Page 26 of Dance of the Phoenix (Cloak of the Vampire #3)

Aileen

That afternoon, Ragnor wasn’t the one who waited for me near the cafeteria entrance. Instead, Magnus was there, drawing attention from most female—and some male—vampires, who openly salivated over his admittedly godly looks.

When he saw me, he waved his hand and I approached him, feeling my anger from before blooming again. “Hey,” he said when I stopped before him. “I’ll be training you today.”

“I figured,” I murmured, clenching my hands into fists. “Where’s Ragnor?”

Magnus seemed pained. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on with you two,” he said quietly, “but whatever it is, I recommend you fix it sooner rather than later. We’re heading to the Hecatomb in a few days,” he added, “and you should really not let your issues be your undoing.”

With those eerie words, and my distress already rising the closer the Hecatomb got, Magnus took me to Ragnor’s town house, and the training commenced.

Knowing Magnus was right, I decided to see Ragnor that evening. I was still beyond furious with him, not to mention extremely hurt by his behavior, but the Hecatomb was almost upon us. I had to make sure things were at least amiable between us if not fixed entirely.

So instead of heading straight to the suite, I went to his office. His secretaries, however, told me he wasn’t there.

I looked for him in the cafeteria, but he wasn’t there, either, so I headed to the Troop gym, hoping to find him there.

And I did find him there.

Just not alone.

Hiding behind the wall, I did the mature thing and eavesdropped.

“You can talk to me,” Margarita said to Ragnor in the training room we’d been in that morning. “You’ve always talked to me before.”

Her pleading, whiny voice made my fury worse. I really couldn’t stand that woman.

“This is different, Margie,” Ragnor said, and the fact he called her by a nickname made pain hit me deep. He hardly ever called me by a nickname. Perhaps he called me “baby” once or twice, but he never gave me an actual nickname.

Asshole.

“What’s so different?” Margarita asked, frustrated. “She’s just another lover for you. I know you, my Lord.” Her voice turned bitter. “When things get complicated, you leave. So why don’t you leave her now?”

A deep sigh followed before Ragnor said softly, “I don’t think I can talk about this with you, Margie, of all people.”

His words gave me pause.

“My Lord,” Margarita whispered, and I could hear the hurt in her voice. “Tell me. I can take it. You talked to me about Ilona all those years ago. And about Parvati, and Naima ...”

My heart rate picked up.

“Those times were different,” Ragnor murmured. “Look, I don’t need your help. Thank you for worrying about me, but I can handle this on my own.”

I could hear Margarita growl. “I don’t get it!” she snapped. “Why her? What’s so special about this woman that two powerful men are going so crazy over her?!”

“ Two men?” Ragnor inquired, and I could feel my heart come to a chilling stop.

“Yes, my Lord, it’s not just you that this ... this woman is manipulating,” Margarita hissed. “She also leads Logan on as if she owns him. In his training with me earlier today, he was so angry, he almost hurt himself!”

I felt myself shaking at her words, almost unable to compute what she was saying. When the hell did I “manipulate” either of them?

“Margarita,” Ragnor said quietly, “do you know about her relationship with him too?”

My throat clogged as my fury quickly changed into pure, undiluted panic.

“Of course I do,” Margarita said haughtily. “Logan told me everything . That woman is a fucking nightmare, my Lord. The things she did to him ...”

I couldn’t listen to this anymore. I pushed myself off the wall and was about to leave when I suddenly lost my balance on a stair and fell down, causing quite the noise. I hadn’t noticed before, but that conversation made me weak in my knees in all the wrong ways.

Before I managed to lift myself back up to my feet and get the hell out of there, I heard footsteps behind me. “Aileen?”

Tears clouded my eyes as I stood up, my back to Ragnor. “So it’s not okay when I don’t tell you something, but it’s totally fine when you hide things from me too?” I couldn’t stop myself from saying it. “It’s good to know just where we stand.”

“Aileen—”

I whirled around and glowered at him, not caring that Margarita was right there behind him.

“Did you ever plan to tell me you and your Lieutenant had been in a relationship once?” Because that’s what it was.

That’s why Margarita had been so possessive of him before.

Why it took me so long to realize that, I didn’t know.

“And what about those other girls she mentioned? What about your past? Did you ever plan to tell me more about it?”

Ragnor’s face contorted in anger, but I didn’t care. “Save it,” I sniped before I walked away.

Unfortunately, he didn’t just let me leave, because he followed me and grabbed my wrist to stop me when we were outside the Troop’s gym. “Let’s talk,” he said, forcing me to look at him with his hand grabbing my chin. “We can’t keep talking in circles like this—”

“I don’t want to talk to you anymore,” I cut him off with a snarl and swatted his hands away from me. “You’re a piece of shit, Ragnor.”

He grabbed my hand again, and this time he forced me to follow, not letting me go. When I saw he was leading me to his suite, I felt as if an invisible pressure had locked itself around my neck.

I didn’t want to go back there.

But Ragnor manhandled me into his suite and closed the door behind us.

Caging me.

“Aileen,” he said, grabbing my shoulders when I tried to put some distance between us. “We’ve got to talk.”

To my horror, the tears fell on my cheeks. I was in pain. So much pain that I couldn’t think straight.

Any rationality I’d had before was gone.

Talking? There was no need to talk anymore. I knew exactly where we stood now. What else was there to talk about?

