He chuckled at her words and then replied, "And you still want like that, don’t you, my silly naughty little wife?" He pinched her nose playfully.
If only she knew how he had been tempted every night to co to her. But then, he had been good at holding himself back from what he wanted. He had pretended he had no wife and continued with his life until he was certain she missed him enough to reach out to him first.
But then she had co to search for him—or more precisely, Kuhn, the damned hypocrite, had brought her to his art room to reveal to her things about him she was curious about behind his back.
Rohan fought the urge to go and search for the creature. He had switched so fast ever since Belle had started to see him. Before, he hung around Rohan like a tail, and now it was his wife. And since she couldn’t understand the words he wanted to tell her, the damned hypocrite had co to show it to her.
Very soon, Rohan thought, he would use Kuhn for firewood in the fireplace!
If he hadn’t co sooner, only the devil knows what she would have seen in his paintings with her abilities. To him, there were pasts he did not want to ever revisit nor let anyone see. But at this rate, with these abilities of his wife, he knew it would be a matter of ti before she pieced things together and understood those visions. He never wanted her to see nor understand them.
They were his past, and the pasts should always be locked away and never be let out to ruin a future and the present.
Belle hated that she flushed at his words, especially when she should be mad—mad that he had hoped for her to be miserable without him. Now she rembered just how infuriating he could be and why she shouldn’t have co looking for him in the first place.
But even so, she couldn’t bring herself to leave again. All she could do was glare up at him while he stared down at her, his midnight eyes glimring, narrowing slowly like he was trying to focus on sothing just beyond reach—sothing he couldn’t quite grasp.
"Are you injured?" he suddenly asked with a deep frown on his face.
"What?" Belle was taken aback. "No. I am not injured."
"I can sll your blood. It’s faint, but it’s still there. Did you get hurt in the training?" he questioned again, this ti reaching out to raise her hands as if to examine her for injuries, and it suddenly dawned on Belle the blood he could sense. She flushed to the root of her head and hurridly pulled her hands back from him.
"It’s not an injury..." she muttered, wishing the ground would open up and swallow her whole as he gave her a questioning look that made her avert her gaze in embarrassnt. "It’s... the last day of my ti of the month. I’ll take my leave," she added quickly, turning to walk away before the mortification could swallow her entirely. But before she could get far, he caught her arm and gently pulled her back into his embrace.
She had never known that vampires could sll even the faintest traces of blood, and now she was horrified—not knowing whether it was the blood he slled or the subtle odors that ca with it. It was that ti of the month when won were taught to bathe often and change their cloth rags regularly. The thought of him sensing it made her feel completely exposed, vulnerable, and painfully self-conscious. She wanted to disappear, to hide away and never see his face again.
Had she known he could pick up on it, she would never have co looking for him.
But as if sensing her sha and discomfort, he circled his arm around her waist and leaned in,
"You don’t need to feel shy about it. It’s just blood I sll—nothing else. There’s nothing about it to be embarrassed of," ca his deep, slow voice that fell straight on the shell of her ears, making her jump slightly —she hadn’t even realized he’d leaned in so close. She made a small motion to step back, only to realize a heartbeat too late that his arms were still wrapped around her, holding her securely against him.
"Not so fast," he muttered, brushing his lips against her earlobe, causing her toes to curl inside her shoes. "I am thirsty now that you have tempted . I haven’t taken blood straight from a woman in a while now."
Belle went rigid as a stone. "I should go back to my chamber. You can carry on whatever you were doing," she said quickly, terrified that he would drink from her, but then she couldn’t move away from his grip that held her against him.
"I want a woman’s blood, Isa," he rasped thickly in her ear, his warm breath tickling her sensitive lobe.
"Does it make a difference which blood you have, whether male or female?" she questioned, her voice breathless.
"Hmm," he humd, using the tip of his tongue to tease her ear further. "It makes a huge difference. A female’s blood is more alluring and tastes more delicious than male’s. But if you don’t mind taking from another woman—who I will have to touch and hold her in the process—I will go and find a human woman."
Belle’s fingers, which were spread against his chest, clenched into a fist. "You are being wicked again," she muttered, and he laughed.
