emotions unless we both shielded harder than we were currently shielding, he knew I wanted a hug, but he didn’t come to me or tell Asher to move, which pissed me off. I was already scared; anger wasn’t a good addition.
Jean-Claude was lounging on the huge, custom-made bed, watching me. He was wearing one of his favorite robes, the black one with black fur edging. It was also one of my favorite robes to see him in; there was just something about the utterly white skin of his chest framed by the black fur, his long black curls mingling with the fur until it was hard to tell which darkness was which, and he’d even opened the top enough so I could see the pale brownish cross-shaped burn scar on his chest. He’d opened the robe purposefully that far because he knew how much I enjoyed the view, which pissed me off even more.
“We have an emergency here, Jean-Claude, or didn’t you sense the vampire master that’s got its hooks in Hector?”
“You know I did.”
“Then why aren’t you more upset?”
“I have sent word for everyone to gather here, so we can plan our strategy for tonight, ma petite. Rafael is off telling his people in person, and then he will join us here. Until everyone arrives there is nothing more we can do, so why do you not join us on the bed for the cuddling and comfort?”
I stared at him, openmouthed, not sure what to say. I wasn’t sure if I was more upset that he didn’t seem to be taking the threat seriously, or that he was trying to encourage me to cuddle with him and Asher, when he knew I hadn’t forgiven the other man for his years of terrible behavior.
“You have shocked her speechless,” Asher said from the bed where he lay beside Jean-Claude. I was working so hard at ignoring him, because he was still on my shit list from the epic string of bad choices he’d made that had led all of us to dump him. Jean-Claude had taken him back recently, but with one other exception the rest of us were still pissed at him. At first being pissed at him had made him less attractive to me, but as he kept behaving better, it got harder to stay angry at him, and even harder not to see him as beautiful.
His hair was foamy golden waves around his face. They’d taken time to blow-dry their hair after cleaning up after sword practice; normally they would have sex in the big tub, but they’d cut it short because I was feeding on Rafael and Jean-Claude had needed his attention on that to make sure the energy went where we needed it to go, instead of like a flood that just washed over everything, which was what could happen if I didn’t have help controlling it. The first time I’d fed on Rafael had been an emergency feed to save Jean-Claude’s and Richard’s lives; that time I’d known exactly where to send all that energy, but day to day—that wasn’t my area of expertise.
Jean-Claude stroked his hand along Asher’s hair where all that gold hair was hiding half his face like a veil. That was why they’d dried their hair instead of having sex, because if his hair had been wet, Asher couldn’t have used it to hide the scars on the right side of his face. Holy water burns vampire flesh like acid. The Church had tried to burn the devil out of Asher centuries ago. Jean-Claude had saved his life, but the holy water scars went down the left side of his body. All of that was hidden now behind a brown brocade robe with golden and brown fur trim. Since there was black-on-black brocade on Jean-Claude’s robe, they looked even more like a matched pair than normal. Belle Morte had collected beautiful men with blue eyes. Jean-Claude’s had been the darkest, and Asher’s were the palest blue I’d ever seen in a human. Jean-Claude’s eyes reminded me that the sky was always blue no matter how dark the night, and Asher’s eyes were winter skies, pale and cold, but glittering with humor right now. I didn’t want him laughing at the fact that I was speechless with provincial shock, not when the thought that only me being angry with him was preventing me from crawling onto the bed and getting cuddles from both of them. The offer for more than just cuddles