Chapter Three
Everything blew by in a blur.
Charlize wasn’t sure what had happened…what was happening. To start with, she could barely see, her eyes crossed from an intensity of pleasure she’d never dreamed possible. Her, who thought she’d experienced every level of pleasure out there.
Apparently not.
Weird part was that first there’d been pain. Not stinging, butt-slap pain or oops-I-grabbed-you-too-tight-while-shooting-my-wad pain. But nail-scratching, screaming, slapping, stop-biting-me-you-asshole! pain. Then just as quickly, there was pleasure. Not oh-yeah-baby-I’M-COMING! pleasure or even holy-shit-are-those-diamonds? pleasure. But a brand-new plateau of ecstasy that rocketed her vagina into geosynchronous orbit and boggled her brain.
The burly men in matching black workout gear who came pouring into the gym moments ago seemed to understand what was happening. Eyes narrowed, nostrils flared, they started cursing. And whatever the problem was, it changed her hottie-potential-hookup into a violent, wild-eyed beast.
In the second it took the black-haired man to yank Hottie off her, the two men raged into a brutal wrestling match—a real one—muscled bodies savagely twisting and straining, one man dominant this second, then being dominated the next. Then another edge-of-your-seat reversal. Flip again. A shot with a fist. Wham! The snarling going on between the two sounded like a gangland lion fight in the Serengeti. She couldn’t believe the violence! Her hottie seemed like he genuinely wanted to kill his black-haired opponent, which wasn’t just weird, but totally fucked up. What kind of guy changed so fast from wantonly sexual to ruthlessly violent?
It took four men to break up the fight.
From there, she and her hottie—now locked in iron shackles—were hustled to a room filled with chic décor Charlize was too frazzled to really notice. Her pulse was still racing from all the violence she’d witnessed, not to mention that her body was feeling orgasm-deprived, her clitoris a stiff, sensitive point.
Within ten minutes they were met by a woman who introduced herself as the community lawyer.
This woman, Kimberly Stănescu, asked rapid-fired questions, mostly of Charlize. Hottie—Breen, Kimberly called him—was too out of it to answer. His eyes were semi-glazed, his lungs were pumping, and he was sweating so much a small pond had formed on the carpet beneath his chair. He was also sporting a raging boner.
Kimberly did an admirable job of ignoring the tent-up, or pretending to, because there was no way she couldn’t see it. Breen’s tight workout shorts made the monster erection ginormously obvious.
Charlize herself couldn’t stop noticing it. Breen was clearly fully equipped to see her through to her much-needed O. What she really wanted to do was thanks-so-much-buh-bye Kimberly out the door, then get her climax on.
It wasn’t to be.
Charlize was left to field the countless questions, her head spinning like she was on a bad drug trip. Why the fuck should anyone care if Breen bit her? He was a vampire, right, so wasn’t that sort of his jam?
Mid-interview, Kimberly, Charlize, and Breen were summoned to a courtroom. The space wasn’t very large, just big enough for eight rows of shiny wooden benches, split down the middle by an aisle. About a dozen onlookers were scattered around the seats already—Jesus, it’d been, like, twenty minutes. Scandalous news traveled fast in any small town, but here, Charlize would guess gossip had warp capacity.
Marissa was seated in the back, a toddler girl of about one nestled on her lap. She offered Charlize a crooked, supportive smile.
Kimberly led Charlize and Breen to a bench up front and latched his shackles to a fat metal ring on the floor.
“Sorry,” the lawyer murmured. “But you’re not yourself right now, Breen.”
As if to prove Kimberly’s point, Breen did his snarly ass-can act again, growling and lurching at his chain, when a man entered the room.
Black-haired and well-dressed, the new arrival was announced as Roth Mihnea. He took a seat at a rectangular head table. He was followed inside by a young woman with curly black hair who slipped behind a smaller table and flipped open an iPad, obviously there to take notes. Finally Dr. Toni Parthen entered. She was blond, or maybe closer to strawberry blond, beautiful, and elegant. Charlize and Lara had met her when they arrived at the community a few hours ago.
She sat next to Roth.
