Love for a vampire, if it existed, was always one-sided. All servants accepted that truth, because if there was any one thing forbidden in the vampire world, it was a vampire being in love with a servant.

“My apologies, Master. I shouldn’t have said that.”

Evan merely tightened his arms around her, dropped a kiss on her head. “Go to him. He’s probably eating something out of a can with a spoon, looking pitiful.”

She smiled against him, relieved. “Should I make something for you?”

“No. I’ve fed well from your lovely throat. I’m going to spend some time on my own tonight, up in the mountains.” Lifting her off him, he rose to his feet, but recaptured her attention with a firm hand on her chin. “But after you feed him, I expect you in that chair, as I ordered. I’ll let you know when you can get up. I don’t want you to forget the lesson you learned tonight.”

“Yes, sir.” She never would, but she’d do anything he asked of her.

Giving her a searching look, he ran his hands down over her hips, dropping one last kiss on her shoulder, a prick of fang against her throat. Despite the protection of his second mark and her attempt to mask it, she had started to shiver from the cold night air. Removing his own shirt, he slid it over her shoulders, buttoned a couple of buttons down the front, then teased the cleft between her breasts with a brush of his knuckle. “You’re lucky it’s not summer. I would have made you sit out here and let the mosquitoes and gnats chew on your pretty pale flesh. It’s not a good place to be bare-arsed, as Niall might say. Keep that in mind.”

Then he was gone, leaving her standing alone in the night. Yet she wasn’t alone. She felt a thread, a connection between the vampire artist traveling through the night with his own thoughts, and the servant brooding inside the cabin. Even after three centuries together, there was obviously a final step to be made between them. That they were bound to each other was beyond question; one responded to the movements of the other like a mirror image. Recalling their sensual expertise was knee-weakening vivid proof of it. They were brothers-in-arms, but also adversaries. Would they reconcile it before Niall was gone forever?

Death was a part of life. Every living being knew that, even vampires. Most didn’t live to the great age of Lady Lyssa, who was reputedly over a thousand. Various factors could bring their lives to an end, though at an age much greater than humans. Despite Niall’s three centuries of life, the thought of his death made her throat ache. As the warm light of the kitchen spilled out into the yard, she compared the strong, powerfully built male against the thin, fierce fighter Evan had shown her in his mind.

We all grow up, sister, but few of us learn to be adults. Not until we know what love truly means. Duty and honor are part of it, but when duty and honor transcend, become devotion and unconditional commitment, it is an entirely different realm of possibilities.

Adam had told her that, in a letter he wrote to her. A letter she now wished she’d kept, though that line had stayed in her head.

Since her betrayal of Stephen, she wasn’t sure who or what she was from day to day. But tonight, thinking how she’d lost herself in Evan and Niall’s desires, their passion, she wondered if she was at last going to discover the answer, only to lose it with her life, in a matter of weeks, days . . . hours?

No. If there was an afterlife, and even if she was stuck with Stephen, she’d hold on to that knowledge. Once discovered, it couldn’t be taken from her. If it could, then there really was such a thing as Hell.

15

SHE’D started toward the house when Niall came back out. She’d intended to ask him what he wanted for dinner, but at his pensive expression, she changed tactics.

“Are you in there eating SpaghettiOs?”

Brooding turned to surprise at her obvious attempt to tease him, but he recovered quickly. “I’m making dinner for you tonight. You’re goin’ to eat half o’ the pizza with me.”

“I will not.”

He grinned then, that wicked smile that could actually curl her toes, because they dug into the earth the minute he did it. “We’ll argue about it after.”

“After what?”

His gaze roamed over her body. She’d served at vampire dinners involving elaborate servant orgies. Stephen regularly called her to his room to service his needs, requiring her to pad barefoot from her quarters, completely naked. The staff and other servants she passed found it unremarkable, unconcerned about her appearance.

The way he looked at her now, clad only in Evan’s shirt, was not unconcerned at all. He took his time with it, not answering her right away. “Christ, we should make ye stay like this all the time.”

Even after a demanding session like she’d just experienced, she was trained to be sexually prepared at the merest hint of vampire interest, her pussy automatically lubricating itself, her nipples tightening. Niall, being a third mark, would have no problem responding in kind. His nostrils flared, eyes registering her reaction.

“Christ, lass. You’re going to kill me.”

