Which would she be now that they were alone?
Which did he want her to be?
He was all too aware that she fed off his behaviour. If he were gentle with her, she would remain that way. If he gave in to his darker urges, then she would too.
She cast her green gaze around his apartment, taking in the black walls, mahogany furniture, and the gilt-framed paintings. Her eyes lingered on them. Did she like art? He had quite the collection stored in the basement of the theatre in a secure, temperature and humidity controlled vault. In his bedroom, he preferred the works of the Italian masters. Original paintings by Da Vinci, Raphael, Botticelli and Caravaggio decorated his walls.
He had met some of them, fortunate enough to be alive during the wonderful renaissance period. He had been youthful then and carefree, full of the joys of the world and unaware of the dark times that lay ahead of him. The paintings were his link to those happier years of his life, granting him peace during his more troubled nights or days when images of the past haunted him. He could lose himself in a single piece, mesmerised by the perfection of each brush stroke and touch of colour that brought the scene to life before his eyes.
“All yours I take it?” Sera said and he nodded.
She stepped forwards and leaned her back against the carved black bedpost, hands tucked behind her.
“Even those?” She jerked her chin towards the other corner of his bed.
Antoine frowned and looked there. A set of thick steel and leather restraints hung with their short chain on the mattress and their cuffs dangling on either side of the bedpost.
“Those belong to my brother,” he said and she looked relieved. “I keep a set on hand in case he needs them.”
Her expression shifted, questions surfacing in her eyes that he would rather not answer so he turned away, walked to the chest of drawers that stood against the wall to the left of the door and poured himself a glass of blood. He raised it to his lips and then lowered it again, set it down and fixed her a glass too. Old habits died the hardest. He wasn’t used to drinking with company. Definitely not in his room. He never drank blood with his brother. Snow had a tendency to turn snappish and territorial when he fed, and was prone to lashing out at anyone who tried to come too close to his precious blood.
Would that be him one day?
Antoine picked up the two glasses and offered one to Sera. She moved away from the bed, long legs luring his gaze to them and hips swaying just enough to catch his attention. He lifted his gaze back to hers when she took the glass and raised it in a salute.
She smiled.
Would she still smile at him when he was savage and unpredictable, lost deep in bloodlust that never relented?
Would she want to be with him then?
He still couldn’t believe she wanted to be with him now. Or that he wanted to be with her.
When he looked at her now, he didn’t see an elite, or a turned human. He saw a beautiful, strong woman who bravely stood up to him and refused to back down. She had seduced him, both his body and his heart.
His parents would turn in their grave.
He closed his eyes against the pain that welled up in his chest, choking him, and flinched as the glass in his hand shattered under the pressure of his grip, fragments cutting deep into his palm and fingers.
“God,” Sera said and he wondered just how young she was that she retained some faith in such a power.
He mumbled a request to be excused under his breath and went through the door to his left, into the black-tiled bathroom. Blood dripped from his hand and rolled down the sides of the obsidian oval sink. Antoine picked the splinters of glass out, dropping them into the sink to swim amongst the blood, and ignored the scent as it filled his senses and tempted him to taste it. He flicked the gold tap around to cold and ran his hand under the water. The rush of it covered whatever Sera said to him and he glanced up at the mirror to see where she was.
The moment his eyes found her, the wave of her fear swept past him.
She stood in the bedroom with her side to him, staring at something.
Or someone.
Antoine turned and was in the room with her in under a second, standing between her and whoever had frightened her.
Snow.
His brother leaned in the open doorway, thick muscled arms folded across his broad bare chest, his icy blue eyes fixed on Sera. They flicked to him as he came to a halt.
“You are hurt,” Snow said, his voice a deep rasp that spoke of fatigue.
He had been disturbing his brother’s rest far too often recently and the Devil only knew that Snow needed all the rest he could get. Battling his bloodlust drained his strength, giving the bastard demon that rode him a chance to overcome his control and send Snow into a feeding frenzy that only worsened his addiction.
Red ringed his brother’s irises and his eyes tracked downwards, searching for the source of the scent of fresh blood now pervading the room.