Page 24 of Blood Ties (City of Blood #1)

Elina

Falling in love happens slowly, then all at once. You don’t even realize it’s happening until your heart already belongs to someone else and you can’t stop it. Even if you see it like a train wreck coming your way, it’s already too late to dodge it.

That’s how I feel as I lay on Bash’s couch.

After he teased and touched me. The orgasm was unexpected, and better than I could have imagined.

I feel slightly ashamed. I guess ‘ashamed’ isn’t the right word but something similar.

Like I betrayed my own humanity by giving in.

Seeing him kneeling between my knees looking so earnest and open has brought my defenses down, and I can’t wait to explore what happens next.

I don’t want to want this. But I do, and I feel safe here, with him. That’s the most dangerous part of all.

Bash brings me a glass of water and I sit cross-legged on his couch facing him. This aftercare version of Bash is a new side of him that I am excited to learn more about. “Thank you. For the water, I mean. And for the other thing too.” I blush.

“You’re welcome, for both. God, I love this blush so much.” He brushes his fingers down my cheek. “Let me tell you about Vlad the Impaler, please.”

Twenty minutes later I am almost crying from laughing so hard at his story.

“He really was a very weird, very cruel prince. My mother could tell you more, she knew him when he was merely a whiny brat in a castle. For all his cruelty though, he did inspire the greatest piece of vampire fiction in history. Vlad Dracula!” He says this with a huge flourish and a silly accent, throwing his arms out, fangs on full show.

I almost fall off the couch in surprise and burst out laughing.

“Stop, stop, stop! Now I’m going to need to know about all of the famous vampires through history.”

“I’ll save a few steps and say there haven’t been many reported vampires that were actually vampires.

Obviously, there are some now, since the Devereaux family threw the curtain back by invading New Orleans, but generally we tend to fly under the radar.

There is another clan of Italian vampires, but they aren’t the bloodline variety so we don’t intermingle. ”

“Wait, there are different kinds of vampires? You know what? Nevermind. Let me focus on what’s in front of me. I guess the pendant works—good to know. Also, still sorry about that, by the way.”

He laughs under his breath and gently rubs the slight red spot on his chest. “It’s ok, Tesoro, clearly neither of us were thinking.”

KNOCK.

KNOCK.

KNOCK.

Someone knocks on his door and we both turn our heads towards it, as though we would be able to see through the solid wood.

“Expecting someone?” I ask him tentatively, suddenly feeling genuinely trapped.

“No, I am not.” He furrows his brows for a moment before relaxing.

“Stay here, and don’t freak out or anything, but it’s my mother.

” I don’t ask how he knows that, must be a vampire thing or something.

The couch is somewhat hidden from view due to the direction of the door, so I hear her before I see her when he swings the door open.

“Stellino, my love. I heard that you were—what’s that smell?

It smells like human food and—” she pushes the door all the way open and looks over at me on the couch, trying to make myself as small and inconspicuous as possible.

The dark grey eyes that perfectly mirror Bash’s own study me for a moment.

“Sex. Oh my. I see.” And just like that she turns around and walks back out the door.

Bash looks a little chagrined, closing the door behind her.

My face flames as he rejoins me on the couch. “What does she mean, ‘it smells like sex’?”

“Oh, um.” He rubs the back of his neck. “Vampires have really good senses, you know, right? Better eyesight, better hearing, better sense of smell. So, we can smell a lot of things, including when a woman is turned on.” As though the levels of my embarrassment aren’t deep enough, there is a new one.

It’s like Dante's inferno, and I keep sinking further and further.

“Well, isn’t that interesting,” I answer because what else am I supposed to say?

“Tesoro, it’s nature. Don’t worry about it.

” His response is nonchalant, as though it doesn’t matter in the slightest. I think back to his letters and the way he discussed sex and vampire culture.

I guess to him, it is not a big deal. “Well, that was my mother. After you go home, I will definitely have to go have a conversation about it. Shit, I did not want to have to explain all this already to her.”