Charges were read, indecipherable phrases like “Unauthorized Bite” were bandied about, and a bunch of other yakkity-yak.
The muscles in Charlize’s legs tensed. Lactic acid buildup or a case of nerves? She was used to getting into the sauce, but it had to be some kind of record for her to find herself neck-deep in it within a few hours after arriving someplace new. And how much trouble was she in, exactly? She was having difficulty telling. This town’s rules and regulations were stupefying.
A masculine voice rose, and Charlize glanced over at Roth.
He was red-faced. “Breen Dalakis is guilty of an Unauthorized Bite,” he accused—there was that phrase again. “If this offense goes unpunished, then every Vârcolac in the community will think he or she has free rein to do the same. This is unacceptable.”
Lawyer Kimberly’s gaze was iron-hard. “With the court’s respect, Mr. Dalakis’s guilt has not been established. It is our contention that Mr. Dalakis was, in fact, authorized.” Kimberly checked in with a yellow legal pad she held, then looked at Charlize. “Miss Renault, when you and Mr. Dalakis were in the gym together did you say to him, ‘I want this’ when his fangs were elongated?”
Charlize paused over the question, but after inspecting it from several angles, she couldn’t see how answering it could hurt her. She also couldn’t figure why anyone would care. Unless free love was illegal in this town or something—and, hell, if it was, she was outta here. But then…why would Marissa have emphasized the mega-hot men part of this place if a woman wasn’t allowed to fuck the snacky treats to her heart’s content?
“Miss Renault?”
“Um, yes, I did.”
Roth pushed in. “Were you giving Mr. Dalakis permission to bite you?”
Jesus, the “bite” question again? Why the—? Oh, crap. Her heart tripped. Had she been “turned” by Breen’s bite, was that what all this commotion was about? But…but Marissa had said her vampires weren’t like television monsters. “I… No. I was just agreeing to have sex with him.”
Roth turned a righteously satisfied expression on Kimberly. “Miss Renault’s testimony confirms she was only agreeing to sexual play. We must therefore conclude—”
“Mr. Dalakis couldn’t have known that,” Kimberly cut in.
Roth gave the lawyer a look like, puhlease. “Are you suggesting that when Miss Renault said ‘I want this’ to Mr. Dalakis, he wholly believed she was agreeing to a life-bond? After, what…?” He looked at Charlize. “How long did you and Mr. Dalakis interact in the gym?”
“I don’t know…” What’s this life-bond shit? “About ten minutes.” Charlize quick-scanned the faces, expecting disapproval. She didn’t find any. But then maybe everyone was just too distracted right now, both Roth and Kimberly more interested in proving their respective points rather than making Charlize feel like a slutbucket.
“Ten minutes,” Roth emphasized. “Considering the short period of time Mr. Dalakis was acquainted with Miss Renault, your contention that he could have reasonably assumed himself authorized to bite her is utterly flimsy.”
“Reason doesn’t enter into this,” Kimberly argued evenly. “In no part of the law regarding a UB does it state that a Vârcolac is required to understand the motivation behind a host’s consent. He only has to have it. Mr. Dalakis did.”
“The court disagrees,” Roth shot back. “Vârcolac make these kinds of discernments all the time about the true willingness of a host.”
“In normal circumstances, perhaps,” Kimberly countered. “In this instance, Mr. Dalakis was in a predatory fugue.”
“A what?” Roth laughed coolly. “I don’t think so.”
Kimberly’s nostrils discolored.
Charlize glanced back and forth between the lawyer and Roth. What was up with these two?
“Vârcolac,” Roth continued, “control their predatory nature all the time, Mrs. Stănescu, as they must—this is the very point that has to be reiterated here today. Otherwise there will only be anarchy.”
Kimberly turned away and rolled her eyes.
Anarchy? Yeah, that seemed sort of melodramatic to Charlize too.
Taking a few steps, Kimberly turned back around. “With the court’s indulgence, I would like to call forth Mr. Devid Nichita to offer testimony on this issue.”
“Very well.” Roth gestured to the black-haired note-taker. “Donree.”
