so blatantly. I have no doubt that’ll cause trouble for you, but I…I just couldn’t stand to stay silent as he stood there with that smug look on his face, and that poor woman…”

“Do you think I am angry with you?” Corbin asked, as if he were amused.

Dani shook her head a little, sipping more of her champagne glass. Now that she was really letting the flavor linger in her mouth, she wasn’t even certain she truly wanted it. She set the half-full flute down on another passing tray again. “I just thought maybe you’d be—”

“You were incredible, darling, and Lucien is no doubt furious. You have his attention now, and that’s exactly where we want him.”

Dani lifted a brow. “Andwhydo we want his attention again?”

Corbin had never exactly made that clear.

He hadn’t been very forthcoming about their plans. A fact that hadn’t escaped her attention.

He chuckled a little, as if she’d done something to amuse him again. “Like I said before,” he extended his arm toward her. “You’ll have your revenge. Leave the details to me.”

Dani hummed her approval. The champagne going to her head quickly, relaxing her. Just enough to make her forget, if for a moment, that she couldn’t fully trust him.

Not really.

He was still a vampire after all. As her brother had reminded her.

The growing tension and feeling between them nothing more than for show.

Hiccupping, she held Corbin tight as he led her back toward the dance floor. “Now that you’ve proven to this world that you’re unafraid of Lucien, time to reclaim your place as its queen,” he said, his words enticing and entrancing her once more.

To her surprise, for the next hour, Dani didn’t once think of Lucien again, or, if she was truthful, she managed to avoid looking at him directly, at least. Instead, she was too caught up in the feel of what it was like to be whisked about the dance floor in Corbin’s arms, to have all eyes watching her. Even if it wasn’t real. Even though it never would be.

And though she knew that in time, Corbin would give her the signal to slip away, to take her true shot against Lucien, already she felt as if she had won, because tonight, she’d learned what she’d came here to do. To reassert herself. To reclaim her place.

And survival was its own kind of revenge entirely.

6

The hour grew late, and for once in his very long life, Corbin was starting to become nervous. “Where are they?” he hissed, pulling Kharis to the side whilst Dani had ducked into the ladies’ room.

“There here now. Just arrived,” Kharis confirmed.

A weight lifted from Corbin’s chest. “Good.” He nodded. “Good.”

They needed more than a little finesse, if this was to go smoothly.

“And Lucien?” Kharis asked, quirking a brow. The Greek’s dark eyes combed the room, as if in search for the vampire in question.

“Intrigued,” Corbin said, his gaze narrowing to where Dani now crossed the room toward them. “And none the wiser. He hasn’t been able to take his eyes off her all evening.”

“Good,” Kharis said. He made a show of clapping Corbin on the shoulder. “We may just pull this off, old boy.”

“Don’t get too confident,” Corbin warned, as Dani approached. “Not yet.”

“Too confident about what?” she asked, those large doe-eyes staring up at him.

Fuck, she made him wish he were an honest man. Agoodman.

It really did kill him that he had to use her this way, to treat her as if she and her goals didn’t mean anything to him, but it was par for the course, he supposed. He was a vampire, and she was a human, and everything good in his life had already been taken from him.

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