Kneeling before me, he gently pushed up the legs of my bloodstained khaki capris — my favorite little Abercrombie & Fitch lowriders, ruined now — till my knees were exposed.
“Maybe you shouldn’t watch,” he said, looking up, his eyes meeting mine. His weren’t red, thank God, so I guessed I was safe. Still, I could see hunger in his gaze — something that looked a little like lust, and a shudder worked its way down my spine.
What is he going to do to me? I had no clue, but whatever it was, my eyes were staying open.
“Okay,” he said, his voice deeper, rougher than usual. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He smiled then, a slow, sexy smile, and I watched in horror as his canine teeth elongated, if only slightly.
And then his tongue came out of his mouth, and he licked my wounds — literally. Once, twice his tongue made slow, soft strokes against my bloody, raw skin. Goose bumps erupted all over me, and it was all I could do to sit still. I clamped my mouth shut, grinding my teeth, trying to keep from making a sound.
Whatever he was doing, it felt like nothing I’d ever experienced before, and I didn’t want him to stop — ever. He finished with my right knee and moved to my left, repeating the slow, sensuous licks before he reached for my hands and did the same to my hypersensitive palms. Every once in a while he’d pause and glance up at me questioningly, as if he were testing my response. The look in his eyes — the heat, the tenderness, all blended into something indescribable — stole away my breath. By the time he finished, I was reduced to a quivering mass on the bed, panting and squirming.
“Are you okay?” he asked softly, rising from his knees and sitting beside me on the bed. “Do you need to lie down?”
Yeah, I do.
“Here,” he said, lifting me up and laying me back against the pillow. I closed my eyes and took a deep, calming breath.
“I hope I didn’t hurt you.”
I glanced down at my knees, at my hands, and gasped. The blood was gone, the scrapes were gone. Everything was just. gone. My skin looked perfect, totally unblemished. As if nothing had happened.
“Okay, love,” he said, brushing back a stray lock of hair from my flushed cheek. “Now you’ve got to tell me what happened.”
Taking a deep, steadying breath, I told him.
“And that’s everything?” he asked, lying beside me now, his arm tucked around me, my cheek resting on his chest — I could hear the faint thumpthump of his heart, his vampire heart, pumping the infected blood throughout his body. “Nothing else?”
“Nothing else. And then there was that weird reaction afterward, like the vision kept trying to suck me back into it, but couldn’t quite do it. That’s never happened before.”
“That almost frightens me more than the vision itself,” Aidan said.
I took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, trying to calm my racing heart. “The next all-school assembly is Friday. Five days from now,” I clarified.
“It’s coming, Aidan. Whatever it is, it’s coming.”
“It would seem that way.”
I bit my lower lip, steeling myself for what I knew I must say. “We’ve got to tell them. There’s no other way.”
“Tell who?”
“My friends. Cece and Sophie and Kate and Marissa. All of them. We need them. Maybe Jack, too.”
“We can’t tell them, Violet. It’s impossible for me to do so. It’s against the laws of my kind.”
“You told me about Blackwell,” I shot back.
“Yes, and I paid a price for it.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, an uncomfortable lump in my throat.
“I was sent to the Tribunal for that little slip,” he answered, his voice hard. “I suppose it was Blackwell himself who turned me in.”
“The tribunal? Like a vampire court or something?”
“Something like that, except there’s no pleading your case. Punishments are simply handed down. My sentence was three days of torture.”
“They. they tortured you?” I stammered, my stomach lurching uncomfortably.
He just shrugged.
“What did they do to you? I. I thought it was impossible to hurt you.”
“My body will heal itself when injured,” he explained. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel pain. Especially when an. injury. is repeated over and over again, every time it does heal.”
Hate and revulsion welled up inside of me. More than anything, I wanted to harm the vampires who had harmed Aidan.
But this was a war, and we needed an army. “Well, there aren’t any laws preventing me from telling them,” I said. “Are there? Would you be held accountable if I did?”
“No,” he answered. “I wouldn’t. I guess you could call that a loophole.”
Thank God. “We need their help, then.”
“What are you suggesting?” he asked.
“A plan, that’s what. With everyone’s gifts combined, we can turn the tables on Julius and his allies. Lead them into our own trap.”
“Blackwell would never allow—”
“Blackwell is the enemy, remember?”
“But according to your vision, he’ll protect you. He won’t let them harm you.”
“Even if that’s true, what about you?”
“Your safety has its price,” he said somberly.
I shoved myself up to a sitting position. “No way. You’re not going to. to. sacrifice yourself for me, Aidan. Forget it.”
“I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you safe, Violet,” he said, his voice suddenly hoarse. “I’ve already stood by once, watching helplessly as a woman I cared for lost her life in my stead. It won’t happen again. I won’t let it. If taking my life will save your own, then I must have your word that you’ll do it. I’ve taught you how.”
I hit him then, on the chest. Hard, though he didn’t even flinch. Again I struck him. “No, you hear me? I won’t do it!”
In a flash he’d captured my wrists and was holding them immobile in his grasp. His head ducked down toward mine, his blue-gray gaze steady and firm. “Yes, Violet. You will. You must.”
I swallowed hard, trying desperately to slow my breathing, to steady my heart. “It won’t come to that. Not if you let my friends help us. I’m telling them everything, tonight.”