Taken by a Vampire (Vampire Queen) - By Joey W. Hill Page 0,134

her instantly. What was she doing? Startled, she pushed away from Niall, moving to the edge of the bed, trying to get her breath.

“I’m sorry. I apologize, Master. I don’t know . . . it won’t happen again.” She hurried to the bathroom, not looking back as she closed the door, put her hands to her heated cheeks. Was it possible she didn’t have the strength to manage or suppress it? It seemed to be taking her over.

In the bedroom, Niall pressed his forehead to the quilts. He realized his mistake as the warmth of her body, the smell of her, filled his senses. Straightening, he willed his aching cock to ease off so the fit of his trousers wouldn’t be this damn uncomfortable. Was it necessary to be that harsh? ’Tis new to her, the wanting. And a pure pleasure to watch, even if it’s pure hell to resist.

She’s learning to be a different kind of servant, but she’s still a servant, Niall. She needs the boundaries, the reminders. For someone with her training, it’s critical.

Ye just wanted to deprive me.

There was that added benefit.

Niall had a creative response to that, to which Evan responded in kind. The Scot heaved out a sigh, shoved off the bed. “Join me in the kitchen,” he called out to Alanna. “We’ll make a quick breakfast, then start packing.”

Evan, down in the cellar, gazed at the final prints drying, but his mind wasn’t on them. Niall wasn’t the only one aching. He’d wanted to join them both last night, as well as this morning. Alanna had slept in the back bedroom with Niall last night, not just because she wanted to be near his servant. She’d already made the connection that Evan could remain in that bedroom, at least during the early dawn hours, and she wanted to be accessible to both her Master and his servant. She was chastising herself for letting her passion override his command, but he himself had never managed the heady experience of a servant so committed to pleasing him. If it had been the rote response of her training, he could have contained his own response, but she was right. They’d opened something inside of her, something he was fairly sure Stephen had never discovered, the true gem of what she wanted.

A Master who would let her love as well as serve him.

He’d proven to her that, when her will and desire were added into the mix, it increased the pleasure for her Master, but in his self-appointed position as mentor for that sensual treasure trove, he hadn’t expected what it would do to him and Niall. His servant was getting as captured as his Master by the intriguing contradiction of Alanna. Since becoming Evan’s servant, Niall had enjoyed many women and some men as part of their travels. But he hadn’t truly wanted a female heart since the death of his wife. The circumstances of her death, his guilt about not loving her as much as he felt he should, had kept a wall in place.

Alanna was breaking that wall down, in more ways than one, and she didn’t even realize it. It’s obvious how much he loves you . . .

Evan shook his head, made himself focus on the photos again. Soon he’d have to sleep, and he needed to pack these up now, so that when he rose at dusk they’d be ready to get on the road.

The rest would figure itself out. Or not. Small fish in a big pond, he reminded himself. He was valued among the vampires because of Lord Uthe’s sponsorship. Like Alanna recognizing it didn’t matter who she served, she was still a servant, he had no illusions as to how much influence that sponsorship gave him.

Some of his original humanity remained, but Evan thought it was more his isolated circumstances than humanity that gave him latitude to exercise things that most vampires didn’t. Compassion, interest in the minds of their servants, what they were thinking, feeling, wanting . . . Niall wasn’t all wrong about the blank canvas. Sometimes Evan did have to remind himself there was a value separate from his artistic impulses. A separate soul.

But a soul that was his. It was hard to resist the vampire compulsion that told him his servant was all his, to do with as he would. And now he had two of them.

But that compulsion also helped him do what he’d done earlier, keeping Alanna mindful of her service. Raised