The young woman hopped up, opened the courtroom door situated just behind her small table, and spoke quietly to someone in the hall. There was some murmuring—how many people were out there?—then a second later, Biker Snack Dev stepped just inside the door and—
Breen roared up from his bench and lunged at him, fangs bared, a snarl coming out of him that raised every hair on Charlize’s nape. She gasped.
Breen was brought up short by his shackles, but Dev still hissed something unintelligible beneath his breath.
Kimberly leaned toward Charlize and spoke in an urgent tone. “You need to calm him down.”
Me? Charlize made a face at the lawyer. “I don’t know what’s wrong with him.” And, frankly, she wasn’t particularly into this hothead anymore. She normally liked aggressive men—they made great lays—but Breen having a hairy canary every five minutes was rapidly losing its charm.
“Newly-bonded males turn savagely possessive of their mates right after bonding and subsequently view all males as rivals. Breen’s in even worse shape because he’s caught in a half-bond. He’ll only listen to you.”
Oh, well, gee, thanks for giving me the explanation in frigging Chinese. Charlize eyed Breen sideways as she edged away from him. “He’s going to hurt me.” The man was completely gone—he was salivating, for God’s sake.
Kimberly squinted a little, like Charlize was a new species of kitchen fungus she was trying to figure out. “No. He’s actually protecting you.”
From what? Charlize huffed. Never mind. Whatever. She seized Breen by the wrist and tugged him down on the bench. “Be quiet, would you?”
Kimberly looked like she was going to say something more, then didn’t. She went back to the proceedings. “Mr. Nichita,” she addressed Marissa’s husband, “could you please describe to the court your experience of going into a predatory fugue on the night you and Marissa bonded?”
Dev’s brow creased. “What?”
“It’s my understanding,” Kimberly clarified, “that you lost control of your predatory side on the first night you and Marissa were together.”
Dev’s face froze.
Behind her, Charlize heard Marissa breathe, “Shit.”
Dev raised his eyes toward the ceiling. “You know what? This is when it sucks that you and Marissa are friends.”
Kimberly’s expression softened. “I apologize for bringing up something so personal. But it’s important to Mr. Dalakis’s defense for the court to understand whether or not a Vârcolac is capable of reasoning intelligibly while in such a state.”
Dev’s jaw hardened. “I scared the hell out of Marissa on our wedding night and almost hurt her. Does that sound like I was thinking straight?” He aimed his attention to the back of the courtroom.
Charlize followed his gaze, glancing over her shoulder at Marissa.
Marissa gave her husband a look of such loving intimacy, Charlize actually felt herself blush.
“I’m sorry,” Kimberly said softly.
“Yeah, well.” Dev shoved his fingers through his hair. “There were what you might call extenuating circumstances. I’d recently found out it was my father who betrayed the Vârcolac breed, I’d been stuck in jail for a week, and I was low on blood.”
Kimberly nodded. “Those are understandable challenges.” She checked in briefly with her legal pad. “And would you consider these parameters extenuating: being in an unventilated room with a Dragon woman who was sweating profusely and not wearing any scent-reducing mud, a woman who had made her sexual interest in you unfailingly clear, and who, in fact, had engaged you in a playful wrestling match? Who told you ‘I want this’ when your fangs were elongated and ready. Would you consider circumstances such as these extenuating?”
Dev’s eyebrows rose high on his forehead, then he snorted. “Put that way? I don’t see how any unbonded male could have resisted.”
Roth’s lips thinned.
Kimberly fought a smile. “Thank you, Mr. Nichita. You may go with the court’s gratitude.”
Dev looked glad to leave. But instead of exiting the way he’d come, he strode down the aisle toward Marissa. When he reached her, he plucked the baby off her lap and swung the little girl up high in his arms. The kid squealed in delight, her gaze fastened on her father in open adoration. Dev touched his wife gently on the top of her head and disappeared out the back door.
Kimberly straightened her blazer. “Taking into account the testimony we just heard, I don’t think it goes beyond the bounds of reason to accept that during the time of the alleged UB, Mr. Dalakis was in no condition to stop and discuss the intricacies of Miss Renault’s consent.”
Roth scowled. “The court would also draw on Devid Nichita’s wedding night as evidence and cite that he did, in fact, gain control of himself.”
