I nodded in silent agreement. He was incredibly handsome.
The blond was accompanied by an equally attractive redhead, her skin luminously pale. She wore only a slim burnt orange cocktail dress, the toes of her bare feet painted red. Her arms were crossed over her chest, and while she stood intimately close to the blond, she scanned the room with an almost mechanical precision. She looked around, saw Mallory and me, and tensed. Then she leaned toward the blond and whispered something. He raised his head, a lock of golden hair across his brow, and looked up.
Our gazes locked. He stared, and I stared back.
A chill raced up my spine, an eerie premonition of something I couldn't quite discern. Vampires definitely had some sort of spidey sense, and mine was sending up flares - enormous, fiery flares that put the Fourth of July fireworks at Navy Pier to shame. I pushed down the sensation and the disturbing, burgeoning sense of familiarity. I didn't want him to be familiar. I didn't want him to know me, to know who I was, to have taken part in my change. I wanted this beautiful man to be new to the House, a regular vampire doing a hard night's work for the Master he secretly loathed. I wanted him to approach me, introduce himself, be pleasantly surprised that I was a vampire and that I'd just joined his cool kids' club.
I couldn't tear my eyes away. I stared. He stared back, lips parted in shock or surprise, his knuckles white around the file folder he held in his free hand.
The rest of the room stilled and quieted as the vampires watched us, probably waiting for cues - Should we jump the new girl? Mock her for wearing jeans and sneaks? Welcome her into the ancient brotherhood of vampires with a pancake breakfast and mixer?
Making some decision, the blond snapped his cell phone shut and walked toward us, his stride confident and swift. Each step seemed to make him more handsome - his perfectly sculpted features coming into sharper relief.
Before that moment, before watching him walk toward me, I'd been a normal girl. If I saw a boy I found attractive, I might smile. I might, on the rare occasion, say hello or give someone my phone number. I wouldn't say I was forward, but I made a move when I was interested. But something about this boy, maybe mixed with the fact that I'd recently become a vampire, made every molecule in my body tingle. I wanted to sink my fingers into his hair and push my lips against his. I wanted to claim him for my own - the rising of some deep-seated, instinctual need. Time seemed to speed up, to zip by, my body driving me toward a fate my head didn't understand. My heart thudded, hammerlike inside my chest, and I could feel the blood rushing through my veins.
Mallory leaned toward me. "FYI, your eyes are silver. I'll just add 'horny' to the list of reasons that happens."
I nodded absently.
My beautiful blond moved closer, until he stood in front of me, until, looking up, I could see the color of his eyes.
They were a deep, translucent, emerald green.
Impossibly green.
And as my heart sunk, I realized, familiarly green.
"Shit," was all I could think to say.
Our rangy Beckham look-alike was my sworn enemy.
CHAPTER THREE
YOU GOTTA FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT.
"Merit?"
Pulled from my fantasy by the sudden flood of adrenaline, I clenched my hands into fists. I'd heard about the fight-or-flight instinct - the animalistic drive to dig in and fight for survival or to run away, seek shelter or cover. Before tonight, it had always been an abstract construct. Biological trivia. But I felt it after the attack on our house, and as I faced Ethan Sullivan for the first time, I felt it intimately. Some previously absent part of my psyche awoke and began to evaluate surroundings, to debate whether to set heel to the ground and get as far away from him as possible, or face him, stand against him, and even if the effort was doomed, to see what I was made of.
This was one of those moments, I thought, one of those make-or-break moments that set the direction of your life, that remind you about courage and free will.
I felt a nudge at my ribs, and heard a fierce whisper. "Merit!" I looked beside me, where Mallory stood, eying me curiously. "Are you okay? Ethan was just saying hello. Did you have something you wanted to say to him, maybe regarding an eath-day eat-thray?"
I slid my gaze back to Ethan, who watched me cautiously, then let my focus shift to the vampires, who stood at attention in the room. They'd stopped tapping the keys of their PDAs and were outright staring. Without looking at him, I asked, "Can we speak privately?"
He paused, apparently surprised, and then said in a voice smooth enough to send a second chill down my spine, "Of course."
His hand at my elbow, Ethan escorted me through the crowd of gaping vampires, back into the hallway, and then into the room next door. It was an office, masculine and well- appointed. His office. To the right was a sizable oak desk; to the left was a seating area of brown leather furniture. At the end of the room was a long, oval-shaped conference table, which stood just before a bank of windows covered by navy blue velvet curtains. Both side walls were lined with built-in shelves covered in books, trophies, photographs, and memorabilia.
Mallory followed us in, and Ethan closed the door. He waved his hand in invitation at two chairs that sat in front of his desk, but Mallory moved to the shelves at the far end of the room and, hands crossed behind her back, began to peruse the mementos. She gave us privacy without leaving me alone with him. Appreciating the gesture, I remained standing.
Ethan crossed his arms and gazed at me expectantly. "Well? To what do I owe the pleasure, Merit?"
I stared at him blankly for a moment, trying to remember why I thought visiting the Hyde Park office of a Master vampire was a good idea, when my mouth, which apparently wasn't privy to the internal debate, suddenly blurted out, "I didn't give you permission to change me."
Ethan stared at me for a moment before turning his head. He walked away, moving with self-assurance to the leather chair behind his desk. For all the tailored clothes and impeccable looks, his power was obvious. He fairly hummed with it, and while his movements were crisp and elegant, they hinted at something darker, something menacing beneath the surface - a shark arcing below deceptively smooth water.
He shuffled papers on his desk, then crossed his legs and looked up at me with those obscenely emerald eyes. "Frankly, that's not what I expected to hear. I was hoping for something along the lines of 'Thank you, my Liege, for saving my life. I do so enjoy being alive.' "
"If saving me had really been your goal, you could have taken me to a hospital. A doctor could have saved me. You unilaterally decided to make me something else."