Claimed by the Prince of Darkness

Chapter 136: Within reach

In Sexton, Ruelle quickly pulled her hand back to her chest with a deep flush spreading across her cheeks and her eyes widened in stunned silence. The place where his tongue had brushed along her finger still tingled, a strange warmth travelling from her hand up her arm and settling somewhere beneath her ribs.

"I—I gave you the fruit to eat..." her voice came out unsteady as they left her lips.

Lucian, however, looked entirely unaffected. He leaned back against the chair with calm ease, as though nothing unusual had occurred.

"I know," he answered. For a fleeting moment, she thought she saw something shift at the corner of his mouth. His eyes did not leave her as he spoke again, his voice low, "It wasn’t the fruit I wanted."

Her heart almost tumbled at his words.

Was Lucian trying to kill her today? He was telling things she would have never imagined him speaking. But then she remembered how he liked to ace his classes, and she could only imagine that the pureblooded vampire was a master in seduction techniques.

Ruelle quickly gulped down the strawberries before placing the used plates back into the trolley and placing it outside the room for them to be picked up.

When it was time to sleep, she climbed on the bed in time to catch Lucian taking the other side of the bed too. Her heart began to thud in her chest and he heard it loud and clear.

"Whatever you are imagining is not going to happen tonight," Lucian remarked, pulling the covers, and he jerked his head to the bed. "You need sleep. Get in."

"I wasn’t imagining anything improper," Ruelle defended herself as she carefully lay on her side and a moment later, she felt the blanket shift. Lucian pulled it up slightly, covering her shoulder properly so the night air would not reach her and the gesture made her toes curl. "Thank you."

her a

the other side of the bed. The mattress dipped slightly as he lay down on his back, one arm resting beside him and

with an almost careless motion of his fingers, the

you do that?" Ruelle asked in awe. "Is

he didn’t write down what he did. It was like cooking and adding ingredients

corruption is very impressive, Lucian," Ruelle murmured softly and she caught a slight smile

unsettling," Lucian turned his head to her side so that he could gaze

didn’t worry about it. As a bite from

her voice soft. "You only hurt people when you have a reason. If you wanted

a long moment, his

wouldn’t say that if you knew the things

entirely belong to the person was hard. "You have killed people, but it was to end something, not start it. And when you hurt someone...it is to make sure they never

how she would look at him when she would learn that he had burned down her house. It had seemed like the simplest way to erase the memories of pain that she

Ruelle’s lips

relentless as it shook everything that stood in its way. The windows of the room shook strongly, while Ruelle

was steered to the darker parts of her memory while borrowing what occurred

that she was unfamiliar with. She followed the carpet trail until a man suddenly appeared before her with a sharp wooden log in his hand. His lips moved but she couldn’t hear what he was saying over the screams that erupted from

want?"