“Only because Marissa spoke up to stop him, whereas Miss Renault—”
“This argument is groundless, at any rate.” Roth cut a dismissive gesture through the air. “Miss Renault’s consent isn’t valid in this instance. Just as an intoxicated woman can’t give consent for sexual intercourse, the same holds true here. Miss Renault did not understand the full parameters of her so-called consent due to her unfamiliarity with Vârcolac culture, and, therefore, she was not capable of issuing an authorization.”
Kimberly looked astounded. “Capability of consent is not germane to a UB.”
Roth opened his mouth—
Kimberly plowed over him. “However, if the court would like to be indulged in this line of thinking, then let’s pretend for a moment that Mr. Dalakis was capable of reasoning. Would he not have been right in assuming that if a woman was in the gymnasium she would have full knowledge of the choices she was making in regard to a bite. Because the court knows that Miss Renault absolutely would not have been out of her bedroom had she not been deemed fully conversant in Vârcolac culture. And so, therefore, Mr. Dalakis would have been wholly correct in assuming that Miss Renault was capable of giving her consent for a life-bond. Ten minutes,” Kimberly concluded hotly, “ten weeks, or ten years notwithstanding.”
The summation was followed by a grim silence.
Charlize blinked. Wow. This Kimberly woman was Kimberly the Killer. She might be someone Charlize could be friends with.
Toni Parthen finally spoke. “Why was Miss Renault out of her room?”
“Miss Renault claims she was told not to leave the mansion only,” Kimberly answered. “Nothing was stated about not leaving her room.”
Toni massaged her brow. Charlize didn’t know the woman, but she’d guess Toni was fighting a headache. “Who welcomed Miss Renault and Miss Klein to the community this morning?”
“Hannah Crişan and Beth Costache.”
The two welcome-wagon women were called to the courtroom and questioned. The old rule, apparently, had been to instruct new arrivals not to leave the mansion only, and so with some embarrassment, neither Hannah nor Beth could remember exactly what they’d told Charlize and Lara. They also both admitted to being rushed this morning.
They were thanked and excused.
Toni sat back in her chair. “Considering that no one can clearly recall what instructions were given to Miss Renault and Miss Klein, I feel the community must bear some responsibility for a woman being out in the general population when she shouldn’t have been. This incident between Mr. Dalakis and Miss Renault wouldn’t have occurred if they’d been kept apart until Miss Renault was cleared according to community law. Taking into account these circumstances—along with the evidence provided that consent, weak though it might be, was given—I wouldn’t feel right about finding Mr. Dalakis guilty.” Toni looked at Roth for his opinion.
Kimberly’s eyes shone with the beginnings of triumph.
Thunder sat on Roth’s brow. “Are you saying Mr. Dalakis isn’t to reap any consequences for his actions? I don’t like the message that sends.”
“He’ll reap the natural consequences of his mistake,” Toni said. “Breen is stuck in the agony of a half-bond for who knows how long. Until Miss Renault can be educated about the full commitment a bond entails, she can’t make a competent decision about completing it.”
“At this time,” Kimberly inserted hastily, “I would ask that Mr. Dalakis be taken to the hospital and sedated during the course of his half-bond. Since he hasn’t been found guilty, anything less would be cruel.”
Toni paused, then glanced again at Roth. “I can’t think of a logical reason to deny that request.”
Roth’s face went tight. “I fervently disagree with allowing this misstep to go unpunished. Such negligence will have profound, negative repercussions on this community.”
“So noted.” Toni pushed to her feet. “Donree, please mark down Mr. Mihnea’s objections for the record, then send a community-wide text warning that a newly-bonded male will be traveling down Main Street. All other males should steer clear.” Toni added to Kimberly, “I’ll meet you and Breen at the hospital shortly.” Toni exited through the main door.
Filing her legal pad into her briefcase, Kimberly leveled a look at Charlize. “Read the community manual, Miss Renault. Quick. You have no idea the shit-storm you just landed yourself in.”
Yeah? Charlize turned away and gave the wall across from her a long stare. Well, she could guess well enough. Shit-storms were sort of her forte.