a low neckline that unfortunately didn’t reveal any tempting, plump cleavage, but at least accentuated the flawlessly smooth skin of her long neck, upper chest and arms. She paired it with a high-waisted skirt that came just above her knees (shocking!) and left her legs completely bare.
In fact, she took her rebellious streak to the next level by eschewing underwear altogether.
Her boobs didn’t need a bra to keep them up—they weren’t big enough to answer the call of gravity. And her sex…well, she did feel a strange, disconcerting breeze without the barrier of fabric to protect her core, but it wasn’t an entirely unpleasant feeling. And as Eveline was a woman of efficiency, since the plan was to seduce the Dark King into acquiescence, underwear seemed like an unnecessary encumbrance.
Slipping on an old pair of leather flats, she left her apartment in search of her target.
It was in the middle of the night, so Ramses must be conducting official business either in the throne room or in his adjoining office.
She stopped by his office first, but he wasn’t there. She hoped he wasn’t away from the Cove, which meant she’d have to wait for his return.
Eveline was a relatively patient person. One had to be when trying to piece puzzles together from countless different stories across millennia of history. But when it came to Ramses, she was impatience incarnate.
She wanted everything now. To hear his husky, sinful, dark chocolate voice. To look into those mesmerizing obsidian eyes. To touch that big, muscular, harder-than-hard perfect male body. To kiss his smooth, satiny, golden-bronzed skin. To wrap her mouth around his thick, ruddy, glistening—
“Steady there.”
Two strong hands clasped Eveline’s upper arms before she plowed right into the male in front of her, so lost in her fantasies that she hadn’t noticed where she was going.
“Can I help you, Keeper? Court is in session.”
Eveline looked up at Devlin Sinclair.
The Hunter usually kept watch outside the throne room whenever Ramses held court. The heavy double doors were closed.
“I want to see Ramses,” she blurted.
Then grimaced, because she sounded like a petulant child.
“Will he be in there long?”
Devlin smiled down at her with a strange twinkle in his always mischievous eyes.
“Actually, you come at a good time. I was supposed to retrieve you from the library at about now. You saved me the trip.”
“Oh. I’m invited?”
Eveline recalled the last time Devlin had brought her into one of Ramses’ courts. The Dark King had made her sit at his feet like a dog.
Devlin didn’t directly answer her question, saying instead, “Come. He will be pleased to see you.”
He gestured for the guards to pull the doors open and ushered Eveline in front of him, giving her a gentle push between the shoulder blades.
Bollocks!
Eveline realized belatedly that she probably should have worn underwear after all. Who knew she was going to attend a formal gathering of Dark nobles and royalty?
The scene in the gigantic throne room was similar to the one she experienced before. Throngs of elaborately dressed, beautiful vampires lined up on two sides of the opulent space, leaving a wide path in the middle that led to the raised dais upon which the Dark King sat.
Eveline could feel their stares—some curious, some malevolent, all judgmental. But, as she had before, she focused her attention entirely on the male she was walking towards.
Merciful Goddess, but he was beautiful.
He was dressed the same way during the other formal court he’d held. All black, no adornments, almost casual in attire, his clothes flowing yet fitted. As always, his dark curls were tousled as if his lover had run her hands through them repeatedly while he made hot, passionate love to her; pulled those curls wildly while he made her scream in climax.
Eveline’s core involuntarily clenched and throbbed. Wetness gathered. She really, really regretted the lack of underwear.
His obsidian eyes glittered, and his nostrils subtly flared, as she made her way toward him, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking about when she looked upon him.
But who could blame her!
It’s what every sexually-aware female thought about when they looked at him. He turned her logic to mush, obliterated all her intelligence and reduced her to a molten, quivering mass of fleshly desire that only he could ever satisfy.
Eveline resisted the urge to rub a hand down her face in self-disgust. Even her thoughts were reduced to purple prose.
Finally, she stood before him at the bottom of the dais. Not meeting his eyes (because there was only so