Her pulse leaped in her throat as he took a step closer. “You need dinner,” she said, but her voice was unsteady to her own ears. The expression on his face became more intent, male senses recognizing female compliance, and becoming even more concentrated on his desires as a result. “But not pizza.”

“Aye, pizza.” His brown eyes glinted. “There’ll be no arguin’ that. But first, we have to deal with the other matter. Ye were tearing yourself down in your mind today. At the store. Evan told me. Ye recall what happens when ye insult his property.”

Oh no. Evan’s shirt had warmed her, though the gesture itself, his touch, his possession, had kindled the small furnace in her vitals even more. Niall’s look now only increased it. She didn’t want to lose all that delicious heat in the cold creek. She shook her head, backing away. “No. I’m sure he misunderstood.”

“I’m entirely sure he didnae, lass. All-powerful vampire and all that.”

When he lunged at her, she dashed behind the picnic table, sending the tails of Evan’s shirt flying away from her bare backside. When she spun to face him, her hair swirling around her face, Niall eyed her appreciatively. He began to stalk her. “I’ll probably need to hold ye under the water a minute or two. Get ye nice and cold so you’ll want to cling to me after.”

“I think you’re taking undue liberties with Master’s instructions.” She circled the table as he followed her from the other side. The moment he started around the far corner, she dashed for the cabin door. She’d lock him out, entice him with dinner smells so he’d forget all about throwing her into that creek. When he caught her at the door, she was laughing, which morphed into a squeal as he banded his arm across her chest. She lunged forward, offsetting his balance, allowing her to duck out from under his grip and make it back to the picnic table.

Sparring with other servants was a regular activity, given that there might be reason to defend the Master’s home or belongings. Or prove oneself against the power games that other servants sometimes played. But the last time she’d wrestled for fun and sport was with Adam when they were young.

Niall was like a cougar, not stalking dinner, but playing with his mate. Had Evan given Niall the parting command to throw her in the creek because it might result in this, lightening his heart and drawing it from the dark place it had gone? Had the vampire also known she would figure it out, giving her a service she could do for them both? The confidence that she was right gave her a bolstering warmth, something she was reluctantly certain she would need in the next few moments.

With a bellow, Niall charged, coming over the picnic table, effectively chasing her out from behind it. Around the yard and cabin they went. He always managed to block her so she couldn’t get into the cabin and lock him out, but she was nimble enough to keep out of his clutches.

“Quick and small have their uses,” she noted when she was behind the temporary protection of the well. “Bears are fierce, but they’re big and lumbering, too.”

“Hmm.” He lunged again, and she relocated to a rock outcropping almost taller than herself, but she could still see over it. Since the creek was gurgling behind her, she’d taken a risk, getting so close to where he’d intended to throw her, but he hadn’t left her much choice. She’d been herded. Wily Scot.

“Bears can sprint, Alanna,” Niall said, giving her a portentous look. “Especially when we’re hungry.”

She shrieked and bolted as he came around the rocks, moving faster than he’d yet moved. Though he had to put three hundred years of agility and speed into it, her satisfaction was short-lived. He caught her about the waist, flipped her in the air and slung her over his shoulder, clamping his large hand over her ass, Evan’s shirt sliding up her spine.

He hadn’t anticipated the tactics a sister had learned against a twin brother. Reaching down the loose waistband of his jeans, Alanna grabbed the edge of his boxers and yanked. It wasn’t as effective as briefs, but the wedgie would put an uncomfortable pressure on the sizeable package she knew the man had.

“Should have worn a kilt,” she suggested when he snarled at her. She squealed as he gave her still very sore ass a smart pop.

“I wasna planning to enjoy this, but now—” As he shifted, preparing to heft her, she grappled his body like a cat digging in her claws.

“I’ll never bake you cookies again.”

“Aye, ye will, because you’ll make them for Evan and I’ll eat the rest.”

“I’m . . . not . . . going . . . in . . . alone,” she gritted, clamping onto that muscular torso with arms and legs, bringing them face-to-face. He caught his hands in her hair, tilting her head back so he could eye her with malevolent, amused intent. He looked about to kiss her, her lips parting in involuntary anticipation, but he started tickling her instead, making her squirm and squeal, loosening her hold.

“You bastard,” she pronounced, right before she hit the cold water with a resounding splash.