"Not wicked. Hungry for my wife’s blood. It’s not as bad as your mind makes it seem. It won’t kill you if I take a little," he coaxed.
Belle suddenly recalled Cordelia’s words about Rohan being a vampire who didn’t know how to control his thirst and that once he started taking, he didn’t stop. She always rembered all the stories about night creatures who drank blood and ended up killing their prey in the process. She wasn’t ready to die, and at those thoughts, her heart began to race in terror.
"I will only take a little, I promise. Don’t be afraid," he assured her calmly, stroking her hair in a way that was coaxing and reassuring.
She’d never been bitten by a vampire and never thought she would allow it. It was any human girl’s nightmare to have sharp fangs sink into their flesh, and it was hers as well, as she feared it like one would a disease.
"What if I don’t want to give you my blood?" she asked fearfully.
"I am not forcing you. You don’t have to if you don’t want to," he said as he caressed her cheek with his thumb.
Belle was about to sigh in relief at his words when he continued to say, "I will go and find a woman to drink from. We have quite a few in the castle anyway. One of the servant girls will do just fine. Only, I am not certain if I can control myself like I will if it were my wife. It’s been a while since I had a female’s blood."
Manipulative demon! Belle accused in her mind as she glared down at his chest that was in her view because her head was bent. She knew he was manipulating her into giving her blood, but then she also could not allow him to touch the servants in the castle, knowing he did not look like a man who would say empty words.
If he drank from any of them and ended up killing them in the process, she would never forgive herself. She knew each of them by na, and even though she had made a conscious effort not to get too close to the servants anymore, she genuinely liked them. They worked well and were always kind to one another.
They served her without complaint, and hearing their movents echo through the vast castle gave her a strange sense of comfort. It almost made her believe she was living among humans. The thought of any of them being hard—let alone killed—was sothing she couldn’t bear.
She could say no, of course, but...
"Don’t take too much," she said in a small whisper.
Rohan smiled. "I won’t," he promised.
He had just returned from feeding outside the castle, thus he was certain he wasn’t in danger of losing control. He just wanted her to know that it wasn’t as bad as she thought it was to have her blood. Besides, he had been dying to have a small taste of her blood.
Belle closed her eyes and turned her head to the side to give him access to her neck, but her husband smirked and said, "I don’t want to take it from there. I want it here."
He raised his hand and pointed a finger at the swell of her breast, and before she could say anything, he had already leaned down and brought his mouth to her breast, causing her to gasp.
She felt his mouth open and his warm, wet tongue sucked on the flesh of her upper bosom—licking it and making her curl her fingers into his thick, rich blue hair. Her skin was lting and tingling from the way his tongue moved across her.
Then she felt the graze of his fangs, making her go still. When they sank into her skin, she inhaled sharply and tugged at his hair from the sharp pain.
She felt him begin to suck on her like an infant would draw milk from its mother. The pain of his fangs, combined with the sucking sensation of his mouth, created a strange mix that made her insides warm with pleasure and heat.
She felt his arms tighten around her, and his mouth sucked hard. Then he withdrew his fangs and began to slowly lick her skin, as if wanting to savor and cherish every single drop of it in his mouth before he pulled back his head. His lips were red with her blood, and he licked it off, his eyes closing a little.
"I could have you every day," he groaned and then said, "It wasn’t that bad, was it?"
Belle could barely believe he had taken her blood and she hadn’t fainted from fear. She looked down at her chest, at the exposed flesh of her top breast, and saw the two marks that looked like two pins had pierced her. The skin around it had reddened, but apart from that, there was no damage done to her nor to her skin. It did not even hurt as much as she had dreaded.
However, the place he had chosen to bite was an intimate part that made her skin burn. Touching it with her hand, she looked up at him. "It doesn’t hurt that much..."
Then, to distract her body and mind from the lingering heat inside her, Belle rembered the topic they had been talking about before he had kissed her. After a few monts of silence, she asked, "About the painting, where—"
"It’s sothing I painted randomly. It has no aning nor story behind it."
"Then the boy in it—"
"Perhaps it’s sothing that the strokes of my brushes made unknowingly and nothing significant. You..." Rohan trailed off as his eyes swayed just behind her, and Belle turned to see what had caught his attention.
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