“You don’t love me, Ragnor,” I told him with a hollow feeling that made me cry harder. “I refuse to believe that this is how you express your love.”

Ragnor’s eyes flashed in fury. “Like hell I don’t love you,” he growled, grabbing my face. “It’s because I love you that you drive me fucking insane, Aileen.”

Everything I’d been feeling in the last week and a half surged inside me, causing any lingering rebellious spirit to leave my body, replaced by numbness. “I can’t do this anymore,” I whispered. “I can’t, Ragnor.”

“I can’t either,” he said, leaning his forehead against mine. “Please, Aileen ... Let’s stop this futile fight.”

“How?” My voice broke. “How can we stop when we can’t seem to see eye to eye?”

“Because I love you, and you love me,” he said plainly. “Isn’t that all that matters?”

I laughed bitterly and leaned back, staring at his eyes. “Do we really love each other, though?”

His eyes glowed as he growled, “We do. Or at least, I know I do.” He paused, peering at me with what looked almost like panic. “Don’t you?”

Did I?

Did I love this man, who broke me almost beyond repair and yet built me up in a way no one else ever did?

Did I love this man, who wanted me to strip myself bare while remaining clothed and yet offered comfort and warmth when I was most vulnerable?

Did I love Ragnor Rayne, who’d forced me into my vampiric existence, sold me to the enemy at the Auction, and yet all but begged me to take him back? Who was willing to go to war for my sake?

And suddenly, all the arguments and fights we’d had in the past few days, all the disagreements and disappointments—it all diminished when I looked at everything in the grand scheme of things.

My shoulders slumped and my head fell. “I do,” I whispered, the fighting spirit leaving me. “I love you.” So much that it hurts.

His arms wrapped around me as he embraced me close, cradling my head against his chest. “I love you, Aileen,” he murmured into my hair, squeezing me tight. “I’m sorry. Let’s drop this whole thing, Aileen. We don’t need to know everything about each other’s past—not if it risks our relationship.”

He was right. I knew he was right. And I also knew I would live to regret it if I didn’t stop it from going further.

Just earlier today, I’d seen Jada crying on Bowen’s shoulder. I’d also watched CJ between trainings, and he seemed to grow more gaunt and worried the closer the Hecatomb got. The relationship between the two of them seemed all but over.

Instead of spending the time they had left until the Hecatomb together, in each other’s arms, they spent it by avoiding each other at all costs.

And while I couldn’t judge them, since I was not in their shoes, I could judge myself and my own relationship.

Would I be able to live with myself if I headed to the Hecatomb without ever patching things up with Ragnor?

And I had my answer.

I squeezed him back at his rare apology. “I agree. I’m sorry too.”

He leaned his head back, stared into my eyes, and caressed my cheek before drawing near and closing his lips over mine.

The soft yet rough touch of his kiss made me shudder and sigh, as if it was all I’d been waiting for this past week.

I deepened the kiss, wrapping my arms around his neck, pressing my chest against his and giving in to the abrupt, strong desire thrumming through my veins.

And when he responded in kind, his hand grabbing the nape of my neck while his thigh shoved between mine, his knee rubbing against my clothed crotch, I was suddenly desperate for him.

Silently, we shrugged off our shirts and pulled each other’s pants down, as if battling over who could get the other naked first, while our kiss grew deeper, faster, and far more furious than before.

Our frustration with each other, which we might’ve agreed to bury, burst out the moment his unsheathed, hardened length pressed against my entrance. A switch flipped inside us, and we were suddenly grappling with one another, each of us trying to get on top of the other.

As our tongues danced, his hands found my breasts and squeezed, making me gasp into his mouth. That gave him the leverage he needed to push me onto my back, forcing my legs apart in such a rough way that it made my already dripping pussy even wetter, and thrust hard and deep inside me.

I moaned, and he used the momentum to bite my lower lip, hard, almost bruising it, as he began to move inside me, his hands gliding over my thighs as he pushed my legs up toward my head, giving him the full view and access to my most intimate part.

And when he leaned back, finally letting my lips go, his grip on my thighs tightened, and he began to really move.

It was fast, rough, and hard. All I could do was lie there, immobile, as he fucked me into oblivion and beyond, my eyes rolling up in abysmal pleasure as I moaned loud enough to wake the dead, the tension inside me rising, pulling at my stomach, and building up to my quickening heart.

And when I finally shattered, the orgasm rippling through me so strongly I spasmed, Ragnor had no choice but to growl as he emptied himself inside me for many long moments.

When he pulled out, I could feel his cum dripping out along with my own juices, and when I saw his midnight blue eyes, now neon with his recent release, watching the trail of cum out of my pussy, I spasmed again as a mini orgasm hit me out of nowhere.

His face grew ravenous, and when my eyes dropped to his beautiful dick, I could see he was hard again, precum creaming the head.

For the next few hours, all we could do was fuck.

I was on my hands and knees, then riding him, then lying with my back pressed to him as he entered me from behind, and yet the desperation we had for one another, mixed with things we’d left unsaid, made it feel as though there weren’t enough orgasms in the world that could be enough to satiate this infinite hunger.

In the end, what forced us to stop was sheer exhaustion. With the room smelling heavily like sex and the sheets damp from all the coming we had done, he hugged me close to him, bare chest to bare chest, and we fell asleep like that together, clinging to one another.

Nothing was really resolved; that much I knew. But after the night we had, I felt like maybe we could get past this issue and find peace as a couple again.