Read Online Claiming the Vampire by Chloe Hart - Free Book Online Page B

with Artemis, moon goddess and virgin huntress, and every time she rebuffed an advance she thought of her.
    Artemis had been a warrior, too. And she had never surrendered to lust.
    Lust. There was no other word to describe what she’d felt for Hawk. She, Jessica Greenwood, had been overwhelmed with lust.
    She had to forget it. Put it out of her mind completely. But as she stared down at herself, she couldn’t stop picturing Hawk’s hands on her. The way he’d touched her, covering her breasts with his palms.
    Sharp twinges of excitement sparked through her body. She felt restless, and at the same a kind of voluptuous languor made her limbs seem heavier than usual. Slowly she raised her own hands out of the water and settled them on her breasts.
    What if her mother and the prince hadn’t come along? What if she’d let him keep going?
    What if she’d said yes to his outrageous proposal, there at the edge of her mother’s property?
    She started to knead her breasts the way Hawk had. She moved her thumbs over her nipples and they hardened, the way they’d hardened for him.
    She closed her eyes and let her head fall back.
    There was a knock on the bathroom door. “Your Highness?”
    Jessica sat up with a splash, her face flaming. “Yes. Come in.”
    It was one of her mother’s ladies-in-waiting.
    “Your Highness, the queen asked me to do your hair for you. Are you nearly through with your bath?”
    Jessica was already stepping out of the tub and reaching for a towel. “Yes, thank you. And I would appreciate your help with my hair. It’s a skill I’ve never mastered.”
    Now, ten minutes later, she was standing in front of her bedroom mirror with her mother at her side. Her dress had been invisibly repaired, her hair looked beautiful, and her expression was calm and cool.
    Everything was exactly as it should be, and the satisfaction in her mother’s face reflected that.
    “You know, Kel was very impressed with how you handled yourself during that…ordeal. And he was quite relieved when you came back safely.”
    “That’s nice of him,” Jessica said drily. “But you and I both know that the ‘ordeal’ would never have happened if I hadn’t been such a fool.”
    “You weren’t a fool, Jessica. You were taken in by a master manipulator.”
    She couldn’t deny the truth of that. “I know.” Then she turned away from the mirror and faced her mother. “Will you tell me what the two of you were talking about?”
    Talia stiffened. “That doesn’t concern you.”
    In her twenty-three years, Jessica could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times she’d pushed her mother about something, or opposed her in any way. But she wasn’t willing to let go of this.
    “After everything that happened tonight, I think it does concern me.”
    Talia turned away and went over to one of the windows, overlooking the circular front drive.
    “A few stragglers are still arriving, but most of the guests are here. We should go down to them.”
    That made Jessica think of something else that bothered her. “I wish you had let me invite Liz and Celia.”
    Talia turned back to face her again, probably thinking that her daughter had accepted the change in subject.
    “My darling, we’ve been over this. This ball is the first time in centuries that we have welcomed one of the Dark Fae among us. Royalty have come from all over the world to meet the Prince and to congratulate you on your engagement. There simply isn’t room in the house to invite everyone we wish. And you must remember, however much you like them, Celia is an eighth-blood—and Elizabeth is only a sixteenth. A hundred years ago, she would never have been admitted to the Green Fae.”
    Jessica bristled. “Liz is one of the best warriors we’ve got.”
    “I know, I know.” Talia smiled now as she returned to her daughter’s side. “You are a true American in many ways, do you know that? You’ve always insisted that people should be judged on merit