He kissed me and it took me by surprise, but not in a bad way. I wrapped my arms around him as the kiss deepened.
“I’ve missed you very much,” he murmured then. “I’ve wanted to see you but I’ve been fearful for your safety. I’ve wanted to touch you but I couldn’t.”
I smiled against his lips. “Well, you’re here now. And my blouse is currently on the floor. I think that’s probably a good sign that even though I’m still mad at you right now, touching is allowed.”
He leaned back and placed his hands on either side of my face. “This will work out. All of this. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
“Promises, promises.”
“It’s a promise and a vow.” His lips brushed mine again.
I unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it away so I could inspect his chest. I ran my fingers over the now rapidly healing wound. Only a small pink mark remained from where the knife had made contact. I kissed it before looking up at him again.
“See?” I said. “All better.”
“Your blood is as powerful as Gideon claims it is.” His expression shadowed. “It worries me deeply.”
I felt another chill as I remembered the look in Gideon’s eyes as I turned against him. He’d looked angry and disappointed with me—not a good combination.
I pressed my index finger against his lips. “Let’s think about that later, okay?”
“Why? Did you have other subjects for us to address at the moment?”
I nodded this time. “Actually, I do.”
He didn’t protest this time when I kissed him, no more talking about Gideon, or my curse, or anything like that. He was alive. He was okay. He knew I knew who he was and he knew how much I loved him.
But just to make sure, I led him to my microscopic bedroom and showed him. Twice.
Um. Make that three times.
He told me again how much he loved me as his mouth and body took me to the edge and back… however, he very politely kept his fangs to himself.
I didn’t care if he was old enough to have had the chance to see Romeo and Juliet performed on stage for the first time sitting next to Shakespeare himself, the man I loved had the stamina of a thirty-year-old.
Afterward, he held me in his arms and I explored his chest: muscled but lean, with a familiar old three-inch scar from where he’d been injured as a human. So faint that it was hard to see if you weren’t looking for it. I traced it with the tip of my finger.
“Now, no more secrets,” I said. “Tell me about the Red Devil. Let’s start with the main points.”
He threaded his fingers through my hair and pulled me closer to him. “I wasn’t the original
Red Devil. It was Marcellus, Veronique’s lover from before I even met her. The night
Marcellus died I learned his secret, and he entrusted me to destroy his papers, his identity.
But I knew that the Red Devil couldn’t die. I wanted to continue with the same name and try to… try to—”
“Help others,” I finished for him.
“That was the original plan.”
“Does Veronique know this about Marcellus?” I’d heard enough about the guy from her before. She claimed he was her one true love. All her multitude of lovers since had paled in comparison to this Valentino vamp.
“I don’t think so. At least, she never gave any indication.”
“It’s all very Zorro. Very solitary Musketeer.”
“If you say so.”
“And you funded this all yourself? Without telling anyone?”
“No one has known.” He swallowed. “Until now. Obviously I’m very rusty after being out of commission for so long.”
“I think I still would have known.”
He looked at me incredulously. “I still cannot believe it.”
“Believe it. Why did you stop? You haven’t done the mask thing for a hundred years, right?”
His jaw tensed. “It was after what happened with Elizabeth.”
I remembered the name. Elizabeth was Thierry’s friend’s wife who wanted to have an affair with Thierry a century ago, but it didn’t turn out the way she’d planned. When she used her own blood to try to seduce him, it backfired—due to his blood addiction—and he nearly drained her. She ran from the bloodthirsty Thierry into a pack of hunters who killed her without a second thought. Thierry felt it was his fault, and the guilt had stayed with him all of these years.
“It was then I knew that the Red Devil caused more harm than good. That perhaps it was safer to stay hidden than charge headfirst into danger.”
“Not safer for you, safer for others, you mean.”
He wouldn’t meet my gaze anymore. “That’s right.”
I studied his tense, haunted expression. “What’s the problem?”
He shook his head. “No problem. I don’t usually share so much.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
“There are so many things that I regret in my life.”
I touched his face and made him look at me. “Which totally answers the question of why you’re always so serious.”
He finally met my eyes directly. “Actually, I was serious even as a human.”
“Figures.”
I kissed him again before he pulled back to look down at me. He stroked the hair off my forehead.
“I keep waiting for you to be so disgusted by my past that you really, truly want to leave me. And your spending a great deal of time with Gideon while keeping it from me has done nothing to ease my mind.”