“I have met obstacles,” he whispered, his mouth so close I felt his lips brush mine. “But no longer. ”
And then he kissed me, and it wasn’t like kissing Carden, not at all.
Alcántara’s kiss was studied, methodical. Conscientiously thorough. I waited to experience some emotion—desire, longing, any sort of tingling whatsoever—but I didn’t feel a thing.
And it wasn’t just because we weren’t bonded. Alcántara’s kiss was different from Carden’s because Carden could kiss. He’d been my first, so I hadn’t realized it before. But now, kissing Alcántara, I knew. Carden…just…wow.
But I knew better than to spurn the affections of a vampire, particularly one whose fangs were right there, and so tried to sense what Alcántara wanted me to do. Technically, his kiss was fine, but something about it was coldly precise. Passionless compared to Carden’s all-consuming touch. His lips were cool, and as much as I tried to follow his lead, I felt how my movements were just as stiff and studied in return.
He pulled away. Compared to my kiss with Carden, the contact had been brief. With Carden, I’d fallen into the kiss, into him, from the instant my lips had touched his.
“I thank you for the small intimacy, mijita. It was most illuminating. ” Alcántara gave me a tiny half bow. “I will bid you good night,” he said, his voice chilly and polite.
The keening in my mind hitched up a notch, but this time my panic was for an entirely different reason. Had I been too reluctant? Or worse, had he sensed Carden? Detected our bond?
I wouldn’t know, because the Spanish vampire swept me aside and was out the door before I could shut my mouth.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Last night, I’d been lucky. Lucky the Guidons hadn’t eaten Mei-Ling for a midnight snack. Lucky that Alcántara hadn’t torn me limb from limb when he sensed whatever it was he’d sensed in my kiss.
He’d left, and Mei-Ling had been sitting on the floor outside the door, curled into herself.
“Mei. ” I was still shaky and weirded out from Alcántara’s kiss, and it took me a moment to register that she was there and relatively unscathed.
She looked up at me. “Are you okay?”
“Me? How about you?” A welt was rising on her cheekbone, and it made my blood boil. I recognized Masha’s whip in that mark. Anger focused me, wiping away the remnants of Alcántara’s surreal and creepy touches. “What did they do to you?”
“It’s no big deal. ” She stood and brushed herself off.
I could see that it was, in fact, a big deal. But I knew Mei, which meant I knew not to press the issue. Instead, I asked, “What are you doing out here?”
“They told me not to go in. ” She glanced at the door as though a dozen vampires might spring out. “You know, while he was in there with you. ”
I glanced down the hall, the lights dimmed for curfew. “You could at least have waited in the lounge. ”
She shrugged. “I wanted to be close…just in case. ”
“In case…” I’d thought I knew Mei-Ling, but apparently I still had much to learn. “In case I needed help?” My shoulders slumped, I was so completely touched by the sentiment. Though if Alcántara decided he wanted me dead, how anyone could help was beyond me.
“Yeah. ” She gave me a flicker of a smile.
I scanned her, standing there in her gray Acari uniform tunic and leggings. “Do you even have your flute?”
She shook her head.
I considered the situation. Mei-Ling had been kidnapped here against her will. I was bonded to a vampire who was going to be staked because another vampire decided he stood in the way of a goal. Oh, and apparently, I was the icing-on-the-cake part of that goal.
I was embroiled in a game that was far more complicated than the girl gladiator torture they’d subjected us to in the first semester.
I shooed her into our room, shutting the door behind us. There was work to do, and I didn’t waste any time. “Okay, lesson one. Always have that flute. We’ll make a special holster or something. You need a way to tuck it in your pants without anyone seeing. It won’t break, will it?”
“No,” she said, sitting on the edge of her bed, not taking her eyes from me. Her attention was avid, but not in a slavering, I’ll-do-whatever-you-tell-me sort of way.
I appreciated the trust. It made me want to help her all the more. “That’s good,” I told her. “You’ll have enough to occupy you with lesson two. ”
“What’s lesson two?”