Page 19 of Vengeance and Vipers
I should shut up. What if he decides he wants me to be more miserable and takes the blankets away? Makes the food less palatable, or stops bringing it altogether? He could just stop coming down here and kill both Krase and me that way. I wouldn’t put it past him. He’s a supe no matter how human he looks, how civilized he pretended to be when I was here before. He could do it easily and probably wouldn’t feel a thing if it was just me, but Krase is a different story. He’s family, after all.
‘What are you going to do about Krase?’ I ask him point-blank.
His eyes flick to his clan mate, who’s in the corner staring at the wall and hasn’t even made a move towards his food, though he must be as hungry as I am.
‘Have you reconsidered?’ I ask, hoping that he has, even though Demon Krase is a dick.
‘For now,’ he answers.
‘Why?’
He stares at Krase. ‘Because he asked me for more time, and he’s my friend.’
He looks back at me, clearly surprised that he just answered me like that, like we’re not prisoner and jailor.
‘How do you do that?’ he asks me quietly, coming closer to the bars.
‘Do what?’ I say, looking up at him from my knees.
His eyes move over me, and I can tell he likes me in this position. He never said anything, but I always had a feeling that he and Daemon especially had certain proclivities.
Guess I was right.
I should probably use them to my advantage.
I lean forward a little so he can see down my top just a smidge. His eyes flick down, and I pretend not to notice.
‘You always know how to make me relax, tell you things.’
I don’t break our eye contact.
‘It’s not on purpose,’ I say.
He huffs, and the spell is broken.
I look down at my plate and finish eating, but despite the food, the hollowness in my belly hasn’t been assuaged. Reluctantly, I push the tray back under the bars, wishing I’d have eaten slower because now I have nothing to do.
‘Would you do me a favor?’ I murmur, grasping the bars in front of him.
After all, if you don’t ask, you don’t get.
‘What is it?’ he asks, his eyes darting over me in suspicion but still lingering on the breasts that are squished against the bars.
He steps so close we’re almost touching, and I gasp a tiny bit. He smellsso good. For a second, I forget my question as I breathe in the scent of leather and neroli. My eyes have drifted closed, and I feel something coming from him.
He wants me, I realize.
My eyes snap open at the same time his do, and he leaps back with a snarl. ‘Don’t you fucking dare, Julia!’
I try to hide my surprise at his visceral reaction, taking a couple of steps back into the cell while I watch him. I jump as an arm darts through the bars beside me, and I dance away from Krase’s claws that are trying to grab me. He’s staring at me with such a hungry look in his eye that I shudder because, despite his threats of physical violence, it looks like that isn’t what he really wants to do to me. He’s been lying, maybe to us both.
I hear the door open, and I let out a cry.
‘No, wait! Please, Julian! I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry.’
I say everything I can think of to delay him even though I have no idea why he was so upset, nor any inkling of what I’m actually apologizing for.
‘Stop doing it then!’ he thunders.
