Blue Moon Read Free

me how much I wanted him—and how often. He was like a new drug. It wasn’t vampire powers. It was good, old-fashioned lust. But it was still scary, so I had set up some parameters. Rules. He followed them most of the time.
    He smiled, and it was the smile I’d grown to both love and dread. The smile said he was thinking wicked thoughts, things that two or more could do in darkened rooms, where the sheets smelled of expensive perfume, sweat, and other bodily fluids. The smile had never made me blush until we started having sex. Sometimes all he had to do was smile, and heat rushed up my skin like I was thirteen and he was my first crush. He thought it was charming. It embarrassed me.
    â€œYou son of bitch,” I said softly.
    The smile widened. “Our dream was interrupted, ma petite.”
    â€œI knew it wasn’t an accident that you were in my dreams,” I said. It came out hostile, and I was pleased. Because the hotsummer wind was blowing the scent of his cologne against my face. Exotic, with an undercurrent of flowers and spice. I almost hated to wash my sheets for fear of losing the scent of him sometimes.
    â€œI asked you to wear my gift so I could dream of you. You knew what I meant to do. If you say other, then you are lying. May I come in?”
    He’d been invited in often enough that he could have crossed my threshold without the invitation, but it had become a game with him. A formal acknowledgment every time he crossed that I wanted him. It irritated me and pleased me, like so much about Jean-Claude.
    â€œYou might as well come in.”
    He walked past me. I noticed the black boots were laced up the back from heel to top. The back of his black jeans fit smooth and tight so there was no need to guess what he wasn’t wearing under them.
    He spoke without turning around. “Do not sound so grumpy, ma petite. You have the ability to bar me from your dreams.” He turned then, and his eyes were full of a dark light that had nothing to do with vampire powers. “You welcomed me with more than open arms.”
    I blushed for the second time in less than five minutes. “Richard is in jail in Tennessee,” I said.
    â€œI know,” he said.
    â€œYou know?” I said. “How?”
    â€œThe local Master of the City called to tell me. He was very much afraid that I would think it was his doing. His way of destroying our triumvirate.”
    â€œIf he was going to destroy us, it would be a murder charge, not attempted rape,” I said.
    â€œTrue,” Jean-Claude said, then laughed. The laughter trailed over my bare skin like a small, private wind. “Whoever framed our Richard did not know him well. I would believe murder of Richard before rape.”
    It was almost exactly what I’d said. Why was that unnerving? “Are you going down to Tennessee?”
    â€œThe master, Colin, has forbidden me to enter his lands. To do so now would be an act of aggression, if not outright war.”
    â€œWhy should he care?” I asked.
    â€œHe fears my power, ma petite. He fears our power, whichis why he has made you persona non grata in his territory as well.”
    I stared at him. “You are kidding, I hope. He’s forbidden either of us to help Richard?”
    Jean-Claude nodded.
    â€œAnd he expects us to believe it’s not his doing?” I said.
    â€œI believe him, ma petite.”
    â€œYou could tell he wasn’t lying over the phone?” I asked.
    â€œSome master vampires can lie to other master vampires, though I do not think Colin is such a power. But that is not why I believe him.”
    â€œWhy then?”
    â€œThe last time you and I traveled to another vampire’s lands, we slew her.”
    â€œShe was trying to kill us,” I said.
    â€œTechnically,” he said, “she had set all of us free save you. You she wished to make a vampire.”
    â€œLike I said, she was trying to kill