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Tempting Raven (Curse of the Vampire Queen #1)(18)

By:Jessica Sorensen


She sighs then snatches Anders' hand. "We'll be back after one song." She hauls him with her as she pushes her way across the dance floor.

I face the bar and stare at the mirror hanging on the wall behind the counter. While I feel sleepy and content, my reflection looks alive, my cheeks hued with pink, my eyes buzzing with energy, my pupils huge.

"Admiring your reflection? That seems more like a Nadine thing than a Raven thing, if you ask me."

I tense as Kingsley plops down in the stool beside mine and his reflection appears in the mirror. I start to automatically stiffen, but the contentment that's taken over my body for the last couple of hours quickly smothers out any rigidness.

"Why are you here?" I say the first sentence that pops into my mind, looking at his reflection, not him.

A deliberate smile curves across his face. "For the same reason you are."

"How do you know why I'm here?"

"Because there's only one reason anyone comes here-to drink, to dance, to let out their sexual tension."

"It's an awfully big assumption to think that everyone here has the same agenda. That everyone here is the same."

His teeth sink into his bottom lip as he bites back his smile. "What can I say? My big, overly inflated head likes to make big assumptions," he throws back the words I said to him and Rhyland earlier tonight.

"Yeah, it does." I rotate around in the stool with every intention of getting up and going to the dance floor. But he places a hand on my leg, stopping me.

"Don't go running off just yet. I need to talk to you."

I stare down at his hand, my lip twitching with annoyance. "You know, this is the third time tonight someone has touched me without my permission, and honestly, I'm getting really tired of it." I fling his hand off my leg and glare at him.



       
         
       
        

He starts to smile, seeming a bit confused, but then his lips sink downward. "Wait? Third time? Who's been touching you?" He sounds pissed, which is completely annoying.

I roll my eyes. "Your brother, you, and this creepy dude who tried to grind up against me on the dance floor."

Wait? Why am I telling him this?

Why am I even still here at all?

I start to get up, and again, he puts a hand on my leg.

I move to fling it off, but he captures my hand. Something explodes inside me, a cloud of angry, ready to storm, lightning bolts of rage.

"Let go of me." I try to wiggle my hand from his grip.

Surprisingly, he lets me go, but keeps his hand on my leg.

"Look, I'm not trying to do whatever it is you think I'm going to do." He slants toward me and lowers his voice. "I came down here to tell you that you need to come upstairs. And it's probably a good thing since creepy dudes are touching you. They shouldn't be doing that. At all. No one should be touching you, except  … " A strange seriousness look masks his face as he trails off.

"Except what?" I press. I don't even know why. Why I'm curious about anything he's doing. But I am

He shrugs. "Nothing."

"Fine. Don't tell me." Again, I try to stand up, but he won't let me go. I huff a frustrated breath. "I thought you came here to drink, to dance, to let out your sexual tension, not keep me trapped at the bar."

He wrestles back a smile. "You're a feisty little thing when you're drunk, aren't you? That's new."

"I'm not drunk."

He squints at my eyes. "You sure look like it."

I give an indifferent shrug. "Well, I'm not."

He assesses me. "No, you're on something," he accuses. "And that's definitely new."

"So what?" I say with my chin held high, portraying more confidence than I've had sober. "At least half the people in this place are on something."

"Yeah, but  … " He pauses, his mouth sinking into a frown. "What did you take?"

"Why would I ever tell you?" I jump to my feet, moving faster than I ever have before. So fast, in fact, I nearly trip over my feet and face plant it on the floor. Thankfully, I manage to catch my balance at the very last second and square my shoulders. "Now, if you'll excuse me, you're ruining my buzz." I stride toward the dance floor.

"Raven, you really need to  … Goddammit, this is a frustrating new detail to the … " Music swallows up his voice as I slip into the throng. 

Music surrounds me, pulsating through me, as I weave between sweat-soaked bodies and lustful hands. I put my hands up and sway my body to the rhythm, that wonderful contentment settling over me again.