“You can leave now, Seven. She’s safe. I won’t bite.” Her tense smile turns genuine, and Seven nods stiffly, formally.
“Right,” he whispers. He lingers at my side though. “I wanted to make sure you ate today. I’m so sorry, Crymson.”
Only then do I turn toward him, and the wall I was stacking up around my heart crumbles weakly when I look down at his palm.
A red apple rests in the palm of his hand. My stomach rumbles demandingly at the simple sight of something so small and yet so freaking amazing!
“We don’t have food here at the palace. We don’t have need for it.” He extends the apple to me, and I take it immediately. “I had a lot of trouble finding something for you. I asked around the village until I found this at the edge of our borders. Is this enough for you?”
Fuck no, it’s not enough. But oh, my fucking naive little heart. He traveled to get me food.
I mean, yeah, it’s justoneapple, but it’s food.
Why did he do that? Why do these men do this back and forth of emotions with me?
I hate how heavy my heart is with confusion.
“It’s plenty,” I say on a quiet breath.
One apple a week is not nearly enough but right now is not the time to let this sweet man in on that secret.
My lashes flutter, and my chest warms when I meet his puppy dog eyes. The red ring around the warm honey of his gaze pulses strangely when our eyes meet.
“Right. I—I should get back to Christian and Rorrick.”
That stupid fluttering heart nosedives immediately. Those damn butterflies break their wings on the wall I’m building back up for this man.
“Yeah. You should go.” The flat tone of my voice makes his head quirk immediately.
Fuck him and his cute puppy-like persona.
Fuck all of them and those beautiful women. I don’t own these men. They’re nothing to me. We haven’t even kissed.
Well... except for the night of the club, but that was entirely different. That was the weed talking, not me. And except for that fantasy Seven gave me. That was just poor imagination. I’m just too boring to think of anything better than...
I glance at his full lips, and the moment I do, the pink of his tongue slips out there, tangling my emotions up badly, and the energy pulses down right over my clit.
The fucking butterflies get back up again.
“Yeah. You should go. Right now.”
He pauses as if he wants to question my tone or even the fact that I won’t look him directly in the eye, but he doesn’t.
He takes a single step back. The pause he clings on to isn’t something I give any attention to. Then he leaves.
Just like I said I wanted.
FIFTEEN
Crymson
“The red would bringout your eyes, Miss Delilah,” the petite seamstress says.
The young blonde preens with a sharp toothy smile and bright red eyes.
I swallow hard at how radically my life has changed. I’m sitting side by side with a vampire princess, and I’m totally cool with it. How the fuck did I get here?
“And for you,” she glances at me stiffly, “green, I’m afraid.”
