Until the Sun Falls from the Sky (The Three #1)(63)
Author: Kristen Ashley

“I didn’t want to be seen.”

“You can do that?”

“When you can control people’s minds, you can do anything. Even disappear.”

I felt my body tense. “You controlled my mind?”

He nodded and said, “I also marked you.”

Oh my God.

That was true!

I’d felt it. That weird drugged feeling, not as strong as he did it now but I felt it. I always thought it was the oppressive heat of Aunt Fiona’s kitchen. She had bad ventilation and frying chicken for seventy-five guests heated up a kitchen, believe you me.

“Why would you do that? There were no vampires there.”

“Yes there were.”

Wow. I didn’t know that. I’d been in the presence of vampires before.

“Really?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Did Aunt Fiona tell you about me?”

“As much as she knew. She liked talking about you. She’s very fond of you, thinks you have spirit. She also kept an eye on you for me.”

Holy crap!

What on earth did that mean?

“An eye on me?” I prompted.

He nodded again.

“What does that mean?”

“She told me what you were up to,” his face grew dark, “and who you were with when you were up to it.”

He didn’t look happy.

I figured I was less happy.

“Are you saying Aunt Fiona informed on me?” My voice was pitching higher.

“Yes.” He was back to seeming unperturbed.

This was unreal!

“So, essentially, she spied on me.”

“Not with that, no. Fiona listened, she watched and she told me. She’d also tell me where you were. Then I spied on you.”

My body jerked again.

“What?”

“It wasn’t exactly spying,” he continued casually, “more like watching. It was highly enjoyable. You’d get up to practically anything and you’ve a very expressive face, pet.”

I couldn’t take this in. The Mighty Vampire Lucien was a stalker!

“Why…” I spluttered. “Why would you do that?”

“It amused me. You amused me.” He studied my face and muttered, “Most of the time, you still do.”

“You stalked me!” It wasn’t a shout. Cousin Myrna wouldn’t shout. But it was pretty damn close.

“You can’t stalk what’s yours,” he returned.

I looked at his shirt. “Yes, I suspect that’s what all the stalkers say.”

He threw back his head and shouted with laughter.

I didn’t feel like putting this in my Why I Might Like Lucien Safe. This went straight into the Why I Hate Lucien Vault, pride of place.

“You’re freaking me out,” I informed him as I pressed against his chest to get away.

His other arm joined the one around me and he drew me closer as his face dipped lower. “The minute I saw you, twenty years ago, I knew you’d be mine.”

Yes, totally freaking me out.

“Lucien –”

He cut me off. “Leah, I’ve been waiting twenty years to have you right here.” He emphasized his last two words with a tight arm squeeze.

Nope, not freaking me out. I didn’t know what beyond freaking out was but whatever it was, he was making me do that.

“I don’t know what to do with this information,” I told him honestly.

“You don’t need to know. I know,” he returned.

I didn’t think that was good.

“Are you going to, um… share?”

He shook his head and then bent to brush his lips against mine.

Pulling away a scant inch, he said mysteriously, “You’ll know when it happens.” Then his arms grew tighter and I was pressed against him from chest to knees. His voice turned rough and his eyes went intense when he asked, “Are you hungry for dinner or should we find something else to do for a while?”

I didn’t think it would be healthy for me in any way to find something else to do with Lucien for a while.

Fried chicken wasn’t healthy for you either but I figured it was far healthier to my future than what Lucien might have in mind.

“I’m hungry for dinner.”

He grinned. “Now why did I know that would be your answer?”

I decided my best course of action was not to reply. So I didn’t.

He bent and kissed the pulse in my neck then shifted to my side, his arm sliding around my shoulders and he walked me to the kitchen. After he deposited me there, he disappeared.

Now, forty-five minutes later, I looked down and found I was whipping the potatoes.

Dinner was ready. A dinner I’d have to share with Lucien.

I looked across the room.

I’d tidied as I’d cooked which was something my mother taught me to do. The kitchen was relatively clean, the chicken in the oven staying warm, the green beans in their water, the warm homemade biscuits wrapped up in a clean tea towel. I’d set the breakfast nook for our meal.

Myrna would definitely have set the dining room table. She’d have a damask tablecloth, perfectly clean and unwrinkled and a silver candelabrum and fresh-cut flowers from the garden she tended that she’d arranged herself.

I figured Lucien would know that wasn’t me and if I did something like that it might put him in a mood.

I had to get through the night before I got through the rest of my however many years with him trying not to put him in a mood. So I set the far more casual breakfast nook.

However, I was in a quandary. I needed him at the dinner table and I needed to set out the food.

Old Leah would just shout for him, louder and louder, until he appeared.

New Leah thought that wasn’t seemly.

Myrna would go find him and likely give a low curtsy, begging the pleasure of his company.

I took a chance and tried something.

Lucien, if you can hear me, dinner is ready, I thought in his direction wherever that was.

I listened, heard no movement in the house and sighed at how annoying it was that he couldn’t hear me talking to him when I wanted him to hear me, only when he was eavesdropping. I threw another tea towel over the potatoes, deciding to go in search of him.

I turned and saw Lucien walking in, his eyes on me, his face blank, his posture strange.

It was, somehow, alert.

I went alert too.

He got in my space (again) and looked down at me, his face still blank.

“How did you do that?” he asked.

“Do what?” I asked back.

“You got in my head,” he told me.