Page 144 of Vampire so Virtuous

The door behind him opened, and he leaped to his feet. Somehow, he hadn’t heard her until she was already there.

“No,ma fillette, he didn’t,” Belle said as she entered. “As I told you already, I believe.”

In the hallway outside, he glimpsed her two thralls still sprawled on the ground before the door swung shut behind her.

He fixed her with a hard stare. “You left her here, with only two thralls to guard her?”

Belle’s lips twitched in that knowing smile, the one she wore whenever he tried to challenge her. The one that inevitably ended in his pain. “She was safe enough,mon amour. I left explicit instructions that no one was to venture into my rooms.” She arched an eyebrow. “Only you, it seems, disobey.”

“You left her alone in a house full of vampires—”

“I would kill them if they touched her,” Belle said, bored. “Have you forgotten? Power is everything.”

“A great comfort if she is already dead,” he spat.

Her interest piqued as she studied him. “Does she matter so much to you?”

He straightened, Éliane’s memory pressing against him like a ghost. “She ismine, Belle. Not yours. Not this time. She is mine, and mine alone.”

“The hell I am!” Cally said, pushing to her feet. “No one owns me, Antoine, least of all you!”

“Ah! A lover’s tiff,” Belle said airily. She wagged her finger at Antoine. “She deserves better, don’t you think?”

He shifted position to keep them both in sight. Turning his back on Belle was never wise, least of all when she was in one of her strange moods. “That’s not what I meant, Cally—”

“I’m not yourproperty, Antoine.”

“So forceful,” Belle said. “Such a vampire she would make.”

“No,” Antoine said sharply, almost a shout. “You cannot have her.”

“On se calme, là,” she tutted. “One cannot make a witch into a vampire,mon amour.” Then, as if toying with the idea, she tilted her head. “Although,it might be interesting to see what would happen.”

“Stop talking about me like I’m not here,” Cally said, her glare flicking from him to Belle.

What had transpired that made her think she could talk to Belle in such a manner with impunity?

He braced himself, expecting Belle to be at Cally’s back faster than he could track, her hand tightening around Cally’s throat. But Belle only drifted gracefully across the room, settling onto the sofa where Cally had just been. She patted the cushion beside her, looking up expectantly.

Cally ignored her, crossing to an unoccupied armchair and perching on the edge of its seat.

Belle folded her hands in her lap, seemingly unbothered. Antoine had never seen her so accommodating, and it was unsettling.

He sat back down on the sofa and looked at Cally, trying to ignore Belle’s presence. “You were saying?”

She took a breath, glanced at Belle, who was watching serenely, then met his gaze. “The short version. If a vampire feeds on a witch, they bond, growing more powerful. It’s irreversible, and they both die without one another.”

“Oh,” he said, leaning back as he let her words sink in.

That explained… a lot. The potency of her blood. The surge in his power, even in the time since feeding on Minh. Why nothing else tasted as good or as filling. How much he craved her, and only her, all the time. His possessiveness… maybe. Or maybe that was all him. Her awareness, her nightmares afterwards. Even the bilateral mark.

And her bitter comments about marriage and life-long commitment.

“Is that all you have to say?” Cally asked sharply. “Just ‘oh’?”

He looked at Belle. “Is this bond already formed? Is it too late?”

Cally bristled at the question, then tensed and turned hopeful eyes to Belle.