Page 48 of The Doctor and the Devil
The smile slipped from her lips, but her eyes carried the sparkle of mirth.
“Of course,” she said. “Perhaps it’s simply the exertion and excitement of the last few days.”
“It must be,” I answered, glaring, wishing to be anywhere but beneath those intense, amethyst-colored eyes.
“It would be absurd to suggest that you’d found love within mere weeks with the man who broke your heart twenty years ago, who was not the villain you believed him to be, and who has come back to claim you once more,” she continued. “You’re much too sensible to fall for his charms again. Humans and vampires make difficult pairings if you do not wish for immortality. You know that, of course. He is handsome and honorable, I believe, but his past…well, you know. Some women have a hard time settling down with rogues, even if they are reformed. Still, he would make a fine match for any supernatural woman.”
The thought of Rafael with another woman kicked bile up into my throat, and I swallowed the instinctive swell of anger with force.
“He would, of course,” I said with a tight smile. “A fine match for a supernatural woman. Clearly anyone but me.” The words came out bitter and dripping with misery.Of course I don’t deserve him. I’m just some lowly human.
“Oh?” Her sharp gaze pinned me in place, seeing through my lie. Mercifully, she carried on as if I hadn’t said the words. “I’ve never known you to be interested in marriage or immortality,” she said airily, walking back to her seat at the end of the table and picking up Étienne’s abandoned glass of blood. “I suppose you worry a husband would force you to stop working and that marriage would be terribly dull. And that immortality comes with too many sacrifices and too few benefits.”
I didn’t say it, but Daphne had put her fingers on two precise reasons why I’d been so afraid to consider a future with Rafael. I pursed my lips, wishing this exchange would end.
She sighed as she sat down. “It would be untrue of me to say I didn’t miss a warm, sunny afternoon now and then. The hum of birdsong and insects in a summer meadow. The glitter of sunlight on freshly fallen snow. The dazzling blue of a cloudless sky.”
I wasn’t particularly attuned to the natural world, but every time I had considered immortality, I shied away from it like a coward.
“Of course,” I said. “Your world is marked by blood and darkness and death.”
“So it is,” she agreed, with a knowing smile. “But so is yours.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but upon reflection, realized that she was right. Even if I wasn’t a vampire, I’d kept to a supernatural schedule for so long, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen a sunny afternoon. And in my profession, blood and death were as common as they were to any vampire. It was an odd realization and one that gave me pause.
“On the other hand,” she said, violet eyes fixed on the red swirling in her glass. “There is beauty to be found everywhere, and supernatural senses have much to offer. Sometimes, when it is truly quiet in the small hours of the night, I could swear I hear the stars singing.”
A floorboard creaked behind me, and Daphne’s gaze rose above my shoulder.
“Rafael,” she said, her sly smile returning. “I do hope you haven’t been waiting there long.”
Dread pooled in my stomach. I hoped he hadn’t heard my conversation with Daphne, but as I turned to face him, the fire in his eyes told me that he had.
Merde.
17
RAFAEL
April 27, 1768
Château de Ruisseau Magdelaine
When I enteredthe dining room, two things were excruciatingly,painfullyclear to me. The first was that Mina was wearing breeches.Gods above and demons below, this must be some sort of test.The second was that I suspected Daphne had known I was outside the dining room and expected me to hear every word of their conversation.
Nursing the gaping wound where my heart would have been made it a touch easier to try to ignore the uncomfortable insistence of my hard cock pressing against my breeches. I couldn’t help but stare, taking in the way the supple buckskin caressed her round ass and shapely legs as my hands had done a day ago. The men’s clothing she wore showed off every curve of her body in a way that made my mouth go bone dry. I felt my eyes darken to black and red and my fangs lengthened, startling me with the ferocity of my desire. Altogether inconvenient given Mina had just confessed she thought I’d make a better husband for someone else.
“Rafael,” she said, the panic in her voice evident.
“I’ll just go see where Charlotte is,” Daphne said, downing the last of her blood and hurrying from the room. Mina’s gaze cut to the retreating duchess—also clad in men’s attire—as if she would rescue her from the looming storm of my anger.
The door closed quietly behind her, but the sound was like cannon fire in the tense silence that stretched between us.
“What Daphne said…I didn’t mean…” Mina fumbled over the words.
Frustration pulled my nerves taut. Maybe it had been naïve of me, but after the intimacy we’d shared, I’d sensed a change in her. A softening. I dared to hope that it meant we’d be able to work through some of the things that parted us, but I’d been fooling myself. How could I have expected her to leave behind a past that she felt defined her? She’d told me herself. In the wake of my false betrayal, she’d forged a life of ambition and solitude. I didn’t fault her for that, but it devastated me to allow my absent heart to become entangled in something that was apparently some kind of physical distraction for her. Despite knowing that, I would be with Mina in any way she would allow—even if it meant never being able to have her completely. That heavy knowledge made me the world’s greatest fool.
Pain took root in my chest and seemed to wind throughout my body, irritating me like thorns beneath my skin. The pitying expression on Mina’s face cut worse than a thousand harsh words. I stalked to the end of the table where Daphne had left the decanter of blood and poured myself a glass.