“You’re almost 500 years old, Bash, what could you possibly need to explain?”

“I want her to like you and she hasn’t seen me with anyone besides Talia in a very long time. She will have questions, and opinions. I need to pave the way carefully here.”

“Ok, so pave the way. Tell me what happens now, Bash? I’m not sure what we are doing or what this all means to me, but I can’t emotionally invest unless there is something here.

It’s already difficult enough to reconcile my feelings with what my brain thinks is the right thing. You’re the villain in my story.”

He stares at me seriously for a few minutes, almost as though he is just realizing something.

“I don’t want to be the villain in your story because you’re the sun in mine.

” Pulling me closer so that I am tucked under his arm, he breathes in the top of my head.

“I don’t have all the answers Elina. All I know is that I want more—so much more.

Stay with me tonight, I’ll take you home before sunrise. ”

“I can’t. Grand-mere already worries too much about me when I’m here, I have to go home. And I need to think about everything that’s happening. We should go now, before it gets too late.”

After a truly quick ride home on the back of his bike, I climb off and hand him my helmet.

Walking across my lawn, I hear a whispered “Tesoro.” I turn back and Bash is striding across the grass, my helmet in his hand.

He drops it at my feet before wrapping one arm around my waist, lifting me off the grass while his other hand holds the side of my neck.

He, almost imperceptibly, presses on my pulse point with his thumb, growling in a distinctly sexy way, and kissing me like he needs my breath to live.

He’s kissing me in my front yard like he is yearning, dying for a taste of me, and couldn’t wait another minute.

I’m breathless by the time he sets me back on my feet.

I wobble unsteadily as he lets me go, making him chuckle.

Pressing his lips against mine lightly, he says “Goodbye,” before swiping up the helmet and going back the way he came.

“I think you better come inside now,” I hear from the porch and my eyes find Grand-mere Celeste standing in the doorway.

I don’t think I have ever seen her look at me that way, her eyes shrouded with an emotion I don't recognize. I think it's disappointment. I can’t be sure because she’s never been disappointed in me before.

I look back at Sebastien who watches me warily, concern etched in his brow.

I give him a nod to let him know I’m ok and I trudge up the stairs, my head hanging low.

She rounds on me as soon as we step into the living room.

“You should be damn ashamed of yourself. Standing on the front lawn of the house I raised you in—the house I raised your maman in—kissing a damn vampire. And not any vampire, the man whose family is the reason you’re an orphan.

Elina, I know you’re grown now, but this is too much for me to allow.

I was horrified when I looked outside after I heard that motorbike.

Horrified. What were you thinking?” She all but yells at me.

I have never seen her so upset about something I did. I have always tried to make her proud.

What the hell am I doing? She’s right, of course.

I should be ashamed. I’m falling for a man responsible for so much death and destruction.

I can’t give him my heart, we can’t be together.

I’m a human. A fragile, mortal human who is being subjugated by his family.

We are blood donors for the vampires, not wives and loved ones.

He has no stake in whether I or my family lives or dies.

If he does decide to start caring about me, how far does that concern go?

How many degrees of separation are covered by Bash’s umbrella of love?

“Grand-mere Celeste, I’m sorry. I like him—I care about him—but you’re right.

It’s stupid. I can’t believe I allowed myself to be drawn in by him.

I let him in and I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry.

Please don’t be mad at me. I vow to you that you will never see again what you saw today.

I swear it,” I plead for her forgiveness.

She stares at me, her gaze softening as she takes in my desperate words, the hitching of my breath, and the tears welling in my eyes. “Elina, I don’t want you to be unhappy, but I can’t support this. Where are the human boys you could be going out with? Don’t do this to our family. Please.”

“I’m sorry.” I leave her in the middle of the living room, grey hair in curlers, and her feet in slippers that match the robe I got her last Christmas. I drag myself up the stairs and climb into bed. Crying myself to sleep, I clutch Bash’s letters like they are a lifeline I am about to drop.