to cradle her as he sank his teeth in, and I doubted he had much time to drink before he lifted his head.
He spared me a look of distaste, as if finding my observation tacky. Too. Fucking. Bad. If they wanted to put on a show in front of me, let them.
Eleanor wasn’t done. She went to Fin next and slid her arms around him. He scowled, no pretense in his expression at all. When she pressed her lips to his ear, he moved his head, then caught her hand and lifted her wrist to his mouth. He bit down once, and she let out a moan, but he didn’t hold her there and, like Rogue, finished in scant seconds.
The apology in his eyes surprised me, but Maddox’s snarled, “Go the fuck away, Eleanor,” distracted me.
The woman paused in front of him and, as with Alfred, she went almost to her knees, but he ignored her.
“Have I offended you?”
Alfred moved into my line of sight, his expression utterly unreadable as he studied the pair.
“Just go away,” Maddox said, motioning her to rise.
“But I am here to serve as always.” Woman apparently didn’t get the memo of disinterest, because she all but flung herself at Maddox. His expression darkened, and heat ballooned out as he shoved her away without any care, then she landed on her ass right in front of me.
Surprise, hurt, and then rage slid over her gorgeous face, and she lifted those dark eyes toward me. Challenge flooded her expression, but she shuttered it at Rogue’s clipped, “Take the blood offering, Maddox, and then Eleanor can go.”
“I don’t want it,” Maddox argued.
“It’s not a matter of want,” Alfred stated. “The offerings are coming. All will be accepted in due course. Eleanor is merely the first.” He looked at me, and I lifted a middle finger while I picked up a piece of bacon.
Fin bit back a laugh, and Maddox’s furious expression turned amused. None of these reactions lasted as Eleanor moved to her knees and then almost crawled to Maddox.
“Just get it over with,” Rogue advised, and Eleanor’s back stiffened. I crunched the bacon, even if my appetite had gone away. More offerings were coming? Retainers were filling the keep?
Did that mean their isolation was ending?
Those distractions might give me the time I needed. The stand-off lasted another three blazing minutes. Maddox looked at me finally, and his expression made all kinds of promises I didn’t want him giving me. Like Fin, he went for her wrist, but rather than bite her, he just licked one of the drops of blood dribbling there and then dropped her hand like it burned him.
He hadn’t wanted her blood. At all. Disgust rolled off of him in waves, and anger coiled in my gut. Alfred shouldn’t have forced him. Still, my dragon moved away from the woman, who remained on her knees.
Undeterred, Eleanor rose to her feet and started toward Alfred, only to stop when he raised a hand. He motioned for her to twirl and then nodded toward me.
If I’d thought her spine had stiffened before, that was nothing on it now. She turned to face me.
Oh. Fuck. No.
The earlier rage rekindled in her eyes. Rogue had moved to stand next to my chair while Maddox bracketed it on the other side.
Smoothing the emotions away from her expression, Eleanor dropped to curtsey before me and then tilted her head, though every part of her seemed to vibrate in rejection.
Yeah.
Not happening.
I met Alfred’s gaze over her head, and he raised his eyebrows.
Ignoring Eleanor, I rose from the chair, and before I could put my plate or tumbler aside, Anton swept them from my hands and also offered me his throat.
Fin shook his head. Beautiful…
“Save it,” I told him. “This…isn’t happening.” With that, I turned and moved away from all of them. They wanted to trap me here, turn me, and keep me isolated, fine. Whatever.
“Fiona,” Alfred said in a tone that demanded I obey.
I paused at the doors to the library, but I didn’t turn around. “You know I wouldn’t take the warden’s blood bags either.”
Silence crashed through the room, and I shoved the doors open. What fondness for the library I’d developed died in front of the fireplace.
I wouldn’t take a meal in there again.
If they planned on having a parade of these fuckers coming to offer their blood, I’d rather be back in a cell.
I doubted they’d give me long, but I descended the steps and headed for the