Page 48 of Thirst
“You don’t understand,” I said. “Please—just listen. You owe me that much.”
“Talk, then.” He halted, staying behind me like he couldn’t bring himself to look at my face. “Explain why you were meeting with Baker—who wanted to sell me to your sire.”
I winced. Goddess, it looked bad. “He contacted us, not the other way around.”
“Yeah—so?”
“So my father was interested, of course. He’s obsessed with Brien—you know that.”
“Go on.” His breath was warm against my cheek and smelled faintly of beer.
“He asked me to meet with Baker. I didn’t have a choice—I couldn’t turn him down. And I didn’t want to once I knew it was about you. I didn’t expect you to come instead.” I drew a slow inhale. “Was your uncle even a part of this or was it all a trick?”
“Oh, he was a part of this. We intercepted the texts.”
“Was?”
“He fell off a cliff. Sharks got him.”
“Oh.” I absorbed that.
Fitting, really. The man had tried to hand his own nephew over to a rival syndicate; even a human had to know what that would’ve meant for Cain.
“Well,” I said, “my plan was to talk to him, see what he had to say. Then I’d go back to Nazaire and tell him to forget it, that Baker couldn’t be trusted. That it could be a trap.”
“You don’t say?”
Cool fingers curled around my throat. Not tight. Just enough pressure to remind me of other times he’d controlled me like this, how the world would narrow to the heat between us, his body against mine.
For a few seconds, I forgot the bite of the cuffs and the danger I was in. Forgot everything but how that grip had meant something else entirely, something that made my knees weaken and my thoughts scatter.
“I can’t tell if you think I’m a fool,” he said, “or just too blinded by you to notice what’s right in front of me. You didn’t have to meet Baker. You could’ve contacted me—sent word through that bar in Halifax. I would’ve shut him down from my end. But you came yourself—with a vampire for backup. And I’m supposed to believe you’re not here to negotiate."
I swallowed sickly. “I didn’t have time to contact you—I just found out two nights ago myself. And I didn’t want to bring Jerome, but I didn’t have a choice. My father insisted. I think he’s getting suspicious. In Paris, when you and I, you know?—”
“Fucked,” he finished for me in a flat voice.
I dipped my chin, wondering why I hadn’t been able to say it aloud. I suppose I wanted it to be more than fucking.
“Anyway,” I pushed on, “I was afraid my father had found out about us, that we’ve been meeting. He said Jerome was for my protection, but then why send me at all? This isn’t the kind of op he usually sends me on. What if it was a test? So I had to do exactly what he said—no deviations.”
Something shifted deep in his eyes—small, but real enough to make me think I’d reached him.
Behind us, the bar door creaked open. Two humans exited and picked their way through the slush and ice to their vehicle.
“Get moving.” Cain used the hand at my throat to turn me in the direction of a big black truck, guiding forward with his fingers clamped on my nape. “You can tell me the rest on the way.”
The cuffs burrowed deeper. I stifled a moan. The pain didn’t matter. What mattered was making things right with Cain.
“Please. It’s the truth. You have to believe me.”
“Right now, you could tell me your blood is red and I’d doublecheck it.”
I went limp, but he lifted me by the waist and kept moving, my feet dangling above the snowy pavement. The spiky teeth bit harder. This time, I couldn’t hold back a yelp of pain.
“Put me down,” I begged. “I can walk myself.”
“No.” He didn’t set me down until we reached the truck.
