SovereignsChoice Read online

  “So…I can ask you questions and you’ll tell me what I want to know?” I look at him hopefully.

  “Within reason,” Aiden says, frowning. “But yes, ask away.”

  Questions rise to my lips so fast they almost choke me but what comes out first is, “Tell me about Katherine.”

  A look of intense pain passes over Aiden’s chiseled features and he closes his eyes briefly. “Ah, you would ask me that. Not that I blame you—doubtless you’ve heard of her untimely demise.”

  “Not really,” I say honestly. “I mean, I heard that she was a witch and that she died but not…not exactly how.”

  Aiden sighs. “Very well. But in order to explain her death, I’ll need to tell you about her life. She was an extraordinary woman and I loved her with all that was in me.” He hands me a plate with scrambled eggs and toast just the way I like it—no butter but plenty of strawberry jam. “You’d best eat. This is a long tale and your food will be cold if you wait until I’m done.”

  Obediently I pick up a piece of toast and begin to nibble. Aiden puts the tray to one side and takes a sip from his tea mug, gathering his thoughts. His gray eyes go silver, as though remembering something from long, long ago. Something buried in the past. And then he begins.

  “I found Katherine in the woods to the north of here over a hundred years ago. In those days Tampa was little more than an overgrown town. Florida was the least populous state in the union for years, you know. It was too hot and swampy here for most people. As a vampire, the heat and humidity didn’t bother me, especially since I was, at that time, confined to the night as most of my kind are.”

  Hmm, interesting I eye the heavy gold-and-onyx ring on his hand again but say nothing. Aiden takes another sip of tea and continues.

  “When I came upon Katherine, she was being assaulted.”

  I frown. “Assaulted…how?”

  “Raped.” A look of pain passes over his face again. “She was being raped.”

  “What?” I spill my tea on my leg in agitation and have to wipe it up hastily with a linen napkin. “I mean, really?”

  “Really.” He nods grimly. “I was out hunting in the woods and I heard her screams. A group of human men had her—they had discovered she was a witch and decided that was reason enough to brutalize her.”

  “Oh no.” I put a hand to my mouth. “Could you…did you stop them?”

  Aiden closes his eyes briefly. “Regrettably, by the time I got there considerable damage had already been done. I pulled them off her and dispatched them—”

  “Dispatched?” I ask softly.

  “I killed them.” Aiden bares his fangs in a display I’m glad isn’t meant for me. “I ripped their throats out and drank their blood. There were five of them and I was alone but all the same, it only took a matter of minutes.”

  I’ve seen how fast he can move and I know how strong he is so this comes as no surprise. I have to shiver anyway, though. This is the first time Aiden has ever talked about hunting and killing humans around me.

  “Was she all right?” I whisper, and then realize what a stupid question that is. “I mean, was she badly hurt?”

  “She had some bruises and contusions—some inner trauma.” He glances between my legs and I cross them hastily, understanding his meaning. “But her mind was more broken than her body.” Aiden sighs deeply. “I went to her and she tried to fight me off at first. Not because I was a vampire but because I was male. I didn’t blame her, of course.” He runs a hand through his hair. “When I finally made her believe that I had no intention of continuing the brutality the human bastards had been inflicting on her, she begged me to kill her.”

  “Goddess,” I whisper, my breakfast forgotten.

  He nods. “Yes. She wanted to die after what had been done to her. Virginity was much more important back then, even among witches, and hers had been taken from her in the most brutal way possible. There wasn’t as much freedom to do as you pleased and marry or not as you chose. Most women, even witches, found a husband. There was no other way to fit into the human community.”

  I nod thoughtfully. “And of course, she would have a hard time finding one after…that.”

  “I swore to her that no one else had seen—that I had killed all the men who hurt her,” Aiden says softly. “But she told me there were others—two who had left before I got there.” His eyes burn silver for an instant. “I took care of them later. But at that moment, my whole focus was on Katherine. There was something about her that drew me. As a vampire—a predator—I should have wanted nothing more than to finish her off. She was wounded prey—my natural instinct should have been to kill.”

  “But you couldn’t, could you?” I whisper.

  “No.” He shakes his head. “I don’t know if it was her magic or some of my old human instincts coming back. I was still a fairly new vampire, having just recently left she-who-made-me. All of my training before my vampire life began had instilled in me the necessity of being careful and gentle with the fairer sex. My human mother, especially, emphasized self-control and gentlemanly conduct. So consideration for ladies was ever uppermost in my mind.” He laughs softly. “She’s been dead well over a hundred years but the things I learned at her knee are still some of the only parts of my human past I recall vividly.”

  “She’d be proud of you, I’m sure,” I say softly.

  “Would she?” Aiden looks at me steadily. “After seeing what I have become? I doubt it, my darling. But I do have few fleeting moments in my past I can look back on without shame. My treatment of Katherine is one of those.”

  “What did you do with her?” I ask, fascinated by the story of my Master’s long-lost love.

  “I took her back with me to my house. It was a much smaller, wooden structure but it was built right here, on this site.” He indicates the house around us. “This land has belonged to my family for generations. It’s where I go to ground. Where I feel most comfortable.”

  I can’t help looking around me, imaging what it must have been like. I can almost picture Aiden carrying the injured, weeping girl in his arms and laying her gently on the bed. Comforting her as he comforted me last night. “What happened then?” I ask.

  “I put her in a sleep trance,” he says. “It’s not magic—we can’t do magic, as you know. It’s more like the technique a cobra uses to fascinate a mouse. We usually use it for hunting and capturing prey. In Katherine’s case, I did it to give her time to heal.”

  “And did she?”

  “In time.” He frowns. “Her body was young and strong but her mind…” He shakes his head. “I’m afraid she was never completely free of what had been done to her. It made her sexual tastes…peculiar, when they finally emerged.”

  I raise an eyebrow at him. “Peculiar?”

  He laughs briefly. “Well, no more peculiar than what you and I have been doing for the past month, I suppose. But back then, the erotic practice of Domination and submission wasn’t nearly so well-known or widespread.”

  “I imagine not. But…” I hesitate, trying to think how to phrase my question delicately. “I don’t understand how Katherine could want to be…to be dominated after what she’d been through.”

  “Oh she didn’t,” Aiden says blandly. “It was she who did the dominating. I submitted to her.”

  “What?” I can’t help staring at him in disbelief. There is nothing he could have said that would have surprised me more. Just the thought of my tall, dark, vampire Master wearing a collar and being punished is…well damn, actually it’s hot. But still extremely surprising.

  “You needn’t look so shocked, darling.” Aiden sounds amused. “It wasn’t the first time I had been on the receiving end of the whip—she-who-made-me was French and notoriously hedonistic, even among my kind.”

  “Is, uh…” I clear my throat. “Is that what you prefer?”

  He shakes his head. “I am a Dominant by nature. But Katherine was frightened. She had deep sexual desires—urges that tormented her. Ho